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rational thinker
02-05-2009, 05:44 AM
I'm enjoying this volume so far but I'm kind of confused when he speaks about Property in depth in Chapter V. How exactly does nature limit each of us to an equitable share of property, if that is what he is trying to get at? And how exactly does the advent of money affect those natural limits? I mean, why would John Locke support the invention of money despite the fact that it destabilizes the equitable balance that nature establishes for individuals' acquisition of property?

rational thinker
02-05-2009, 07:00 AM
bump

newbitech
02-05-2009, 07:09 AM
can you quote the part that talks about "nature limit each of us to an equitable share of property"? Please.

My understanding is that property, and private property are born from labor. This means that the part of the property that becomes valuable is the part of land that produces food, graze land, water, shelter. The limit would therefor be on the population. As societies grow up around the valuable land, the resource becomes limited in terms of what each parcel can output. 1 acre of land at 100% utilization with 100% maximum technology applied will provide for (n)number of people. This sets the upper bound of value. The function of the land can be set to a value of 1 dollar, 1 bead, 1 ounce of gold etc... We can increase the value of our "money" by working harder, working smarter, or dividing up equally the product of the total sum of land.


"I think it will be but a very modest computation to say, that of the products of the earth useful to the life of man, nine-tenths are the effects of labour."
http://libertyonline.hypermall.com/Locke/second/second-frame.html

does that help?

Uncle Emanuel Watkins
02-05-2009, 05:48 PM
I'm enjoying this volume so far but I'm kind of confused when he speaks about Property in depth in Chapter V. How exactly does nature limit each of us to an equitable share of property, if that is what he is trying to get at? And how exactly does the advent of money affect those natural limits? I mean, why would John Locke support the invention of money despite the fact that it destabilizes the equitable balance that nature establishes for individuals' acquisition of property?

Think of an equitable share of property as that which is self-evident and unalienable. This is how the truth narrowed down to manifest itself as a natural law before there was the advent of money. Money is just a tax invented to cheat some people out of what was unalienably theres as a natural right while it benefitted others as a consequence. As apposed to a tithe which was 10% of wages given to orphans and widows.
Understanding John-Locke is understanding how natural science worked during his day. There was no such thing yet as the social sciences or of the concept of theory. An English person during the time of Sir Isaac Newton would have had to be insane to question his natural laws because such conclusions reduced down to an undeniable conclusion while the explanation given of it, the analysis, was impossible to misunderstand (linquistics).
Rousseau moved people by how he wrote the world's best political essays in his spare time while John-Locke was no less significant in how he narrowed down truths to an unalienable, self-evident, natural conclusion.

Xenophage
02-06-2009, 03:25 AM
I don't understand the negative connotations you are ascribing to money.

Define money.

Uncle Emanuel Watkins
02-06-2009, 11:39 AM
I don't understand the negative connotations you are ascribing to money.

Define money.

Watchman Nee, a Christian minister in an over crowded China, once made the paradoxical statement that God's purpose is to give each and every one of us twice what we need.
Scientifically speaking, John Locke makes less of a paradoxical statement that each and every one of us owns an equal amount of property. To rob us of this property, money was invented as the first tax. Accordingly, a tax is invented with the purpose of cheating some for the benefit of others. The advent of money (tax) allowed tyranny to violate the natural law that we are born into this world as equal property owners.
The idea is that reality manifests itself as an illusion. While it might appear that we don't own the land, the natural law stating that we do will alway win out regardless. The real power is in what the truth expresses (Civil-Purpose) and not in what one corruptly does once that truth is known (legal-precedence).
So, while it may seem like mankind hasn't the resources for everyone to be happy, the natural law, that which is self-evident and unalienably a natural-right, states that the Civil-Purpose for people to be content will always supercede the legal-precedence they they should be free, responsible and equal.

Xenophage
02-06-2009, 02:51 PM
Watchman Nee, a Christian minister in an over crowded China, once made the paradoxical statement that God's purpose is to give each and every one of us twice what we need.
Scientifically speaking, John Locke makes less of a paradoxical statement that each and every one of us owns an equal amount of property. To rob us of this property, money was invented as the first tax. Accordingly, a tax is invented with the purpose of cheating some for the benefit of others. The advent of money (tax) allowed tyranny to violate the natural law that we are born into this world as equal property owners.
The idea is that reality manifests itself as an illusion. While it might appear that we don't own the land, the natural law stating that we do will alway win out regardless. The real power is in what the truth expresses (Civil-Purpose) and not in what one corruptly does once that truth is known (legal-precedence).
So, while it may seem like mankind hasn't the resources for everyone to be happy, the natural law, that which is self-evident and unalienably a natural-right, states that the Civil-Purpose for people to be content will always supercede the legal-precedence they they should be free, responsible and equal.

I won't debate your interpretation of Locke, but that's a bunch of confused, logically flimsy bullshit. Anyhow, you didn't answer my question: What is money?

Uncle Emanuel Watkins
02-06-2009, 03:47 PM
I won't debate your interpretation of Locke, but that's a bunch of confused, logically flimsy bullshit. Anyhow, you didn't answer my question: What is money?

"Bunch of confused, logically flimsy bullshit?" The use of logic had actually fallen out of favor during the time of John Locke and our Founding-Fathers because of how Gallileo was persecuted for questioning the mighty Aristotle.

newbitech
02-06-2009, 05:04 PM
Scientifically speaking, John Locke makes less of a paradoxical statement that each and every one of us owns an equal amount of property.


The use of logic had actually fallen out of favor during the time of John Locke and our Founding-Fathers because of how Gallileo was persecuted for questioning the mighty Aristotle.

Can you cite phrases from the source literature we are discussing? I am not sure I agree with anything you are saying.

please cite some sources or something. I don't think that money was created as a tax. I also don't think that everyone naturally has an equal share of property. I think that Locke was more interested in showing how land is valued through labor in this particular chapter. Also, some land is more properous than others because nature gave a more generous offering to those people working that land. Also, even though that land is more valuable, it may not be worth a penny if the fruits are shared equally with those who do not the labor.

Gallileo
(15 February 1564[2] – 8 January 1642)

John Locke
29 August 1632 – 28 October 1704

dr. hfn
02-06-2009, 05:38 PM
money is a type of currency used by state level societies, im an anthropologist

Uncle Emanuel Watkins
02-07-2009, 04:31 PM
money is a type of currency used by state level societies, im an anthropologist

Indeed, there is an official definition of what money is. But what is money really? I mean, you didn't spend lots of money on an education to be taught horseshit and I'm not saying anthropology is.
What I'm saying is that anthropology and the social sciences did not exist during the time of John Locke. Neither did the concept of theory as a way to narrow down evidence to juxtapose it with other theoretical conclusions. Natural law conclusions, to the contrary, existed outright as the ultimate truth narrowed down to the extent that they could not be denied while scientists developed the field of linguistics to make sure that an analysis of the narrowed conclusion could be understood.

Uncle Emanuel Watkins
02-07-2009, 05:27 PM
Can you cite phrases from the source literature we are discussing? I am not sure I agree with anything you are saying.

please cite some sources or something. I don't think that money was created as a tax. I also don't think that everyone naturally has an equal share of property. I think that Locke was more interested in showing how land is valued through labor in this particular chapter. Also, some land is more properous than others because nature gave a more generous offering to those people working that land. Also, even though that land is more valuable, it may not be worth a penny if the fruits are shared equally with those who do not the labor.

Gallileo
(15 February 1564[2] – 8 January 1642)

John Locke
29 August 1632 – 28 October 1704


Socrates developed "inductive reasoning."
http://www.abu.nb.ca/Courses/GrPhil/Socrates.htm

Plato developed "best principle statements."
http://www.wsu.edu/~dee/GREECE/ALLEGORY.HTM

Aristotle developed "deductive reasoning" as the way to arrive at first principles and he developed the concept of the "four causes."
http://faculty.washington.edu/smcohen/433/arintro.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Four_causes

Galileo wrote a Platonic dialogue when challenging Aristotle's logic that concluded the earth was geocentrically positioned at the center of the universe.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dialogue_Concerning_the_Two_Chief_World_Systems

When questioning in meditation what was rational after Galileo's persecution by the Catholic Chruch, Descartes did not conclude with the use of logic, which by that time had fallen out of favor, but with the conclusion of "Cogito, ergo sum;" or, "I think therefore I am," which was actually a Platonic best principled statement.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cogito_ergo_sum

Spinoza starts the weeding of metaphysics from science by cutting out the final cause from Aristotle's four causes.
http://oregonstate.edu/instruct/phl302/distance/spinoza/comment1.html

David Hume continues the weeding of metaphysics from science by reestablishing the need for empirical science (Aristotle was an empirical scientist).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Empiricism

Immanual Kant, the father of modern epistemology, opens up the door to the social sciences by focussing on the mind understanding the conclusion rather than on the truth of it. This asked the question of whether the human mind can be depended on when interpretting the truth.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Immanuel_Kant

Okay, logic has not always been in favor as a result of Galileo's persecuation by the "natural philosophers" -- scientists who had to be Catholic. As logic fell out of favor, so would have Aristotle's empiricism which never really quite caught hold in Western Europe. Aristotle wasn't introduced to Western Europe and the Catholic Church until the twelth centeruy.
Modern science exists as a result of past philosophers of science weeding out Catholic church dogma under the guise that they were weeding out metaphysics.

This is why natural-law science is so difficult to understand. Such a scientific method predates theoretical science while one has to understand that the social sciences had yet to be developed at that time.