Auto-SummaryThe author is presenting a hypothetical scenario where denying someone air (initiating force) is considered "bad" for survival, but the same principle should not apply to food. The author argues that while humans have a right to exist, they do not have the right to take others' belongings by force. The discussion revolves around the ethics of giving abundance to those in need versus the use of force to take from others.
Please note that this isn't my argument. I am not defending the position. I am repeating, to the best of my ability, a position I have read about. What I need you to do is to provide me with solid answers in the form of a counter argument so that I don't end up holding what would be an uncomfortable position.
It follows then that we "ought to" breath air. Is it "good" for us.
Yes, this follows. How does it follow that it is the responsibility of one human to provide air to another human, and if he fails to do so, he may rightfully be killed? Lay the chain of reasoning out for us.
I said nothing about "he may rightfully be killed". That invention is yours and doesn't appear in the author's position even by extrapolation. Therefore, I cannot lay out a chain of reasoning to defend it. Nor would I want to.
Then it also follows that choking someone (denying them air) is "bad" since it is necessary for life.
Choking someone is clearly an initiation of force. This is what I was getting at when I asked if your definition of "deny" involved action rather than passivity -- are you seizing bread he already has, or preventing him from baking his own, etc.
Yes, that is very easy to understand and easy to agree with.
Think of an area underwater where there are lots of scuba divers and a person's regulator goes haywire.
Would it be just or "good" to let them die from asphyxiation?
"Hey buddy, I don't have to help you. Can't you see I just came down and I am busy looking at some coral?"
I swim away and continue taking pretty pictures of the coral while he dies.
Bad analogy. You can do better than that.
Agreed. The author doesn't use analogies to make his point(s). I pulled that one out of my ass and it was the best I could do off the top of my head.
First, swimming underwater breathing compressed air is not the normal state of existence for humans. It is a temporary activity undertaken voluntarily by humans who know up front the risks associated with it.
The fact that scuba diving is a voluntary action has relevance to some degree but that doesn't address the primary thrust of the argument. One could say that deciding to continue to exist is also a voluntary action because living can be hard work.
Second, humans do not need to swim underwater breathing compressed air in order to survive. It is done mainly for recreation (i.e. hang gliding, mountain climbing and other risky leisure activities) or to gather knowledge non-essential to the business of survival day to day. Note how many billions of humans lived long and fulfilling lives before the invention of SCUBA gear.
Indeed. And quite beside the point. The issue is survival, period.
Third, the situation you describe certainly fits the definition of an emergency. As I have already pointed out, the ethics of emergencies are not a rational base on which to design the rules governing human interaction. They are by definition exceptions to the rule.
Yes, and that is what makes it a poor analogy. It contains the fallacy of "hard cases". And we both know hard cases make bad law. But it shouldn't be very hard to understand the premise of the argument. My analogy is a poor one but that alone doesn't destroy nor defeat the premise.
I "denied" him air. It is in that sense that I mean 'deny'.
You did not deny him air. There's plenty of air at the surface. You denied him your air. The two concepts are not equivalent.
True, the two concepts are not exactly equivalent. But since the only air that was readily available to him was mine and I decided not to give him any I did deny him air, even though the air was in my possession.
Do you think Congress should pass a law requiring all scuba divers to donate air to other scuba divers? What should be the penalty for failing to do so? How is a court to decide whether the "donater" had enough air on hand at the time to support both divers? What if during the process another diver's regulator malfunctions? Is he to supply air for all three of them?
This is getting ahead of the argument. I am only on page three.  Seriously though, the application of any law and the sense of justice it is derived from are two separate, albeit related, issues. We are only considering what justice requires, not the application of it.
Mere existence distorts the issue I think.
In what way? I see no distortion. Elaborate, please.
In the sense that the qualifier 'mere' could mean small, slight, of relative unimportance.
If you hold that the a starving human has a rightful claim on the belongings of other humans, ultimately you are saying nothing more than that if there is more than one human, no human has the right to be free. Work it backwards down the chain of logic to verify this for yourself -- I am exercising no distortion here, merely compressing a lengthy chain of logic.
In some sense yes. But others would say your definition of 'freedom' is harsh in the sense that it violates what justice requires. Your definiton could be considered extreme. That is the premise and the position of the author. I too find it repugnant. Which is why I turned to you for help. 
All of us have the right to exist. Take one --
Not so. All of us have the right to take those actions we judge to be required to continue and further our existence without the forcible interference of other humans. Or, to put it another way, we have the right to attempt to continue to exist. That is not the same thing at all.
This may be but it appears to be hair splitting and is irrelevant to the issue at hand. Perhaps I am confused about it. Let's focus on the major premise before tackling tangential ones.
All of us have the right to exist. Take two --
Except, apparently, those of us who vigorously resist having our belongings forcibly seized from us to be given to others. In other words -- to refer to the quote -- if all of us have the right to exist, all of us have the right to exist without giving a dime to a beggar.
Who said we didn't have that right? Certainly not the author and certainly not me. I think you have extrapolated a windmill there.
Do we have the right to retain our possessions?
Yes, obviously.
Do we have the right to retain our possessions and withhold them from a starving beggar?
Again, inarguably, yes, obviously.
Can we withhold those possessions from the beggar and not violate what justice requires?
This is the issue.
But that says nothing about whether giving of our abundance would cause our existence to cease.
Agreed. Giving part of an abundance of my belongings will likely not lessen the odds of my continued survival and the survival of my family and friends by very much if at all. This is why throughout recorded history humans on the whole normally choose to voluntarily assist other humans who are in desperate straits.
Do you then agree that giving of an abundance of your belongings to humans beings is a good thing to do?
But that is not what is under discussion. We are discussing the acceptability of seizing by force the belongings of one human to transfer them to another human -- and if the owner resists strongly enough, he ends up dead.
Not the same thing at all. Not even close.
I have said absolutely nothing about force in so far as the author's premise is concerned. And neither did he. It is most decidedly not what we are discussing.
I know what you are driving at though and I couldn't agree with you more. But the author's point is that withholding your abundant goods from another in dire straits constitutes a violation of justice.
Try to stick to the points if you can. It is the only way you can help me figure this out. You are the only person I can turn to that I trust has the intelligence and the will to do it.
Thanks for taking the time to respond.
MM
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