[ExI] intellectual property again

[JOSHUA JOB]

On Mar 4, 2010, at 9:34 PM, Emlyn wrote:
> I agree that personal sovereignty is desirable. We should have power
> over ourselves comparable to a sovereign state over its territory
> (putting aside our feelings about sovereign states for the minute).
> But, self ownership implies the ability to sell oneself. Does
> sovereignty require that? Does the rights-based-in-property-rights
> position require the ability to sell oneself into slavery?

Ownership is the right to control. Self-ownership is complete control over yourself, which is a given from the nature of human beings, and a requirement of survival.

> I tend much more toward rule utilitarianism.
Well there is one major difference, I reject utilitarianism as an origin for rights, instead opting with a logical derivation from the the nature of person's (which to some extent I have already given). That is, almost certainly, the root of our differences on this issue.

>  Part of that protection is actually to deny individuals the ability to sell
> themselves into slavery! More precisely, I would say that there should
> be no ability to enforce a contract that includes servitude of one
> party to another. Probably many human rights can be framed in terms of
> classes of unenforceable contracts.

You do have the right to enslave yourself. It's stupid as all get-out to do so, but I see no logical reason it should be impossible. If you enter into the contract without threat of physical force, it was your decision.

> I flat out deny that in a landscape of strongly assymetrical power
> relations, we can simply assume that all contracts are entered into
> freely. Those with more power will coerce those with less power, in
> myriad ways, into contracts which run counter to the interests of the
> less powerful party.

How can you coerce someone without actually using coercion, i.e. physical force or threat of force? Saying "I'll fire you if you don't do X" might be one example you might be thinking of (and quite possibly an obvious possible example). But either that is perfectly fine (as X was included under your business contract, or there is a clause saying he can fire you for any reason at all) or it is a violation of your contractual obligation with your employer (that is, it is not in the job description, and according to the contract, you cannot be fired or reprimanded unless you are not meeting job criteria). It isn't coercion if it is within their right to act in that way. Only violations of actual rights (i.e. property rights, personal sovereignty; or put another way, stealing, murder, assault, fraud) are instances of coercion or force. Without actual force, you are always free, at least in any civilized society such as ours, to choose differently than another would like you to.

> So back to the matter at hand, I hold sovereignty over the self as
> basic, not derived from property rights. I don't have to "own" myself
> to not be enslaveable; rather, it should be impossible for me to enter
> into a binding contract which causes me to be enslaved, and the state
> or other equivalent holder of a monopoly on force should intervene on
> my behalf should I find myself enslaved. Similarly with other breaches
> of individual sovereignty.

Why exactly is it impossible for you to be able to enter into such a contract voluntarily? It is plainly obvious there are ENORMOUS risks involved in doing so, to anyone with half a brain. So if you go ahead and do it anyways (so long as actual force or threat of force wasn't involved), you deserve what you get, in my opinion.

The major problem I see with your position, is that you essentially have every conceivable decision as being under duress, as there are always power relations involved (power meaning influence, not force), so all interactions with others are not free. Any boundary between free and not free is meaningless in such a case, so I don't see how contracts could ever be enforced. You get around it by invoking personal sovereignty, but it really seems to me that that is just a teensy-bit limited form of self-ownership, with all it implies.

Joshua Job
nanite1018 at gmail.com