[ExI] Nolopsism

[Aware]

On Sat, Feb 6, 2010 at 9:54 PM, Spencer Campbell <lacertilian at gmail.com> wrote:
> The Avantguardian <avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com>:
>> Philosophically nolipsism bears some resemblance to Buddhism which is fine from a spiritual point of view. E.g. why fear death when there is no "me" to die, etc. Being an attorney however, I am sure you are aware of the legal can of worms nolipsism opens up. Human rights are tied to identity. If "I" don't exist, then stealing my stuff or even murdering me is a victimless crime. Doesn't make for a happy outcome in my opinion, especially for libertarians. Probably why the authors back-pedalled from their claims in the conclusion.
>
> Hi, my name is Spencer Campbell, I will be your Stefano Vaj for tonight.
>
> Are victimless crimes morally, ethically, and legally acceptable? They
> ARE crimes, so, no to the last one. The first two are arguable. I feel
> confident that a coherent system of law could be made without the
> assumption that any selves exist for it to protect. It would
> essentially treat people as highly valuable property, no different
> from houses or cars, owned by entities just as imaginary as
> corporations.
>
> Really it could only streamline everything. We should do this. We
> should do this right now.

Spencer, a more coherent system of justice is possible, and "we"
continue to move, in fits and starts, in this direction already for
many millennia.

But it's not based on abolishment of the self.  As Pollock's paper
shows, a sense of self is NECESSARY for situated effectiveness.

Rather, it's a matter of identification of self over a GREATER sphere of agency.

Increasing agreement on the rightness or "morality" of actions
corresponds to the extent such actions are assessed as promoting an
increasing context of increasingly coherent, hierarchical,
fine-grained, evolving but present (subjective) values, via methods
methods increasingly effective, in principle, over increasing
(objective) scope of interaction. Lather, rinse, repeat.

Yes, it's a mouthful, and I estimate it takes several hundred pages to
unpack in order to accommodate the priors of most here.

- Jef