The Decline of Violence

[moda0306]

The argument that humans will always choose violence because they are very similar to gorrillas (an argument so riddled in falseness I should have just ignored it) has now turned into whether or not I can prove that animals don't have a concept of morality. When people here make crazy statements and can't back them up they just try to change the subject as quickly as possible. Others have pointed this out. It's frustrating.

Please. As you describe it, your entire belief system seems to be based on this idea that "free will" separates us from all other animals. Well, we've just established that the building blocks of "free will" — if it even exists — are present in non-human primates. The building blocks of morality ("attachment and bonding, cooperation and mutual aid, sympathy and empathy, direct and indirect reciprocity, altruism and reciprocal altruism, conflict resolution and peacemaking, deception and deception detection, community concern and caring about what others think about you, and awareness of and response to the social rules of the group") are most definitely present in non-human animals.

This idea of "free will" is just something that Homocentrist armchair philosophers have dreamed up to explain our differences from other non-human primates. Biologists and theologians have different opinions on the matter. You can ignore those other opinions if you wish, but you just alienate yourself in the process.

So friggin' glad you joined this debate. You make things so much easier (as long as I'm on your side... I dread the day I ever disagree with you).

Kshartle,

You've built an entire moral premise, and entire political philosophy, on the fact that 1) human beings are special because we can control our actions, and understand the consequences of those actions, 2) you understand EXACTLY what that specialness means in terms of morality of our decisions and claims we can make on the world around us, INCLUDING ownership, slaughter and displacement of animals you deem to be "unworthy" of any ounce of the specialness we humans have.

We're not changing the subject... We're testing the premises of your so-called perfect logic.  And it's failing the test.

Another common defense of people who are incorrect is to label something as "changing the subject," when it's really the CORE issue. The "specialness" and uniqueness of humans, what that means in terms of morality, and how that moral status extends to the world around us, IS the core issue here.

And forget the members of this board... do you really think philosophers spend their entire lives trying to study this stuff when your simple "non-aggression principal" was so simple?  Do you think that maybe there are other school of thoughts to study?  What about how we behave when faced with moral dilemmas?  Is there any moral weight to doing absolutely NOTHING to prevent the unnecessary harm to others if it would have been easy to do so?

[Gumby]

You've built an entire moral premise, and entire political philosophy, on the fact that 1) human beings are special because we can control our actions, and understand the consequences of those actions, 2) you understand EXACTLY what that specialness means in terms of morality of our decisions and claims we can make on the world around us, INCLUDING ownership, slaughter and displacement of animals you deem to be "unworthy" of any ounce of the specialness we humans have.

Well, he wouldn't be the first. The same Homocentrist arguments were once used against minorities and people of different races...

[align=center][/align]
[align=center]Source: The London and Westminster Review, Volume 25; Volume 27 By Sir John Bowring, John Stuart Mill[/align]

Note that I'm not saying that KShartle is a racist. I'm just pointing out that the Homocentrist line of reasoning on "free will" was often used to justify certain beliefs — such as beliefs that led to immoral behavior against those deemed to be less than worthy. Oh, the irony.

[moda0306]

You've built an entire moral premise, and entire political philosophy, on the fact that 1) human beings are special because we can control our actions, and understand the consequences of those actions, 2) you understand EXACTLY what that specialness means in terms of morality of our decisions and claims we can make on the world around us, INCLUDING ownership, slaughter and displacement of animals you deem to be "unworthy" of any ounce of the specialness we humans have.

Well, he wouldn't be the first. The same Homocentrist arguments were once used against minorities and people of different races...

[align=center][/align]
[align=center]Source: The London and Westminster Review, Volume 25; Volume 27 By Sir John Bowring, John Stuart Mill[/align]

Note that I'm not saying that KShartle is a racist. I'm just pointing out that the Homocentrist line of reasoning on "free will" was often used to justify certain beliefs — such as beliefs that led to immoral behavior against those deemed to be less than worthy. Oh, the irony.

If we can establish that animals have certain "rights," or some sort of moral status, then this puts a HUGE damper on our ability to claim "private property" with a straight face.  Because the amount of animal death and dislocation that's done as a result of "private property" is absolutely massive.

It certainly is convenient to hand-wave this away, and I'm not saying I'm a perfect defender of animal sovereignty (or anywhere close to it).  I just want to recognize reality.  The reality is that there is HUGE evidence that many animals have a moral compass and make decisions around it, and if this establishes rights in humans, then rights are maybe more a matter of degree than a binary "you either have them or you don't" type of situation.

The amount of production sacrifices we would have to make as a country if we TRULY recognized certain animals as having a moral status is absolutely massive. This means that 1) most of our land claims our stolen and invalid (if we didn't already know this from the gritty details of our westward expansion), 2) factory farms are essentially slave/torture mills, 3) this idea that things would just be wonderful and amazingly productive if we would just live by the "non-aggression principal" begins to look like a bigger joke than it ever did, and 4) this moral dilemma of all being placed on the same rock just got exponentially more complicated in terms of what we can validly claim as property.

At some point we have to balance our own will to individually conquer the world around us with the sovereign rights of those people/beings around us with natural laws.  Not only is there NO history of us doing that on our human past as a species, but it's really quite impossible considering our natural constraints, especially if we can establish that the very thing that gives us this "special" moral status is also somewhat present in animals around us.

[MediumTex]

I just wanted to be clear that you're changing the subject. I said people believing in something doesn't make it true. You challenged that statement. Now rather than agree with me or make the disagreeing case you are changing the subject to why you would care if someone believes something different. Ok, that's fine. Constantly changing the subject when someone presses you to support a statement is fairly common. I prefer to stay on topic or not say things I'm unable to support. Unfortunately I've gotten myself into 20 different exchanges on different topics with different people here and it's impossible to address them all.

I don't think that you are following me.

I'm not changing the subject.  The subject is whether someone believing that something is true makes it true.  You posited as an example of why belief doesn't equate to truth something that you knew NOT to be true.  That's not a good example.  A good example would be something that someone else really believes to be true and which I believe to be false.

Let's take my 6 year old son, for example.  He is currently in the throes of an elaborate set of basically fantasy-based ideas about an old immortal man who evaluates the behavior of selected groups of children all over the world and delivers gifts to them later this month based upon his assessment of their behavior and his own mysterious whims.

Guess where my son got these beliefs?  In large part they came from me.  I implanted in his mind ideas that he now believes to be true.  The question now is the extent to which his belief in them in some way makes them true.  The first question would be "truth from whose perspective?"  I do not believe them to be true in the way that he believes them to be true, but he completely believes that they are true, and thus he is inhabiting a reality that may be fantasy-based to me, but it is very real to him.  I would suggest that this reality he is experiencing, and more importantly the pleasant feeling it gives him, easily meets the standard for truth as my son understands it. 

If I stumbled into a situation like the one I am describing above and simply started talking about "intellectual sloth" and that sort of thing, I would be utterly missing the point of what was actually going on.  What is going on in these situations is that people are experiencing a sense of wonder, mystery and connection to something outside of themselves that they don't fully understand, but which ignites in them powerful feelings of pleasure and often inspiration.  There is value in these things.  In some cases, it may inspire a person in a way that logic never could.

I would say that if a set of false beliefs (according to my standards) nevertheless provides a rationale for real and meaningful achievements or sensations, then perhaps belief does infuse certain ideas with a measure of "truth."

If you had the opportunity to go back a few hundred years and perform the "intellectual sloth" routine on the builders of the great cathedrals in Europe, knowing the they would never do work nearly as good on other projects without the inspiration of religion, would you do it?  Would you help cleanse the minds of the ancient Egyptians before they started building pyramids?  If you had a son who brought home ideas about Santa Claus, would you immediately set him straight?

How would you contrast your certainty about the nature of the world around you with that of a person 500 years ago, 1,000 years ago or even before that?  If their certainty was simply wrong while yours is right, what might you say to the person in the year 2,500 who looks back on your beliefs dismissively, noting all of the ways in which they are flawed according to year 2,500 standards?

I feel like I learn more about the subtleties of human nature by observing the sense of wonder that my son experiences around Christmas than I could ever possibly experience by seeking to make his inner experience of Christmas the same as mine by putting the blow torch of reason and logic to his current beliefs about what is true.

Wouldn't you like it if someone came along and showed you something truly supernatural or completely outside of your current understanding?  What if it involved a different type of logic than you are accustomed to following?  Would you be open to understanding the new logic?  Would your mind even be able to see the potential in what they were showing you?

[Pointedstick]

At some point we have to balance our own will to individually conquer the world around us with the sovereign rights of those people/beings around us with natural laws.  Not only is there NO history of us doing that on our human past as a species, but it's really quite impossible considering our natural constraints, especially if we can establish that the very thing that gives us this "special" moral status is also somewhat present in animals around us.

…Or else we have to admit that we humans do whatever the hell we want because we're the most powerful animal on the entire planet and that all of our moral systems are logically inconsistent and largely designed to make us feel better about our own actions to dominate the world.

All rights are invented and enforced through voluntary compliance or violence. If you can't get the powerful people to agree that you have rights, and you can't force them to accept your claim of rights, then you have no rights and they will probably do with you what they will. See also: nearly all of history. Heck, if not for humans, rights as a concept wouldn't even exist. No other animal has invented such an idea.

In the end, it always boils down to "might makes right." Always. If rhinoceroses or dolphins were the most powerful species on the planet and they enslaved the humans and kept us for pets and bloodsport, don't you think they would find it convenient to invent systems of morality that absolved them of the guilt they might feel if they realized the pain their actions had wrought on all the squishy humans?

[moda0306]

At some point we have to balance our own will to individually conquer the world around us with the sovereign rights of those people/beings around us with natural laws.  Not only is there NO history of us doing that on our human past as a species, but it's really quite impossible considering our natural constraints, especially if we can establish that the very thing that gives us this "special" moral status is also somewhat present in animals around us.

…Or else we have to admit that we humans do whatever the hell we want because we're the most powerful animal on the entire planet and that all of our moral systems are logically inconsistent and largely designed to make us feel better about our own actions to dominate the world.

All rights are invented and enforced through voluntary compliance or violence. If you can't get the powerful people to agree that you have rights, and you can't force them to accept your claim of rights, then you have no rights and they will probably do with you what they will. See also: nearly all of history. If not for humans, rights as a concept wouldn't even exist. No other animal has invented such an idea.

In the end, it always boils down to "might makes right." Always. If rhinoceroses or dolphins were the most powerful species on the planet and they enslaved the humans and kept us for pets and bloodsport, don't you think they would find it convenient to invent systems of morality that absolved them of the guilt they might feel if they realized the pain their actions had wrought on all the squishy humans?

I simultaneously completely agree with you (or almost) and think that there HAVE to be some fundamental moral truths out there, otherwise all we're left with is nothingness.

I mean I am sure that you have a moral code you tend to TRY to live by, right?

[Pointedstick]

I simultaneously completely agree with you (or almost) and think that there HAVE to be some fundamental moral truths out there, otherwise all we're left with is nothingness.

I mean I am sure that you have a moral code you tend to TRY to live by, right?

Why does a lack of any fundamental moral truths leave us with "nothingness?" Serious question.

I just don't think you're going to find any out there unless you start to enter the realm of the theological, and even there the "fundamental moral truths" that one theological system has discovered often have a stubborn tendency to be repudiated by others. That's because they're all either made up, or--if you're a believer--filtered through a flawed human understanding and incapable of being perceived in its fundamental form.

That said, we humans have come up with a variety of satisfying moral systems that, while not "fundamental", certainly make us feel good, help us smoothly interact with the rest of the world.

A moral system doesn't have to be a perfect artifact of flawless cosmic grace. It just needs to make us feel good, help us interact better with each other, and not give us too much leeway to trample on the natural world. That's why we invented them, after all.

[MediumTex]

At some point we have to balance our own will to individually conquer the world around us with the sovereign rights of those people/beings around us with natural laws.  Not only is there NO history of us doing that on our human past as a species, but it's really quite impossible considering our natural constraints, especially if we can establish that the very thing that gives us this "special" moral status is also somewhat present in animals around us.

…Or else we have to admit that we humans do whatever the hell we want because we're the most powerful animal on the entire planet and that all of our moral systems are logically inconsistent and largely designed to make us feel better about our own actions to dominate the world.

All rights are invented and enforced through voluntary compliance or violence. If you can't get the powerful people to agree that you have rights, and you can't force them to accept your claim of rights, then you have no rights and they will probably do with you what they will. See also: nearly all of history. If not for humans, rights as a concept wouldn't even exist. No other animal has invented such an idea.

In the end, it always boils down to "might makes right." Always. If rhinoceroses or dolphins were the most powerful species on the planet and they enslaved the humans and kept us for pets and bloodsport, don't you think they would find it convenient to invent systems of morality that absolved them of the guilt they might feel if they realized the pain their actions had wrought on all the squishy humans?

I simultaneously completely agree with you (or almost) and think that there HAVE to be some fundamental moral truths out there, otherwise all we're left with is nothingness.

I mean I am sure that you have a moral code you tend to TRY to live by, right?

All systems of morality are ultimately self-serving in that they provide a rationalization and justification for what a group of people wanted to do in the first place.  Often what the group wants is to restrain the actions of deviant members of the tribe, and morality is a convenient way to do this.

As far as the idea that only a moral framework provides a way of living a meaningful life, I personally believe that there is an evolutionary bias against overpowering nihilistic tendencies in the human mind (if nothing else, such people are too depressed to effectively attract sexual partners), and thus a life without a moral code imposed upon it can be quite fulfilling  (and not utterly hopeless), and part of this fulfillment might be creating a moral code for oneself (though you might not call it that and you certainly wouldn't be bound by it in any way). 

There is no absolute moral system, though.  Give me any rule and I will give you an exception.  It is ultimately all situational, even though this really bugs a lot of people.

[MediumTex]

I simultaneously completely agree with you (or almost) and think that there HAVE to be some fundamental moral truths out there, otherwise all we're left with is nothingness.

I mean I am sure that you have a moral code you tend to TRY to live by, right?

Why does a lack of any fundamental moral truths leave us with "nothingness?" Serious question.

I just don't think you're going to find any out there unless you start to enter the realm of the theological, and even there the "fundamental moral truths" that one theological system has discovered often have a stubborn tendency to be repudiated by others. That's because they're all either made up, or--if you're a believer--filtered through a flawed human understanding and incapable of being perceived in its fundamental form.

That said, we humans have come up with a variety of satisfying moral systems that, while not "fundamental", certainly make us feel good, help us smoothly interact with the rest of the world.

A moral system doesn't have to be a perfect artifact of flawless cosmic grace. It just needs to make us feel good, help us interact better with each other, and not give us too much leeway to trample on the natural world. That's why we invented them, after all.

I love the scene in The Big Lebowski where The Dude and his associates battle The Nihilists outside the bowling alley.

Such a wonderful allegory for the way we move through life.

[moda0306]

I simultaneously completely agree with you (or almost) and think that there HAVE to be some fundamental moral truths out there, otherwise all we're left with is nothingness.

I mean I am sure that you have a moral code you tend to TRY to live by, right?

Why does a lack of any fundamental moral truths leave us with "nothingness?" Serious question.

I just don't think you're going to find any out there unless you start to enter the realm of the theological, and even there the "fundamental moral truths" that one theological system has discovered often have a stubborn tendency to be repudiated by others. That's because they're all either made up, or--if you're a believer--filtered through a flawed human understanding and incapable of being perceived in its fundamental form.

That said, we humans have come up with a variety of satisfying moral systems that, while not "fundamental", certainly make us feel good, help us smoothly interact with the rest of the world.

A moral system doesn't have to be a perfect artifact of flawless cosmic grace. It just needs to make us feel good, help us interact better with each other, and not give us too much leeway to trample on the natural world. That's why we invented them, after all.

As you are libertarian, you keep referring to "us" and "we," but aren't we really just all individuals?

So the idea that I've "invented" (or used someone else's invention of) a moral code for no other purpose than to make myself feel good (I mean I'm certainly not doing it for someone else to feel good, as there is no "we"... only "me"), then this is great for me, but it has nothing to do with "society."

Now maybe "fitting in" feels good, so I act morally simply to feel better, myself, but this is just a more complex version of greed... or, essentially, no morals at all.

But part of me agrees with libertarians when they say, "there is no 'we,' no 'society,' no 'collective conscious,'" but just a bunch of individuals trying to get by and benefit themselves.

There's a line of theorizing that we don't do ANYTHING outside of our own self-interest.  Even when we're being charitable, we're doing so because it somehow makes us feel better going forward than if we hadn't.

So if we've somehow stumbled onto enough embarrassment if we do bad things that we do mostly moral things, then this probably is going to serve most individuals pretty well, but it certainly isn't something that we can improve ourselves morally from.  I can't decide how to be a more moral person by deciding morality doesn't exist and that it's all to make myself feel better... or maybe I can, but I just realize that it's all a circular game of self-interest.

I'm lost.  I'm better at arguing with Kshartle than quasi-agreeing with you haha!

[Pointedstick]

I think you're overcomplicating things, moda. When I say that humans invented moral codes, I'm not saying that any individual did or that a group voted on it or anything. It evolved organically, like nearly everything has: some people started to do things, and other people followed them, and some people started to come up with pleasant-sounding rationalizations for why they were doing it, and other people liked it, and so on and so forth. There's an interplay between the individual and the collective that defines how complex collective systems can evolve organically while simultaneously preserving the individuality of the participants.

I'm not saying that morality doesn't exist. It surely does, because we created it, the same way that a car exists because we created it. Does the car "not really exist" simply because without humans it would never have been? Morality is an invention, just like all the millions of other things we humans have invented. IMHO.

What I am saying is that in this messy world we live in, usually you just have to choose a moral system and stick to it, jettisoning parts of it that aren't serving you well and bolting on aspects of other ones that seem to be working better. This is basically what everybody does without even thinking about it, and we learn how to do it as we grow up and are exposed to cultural mores and situations that challenge us. It's why most people's moral codes seem so illogical and contradictory: they are.

This is often difficult for highly intelligent people such as yourself to accept. I completely understand the temptation to try to use your big brain to latch onto something real, something concrete. To try to pierce the intellectual darkness and discover the truth. But this is a squishy subjective realm we're exploring. When we are talking about invented opinions on abstract and subjective matters, there is no truth. But that doesn't mean there are no answers for yourself. If nothing is true, then that frees you tho choose whichever answer you like best.

I mean, if I say that I like Toyotas, am I wrong? Can I even be wrong? The fact that there is no way to divine the truth or falsity of my Totoya-preference statement means that you have to stop looking at it through that lens, because it will eventually drive you crazy. That's why this thread is 30 pages long. Kshartle is trying to look at things that are nebulous and subjective and evaluate their truth or falsity. He's trying to capture sunlight with a net. It will never work.

[Pointedstick]

For example, here's how my personal moral system applies to your absurd puppy-torturing example:

- Do not intentionally inflict pain or death on animals unless it is for the purpose of eating them
-- In such a circumstance, make the kill as quickly as possible to minimize suffering
- The prior two rules are progressively relaxed the farther away the animal is biologically from primate mammalian life (i.e. it's okay to intentionally stomp on ants in your pantry or distribute time-delayed poison that you know will wipe out their colony)
-- Regardless, never take pleasure in the act of inflicting pain itself

Are these moral rules "correct"? Are they true? Can they be proven? Are there axiomatic rules of logic underpinning them? No, none of the above. However, following these moral rules puts me squarely within the mainstream of society, helps me avoid feelings of sadness, regret, and guilt, and prevents other people from viewing me as a psycho--all very important benefits if I wish to live a peaceful and trouble-free life.


See how easy that was?

[moda0306]

For example, here's how my personal moral system applies to your absurd puppy-torturing example:

- Do not intentionally inflict pain or death on animals unless it is for the purpose of eating them
-- In such a circumstance, make the kill as quickly as possible to minimize suffering
- The prior two rules are progressively relaxed the farther away the animal is biologically from primate mammalian life (i.e. it's okay to intentionally stomp on ants in your pantry or distribute time-delayed poison that you know will wipe out their colony)
-- Regardless, never take pleasure in the act of inflicting pain itself

Are these moral rules "correct"? Are they true? Can they be proven? Are there axiomatic rules of logic underpinning them? No, none of the above. However, following these moral rules puts me squarely within the mainstream of society, helps me avoid feelings of sadness, regret, and guilt, and prevents other people from viewing me as a psycho--all very important benefits if I wish to live a peaceful and trouble-free life.


See how easy that was?

So it seems to me that the morality of your actions are more about your feelings than whether you're truly doing harm to others.

You could take that same paragraph, and apply it to European societies that gladly gave up their Jewish neighbors during the Holocaust:

- German soldiers and neighbors of Jews seemed to felt in the mainstream of society in their actions.

- They didn't feel sadness, regret, and guilt, and weren't viewed as psycho by most of their Christian neighbors (not trying to bash Christianity (or you) here).

- You probably were viewed as more psycho if you tried to actively defend the Jews from imprisonment rather than comply with detainment.

I'm not saying every community was like this, but parts of Poland seemed to do a collective "shrug" when all their neighbors are carried off in chains.  They actually looked at it, often, as serving a very valid purpose (not as food... but gave them more "stuff" to split amongst themselves, and more neighborhood cohesion, and whatever else they thought they'd gain by ridding themselves of "others."

This is what I'm talking about.  We can't just look at the "normalness" of our position to determine whether it's correct.  This has been done in genocide after genocide for centuries.  We need to have more concrete moral truths than what you mentioned about hurting animals, IMO.  I think it's useful to actually believe in individual sovereignty, and that there should be a floor of human dignity.  Not for myself, because if I think of morals more in terms of how comfortable I feel and less in terms of guiding principals, then I run the risk of being one of those Polish neighbors that is ok as their Jewish neighbors get detained and taken away, just before I go rummage through their stuff like everyone of my other neighbors...

... but hey, at least nobody sees me as psycho, and I won't feel bad about myself because I've justified it as improving society and it being "mainstream."

I am not trying to get melodramatic... and I know we'll never discover a "concrete truth," in spite of my will to do so.  But if I'm going to develop a moral philosophy that is built on a foundation of "feeling like I'm normal" then I'm falling into the same trap that far, far too many people have allowed themselves to fall into before I even am tempted by "mainstream opinion" to do so.

[Pointedstick]

Exactly, TennPaGa.

Moda, Do you really think all of those neighbors were fine with the kidnappings and killings? Maybe they repressed their feelings and later felt bad that they hadn't helped. Maybe they felt bad at the time but were afraid of government violence against them too if they spoke up or helped out. And a lot of people certainly did help out. Chiune Sugihara, a Japanese ambassador to Lithuania who singlehandedly saved the lives of more than 6,000 Jews by illegally granting them travel papers to Japan

And the reason why we honor people like him was because we view his actions are moral, as heroic, even. I believe this is because that saving innocent human life is a near-universal human morality shared by pretty much all societies everywhere. Governments can't extinguish that by systematically violating it for periods of time.

If anything, I think the Nazi period sort of illustrates my point by showing that the Germans (and the Japanese, too) were under a bit of madness in which their government acted in offense to their morality. As soon as the Third Reich fell, the German people didn't put up a fuss or resist at all. It was as if they knew that things had gone terribly, horribly wrong. Even today there are lingering pangs of guilt that Germans feel for what their society did 70 years ago. You wouldn't get that from a people who believed they were right to do what they had done.

In other words, when a society's collective sense of morality is systematically violated by the government, that does not redefine the morality to accept systematic government violence.

Now, where does this squishy line get drawn? What if the government does it for 100 years and indoctrinates people in a weird cultlike state religion or some other bizarre sense of morality? Maybe in that case, whole generations of people will have been raised with a different sense of morality, one alien to the rest of the world. Like, say, North Korea. These situations are very sad precisely because there is no good answer for how to resolve them. The poor North Koreans have been so warped and twisted by their tyrannical overlords that they almost don't behave like normal humans in many circumstances because of how systematically they and their society have been traumatized.

[Pointedstick]

But really, moda, I get your point. And the answer is that it's messy. This is an issue that anthropologists struggle with every day.

Let me give you a concrete example:

My mother is an anthropologist who once studied a remote African village and witnessed a brutal marital rape sanctioned by the whole community. A woman was refusing to have sex with her just-married husband, a taboo (this society was filled with taboos). So her relatives had tied her to her bed and urged her new husband to rape her. She protested, saying, "there is a demon inside of me making me not want to have sex with you!" He raped her while her relatives and a few dozen others looked on approvingly.

Can you possibly imagine something so horrible? And yet, in their society, this was normal. Our moral code would dictate that this act should be punished extremely harshly, yet to them it was justifiable or even praiseworthy. Even the rape victim herself said the next day that it was right that her husband had raped her because it caused the demon inside of her to escape. My mother interviewed her and she didn't appear to have been traumatized.

What's the answer? Are we right and they were wrong and were a backwards and primitive society for sanctioning marital rape? Or is the badness of rape relative, and they simply had a different way of looking at things?

It's kind of uncomfortable to think about, no?

[moda0306]

I guess what I'm trying to say is that if morality doesn't exist, then let's admit it and call what we do a big game of trying to feel better about ourselves, even if it means doing what some may think are "good acts" to give us that feeling.

If morality exists, but is impossible to prove, let's at least try to use some probability or inductive reasoning around what some of these truths MIGHT sorta look like, so we can get closer rather than further.

If morality exists, and is provable (seems impossible to me, too), then let's try to prove it.


But if "morality" is essentially the first example, where we limit pain or bring enjoyment to others to either "feel normal" or bring enjoyment to ourselves, why don't we just call it what it is... Greed with positive externalities .

[Pointedstick]

Why is it so important that everyone acknowledge that morality doesn't exist?

Or, if it does exist (and I certainly think it does, though only in the minds of the practitioners), why is it so important to "prove"?

Exactly. Why is it so uncomfortable to admit that morality is a subjective human meme?

All memes only exist in the minds of believers. What's the point of trying to prove they exist? You'll be twisting yourself into philosophical pretzels for 30 pages of forum posts. Memes only exist because people believe they do. The more people believe in a meme, the more it exists. That's why the moral meme of impassioned murder being wrong is so much more prevalent across societies than the moral meme of smoking marijuana being wrong. More people across humanity believe that impassioned murder is wrong, so they put it in their moral principles. That's really all there is to it.

[moda0306]

TennPaGa,

If it does exist, and CAN be proven, we should try to just like anything else in science.

If it does exist (and I believe it does), and CAN'T be proven (I don't think it can), then we should at least try to use inductive reasoning and debate to understand it better for ourselves so we don't fall into this logic:

- Well if I don't feel bad about myself and if it feels right and if I don't feel like a weirdo around my neighbors, I must be using good morality.

That's why... otherwise, as individuals, we're not using our brains to come up with morality, we're using what is essentially greed (a warm feeling inside of community belonging) to justify our actions.  Groupthink is almost always a bad, lazy thing, IMO.

[moda0306]

Why is it so important that everyone acknowledge that morality doesn't exist?

Or, if it does exist (and I certainly think it does, though only in the minds of the practitioners), why is it so important to "prove"?

Exactly. Why is it so uncomfortable to admit that morality is a subjective human meme?

Because if we just shrug our shoulders at this, we're no different than all the people who essentially subconsciously use groupthink to drive their morality.  We should be vigilant to at least TRY to identify vague moral truths that are fundamental, and don't depend on what the lazy thinkers around me think are "weird," or whether something "feels ok."  Those are the tools of people who do what they want and build their morality around it after.

Keep in mind, I don't think that having a unique (but correct) moral position is going to do me or society much good.  This comes back to HB's observation that you can have all the right answers but be able to convince nobody and it just makes you miserable to think about all the time.

However, if we are actually going to spend parts of our lives trying to develop a moral framework and help our kids do the same, then maybe we should build it free of groupthink.

[Pointedstick]

Moda, what I don't think you're getting is that the existence of a meme can't be proven in the same way that you can prove the existence of a fish or a rainstorm.

For example, can you prove that The U.S. government exists? I bet you can prove that there are a bunch of buildings marked, "U.S. government", but those aren't the government, are they?

And I bet that you can prove that a whole lot of people go to work for an entity they describe as "the U.S. government" they they aren't the government are they?

You could even point out the president, congress, the pentagon, social security offices, a bunch of aircraft carriers all sort of of things, but they could all be replaced and the U.S. Government would still exist, right?

The U.S. Government itself is simply a meme that exists in the minds of humans. And those humans go to work, and inhabit buildings and build weapons of war and mail checks to old people, and do all sorts of other things in the name of this fictive entity, but you still couldn't find the actual U.S. Government itself. Does that mean it doesn't actually exist?

That's what I'm talking about. A meme exists in the mind. You can't prove it exists in the way a physical object does because it doesn't really exist. We all just believe it does. That's what makes us human. We believe in memes. To our knowledge, no other animal invents fictional universes like this and then bases their societies on them.

[moda0306]

But really, moda, I get your point. And the answer is that it's messy. This is an issue that anthropologists struggle with every day.

Let me give you a concrete example:

My mother is an anthropologist who once studied a remote African village and witnessed a brutal marital rape sanctioned by the whole community. A woman was refusing to have sex with her just-married husband, a taboo (this society was filled with taboos). So her relatives had tied her to her bed and urged her new husband to rape her. She protested, saying, "there is a demon inside of me making me not want to have sex with you!" He raped her while her relatives and a few dozen others looked on approvingly.

Can you possibly imagine something so horrible? And yet, in their society, this was normal. Our moral code would dictate that this act should be punished extremely harshly, yet to them it was justifiable or even praiseworthy. Even the rape victim herself said the next day that it was right that her husband had raped her because it caused the demon inside of her to escape. My mother interviewed her and she didn't appear to have been traumatized.

What's the answer? Are we right and they were wrong and were a backwards and primitive society for sanctioning marital rape? Or is the badness of rape relative, and they simply had a different way of looking at things?

It's kind of uncomfortable to think about, no?

Societies can't be "wrong."  Only people can be.  Or at least this is one way to look at it.  I think that family and husband were wrong because the pulled that woman down below a level of human dignity that I find appalling, and for no utilitarian purpose but to feel like a more cohesive, "normal" group.  I'm not saying that I want to impose my view on what's right on others who do wrong... that's another level of moral debate.  But I want to determine what IS wrong.  That was wrong, in my view.  What we do with that, and what her family would do with that conclusion, are other issues to work out.

[Pointedstick]

Because if we just shrug our shoulders at this, we're no different than all the people who essentially subconsciously use groupthink to drive their morality.  We should be vigilant to at least TRY to identify vague moral truths that are fundamental, and don't depend on what the lazy thinkers around me think are "weird," or whether something "feels ok."  Those are the tools of people who do what they want and build their morality around it after.

Keep in mind, I don't think that having a unique (but correct) moral position is going to do me or society much good.  This comes back to HB's observation that you can have all the right answers but be able to convince nobody and it just makes you miserable to think about all the time.

However, if we are actually going to spend parts of our lives trying to develop a moral framework and help our kids do the same, then maybe we should build it free of groupthink.

Why? Don't we want out kids to fit into the society they're going to inhabit? It would be a terrible shame to be taught one set of morals and ideals and then go out into the world and discover that it runs on a totally different set. This is a totally different proposition from teaching your children to be free-thinkers; you can think freely while still accepting whatever parts of your society's morality make the most sense to you.

I think emotionally you're trying to differentiate yourself from people you deem to be intellectually lazy with a hint of disdain for majoritarianism--positions not too far from Kshartle's, in fact.

What I am proposing is what you already admitted: that it's futile. Like it or not, morality is a meme that's determined collectively. You can follow whatever one you prefer, but if it's incongruent with what other people believe, all you're going to get for your intellectual efforts is frustrating miscommunication and hardship when you try to use it as a basis to interact with other people (Example: Kshartle).

No sense in yelling at the hurricane barreling toward your beach house.

[Pointedstick]

I'm also not saying that you should always condone and go along with everything your society says; of course not. But the more you disagree, the more you often have to keep your head down to be taken seriously, from a practical perspective.

For example, I don't think ownership of full auto weapons, firearm sound suppressors, or hard drugs is immoral. These are non-mainstream positions and as a result I don't vocalize them too much. I view my position as out of sync with mainstream morality in that I am right and the rest of society has simply not realized it is wrong yet. Am I actually right? Who knows. And frankly, who cares?

[moda0306]

Moda, what I don't think you're getting is that the existence of a meme can't be proven in the same way that you can prove the existence of a fish or a rainstorm.

For example, can you prove that The U.S. government exists? I bet you can prove that there are a bunch of buildings marked, "U.S. government", but those aren't the government, are they?

And I bet that you can prove that a whole lot of people go to work for an entity they describe as "the U.S. government" they they aren't the government are they?

You could even point out the president, congress, the pentagon, social security offices, a bunch of aircraft carriers all sort of of things, but they could all be replaced and the U.S. Government would still exist, right?

The U.S. Government itself is simply a meme that exists in the minds of humans. And those humans go to work, and inhabit buildings and build weapons of war and mail checks to old people, and do all sorts of other things in the name of this fictive entity, but you still couldn't find the actual U.S. Government itself. Does that mean it doesn't actually exist?

That's what I'm talking about. A meme exists in the mind. You can't prove it exists in the way a physical object does because it doesn't really exist. We all just believe it does. That's what makes us human. We believe in memes. To our knowledge, no other animal invents fictional universes like this and then bases their societies on them.

PS,

I DO agree with you that these things are almost certainly unprovable.  I've tried to tell this to Kshartle several times.  Probably dozens.

I agree that some social phenomenons are very vague, but in my view morality is different.  A government would not exist in our minds unless it exists in our minds.  It's something entirely built by how we interact with each other and that enough of us want a third party to be part of some of those interactions.  It exists as a social phenomenon whether a few libertarians want it there or not.

Morality, to me, is a bit different in that even though it can FEEL like a social structure in some ways, a meme, we're talking about a thing that invokes the DEEPEST emotional responses if it is violated.  If someone invaded your home and hurt your family (sorry to go there), you would feel things that you never felt before that probably are about 1,000 times stronger than what you feel morally about things now.  Hatred, love, despair... all that stuff would be going on red alert inside you.  You as an individual.

There's something that feels fundamentally different about an immoral act that ANY other kind of intangible social structure, is there not?  I can try too goofily imagine a world without government or "societies" and it doesn't really make me "feel" anything.  But trying to imagine the holocaust is sickening.  In fact, it's immoral acts that are done as onlookers think it's ok that give us an extra degree if disgust.  If 6,000,000 Jews had died at the hand of one terrorist, I think we'd feel very differently about it in our guts than watching a civilized society turn into what the Third Reich did. 

Don't you think that there is something truly FUNDAMENTALLY different going on with morality than "government," "family," or "society?"

[Pointedstick]

Don't you think that there is something truly FUNDAMENTALLY different going on with morality than "government," "family," or "society?"

Maybe I've misunderstood your point, but I believe you just argued for the memetic fragility of government: government in and of itself simply doesn't provoke the kind of emotional reactions that home invasion or child abuse or rape or animal torture or love or joy or enlightenment can provoke in humans. It's why governments--especially expansive modern ones--usually work so hard to indoctrinate people into believing that they are not only necessary but also the most moral entities in society (e.g. patriotism).

The desire for third-party entities to arbitrate disputes in no way requires a government, IMHO. That emotional desire is already satisfied in a million different ways by private, voluntary entities and I think they could probably replace all of what government purports to do as well.

Society itself will probably never cease to exist as long as we remain human. We've had societies for hundreds of thousands of years. Governments are actually far newer inventions; they've only been around for about 10,000 years or so, and it's only in the last 1,000 that they conquered the entire world.

But that's a different topic.