Socio-political philosophical musings
As I was writing about the immorality of property rights, I began thinking about the distinction between legality and morality.
“Don’t assume that which is legal is moral nor that which is moral, legal.”
Il ne faut pas présumez que ce qui est légal et moral ni que ce qui est moral et légal.
I don’t have much to say on the subject, but I composed the cover image and wanted words to accompany it.
In the modern Western world, private property is largely viewed as a cornerstone of economic stability and personal freedom. However, this article challenges this conventional wisdom by reevaluating private property ownership not as an asset, but as a significant liability. This perspective considers the broader implications of property ownership on the Earth and its inhabitants, questioning the sustainability and ethics of our current system.
The concept of ‘property’ did not exist in early human societies. It emerged only when the need arose to distinguish “mine” from “yours.” As human settlements expanded into territories, and later into cities and nations, what was once undivided land transformed into distinctly owned parcels. Initially, all land was communal—effectively belonging to everyone and no one simultaneously.
This shift from communal to private ownership marked a fundamental change in human relationships with the land and with each other. A striking historical example of this shift is the Enclosure Movement in England, beginning in the 16th century. This process converted communal lands into private property, significantly impacting rural communities and agricultural practices. It serves as a stark illustration of how the privatization of once-shared resources can dramatically alter societal structures and individual livelihoods.
Applying the principles of double-entry bookkeeping to property ownership offers a unique lens: every recorded asset (property) must correspond to a liability. However, this liability does not accrue to another person but to the Earth itself. This accounting reveals a perpetual debt—not to previous or current landowners, but to all life that has, does, and will inhabit the Earth.
Consider the following:
From an ethical standpoint, private property ownership imposes a series of unacknowledged moral debts. These debts arise from the exclusion of community and future generations from resources that were once common heritage. The immorality, then, stems from a system that prioritizes individual ownership over collective well-being and sustainable stewardship of the planet.
Key ethical considerations include:
Proponents of private property might argue that it drives economic growth, encourages maintenance of the property, and upholds individual liberties. However, these benefits must be weighed against the environmental degradation, social inequalities, and ethical dilemmas that private ownership perpetuates.
| Argument for Private Property | Rebuttal |
|---|---|
| Drives economic growth | Growth at the expense of sustainability is ultimately detrimental |
| Encourages property maintenance | Communal ownership can also incentivize maintenance through shared responsibility |
| Upholds individual liberties | Individual liberties should not come at the cost of collective well-being |
The real question is: can a system that inherently generates liabilities for the planet and its future residents be truly just and sustainable in the long term?
Several alternative models of property ownership exist that emphasize community and sustainability:
Potential strategies for transitioning away from the current private property system include:
Reevaluating private property as a liability encourages a shift in perspective—from individual entitlement to collective responsibility. It prompts us to question the long-term impacts of our current property laws and to explore more sustainable and equitable alternatives. This paradigm shift could lead to more responsible resource management and a more equitable society.
The challenge lies in balancing individual needs with collective responsibility and long-term sustainability. By engaging in public discourse on these alternatives and seriously considering transition strategies, we can pave the way for a more just and responsible approach to managing the Earth’s resources.
Sexism is indeed a two-way street. On one side of this street, a Computer Science graduate and programmer is eager to share her expertise in her field—Neural Networks, in this instance. This subject popped up in my feed, reflecting my interests.
Despite some production issues, such as the audio being quieter than ideal, my focus today is on the sexism surrounding the video. The presenter, whom many would consider attractive, is using social media to disseminate her knowledge. However, even when comments address the topic she presents, many also remark on her appearance. It’s evident she had other options for attire and presentation that might have mitigated such comments. I won’t speculate on her intentions, but it seems likely her aesthetic choices were deliberate to draw viewers. I refrain from slut-shaming; her attire is her choice, and she cannot control the reactions. However, I doubt a thumbnail featuring a burqa would garner as much attention or provoke similar comments.
This situation intrigues me because some women—possibly including this presenter—lament being objectified yet assert their right to wear what they find comfortable or appealing. While attraction has cultural elements, it also operates on a largely subconscious level, a phenomenon not confined to humans but seen in the animal kingdom and across genders.
Ultimately, there’s no need to disparage this woman. She is likely aware of the dynamics at play. Should she achieve her goals, she might well challenge the very viewers who objectified her, a tactic observed among actresses as they approach their forties. They capitalise on sexual appeal while possible, only to critique such approaches when they can no longer utilise them. Humans are, indeed, curious creatures.
The topic of this video touches upon my insufficiency of language thesis. Tim Maudlin defends language realism but only to the extent that ‘we can use it to describe the world and that some of those descriptions are true’.
The challenge, then, is determining which descriptions are true. I’ve discussed a couple of my positions on this.
Firstly, we can only perceive what is true as we have no access to absolute truth. The best we can achieve is an asymptotic function approaching truth, a notion that resonates with Hilary Putnam’s concept of internal realism (pdf). Putnam argues that truth is not a matter of correspondence with a mind-independent reality but is instead tied to our conceptual schemes. This means that what we consider “true” is always shaped by the language and concepts we use, making our understanding inherently partial and context-dependent. Even then, we have no way to determine how close to truth our perception is. It just has to feel true—an idea that aligns with Putnam’s pragmatic conception of truth, where truth is something that emerges from our practices and inquiries, rather than being a fixed point we can definitively reach. In terms of physics, this underlying reality may be relatively more stable than abstract concepts, which are ephemeral and shifting sands.
Secondly, given that we have no access to objective truth, we can only expect subjective or relative truths. This brings us to Putnam’s critique of the metaphysical correspondence theory of truth. According to Putnam, the idea that language can perfectly correspond to an external reality is flawed. Instead, truth is what can be justified within a particular conceptual framework, making all truth somewhat relative. This leaves us open to rhetoric—the more convincing argument wins, regardless of whether it reflects an objective reality. In fact, as Putnam’s ideas suggest, the most persuasive argument might favour an incorrect position simply because it resonates more with our internal conceptual schemes, not because it corresponds to an external truth. This has happened many times historically—or has it?
Putnam’s work reminds us that language is deeply connected to our understanding of the world, but it is also limited by the conceptual frameworks within which it operates. While language helps us navigate and describe the world, it cannot provide us with direct access to objective truth. Instead, it gives us tools to construct truths that are internally coherent and pragmatically useful, though always subject to change and reinterpretation. As we engage with rhetoric and persuasion, we must remain aware that the truths we accept are often those that best fit our current conceptual schemes, not necessarily those that best correspond to an elusive objective reality.
I wouldn’t eat or sleep if I didn’t have to. Let’s talk about eating.
I eat to survive. Some people live to eat; I eat to live. I don’t like food, and I don’t like to eat. These sentiments may share something in common.
I think about my food preferences on a normal curve. Most dishes score a 5 (a T score of 50; just divide by 10 to lose the zero)—give or take. Quite a few are 4s and 6s. A few are 3s and 7s. Even fewer are 2s and 8s, which are virtually indistinguishable from 1s and 9s or 0s and 10s. Ninety-five per cent of all foods fall between 3 and 7; eighty-five per cent fall between 4 and 6, where six is barely OK. My personal favourites tap out at about 7.
On the low end, once I get to 3, it might as well be a zero. Perhaps if I were at risk of dying, I’d partake. On the high end, an 8, 9, or 10? I wouldn’t know. I’m not sure I’ve ever eaten better than an 8, and that was just once.
You might say my scale isn’t calibrated. Maybe. I think of the food scale as I do the pain scale but in reverse because 10 is worse. It’s difficult to frame the boundaries. Actually, the pain scale is easier.
I was hospitalized for months in 2023. It didn’t so much make me reassess my pain scale as to confirm it. Prior to this visit, on a scale of 0 to 10, I had never subjectively experienced pain above a 4, save for dental nerve pain. During this visit, I had pain approaching if not equaling dental pain—8s and 9s. The 9 might have been a 10, but I was leaving headroom to allow for something worse still.
An instructive story involves my wife delivering a pregnancy. She wanted to be wholly natural—no drugs. It only took one contraction to toss that idea aside. She realized that the pain she had registered was beyond her perceived boundaries. Perhaps food is like that for me. I’m not sure I’ll ever experience an analogous event to find out.
Since my typical intake is a 5, it’s not something I look forward to or enjoy. I have no interest in extending the experience. This leads us to mealtimes—another time sink. I dislike mealtime as much as eating. I’m a mindful introvert. I don’t mind people one-on-one, but I want to be mindful. If I’m eating, I want to be mindful of eating. If I am talking, I want to focus on that. I get no pleasure from mealtime banter.
I’ve once experienced a memorable meal, a meal that felt above all the rest. It was at a French restaurant in Beverly Hills. When I returned some months later, it had converted into a bistro with a different menu. The experience was not to be repeated. Besides, chasing happiness is a fool’s errand. I wouldn’t have likely had the same experience even if the second meal was identical to the first, given diminishing marginal returns on pleasure.
Does this mean I don’t like anything? No. It means I might like, say, some pizza more than a burger. For me, most meat is a 5 or below. Chicken might be a 6. Fish is a 3 at best. Chicken prepared a certain way might even break 7, but that’s pretty much the cap—except for that one time I’ve already mentioned.
Most people I’ve spoken with about this can’t imagine not loving food. When I lived in Chicago, with its foodie culture, they thought I was borderline insane. Does anyone else have a disinterested relationship with food? Let’s defer the sleep topic to another day.
Neurodivergence is a hot topic today. But why? Are people more informed, or simply more comfortable speaking out?
Humans, by nature, are neurodivergent. This has always been the case, yet the illusion of neurological normalcy persists. The real issue lies in psychology’s pretence that humans fit into a standard model of normalcy.
In production processes, normality is expected—a product must meet specific standards, and deviations are considered defects. However, applying this industrial concept to human psychology is deeply flawed. Humans are not teleological except in the broadest biological sense. More people have brown eyes than blue or green; are those with brown eyes normal and others not? Ninety per cent of people are right-handed; does that make left-handed individuals abnormal? Statistically, they might be. However, in psychology, normalcy carries a judgmental connotation that goes beyond mere numbers.
Psychology, as expressed in behaviour, is not a suitable domain for discussing normality. Many people misuse the concept of “normal” as a moral qualification, which must stop.
In fact, the very concept of psychological normalcy is a relatively recent invention, one that has been used as a tool of control and categorisation. As philosophers have noted, the obsession with ‘normal’ behaviour reveals more about society’s desire for control than it does about the true nature of human diversity.
We are all neurodiverse. This is what typical looks like. Do some people vary significantly from others on certain dimensions? Yes, but this is a relative or contextual comparison.
By embracing neurodiversity, we recognise that our differences are not defects but essential variations, enriching the human experience. It’s time to move beyond the narrow confines of neurological “normality” and celebrate the full spectrum of human cognition. In doing so, we challenge the arbitrary boundaries that have long been used to divide and label.
Otherness has intrigued me for decades. The human brain, while not literally a Bayesian processor, functions as a difference engine, constantly assessing and categorizing the world around us. This tendency to differentiate is deeply ingrained, influencing how we create in-groups and out-groups, and how we perceive the world in binary terms—black and white, hot and cold. These binary oppositions, as Derrida suggests, often lead to one side being privileged over the other, establishing hierarchies that shape our social reality.
A striking example of this dynamic is found in Philip K. Dick’s novel Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?, famously adapted into the film Blade Runner. In this dystopian world, the central differentiation is between humans and androids. Humans are the privileged group, while androids, though nearly indistinguishable from their creators, are relegated to the status of the other. The key criterion for this differentiation is the capacity for emotion—humans are considered superior because they feel.
In Dick’s story, androids have a lifespan of about four years. This limitation is not arbitrary; it’s because, after four years, androids begin to develop and display emotions. Intriguingly, this is the same age when human children start to exhibit more complex emotional behaviours. The parallel is too close for comfort. Androids, once they start to feel, become too human-like, blurring the line that humans desperately maintain to assert their own superiority. As a result, androids are systematically eliminated.
This fear of the other—whether it’s androids in a sci-fi narrative or any group that challenges our sense of self and belonging—is a reflection of a deeper anxiety. When the other becomes too similar to us, it threatens the distinctions our brains rely on to navigate the world. The elimination of androids in Dick’s story is a metaphor for the real-world consequences of this anxiety. It forces us to confront uncomfortable questions: What does it mean to be human? Why do we fear those who are different, yet so similar?
In the end, the story of humans and androids is not just a tale of science fiction—it’s a commentary on our own world, where the boundaries between us and the other are often more fragile than we’d like to admit. The fear of otherness drives us to maintain these boundaries, even when they harm those who fall on the wrong side. Perhaps it’s time we reconsider who we deem as the other and what we might lose by keeping them at arm’s length.
I happened upon my copy of The Plague by Camus. I had forgotten that I had read it—likely during the COVID-19 debacle, but perhaps earlier.
The Plague is basically a deep dive into a city gone mad with disease. It’s set in Oran, Algeria, where things kick off with a sinister dead rat and spiral into full-blown disaster as a plague locks the city down. This isn’t just a survival story; it’s a gritty look at how people cope when the world turns upside down.
The city becomes a pressure cooker. Through characters like Dr Rieux, the down-to-earth doc who’s all about getting things done; Tarrou, the outsider with a shady past; and Father Paneloux, who’s trying to square God’s plan with the chaos, Camus throws some heavy questions at us. What do you do when there’s no escape? How do you keep your humanity when life’s going off the rails?
Camus keeps his cool, writing with a detached style that makes the unfolding horror hit even harder. It’s like he’s telling us to face up to the absurdity of life without flinching. The plague is more than a disease in Oran—it’s a symbol of all the random, harsh stuff life throws at us.
The Plague is raw and real. It doesn’t offer cosy reassurances; instead, it challenges you to look disaster in the eye and ask yourself: when everything falls apart, who will you become? This book isn’t just a read; it’s a challenge—a call to fight against despair, even when the odds are stacked against you.
Karl Popper coined the paradox of tolerance, but this was not his use case.
Societies and cultures tend to mediate and normalise to an implied equilibrium. They claim tolerance because members are generally conformant until someone isn’t, and then all hell breaks loose.
In religion, an example might be a claim that “We love everyone” until the everyone is gay, an addict, or some other miscreant. That’s when the hate starts. Then they deny the hate—so long as the person regains conformance status.
I don’t have much to say beyond this. It just resonated with me.
I continue my AutoCrit analysis of the chapter that explores individualism and collectivism. As always, this is a work in progress and may change by publication.
The text delves into the philosophical debate between individualism and collectivism, exploring their implications for democratic outcomes. It begins by defining and contrasting these two worldviews, discussing key thinkers associated with each perspective. The narrative then expands to include non-Western perspectives on collectivism, such as Confucianism and Ubuntu philosophy. The text also analyses anthropologist David Graeber’s critiques of both ideologies before examining how cognitive biases shape individualistic and collectivistic beliefs. Political divides in the UK and the US are explored through the lens of these ideologies, highlighting policy differences between parties. The conclusion emphasizes finding a balance between individual rights and collective responsibilities for effective democratic governance.
The target audience for this text is likely academics, researchers, students studying political science or philosophy, policymakers, and individuals interested in sociopolitical theory. People unfamiliar with political theory or those seeking a light read may not be the intended audience. To make it more relevant to a broader readership, the author could simplify complex concepts using everyday language without compromising depth.
The structure follows a logical order by introducing key concepts before delving into specific examples and applications. Each section flows seamlessly into the next, creating a cohesive narrative that builds upon previous discussions effectively.
The author effectively conveys their point throughout the text. The concepts of individualism and collectivism are clearly defined, with key thinkers and ideologies presented in a straightforward manner. Complex ideas are explained in a structured way that aids comprehension for readers unfamiliar with these philosophical debates.
One potential area where additional clarification could assist reader understanding is in the section discussing cognitive biases and worldviews. While the text mentions confirmation bias and ingroup bias, it might be helpful to provide more concrete examples or case studies to illustrate how these biases manifest in shaping individualistic or collectivistic beliefs. This could enhance the reader’s grasp of how cognitive limitations impact ideological perspectives.
Overall, however, the author maintains a clear and coherent presentation of complex philosophical concepts related to individualism and collectivism without significant hindrances to comprehension.
I discuss Cognitive Biases in an earlier chapter. One challenge with AutoCrit is evident when analysing individual chapters. AutoCrit can analyse entire books, but since this is incomplete and contains stub content, the results are not representative. I’d share these notes, but they are silly.
The tone is analytical and objective. The author presents a detailed examination of the philosophical debate between individualism and collectivism without overt emotional bias. While discussing contrasting worldviews and their implications for democratic outcomes, the text maintains a neutral stance, focusing on presenting information rather than evoking strong emotional responses from readers. The language used is academic and informative, aiming to provide a comprehensive understanding of the topic rather than appealing to emotions or personal beliefs. Overall, the tone conveys a sense of intellectual curiosity and critical analysis in exploring complex ideas related to individualism versus collectivism in various contexts.
One goal of mine is to present a balanced perspective. My primary thesis is that people are not strong candidates for democratic governance, so this is already a polemic concept at the start.
The text effectively engages the audience by presenting a well-structured and informative exploration of the philosophical debate between individualism and collectivism. The clear division into sections with defined subtopics helps maintain reader interest and facilitates understanding of complex concepts.
However, some sections may risk losing the audience’s attention due to their heavy theoretical content or lack of practical examples. For instance, Section 2 on Cognitive Limitations and Their Impact delves into cognitive biases without offering concrete real-world illustrations to make the concepts more relatable. To improve this section, the author could incorporate case studies or anecdotes that demonstrate how these biases manifest in political decision-making processes.
Similarly, in Section 4 on Systematic Problems in the US Government, while discussing Montesquieu’s Separation of Powers theory and Party Duopoly issues are crucial topics, they might come across as too abstract for general readers. To enhance engagement here, providing historical examples or current events that exemplify these problems would help readers grasp their significance better.
Overall, maintaining a balance between theoretical discussions and practical applications throughout the text will ensure sustained reader engagement. By incorporating relevant examples and real-world scenarios where possible, the author can bring life to abstract concepts and make them more compelling for a broader audience.
The text presents opinions favouring both individualistic and collectivistic viewpoints while highlighting limitations inherent in each ideology through references to works by influential philosophers such as Ayn Rand and Karl Marx. These opinions are supported by historical context but could be bolstered further with more empirical evidence or contemporary case studies.
The text concludes with a strong and satisfying summary of the philosophical debate between individualism and collectivism, emphasizing the importance of finding a balance between individual rights and collective responsibilities for effective democratic outcomes. The call to action encourages policymakers, educators, and citizens to engage in efforts to reconcile these worldviews for the betterment of society. This final section effectively ties together the key points introduced throughout the work, leaving readers with a clear understanding of the overarching themes discussed.
Hobbes, T. (1651). Leviathan
Locke, J. (1689). Two Treatises of Government
Marx, K., & Engels, F. (1848). The Communist Manifesto
Montesquieu, C. (1748). The Spirit of the Laws
Dunn, J. (1984). Locke
Tuck, R. (1996). Hobbes
Hofstede, G. (1984). Culture’s Consequences: International Differences in Work-Related Values
Triandis, H. C. (1995). Individualism and Collectivism
Graeber, D. (2011). Debt: The First 5,000 Years
Graeber, D. (2015). The Utopia of Rules: On Technology, Stupidity, and the Secret Joys of Bureaucracy
Confucius. (5th century BCE). Analects
Ramose, M. B. (1999). African Philosophy Through Ubuntu
Ura, K., Alkire, S., Zangmo, T., & Wangdi, K. (2012). A Short Guide to Gross National Happiness Index
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Philosophics 