c) rape hnns

am i black?

No, you're white and not racist.

COOLLER BEST PLAYER

haha

USA A-OK

Not guilty, there is no way of proving that further deaths will occur, despite there being a strong possibility.

in those days, pleading not guilty will probably get you killed aswell

guilty
for fun

Not guilty, the only life I can be guaranteed to save by my own actions are his. I will leave others to their own free will to act.

Agreed.

wah you little

rape him and then cum on the judge while shouting "Yippee-ki-yay, motherfucker!"

if you ain't like me you can hang from a tree

The year is 1930 in a small community in the south-west USA.

Southwest? Sure you don't mean just "the South"?

dude, let me tell you something:
im a brazilian, if i travel to your country "they(your people)" will treat me differently because first: im latin american, second: people from my country have immigrated illegally into so many countries, so.. when you are discussing about stereotypes.. you have to include all those who have done something wrong or bad to others. think politics then you are going to the right way, think esreality is thinking trolling :D

I think he's basing this question on something that actually occurred.

"dude, let me tell you something:
im a brazilian, if i travel to your country "they(your people)" will treat me differently because first: im latin american, second: people from my country have immigrated illegally into so many countries, so.. when you are discussing about stereotypes.."

If you go anywhere with that kind of attitude you are already hurting yourself.

You control what you believe, try a different outlook and see where it takes you.

"If you go anywhere with that kind of attitude you are already hurting yourself. "

thats totally the opposite.. when i travel i can fit myself much better than others because i know how each culture and customs(traditions) are.

cool story bro.

tak mycket

depends if she's fit or if she's a hoond ofc

I put on my robe and wizard hat.

The white one that covers your face?

I cast level 20 eroticism and I grow a huge strap on

oh, you poor guy need a strap-on? :(

Let me forward you some mails you might find interesting!

http://www.bloodninja.org/view.php?id=53

i doesn't get any more serious than a rhinocerus charging your ass.

I know it. It's older than the internet but still great.

Doesn't stop me from joking about you, though. Cause Raistlin isn't exactly a female name afaik. ;P

i turn and stick the staff into ur cnut

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cnut_the_Great

?????

AAAAAHHHH YOU RIP OFF MY OUTFIT TO REVEAL MY TRUE IDENTITY: AN ORC WORKING FOR THE ALLIANCE

to kill a mockingbird

i wonder, because noone has brought up this book befor me:

has anyone here read it?

in book suggestion threads i see people throwing around the biggest epic nu-scifi-kind-of-vintage-bible-esque books.

Read it and seen the movie.

i read reread instead of read, so i reread and there it said read!

Yeah read it - Scout would get it =)

(More relevantly the chapter with Atticus staking out the courthouse, or Scout getting clubbed coming home from the dance - really great book)

STUPID WHITE PEOPLE

this is from H.J. McCloskey's A non-utilitarian approach to punishment and is one of the most famous examples used against utilitarianism. though, i should have made it clear in the hypothetical that more bashing and lynching are sure to occur if he's found not guilty. probably wouldn't have changed your answers anyway: the original quote is:

Suppose a utilitarian were visiting an area in which there was racial strife, and that, during his visit, a Negro rapes a white woman, and that race riots occur as a result of the crime, white mobs, with the connivance of the police, bashing and killing Negroes, etc. Suppose too that our utilitarian is in the area of the crime when it is committed such that his testimony would would bring about the conviction of a particular Negro. If he knows that a quick arrest will stop the riots and linchings, surely, as a utilitarian, he must conclude that he has a duty to bear false witness in order to bring about the punishment of an innocent person.

the point being that the utilitarian would only weigh the end result and would have the innocent man hanged.

I would still go with not guilty.

that's because you are a good person! bravo

why? cuz of my action more innocent people die

yeah. but you are ultimately doing the "right" thing, as in not lying and pleading for the guy's innocence.

the only problem this decision has(for you), is that it may get yourself in trouble, because the people might turn on you.

for the person making the decision however(in this case you), the continueing riots will not lie on your conscience.
They are only a secondary effect of your decision and you are only indirectly responsible.

similar as to how the hiroshima bomber himself would feel guilty, but the person making the call (president or whatever)- and ultimately being responsible- will not feel as guilty.

because of this, i say you would not care if the killings continue, because you are not directly responsible.

the thing most normal people would do is plead guilty.
not because of some riots, but because they've grown up in a time where racial prejudice is present, and they would get into trouble by pleading 'not guilty' when a negro is on trial.

that is also why i made that somewhat sarcastic comment:

people saying "i would go with not guilty" are kind of the same people that would also say "why did the germans march along in the third-reicht, i wouldn't have!". When in reality, it is far more probable that you'd of picked the easy and more realistic choice.

i know that much of this is not the issue in you original dilemna, but since you brought up 1930s, souther-usa, i thought i'd add this, because its more realistic...


whatever, hope you could follow my trail of thought..

Yeah, sure. It would've at least not done the man injustice from my part, it's hard to envision the morally right thing to do is hanging an innocent man although it's clearly a dilemma. But like you said it wasn't the point of his example to find out one's position on lynching as if we'd live back then, but just to find an example all of us can accept today as morally absurd enough to see how well it fits the theory.

there's no dilemma. utilitarians are not able to predict the future and when they tell you they do, run away cos it's a huge scam :o

nobody predicts the future, but we can sometimes predict things up to a certain probability, even certainty, and act in relation to that.

yeah, like racists suddenly stop being racists after you hang one guy. sure :X

history approves.

they'll still be racist, but they'll stop the rioting and lynching for the time being.
history approves but that's not really the point.

that's an assumption not a fact. good luck basing your moral decisions on mere assumptions.

i'm not familiar with the south african history of the 1930's but let's take a look at other cases from that time:
did the germans stop prosecuting and killing communists after van der lubbe was found guilty and later executed for the reichstags fire in 1933? - no.
did they stop killing jews after grynszpan was imprisoned and executed for the killing of vom rath in 1938? - no.
do you really want me to continue?

utilitarians refuse to acknowledge the importance of intentions/motivations for certain actions. your south african lynchmob is certainly not caused by a rumor about a black man raping a white woman but by racist hatred that does not need or stems from an explicit cause. germans killed millions of jews without having an actual cause.

why? because 'hate crimes' are not rational, because racists and antisemites do not follow a rational logic.

you're entirely missing the point. of course this is all hypothetical, the point is that if this situation would arise utilitarianism theory dictactes that the innocent men be sacrificed.

my point is that utilitarianism is entirely hypothetical and only works in the minds and books of dreamy philosophers. like most other philosophy it's a lot of 'if situations' that will not and can not ever arise. it's a bogus theory.
it's a shame and it's pretty frightening it is received so well. eg. if you're studying law you probably read about the post-9/11 discussions about the legality of shooting down civilian aircrafts.

i thought you wanted provoke arguments against utilitarianism with this, i tried to give some.

another fundamental flaw is (like you pointed out already) the collective > individual standpoint an utilitarian has to take - but that's probably a topic best discussed elsewhere because it touches on a lot of other theories on society.

Sorry, I actually totally agree with you on utilitarianism. I just thought this example given by McCloskey in probably the best received writing against utilitarianism was a very good one to explain why. It's on me to not further elaborate on his reasonings which is why I think alot of people if not most misunderstood the question.

that said there are still many things about it that I agree with even though it doesn't work as a moral theory, for reasons like you said of "collateral" damage for the greater good. But Mill's idea on the boundaries(or lack-of) of individual freedom and the limits to which the government can constrict you. His theory on the importance of absolute freedom of speech and why allowing wrong opinions is not only right but crucial etc. I think both these theories stand undisputed and overall his(and benthams) enormous influence on western society the past 200 years is more of positive than negative. And of course the idea of seeking happiness is beautiful, even though upon further inspection it doesn't work, as an absolute.

i agree with you on mill's take on invidivual freedom (and sexuality btw).

[rant]
my frustration with utilitarianism and the quest of finding answers to the problems of today's world by discussing philosophical questions probably stems from the university (institute) i'm at. not long ago they received large gov based funds to research the formation of new 'normative orders'. i know i'm biased but i am so tired of all these people thinking their rawls vs. habermas debates will change anything in a fucked up world.
[/rant]

I Would say not guilty warn the other negroes they have to move or start a war against the whites and then id gtfo to civilised countries

I was the one who did the rape so if it'll get me off the hook then hang that nigger.

the women is guilty

cleaning up nigger's desk without panties =[

If i'm single and not tied down in any way, then not guilty, and i'd run as fucking far away from the place as i can, wondering why i ended up living there in the first place.

If i have a family or am tied down with a business i own there, or something like that, i say guilty, just to protect that which is precious for me from the mob's wrath, then drown my sorrows in alcohol, convincing myself it was the right thing to do.

Alternatively, in a sudden fit of vigilantism, i try to stall the hearing for a day or two, find out who the real rapist is (shouldn't be too hard in such a small community), kill him in a way that seems like suicide out of remorse for the crime he committed (rope/veins), forge evidence that cannot be possibly overlooked that points to him being the real rapist (scribble down some lusty, indicative notes about the raped gal, cum on a photo, make a list of her daily routines, anything to indicate he was obsessed with her), and call it a day.

Hehe. But you should take everything out of the equation other than your conscience and what your morals tell you to do. Simply answer whether it's morally acceptable to you to punish an innocent man by hanging in order to stop the riots, or find him not guilty resulting in continuing riots and the lynching of innocent people.

maybe if i explain myself in a blazing anti-racism speech, they'll all fall into each others arms and eat some chicken at the cookout.

The way i see it, whatever you do, you end up doing, both, something good, and something bad, and there's no easy way out of it, in which case i'd just look out for what is best for me (scenario 1 ensures i cut myself off from the mental disease that beset my soon-to-be-former place of residence, scenario 2 ensures my continued well being, even in such a wicked place).

Removing any ulterior motives, and realistically speaking, if i was exactly the same man i am now, i'd say not guilty. This is not really a choice spawned by a sense of justice, as much as succumbing to the pressure of having the power of deciding whether that man lives or dies. I couldn't live with his blood on my hands, even if sparing him means more blood will be spilled later, at least that won't be by my direct action, even if i did trigger the events. At least that's how i'd rationalize that to myself.

I'm glad there is no jury system in Poland, i'd hate being drafted, i would just keep pacing back to this thread in my mind. :@

you end up doing, both, something good, and something bad

Disagreed, even if you know someone's going to be killed because of that, unfair judgment is more than a few non-guilty victims. I'd say it should be about (or should be moving towards) justice.

That depends on your very own perception of 'good'. My point was, there is no good or bad thing to do in that situation, it's a huge gray area.

Let's increase the magnitude of the problem a bit: replace 'mob' with a nuke-wielding terrorist group, and 'black guy' with a man they're so intent of getting their hands on, they are willing to unleash it on a major city. Let's say the man was a model citizen, who, while serving in the army, killed one of their leaders. You have the power to either check if they're bluffing, and, possibly, doom several million people, or give up an innocent man, who, most likely, will die the most horrible death at the hands of his oppressors.

Would you cling to your sense of justices then?

My sense of justice remains intact, even if my own choice changes with the consequences growing worse. That's not to say it's good or bad though. Even if evil, the right choice might lead to good consequences, too, for instance people taking example (there'd be more hater ofc), dealing with things the way I do.

PS. Oh, and justice > everything, if I didn't make it clear enough. If everyone challenges themselves to be just, the world is moving towards being perfect.

What is justice?

Doing what's in one's own real will to not violate others rights. I don't think it's anyone's but the terrorist's fault to launch that nuclear strike.

so if a guy has a machine that launches a nuke to kill 1000000 people if the man goes free you still wouldn't lie and say that the man did it..?

I can't really say in the situation; it kind of depends on whether doing the right think would effect society in ways other than the strike. It's very possible that I'd lie, but that'd still be an unjust decision in my book.

I know hnns didn't use the "full" scenario in the original post but in his later post it does mention...

Suppose a utilitarian were visiting an area

I'd imagine this has been added to the dilemma so that there is a sense of detachment and nothing is personally at stake except your conscious.

It's basically just a "would you sacrifice one life to save many" scenario that plays with peoples sense of "justice" ("But he's innocent!").

I don't like this scenario because it doesn't explain how the accused ended up in that situation and I'm unconvinced by the whole idea that only lynching an innocent man will stop riots and so on especially since they know you were a witness and are able to identify the guilty subject.

and I'm unconvinced by the whole idea that only lynching an innocent man will stop riots

that's what i'm saying. if matthew mcconaughey can do it, so can i.

It's basically just a "would you sacrifice one life to save many" scenario that plays with peoples sense of "justice" ("But he's innocent!").

I don't like this scenario because it doesn't explain how the accused ended up in that situation and I'm unconvinced by the whole idea that only lynching an innocent man will stop riots and so on especially since they know you were a witness and are able to identify the guilty subject.

Then suppose you're the long time sheriff of the town and from your experience you just know that if you arrest this one black man it will sooth the people, if you don't, all hell will continue to break loose with lynching and harrassment.

mccloskeys point with this was to criticize consequentialist and utilitarianist philosophy where the only thing that matters are the consequences of an action and which action will result in more happiness. With this hypothetical he argued that a moral theory that allows for an innocent man to be killed can't be a just one.

The scenario needs the detachment so that you can't take into account your life situation and all that is at risk is your morals/conscious.

I understand what he's trying to point out and he succeeds, I just think the scenario isn't exactly true to life, practical or fair.

It assumes that if one sides with the defendant then that's the end of the situation and the riots and lynches just occur until people get bored. This is despite one being a witness and capable of identifying the true criminal.

Naturally the Consequentialist and Utilitarianist philosophies aren't "just" (This appears to be self-evident to me) but they clearly aren't putting ultimate value on justice and are emphasising the "greater good" so it's a bit of a pointless argument.

It doesn't matter if it's hard to believe, all that the reasoning is saying is that if a person finds himself in this situation utilitarian theory dictactes that he should hang the innocent man.

Naturally the Consequentialist and Utilitarianist philosophies aren't "just" (This appears to be self-evident to me) but they clearly aren't putting ultimate value on justice and are emphasising the "greater good" so it's a bit of a pointless argument.

even if utilitarians accept their punishment to be "unjust" by conventional standards they'll argue that nonetheless it is morally right, which is what the argument about.

Neither is morally wrong or right and that's why...With this hypothetical he argued that a moral theory that allows for an innocent man to be killed can't be a just one.

Morals are flexible and entirely dependent on what one values.

If you value the greater good above justice then confirming him as the criminal is, assuming the rioting and lynching would happen if he was not guilty, the morally right thing to do.

If you value justice above the greater good then confirming his innocence is, despite the riots and lynching of other innocents, the morally right thing to do.

So the "real" argument is simply which action results in the objectively better outcome and that can't be answered without further information about the people involved and at risk etc.

this hypothetical he argued that a moral theory that allows for an innocent man to be killed can't be a just one.

But it's either you with bloody hands or criminals with bloody hands. I'd say allowing is a too strong word in this example, it's not you that decide, really (they're up to kill not because of your choice).

"which action results in the objectively better outcome" ?

What is troubling you?

you conceded to utilitarianism :P

you reading/interested in moral philosophy?

just a little, i'm studying law but they have us take classes on philosophy, mostly reading authors on ethics and punishments in the broader sense. i'm enjoying them very much, surprisingly!

Oh. If you ever, and it looks interesting, and.. then, "Reasons and Persons" by Derek Parfit. When it is digested, a new world! :D

Coo, I can't do any extra curricular though until summer, but I've saved the title in my documents.

"Crime and Punishment" by Dostoevskiy, much better.

How is that even related?

And i've read everything of Dostoevsky :D

Haven't you read "Topics and Comments" ?

Lol, maybe. I have a shitty memory.

I don't think I did.

*goes on and on about my life* ..AND THEN THIS COMMENT ON ESR OH MY GAWHD!

buttuh.. yeah, just wondering what you mean

you specified *morals* as flexible or something. and then they can be framed i guess according to this or that perspective/values.

do you mean we first settle perspective and whatever a whatever values, and then we decide what's objectively better based on that, or did you have some conception of what's better aside from those considerations?

"Morals" is just a junk term that people throw about. It's de facto meaning is basically "What I think is good/right/just" and thus "immoral" is "What I think is bad/wrong/unjust".

So talking about "morals" is useless since it means totally different things to different people.

You have your own values, your own criteria and you use all available information to decide what would be the "best" option and thus the only worthwhile argument here is what collectively would be the most "objective" decision.

Of course, in some situations you won't be objective but I think the situation presented here is designed to have people think objectively. The problem is there isn't anywhere near enough information to make an objective decision and there rarely is.

Well, i'm basically wondering and pressing you like hnns does in that comment below here.

But also, i'm still not quite sure i see what you mean.

I agree that morals in fact mean different things to different people. This is okay. People can have different beliefs on an issue, and you can still think that you yourself has the objective truth. You can say, well "they are wrong".

Now you might say. With normal facts, we can separate truth from falsehood by just looking at the evidence; there's no such thing in morality! So any position would be a sort of dogma.

No if you say this, then your notion of objectivity would be a kind of collection of what people think in a sort of democratic way. So you have everyone kind of having their opinions and values heard and you kind of mediate objectively between these forces.

Framed in this more explicit way, does it not seem to you that some paradoxes become apparent? For instance, that the way to mediate this democratic collecting up of values itself rests on a sort of moral judgement as to how this is to be done?

The only way to come to reach an objectively "right" decision would be to be omniscient and thus capable to a decision that is "perfect" and would lead no harm to anybody or anything.

This is of course "impossible"!

So you believe "moral rightness" is relative to each of us and solely based on our values and feelings and nothing else, there's no such thing as wrong in the sense of morals? I entirely disagree, e.g. if this were true both these advocates we're were discussing (utilitarians and retributive followers and any other ethical theory for that matter) wouldn't be debating over which is morally right, they'd both be right. They disagree and thus can't both be right.

To me what is morally right is what can best be argued with sensible facts. If someone says "homosexuality is disgusting" he'd have to make a good argument for it. Certainly he wouldn't be "right" just because he values the bible over individual freedom, however consistent he is with his owns values.

Nor can a Saudi muslim that stones his 15 year old daughter for being raped be "neither morally right" or "morally wrong" just because in his mind he values justice more than X.

So the "real" argument is simply which action results in the objectively better outcome and that can't be answered without further information about the people involved and at risk etc.

No, the argument is whether the utilitarian is right in assuming precisely what you said, that choosing the path which objectively has the better outcome can be morally right even if it comes with the supposed injustice of sacrificing an innocent man. On the other hand followers of retributive justice would disagree.

I don't believe anything, a quick look at any discussion of politics, religion, philosophy or morals will show you that they are relative.

This belief that someone must be right and others wrong is rather naive. There is no right or wrong, there is no universal good or bad.

Morals are man made and subject to change depending on just about everything imaginable.

To the Saudi Arab, his raped daughter is useless now and thus it is perfectly moral to stone her to death.

If a person does find homosexuality disgusting, I'd imagine they genuinely find the concept disgusting and if they view it as "useless", due to a belief that we are here to reproduce, then it would be immoral to that person and those who think a like.

That is ultimately what matters: How many people agree with me/you/us/them.

You can justify what people believe and point out that people believe different things morally. But you can do this equally with facts. It might be just as excusable to believe absurd things if we knew what lead them to believe it (e.g. living ages ago and thinking earth was flat).

Seems you can level just the sort of argument against normal truth. That it's just what people agree on.

What this does not explain is how some people come to it (often the most healthy and brightest among us) before others. And how we after the fact applaud these people for being moral when everyone else was following the flock, or understanding this or that thing before everyone else.

I'm sure you would agree at least that this weak principle is true, namely, that the values people have and the ways they think its manifestation can be brought about are often not in alignment. I.e. that they believe in a method which, if they knew some further thing, would be changed.

This weak principle can account for many things. And i'm sure that many people across different backgrounds and cultures and times would accept some modified version of utilitarianism. If they did, they would all be in agreement about morality, despite many differences in beliefs about methods to bring about this "happiness" to most amount of people. They would then also agree that they could be wrong or right about these things.

The stronger principle would argue that people can change values altogether. Maybe some values are in conflict with each other? Maybe they have to reflect and think about which values to adopt so that they can be coherent? Wouldn't you agree that if two values are shown to a person to be in conflict, it would be wrong and even self-defeating to hold on to both?

And couldn't there be a sort of progression of values. Not only as cultures grow and assimilate more knowledge and intelligence, but we can draw an analogy to the things we believed morally when we were young and what we believe now. Would you say to your young self, "you are wrong because this and that", or would you put yourself on equal terms with the childish child you were?

More fundamentally, do you not recognize that you yourself can progress morally as you find out new things and reflect deeper on the things you believe?

Well, there isn't really "evidence" you can use to back up any moral argument, merely subjective opinions so while you can level a similar argument against "facts" it becomes increasingly more difficult.

You can't explain to a slave owner in Ancient Egypt why slavery is "immoral" no matter how hard you tried simply because slavery is useful and one of the most successful economic systems during that period.

However you could gradually teach an Egyptian engineer from the basics that they already understand to higher level.

The changes in moral values simply come about gradually with the decline of the "issue" being useful, though rituals and traditional practices keep some alive (e.g. circumcision).

I thought I covered the whole "progression of values" thing, although I wouldn't use the term "progression". Moral values are constantly changing throughout populations and over time.

You could say that a contradictory idea one holds is "wrong" but that's only in the presence and context of the idea it contradicts.

Of course you could explain to them why slavery is wrong.. It may be difficult, but the same is true of many facts we now take for granted; try explaining the sun is in the middle of our galaxy etc.

Relative to many ways of life, the kind of knowledge we have now would be a disaster; it could undermine whole societies.

Often physical and moral theories are adopted simply because they are more coherent, *they make more sense*. Like having the sun in the center. It's not like it had any other advantage right at the beginning than making more sense..

I'm just trying to make the point that, even if it's harder to argue for, you can equally challenge "facts" with arguments "that they are merely useful" as you can challenge "moral facts" that they are.

"Of course you could explain to them why slavery is wrong.."
What? You *seriously* think you can explain to someone who believes that Ra lights up his morning and that certain humans are EQUAL to animals, that it is somehow WRONG for him to keep these humans as property? He will laugh in your face and tell you how much of an honor it is for that clay eater to serve him, and how lucky he is not all of his family was sold off to Sumerians for his debt or something. "Wrong" to an Egyptian has to mean "to the detriment of somebody of higher status, all the way to gods" and "Right" means "for my benefit, and therefore the benefit to my superiors".

I'm not sure what i believe morally in regards to equality of various kinds, but that slavery is wrong shouldn't be harder to explain than the ideas of Einstein for instance..

In fact, if you explain evolution, astronomy, dna, psychology and so on to him in a way that he fully understands, he would change so much that i'm not sure it's right to even talk about the same person :P

I think you don't understand. You can't explain any of these things to an adult Egyptian.

hahaha

a little "adult" slipped in there. in any case, that's not my point. as you'll see from my post.

A non adult Egyptian is not an Egyptian yet, and can't have slaves anyway. If I slipped anything in, it's some 'reality' into your 'suppose 2 < 3, then the horse in the vaccume behaves like so". My point is that your point is ridiculous nonsense.

Morals are about "right" and "wrong" not about making sense.

It's considered "immoral" for women to show their faces in public in certain places in the world.
Does it make sense? No
Is it right? Maybe
Is it wrong? Maybe

Or take the stoning the raped teen to death example:
Does it make sense? No
Is it right? Maybe
It it wrong? Maybe

You can justify both of these using moral dilemmas etc.

Whereas the Earth not being the centre of the universe just makes sense and you can't really argue against it.

what the fuck. what's with all the (cultural?) relativism in this thread.

you gave a valid answer first just to take it back and change it to a 'maybe' later. i don't get it, you can not justify killing homosexuals and raped teen girls just because they are homosexuals and victims of rape. what the hell are you doing :p

your standpoint culminates into something rather cruel and very egoistic because i'm pretty sure you'd care if it'd be you getting stoned.

would you prefer to have a study on the treatmeant of sexuality (esp. homosexuality, extramarital sex, etc.) in 'certain places' to be able to judge such actions? because if you do, i'm pretty sure they exist and their conclusion will be as simple as 'it does not make sense' and 'it is wrong' with an added 'we have to change it'.

you can not justify killing homosexuals and raped teen girls just because they are homosexuals and victims of rape

Yet people do this everyday.

What's my view point exactly?

Of course I wouldn't like to be stoned, anything that results in me being harmed when I do not wish to be harmed is "wrong" obviously.

Do you think I believe in stoning raped girls?

you're close to actively justifiying it, so yeah?

Also, "moral theories are adopted"? Morality evolves. A bunch of German cunts writing books hasn't impacted any society.

it evolves!

dna is like a program.

and it's logical.

the fittest survive because it is most fit.

and that's empirical.

universe solved.

i think i got it guyz.

i don't do philosophy any more.

i'm in the realm of science now. evolution, relative, dawkins, dna, program, logic, indeterminacy, survival, skeptical, darwin.

Uh, whatever you are, don't spout nonsense such as "moral theories are adopted".

I am well aware of blind evolution and "gunsgerms and steel" and whatever else is floating around

you can argue about how religions came about and how they spread and avoid talking about human intension and psychology, but this doesn't necessarily make things more clear than if you include these things

Society in relation to psychology and intent? Thats just not how systems work.... Not how big groups behave. This IS empirical.
Anyway, "gunsgerms and steel", could be the first book you mention that I think is good.

not how systems work?

that's like arguing that human agency itself doesn't exist because of 1.freud and the unconscious, 2. biological drives 3. neurons want their own thing 4. context and situations guide you 4. jung and the archetypes as well as personal history etcetc.

you can't just exclude psychology and intention; it's also like the way psychology at the start of the century tries to think of humans as "a black box" with no inside. obviously this was scientific right, instead of all that internal processing, unconscious drives, and attention and so on..

in the long run such external approaches doesn't give the whole perspective

No, thats not like arguing that. It's more like arguing systems are made up of components. Jesus.

it seems you're saying you can explain group behavior without recourse to human intentions and psychology; i'm telling you that if you do this by reducing intentions and psychology in a way that leaves them without any causal power, you're missing out..

nuances at the level of intentions and psychology can significantly tip considerations of the parts.. and it's easy to oversimplify this

"you're missing out.. "

On what? I'm not missing out, I'm compartmentalizing. So what that two humans can reproduce through doggy or through missionary positions. No, it doesn't effect the part where the structure of the system is influenced primarily by the adaptation and competition within the surroundings of the system. Internal components are many, and decisions systems make are not influenced by the nuance of 'psychology'. That's like saying Obama makes decisions based on his morals. Naive and missing the point that he got where he did because it satisfied positions of multiple groups within the country which in turn evolved because of the success of the present system. And so on.

you don't think compartmentalizing leaves things out?

i'm pretty sure it does, but the philosophical argument would be involved and i'm not ready to tackle that sort of thing

it's interesting debate in itself i think; debates about kinds of reductionism and kinds of emergence.. maybe that's too philosophical

It's like you don't understand what a system with multiple layers of components is.

and i know studies of groups like fleeing a burning building and so on and you can identify rules of behavior.. and this is interesting and so on.. you could get lots of interesting complex behavior out of the black box psychology as well..

No, universe is not solved. But it's more clear. Lets not clutter it with bullshit?

Of fuck, you got me!
Screw this random shit.
People are a collective mind with an subconscious that does things like mold banana into a shape comfortable for the hand, and raise up the temperature because it's just a tad too boring on this planet.

it's not about screw random shit, it's about including everything else

Like the great theory of morality? Which we can deduce by staging a mind boggling experiment after a mind boggling experiment created to add an exceptions, conviction indexes, and nuance for the ever changing moral dilemma.

the reason people are alike is not because they have the same facts

it's because they are copies of each other

logic doesn't even enter into it

Unfortunately logic enters everything, but too many people try to enter things without it, and fail.

i can say the same thing about philosophy, or about biology, or about evolution

it's pointless

it's obvious that "enter into it" doesn't mean non-existence

Let me know when I say something as stupid as "moral theory is adopted".

"(social programming) are anything but random in variation, only enforced by the evolution of this structure for the sake of being most competitive?"

i think this was even more stupid, because it's so obviously a rip-off everything we hear and read everywhere these days - it's almost like a caricature of it

Uh, so one is banally wrong, and the other is banally true. Which one is "stupid", again?

one tries to argue for an abandoned concept, another relishes the misrepresenting high of modern thought

ROFL
What the FUCK are you smoking?

When was evolution abandoned?
When did being part of a small group of believers start to mean society as a whole was impacted?

what?

i said adopted moral theory. this is looking at morality from psychology and intentional perspective (and to some extent social).

sure there are other ways of looking at morals.

first. it was in context of a moral argument. it was "moral theory" in context of thought experiments.

so alright. we have a claim that adds up to thinking that people could consider various moral theories. it's not like i'm saying, oh god, people chose everything and they pick their own language and blabla. i know all the germs and steel. i know the intricacies of evolution and have great respect for the diversity of levels of explanations.

so what are you doing?

you're introducting the metaphor of social programing..

you're reinforcing the conception that random variation is the only force of evolution

you're using the words "for the sake of being competitive", as if they explained anything

*sleeptime*

i'm also not able to defend these views really. it's just too much inertial mass against me; when people are so fired up about religions and so on, it's impossible to talk about evolution in a speculative way; essentially anything that's not orthodox gets filed under heresy

"so alright. we have a claim that adds up to thinking that people could consider various moral theories. it's not like i'm saying, oh god, people chose everything and they pick their own language and blabla."

No you're not saying they pick. You're saying they can. They can't.

"you're introducting the metaphor of social programing.."

And? Morality is a code of rules according to which people try function in society. What about that?

"you're reinforcing the conception that random variation is the only force of evolution"

What?? Is that like saying random gene mutation being the only force of evolution, and it excludes humans from having intelligence? No, of course I'm not saying that.

"you're using the words "for the sake of being competitive", as if they explained anything"

They explain the goal, which is to survive and beat competition.

yeah, because Hegel didn't do anything related to the concept of *evolution*, and Marx didn't...

Marx's works were about morality, nor did they impact anyones morality, even if you can claim they tried. Worse, even the useful, applicable stuff, which didn't have anything to do with changing every person behaves, still didn't change anything. How did Hegel impact peoples morality, again?

Hegel introduced people into thinking in the way now everyone think darwin did.. thinking of seemingly stable laws as evolving through historical time up to the present. he didn't accept evolution in the darwinian sense but considered it (and the profound thing here is inventing the way of thought in which the question naturally arises)

of course, you might not understand the "way of thinking" as important..

consider it like the guy who invented non-euclidean geometry; if he said it was "unreal" and so on.. and later on an einstein makes use of it

it's not a matter of important, it's a matter of effecting peoples behavior, morality. none of these are relevant, and the any that are, are only indirectly so. Here are the examples of things that "changed morality": argaculture(once), city states(when they happen, forcing people to live closer together), geopolitics (evolved until machiavelian level). Each change was a minor refinement, and I don't see any further changes until either 1)free energy, 2) singularity, 3)human omnipotence (1+2 :)?

you might as easily say that the next level of morality is not reached before the previous one is perfected

you're so inclined to see the moral phenomena as being an after-effect that you cannot see it as being relevant to a description of history whatsoever

this would naturally include all "non-material things", thoughts, feelings, and so on.

in fact. this is the next step after hegel, because after him, came marx and he said, all this stuff about thoughts and their evolution and so on is a load of bull - real change happens through material means...

so he just inverted hegel.

what do i say? i say, big deal. it's basically the same thought, and by now we have a lot more than thoughts and ideals to include into material reality.

"information"

"programs"

\o/

marx did not impact anyone's moral decisions, really? hegel lectured prospective prussian officers and as a result published his 'philosophy of rights'. how can you say he did not impact anyone?

i'm not sure what you're trying to say but i'm pretty sure you are wrong.

ideology is not morality, marx created new ideas around morality people already had already evolved into. Ideas that required morality that did not evolve at the time obviously failed.

I'm not sure what you're going to reply, but I'm pretty sure you're going to be wrong, so I'm not going to reply.

explain ideology?


also: you completely dodged my question. you said marx/hegel did not impact anyone's morality/moral decisions. i believe you're mistaken and gave reasons as to why. you did not explain yourself at all.

"weak principle"
Why do you "philosophers" have to make up pseudo-scientific terms about things that don't actually exist? You think you're trying to formulate something, but you're just over-complicating reality.
People don't "draw analogies to the things they believe morally". There is not CONSCIOUS progression of values in which cultures grow and assimilate more knowledge and intelligence. Why would you approach an animal with 'eat, fuck, sleep' life-goals within some social structure, and assume that animals morals (social programming) are anything but random in variation, only enforced by the evolution of this structure for the sake of being most competitive?

how is that scientific?

is "principle" scientific? lets see..

c.1380, "fundamental truth or proposition," from Anglo-Norm. principle, from O.Fr. principe, from L. principium (pl. principia) "a beginning, first part," from princeps (see prince). Meaning "origin, source" is attested from 1413. Sense of "general rule of conduct" is from c.1532. Used absolutely for (good or moral) principle from 1653.

"It is often easier to fight for principles than to live up to them." [Adlai Stevenson, speech, New York City, Aug. 27, 1952]
Hence principled "moral" (1697). Scientific sense of "general law of nature" is recorded from 1802.

"weak principle" not "principle" and "pseudo-scientific" not "scientific"
As in, trying to appear more grounded in empirical, logical, then really is.

over complicating the logical-empirical reality by fancy distinctions such as weak and strong moral principles

Yeah. You mean "I feel like" and "I kinda feel like"?

i've no idea what you mean.

maybe you could flesh that out a bit? oh wait. that would make it fancy philosophy with verbal distinction aimed at fairly common sense problems between humans, therefore it's not science, hence irrelevant.

"i've no idea what you mean."

I think thats a pretty big problem.

"maybe you could flesh that out a bit? oh wait. that would make it fancy philosophy with verbal distinction aimed at fairly common sense problems between humans, therefore it's not science, hence irrelevant."

Uh no. If you're asking me to say 2=2 because 2-1 = 2+4 - 5 +1, I won't. If you want me explain equality with set theory, I can. Which part of the example of 'weak moral principle' and 'strong moral principle' in practice did you not understand?

i want you to explain equality with set theory also..

ever since i read Frege i've wondered :p

i don't even know what that means. and also, i've no idea what you're on about in the principle thing.

i made a casual distinction to make a point to another guy in a complex issue, and you take it out of nowhere and start pointing fingers with only hand waving as explanation

MEANWHILE:

"(social programming) are anything but random in variation, only enforced by the evolution of this structure for the sake of being most competitive?"

booooooooooooooooooooooon

Do you need to ask a question?

let me ask you this.

will an alien society reach some of the same moral mile-stones as we do?

how alien? There are many social animals on earth that already did.

But the muslim is wrong since the logic he's using to draw to his conclusion is false.
Just like people 200 years ago people in the USA felt it was morally right to lynch black people since they thought they were genetically inferior, less intelligent, animals almost. They know better now with advances in science and more cultural enlightenment. The criteria and reasoning they used to shape their values and morals was based on a false premise. We can say now it is morally wrong to lynch black people using the justification they used, wrong then too.

For us it is wrong, for them it isn't.

What logic is the Arab using? Do you actually know the full story and history of that "system"?

how can they can be morally right in that it's ok to treat black people badly based on X when X has been proven wrong?

if someone believes it is morally wrong to eat cows because they are gods, they're either right or wrong, either the cow is a god or not. if they're not gods their moral opinion holds no ground and cannot be considered right or simultaneously right and wrong. same with the arab.

in my opinion the only way to assess an ethical or moral query is by using facts and logic, there needs to be a valid reason that my logic will accept. that's why I don't like this theory because it doesn't account in any reasoning, relative morality isn't morality. from what I've read on "Simple subjectivism" I find the logic against it far more convincing.

Morals are codes of conduct that we have invented. They need no reasoning to make sense, they need only provide a "system" for those who follow them.

Morals are incredibly flexible, which for me pretty much proves there is no right and wrong when it comes to morals only shades of grey.

Is it right to kill a human?
Is it right to kill a cow?
Is slavery ever right?

You could come up with a right and wrong for every individual situation
you come across, but that's not exactly "morals" now is it?

One thing you have to consider is that while you have access to all the information you could ever want on certain subjects other people do not and while you were brought up the way you were others have layers and layers of different beliefs.

The question shouldn't be "is this right or wrong?" or "is this moral or immoral?" but "does it make sense?"

With morals you can argue and justify anything but racism, for example just doesn't make much sense, torture just doesn't make much sense, stoning to death a girl just doesn't make sense etc.

for example just doesn't make much sense, torture just doesn't make much sense, stoning to death a girl just doesn't make sense etc.

"Just doesn't make sense" doesn't mean anything. There's a reason for every one of your morals which you could write down and they're based on what information you have. The only way to change your moral opinion is with facts. True there are many moral questions that seem impossible to prove right or wrong, just like there are religions and silly customs you can't disprove with the methods of science. But ultimately they're either wrong or right because one of them could be right making the other ones false. To draw a parrelel we can disprove alot of ancient religions with the knowledge we have now, the people that believed the earth was flat and there lived a monster at the end were wrong even before we could prove them wrong even though they had a different outlook on the world and stuck true to their beliefs.

To me "moral opinions" when based on wrong assumptions like racism, prejudice, lies, misunderstandings - if you can disprove/prove the premise you can say they're morally wrong/right. But never neither or both.

Anyway I'm no casuist this perhaps explains better why I don't agree with your theory. But maybe we're just brought up different and have layers of different belief :)

Doesn't look like you have actually tried to imagine a totally different mindset. What if 'god' and 'cow' are synonymous? The cow is not an omnipotent being, or god in western sense, but it is 'holy' and a 'symbol'. And thats not something you can change or 'prove' and invalidate the 'morality' of. It's a belief, and most of our world view and all 'morality' is defined using this kind of programming.

how about fixing E$ bug instead of this rant?

how about no

=(

I don't really know, 1930... Right now, I'd definitely say not guilty even if in the consequences would be the same, but seeing how now, in 2010 many people still have retarded things they believe in, I wouldn't be surprised if I was one of those 'black men are evil/inferior' guys, even if I'd like to think I wouldn't.
You pointed out that I [i]know]/i] that he's not guilty tho, so it's a nobrainer then. After that, either try to do some smart talk or just runrunrun, with the latter one being way more likely.

Not guilty. You should not make immoral choices on the basis of pragmatic assumptions because the assumption may be wrong and you just perpetuate the immorality. Make the right choice and try to prevent negative consequences.

Isn't "perpetuate immorality" a pragmatic assumption? and isn't the "right choice" also fallible?

and your last sentence tries to unite them again?

Not in the example given. The perpetuation is direct, by your own choice you cause an immoral outcome- you lie, an innocent dies. You seem to be losing track of the point in layers of philosophical nonsense. The short term right choice is very clear, do not lie and do not let an innocent die. The longer term choice is an attempt at a pragmatic choice, not the shorter term one.

How is the short term choice a pragmatic one?

Tries to unite them? I am saying that the longer term outcome is not predictable and since a negative one has been suggested this is what you should attempt to avoid by moral means, not by immoral ones.

This question is a lot like the stupid ticking bomb and a terrorist question. Do you torture them? The reality is that having tortured 10 people to death you then discover there was no bomb or that none of them knew where it was. If you carry out immoral acts in the name of being moral the outcome is likely not to be what you expect but your acts have still happened and will happen again because you choose to behave that way.

Stupid question?

It's more enlightening than stupid when it reveals such gaps between people in the way they think morally.

The fact is also that it seems quite unreasonable for many people to stick to a moral principle like "do not lie" in a situation when it most likely could've saved more people if you lied.

Some people say "never lie. ever. no matter the consequences.", and then you present to them some thought experiments to see whether they really believe this in extreme cases, or whether they have their principle "on a leash", so to speak. Others might say "in each case do whatever leads to the best consequences", and you can invent other situations to see if they really should carve this into stone, and so on.

I didn't mean it's stupid as a thought experiment, it's stupid when it's used as a part of the debate over torture as a justification that torture is acceptable under some circumstances when it is not. It is interesting as a way of making people think about their moral choices.

"utilitarians are not able to predict the future and when they tell you they do, run away cos it's a huge scam" - zealot

zealot is onto something. you may predict what will happen immediately, but the force of principles and radical acts like refusing to sit at the back of a bus can have implications that no one can predict.. in addition there's the psychological force of principles *in general* that may be erroneous in some cases but the economy of human thought leads us to think they are superior anyway (and from a human perspective they are)..

also. utility doesn't make sense. (but this second reply would step out of the whole utility framework to defeat it instead of showing how it is self-defeating) \o/

Defo hang him for the sake of evolution.

holy shit, he probably has that thing where skin is all stretchy all over

Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome

lol, might not be it, but the "explanation-music" is awesome

music is all like, "this is complicated, this is detailed, this is science, this is at the cutting edge, you aren't supposed to fully understand this"

am I mistaken or does that link not feature a nigger with a big mouth?

silvia saint can do better

and not only with her mouth

That nigger deserves to die anyway, because he is an idiot. There are only two possible scenarios:
-1. he did not rape that woman -idiot
-2. he did rape her -in this case he deserves to die because he did not sign her an autograph after -idiot

Read up on linguistics, pragmatics and semantics and the answer is pretty straight forward.

Perception is everything!

well if it was 1930 probably every white person here would have said guilty
dumb thread

Not every country has such a vile recent history towards other races.

yeah but the op said this is in the usa

Jeremy Bentham? I love the writers on that series, man. love 'em.
http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Locke

:D word

build a robot-spider, put innocent man onboard and let him flee mowing down the riff raff with an integrated mg

Rape, the funniest thing on the interwebs besides hitler.

Did you hear about Ku Klux Knievel?

c) Blast it with piss.