Do we own our own lives? A discussion on the morality of suicide and voluntary slavery.

[The Grand Nudger]

You still haven't given anything to connect the two concepts. Your premise here is
P: I can experience myself, i.e., I have self-awareness and the capacity for subjective experiences.

Your conclusion is
C: Therefore, I should get to determine what happens to myself.

Not only the conclusion does not follow the premise, we often find it to be not true in the real world. Further, if that is the only basis for self-determination, then it'd apply not only to humans but most of the animal kingdom as well.

Not actually a conclusion or argument I offered now is it? I'm not looking to establish an argument for any given right, just offering some insight into a way in which one right can be weighed against another (particularly by reference to where their basis might be in relation to the basis of other rights). Whether or not we -should- use such a system for determining what right might overrule or lesson the importance of another would be a different issue entirely. IMO, however, this was one of the more robust ways I can recall having it explained to me.

Our experience of self is the "thing" we refer to when we discuss a right to self determination. I wouldn't say that our experience in and of itself makes a compelling argument for that right but without it it the notion becomes nonsensical (as do notions of rights at all, granted). As I said, we'd probably need to add more before we started an argument (as far as that argument goes I like the utilitarian argument for well being). If we consider the basis for these rights as the trunk of a tree, and the rights themselves as branches, self determination will be "branching out" shortly after the section of the trunk we call "self". We may want to add something, like self awareness or sapience (and by and large people do add something, which might be why we end up with paradoxical readings on the extreme ends of their justifications, such as the right to self determination being granted to human beings with impaired capacities for experience- or self determination for ants) when discussing this right-but we don't have to. We could begin there.

Some things might actually branch out directly from "self" with no other consideration on that end applied -we do justify some rights on that basis alone (and those generally are the rights we extend to the animal kingdom)...and they're also rights which we still recognize even when we revoke the right to self determination here in the real world. For example, neither livestock nor prisoners have the right to self determination (granted it's generally a temporary and conditional revocation in the case of prisoners) but we do not feel that we have the right to cause either undue harm or pain. We take the experience of self as the basis, weigh that against a value judgement of those experiences (particularly those experiences which we would not wish-to-experience ourselves) and we put a wall between "self" and imposition of pain(or any of those negatively valued experiences) - that wall being a "right".

Now, the reason I offered the above is to demonstrate a way in which a right - having to leverage less in the way of justification (and possibly being part of the justification for the next right)- can be set against some other right which we might consider to be further up that tree. I personally think that the right we recognize in livestock or prisoners re harm/pain/ etc is very very closely situated with the right we recognize when we refer to self determination - so it makes for sticky application. If we consider three sets of rights and their justification (ignoring any others that fall on the spectrum)- and keep in mind, as I said above, I'm not looking to justify them merely to justify how we might weigh them if we take them as a given-

1. experience of self -itself- confers some rights -Livestock, prisoners, etc
2. certain experiences of self confer a more elaborate set of rights -the grumblings of self determination
3. activities that arise from certain experiences of self confer yet another set of rights (specifically with regards to the products of those activities) -the beginnings of property rights

What would it mean if 2 had the ability to abrogate 1? If your right to decide what you wanted to do entailed denying another 1? It would mean that the foundation for the very right you're attempting to leverage has been eroded.

What would it mean if 3 had the ability to abrogate 2 (or 1)?

As you said, if you could "sell" yourself as property but still retain your right to self determination you haven't actually -sold yourself into slavery as property-. If you could, then you would have denied (in this case denied yourself) a right that falls further down the tree (and so impeached your justification for the right to do so in the first place). A similar situation occurs when your right to property, or rights over property would come to odds with that elusive number 1.

Now, we do actually leverage a system similar to this when we consider legal disputes involving conflicts of 3, 2, and 1. Property rights don't extend to what would amount to a denial of the right to self determination (you can't own people-or sell yourself), and the right to self determination doesn't extend to a denial of whatever rights are conferred by "self" (you don't get to waltz around deciding to stab people or torture livestock).

[I know that was obscenely long, but I do enjoy our conversations that ring around this subject-so I couldn't help myself. Take a cleaver to the above, help me whittle it down]

Ownership of property and ownership of life are two different concepts. While your may make an argument that right to property is a derivative of right to self-determination, the same cannot be said of the right to life.

Oh I don't know, I probably wouldn't even use the phrase "ownership of life". I would make the argument that all rights should be derivative of rights on a "lower order" all stemming from the same lines of justification, sure - but I don't see the need to invoke anything other than self determination when referencing suicide, for example. I certainly don't see the need to argue that your life is your property-that you have ownership of it, for example.

[Faith No More]

Perhaps. If that were the case, I would argue that another's discomfort does not rationally give them right of dominion over that which does not belong to them. Of course, simultaneously, I recognize that I would not wish for people to kill themselves and would intervene.

Yep, I'm an irrational hypocrite. So?

Well, I think that's where most of the difficulty lies with this issue. Our intellect and our emotions are in direct conflict on deciding how this issue should be treated.

And don't worry about being a hypocrite. I used to be so bitter that I was being prevented from killing myself, because people wanted me to stick around. When I found out a friend of mine was trying to OD, however, I didn't hesitate to take action and save his life. It tore me up inside that I was so hypocritical, but I eventually realized that no matter how much I would have tried to rationalize him having ownership of his own life, I would intervene every time.

[LastPoet]

I wanted to do that twice in my life, such an ordeal made me conscious that I shouldn't underestimate people's suffering. The first time I planned to buy a lethal dose of heroin and just float away. Failed miserably, because I woke up a few hours later with the third seringe halfway still in my arm. The second time I thought of using my dads shotgun, but then I realized that I would probably be a selfish bastard and probably do more harm to my loved ones if I gone trough with it. That is why I decided to go on, and I say to life, bring it on motherfucker, you won't beat me that easily!

[Brian37]

In responding strictly to the title of the thread, there is NO such thing as ownership. All we have in life in reality is conditional control and temparary control over things. I hate the absurd implication that there is such a claim as voluntary slavery. There IS voluntary submission and forced submission. There is no such thing as voluntary slavery.

Is it possible to be an Uncle Tom? Yes, even today you can have minorities who support an idea that goes against their self interest, such as a Log Cabin republican. You can also have a wife who likes the idea of a man telling them what to do.

A few years back I ran into an old couple, and the woman said "It is the man's role to take care of the woman". That made me want to vomit.

Slavery by proxy of definition is not consensual. Submission by consent is NOT slavery. Slavery is the lack of consent and requires no mutual agreement and ammounts to might makes right. So the title of this thread is tottally absurd and logicaly assinine.

There is no such thing as "voluntary slavery". And how the hell did this get tied into suicide?

[genkaus]

Not actually a conclusion or argument I offered now is it? I'm not looking to establish an argument for any given right, just offering some insight into a way in which one right can be weighed against another (particularly by reference to where their basis might be in relation to the basis of other rights). Whether or not we -should- use such a system for determining what right might overrule or lesson the importance of another would be a different issue entirely. IMO, however, this was one of the more robust ways I can recall having it explained to me.

Our experience of self is the "thing" we refer to when we discuss a right to self determination. I wouldn't say that our experience in and of itself makes a compelling argument for that right but without it it the notion becomes nonsensical (as do notions of rights at all, granted). As I said, we'd probably need to add more before we started an argument (as far as that argument goes I like the utilitarian argument for well being). If we consider the basis for these rights as the trunk of a tree, and the rights themselves as branches, self determination will be "branching out" shortly after the section of the trunk we call "self". We may want to add something, like self awareness or sapience (and by and large people do add something, which might be why we end up with paradoxical readings on the extreme ends of their justifications, such as the right to self determination being granted to human beings with impaired capacities for experience- or self determination for ants) when discussing this right-but we don't have to. We could begin there.

Some things might actually branch out directly from "self" with no other consideration on that end applied -we do justify some rights on that basis alone (and those generally are the rights we extend to the animal kingdom)...and they're also rights which we still recognize even when we revoke the right to self determination here in the real world. For example, neither livestock nor prisoners have the right to self determination (granted it's generally a temporary and conditional revocation in the case of prisoners) but we do not feel that we have the right to cause either undue harm or pain. We take the experience of self as the basis, weigh that against a value judgement of those experiences (particularly those experiences which we would not wish-to-experience ourselves) and we put a wall between "self" and imposition of pain(or any of those negatively valued experiences) - that wall being a "right".

Now, the reason I offered the above is to demonstrate a way in which a right - having to leverage less in the way of justification (and possibly being part of the justification for the next right)- can be set against some other right which we might consider to be further up that tree. I personally think that the right we recognize in livestock or prisoners re harm/pain/ etc is very very closely situated with the right we recognize when we refer to self determination - so it makes for sticky application. If we consider three sets of rights and their justification (ignoring any others that fall on the spectrum)- and keep in mind, as I said above, I'm not looking to justify them merely to justify how we might weigh them if we take them as a given-

1. experience of self -itself- confers some rights -Livestock, prisoners, etc
2. certain experiences of self confer a more elaborate set of rights -the grumblings of self determination
3. activities that arise from certain experiences of self confer yet another set of rights (specifically with regards to the products of those activities) -the beginnings of property rights

What would it mean if 2 had the ability to abrogate 1? If your right to decide what you wanted to do entailed denying another 1? It would mean that the foundation for the very right you're attempting to leverage has been eroded.

What would it mean if 3 had the ability to abrogate 2 (or 1)?

As you said, if you could "sell" yourself as property but still retain your right to self determination you haven't actually -sold yourself into slavery as property-. If you could, then you would have denied (in this case denied yourself) a right that falls further down the tree (and so impeached your justification for the right to do so in the first place). A similar situation occurs when your right to property, or rights over property would come to odds with that elusive number 1.

Now, we do actually leverage a system similar to this when we consider legal disputes involving conflicts of 3, 2, and 1. Property rights don't extend to what would amount to a denial of the right to self determination (you can't own people-or sell yourself), and the right to self determination doesn't extend to a denial of whatever rights are conferred by "self" (you don't get to waltz around deciding to stab people or torture livestock).

[I know that was obscenely long, but I do enjoy our conversations that ring around this subject-so I couldn't help myself. Take a cleaver to the above, help me whittle it down]

The problem is, in your tree-of-self model, it is the missing connectors - the ones you refer to as "certain experiences" that make your position weak.

First of all, let me be clear on this - self-ownership is not the same as property rights. Your self-ownership is indicated by your right to life. Your self-determination is indicated by your right to freedom. Your property rights are the derivatives of one or both of these two rights.

Now you have a trunk representing "experience of self". You have a branch growing out which indicates "right to life" or self-ownership. You can see another branch indicating "right to freedom" or self-determination. Is self-ownership a branch coming out of self-determination or is it the other way around? Or are both of them connected to the trunk simultaneously and thus neither can hold primacy over the other?

The rest of your argument assumes the first choice - with the justification consisting of "certain experiences" - which could easily be used to justify other positions. For example, i could assume that the model goes like:

Trunk/Subjectivity->First Branch/sentience/right to avoid pain->Derivative branch/Self-awareness/right to life->2nd Derivative/Sapience/right to freedom->3rd derivative/rational judgment/property rights.... etc.

The problem is determining which qualities lead to which rights and why, which is the only way to justify which are more basic and thus cannot be abrogated in favor of the derivatives.

Oh I don't know, I probably wouldn't even use the phrase "ownership of life". I would make the argument that all rights should be derivative of rights on a "lower order" all stemming from the same lines of justification, sure - but I don't see the need to invoke anything other than self determination when referencing suicide, for example. I certainly don't see the need to argue that your life is your property-that you have ownership of it, for example.

Well, I don't see the need to invoke self-determination and consider self-ownership to be the sufficient argument. That in no way tells us which is the more fundamental of the two.

[The Grand Nudger]

Absolutely, if we want to use the "tree model" we'd have to determine which precedes which. But as proof of concept, if you will, it certainly seems like it could be functional (which might explain why we seem to be using something like it). What argument we may offer has no bearing over whether or not this model can be used for comparing two rights- so long as those arguments reference some observation of the world around us (as you have so often mentioned being a requirement for a morality from reason). My position, Genk, is that comparing the number of assumptions for (and underlaying givens) between two rights can determine which would be more fundamental than the other.

You may place this or that above or below on the trunk but regardless of what you place - where, the way you're reaching conclusions on what right takes precedent over another is the same.

I offered a very loose model for a way to place these rights on the tree, in case you missed it

Now, the reason I offered the above is to demonstrate a way in which a right - having to leverage less in the way of justification (and possibly being part of the justification for the next right)

I suppose I should have elaborated, or maybe not wedged it in a wall of text. I figured you might appreciate this one, since it leverages parsimony. Fewer assumptions, a less elaborate argument for justification, and of course we couldn't place a right lower (on that tree- with relation to another) than some other right if our justification for that right contained within it the right we were attempting to slide under.

For example.

If A -right to avoid pain
If A and B -right to self determination
If A and B and C -right to ownership of property (like I said, I'd put a ton of shit in between this one and the last one..but just for illustrative purposes...

Trying to slide the right to self determination under the right to avoid pain (essentially claiming that your right to free-will..if you will, truncated the right to avoid the imposition of pain) would, in essence, be setting one of it's justifications (it's inputs) to "false"..the gate would return false. You wouldn't have the right.

Does this all start with an assumption, of course it does. Remember, I don't have that objectively true morality we hope might one day be discovered. What I have starts with sentience-subjectivity, experience. You're free to start elsewhere, or place rights elsewhere, but we would still be able to compare their placement in such a manner.

I propose that the one thing that all rights have in common is experience. To discuss a right without reference to experience seems non-sensical to me. As Apo mentioned, we can't go out into the forest and find a right. It doesn't seem like we could pick one up and say "this is a right". The very notion is itself a concept which derives -from- the ability to have experiences. As the lowest common denominator of this thing we like to call "rights" I feel that any right which derives solely from this would be foundational. It would be the "lowest order" of rights as we begin to justify them and they would apply to the broadest number of entities.

You know it's probably important to mention that while you questioned me about the assumption of my first choice we aren't questioning each other about rights to begin with. If we're going to assume rights at all (which we seem to have done), where would you begin?

If we could both agree on some common starting place then we could probably come to a more robust conclusion (either way) and we'd certainly reach it much more quickly. Do rights begin at planck time, or are we willing to come a little closer to where we are in having such a discussion? Where we begin is bound to ave a hell of an effect on where we end up (and the roads we take to get there), yeah?

[naimless]

My friend replied that if I were right, we should approve voluntary slavery. If we own our lives, we should be able to sell them, like any other item that we own.

I didn't (and still don't) have a strong argument against this conclusion, but I don't really like the idea of voluntary slavery being morallly acceptable.

So I thought to bring these questions to the forums and to see what other people think of it. Is suicide morally acceptable? Do we own our own lives? And if we do, can we sell them to someone else?

We do have voluntary slavery. It is called getting a job.

I don't believe our universe has an objective morality without a higher power from outside dictating it and if there is one, it is fucked up. Suicide is only morally wrong because the people who want to decide morals are so full of endorphins that they think they are on the same wavelength as the person who commits suicide. It hurts them to realise that the person actually wasn't just being grumpy or a cunt relative to their perception and was genuinely living against their will.

Free will is as illusionary as any god or drug. Our physical neurons decide before our conciousness kicks in and comprehends the morality of the action that just happened to us. And even that morality is decided upon by social norms/conditioning and depends on the environment you are brought up in. One may raise the argument of genetics having a part to play, but considering an environment of 13.7 billion years, the word environment takes it into account.

We can sell our lives. Again that is called getting a job.