Non-theistic foundation of morality?

[Bradski]

To paraphrase, let him without a poorly formed conscience cast the first stone.

You seem to be implying that our conscience will lead us to the truth.

If my consience disagrees with yours, then who is right? Has my conscience ld me to the truth and yours has not?

How do we tell?

 

[e_c]

inocente - Yes, this is the rule for an individual’s action, but the real question is how the conscience should incline one. In other words, saying “follow your conscience” begs the question. You may as well be saying “do what is right.”

But did the conscience of St. Thomas Aquinas guide him to teach that women were inferior to men in several ways:
Woman is subject to man because in the male reason predominates
Summa Theologica I, qu. 92, art. 1, ad 2.

Man is the image and glory of God, but woman is the glory of man
Summa Theologica I, qu. 93, art. 4 ad 1

The woman’s hair is a sign of her subjection, a man’s is not.
Summa Theologica Supplement , qu. 28, art. 3 ad 1.

Man is more ordered to intellectual operation than is woman.
Summa Theologica I, qu. 92, art. 1.

Would you actually like to go through each of these things, or no? If yes, start another thread. (Or not. Apparently this thread is for whatever.)

Bradski - That’s it? That’s the whole show? Let me just zoom in on two issues for now:

What in the heck does “use reasonable arguments” mean? What are their basis? Shouldn’t it be clear that such and such is harmful and therefore ought not be done? What does a “reasonable argument” look like? Are you just trying to show that one act causes more harm than another? If so, what is the mechanism for measuring harm? How far is one bound to go in his considerations of harm and possible harm?

So it isn’t that you are actually harming someone that makes an action wrong, it is that one is simply always bound not to do anything that MIGHT harm someone IF they encountered it in a CERTAIN way. Do you understand what this means? Try to find some implications… practical epistemic implications, metaphysical implications, meta-ethical implications. You are at odds with yourself in many ways.

Will be gone this afternoon for a few days… We’ll be on page 900 by the time I return, I suppose. G’luck mates.

 

[inocente]

But did the conscience of St. Thomas Aquinas guide him to teach that women were inferior to men in several ways:
Woman is subject to man because in the male reason predominates
Summa Theologica I, qu. 92, art. 1, ad 2.

Man is the image and glory of God, but woman is the glory of man
Summa Theologica I, qu. 93, art. 4 ad 1

The woman’s hair is a sign of her subjection, a man’s is not.
Summa Theologica Supplement , qu. 28, art. 3 ad 1.

Man is more ordered to intellectual operation than is woman.
Summa Theologica I, qu. 92, art. 1.

I’ve no reason to think he acted against his conscience. The biology and prevailing wisdom Thomas was taught would have come from Aristotle, who argued that the woman only provides a passive incubator for a baby, and the man’s seed alone provides its form. In that culture the prevailing wisdom was that women were inferior.

In Aristotle’s day the prevailing wisdom was also that some people lacked the rational part of the soul and so were destined to be slaves, ruled over by those destined to be their masters.

You can argue they ought to have known better, but then the prevailing wisdom in our day presumably also contains error, unless we alone are blessed to live at the only point in history that’s completely perfect.

 

[PRmerger]

Let’s say that someone asks us for our advice if it is ok to do something. We obviously need to know the conditions under which the act will be committed. We need to ascertain if harm will result.

Based on all of this we decide under which column it will be listed. We may both decide that it goes under Harm. There are zero benefits as far as we can tell. We therefore tell the person that it is immoral.

Now if you disagreed with me, then only one of us would be right (you reject the fact that it could be right or wrong for each of us).

If we agree, then we are either both right or both wrong. Do you know how to tell which is which? Because I don’t. All I have is my personal opinion based on all the facts that I have available and our combined reasonable arguments.

If we agree, then all that has happened is that we agree. We haven’t cracked morality. We are just giving our opinion. It is right for us.

But when you talk of something being morally absolute, you don’t go through any of those processes. Or if you do, wonders will never cease, you end up agreeing with the moral absolute. You cracked morality. There is no moral absolute with which you disagree! It cannot be coincidence. You have access to moral truths.

Well, not really. You are not the New Oracle of Western Civilisation. You are simply refusing to go through the process.

Wha???

What in the world does the above have to do with the mercy killing we were talking about?

You proposed that “you decide that for yourself” (regarding whether something is moral or not)

I asked if the mercy killing was moral because the father decided it was.

Or if morality was something that transcended his decision.

What’s your response to that ^^?

 

[inocente]

You seem to be implying that our conscience will lead us to the truth.

If my consience disagrees with yours, then who is right? Has my conscience ld me to the truth and yours has not?

How do we tell?

Let’s suppose there is a truth for you to find. Can you find this truth by ignoring your own sense of right and wrong? By following the herd or by following orders?

I see no way you can find the truth and know it’s the truth other than by weighing what is right and wrong for yourself. And once you’ve done that, you would be denying that truth if you acted against your conscience.

inocente - Yes, this is the rule for an individual’s action, but the real question is how the conscience should incline one. In other words, saying “follow your conscience” begs the question. You may as well be saying “do what is right.”

Conscience = “a person’s moral sense of right and wrong, viewed as acting as a guide to one’s behaviour” (OED)

If we act against our own sense of right and wrong, we’re no longer a moral agent. That’s true whether or not there are (other) absolute rights and wrongs.

 

[Tomdstone]

If we act against our own sense of right and wrong, we’re no longer a moral agent. That’s true whether or not there are (other) absolute rights and wrongs.

But if you act in adherence to your own sense of right and wrong are you then a “moral agent” or can you be acting immorally even though you are adhering to your conscience?

 

[inocente]

But if you act in adherence to your own sense of right and wrong are you then a “moral agent” or can you be acting immorally even though you are adhering to your conscience?

"A moral agent is “a being who is capable of acting with reference to right and wrong.” - en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moral_agency

Way I see it is if we act against our conscience, say under peer pressure, then we’ve sacrificed that capability. According to my single absolute principle, “always let your conscience be your guide”, that’s always bad. So only by acting in conscience is there a possibility of being good.

 

[davidv]

"A moral agent is “a being who is capable of acting with reference to right and wrong.” - en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moral_agency

Way I see it is if we act against our conscience, say under peer pressure, then we’ve sacrificed that capability. According to my single absolute principle, “always let your conscience be your guide”, that’s always bad. So only by acting in conscience is there a possibility of being good.

And yet, following conscience does not always lead to doing good. Therefore, your principle cannot be the only criterion on which to determine what is moral.

 

[PRmerger]

Technically:

“Moral relativism is the view that moral judgments are true or false only relative to some particular standpoint (for instance, that of a culture or a historical period) and that no standpoint is uniquely privileged over all others. It has often been associated with other claims about morality: notably, the thesis that different cultures often exhibit radically different moral values; the denial that there are universal moral values shared by every human society; and the insistence that we should refrain from passing moral judgments on beliefs and practices characteristic of cultures other than our own.” - iep.utm.edu/moral-re/

So it has a counter-colonialism, counter-imperialism overtone.

Or…here’s another definition, technically:

books.google.com/books?id=hkY_GFi_QMsC&pg=PA104&lpg=PA104&dq#v=onepage&q&f=false

 

[Bradski]

And yet, following conscience does not always lead to doing good. Therefore, your principle cannot be the only criterion on which to determine what is moral.

But isn’t your conscience a reflection of what you have already decided? If you decide that something is immoral and still do it, you will experience a guilty conscience.

It’s inconceivable to feel guilt about doing something that you think is morally correct.

Following your conscience simply means doing what you have already decided is the correct action.

 

[IWantGod]

It’s inconceivable to feel guilt about doing something that you think is morally correct.

Its inconceivable that such a meaningful feeling like guilt would exist at all in relation to objectively meaningless behavior.

 

[Bradski]

I asked if the mercy killing was moral because the father decided it was.

Or if morality was something that transcended his decision.

What’s your response to that ^^?

I’m not sure what this is in reference to.

 

[Aloysium]

But isn’t your conscience a reflection of what you have already decided? If you decide that something is immoral and still do it, you will experience a guilty conscience.

It’s inconceivable to feel guilt about doing something that you think is morally correct.

Following your conscience simply means doing what you have already decided is the correct action.

Random :twocents:

Our conscience does not present us with logical arguments. It whispers from the heart.
No decision is involved in its subtle insights; we then decide how we will respond.
Guilt as a feeling differs from guilt which defines an act.
Life is not as controlled, rational, and lacking in conflict and self-deceit as you may imagine.
Lives without a strong moral foundation tend to be victim to irrational feelings of guilt.
There is also mental illness that includes depression and obsessive compulsive neurosis.
Following your conscience for the majority of us is not pleasant, and fraught with fears and doubts. Secular society offers us trivial choices to avoid such difficult situations.

 

[PRmerger]

In regard to causing harm, this is where empathy comes in. In gives you the ability to understand how an act will affect a fellow traveller.

Interesting example.

Empathy.

Empathy seems to be contrary to your atheistic model for morality.

For does not empathy cause MORE harm to you? It hurts you to have empathy.

Rather, APATHY seems to be the virtue you should appeal to in order to reduce harm.

When you have apathy towards others’ suffering, you decrease the harm in your life, no?

 

[PRmerger]

I’m not sure what this is in reference to.

You said:

The man who kills his daughter for having an affair believes that the harm caused to his family’s honour outweighs the physical harm he will cause his daughter. Sacrificing people causes less harm than a bad harvest would, which people would believe would be the case without the human sacrifice.

It’s not just physical harm. It includes harm to one’s honour, one’s sense of family or tribal loyalty, one’s pride. Which is not to say that using any of these reasons means that the act automatically becomes moral. You decide that yourself.

I countered with:

Ok. So he decides that for himself. He decides it’s the moral thing to do.

Is it?

Is it moral because he decided that it is?

Or is morality something that is outside of his decision?

So could you please respond?

 

[JuanFlorencio]

Following Sartre’s line then, we always have options, we can always change. Bad faith is pretending we can’t, pretending we’re trapped by circumstance or our culture or tradition or our own self.

We could each become all that we currently are not. Yet the waiter tells himself he can only ever be a waiter. Sometimes, late at night, the waiter’s conscience breaks through and tells him that’s not right. But he doesn’t let his conscience be his guide. Easier to live with the pretense.

btw I don’t know what a first conscience is.

Conscience is not an entity “within” yourself, but an act, or a complex homogeneous or heterogeneous system of acts. When the waiter tells himself he can only ever be a waiter, this “telling himself” is an act of conscience. If, given his situation, a different discourse comes to his mind and it emerges through an act of conscience claiming to become flesh, it is not his first act of conscience, but the second or the third… There are so many discourses in your mind waiting for an opportunity to emerge through an act of conscience and become a rule of your behavior, displacing the ones that are currently dominant in you, that it would be difficult for you to say which one of them is “your conscience”.

Certainly, we can always change. I understand Christianity as a calling to a permanent conversion. Your conscience has to be transformed and become more and more mature, always needing revision and being subject to continuous transformation. But what shall you become? Which discourses shall be your guide? Shall it be this, or that, or a new one? You need to decide, and you need to accept your responsibility for the decisions you make.

 

[Bradski]

When you have apathy towards others’ suffering, you decrease the harm in your life, no?

Empathy is not something you can turn on or not. Unless you are a psychopath, everyone has it (plus a few close animal relatives). It’s inbuilt. You can’t ‘decide’ to be empathetic. I’m not in a position to recommend it any more than I could recommend breathing in and out now and then.

So could you please respond?

As to whether an honour killing is morally acceptable to the father? Well he’d put it into the Benefits column, obviously. And he’d have his reasons. We’d put it into the Harm column and we’d have our rather obvious reasons for doing that. Personally speaking, I would consider, obviously, that my reasons would trump his. If he disagreed and we lived in a society that considered honour killings acceptable, she dies. If we live in a society that considers it unacceptable, she lives.

You want to call that a moral absolute. You want to string all the conditions that are relative to the act together and then say: ‘Look, it’s undeniably wrong!’ But an absolute immoral act is one that has no conditions. That it is wrong under all circumstances. So remove the conditions from this example and what have you got:

A man kills his daughter.

That is either right or wrong dependent upon, relative to, the conditions. There are very many conditions when we’d consider it the correct thing to do. Does that make it absolute? No, it is relative to the conditions that make it acceptable. There are many more conditions when we’d consider it to be wrong. Does that make it absolute? No, because that would be relative to the conditions that it make it unacceptable.

Absolute morality isn’t an act that everyone just knows to be wrong. It isn’t an act that has conditions. It is, by definition, an act that is wrong whatever the conditions. But it is literally impossible to name an act that doesn’t have conditions attached. There are no ‘ifs’. If you include one, then it becomes relative to the clause that follows.

Killing your daughter is wrong if X. That’s relative.
Sex outside marriage is wrong if X. That’s relative.
Harming your child is wrong if X. That’s relative.

And so on. And none of those statements can be decided upon UNLESS you include the ‘if’.

Killing your daughter is wrong IF it’s punishment for dishonouring her family.
Sex outside marriage is wrong IF it results in an unwanted pregnancy.
Harming your child is wrong IF it’s done just for fun.

There are no absolute moral acts. They all depend upon the conditions.

 

[PRmerger]

Empathy is not something you can turn on or not. Unless you are a psychopath, everyone has it (plus a few close animal relatives). It’s inbuilt. You can’t ‘decide’ to be empathetic. I’m not in a position to recommend it any more than I could recommend breathing in and out now and then.

Sure you can turn off empathy. One easy way to do that is to not look at the suffering.

If you don’t know about it, you can’t hurt. Voila!

Do you think that’s a moral thing to do, to decrease the harm to yourself?

 

[PRmerger]

As to whether an honour killing is morally acceptable to the father?

No, Bradski.

I am asking: is the honor killing acceptable?

Yes? Or no?

 

[Bradski]

No, Bradski.

I am asking: is the honor killing acceptable?

Yes? Or no?

To me? No.