Tolerant / Intolerant

[ClintMemo]

But ClintMemo, you keep using terms like "better" and "right/wrong."  On what basis can you use those terms if not on the basis of an obejctive standard?

You say "There is nothing more jarring than discovering that something you held as a lifelong principle is wrong."  Wrong as compared to what?  When you say "I've been wrong all my life," you aren't simply saying that you changed your mind.  You are saying that you have become aware of a truth that you were previously unaware of: A truth that was prevously outside of yourself has been internalized.  Where did that truth come from?

I guess I should say "wrong as I see it."  What someone sees as right and wrong is based on their own set of values.  If those values change, what they see as right and wrong will change as well.  It might be as simple as having one principle be more important than another.  For example, is freedom of choice more important than maintaining the peace?  Compared to when I was younger (I'm 42 now), I would have rated freedom of choice lower in comparison to maintaining the peace than I do now.  This has changed slowly over the last ten years.  (My friends who ten years ago accused me of being a socialist now accuse me of being a libertarian ).  As a result, I've gone from being very anti-gun to more pro-gun, for example.  I'm also much more concerned about freedom of speech issues than I used to be.
My values changed because of ten years of life experiences, ten more years of observing the world and ten more years of trying to understand the way things work.  To make a scientist analogy, I would say that I have better instruments to measure with and better techniques at my disposal than I did then.  No two people's life experiences are going to be the same so no two people are going to have the exact same set of values.

[SFEley]

I'd like to point out that all of you are applying objective moral standards.  Daleks are a great example: You all say that Daleks are evil, by which you mean that their moral system is bad.  You are placing your own moral system which says "tollerate" over and obove their moral system which says "exterminate."  If morality is reletaive, then Dalek morality is every bit as valid as Time Lord morality and we have no grounds to condemn either Daleks or their actions.

I disagree.  The morality here is entirely relative and self-centered.  I would like to live.  Therefore, my morality rests in part (not in full) on doing the things that will allow me, and the other people and communities I value, to live. 

Tolerating a Dalek would not be good for me or the people and communities I value.  Therefore, I would make a moral choice to choose to destroy the Dalek before it destroyed me and mine.  I recognize that I am not necessarily better than the Dalek in making that choice; however, I am me, and my choices are made relative to my own point of view. 

All successful life follows such imperatives.  Jungle cats don't make objective moral decisions about the value of their own lives vs. the lives of their prey.  They hunt and kill so they can eat and survive.  Any cat that valued all life as equal would not live to pass its highly moral genes to the next generation.

I would similarly point out the moderators are enforcing their morality on everybody else here.  No one on this board is allowed to insult anyone else, on pain of deletion, and that rule applies to everyone at all times on all threads.  Those who view insults as a valid rhetorical device are out of luck, period, and they aren't allowed to plead for special treatment.  This is an example of an objective standard.  A subjective standard would allow some people to insult sometimes, depending on the circumstance.

I see where you're coming from here, but I still can't agree.  What you describe is the ideal, but the perception of "insult" is itself highly subjective, and the application of the rule can be problematic and sometimes personal.  We try to be fair, that's the goal, but all fairness is perceived at a close-up human ground level.  Who's truly capable of saying whether we succeeded?

Lastly, I would point out that all of you who have argued that my views on homosexuality are incorrect are also applying an objective standard.  You all believe that homosexuality is okay.  You consider that to be a moral fact, and you expect me to recognize it as a fact.

Lastly, no.  I don't expect you to recognize it as a moral fact.  You're welcome to disagree with it morally if you want to.  I just don't believe your views on the matter should be important to anyone except you.  Or at least, not important enough to enforce to the detriment of others.  I don't expect other people to follow my morality, and I'm perfectly cool with people who don't, so long as they're not infringing on the life, liberty or property of others.  (At which point the reason to stop them isn't intrinsically moral, but practical and utilitarian.)

The people I have a problem with are the people who believe that their morality is so fundamentally correct and important that its precepts should override both the morality and the liberty of other people.  When such beliefs are enacted into law, freedom and happiness are reduced without real benefit for anyone.  It has nothing to do with "objective" or "subjective" morality.  I just don't like people making life suck for other people.

[ClintMemo]

I disagree.  The morality here is entirely relative and self-centered.  I would like to live.  Therefore, my morality rests in part (not in full) on doing the things that will allow me, and the other people and communities I value, to live. 

As a side note (like this thread needs another tangent ), if you start with the assumption that the urge to survive and the urge to reproduce and the urge to protect the species are "good" and then only use morally neutral concepts that you can demonstrably prove, you can then logically argue (though perhaps not prove) that a handful of actions that most consider "evil" are in fact "evil" at least most of the time.  But it's only a very short list of obvious items - like murdering, stealing and  lying.

[Mr. Tweedy]

So the Doctor isn't better than the Daleks, just different.  The Daleks have just as much right to kill all humans as the Doctor has to save them.

[FNH]

I just don't like people making life suck for other people.

Thats just plain brilliant. 

[SFEley]

So the Doctor isn't better than the Daleks, just different.  The Daleks have just as much right to kill all humans as the Doctor has to save them.

I reject the question, because "have as much right" implies some sort of judge or referee.  Who's handing out those rights?  Is there a scorecard we can use?  Daleks don't have the right to kill all humans; it's what they do.  They do it whether they have the right to do it or not.

Likewise, no one gave the Doctor the right to kill the entire Dalek race over and over -- or to go saving us, meddling in human affairs, etc.  Sometimes the people he saves get pretty annoyed about it, especially in the recent seasons.  And they've been hinting more and more at shades of darker consequences to all his well-intended actions.  But it's what he does.  It's what the show is about.

From my relative standpoint as an observer, I am naturally inclined to root for the Doctor.  He likes humans and the Daleks do not; and hey, I'm a human.  Of course I'm on his side.

Besides, David Tennant is really cute.  >8->

[Mr. Tweedy]

Wow, those are really disturbing words.  Terrifying, actually.

So, you're saying that there is no moral principle that restrains me from, lets say, firebombing the local gay bar?  If, in the subjective moral system which I invent for myself, killing gays is a good thing, then I should kill as many as possible and feel proud of myself for it, right?

Is that what you're saying, or have I missed something?

[SFEley]

So, you're saying that there is no moral principle that restrains me from, lets say, firebombing the local gay bar?  If, in the subjective moral system which I invent for myself, killing gays is a good thing, then I should kill as many as possible and feel proud of myself for it, right?

No, that would be sociopathic.  I did say that one needs to value other people and communities.  If empathy isn't enough reason for you to care about other people, there's also logic.  Killing people or making their lives miserable wouldn't result in any actual benefit to you.  But it would be pretty unhealthy for you, and certainly not conducive to your safety and well-being.  The last guy who acted on such a moral code ended up living in the wilderness for five years, was caught rooting through garbage for food, and is spending the rest of his life in prison with no possibility of parole.  Why would any sane person create a moral code that hurts other people and themselves?

As I've already implied, my basic philosophy is utilitarianism.  I believe in making own life better, maximizing good stuff and minimizing bad stuff -- and I believe strongly that the only way to do that sustainably is to try to make the world around me a better world to live in.  Doing good things for other people, even without direct good to myself, increases the good in my life far more often than it decreases it.  I don't analyze it to the extent of picking a flavor of utilitarianism (hedonistic, preference, etc.) because they all have merits and because I also believe in the value of instinct and gut feelings.

Can utilitarianism be criticized?  Of course it can.  One can think of edge cases for any philosophy that makes it sound evil.  My response to that is that one shouldn't take one's philosophy too seriously.  Some of the most evil people in the world (yes, I'd include Eric Rudolph) are people who developed a moral code that they adhered to absolutely, regardless of other people and regardless of common sense.

I don't want to be that guy.  I don't want you to be that guy either.  Fortunately, most of us do have sense and are fundamentally good people, whether we think about it in depth or not.  People are good because we have the instinct to be good.  Society wouldn't have lasted long enough for us to be having this discussion otherwise.

Finally, to bring this all the way back to topic, I believe in tolerating other people because it inclines them to tolerate me.

Any of this not make sense?

[Anarkey]

So, you're saying that there is no moral principle that restrains me from, lets say, firebombing the local gay bar?  If, in the subjective moral system which I invent for myself, killing gays is a good thing, then I should kill as many as possible and feel proud of myself for it, right?

Is that what you're saying, or have I missed something?

I'm troubled by your use of the word "should" which implies we're endorsing the hypothetical morals of the hypothetical firebomber.  I would instead say that when people adopt morals that say killing is good, then they kill.  There's no should, it's what happens.

I'm also surprised that you think most of people's choices are based on their morals.  I think there are numerous psychological studies that decidedly counter that assumption and show that people's behavior is much more complex and based on a number of factors outside what they perceive as their morals.  Provided you see morals as a dispositional attribution (and I do), then the earlier quoted Stanford Prison Experiment is one such study.

I think that's part of Steve's point.  Morals may or may not come into every day decision-making.  It might be more accurate to view human acts as based on an intersection of several polygons of neurology and biology and environment, including (but not limited to) instinct, mood, biological drive, rational practicality, the desire to be members of our society, and all around utilitarianism, as well as the ideals and morals involved.  If I'm catching the drift of the conversation correctly, he's asserted that everyone's morality is subjective, and that most choices are made without resorting to the use of that morality, or with checks on the use of it at least.  Thus things that may be absolute in our mind are tempered by external reality.

So frex, because I don't keep kosher and am not vegetarian, my decision to have ham on my sammich is not a moral choice.  But for someone who is vegetarian, the ham sammich is a moral choice.  He weighs his morals in with everything else when he's standing at the deli counter placing his order.  Maybe they're out of anything but ham, and the guy has to decide whether he'd prefer to go hungry or not.  Thus the having of ham sammich is a moral choice for some, but not for others, ergo subjective. 

Escalating the rhetoric a little, as you did, our hypothetical firebomber would be behaving according to his subjective morals, but unfortunately, all his other faculties have been dimmed or supressed and so his morality precludes the rest of his sensibilities, even his ability to be a rational, non-sociopathic member of our society.  Which in fact, is a very reasonable explanation for what happened in the Birmingham church firebombing.  While there were plenty of people in Birmingham who were morally opposed to granting black Americans civil rights, only a very few decided that their moral opposition should extend to firebombing a church, and killing children for it.

What you're talking about is a failure of reason over morality, which hey! ties neatly back to whether morality can be scientific or not.  Based on his post, (which I'm piggybacking on, to be sure) I'm thinking Steve says not.  So do I. 

(Yes, I know how to spell sandwich, my colloquial spelling better suits me, thank you very much).

[Heradel]

and I wouldn't say that the matter has been decided yet.

It hasn't, and won't in my lifetime (unless I get hit by some life-extending cosmic ray/multiple chemicals/make a deal with the punky-gothy-Dream-and-Death), but democracy and belief in equality of all humans is certainly more visible now that it has been in human society.

I'll hop in on the firebombing bit later tonight, I have a play to go to at the moment.

[Michael]

What you guys seem to be debating now has been covered fairly extensively in Sociology.  Emile Durkheim and others posit there are two classes of societal rules:

mala in se (inherently wrong, all sane persons will agree--universal truth) and
mala prohibida (local tribal rules which can be a flukish and strange to outsiders, but something you sign up for when you join that tribe)

Showing the sole of your feet to another in America is no big deal, in Saudi Arabia it is a terrible insult--local tribal rules.  In Thailand a symbol that looks just like a swastika is a good luck sign--in Germany it is a felony.
So the trick is, what is truly wrong and what is just local prejudice?

As I recall, the only truly "mala in se" things that could be found was murder and incest.  Everything else was up for negotiation. 

[slic]

By the awesome coincidence of the Internet, there is an article in Discover Magasine, about this very subject:
Is Morality Innate and Universal? http://discovermagazine.com/2007/may/the-discover-interview-marc-hauser

It's not too big a read, but the most interesting part for me was here:

What impact does religion have on moral behavior?
I think that for many who come from a religious background, religion is synonymous with morality. Some people think that if you’re an atheist, you simply have no morals. That is just wrong. There are an awful lot of people who are atheists who do very, very wonderful things. As an objective question, do people who have religious backgrounds show different patterns of moral judgments than people who are atheists? So far, the answer is a resounding no.

Do you mean that people give the same answers to objective tests of moral reasoning regardless of religious background?
One hundred percent. So far, exactly the same. Here’s an example that comes from MIT philosopher Judy Thomson. She was interested in a question of whether the fetus has an obligatory right to the mother’s body. So she gives an incredibly apocryphal, crazy example: A woman is lying in bed one morning, and she wakes up to find a man lying in bed unconscious next to her. Another gentleman walks up to her and says: “I’m terribly sorry, but this man right next to you is a world-famous violinist, and he’s unconscious and in terrible health. He’s in kidney failure, and I hope you don’t mind, but we’ve plugged him into your kidney. And if he stays plugged in for the next nine months, you will save him.”
You ask people, “Is that morally permissible?” They’re like: “No, it’s insane. Of course not.” Well, that makes [Thomson’s] point exquisitely. It would be nice if she said, “Sure, I love this guy’s playing; plug him in.” But she’s not obligated to do so. Now let me make it like the abortion case. She says, “Yes, I love this guy’s violin playing!” Two months into it, she goes: “You know what? This really is a drag,” and she unplugs. Now people all of a sudden have a sense that’s less permissible than the first case. But here, people who are pro-choice or pro-life do not differ. So the point is, if you take people away from the familiar and you capture some of the critical underlying psychological issues that play into the real-world cases, then you find that the religious effects are minimal.

[ClintMemo]

Escalating the rhetoric a little, as you did, our hypothetical firebomber would be behaving according to his subjective morals, but unfortunately, all his other faculties have been dimmed or supressed and so his morality precludes the rest of his sensibilities, even his ability to be a rational, non-sociopathic member of our society.

Not that I am switching sides, but this is implying that his morals are "wrong" which implies some sort of objective standard to which to compare them to.   If they are truly subjective, then they are only wrong in that they are in conflict with almost everyone else's subjective morality.

Maybe if nearly everyone agrees on a moral principle (ex:murder is wrong) then we treat it as an objective truth.

[Michael]

I would argue the "universal wrongs" are likely hard wired into human DNA--they are the rules for being part of the human race.  This would not necisarrily apply to Daleks at all. We are using "universal" in the same sense we "world series" for American baseball.   

[slic]

Maybe if nearly everyone agrees on a moral principle (ex:murder is wrong) then we treat it as an objective truth

The problem is the sample size of "everyone" and what happens when that sample size changes.  The idea that you could have consensus on a principle by a group of more of varied individuals larger than 100,000 seems ludicris - to take a horrible example - child molestors see nothing wrong in what they do.

I would argue the "universal wrongs" are likely hard wired into human DNA

That is certainly the main theory of the article I linked above.  Here is a paraphrased example:
A train is hurtling down a hill and will crush 5 people, but you have a button that will switch the track, and the train will only crush one person - everyone agreed, hypothetically, that it would be the better thing to push the button.  Then they switched it around and said 5 people in a hospital need a different organ transplant, and a healthy person walks in - you have a button that will signal it's ok to take the organs of this one healthy person to save the other 5 - no one thought that it was ok to press the button.

[SFEley]

Escalating the rhetoric a little, as you did, our hypothetical firebomber would be behaving according to his subjective morals, but unfortunately, all his other faculties have been dimmed or supressed and so his morality precludes the rest of his sensibilities, even his ability to be a rational, non-sociopathic member of our society.

Not that I am switching sides, but this is implying that his morals are "wrong" which implies some sort of objective standard to which to compare them to.   If they are truly subjective, then they are only wrong in that they are in conflict with almost everyone else's subjective morality.

I didn't read that quote from Anarkey that way.  I read her as saying that the morality in this case is irrational, and out of proportion with other essential personal characteristics. 

I think that's a defensible argument without having to get into judging the morality itself.

[Simon Painter]

to take a horrible example - child molestors see nothing wrong in what they do.

This does raise an interesting exmple of moral relativism, though.  In ancient Greek society it was considered normal that a master would take his apprentice on as a lover.  In fact older men having sex with children was a relatively common practice (I'm sure I read a play in which one of the Greek Philosophers is convinced to give a speech when his friends temp him with the possibility of young boys being present).

But now, of course, it's considered utterly unacceptable to do anything of the sort.  It's an interesting example of how morals change over time.

Simon Painter
Shropshire, UK

[SFEley]

The problem is the sample size of "everyone" and what happens when that sample size changes.  The idea that you could have consensus on a principle by a group of more of varied individuals larger than 100,000 seems ludicris - to take a horrible example - child molestors see nothing wrong in what they do.

Not necessarily.  Sometimes people know things are wrong and do them anyway.  To use your example: there are a lot of reasons why people commit or attempt child rape, and many are situational; but pedophilia as a psychological condition is a genuine disorder.  It can be recognized by the person who has it; it can be diagnosed; it can be treated with varying degrees of success.  Simply having the condition is not a conscious choice.  People don't wake up and decide to be sexually attracted to 8-year-olds; they just are.  Many people with real pedophilia are just as repelled by their desires as you or I would be, and take steps to get help and in particular to avoid children.

And some, well, some know it's wrong and do it anyway -- just as an alcoholic can know it's wrong to relapse but does it anyway.  The mind can be slippery and treacherous.  A lot of people do terrible things while knowing that they're wrong.  That's the nature of addiction.  In the case of pedophilia, it's near-universally acknowledged to be wrong because everyone agrees that sex with young children is psychologically damaging to them.  Most other paraphilias can be acted out alone or with consenting adults, but there is no way for a pedophile to enact their urges without hurting someone who cannot responsibly consent.  A lot of pedophiles know this and try to cope.  At the same time, though, it can be incredibly difficult for someone who knows it's a problem to seek out treatment -- because society instantly judges one as evil just for bringing the subject up.

This is another tolerance edge case.  Should we be intolerant of people for the thoughts and feelings in their heads?  Do we recognize thoughtcrime?  I say no, because too many of the things we think and feel we have no control over.  This is definitely a case where action upon the thoughts cannot be tolerated, even for a moment; but to say that "child molesters see nothing wrong" is not always true.  I've never done anything on that level of wrongness, but I've certainly done things that I knew were wrong while I was doing them, and I'll bet you have too.

[Mr. Tweedy]

I think this will be my last post on this thread because I think I'm just going to have to give up.  Closing words:

First of all, all of you are still appealing to objective principles, although you seem hell-bent to remain oblivious to the fact.

Quotes from SFEley:

"No, that would be sociopathic."

"I did say that one needs to value other people and communities."

"Some of the most evil people in the world (yes, I'd include Eric Rudolph) are people who developed a moral code that they adhered to absolutely, regardless of other people and regardless of common sense."

"In the case of pedophilia, it's near-universally acknowledged to be wrong because everyone agrees that sex with young children is psychologically damaging to them."

In all of these, SFEley appeals to an objective standard which he think applies to everybody.  Being a sociopath is bad: Nobody should be a sociopath.  Valuing others is good: Everyone should value others.  Absolute adherence to a moral code is bad: Everyone should be flexible.  Psychologically damaging kids is bad: No one should rape kids.   Almost everything each of you says is a statement of absolute morality, saying how every person should feel and act: Every person should place reason over belief: Every person should want good for his own life.  Etc.  The fact that you deny that these are objective moral statements is something I can only ascribe to deliberate obtuseness.

"Doing good things for other people, even without direct good to myself, increases the good in my life far more often than it decreases it."

Here you presume that you are able to know what is good for someone else.  This implies that there are objective goods which are good for all people at all times and which all of can understand.  If there are no objective goods, then your statement means nothing at all.

You all seem to think that raping kids is wrong.  Says who?  What if I like raping kids?  What if I can get away with it?  Is that wrong?  Yes?  By whose standard?

It strikes me as astonishingly naive that anyone in the 21st century would appeal to rational self-interst as a mechanism for restraining human evil.  Every single day people use themselves as bombs to murder their neighbors.  History is filled with hundreds of millions of examples of individuals who were more interested in the death of their neighbors than in the preservation of their own lives.  It is absurd to assume that people are motivated by rational self-interest.  People are motivated by hate and greed and envy and pride.  People habitually do things to make their own lives worse and destroy themselves.  (Know any alcoholics?)  Our firebomber values the death of gays more than he values his freedom: He's glad to spend life in prison for the satisfaction of knocking off a few of them.  He isn't hypothetical: He's common.  There are, have been and will be thousands and millions of people with that sort of mindset.

The world is chock full, just stuffed with people who would rather rule in hell than serve in heaven.  And I'm not just talking about Hitler, I'm talking about the abusive father who takes satisfaction when his children fear him, and I'm talking about the boss who makes work hell for the pleasure of control, and I'm talking about the kids on the playground who mock and belittle the neighborhood dork because it makes them feel superior.  Your idea of relativism does absolutely nothing to restrain such people.  Your system provides you with no grounds on which to tell such people to "stop."  It does nothing to restrain the real, non-hypothetical people in the world who would rather kill you and take your stuff than be friends with you.

It is also naive to say that one's self-interest is best advanced by doing good to others.  Historically, the exploitation of the weak by the strong has been the norm, and the strong have usually done quite well for themselves.  The self-interest of the slaveholder is advanced by beating his slaves.  Treating them like his equals will bankrupt him.  The self-interest of the mafioso is advanced by pushing drugs.

You will protest "But those people have unhealthy mindsets.  They need to be educated so that they will understand the cooperation and tolerance are the best ways to fulfill themselves."  But then again you go standing on objective moral high ground, saying that some ways are better than others and some goals or more noble than other goals.  One person wants to see world where people of all colors live in peace and harmony, another wants to see a world where everyone who is not blonde-haired and blue-eyed gets stuffed in an oven.  If you truly believe in subjectivity (which I don't think any of you really do), then you have to consider both roads to peace as equally valid.

I'm going to go back now to what I said a while ago, which is that "subjective morality" cannot exist: It is a vacuous term.  Unless morals apply universally, they are not morals, they are just individual preferences, like preferring mustard to ketchup.  A morality that is impotent to distinguish between Doctor and Dalek, between Churchill and Hilter, or between physician and hit-man is no morality at all: It is moot and irrelevant.  The system that has been outlined here is not the impossible fantasy of subjective morality, it is the outright rejection of morality.   Morality is either objective or it does not exist at all.

Anyway, this is probably long enough.  Maybe someday I'll be honest and write a book.

My final statement is that all of my choices are moral, including my choice to eat ham, and I hold to my morality in spite of self-interest.  I try to serve and love others even when it costs me something, not because I think that's the best way to get good stuff for myself, but because I believe it is the right thing to do.

I don't expect I'll be posting on this thread again.  I don't really think I have much else to say on these topics except to endlessly reitterate what I've already said, which would be boring for everyone.

I was glad that we all seemed to agree on a definition of tolerance, though.  Some progress.

[slic]

but I've certainly done things that I knew were wrong while I was doing them, and I'll bet you have too.

I really think that we are agreeing, and it's my lazy typing.

"...there are a lot of reasons why people commit or attempt child rape, and many are situational; but pedophilia as a psychological condition is a genuine disorder."
Exactly - I should have typed "some child molestors".  From what I have read, some are disgusted with themselves, but there are some who see themselves as misunderstood, and misuse the Greek example that madsimonJ mentioned as justification.

What I was really getting at is that given a large enough sample size you will get enough difference in genetic make-up and attitudes that you just cannot have absolute agreement on just about anything.

[Simon Painter]

From what I have read, some are disgusted with themselves, but there are some who see themselves as misunderstood, and misuse the Greek example that madsimonJ mentioned as justification.

Just thought I'd add a quick disclaimer, as this hadn't occurred to me.  I didn't give that example in support of Child Abuse, I'm completely dead-set against it, just so that's clear 

The point I was (probably failing) to make is that whether these things are considered moral or not changes over time.

It's probably unnesessary for me to say this, but I've heard loads of stories from my Brother, who used to work for a local council, about how touchy the subject can be.

Simon Painter
Shropshire, UK

[JaredAxelrod]

Since we're talking about Utilitarianism...



Curtousy of the fine folks at Action Philosophers

[slic]

It would be a shame, Mr. Tweedy, if you did leave the thread.  You have made some very good points that I've had to really think about.

I do have a few counter-points, so hopefully you are still reading.

It is also naive to say that one's self-interest is best advanced by doing good to others.  Historically, the exploitation of the weak by the strong has been the norm, and the strong have usually done quite well for themselves.  The self-interest of the slaveholder is advanced by beating his slaves.  Treating them like his equals will bankrupt him.  The self-interest of the mafioso is advanced by pushing drugs.

In my experience and learning, this is wrong.  The problem with this example is you are not allowing a paradigm shift - you are arguing short term gain versus long term improvement.
People clearly work harder when there is something to gain for themselves.  Society on the whole advances (improves, perhaps).  The problem with the slave owners you mention is that they could not see how long term this would benefit them specifically.  Or perhaps the gains did not suit them.  Without enlighted self interest then the slaves wouldn't work at all - it's the personal desire not to be beaten that makes them work.

Your comments about absolute moralism, remind me about a series I listened to on NPR years ago, about why the Bible is not "updated".  The arguement, as I remember it, was that the Bible would become to trendy and basically turn into the "individual preferences" you mention.  "That particular sin isn't in my Bible because..."  The real problem with this is when parts of the teachings get outdated or irrelevant to society - then the book loses some of it's power.  You see many people protesting Red Lobster lately?  It's in the same general area of Leviticus that gets quoted about homosexuals.  However, I've only heard it quoted by smartasses like me to prove a point.  Why are those passages less important to "true Christians"? (this is not a dig at you Mr. Tweedy).

You bring up an excellent point about absolute moralism, and I think, in Western society, the power of the Holy Book in ths regard (be it Quran, Bible, or Talmud) has been replaced by the Rule of Law.  That is our absolute moralism.  These are the codified rules we live by.  I do understand that when a law changes or is created that a large minority disapproves of, they look somewhere else to return the status quo.  However, anything that gives people equality in participating in society always ends up improving the society as a whole.

Religion is the kind of belief that can never be argued - you already believe is something that is immeasureable by all my senses, how could I possible win against God?

[SFEley]

I think this will be my last post on this thread because I think I'm just going to have to give up.

Fair enough.  I think the only valid reason to have discussions like this anyway is if you're enjoying yourself or learning things from having to explain yourself.  Certainly no one's likely to change anyone's mind in a context like this, and no one's accusing anyone else (I hope) of being a bad person just for having different mental frameworks.

First of all, all of you are still appealing to objective principles, although you seem hell-bent to remain oblivious to the fact.

I think this comes down to semantics.  If I had appended "in my opinion," "from my perspective," or "it is my personal judgment" to every sentence in every post I wrote here, would you still think I was appealing to objective principles?  You seem to be judging the omission of these qualifiers to mean that I think my thoughts ought to be imposed on everyone.  Nothing could be further from the truth.  I don't hold anyone accountable to my thoughts alone except me.  I didn't put all those qualifiers in at every point because I thought they were implied.

In all of these, SFEley appeals to an objective standard which he think applies to everybody.  Being a sociopath is bad: Nobody should be a sociopath.  Valuing others is good: Everyone should value others.  Absolute adherence to a moral code is bad: Everyone should be flexible.  Psychologically damaging kids is bad: No one should rape kids.   Almost everything each of you says is a statement of absolute morality, saying how every person should feel and act:

No, everything I say is an opinion, a subjective value judgment, and a lot of the reasons for those opinions are other than moral.  They are directly practical.  Nobody should be a sociopath because the presence of sociopaths can do a lot of harm to me and people of value to me.  Someone else could disagree, of course.  But if their disagreement resulted in harm or became a threat, I'd still want them stopped, and wouldn't give a damn about objective moral frameworks.

Our firebomber values the death of gays more than he values his freedom: He's glad to spend life in prison for the satisfaction of knocking off a few of them.  He isn't hypothetical: He's common.  There are, have been and will be thousands and millions of people with that sort of mindset.

I cannot say what's in the minds of thousands or millions of people.  I'm not them.  I can't judge thoughts because I don't know them.  But I can judge actions.  (Again, in my humble opinion, blah blah.)  I can take great comfort in knowing that action on such principles is extraordinarily uncommon.  That Eric Rudolph is front-page sensational news, and that there isn't a daily list of gay nightclub bombings in the police blotter on Page 8.

The world is chock full, just stuffed with people who would rather rule in hell than serve in heaven.  And I'm not just talking about Hitler, I'm talking about the abusive father who takes satisfaction when his children fear him, and I'm talking about the boss who makes work hell for the pleasure of control, and I'm talking about the kids on the playground who mock and belittle the neighborhood dork because it makes them feel superior.  Your idea of relativism does absolutely nothing to restrain such people.  Your system provides you with no grounds on which to tell such people to "stop."  It does nothing to restrain the real, non-hypothetical people in the world who would rather kill you and take your stuff than be friends with you.

Of course it does.  I can stop them because they're hurting people.  And a world in which people are free to hurt other people without consequence is a world in which I and mine are eventually going to get hurt.  

Furthermore, let's say you were right.  Let's say my moral framework was flawed here, and permitted some evil to happen that I knew about.  If my basic instincts cry out to do something anyway, I feel completely free to ignore any of my own philosophical meanderings and do what I think is right.  Because philosophy is philosophy, but somebody hurting someone right in front of me is too important to waste time squabbling about.

You may call that an absolute morality rooted in my instincts.  I cannot agree only because I don't know who else would do what in the same situation.  And you know what?  I don't care.  I am responsible for my actions.  Whether everyone on the planet would do the same thing doesn't matter.

I'm going to go back now to what I said a while ago, which is that "subjective morality" cannot exist: It is a vacuous term.  Unless morals apply universally, they are not morals, they are just individual preferences, like preferring mustard to ketchup.  A morality that is impotent to distinguish between Doctor and Dalek, between Churchill and Hilter, or between physician and hit-man is no morality at all: It is moot and irrelevant.

I think you've missed my point entirely.  I did say one couldn't tolerate a Dalek.  I am saying now that one cannot tolerate Hitler.  (We'll skip the Godwin's Law invocation for now.)  Whether one refuses to tolerate for "absolute moral" reasons is irrelevant.  Why you stop them doesn't matter.  From my perspective they must be stopped to reduce suffering in the world.  If you want to have a different reason, that's cool by me.

The system that has been outlined here is not the impossible fantasy of subjective morality, it is the outright rejection of morality.   Morality is either objective or it does not exist at all.

Yeah, that goes back full circle.  See?  No one ever convinces anyone of anything in these sorts of threads.  The best you can do is to develop your own viewpoint better for your own benefit.

My final statement is that all of my choices are moral, including my choice to eat ham, and I hold to my morality in spite of self-interest.  I try to serve and love others even when it costs me something, not because I think that's the best way to get good stuff for myself, but because I believe it is the right thing to do.

Good for you.  I mean that -- I'm not being ironic.  Honestly, genuinely, good for you.  May you continue to do good (by your perspective or mine), and be happy with the good you're doing, for a long time to come.  

[Anarkey]

I think this will be my last post on this thread because I think I'm just going to have to give up.

Giving up on all that great tolerance this thread is generating so soon?  Alas.
(That was a joke, btw.  I completely understand thread exhaustion.)

First of all, all of you are still appealing to objective principles, although you seem hell-bent to remain oblivious to the fact.

It's possible I'm just that willfully oblivious, but I have yet to see where I've applied objective principles.  I have applied some of Michael's universal wrongs, but as he noted, those may be hardwired for species survival.  Hardly a case of morality.    I've also applied some basic psychological principles in addition to the basic sociological ones, but I would count that as science, not objective principles.  We may discover on down the line that these principles are flawed or mistaken and I'm assuming an objective principle has to endure through the ages...is that right?... "at all times, for all people, in all circumstances". 

Although I have plenty of philosophical tenets that align themselves with Steve's (or at least do not conflict with his), since you've felt free to generally lump me in with him with your "all of you" followed by numerous quotes taken only from his posts...I'm now forced to demarcate: I am not a utilitarian nor a hedonist.

I'd also recommend that you not take my pointing out flaws in this or that argument as an endorsement of one side over the other.  Generally I'm drawn to pointing out flaws where they seem invisible.  (shrink says: there's a long history of gender marginalization to account for that personality quirk).  So, for example, though I'm not a hedonist, so soon as Steve acknowledged his philosophy as flawed, I was less inclined to point out the flaws in his philosophy because he's already come to terms with them and accounts for them.  One of the way he accounts for the possibility that his life approach may be imperfect is to respect other people's life approaches when they differ from his own, at least up to a point.  And thus we are at tolerance again.

See, I think his moral compass lends itself to tolerance.  In general, the Judeo-Christian-Islamic model does not lend itself to tolerance.  You can square-peg-round-hole it, especially if you take Jesus for a model (see ClintMemo's posts earlier about Jesus as tolerant figure), but all those religious traditions say "We're right, you're wrong.  We're tribe, you're outsider."

Which is, in a nutshell, not tolerant, in just the way palimpsest was referring to in the way-way-wayback of this thread before I ever came into it.

Almost everything each of you says is a statement of absolute morality, saying how every person should feel and act: Every person should place reason over belief: Every person should want good for his own life.  Etc.  The fact that you deny that these are objective moral statements is something I can only ascribe to deliberate obtuseness.

Whoa, whoa, whoa, dude, slow down.  I find it curious that you keep adding in "shoulds" where I never put them.  I never said that "every person should place reason over belief."  I never even implied it.  I explained a situation as "failure of reason over morality".  But yes, we had already agreed (I thought) that the situation was a failure of SOMETHING, so I was merely ascribing a potential (and to me, plausible) explanation as to what went wrong.  I then applied that same situation to a real (rather than hypothetical) situation and saw it still fit.  It's just an explanation of events, not a prescription for behavior.  I'm not even claiming it's an absolute explanation or a universal explanation, I'm merely trying to open the door to alternate interpretations of what is occurring.  My whole point is that we really don't actually know the answers to these things, but with the help of psychology and sociology we might come up with something a little more concrete and predictable than "all morality is based in objective principles" which is difficult to swallow on its face because morality differs from group to group and person to person (as pointed out in MadSimonJ's Greek men with young male apprentices example).

Here you presume that you are able to know what is good for someone else.  This implies that there are objective goods which are good for all people at all times and which all can understand.  If there are no objective goods, then your statement means nothing at all.

Actually, we already know what is good for people, again, based on that wonderful science of psychology.  Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs tells us exactly what is good for all human beings.  Steve doesn't have to presume, he can look into the wealth of human study and know.

It strikes me as astonishingly naive that anyone in the 21st century would appeal to rational self-interst as a mechanism for restraining human evil.

I'm sure Steve can stand up for himself on this one, but I don't think he was offering his self-interest as anything quite so far-reaching and grandiose as a mode for restraining human evil, but as a mode for people to live together with a minimum of problems.  Near as I can tell, he was just offering it up as what works for him, right now.  In ten years he could change his mind.  He's probably changed his mind in the last ten years.  I know I have.  I think probably the only morality that will restrain human evil is the Dalek morality of killing them all.  That's biblical, btw (not the Daleks, but the inescapable evil of all mankind), if the bible happens to be your tool for objective, universal morality.

Your idea of relativism does absolutely nothing to restrain such people.  Your system provides you with no grounds on which to tell such people to "stop."  It does nothing to restrain the real, non-hypothetical people in the world who would rather kill you and take your stuff than be friends with you.

Curious.  I didn't believe moral relativism...or any type of morality was supposed to "restrain" anyone.  I didn't think "restraining" people was what we were discussing.  I thought we were discussing moral systems, and whether they could be compared to science, math or otherwise be considered big T truth.  Yet you've used the term "restrain" several times.

Is, perhaps, what you're trying to say that we need an objective, universal morality so that we can force people to abide by it?  Rules?  Laws?  Punishments?  Protections?

Because there are ways to have all those things without having an objective and universal morality, you know.  We can all just decide we want our society to work certain ways without resorting to morals.  Social contract, Rousseau-style.

I'm not sure why you would want to try and force people to a morality that will always fail and then apply punishments based on those inevitable failures.

You will protest "But those people have unhealthy mindsets.  They need to be educated so that they will understand the cooperation and tolerance are the best ways to fulfill themselves."

You know, I wish you wouldn't tell me what I'm going to say and then answer it.  That's not dialogue, that's monologue.

My final statement is that all of my choices are moral, including my choice to eat ham, and I hold to my morality in spite of self-interest.

Really?  There's some moral principle you serve when urinating and defecating?  When sleeping?  When taking an aspirin for a headache?  When putting on a jacket?  Showering?  Slamming on the brakes in order to not rear end someone who has suddenly stopped in front of you? 

If it's true, that your every action is based in morality, I am astonished.  I have never met anyone else like you.  Perhaps you do have access to a higher understanding of morality than anyone else here.  I am a little skeptical of your claim, but really, if it's true, you definitely ought to write a book, because you're in a class of your own.   

If I had to think on the moral implications of everything I do, I'd never get out of bed.