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The Gay Agenda; Freedom for all?
Topic Started: May 30 2006, 11:39 AM (3,840 Views)
ivorythumper
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Jeffrey
Jun 6 2006, 05:45 PM
Most moral philosophers from Aristotle to Mill to Kant have placed the focus of morality on some combination of (a) free choice, (b) happiness or © psychological self-development.  These are all items readily detectible in a purely materialist universe, and almost all human beings (plus perhaps some non-human beings) seem capable of possessing these attributes.

Sorry, Jeff, your nostalgic appeal to historically contingent "authorities" is hardly compelling. Why privilege the biochemical processes of these figures? You have already dismissed Aristotle as an authority in other posts -- all that hylomorphism and metaphysical language is in disrepute. Do you really want to argue from what you yourself considers to be "aristotelian gobbledegook"?

As far as the appeals to "happiness" or "free will" or "self development" as the basis for moral judgment, everyone has their own notion of what makes one happy, or what is the best choice, or what they consider to be self development. And these difference are presumably based on subtle but significant biochemical reactions to stimuli that are different in different people. Of course, none of the pre 20th century philosophers understood the biochemistry of thought or emotion, so they cannot be adequate authorities to speak about these things. You might as well call upon some other benighted writer like Aquinas.

No, Jeff, none of what you have written here constitutes any sure and stable ground for the discussion of whether moral claims can be made. And even that you would appeal to these shows that you are presupposing what you want to prove. You privilege these biochemical reactions as having specific value, when that is something they don't have in and of themselves, but only that which you choose to ascribe to them. [edit] And even that "choice" and that "valuation" are biochemical processes which are unique to your biochemical composition, so there is no reason that anyone else must agree with them.
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ivorythumper
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Jeffrey
Jun 6 2006, 07:24 PM
IT: "If there is no stable and immutable human nature -- in short if everything is in constant flux"

I guess you have to be smarter than I am to understand your false dilemma. Immutable or constant flux are the only two alternatives?

"Well if you are going to admit to a telos, then there is not much point in further discussion, other than to ask whither the telos?"

I claim your terminology is imprecise and poorly explained and not in accordance with the findings of modern science, and you assume you have won the debate. Is there a Catholic term for chutzpah?

So give me a tertium quid, and a better definition. You can't just claim that my definitions are imprecise without demonstrating it. What's the Yiddish word for chutzpah? :lol:
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Moonbat
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Well since this thread has been ressurected i'll make the post i somehow didn't get round to making.

- My views are probably quite different to Jeff though there are no doubt overlaps.

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BTW, I have not responded to your very good post above. Pain and suffering are not necessarily bad -- they are part of the healing process. They also have a transcendental dimension to release us from the confines of the ego. Religiously they are even considered redemptive.


But you see my point is that there are things that are necessarily bad.

I think suffering is probably a good description for one of them, the healing process is a process that ultimately reduces suffering, the fact that once something dire has happened some suffering is inevitable as a person heals does not mean suffering is a good thing. Simple Utilitarian concepts of healing being usefull in terms of least ill seem to apply.

A person is better off not being tortured against their own will, not watching their family starve, there are things that as conscious agents we do not want to experience: On an individual level conscious experience can be negative.

One of the great evils of religion is that it can say suffering is good, it can act to increase the suffering of others, i see it every day with my girlfriends siblings, to say it disgusts me is an understatement.

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The points I raise are simply playing devil's advocate -- but I do so because I think that at the core your strict materialism is no more intellectually and experientially satisfying or rigorous than a faith based perspective.


But you see they don't work, because even if one accepts what you say about suffering - and i do not, as individuals there are things we do not want for ourselves, from our own pespective there are such things as negative outcomes. Concepts of molecules cannot alter our own experiences, and the nature of experience means somethings are negative. And _that_ gives me a launching point into a system of ethics.

For me core ethics is about quality of life, negative experiences are bad by definition, quality of life encapsulates the idea that our conscious experience can be better or worse, it is therefore good by definition to increase quality of life.

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I suspect that you (qua athestic materialist) have been so immersed and cultivated in the matrix of vestigial religious thought that it is difficult to entirely eradicate these influences from your consciousness. You make appeals to "equality" which is an attribute of justice (an "eye for an eye" is a deficient formulation of that, "giving each person his proportionate due" is a better notion), but that begs the question.


"Giving each his proportionate due" says nothing, one could equally say giving each his just due. Clearly within this idea, is that the "proportionate due" for people who do harm is for harm to happen them. Because i find this runs counter to the idea that we should merely reduce harm done i oppose it.

I also find that it is this proportionate due stuff that means people keep on fighting, he hit me, i'll hit him, he hit me, i'll hit him. They suicide attack, i will reprise, they reprised i will suicide attack, they killed one of my family, i will kill one of their family, they killed my family i will kill one of their family and on and on the cycle goes.

No thank you.

I make appeals to equality because equality increases quality of life.

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From a strictly materialist POV you have your experiences and observations, but you privilege them as if they really mean anything apart from your own consciousness and whatever societal corporate agreements are made.


I don't understand what you mean when you say I "privilege them". They "mean" something to "me". Conscious experiences are sources of meaning, they create meaning, they manipulate meaning, they chisel meaning into the world around them. Stuff matters to me, self evidently, in a way completely immune from an exploration of how and why things are the way they are.

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So you have the comfort of maintaining some semblence of human dignity because of the superstructure that religion has created, and you think yourself competent to judge that superstructure -- but I do earnestly think that if the superstructure were dismantled in some sort of zero degree project that you would have no ethical standing to argue why you have any "right" to exist in the present state of your particular biochemical complex.


You see you always come back to using your terms but i don't accept them at all, i have a feeling you mean something when you say "human dignity" far more significant than i do, i care about common speak concepts of dignity because when people feel they do not have this thing they feel worse for it, a lack of dignity is often a negative experience for the experiencee.

Rights are just a set of rules that work to protect us as individuals, protect easily translates into concepts of quality of life, if we were not protected we would be worse off for it.


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In short, you would be hard pressed to justify your existence without appealing to some transcendent "good", which is precisely what the Natural Law theories that you reject have developed.


But i don't really understand the question, i don't need to "justify" my existence -i already exist. I can justify the law being what it is, reasonably easily in terms of quality of life, if you ask the question "why should we not try and kill people who annoy us" then i answer "because if you do then you'll lower the overall quality of life of society".

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The utilitarian project has taken certain aspects of NL and gutted them of transcendence and reframed the language, but still attempt to make some of the same appeals.


I don't see that.

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But these rely on commonalities in the human condition that are refused the name "human nature" when any validity to the notions can only be asserted through the agreement of what humanity is and what the role of the state is in regulating human activity so as to help humanity flourish in an optimal state (common good).


I notice that you said somewhere else that under "materialist" ideas there was no human nature. I find that a very strange statement as it seem to be obvious within the confines of my window of view (i.e. about 100 years or so) there is a human nature. We act a certain way we can understand why we act that way in terms of biology and psychology and evolution etc.

I find ethics challenging, but in terms of a reasonable intellectual structure I have found no alternative, Natural law just says lots of silly things about the world outside my head in order to make things simpler for me to deal with, but those statements have no basis. Thus the whole thing fails.
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sue
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Good post, Moonbat.
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ivorythumper
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Thanks for the reply. I will only focus on one obvious point to clarify the discussion (though I have to reverse the order of your responses)


Moonbat
Jun 7 2006, 03:06 AM
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The utilitarian project has taken certain aspects of NL and gutted them of transcendence and reframed the language, but still attempt to make some of the same appeals.


I don't see that.


For example, your discussion of "quality of life" and being "worse off" -- this is the same NL argument regarding the Common Good.

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Rights are just a set of rules that work to protect us as individuals, protect easily translates into concepts of quality of life, if we were not protected we would be worse off for it.



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In short, you would be hard pressed to justify your existence without appealing to some transcendent "good", which is precisely what the Natural Law theories that you reject have developed.


But i don't really understand the question, i don't need to "justify" my existence -i already exist. I can justify the law being what it is, reasonably easily in terms of quality of life, if you ask the question "why should we not try and kill people who annoy us" then i answer "because if you do then you'll lower the overall quality of life of society".


But presumably if there were enough annoying people, you could improve the overall quality of life. ;) What if there were just one person who was *really* detrimental to society -- and the detriment was of such a great order that society would indeed be better off without that person? Maybe not killing them but exiling them or imprisoning them? How could you possibly do the utilitarian calculus on that?



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I find ethics challenging, but in terms of a reasonable intellectual structure I have found no alternative, Natural law just says lots of silly things about the world outside my head in order to make things simpler for me to deal with, but those statements have no basis. Thus the whole thing fails.


Get specific with me. What claims does NL make that are silly and which you find have no basis?
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ivorythumper
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Moonbat
Jun 7 2006, 03:06 AM

I also find that it is this proportionate due stuff that means people keep on fighting, he hit me, i'll hit him, he hit me, i'll hit him. They suicide attack, i will reprise, they reprised i will suicide attack, they killed one of my family, i will kill one of their family, they killed my family i will kill one of their family and on and on the cycle goes.

No thank you.

That is anything but a NL position regarding due proportion or justice. If that is your understanding of things, I understand why you would be opposed, but it is profoundly mistaken.
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Moonbat
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For example, your discussion of "quality of life" and being "worse off" -- this is the same NL argument regarding the Common Good.


There are overlaps, which is unsuprising as we both share many ethical stances, this started with you saying materialism was in opposition to ethics.

In terms of difference though my concept of quality of life is in a sense true by definition. NL's common good does not seem to define good in this way rather it makes assertions of truth, axiomerically, there is no defense of health as good or procreation as good, they are analysed as good merely because they are common activities across humanity. But this does not seem to me a defense: lust and greed seem pretty common to me.

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But presumably if there were enough annoying people, you could improve the overall quality of life.  What if there were just one person who was *really* detrimental to society -- and the detriment was of such a great order that society would indeed be better off without that person? Maybe not killing them but exiling them or imprisoning them? How could you possibly do the utilitarian calculus on that?


Well if i magically found myself somewhere in the 1930s knowing what would happen, and given the chance to take out Hitler i'd take it. If i had to kill Hitler's innocent niece in the process i'd still do it.

Murderers are really annoying people, and i justify locking them up precisely because it does improve the overall quality of life.

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Get specific with me. What claims does NL make that are silly and which you find have no basis?


Well the catholic encyclopeida says:

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In its strictly ethical application–the sense in which this article treats it–the natural law is the rule of conduct which is prescribed to us by the Creator in the constitution of the nature with which He has endowed us.


and

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According to St. Thomas, the natural law is "nothing else than the rational creature's participation in the eternal law" (I-II, Q. xciv). The eternal law is God's wisdom, inasmuch as it is the directive norm of all movement and action. When God willed to give existence to creatures, He willed to ordain and direct them to an end. In the case of inanimate things, this Divine direction is provided for in the nature which God has given to each; in them determinism reigns. Like all the rest of creation, man is destined by God to an end, and receives from Him a direction towards this end. This ordination is of a character in harmony with his free intelligent nature. In virtue of his intelligence and free will, man is master of his conduct. Unlike the things of the mere material world he can vary his action, act, or abstain from action, as he pleases. Yet he is not a lawless being in an ordered universe. In the very constitution of his nature, he too has a law laid down for him, reflecting that ordination and direction of all things, which is the eternal law. The rule, then, which God has prescribed for our conduct, is found in our nature itself. Those actions which conform with its tendencies, lead to our destined end, and are thereby constituted right and morally good; those at variance with our nature are wrong and immoral.


Creator and anti-determinism is faith. What's more i just don't like this "norms" are good merely because they are norms.

Human's have a nature but it's not wholely "good" (as in lead to increases in the QoL of all conscious agents) , part of our nature is greed, aggression and a strong drive towards self-interest.

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That is anything but a NL position regarding due proportion or justice. If that is your understanding of things, I understand why you would be opposed, but it is profoundly mistaken.


Fair enough, but there does seem to be some element of "eye for an eye"ness in concepts of justice, and i don't really like that.
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ivorythumper
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That passage from the Catholic Encyclopedia, which I generally like, and which I appreciate why you would consult (indeed, I appreciate that you took efforts to get on the same page as me), is pretty strange. From a "strictly ethical application" it seems strange to invoke theological presuppositions. The Aquinas passage is understandable, since he is intentionally synthesizing a non-religious and preChristian ethical structure with Christian Revelation, and finds that in the study of jurisprudence, NL comes under the divine law.

But the whole enterprise is not the least bit contingent on revelation or a personal creator or a religious understanding. It is indeed natural law, not supernatural law.

The major premises are that mankind is naturally ordered or inclined toward certain activities: the pursuit of truth, the acquisition of goods (goods as being that which helps his end -- not necessarily a spiritual concept, but more "what it means to be human"), self preservation /survival, social life, and procreation.

Before proceeding, I'd want to know if you find these objectionable or unclear or silly or baseless.
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Jeffrey
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IT: "And even that "choice" and that "valuation" are biochemical processes which are unique to your biochemical composition, so there is no reason that anyone else must agree with them."

The second half of your inference is not supported by the first half. The fact that love, choice, thought and happiness are chemical/electrical processes does not mean that they are not still really love, choice, thought or happiness, any more than the fact that music is air vibrations makes it not really music. Your whole argument is based on a simple logical fallacy.

The fact that not everyone agrees on moral claims is not a basis for saying that they are not objective (capable of truth or falsity) because scientific claims are also subject to widespread disagreement, especially when people's personal interests are involved (e.g. evolution, global warming, etc.).
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ivorythumper
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Jeffrey
Jun 7 2006, 03:29 PM
IT: "And even that "choice" and that "valuation" are biochemical processes which are unique to your biochemical composition, so there is no reason that anyone else must agree with them."

    The second half of your inference is not supported by the first half.  The fact that love, choice, thought and happiness are chemical/electrical processes does not mean that they are not still really love, choice, thought or happiness, any more than the fact that music is air vibrations makes it not really music.  Your whole argument is based on a simple logical fallacy. 


Your analogy with music to dismiss my argument does not work since music is artifice and "love" "choice" "happiness" etc are natural biochemical processes. Try again.
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      The fact that not everyone agrees on moral claims is not a basis for saying that they are not objective (capable of truth or falsity) because scientific claims are also subject to widespread disagreement, especially when people's personal interests are involved (e.g. evolution, global warming, etc.).


If someone does not accept a scientific explanation it can be for a variety of reasons -- vincible or invincible ignorance, counter evidence that is not accounted for, personal agendas, etc. Yet the objective truth value is (if strict materialist accounts are "true") ascertainable eventually.

I am curious from your response, given what seems to be a confusion between speculative sciences and emprical sciences, which you think ethics falls under?
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Jeffrey
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IT: " Yet the objective truth value is (if strict materialist accounts are "true") ascertainable eventually.

I am curious from your response, given what seems to be a confusion between speculative sciences and emprical sciences, which you think ethics falls under?"

I don't know what a speculative science is, you will have to explain it to me. All science is empirical, including ethics: there is no other source of knowledge of anything. I think ethics is an empirical science, subject to verification or disproof just like other sciences. The human species has made progress in ethics, just as in the natural sciences, for example, slavery was once widely accepted (e.g. in biblical times, in Aftica, and in the US 150 years ago), but is now almost universally rejected. This is an example of human progress in moral knowledge, just as there is progress in knowledge of evolution, physics, and other empirical topics.

If you don't like my music example, that's fine, the general form of your fallacy is that a thing does not cease to be really that thing, just because it is made up of other things. Sound does not become non-sound because it is "really" air vibrations. Use whatever analogy works for you, it is still a formal fallacy.

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ivorythumper
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Jeff: You are appealing to something outside of the material operation of "choice" or "love" to value it -- when in fact your valuation is precisely a material operation. I don't see how you have an archimedean vantage from which to do so.

And I am sorry if you don't understand the term "speculative science" -- it is common parlance in philosophical discourses which I thought you had studied. My bad.
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Jeffrey
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IT: " You are appealing to something outside of the material operation of "choice" or "love" to value it -- when in fact your valuation is precisely a material operation. I don't see how you have an archimedean vantage from which to do so.

And I am sorry if you don't understand the term "speculative science" -- it is common parlance in philosophical discourses which I thought you had studied. My bad."

No vantage point is needed. You have still to explain why you think it is. Of course valuation, like thought, choice, love, and happiness, is a chemical and electrical process. What else would it be?? The fact that valuation is a materal process doesn't make it not-valuation. See your fallacy above.

Re: "speculative science" - well, remind me not to use self-depreciating humor next time. I was rejecting the distinction you were claiming, on the grounds that all knowledge is empirical, including ethical knowledge. There is no such thing as a "speculative science", if this term is intended to posit either a subject of knowledge or method of knowing that is not empirical. Again, you are going to have to explain such a fuzzy, confused, and perhaps even meaningless term, if you are going to use it. I try to use ordinary, easily understood language to express my views.
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ivorythumper
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Jeffrey
Jun 7 2006, 06:16 PM


    No vantage point is needed.  You have still to explain why you think it is.  Of course valuation, like thought, choice, love, and happiness, is a chemical and electrical process.  What else would it be??  The fact that valuation is a materal process doesn't make it not-valuation.  See your fallacy above. 

So if its a chemical and electrical process, how can it be determined as whether good or bad, verifiable or falsifiable? It is what it is. You can't change the chemistry or the electricity or the reaction. It is back to the notion that it is a nerve impulse. You posit (or rather presuppose) that it is important because it has propositional content, but even this valuation is an electrical and chemical process. You can only go in circles. It is just the trigger of a particular sequence of biochemical activity that lead you to think it it so, and these biochemical reactions are what they are. Given that sequence of chemicals and reactions, you can have no other response. But there is no onus on anyone else to have their biochemical reactions correspond to yours.

So, for instance, the biochemical response in one bioenergy complex responds to the stimulus of "foetus" with the same energy and response as to the stimulus of "human being", whereas another bioenergy complex does not have this same correspondence. The difference must be chemical. Two perfectly unassailable biochemical processes that create different reactions. The same argument can be made regarding heterosexuality or homosexuality, or for preferring tandori or not, or for slavery or not, for polygamy as good or bad, for kiddie porn as good or bad, for atheism or theism, for what brand of piano creates what you consider to have more pleasant tone, etc.

All you are doing is privileging (or special pleading) for a particular set of biochemical reactions as more important than others. And in doing so thereby think that you can make claims that some chemical reactions are "good/bad" or "correct/incorrect" or "true/false" or whatever term you want to use when you presume to make moral evaluations.

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I try to use ordinary, easily understood language to express my views.
That deserves a :rolleyes2: ----- :wink:
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Moonbat
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But the whole enterprise is not the least bit contingent on revelation or a personal creator or a religious understanding. It is indeed natural law, not supernatural law.

The major premises are that mankind is naturally ordered or inclined toward certain activities: the pursuit of truth, the acquisition of goods (goods as being that which helps his end -- not necessarily a spiritual concept, but more "what it means to be human"), self preservation /survival, social life, and procreation.

Before proceeding, I'd want to know if you find these objectionable or unclear or silly or baseless.


I don't find those silly, baseless seems too harsh but i do have a problem with your premises.

Why those and not others - mankind seems inclined towards violence and towards sex. Further why deem these particular activities we are inclined towards as "good" i mean i can understand saying they good because they feel good. But if one is not saying that (and i think in the case of truth there is an argument to be made regarding whether truth is necessarily good, my answer is yes, but it something that can be challenged - unlike the awfullness of being kicked the shins) then they become axioms, but then how does avoid moral relativism when someone comes along with a different set of axioms?

-I notice you are still battling with Jeff, whereas our discussion in a different direction but did you accept my description of an ethics based on experience? Or is there still something you object to there.
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ivorythumper
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Moonbat
Jun 8 2006, 01:59 AM
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But the whole enterprise is not the least bit contingent on revelation or a personal creator or a religious understanding. It is indeed natural law, not supernatural law.

The major premises are that mankind is naturally ordered or inclined toward certain activities: the pursuit of truth, the acquisition of goods (goods as being that which helps his end -- not necessarily a spiritual concept, but more "what it means to be human"), self preservation /survival, social life, and procreation.

Before proceeding, I'd want to know if you find these objectionable or unclear or silly or baseless.


I don't find those silly, baseless seems too harsh but i do have a problem with your premises.

Why those and not others - mankind seems inclined towards violence and towards sex.

It seems in general that violence is a response, not an inclination, which falls under the inclination toward survival. Similarly sex is under the inclination toward procreation and the acquistion of the good.

Why not the reverse? Why is the inclination not toward sex, and procreation is just the typical result? Because sex involves pleasure which is a good, and thus more directly falls under the inclination toward the good, along with food, water, air, massages, material possessions, etc.

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Further why deem these particular activities we are inclined towards as "good" i mean i can understand saying they good because they feel good. But if one is not saying that (and i think in the case of truth there is an argument to be made regarding whether truth is necessarily good, my answer is yes, but it something that can be challenged  - unlike the awfullness of being kicked the shins) then they become axioms,


A "good" in this sense is that which is needed or desired by the person for one's (perceived) well being. A plant seeks its goods -- hydration or sunlight for photosynthesis -- by virtue of its form: rooting or heliotropism, for instance. An animal seeks is goods by instinct: it will copulate when in estrus (unless sick or such), it will eat and drink when hungry or thirsty, it has a flight/fight mechanism, etc. The human does not have instincts but inclinations and chooses to eat or drink or not, to copulate or not, to choose one good over the others, etc.

It is not good because it "feels good" but because "it it good for you": we as humans need to know truth and acquire goods and live in society and procreate and defend ourselves. We do not need lust or greed (from your earlier post) or violence.

All human actions are ordered toward the acquistion of goods: knowledge, pleasure, power, food and drink, relationship, material resources, procreation, etc.

From this POV the ethics (and jurisprudence) are based on the properly balance and ordering of these various inclinatons for the good of both the individual and society at large (the common good)

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but then how does avoid moral relativism when someone comes along with a different set of axioms?
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As long as someone is proposing axioms, which can be discussed and debated and judged, that would not be moral relativism. MR says that there is no objectively binding morality on all humans at all times -- but an axiom says precisely the opposite.



-I notice you are still battling with Jeff, whereas our discussion in a different direction but did you accept my description of an ethics based on experience? Or is there still something you object to there.


My conversation with Jeffrey is assuming that he is right -- that we are entirely materialistic and that everything is only chemicals and physical reactions. His challenge is to prove that there is an objective ethic in a material world, mine is to show that there is not an obective ethic.

Your experiential based ethics (which I agree with epistemically and experientally) are arguably grounded in X thousand of years of lived human experience. So it "works" for generally keeping people from killing and raping and stealing and indulging whatever their passion or appetite of the moment is. I have no problem with that sort of lived life, but it seems that it presupposes so much. A state or governing order is required that is stronger than any individual or subset of individuals that might hurt others. But how do we decide how this is best done?: And what are the best laws? and whence the "ought" that says people "ought" to live in a particular way? Is it only to avoid punishment? Is it only out of fear that someone stronger will dominate?

You claimed earlier that you don't need to justify your existence -- but you have the luxury of living in a stable and highly order environment where that question is not put to you. If you become the victim of a mugger or a home invasion, or if society crumbles due to nuclear warfare or plagues, then you might well have to justify your existence.
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