A Summary of Hoppeian (or Argumentation) Ethics

This is my understanding of Hoppe's argument (it may not be his argument accurately, but I still think it's
internally consistent/correct). I'll see if I can bullet-point for clarity’s sake:

- Begin with a dialectical epistemology (so, we recognize that certain statements are irrefutable because
they are performative contradictions: supporting a given thesis necessitates the truth of its antithesis.
If I say “We cannot establish statements as true”, I assume as a norm of argumentation that we can establish
the truth of at least some statements… ).

- Epistemological questions aside, I first want to start off with defining “property” vs. “property rights”.
Property is ‘descriptive’ in Hoppean ethics – that is, property describes an empirically verifiable state in
which an individual maintains exclusive use of a resource. “Property”, then, is inevitable (resources are
scarce, human beings make use of them, “property” will always exist if human beings do). “Property rights”
are an ethical term/normative statement: they are “inviolable” (well, violations of property rights cannot
be “justified”) moral boundaries.

- So, Hoppe begins by noting that resources are scarce (at least, some resources are. Under present conditions
 for most human beings, air is the example resource that isn’t scarce, though there are conditions in which,
 theoretically, this would not be true. Things like land, an automobile, coal, etc. are all scarce).

- If something is scarce, it is also “rivalrous” – there are multiple moral agents acting for control of the
same item.

- This is a problem – that’s not a “value” judgment: it’s not as if I’m uncomfortable with this situation:
this is a logical problem that must be resolved. If a good is rivalrous, then more than one individual
contends for control over it, but, factually speaking, only one individual (or at least fewer than the number
 who demand this resource) can exert exclusive use over the resource (hence, the definition of what is
 “rivalrous”).

- So there is an inherent conflict over scarce resources that exists when multiple agents are interacting.
Social order/ethics is just the inevitable means of resolving this conflict (whatever ethical norm – or no
“norm” – is adopted as the means to conflict resolution, there will still be some sort of ethic, even a
 nihilistic one, to answer this question: as Rand said, we have the power to choose, but not to escape the
 necessity of choice).

- So the real question of ethical philosophy is to determine what sort of ethical theory can be justified,
and Hoppe notes that only one ethical theory can be sustained in argument without an inherent contradiction
 (a “dialectical/performative” contradiction) in which the substance of our argument contradicts the norms
 underlying our argument.

- Argumentation is a means of conflict resolution. It’s really only here that the question of “justification”
 arises: we cannot logically justify violence (aggression) as a form of conflict resolution. I cannot say that
 “individuals ought to use violence to resolve conflicts” without falling into an internal contradiction –
 because, in the course of engaging in an argument over a logical conflict (“how ought individuals to behave?”)
 with you, I implicitly concede that argumentation is preferable to violence, because I am resolving this
 conflict through argumentation. In much the same way, I cannot say that “We ought not to resolve conflicts
 through argumentation” to you without also falling into the same contradiction. Attempting to justify force
 is like saying that “My words have no meaning” or “It is true that truth cannot be established”. It is
 internally inconsistent – it contradicts the norms underlying and substance of my argument.

- Having proven some form of voluntarism, the only last step is why “private property”. That is, we need a
norm to decide how conflicts over scarce resources can be resolved in a way that is rationally justifiable.

- Over one’s own body, the solution is simple: only a norm that states that each individual is the owner of
 his own body is justifiable, because the act of justification requires the use of one’s own body in
 argumentation. Other circumstances would be absurd: my argumentation would require another individual
 (my master/owner) to exercise his will through me and permit me to argue, or I would need joint permission
 of all members of society to argue (and, because norms are universalizable, this would also fall into
 absurd internal contradictions, because every individual would require every other individuals’ permission
 in order to grant permission for other individuals to act/grant permission; it creates a cycle of infinite
 logical regression that essentially abolishes any form of action… these positions of slavery norms are
 untenable in an argument).

- Over external resources (we have already determined that exclusive use is inevitable and that violence is
 unjustifiable), we only have to determine how we know who owns what. Subjective (subject-dependent) norms
 have some difficulties – two individuals could consistently make a claim to the same resource and both be
 “right” (and wrong) at the same time, because these claims have no logical justifications (they’re just
 based in subjective preferences). So only objective claims are justifiable, and the only objective claim
 that is justifiable is that a resource belongs to whoever first appropriated it (of course, it would be
 the first person to establish such a link: if we were to say something like “the second person to
 appropriate the resource should be the first who appropriates it”/gains property, we’re obvious
 contradicting ourselves… in this instance, the “second” person to appropriate the good would be the first
 person to do so, and this norm justifies an infinite cycle of the third/”second”, fourth/”second”, etc.
 claiming the same resource).

-I agree with previous users: Hoppe transcends the is-ought dichotomy. His ethic doesn’t establish a system
of values – it makes no value judgments (on whether or not aggression is “good” or “bad”) because these
judgments are meaningless (“good” and “bad” aren’t just subjective – they don’t mean anything at all, other
 than perhaps what you /want/ to happen). Hoppeanism is a method of ethical reasoning that establishes what
 behavior is “just” (what can be justified) and what is unjust (what cannot be rationally justified). So
 it’s not a matter of men being “good or evil”, or answering the question “why should I /want/ to be moral
 in your Hoppean world?”. Hoppeanism establishes a true, undeniable structure of ethics that is precisely
 that: TRUE. Hoppean ethics are rational, verifiable, justifiable, reasonable, true, etc… denying them and
 breaking them is just the opposite: unjustifiable, “wrong”, irrational, unreasonable, etc. The norms that
 violate Hoppeanism are false, not just “bad”. As I said in another thread, Hoppeanism is like the
 scientific method: by all means, you may act as if it isn’t /correct/, but that doesn’t change anything.
 Nothing will happen to you (I mean, private law might chase after you, but it’s not like you get zapped by
 lightning, unless DROs invent something like that ) – your behavior is just /wrong/.
By A. Beddow, edited by MH