Murder To Be Arbitrarily Determined
Recently I argued that communistic policy in China killed 40 million people. Dan argued that it was in fact an interaction between policy and ‘natural disasters’. In response I argued that any deaths caused by the interaction are still the responsibly of the communists since their policy created the famine that allowed the interaction to kill more people.
Dan responded with this:
Fallacy of the single cause. If you’re conceding that it is an interaction, I could just as easily pick out one of the other variables to take all the blame. It’s an arbitrary designation.
This response borders on absurdity. Allow me to illustrate.
Let us suppose that I were to forcibly move Dan into a firing range and lock the door so that he could not leave. Let us further suppose that I begin target practice firing my gun at the targets at the end of the range. Halfway through the session several of my rounds unintentionally hit Dan as he is trying to get out of the way of my gunfire. He drops to the floor with a thud and I run to him.
As I approach I can hear his breath is labored he has lost a lot of blood. It’s obvious he is going to die in the next couple of minutes. I say to him “Dan it looks like I’m responsible for your death since I forced you into the gun range and locked the door so you could not get out’.
With just a slight whisper Dan responds, “Actually it was an interaction. There is no way we can determine if the cause of my death was locking me in the shooting range or you unintentionally shooting me with your gun.”
“But Dan, even though I did not directly mean to kill you, surely you would agree that forcing and locking you in the firing range while I practice my marksmanship resulted in your death”
Dan’s eyes are starting to close and almost all of his life has leaked out of him. He is turning pallid and is moments from the great beyond. But upon hearing my last statement some vigor returns and he musters all of his remaining strength uttering with resolve, “Fallacy of the single cause. If you’re conceding an interaction, I could just as easily pick you accidently shooting me as the cause of my death. The cause of my death is arbitrarily determined.”
With that Dan’s body goes limp and his soul returns to his secularist god.
When the police came they arrested me even after I explained to them that while it might have been my fault, because of the interaction it’s hopelessly confounded and fault can not be determined. Oddly they did not find my argument compelling and still charged me with murder. Idiots.
The interaction between communistic policy and ‘natural disaster’ makes it impossible to know what caused the millions upon millions of deaths. Simply because the communistic policy forced the citizenry into a susceptibility towards natural disaster does not mean it’s the policies fault when that that susceptibility translates into death. For all we know had China implemented free market policies instead of communistic policy the ‘natural disasters’ still would of caused of millions upon millions of deaths. This interaction hopelessly confounds the cause and for that reason responsibility can not be determined.
Stupid people might argue the communist policies which produced the insufficient harvest prior to the ‘natural disasters’ is to blame for any deaths that might occur from the interaction since crop destruction from the ‘natural disasters’ would have been ameliorated by surpluses in a non-communist policy. In fact I was one of those morons. However, thanks to Dan, I know now that we can not blame policies that resulted in insufficient food to feed a population as the cause of the famine, incidentally a word that characters instances where there is insufficient food to feed a population, because later on, ‘natural disasters’ destroyed crops as well. Intelligent people know that this interaction makes it impossible to determine the blame for the millions of people that starved to death.
Or in the dying words of Dan, “the cause of death is arbitrarily determined”.
April 4th, 2008 at 6:42 pm
So let me get this straight: you cause all of the factors that contribute to my death? For this metaphor to remotely work for you, you would have to be suggesting that communistic policy caused a drought, national disunity and humiliation at the hands of colonial powers lasting over the ~80 years before communism was implemented, and non-mendelian biological and agricultural ideas.
I’ll try to help you out so your metaphor has the hypothetical possibility of working. There has to be exactly -one- person who is -intentionally- causing my death by locking me next to the targets, and another person who is -accidentally- shooting me at the firing range. You could then try to argue that -by my reasoning- the locker is not -entirely- responsible for my death because the person who accidentally shot me also has some responsibility. I don’t see this as a particularly incisive attack against my position (the shooter could still be charged with reckless manslaughter for firing at the targets while I was in the firing range, even if he wasn’t intending to shoot me), but unfortunately the argument still falls apart because the weight of evidence is against you if you are trying to argue that communist policy was set in place with the -intention- to kill 40 million people.
I don’t understand why you are still continuing this with ever more desperate and disjointed hyperbole, given that you already conceded the argument when you admitted an interaction was required.
April 4th, 2008 at 7:32 pm
Actually, according to your argument, the only thing I could be charged with is false imprisonment. The cause of your death is hopelessly confounded.
April 4th, 2008 at 9:22 pm
I accept that communism was one of many critical components, just as in the example I made above either the locker or the shooter would be one of two critical components. Your objection is not a problem for my argument because I never argued for lack of culpability. My argument was that the blame could be distributed between numerous different factors, all of which were necessary for death to occur on the scale it did.
If all you can do is set up the strawman of someone trying to argue that communism deserves -none- of the blame, then go ahead knock that strawman down. But in regards to the argument I am actually making, you should just freaking forfeit, because if a strawman is the best you can do you have lost. Stop hiding your tree of life in a weird part of the map just to drag things out - it’s bad sportsmanship.
April 4th, 2008 at 11:13 pm
Sigh. Its not a strawman. You argue an interaction that makes it impossible to determine cause, and in turn culpability. Unless of course you are claiming culpability can be determined even if cause can not be.
Man up to your claims or don’t make them. Sheesh.
April 5th, 2008 at 11:58 am
My argument was that there are multiple causes. I went back and looked over our arguments, and I never said that cause was indeterminable. Interaction is not the same as indeterminability. These are two very different things.
“my position that non-Mendelian agricultural and biological ideas (by the time of the Great Leap Forward, long discredited by the scientific consensus), drought, and communism were all important factors contributing to massive death”
“Mao’s deep distrust of intellectuals and faith in the power of the mass mobilisation of peasants led him to order this massive countrywide effort without consulting expert opinion.” - me quoting wikipedia
“communistic policy… a drought, national disunity and humiliation at the hands of colonial powers lasting over the ~80 years before communism was implemented, and non-mendelian biological and agricultural ideas.”
I did however find this gem of a quote from Steve, when he was trying to side-step having to explain deaths that occurred under a capitalist system: “Its up in the air who is to blame for these deaths”. Sorry Steve, but -you’re- the only one who took the strong position that blame is indeterminable. Hypocrite.
Go ahead and go back and look. I never said that cause was totally indeterminable, just that it involved multiple factors, and that trying to pick out -one- of them to take -all- the blame and -ignoring- the rest isn’t sensible.
Man up to the fact that you’ve lost or put forward an argument that doesn’t require making stuff up about my position.
April 5th, 2008 at 1:13 pm
Would I be wrong in reading this to mean that blame can’t be determined? That culpability determination is arbitrary? You seem to be saying that by, you know, saying that.
April 5th, 2008 at 4:24 pm
Arbitrary designation is a necessary consequence of exclusive blame.
April 5th, 2008 at 4:26 pm
That was my argument, trying to make the point that exclusive blame leads to an unacceptable outcome (arbitrary choice).
Very different from praising the virtues of arbitrary choice.
April 5th, 2008 at 6:46 pm
So then the analogy holds. One can not be blamed when arbitrary designation occurs. You are saying I should be charged with murder because its indeterminant as to the cause of your death.
April 5th, 2008 at 7:04 pm
Sorry Steve, but you are the one wanting to make an arbitrary designation.
I am the one wanting to say that blame should be distributed out between all factors. My position regarding communism is consistent with the position that the cause of death is not indeterminate, but quite clear: both the shooter and the locker had some of the responsibility. Both would at least be guilty of manslaughter, and possibly murder, depending on the country and jurisdiction.
You want to put all the blame in the hands of the shooter and let the locker get off scot-free. That is the only difference between us.
April 5th, 2008 at 7:47 pm
To clarify my argument: “A AND C (single causative variable AND the concession that interaction is required) leads to B (arbitrary designations are necessary). B is false (arbitrary designations are unnecessary), therefore A is false (your position is stupid).”
Even if I wanted to indulge your imaginary belief that I am saying causality isn’t conclusively determinable, my argument would still be okay. Given that I am, unlike you, not burdened by the ridiculous position that that blame must be exclusively placed in a single factor, blame can still be assigned objectively. For example:
“In Summers the plaintiff, Charles A. Summers, accompanied defendants Tice and Simonson on a quail hunt. Plaintiff advanced ahead of the defendants up a hill, creating a triangle among the three men, with plaintiff front and center. The view of both defendants with respect to Summers was unobstructed, and both defendants knew his location, 75 yards from each of them. A quail flew to a 10 foot elevation above the plaintiff’s head (approximately four feet higher than the plaintiff’s head), both defendants shot at the quail, and bird shot struck plaintiff in his right eye and another in his upper lip. Plaintiff sued both defendants for personal injuries. At trial it was established that each of two (2) pellets had caused the injuries to plaintiff’s lip and eye, respectively, and both might have been discharged from one weapon (defendant) or each defendant contributed one of the injuring pellets. The trial court found that the defendants were negligent (i.e., that when they discharged their weapons they did not do so with ordinary prudence), and that the plaintiff was not contributorily negligent.”
April 5th, 2008 at 8:59 pm
You technically are not arguing for blame distribution since the interaction make it impossible to determine blame. Or are you saying that the interaction does not obscure culpability.