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Philosophy

Pronouns, Free Speech and the Harm Principle!

In this essay, I will first provide an exegesis of Mill’s harm principle then argue in favor of it by showing how existing laws that compel people to use certain speech violate this principle and infringe on rights and liberties that are essential to optimizing the utility of persons. Mill argues that government intervention is only permissible over persons to prevent direct or indirect harm to others. Any other intervention will infringe on the utility of the individual. Mill argues that utilitarianism is the “ultimate appeal on all ethical questions” and the utility of people is maximized when they act and think as they want without coercion because it is in our nature as humans to act and think independently (Mill 1859, 14). This principle that justifies governmental intervention is called Mill’s harm principle. Several terms within Mill’s description of… Read More »Pronouns, Free Speech and the Harm Principle!

A brief Summary Autonomy, Sovereignty, and Privacy: Moral Ideals in the Constitution by Joel Feinburg’s

Historical and modern attempts to define, apply, and understand autonomy in terms of personal and national conception, capacity, condition, ideal, and right have fallen short for respective reasons due to the micro and macro intricacies and disjunct definitions of Autonomy. Considering Autonomy’s origination and etymology, ancient opinions and definitions regarding the dilemmic concept were associated with law creation & factional governance in Greece. This initiation related to “self-governance” has influenced and still influences the use of Autonomy and the understanding of sovereign rule since the Grecian era and in the contemporary geopolitical interactions. Autonomy as capacity can be viewed from two major perspectives. The judiciary viewpoint considers autonomy as capacity to be defined in terms of competency or lack-thereof. This binary definition is based on the activity that an individual or group is capable or not of participating in with… Read More »A brief Summary Autonomy, Sovereignty, and Privacy: Moral Ideals in the Constitution by Joel Feinburg’s