Moral Relativism

[PRmerger]

Does CC dogma limit human “purpose” to a single thing?

Yes, in essence, it does: union with the Beloved.

My guess is that at several locations different “purposes” are stated. I bet the Bible also states multiple purposes, and these get different levels of attention from churches at different times.

Yes, there is indeed a hierarchy of “purposes”; that is a multitude of dogmas and doctrines which, in the end, are provided to offer us a means to facilitate the pre-eminent purpose (stated above).

 

[tonyrey]

You’re putting the cart before the horse. Morality is not important because cultures have reflected on it for nearly all recorded history. They have reflected on it because morality is important.

So morality is not important solely because cultures have reflected on it for nearly all recorded history?

You seem to equate persons with brains…

Not at all. And I don;t even see the point of your claiming this.

You stated: “The brain thinking of morals is objectively real (most likely).”

The point is that you seem to equate thoughts with electrical activity in the brain. If that is true what else does a person consist of - apart from the rest of the body?

Physical objects aren’t moral agents nor do they have rights

Of course not. So what?

To “Morality is **primarily **concerned with personal relations, not physical objects” you responded “perhaps” - as if it is doubtful. If physical objects aren’t moral agents and don’t have rights there is no room for doubt…

It is quite the reverse. Without thoughts and perceptions we wouldn’t know the brain or the physical world exist. Our primary datum is the contents of our mind! We interpret the evidence…

I agree. So what? We can’t “know” without our “knowing” organ. This is obvious.

How do you know that your “knowing” organ consists of nothing more than the brain?

To expand neural activity to be evidence for the sole reality of physical objects you must ignore the basis of all knowledge!

What? This seems purposely obtuse. Why don’t you make your claim clear?

It seems obtuse to you only because you obviously haven’t reflected on the nature of knowledge. We know physical objects exist because we infer their existence from our perceptions whereas we have direct knowledge of our thoughts, intuitions, feelings, decisions and perceptions. They are the basis of** all **our knowledge.

 

[larkin31]

So morality is not important solely because cultures have reflected on it for nearly all recorded history?

No.

You stated: “The brain thinking of morals is objectively real (most likely).”

The point is that you seem to equate thoughts with electrical activity in the brain. If that is true what else does a person consist of - apart from the rest of the body?

Why do you ask? A “person” is generalized term with all sorts of meanings. I try not to use it except in the most generalized and casual conversations–which this exchange does not appear, on the surface, to be.

To “Morality is **primarily **concerned with personal relations, not physical objects” you responded “perhaps” - as if it is doubtful. If physical objects aren’t moral agents and don’t have rights there is no room for doubt…

I disagree. we can also have ethical relations to objects. I don’t know why you are excluding objects from those things that we should have ethical behavior towards. Nor do I see why it matters. I am tiring of this unless you make it germane to moral relativity.

How do you know that your “knowing” organ consists of nothing more than the brain?

Actually, our entire bodies participate in sensory perception of the external world. I did not claim that ONLY the brain does this. But for the most part, it is our mind that stores our higher knowledge (as he collection and processing center for MOST neural information about the external world. No other organ has been demonstrated to do so. If you have another to suggest, please do. You continue to do nothing more than to question the certainty of my claims. I don’t claim absolute certainty about any claims, just a high degree of probability until shown to be otherwise. I will continue to believe that my laptop is actually a Toshiba until if/when the label is shown to be false (which IS possible, although highly unlikely in this case). I will continue to think that my brain is the center of our knowledge, moral, intuitive, sensory, analytical, religious, philosophical, etc, until if/when another organ is demonstrated to be more central than our brain.

It seems obtuse to you only because you obviously haven’t reflected on the nature of knowledge.

False. I have indeed studied this.

We know physical objects exist because we infer their existence from our perceptions whereas we have direct knowledge of our thoughts, intuitions, feelings, decisions and perceptions. They are the basis of** all **our knowledge.

I never claimed otherwise. It took you this long to actually make a claim of any kind. And I agree with you 100%. So, what is your point from this about “moral relativity”? All you have done so far is question my certainty, which I don’t claim to be absolutely certain of to begin with. Can you actually make a claim about moral relativity that we can discuss?

 

[jonfawkes]

Then, Mr. Jon, equally, one could assign the purpose of causing pain to the hypodermic needle, especially when it only contains a partial regimen, such as dose # 1 of the multi-dose rabies vaccine, right? Or, one could equally assign the falling out of the sky, crashing, and the killing of all of the passengers, as the purpose of an airplane. Or, one could easily assign as the purpose of prayer, the supplication of God, because people sometimes do supplicate God via prayer. Or, one could easily assign, as a dog’s purpose, the pain we will receive from a dog, as it bites through one’s skin!

I am not asserting that there are not by-products and confused awarenesses, whenever things are not correctly considered. What I am arguing for is sense as opposed to nonsense (as Merleau-Ponty might suggest), clarity as opposed to gibberish, and sane conclusions as opposed to insane conclusions. If you continue to say that such an endeavor is not possible, I will simply have to have you interred at a sanatorium for a year or two.

JD all the examples you used aren’t good analogies.

The original premise was if something always happens with a said event that happening can be determined to be it’s purpose. I think is a false premise for the reasons stated.

All the examples you used a possible events not guaranteed. I can be can be assured that every time I start my internal combustion engine car it will produce CO. Producing CO isn’t the purpose of my car.

Although your conditional examples also prove that you can’t prove purpose through results.

When the first men appeared, or, if you wish, emerged, on this planet, there were no groups or societies to “train” them not to annihilate themselves. We reasonably intuit that they had no language, a necessary pre-requisite for the sharing and refinement of precepts and mores. Thus, the basic and essential mores had to be attained a priori to such structures. Don’t you think? How would humans have known, if all they had was their initial, rudimentary mental pictures?

The same way that other social animals determine “correct” behavior. Apes have social mores, Wolves have social mores, whales have social mores.

The St. Thomas quote - we all share the same biology so we have similar morality because we all have the same natural needs. Lions eating dinner isn’t immoral.

P.S. How do you know I’m not writing from a “sanatorium”?

 

[jonfawkes]

Well, you are partially correct. We are obligated to do the right thing, in the right way, for the right reason.

So, yes, sometimes the situation (time, environment, society, religion) may dictate what may be moral.

However, it must all be predicated on doing “the right thing.”.

So, it is NEVER right–no matter what society you live in–to rape someone. It is NEVER right to commit genocide. It is NEVER right to murder. It is NEVER right to fornicate.

As far as pillaging, perhaps. Raping? Not so much. As if.

Ok.

Morality is conditional. In the Bible there are things that we may consider immoral but some were God directed, and consistent with the times. I think they are immoral but I live in different times, in a different society.

Gen 38:1-6 - Judah has sex out of wedlock -

About that time Judah parted from his brothers and pitched his tent near a certain Adullamite named Hirah.There he met the daughter of a Canaanite named Shua, married her, and had relations with her.She conceived and bore a son, whom she named Er.Again she conceived and bore a son, whom she named Onan.Then she bore still another son, whom she named Shelah. They were in Chezib when he was born.Judah got a wife named Tamar for his first-born, Er.

Sam 15:3 - God commands genocide

Go, now, attack Amalek, and deal with him and all that he has under the ban. Do not spare him, but kill men and women, children and infants, oxen and sheep, camels and asses.’"

Gen 19:8 Lot offers up his daughters to the men who wanted the Angels.

I have two daughters who have never had intercourse with men. Let me bring them out to you, and you may do to them as you please. But don’t do anything to these men, for you know they have come under the shelter of my roof."

Later the daughters get him drunk and have sex with him and bear children. Moab and Ammon.

Exodus 2:11-12 - Moses murders an Egyptian for revenge.

On one occasion, after Moses had grown up, when he visited his kinsmen and witnessed their forced labor, he saw an Egyptian striking a Hebrew, one of his own kinsmen.Looking about and seeing no one, he slew the Egyptian and hid him in the sand.

Some pretty nasty stuff for my genteel sense of morality.

 

[PRmerger]

Morality is conditional.

Indeed. So it can be.

In the Bible there are things that we may consider immoral but some were God directed, and consistent with the times. I think they are immoral but I live in different times, in a different society.

Gen 38:1-6 - Judah has sex out of wedlock -

About that time Judah parted from his brothers and pitched his tent near a certain Adullamite named Hirah.There he met the daughter of a Canaanite named Shua, married her, and had relations with her.She conceived and bore a son, whom she named Er.Again she conceived and bore a son, whom she named Onan.Then she bore still another son, whom she named Shelah. They were in Chezib when he was born.Judah got a wife named Tamar for his first-born, Er.

Sam 15:3 - God commands genocide

Go, now, attack Amalek, and deal with him and all that he has under the ban. Do not spare him, but kill men and women, children and infants, oxen and sheep, camels and asses.’"

Gen 19:8 Lot offers up his daughters to the men who wanted the Angels.

I have two daughters who have never had intercourse with men. Let me bring them out to you, and you may do to them as you please. But don’t do anything to these men, for you know they have come under the shelter of my roof."

Later the daughters get him drunk and have sex with him and bear children. Moab and Ammon.

Exodus 2:11-12 - Moses murders an Egyptian for revenge.

On one occasion, after Moses had grown up, when he visited his kinsmen and witnessed their forced labor, he saw an Egyptian striking a Hebrew, one of his own kinsmen.Looking about and seeing no one, he slew the Egyptian and hid him in the sand.

Is there anything there that tells you that this was considered moral, even during this pre-Christian era?

(As for God “commanding” genocide, see this article by Jimmy Akin and then let’s talk!)

 

[jonfawkes]

Indeed. So it can be.

Is there anything there that tells you that this was considered moral, even during this pre-Christian era?

(As for God “commanding” genocide, see this article by Jimmy Akin and then let’s talk!)

There were no repercussions, most of the acts were done by “heroes” of the bible, so they would be the embodying the “good”.

Read it - nothing new

It’s still conditional - If God commands it He does it, so it’s ok. Different morality for God and Man.

The first explanation - God give life and so he can take away

I find this explanation falls short because, He’s God he could have sent a plague or flood etc. or had them all just drop dead. There wasn’t a need to use the Hebrews as the tool. The end result was Genocide by the Hebrews hand.

The second half he says what I’m saying - it was different times. Morality is conditional. The thought of killing infants is gut wrenching to me, not so much to them.

I still find it all horrifying. Not just the genocide but the chosen people part as well. It’s racist.

 

[PRmerger]

There were no repercussions, most of the acts were done by “heroes” of the bible, so they would be the embodying the “good”.

Read it - nothing new

It’s still conditional - If God commands it He does it, so it’s ok. Different morality for God and Man.

Right. If God commands it.

 

[jonfawkes]

Right. If God commands it.

So you are amending your statement that “genocide is always wrong” to "genocide is always wrong unless God commands it. "

 

[tonyrey]

So morality is not important solely because cultures have reflected on it for nearly all recorded history?

Then why else is it important?

The point is that you seem to equate thoughts with electrical activity in the brain. If that is true what else does a person consist of - apart from the rest of the body?

Why do you ask? A “person” is generalized term with all sorts of meanings. I try not to use it except in the most generalized and casual conversations–which this exchange does not appear, on the surface, to be.

It is not clear whether you believe **all **mental activity is located in the brain. If you do you must equate persons with human bodies which do not have free will or responsibility.

I don’t know why you are excluding objects from those things that we should have ethical behavior towards.

I am not. We should respect them.

I am tiring of this unless you make it germane to moral relativity.

It is germane because objects don’t have rights whereas persons do and it is arbitrary to regard human beings as the only persons who have existed, exist and will exist.

How do you know that your “knowing” organ consists of nothing more than the brain?

Actually, our entire bodies participate in sensory perception of the external world. I did not claim that ONLY the brain does this. But for the most part, it is our mind that stores our higher knowledge (as the collection and processing center for MOST neural information about the external world. No other organ has been demonstrated to do so.

Why do you distinguish the mind from the brain? How is it different?

I will continue to think that my brain is the center of our knowledge, moral, intuitive, sensory, analytical, religious, philosophical, etc, until if/when another organ is demonstrated to be more central than our brain.

What evidence is there that **everything **has a physical basis?

We know physical objects exist because we infer their existence from our perceptions whereas we have direct knowledge of our thoughts, intuitions, feelings, decisions and perceptions. They are the basis of all our knowledge.

I never claimed otherwise. It took you this long to actually make a claim of any kind. And I agree with you 100%.

So how do make the leap to the priority of the brain?

So, what is your point from this about “moral relativity”? All you have done so far is question my certainty, which I don’t claim to be absolutely certain of to begin with. Can you actually make a claim about moral relativity that we can discuss?

1. There is no reason to assume that all morality is human-based.
2. There is at least one absolute principle, not only for human beings but for all rational, moral beings: we should do what we are convinced is right.
3. The importance of morality and spirit implies that they are not merely ideas but facts.
4. The way we choose to behave has a positive or negative impact on ourselves and others.
5. Other rational beings must have rules of conduct similar to ours in this respect.
6. In the same way that human expressions refer to objective reality, e.g. in science, so they do to personal relations and development - which are either successful or unsuccessful.
7. There is good reason to believe physical reality is not the **sole **reality because all our knowledge and our interpretation of reality begin at home! (in our intangible mind)
8. Morality is not merely “a subjective phenomenon, albeit a noble one” but a set of fundamental, objective truths about persons.
9. Basic moral values are universal, absolute and true for persons in all places, at all times and under all conditions.
10. Facts are also intangible, universal, absolute and immutable.

 

[inocente]

Now, to refute you: A final cause, reason, purpose, raison d’etre, has three essential characteristics: it is that for the sake of which a thing acts; it is the good of the thing acting; and, it terminates the action so that the agent (efficient cause) comes to rest.

I don’t see how this gets us very far in terms of the purpose of our lives.

Just to make sure we’re on the same page about evolution: If bunnies are feeding and hear a sound in the grass, those who run away are more likely to have offspring and pass-on their prudence/better hearing while the others are more likely to end-up on a fox’s dinner plate. Craftier foxes are also more likely to eat well and have offspring. Over many generations both populations adapt, not towards an end-goal but to the changing facts of life.

On teleology - while we would usually say that a bunny runs away from fear, it might be better to drop a level and say it runs because adaptation has resulted in a given set of perceptions triggering a flight response .

On your point about this and Aristotle (#275), rain makes seeds grow, but that’s not its purpose, it’s just the way things turned out. Individual electrons in a wire bounce around more or less randomly, but Ohm’s Law works well when there are lots of them due to statistical probabilities - nature includes both chance and order. A flow of electrons is darned useful, but their reason for being isn’t so we can listen to Bach or power a taser, they’re just one result of how nature works.

Ultimately bunnies exists because self-organization is built into nature. Molecules bond, leading to complicated organic chemicals, then to life and then to increased complexity. We don’t know why this type of ordering is built into the nature of the cosmos (we can imagine alternative universes without it). Some theists would argue that it’s in this nature of nature itself that we find God’s design and purpose. Our high complexity then allows us to relate to Him. We can see shades of this from Benedict:

The clay became man at the moment in which a being for the first time was capable of forming, however dimly, the thought of “God.” The first Thou that – however stammeringly – was said by human lips to God marks the moment in which the spirit arose in the world. – Pope Benedict, Creation and Evolution: A Conference With Pope Benedict XVI in Castel Gandolfo

What St. Thomas is arguing is that when an effect repeatedly follows from a given cause, we attain a sufficient reason why this is so only when we admit that the cause was ordered to produce said effect.

Following on about the nature of nature, effects are ultimately due to the way the physical world is ordered. Some would argue that all this is just for us, that we are the end-product, but to me that’s a leap in the dark, a huge assumption.

 

[inocente]

That being the case, then, I propose that morality is gleaned from a proper consideration of man’s nature in its entirety, not merely from a consideration of an individual faculty. For example, there are much more moral ways of handling impiety, in our societies, than by genital mutilation. True, more impiety may result, but, to be chattel is not the purpose of women.

I agree we should use holistic benchmarks, while thinking absolutes are a poor substitute for relative methods.

One good way to use benchmarks, which is increasingly being used by industry and administrations (at least in the EU) makes comparisons using various objective and subjective measures to place organizations/countries in league tables and help them learn from each other. These assessments are usually run periodically, the methodology improving each time.

Now morals definitely can’t be imposed by civil servants, but have a look at this unicef report (pdf) on the well-being of children in rich countries. The main league table on page 2 has some unexpected and possibly controversial placements, but the main use of this kind of comparison is in all the factors involved. For example, figure 5.2f on page 31 – why are teenage births so much higher in the US and Russia than elsewhere? Different ABC or abortion morality? Prevailing morality produces a wider gap between rich and poor? What effect does this have on individual lives? Don’t know, but you can hopefully see the value of asking questions from the real world instead of getting pat answers from philosophers or holy books. If and when this type of assessment is extended to countries with (to us) weird morals, they may start to see the error of their ways, but then we may see errors in some of our ways as well. Every last step is relative, but in a good way, no?

I think this is the kind of process many of us have always done far more informally in our heads to compare our own moral decision making with others in our society and beyond.

One could say, that their men are simply protecting their women’s places in their afterlife. But, this is all the more reason to argue for a norm of morality that encompasses the nature of man in its entirety. It is precisely the arbitrary, relative and subjective assumption that man is by nature impious (only one of his faculties, remember - not one of the three natures I mentioned) that has resulted in the preposterous conclusion that stoning women and their painful mutilation is morally beneficial - not only for the women’s sakes, but also, for their society’s sake. Don’t you see?

Are you arguing against yourself though? Suppose one religion says X is good and another X is bad, surely we look at both arguments along with lots of others (including one from my wife ), put them together with our own feelings, and then make up our minds. If we do that in one case then why not in all cases?

 

[inocente]

No one yet has been able to demonstrate that chimps can articulate any choice in their “conduct or group relations” that is governed by an urge to do good and avoid evil.

It’s early days, but there’s research pointing to monkeys having primitive forms of morality.

timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article5733638.ece

youtube.com/watch?v=aAFQ5kUHPkY

 

[larkin31]

1. There is no reason to assume that all morality is human-based.
2. There is at least one absolute principle, not only for human beings but for all rational, moral beings: we should do what we are convinced is right.
3. The importance of morality and spirit implies that they are not merely ideas but facts.
4. The way we choose to behave has a positive or negative impact on ourselves and others.
5. Other rational beings must have rules of conduct similar to ours in this respect.
6. In the same way that human expressions refer to objective reality, e.g. in science, so they do to personal relations and development - which are either successful or unsuccessful.
7. There is good reason to believe physical reality is not the **sole **reality because all our knowledge and our interpretation of reality begin at home! (in our intangible mind)
8. Morality is not merely “a subjective phenomenon, albeit a noble one” but a set of fundamental, objective truths about persons.
9. Basic moral values are universal, absolute and true for persons in all places, at all times and under all conditions.
10. Facts are also intangible, universal, absolute and immutable.

I am done with your questions for now, but this list is interesting. But it would be more helpful for discussion if you would take just one (any one) of these claims and explain the reasoning that makes them true. Perhaps #9.

 

[tonyrey]

larkin31:

1. There is no reason to assume that all morality is human-based.

1. Basic moral values are universal, absolute and true for persons in all places, at all times and under all conditions because the life of every person is immensely valuable.
2. There is no a priori reason why one person’s life is more valuable than other.
3. Therefore we have an absolute obligation to respect everyone’s life.
4. We have an absolute obligation to choose what we are convinced is the greater or greatest good or the lesser or least evil.
5. We have an absolute obligation to be reasonable, consider other points of view, accept what we believe to be true and live according to our beliefs and values.

 

[PRmerger]

So you are amending your statement that “genocide is always wrong” to "genocide is always wrong unless God commands it. "

Where did I say that?

Genocide is always wrong, in every culture, at every age, in every situation.

 

[PRmerger]

It’s early days, but there’s research pointing to monkeys having primitive forms of morality.

timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article5733638.ece

youtube.com/watch?v=aAFQ5kUHPkY

If this is true, then you are proposing that our source of morality is biological, not Divine?

Incidentally, how does this comment fit in with your premise:

“I am not arguing that non-human primates are moral beings but there is enough evidence for the following of social rules to agree that some of the stepping stones towards human morality can be found in other animals,”

Social rules are the stepping stones towards human morality, but non-human primates are NOT moral beings.

My point exactly.

 

[PRmerger]

It’s early days, but there’s research pointing to monkeys having primitive forms of morality.

This is an interesting topic: animal morality and human morality.

Does anyone have any evidence of animals martyring their lives for a stranger ala Maximilian Kolbe?

This would be interesting indeed if this ever occurred!

 

[jonfawkes]

Where did I say that?

Genocide is always wrong, in every culture, at every age, in every situation.

Your response was ambiguous - I was asking for clarification.

It’s still conditional - If God commands it He does it, so it’s ok. Different morality for God and Man.

Right. If God commands it.

After reading the article you posted, the author accepts that it is genocide. It is rationalized that it was “ok” for a various of reasons, regardless if it God ordained or not. You posted the article, so you must think that it was justified, since the article was explanation of justification for the act.

You are saying contradictory things.

 

[jonfawkes]

This is an interesting topic: animal morality and human morality.

Does anyone have any evidence of animals martyring their lives for a stranger ala Maximilian Kolbe?

This would be interesting indeed if this ever occurred!

scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=the-ethical-dog