Nova Andromeda wrote:In the end, all I think you are going to end up with is a set of agreements (according to my system) that was useful for accomplishing your goals in the context of interacting with humans.
'All'? That's a pretty big bloody 'all'. But yes, that is what you are going to end up with. And I suspect the two biggest things you will find are the need to act with sympathy (consider where others are coming from) and a sense of fairness (the Golden Rule and suchlike).
--"... the moral code rules out numerous courses of action as being detrimental to society (and hence, indirectly detrimental to the individual) ..."
-That is not always true for the individual since we do not know what the goal of the individual is.
If the individual fails to recognise that their fate is inextricably linked with that of the society they live in, then that individual bloody well deserves everything that happens to them.
The individual may think the detrimental effect they are having on society causes no harm to them - almost always, such an attitude is short sighted. More importantly, if a large number of members of the society adopt the same attitude, then the society will disintegrate. Now, if the society has reached the point where it is no longer providing appropriate benefits to its members, then it may be entirely appropriate for an individual to actively seek the disintegration of the society. Usually, such an individual is hoping or planning that what replaces it will be an improvement (such lofty goals, of course, are not always attained).
--"Restriction of acceptable goals is an essential aspect of any effective society."
-That is not true for the reasons I previously stated. Basically that restrictions on goals leads to conflict and any abridgement must be justified by there being no other courses of action that results in a lesser total abridgement. This type of analysis will generally not lead to the total restriction of a goal, but instead restrictions of various goals at various times for various entities. What you are looking at here is the result of contests of power in which one side has won and imposed its rules on the rest.
So you utterly reject the idea of an informed consensus? You believe that every argument must have a 'winner' and a 'loser'? That it is never possible for two intelligent individuals to sit down and say 'Right, if we both hold out for our original positions, we're both going to end up losing. However, in this particular scenario, we both get the things we _really_ want, and each give up on stuff we might have liked to get'
If you go through life believing that everything is a contest, and there always has to be a winner and a loser, you're going to have a pretty rough time of it.
On the point that blanket bans of particular activities are rarely the right solution - you're absolutely right. But agreements on what restrictions are most beneficial to society as a whole and to the individual members of the society may be reached by informed consensus rather than by imposition by authority (Note: In practice, in large scale states, we do not yet have the mechanisms to seek informed consensus on most issues. Hence, the democratic system where the informed must persuade the clueless, in the form of our duly elected political representatives. To paraphrase Mr Churchill 'Democracy is the worst possible form of government, except for the other forms which have been tried from time to time)
--"... it is not acceptable for one entity to seek to terminate the existence of another entity."
-It actually is under numerous circumstances. It is acceptable when the cost of ending that entity's existance is less than the cost of not ending that entity's existance. For instance it is acceptable to kill an entity infected with a virus when not killing that entity would cost more than the cost of killing that entity (e.g., 10 other entities).
Yeah, bad example. However (just to follow our little red herring a little further, since its an interesting looking fish), notice that it is necessary to justify the individual's termination on the basis of benefit to society. I would argue that a more ethical alternative would be to offer the individual a choice - lifetime quarantine, or immediate termination.
This is because NO society should have the capacity to completely trample over its individual citizens. That, however, is a moral judgment - and quite possibly one you would disagree with. (Other issues, such as the possibility of a cure further along the line, the ability to investigate the nature and course of the disease, and the other benefits of keeping the individual alive would also require consideration)
--"So long as the restriction applies equally to all, then there is no inequity. "
-This is wrong as well. It will probably not be equitable since that is determined by an individual's goal.
You define equitable differently from me, then.
Being equal means that the restriction applies to every member of the society.
Now obviously, the impact of this on each individual is going to depend on how it matches up with the individual's goals.
Taking into account the individual position of each entity is a matter of
compassion (Remember? That thing you said - or seemed to say - wasn't necessary?)
Let's take 3 hypothetical situations (using societal law, rather than an individual's moral code):
In all cases, a house has been robbed (through a window that was left open). $250 cash and $500 worth of CD's were stolen.
In case 1, the thief is a 35 year old male, with a criminal record longer than you are tall. He's on parole from a stint in prison for armed robbery. He stole the stuff, because he saw the open window and decided to pop inside for a look around. (In his words 'He couldn't help himself', so he did).
In case 2, the thief is a 19 year old male. He stole the stuff as part of a gang initiation process.
In case 3, the thief is an 18 year old male. He stole the stuff in order to get money for food for himself and his kid sister - they've been out on the streets for months, running away from an intolerable family situation.
The fact is, all three are equally guilty. They have all commited the exact same property violations. If the law is equitable, it must adjudge all three of them guilty.
Where the compassion comes in is that the law should take into account the individual circumstances when it comes to sentencing (Aside/mini-rant: this is why mandatory sentencing in the Northern Territory is such a dumb idea).
--"... your framework is not a moral code, because it expressly refrains from making value judgments! "
-It is according to the merian-webster definition of moral:
http://www.m-w.com/cgi-bin/dictionary. The reason for this is that it allows an entity to determine if an action is the right one or the wrong one. That is from an entity's perspective it defines good and bad. In addition, it covers large groups of entities and their interactions. However, this is just a matter of sorting out the definitions of the words we are using.
A moral code, to my mind, is only related to this definition: "1.c: conforming to a standard of right behavior"
The moral code is the 'standard of right behaviour' that determines whether or not a particular action is morally acceptable or not.
Given the complexity of the world, it is necessary for this moral code to have a moral basis which can be used to extrapolate the implications of the moral code on a given situation. (As said earlier, it is not possibly to enumerate all possible scenarios a priori - the only practical mechanism is to have a bunch of basic, general extrapolations, and then do the more complex analyses on a case-by-case basis).
Your framework fails to provide a 'standard of right behaviour', since it provides no direction as to
what is right or wrong. If two people agree on a moral basis, even if their extrapolation of the code applicable to a given circumstance differs (hence they differ in their definitions or right or wrong in a particular situation), they are able to enter into a productive dialogue, because they are both working from the same basis (one convinces the other that their extrapolation is correct, they come to a 'middle road' somewhere between their two positions, or, they agree to disagree, and each acts according to their own extrapolation).
With your system, because it does not incorporate a basis, two individuals subscribing to it might have completely conflicting 'moral codes', and no real basis for entering into discussion. Hence, your system merely defines the necessity for each individual to
have a moral code, and that it is likely to benefit the society if there is some commonality between individual's moral codes. It falls short, in that it makes no attempt to specify the minimal
content of a moral code which is likely to lead to the greatest benefits for the individual and for the society at large..
--"Strawman. I never said compassion should be enforced."
-If your moral code is based partly on compassion how do you avoid biasing the system in favor of those whose goals match being compassionate? You might argue that those entities who don't agree to this would not be subject to your moral code, but history has yet to show that was ever the case.
Err, what? There is a difference between 'You will do this because some authority said so' (enforcement) and 'You should do this because social dynamics mean it will probably work out to be to your benefit anyway' (umm, I don't know of any word for that except self-interest).
Individuals
can choose to reject some part of their society's common morals. Sometimes such a choice has consequences (depending on the society and the particular matter in question), but the individual chooses to bear those consequences. C'est la vie.
--"In other words, you agree with me."
-Well, I'm not entirely sure about this. I don't see any reason why both your system and Mike's don't fit entirely within my system. However, according to my system any group of entities that meet my criteria and agree to either your or Mike's basis should still obey the rules of equitability with other entities (they could of course use their combined power to accomplish their goals, but this has other problems I haven't touched on yet). Thus what you and Mike seem to call a moral code is just a set of agreements between groups of humans under my system (assumming power isn't used in an inequitable fashion against those who don't agree).
Yes - as I said earlier, I believe your framework serves as a justification for why moral codes (including ones which individual's do not consciously articulate) are necessary in the first place.
I then believe the next step is to determine an appropriate moral basis (and history is a good source of ideas for that).
Once the moral basis is determined, then the moral code itself takes the form of extrapolations from the basis to either general (for short hand rule-of-thumb judgment calls) or specific situations (for trying to answer the tough moral quandaries). You can either carry out those extrapolations yourself, or else borrow valid extrapolations from someone who shares your moral basis (After all, why bother reinventing the wheel?).
Note that this actually
encourages diversity, since it is possible to have two perfectly legitimate extrapolations from the same moral basis - the differences are likely to come from varying perceptions of the likelihood of different consequences. It also encourages the review of moral decisions as new information comes to light (since the new information will affect the extrapolation). Interesting discussion and results are also to be found in questioning the moral basis - some will question the inclusion for various elements (such as compassion), some might argue that other things ('animals are people too'!) should be added. Sometimes it is possible to select different moral bases, and justify the same actions in a given situation - the reasoning is different, but the effective outcome is the same. However, that doesn't change the fact that each individual still needs to subscribe to their own moral code - the ability to understand and accept others' points of view doesn't change that (although it may alter the content of the moral code!)
Something to note: I will often make analogies using law and criminal charges - potentially implying that I equate law and morality. I don't. Someone once said 'You cannot legislate morality', and they were right (unfortunately, this hasn't stopped plenty of people from trying). In the discussion above, the law most emphatically falls into the category of enforcement. Consequently, it should be reserved for those things which have been identified by the society as out-and-out unacceptable. For things which are the subject of significant debate, or which are none of the state's business, the law should butt out, and leave the question to individual morality. That of course begs the question, "Then why use those analogies?" Generally, I use them because I can't come up with a better way of illustrating a particular point
--Well, IMO, this discussion is entirely worth while. Too bad Mike doesn't participate more.
True (to both parts). I'd definitely be interested in hearing what Mike has to say about where we've got to now. *shrug* I'm guessing he lost interest around (or even before) the time I suggested we were at an impasse.
"People should buy our toaster because it toasts bread the best, not because it has the only plug that fits in the outlet" - Robert Morris, Almaden Research Center (IBM)
"If you have any faith in the human race you have too much." - Enlightenment
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