PFP163 | Hans-Hermann Hoppe - Ethics of Argumentation (PFS 2016)

Property and Freedom Podcast, Episode 163
This talk is from the 2016 meeting of the Property and Freedom Society. Hans-Hermann Hoppe (Germany/Turkey), On the Ethics of Argumentation.
For more on this topic, see Kinsella's “Argumentation Ethics and Liberty: A Concise Guide,” Mises Daily (May 27, 2011). Transcript at the link below.
Shownotes and other info available at propertyandfree...

[@rockwellspipe6115]

The beauty of the argument is that as soon as you try to refute it, you also, simultaneously, prove it correct

[@wowhallo]

Well not all of it, but you do affirm the starting point of argumentation.

[@torosytoros]

Exactly, it is axiomatic.

[@msss126]

But only at the time you are arguing, right?

[@msss126]

@@gmndaxdo why does it transcend from only the moment you are arguing?

[@modernmyth9050]

Yeah, almost like it's a circular, unfalsifiable claim something

[@SacrumImperiumRomanum]

This is the best talk on this very important subject. It was a great pleasure to be there in person.

[@lorenzmuller3542]

That Libertarian Chap How did you get invited if I may ask?

[@PedroHenrique-bp8ts]

@@lorenzmuller3542 I've read at PFS' site that if you want to attend to the event you have to send an email either to HHP or to Kinsella. Take a look at PFS' site and you'll be able to know how to attend to the event.

[@MoleDownunder]

Transcript: First, all truth claims, all claims that a given proposition is true, or false, or indeterminant, or undecidable, or that an argument is valid and complete or not raised are justified and decided upon in the course of an argumentation. Second, that the truth of this (1) proposition cannot be disputed without falling into a contradiction because any attempt to do so would itself have to come in the form of an argument, hence the a priori of argumentation. Third, argumentation is not free-floating sounds, but a human action. Namely, a purposeful human activity employing physical means, at least a person's body, and various external things in order to reach a specific end or goal. Namely, the attainment of agreement concerning the truth value of a given proposition or argument. Fourth, that while motivated by some initial disagreement, or dispute, or conflict concerning the validity of some truth claim, every argumentation between a proponent and an opponent is itself a conflict free, mutually agreed upon and peaceful form of interaction aimed at resolving the initial disagreement and reaching some mutually agreed on answer as to the truth value of a given proposition or argument. Fifth, that the truth or validity of the norms or rules of action that make argumentation between a proponent and opponent at all possible, that is, the praxeological presuppositions of argumentation cannot be argumentatively disputed without falling into a pragmatic or performative contradiction. Sixth, that the praxeological presuppositions of argumentation then, that is, what makes argumentation as a specific form of truth-seeking activity possible are two-fold. First, each person must be entitled to exclusive control or ownership of his own physical body, the very means that he and only he can control directly at will so as to be able to act independently of one another and come to a conclusion on his own, that is, autonomously. And second, for the same reason of mutually independent standing and autonomy, both proponent and opponent must be entitled to their respective prior possessions, that is, the exclusive control of all other external means of action appropriated indirectly by them prior to and independent of one another, and prior to the onset of their argumentation. And seven, that any argument to the contrary, that either the proponent or opponent is not entitled to the exclusive ownership of his body and all prior possessions cannot be defended without falling into a pragmatic or performative contradiction because by engaging in argumentation both proponent and opponent demonstrate that they seek a peaceful, conflict-free resolution to whatever disagreement gave rise to their arguments. Yet to deny one person the right to self-ownership and his prior possessions is to deny his autonomy and his autonomous standing in a trial of arguments. It affirms instead dependency and conflict, that is, heteronomy, rather than conflict free and autonomously reached agreement. It is, therefore, contrary to the very purpose of argumentation.

[@rockwellspipe6115]

Hans is a genius pure and simple; on par with [insert any great philosopher from all of history].

[@actingman7937]

About time, I've been waiting for Herr Prof. Hoppe's so to speak insofar as it vere if you vill.

[@KittredgeRitter]

Acting Man Would you like my facebook page in exchange for a like? facebook.com/Austrian-Economic-Discussion-Page-1777767159139233/

[@sb3424]

Well said at 54:55 ! This proves that when my foreskin was chopped off of my body when I was an infant, that was necessarily creating conflict! And so nobody can legally justify doing that to me! Great arguments against genital mutilation!

[@triclenes6716]

Great lecture from professor Hoppe.

[@crono100lv8]

Indeed

[@DanielSantos-zz9ep]

Tenho que aprender ingles o mais rapido possivel

[@joseasf96]

Todo un mundo nuevo de conocimiento te espera en inglés

[@holdbitcoin1448]

Passou 1 ano. Aprendeu?

[@d68st90]

Aprendeu xará? kkkkk

[@edwaggonersr.7446]

Over my head, but enjoyable. Thanks Hans!

[@ChrisAthanas]

Basically don’t take stuff that is not yours Bc you don’t like anyone taking your stuff This is all so basic and only exposes that there are humans who don’t care about rules and just want power and arguments are irrelevant

[@aaapn]

I love Hoppe! Argumentation ethics changed my whole worldview.

[@donha475]

It's not that people cannot do bad things. They just cannot rationalise / justify it without contradiction. (Justify meaning within the context of argumentation). Personally I would define civility and moral behaviour in terms of acting such that one can justify ones own actions in the context of argumentation (which implies many things, not least of which is non-violence).

[@AnCapChase]

Is there a transcript of this speech anywhere?!

[@wowhallo]

Not yet at least

[@ThomasNigelHawkins]

there you go! thelibertarianalliance.com/2016/10/09/hans-hermann-hoppe-the-ethics-of-argumentation-2016/

[@HowardRoarkBR]

ThomasNigelHawkins thank you!

[@AntonioCarlos-nq6tq]

Could anyone help me understand his argument. Ive tried of everything but i still cant get it.

[@caiofdacosta]

Am I the only one who is having a hard time to understand it all? Maybe it's easier on the books, I don't know...

[@caiofdacosta]

@Yunglung420 Finally feeling like I'm starting to understand it!! :D

[@mathiaszanotto7287]

It is much easier to understand this lecture after reading chapter 13 of "Economics and Ethics of Private Property" and chapter 7 of "A Theory of Socialism and Capitalism"

[@mathiaszanotto7287]

Actually, most chapters of the "Philosophy" part of EEPP kinda talks about argumentation ethics.

[@caiofdacosta]

@@mathiaszanotto7287 good to know. I believe I have a better understanding of it now, but I know I don't fully grasp the argument yet. Nonetheless, I believe this is one of the best arguments in favor of private property. I've been researching about transcendental ethics as well, in particular, Kim Davies' "Transcendental foundation of ethics", which is similar to Hoppe's argument, as Hoppe has stated that argumentation ethics is Transcendental and not deductive. Complex but interesting stuff.

[@Max-nc4zn]

Freiheit statt Demokratie!

[@donha475]

2:54 beginning of argument

[@diddlididdli1376]

My brain, it hurts

[@michalzakrzewski5898]

Shouldn't Austrianism be virulent and virile, not to mention viral? This both a good presentation, and a reply to objections that might be lost in journals past. It's great to see new faces counterbalancing the I'm getting old act. Though seriously, it's Hoppe's conference, the finest mind in the world to some. A Reboot will get you only so far. Safe, but unexciting. The Q & A sessions could use a refresh, I wouldn't even mind a Lester Holt moderating. I admit, There was some new thought embedded, but again I literally fail to recall what it was. Similar as with Rockwell recently, Mises on our Mind.

[@donha475]

So few views...

[@crono100lv8]

Good video

[@kenshikenji]

does argumentation ethics also prove everyone can talk?

[@luismurga1902]

¿ Dr. Karl - Otto Apel ?

[@Omnis2]

PFS 2017 - HHH Ethics of Haberdashery.

[@TruthSausage]

4 liberals have watched this video.

[@Max-nc4zn]

"liberals"

[@luismurga1902]

¿ Frank van Dun?

[@jayclouse8095]

Why if the goal of the "argument" is to verbally berate the other's opinions and invalidate their premise, if possible, or their character, confidence etc. Whatever it takes to get them to submit and accept your view and thus follow your edicts to achieve your goals, even if your own edict is to stop interfering and get out of the way?

[@thefrenchareharlequins2743]

You are describing ideological salesmanship, rather than argumentation.

[@jayclouse8095]

@@thefrenchareharlequins2743 same thing. in the end what matters is power and achieving your objective, if Truth gets others to do what you want, great if lies work better then use lies.

[@thefrenchareharlequins2743]

@@jayclouse8095 Incorrect, ideological salesmanship is merely convincing people that you are correct regardless of whether you are actually correct, argumentation is to seek the truth with regards to whether the conclusions reached are true.

[@jayclouse8095]

@@thefrenchareharlequins2743 Truth is not discernably, where as certainty is merely a subjective sense. There is no measure for Truth, apart from collective certainty, but who you trust with that certainty, the majority or a panel of experts will change which statements hold certainty. In the end all we have is who is convinced, why they are convinced and who you side with. It seems that people have political goals, that is we seek things like, food, shelter, acceptance, the whole Maslow pyramid, but we don't have a need for truth. We have a need for belonging to a group that will validate our opinions, which is to say back up our feelings of certainty. This also aids us in our other needs. Thus, we argue not to get to some mythical Truth, but to expand out base of others who validate our certainty and are convinced by our opinions, so that we can depend on others and use then to achieve politically our physical and emotional needs.

[@thefrenchareharlequins2743]

@@jayclouse8095 of course, this statement seems to be the only proposition that is excluded from thus theory of truth

[@vergo4964]

1:01:8 at 2x speed is amazing lol

[@liuzhen2008]

I’m so lost five minutes in.... what is the purpose of this talk>.>

[@someonenotnoone]

It convinces people who already believed taxation is theft that they are objectively correct. A scary religion.

[@SLUPKOOPRAXEOLOGISTA]

54:50 was very funny

[@lorenzmuller3542]

what is he wearing here?? lol

[@MixMusicas]

Q porra é essa

[@michalzakrzewski5898]

I'm disappointed. I expected something genuinely new, and in Hoppe's 'recent' remarks regarding advice to young people posted on lewrockwell, it's still possible. The above is the screed that any hoppean knows by heart. I feel like we're about to be overshadowed by alt-right.

[@SacrumImperiumRomanum]

This talk was the most thorough one yet on this topic. It brought together arguments which had otherwise been made in papers, responses and asides and had a couple of finer, illuminating points.

[@michalzakrzewski5898]

There's absolutely nothing new about it; Argumentation Ethics is in advanced stage of life, as are the papers, where Hoppe introduced these arguments. They're quite obscure I concur, and so does Hoppe. They've been so 10 years ago. The point is, even though the apriori argumentation is a priori, the world goes on. We'd like a not a new improvement upon the theory but a commentary on current events, influenced by the aforementioned.

[@SacrumImperiumRomanum]

Michal Zakrzewski Now there I couldn't agree with you more. I want to know how this could be and set about applying it in society, politically, in terms of theory of law, everything. I think the best place to begin is the wave of nationalism sweeping the West; that could get us in a better position to move closer to the natural order and to freer, more individualistic communities, perhaps wherein there is the possibility of a dominant role of private law as was once the norm in Europe. Thereupon, the application of the best rational system of social norms we have, ie. argumentation ethics, can be applied and can directly influence the, hopefully, more libertarian aristocracy which may once again rule of Europe and certain parts of the West.

[@KittredgeRitter]

Great monologue. Where is he teaching in this video?

[@wowhallo]

Bodrum, Turkey. He organizes an annual meeting there at a hotel, which he calls the Property and Freedom Society.

[@KittredgeRitter]

wowhallo Thanks :)

[@crono100lv8]

@@KittredgeRitter It's not an monologue there's people with him.

[@KittredgeRitter]

@@crono100lv8 That doesn't disqualify it from being a monologue.

[@crono100lv8]

@@KittredgeRitter It's dialogue.

[@KazimirMajorinc]

Lots of "non sequitur." There is a logical error in second claim already. (Hoppe1) ALL truth-claims ARE raised [in argumentation.] (Hoppe2) The truth of (Hoppe1) cannot be disputed without contradiction, as any dispute is itself an argumentation. The claim (Hoppe2) is "non sequitur." For disputing (Hoppe1) one needs to prove (REFUTATION) SOME truth-claims ARE NOT raised in argumentation Hoppe would be right to say (REFUTATION) is raised in argumentation. But so what? ((REFUTATION) is raised in argumentation) and (REFUTATION) are not in contradiction. They would be in contradiction if (REFUTATION) was NO truth-claims ARE raised in argumentation. Therefore, (Hoppe2) is false.

[@Paronimous]

prove what? Its self-evident.

[@loukurasdoarthur]

He doesn’t say that they are raised in argumentation, only that they can only be raised, justified and agreed upon through argumentation

[@m2msa]

It's the condition my friend, the condition. You forgot that part.

[@crono100lv8]

@@m2msa I don't think he knows that part lol

[@MalucoDivino]

Finally someone talking about it! “SOME truth claims are NOT decided upon argumentation” This is a dispute of his argument that doesn’t refute itself. Since his premise can be one of those which are proved false by argument, but there may still be truth-claims that can be true without argument.

[@barockassegid9912]

If only he wasn't violently racist

[@gloriouscontent3538]

This makes me very mad.

[@BiznizTrademark]

It's a waste of time to try to ground a political philosophy in metaethical ideas because: 1. nobody outside of philosophy classes cares about metaethics (most people have never even heard the term), 2. there will never (and I mean NEVER) be anything close to agreement among skilled philosophers about which metaehical approach is correct. It is better to simply start with some intuitively appealing principle (e.g., the non-aggression principle) and deduce political principles from there. Sure, you will lose the advantage of arguing from the vantage point of the objectively correct moral view, but since the position that there is an objectively correct morality is so controversial, it is better to simply dodge that question. Personally I think Mises was more consistent than Hoppe when he simply applied his subjective theory of value in economics to ethics.

[@KittredgeRitter]

BiznizTrademark what is mateathics?

[@BiznizTrademark]

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meta-ethics

[@KittredgeRitter]

BiznizTrademark Thank you.

[@grasshopper801]

Relying on intuitive arguments is very useful as a short-hand for appealing to people. More formal arguments (such as Hoppe's ethics of argumentation) are helpful for exploring your own position and grounding yourself in a more certain foundation.

[@frederiquest-amant9048]

Maybe you religiously believe in Libertarian principles, but not all of us base our positions on feelings. It is not a waste of time, because it is useful, and it is useful because some of us structure their thoughts to avoid suffering cognitive dissonance, which is exactly what epistemology achieve.

[@giaourtlou]

Oh not this again. This is clearly wrong. It's unfortunate that he presents argumentation ethics as his best idea. It's wrong.

[@giaourtlou]

Dismantle The Matrix What? Do you want an explanation of why Hoppe's argument is a non-sequitur? Fine. I'll give you one. As Hume has pointed out, you can't derive an ought from an is. Hoppe admits that, in his Theory of Socialism and Capitalism. But then he does just _that_, in every way except admitting it directly. To put it briefly, argumentation is a fact, something that happens. That we control our thoughts and voices etc. is a fact too. From such facts it's impossible to derive the "ought" that we ought to own all that. It's a non-sequitur. He says that to deny the *right* of self-ownership during an argument would constitute a performative contradiction. That's simply not true, it's a wrong syllogism. A performative contradiction would be to deny the *fact*, namely to say "I don't control my voice". Then I would be indeed stating something counterfactual. But to state "I shouldn't be allowed to control my voice, but unfortunately I am." is _not_ a performative contradiction, because it's a statement about what _ought_ to be, not about what _is_.

[@ThomasRodriguez2010]

hoppe adressed your argument. Argumentation is not simply talking back and forth. At least listen to the lecture before casting it aside. You are dead wrong. sorry bro, he addressed your counter argument clearly.

[@andrius799]

Yep but i guess what he is saying is this :www.justopia.org/exploding-argumentation-ethics.html

[@giaourtlou]

andrius: Yes, I think what you linked is very close to what I'm saying, if not spot on. Tom: No, he didn't. He addressed different criticisms. (How well is another matter.) Please, point me to where you think he addressed my criticism, in case I missed it. It would be impossible to actually address my criticism, because that would imply crossing the is-ought gap. (Hoppeless, so to speak. :-) ) There is no way one can commit a performative contradiction by arguing about norms, because all performances are facts, not norms. As I said, I can argue "I believe that nobody *should* be owning anything, not even himself, we should all be lobotomized or something, and actually I don't even care if you're convinced peacefully, because we shouldn't even have brains in an ideal world." In this counter-example, I didn't argue that ownership & control don't exist, I argued that they shouldn't. That's the crucial difference. And that's what all normative arguments are about. Socialists don't deny that we all currently own certain stuff, but they say that nobody should. (And no, they don't care to convince you really, they only argue when they don't have the power to kill.) And there are great responses against them that we're all familiar with, but to say "Look, your proposition is contradicted by the fact you're arguing" is an illogical response. Contrast the above to the following _good_ examples of _actual_ performative contradictions: Someone says "I'm not here!" (Obvious.) Also, the existence of an omnipotent creature would be a performative contradiction, because by existing He would have to be able to create a stone heavy enough to be unable to lift, so he couldn't be omnipotent. These are a few well-known examples of performative contradictions in philosophy. It's actually hard to find good examples, because you need to find a fact that would automatically falsify itself. Norms are not facts, so, no fact could possibly falsify a norm. There's no way around that.

[@ThomasRodriguez2010]

***** Can't believe you didn't catch his refutation. Well actually, I can because you're bringing up such a silly counter argument.