(urth) Gene Wolfe Fans Talk Politics (Again)
Adam Thornton
adam at io.com
Wed May 20 11:10:31 PDT 2009
On May 20, 2009, at 6:39 AM, Daniel D Jones wrote:
>
> No, we don't need an exhaustive list. We need simple principles to
> define the
> terms. In short, you're free to do anything you like so long as you
> do no
> harm to me and mine.
If we don't create an exhaustive list, we're going to get an ever-
cascading list of entitlements that become fundamental rights. I
thought that was part of the problem we were trying to solve.
"Do no harm," is also tricky. I mean, every time I breathe, I'm using
up oxygen that you *could* use. If I drive to the grocery store, I'm
removing some gasoline from the global oil supply and thus making it
just a little bit more expensive for a humanitarian aid convoy in
Africa in five years.
Let's say I have a silver mine. You live below it on the mountain. I
do all my mining and waste disposal on land I own, as is my right.
However, my waste disposal makes YOUR well water undrinkable since
water doesn't respect property boundaries. Am I within my rights to
say, "hey, I'm doing lawful things on my own damn property--your well
is not my problem!" ?
"No" harm is clearly not possible. What is the epsilon that is close-
enough-to-zero-for-rights-determination-process, and who gets to
decide it?
Adam
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: smime.p7s
Type: application/pkcs7-signature
Size: 4988 bytes
Desc: not available
URL: <http://lists.urth.net/pipermail/urth-urth.net/attachments/20090520/2e3782e9/attachment-0003.bin>
More information about the Urth
mailing list