A poor argument against hernia repair (and libertarianism) Saturday, March 20, 2010
I have no experience with hernia repair surgery but I understand that one possible outcome of such syrgery is iatrogenic death due to medical errors, an adverse reaction to anaesthesia or other complications. Still, no sane person would claim that the risk of death implies that undergoing hernia repair surgery is actually a bad idea.All kinds of activities carry with them the risk that something bad might happen. Driving a car, taking out a mortgage, getting married, flying in an airplane, working with powertools, becoming pregnant and so on all involve the possibility of a bad outcome. But no sensible person points out that a worst case scenario exists as though the existence of a worst case scenario were proof that any of these activities was an inherently bad idea.
And yet I've heard plenty of people who otherwise seem quite sane make such claims as
"The problem with libertarians is that they want to eliminate the welfare system and leave poor people to a life of poverty."and
"Absent laws forbidding prostitution, there would be nothing to prevent naive women from being victimized."I could cite similar examples, but they are all in the same vain.
These sorts of claims are among the most perplexing objections that a libertarian might respond to because it's hard to know where to even begin. There is overwhelming evidence that welfare states contribute to chronic poverty and that laws forbidding prostitution increase the risk of naive women being victimized. But this is all really beside the point. No matter what the actual effects of welfare states and vice laws may be, a libertarian world would still have worst cases. But it's a non-sequitur to suggest that because a worst case can be named, libertarianism is inferior to some alternative.
Labels: arguments, fallacies, libertarian theory
[ posted by James @ 9:43 PM | | Digg this! | del.icio.us | Permanent link | links to this post ]
1 Comments:
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At Sun Mar 21, 09:56:00 PM EDT,
Mattheus said...
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James,
If you get,
"You might have chaos in anarchy!"
Reply with,
"You might have Stalin in government!"
