[tpaine]

Can you take one of Maddens 'borderline' examples, and refute it with your generalizations?
You say:

-- "without reference to "hard" or borderline cases, the central tenet of libertarianism, ethical individualism, is a good and constructive principle. But like all other theoretical models, it is inherently partial. That is, outside a certain zone of human conduct, it fails to apply, and if forced, will yield negative consequences."

Give us an example of how one of Maddens fails?

[fporretto]

If I wanted to take issue with one of Madden's cases, I would have done so. The "borderline" issues he mentions above aren't true boundary-problem cases, but rather objections from carpers who are unable to grasp that:

1. No matter what rules a society institutes, some people will come to grief through no fault of their own, and:
2. A legal regime premised on ethical individualism is both morally defensible and practically optimum.

If you want to grapple with some really tough cases, David Friedman presents a few in The Machinery Of Freedom. One of my favorites runs like this:

A madman is rampaging through a crowd, taking lives right and left. No one in the crowd is armed, whereas the madman is, heavily. However, there's a loaded rifle in plain sight -- on the front porch of an old curmudgeon whose made it known that he is unwilling for anyone to come onto his property for any reason.

You're a crack shot. Given that rifle, you could drop the madman where he stands. But according to strict property rights theory, you'd be committing a trespass to touch the rifle. What do you do?

Any sane man would blow a razzberry at the property-rights issue and do what obviously needs to be done, secure in the knowledge that no jury in the world would convict him for his trespass. Property-rights purists, for whom nothing justifies an invasion of others' property, would be paralyzed.

As Friedman points out in his study of this case, there are no "trick" answers, for the conditions can always be straitened to foreclose any choices but violating the curmudgeon's property rights or allowing the loss of innocent lives.

Other important boundary-problem issues exist in dealing with children, madmen, abortion, border control, foreign policy and military affairs.

Freedom, Wealth, and Peace,
Francis W. Porretto
Visit the Palace Of Reason: http://palaceofreason.com