natural law

can anybody help me...?
i am being asked to : analyse the natural law tradition and the arguments for and against natural law.

ClivsGirl,

Are you a student ? The Internet and Libraries are
the best resources to get information about "natural law" and "positive law", and the arguments and debates for and against these kinds of "law". You have to be"street smart" . Check on a book ," Doing ethics in a diverse world" by Robert Traer. Are you looking at a legal or philosophical viewpoints ?

Type" natural law" or "Doing ethics in a diverse world", there are many websites on these subjects.

Check in the Internet, there is a PDF on " Natural Law and Natural Rights "

There is a bibliography on these subjects on natural and postive laws. Good luck in your research.

>1 ClivsGirl:

Natural Law or The Natural Order of Things, has been traditionally defined by philosophers and theologians (i.e, the Greeks, Romans, Church Fathers, Scholastics, etc...) as the rule of conduct given to humankind by a Creator in the constitution of the NATURE of which God has given us.

According to St. Thomas, the natural law is "nothing else than the rational creatures participation in the ETERNAL LAW. The eternal law is God's wisdom..."

> 3.
yes exactly, well put.
the interesting thing, for me at least, is the Greek/Roman forumlations relationship to the Christian. There's definitely a lot of overlap, someone like Seneca speaks remarkably like a Christian sometime when he touchs on natural law issues. Particularly when speaking of providence, which is of course a divine providence. But there are also important differences that are also of note. One of these is the place of NATURE. Christians (gross generalization coming up) largely pass over material nature when they speak of natural law. the stoics, on the other hand poured their energies into understanding and theorizing upon nature in a much more scientific manner. Put it this way. Read a treatise by a Christian on Natural law and it reads like a treatise on metaphysics, read a Stoic treatise and reads like an exercise in physics as it is pitched on the level of scientific discourse.

We ordinarily think of law as a rule - a command or a
or a prohibition - which should be obeyed and disobeyed. Both alternatives are usually present. Though the duty or obligation should be no moral significance to discharging this duty if the law could not be violated. However, the laws of nature (natural laws ) which the scientists tries to discover do not have this characteristic. They are inviolable. The so-called law of gravitation - Newton's three laws of motion cannot be disobeyed. It is known that scientists may disagree about the truth of any formulation of a natural law, but if the formulation is valid, then the general rule of behaviour is supposed to contain without any doubt or exception. If doubts are discovered, they are not interpreted as instances of disobedience, but rather as cases to which the law does not apply.The laws of motion is treated as inviolable by those who think it factual or true. This is an aspect of a scientific or natural law.

The rules of any art or "anything" may be violated, either with no intentions or intentions. Take for example, grammatical errors can be made by those ignorant of (grammatical) rules or by those who wish not to follow the rules or not bothered by the rules.

Montesquieu writes, " Laws, in their most significance are the neccessary relations arising from the nature of things." He pointed out that all beings have their laws. Law operates differently within the boundary of physical nature and in the boundary of intelligent beings - man or human.Man does not conform to (its laws) so exactly as the physical world.
This came about that the particular intelligent beings are of a finite nature, and definetly subject to making errors.

The clear division between the laws of nature and the laws of human conduct are

1) the laws of nature - may apply to all things; the laws of human conduct are addressed to man only.

2) the laws of nature - being inviolable, state the neccessities of behaviour; the laws of human conduct ,being violable,imply freedom in those to whom they are addressed.

The laws of nature discovered by the scientist and the rules of conduct instituted by the lawmaker are general rather than specific.Their generality leads to
jurisprudence, the basis for diffferentiating rules of law from particular decisions or decrees.

The convict would, therefore,always be a "criminal", a man who takes the law into his own hands, and uses force to gain his ends. Hobbes quoted, "A man may be justified in using force,only to repel force used against him,and then only in defense of his life."
This is permitted by the laws of nature to do so. However, it does not allow to decide which laws enacted by his (human) rights he shall obey or disobey.

Read Further: Books by Aquinas, Kant,Hobbes,. Spinoza,Locke,Rousseau.

>5 skoobdo:. skoobdo, speaks of a 'clear division' between the laws of nature and the laws of human conduct. i think its necessary to point out that this 'clear division' is only a relatively recent formulation in the west. For stoic philosophy (and in some respects for CHristian theology), the laws of nature were precisely the laws of human conduct. For the Stoics the job of philosophy was to place oneself in harmony with the laws of nature, to play its inexorable game with open eyes and willingly. THus Epictetus tells us only idots resent illness and death as they are Nature's decree

Gierke, Natural Law and the Theory of Society
Tuck, Natural Rights Theories
Haakonssen, Natural Law and Moral Philosophy
Hochstrasser, Natural Law Theories in the Early Enlightenment

As is so often the case, we seem to be a bit confused by terminology. The term “natural law” means many things to many people, as evidenced in this discussion. When this is the case, I usually recommend dropping the term per se and replacing it with a term or expression that is more precise: I propose that we refer to the “laws” that govern the physical universe (such as gravitation and entropy) as PHYSICAL LAW, and to the “laws” that are created by humans regarding behavior, property, etc. as HUMAN LAW. For those who believe that a supernatural realm exists and is populated by a supernatural being who gives orders, I suppose we could use the term “GOD’S LAW”, however, since there is no credible evidence to support the claim that anything supernatural at all exists, it does not seem worth discussing.

So let’s settle on these:

PHYSICAL LAW: the principles which can be inferred from careful observation of the physical universe. These laws would exist even if humans did not.

HUMAN LAW: the binding principles created by humans to regulate such matters as human behavior and property within a given population. Obviously, if there were no humans, there would be no human law.

So we got ourselves PHYSICAL LAW and HUMAN LAW and “GOD’S LAW” (but mostly for simpletons ).

I'm glad that's taken care of!

Oh but wait, what about these other laws ... which also result from the mind?

Those of logic/mathematics?

Somehow the structure of the universe itself seems to reflect these! Isn't it interesting, for example, that newly discovered formulations in mathematics turn out to describe, many years later, phenomena in physics which had previously been unknown? A terminologically confused mind may then wonder: "Why should how the universe works reflect some abstract laws of our imagination?"

So which (PHYSICAL LAW, HUMAN LAW or “GOD’S LAW”) would these abstract logical/mathematical "objects" follow?

Hmm... Thinking out loud here...

Let’s say that I look out the window into my back yard and there are three elephants there. I look to my front yard, and there are two elephants there. I say to my wife, “We seem to have five elephants today.” Is the presence of the elephants in any way being actively affected by mathematics since I can clearly make a mathematical statement about them?. No. In this case, mathematics is serving as an abstract description of one aspect of a physical reality. When I expressed the number of elephants as a sum, I used a mathematical (grammatical) principle to shorten or summarize the information. In this case, it seems clear that mathematics is a sophisticated generalizing language with a rigorous grammar (addition in this case) that we use to describe nature. Just because we can also use mathematics to make an accurate similar statement about three pancakes and two pancakes does not make it a law much in the way that being able to describe both my car and my socks as "red" does not make the English language a law. Math is simply a method of description that we humans have developed for describing nature, especially where quantity in all its forms is involved.

Perhaps the most amazing thing about mathematics is that it can be used to make predictions, such as, “If I sell one of my elephants to Jane who will come and take it away, I will have four elephants left.”

To put it another way, mathematics is a set of symbols (numbers) and rules (operators) that enable us to describe physical reality without having to manipulate the physical objects themselves (elephants in this case).

In short, mathematics is not law; it is language, and it would not exist if we humans did not exist. Physical reality would go on, for instance, in one herd of elephants when one elephant died, thus changing the ratio of that herd to all other herds, but none of this would be caused by or governed by mathematics. On the other hand, the elephant would die as a result of physical laws which can, of course, be described with mathematics.

Anyway, I promise never to mention elephants again.

Let me ask, when the Earth orbits the Sun, is it mathematics that determines the orbital path, or is the path determined by physical properties interacting, physical properties which we find it convenient to describe with math?

Ray

p.s., In other words, mathematics is a language mainly used to DESCRIBE physical law and also sometimes to SPECIFY human law (e.g., you will pay an 8% sales tax). :-)

Ray

Interesting!

Now, to keep with the “confused by terminology” theme, let’s look at whether one of us is speaking of apples and another one of oranges ... (or elephants).

I think I understand what you are trying to say, Ray, but unfortunately, the odd implications of logical/mathematical laws is not resolved by stating the obvious ... namely that mathematics deals with abstractions --- or, to put it less succinctly, --- that it’s “a set of symbols (numbers) and rules (operators) that enable us to describe physical reality without having to manipulate the physical objects themselves (elephants in this case).”

We could add that English is... “a set of symbols (words) and (grammatical) rules that enable us to describe physical reality without having to manipulate the physical objects themselves (elephants in this case) ... It’s all quite fascinating really and oh so relevant unless the actual question is whether the mental constructs of logic/mathematics work according to some independent set of objective laws, with mathematical statements “discovered”, not capriciously posited (as can very well happen for sentences in English).

And there is no real need to proclaim that ... “mathematics is not law”. It’s like saying: ”Swahili is not law”. Of course it’s not. “Math is not law” doesn’t even make sense.

But none of this is what we are talking about. Imagine for example that the grammatical rules of Swahili were such that they a priori arose as necessary (and that they also happened to perfectly reflect the behaviour of quantum subatomic particles). That would be somewhat interesting, don’t you think?

Something called “String Theory”, to take an example, has been the rage in physics lately. It’s a purely logical construct built according to abstract principles. And it purports to explain the structure of everything in many more dimensions than, beyond observable, almost humanly conceivable.

And something like string theory does NOT DESCRIBE the observable physical universe but purports to REVEAL the principles behind the observable universe ... something done by mathematical DISCOVERY.

You write: “In counting five elephants mathematics is serving as an abstract description of one aspect of a physical reality.”

Well, that is simply incorrect, Ray. It’s abstract all-right but certainly not a “description” of physical reality. Which aspect of physical reality did the number five describe in your elephant example? Point it out to yourself. See, the number five doesn’t exist to be observed in elephants ... nor platypoda, unicorns, whatever. There are simply such things to ever be seen, to then be shortened and summarised by grammatical principles. Numbers are immaterial abstractions posited by the mind.

And numbers ... strangely ... do obey laws. These are neither physical, nor human nor that of any of the Gods described in primitive Abrahamic mythologies. But mathematics and logic do seem to follow some kind of law.

Now, when the Earth orbits the Sun the path can indeed be understood as physical properties interacting ... an understanding most famously described in Newton’s "Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy". But interestingly Newton himself felt that he did not understand how the physical properties interacted and, though the math pointed to it, considered some inexplicable action at a distance as a faulty explanation.

One could of course insist that Newton understood the interaction of physical properties and then used math to describe them. But just imagine, for argument's sake, that it was exactly the other way around and that Newton first discovered calculus and then saw that the behaviour of the spheres happened to exactly fit his and Leibnitz’s abstract mathematical models?

Would you insist that there exist no such thing as a law in mathematics, as it is merely something used to DESCRIBE physical phenomena?

Love the discussion here. Hope it's of help to the OP!

I'll note quickly something that I think embraces both RaymondGrey's and askar's points about math. My view is that math is about relationships, and it uses numerals & operations to model those relationships. The relationships are physical laws (most of the time? all the time?), the numerals & functions are language. In this sense, it's both true and false to equate math with law, or conversely, to make a distinction between them.

Perhaps we need another distinction in terminology between these conceptions of math.

You folks have given me a lot to think about. I'll be back in a couple of days after I finish up something I'm helping one of my kids with, probably to acknowledge that we do seem to be misunderstanding each other, but also to grant that your points are excellent and that I am learning a lot from you. Thursday or Friday...

Ray

My trip to Boston to help out one of my children has been postponed, so I’m back. :-)

Looking back at the comments regarding my posts, I came to realize that I had been very careless in stating and arguing for my ideas. It will probably take me several posts to fix this. I begin here, not with the intention of establishing my position as correct, but simply to clarify it. It’s correctness (correspondence to reality) remains an open issue, but by presenting it here, and by discussing it with those of you who seem so well informed and who seem to hold opposing views, I hope to learn something, perhaps even that I am completely wrong.

For now, I’d like to back up and correct some of my statements by offering what I hope is a succinct and accurate summary of the positions in this discussion:

1. I understand that there is a viewpoint which holds that mathematics has an existence that is independent of the human mind, and that it operates according to laws which would exist even if there were no humans. Therefore, it can be said that mathematical laws are something we discover, not invent. That viewpoint seems to be held by a majority of mathematicians.

2. I tentatively (and probably incorrectly) hold the opposing view that all laws, including those of mathematics, are a product of the human mind and would not therefore exist if humans did not exist. Humans infer laws from their observations of the material universe which behaves according to its intrinsic properties, not according to laws. Laws come from people. This differs a bit from what I said earlier and supersedes it.

This all, of course, begs many questions, foremost in my mind being: where do the laws of mathematics reside if not in the human mind? In other words, if the laws of mathematics are something we discover instead of creating, exactly where or how do they exist independently of material reality?

Since the natural, material universe is, in my view as an atheist, all that exists (a reasonable view in that there is no credible evidence for anything else), it seems to me that the claim that the laws of mathematics exist independently of the human mind (which is simply a material state) has a certain religious quality because a kind of supernature (i.e., an existence beyond material reality) is needed to “house” them.

I hope my posts are not too long for this forum. If they are, please say so. This whole environment is rather new for me. Also, since I am a neophyte and amateur in philosophical matters, I expect to learn a great deal from all of you and to frequently amend my position(s) accordingly. I hope that many more of you will join in.

Ray

p.s., Alex (askar), your comments definitely warrant specific responses, and I am not dodging here. I just wanted to say a few things first.

Your message is not too long for me, and I welcome your comments & questions.

I'm not an atheist, and so differ with some of your assumptions. But I say that simply for the record, I don't consider my position any more established than yours.

To answer your question about the claim that mathematics exists independently, perhaps again we're tripped up by terminology. One possibility goes back to my point about math resting on relationships, relationships in the material world. (I'll set aside questions as to whether that is the complete set of relationships, or merely a subset.) In which case, mathematics is another way of defining the "intrinsic properties" you noted in your point 2.

Another possibility rests upon the classic mind-body problem. Where does anything in the mind, distinct from the brain, reside? It's plausible that it is all and merely material, with experience only an epiphenomenon of this material process. I don't find that probable nor convincing, but I think it is plausible. However, it merely rules out by rhetorical fiat so many questions about life and mind that are, for me, quite interesting. I'd rather keep exploring them, and not merely consider them illusions.

elenchus:

Could you explain how "it meerly rules out... so many questions about life and mind...." How would a materialistic view keep you from "exploring them"? How would it imply that the interesting questions are "illusions"?

Ray

Askar:

One of your sentences in an earlier post has been stuck in my mind. You said:

"And something like string theory does NOT DESCRIBE the observable physical universe but purports to REVEAL the principles behind the observable universe ... something done by mathematical DISCOVERY."

So now mathematics is not only pre-existent, non-material and independent, but it provides revelations? I'm sorry to joke around a bit with you on this, but that certainly does sound terribly like religion to me, very spooky and supernatural even.

Without getting into the whole debate about string theory and how utterly useless and pointless it has been, I just want to encourage you to come back into the fold of atheism. (Just kidding. I've really appreciated your posts, but I had to rib you about that.)

When I get a chance in the next day or two to write something about it, I want to share a thought I've had that mathematics is actually a product of biological evolution and owes its approximate correspondence with material reality to the processes of natural selection. That oughta be good, right?

Ray

Ah, now I see that I haven't been very clear. I meant that from a materialist perspective, experience or perhaps mind itself is an illusion: it's not the questions that are illusions, but reality and/or the mind in themselves. As I understand the materialist perspective, reality is the material substrate that gives rise to the appearance of mind, but there is nothing about mind apart from the materialist functions of the brain.

And I grant that this does not mean all interesting questions are illusions. It would be quite interesting to explore the materialist basis for these illusions, how synaptic functions give rise to subjective experience, or to widely-held impressions that there is something to the mind apart from the brain. However, these are simply not as interesting to me as other options, such as that there is something more to mind and reality than materialist underpinnings, as intricate and miraculous as they are. And what might that "something" be? I'm not persuaded by simple faith or dogma in answering those sorts of questions, but I do believe materialism has its limitations and am interested to explore what a person might know of non-materialist reality.

So. Maybe that clears things up, or maybe that's a verbose way of saying the same thing from my previous post.

Most interested to read your take on math and the influence of natural selection!

elenchus:

Thanks for the explanation. I understand much better now what you were saying.

Everyone:

The bit about the effects of evolution upon mathematics might go something along these lines:

It seems reasonable that if mathematics is not supernatural, and if matter/energy and fields (like electromagnetic radiation) have intrinsic properties which do not "contain" mathematics but can simply be described by mathematics, then mathematics seems likely to be a product of the human brain. Because the human brain is a biological structure and has therefore developed through the processes of evolution, especially natural selection, it may be possible that evolution has had an effect upon our mathematical... er... um... activity. Obviously, the math ability/structuring of our brain would be preserved and developed in ways that would promote survival, and since we stand the best chances of survival by being as realistic as possible about nature, evolution would hone our math structures to be those that best reflect nature.

This could explain how math has come to so excellently reflect reality/nature, but also explain why math is not perfect in its reflections, pi being an example (even if we know the precise diameter of a circle, mathematics can only give us an approximation of the circumference, albeit one to any degree of precision desired).

Well, I'm just thinking out loud here, not writing a thesis, so my wording is off the top of my head. I'd appreciate any help that anyone can offer.

Anyway, this seems like an interesting topic to explore, but it also seems that we are getting way off the original topic with it. What do you think about starting a new question within the "Philosophy and Theory" group? Maybe "Where does mathematics come from?" would do the job.

Ray

I've started a new discussion on all of this titled, "Where does math come from?" but still within the Philosophy and Theory group.

We can only be fairly certain that mathematics is non-material ... not that it’s pre-existent, independent, or that it provides revelations. It just seems to be the case. And if that does indeed sound a bit like religion ... it is not intentional.

Now, when I speak of mathematical or logical “discovery”, I realise that the terms is somewhat misleading. Do we, to take a trivial example, really “discover” that 1+1+1=3? “Understanding” may be more accurate.

Logico-mathematical revelations happen a bit like finally seeing a 3D object hidden in one of those stereograms that were fashionable some years ago. The object is there all along but it’s how you look at the stereogram that allows you to “discover” it. But even this analogy may be misleading since whether or not the object is indeed “there” all along or in our mind's eye is the very subject of this discussion.

This is one of the subjects that strain human thinking. Seriously great minds have tried to elucidate the matter with varying degrees of success. And as you said we are getting way off the original topic of this thread. Let's leave it at that these things are much more subtle than they may at first appear.