pug846

Glory said:
It depends on what you mean in this context by moral oughts. Give me some examples of moral oughts.

Glory

One ought not steal. One ought care for the weak and sick. One ought not take advantage of the weak. One ought be responsible for ones actions.

Please don't tell me you were looking for some sort of universal ought. There aint no such animal.

Now you. What is your idea of an ought versus a rule?

Glory

[ September 24, 2002: Message edited by: Glory ]</p>

Glory

I took K's meaning as, "The abillity to function in and be part of a group increases an individual's chances for survival. Self preservation is the motive for moral behaviour."

I don't see where you get anything about preservation of the species except in the broadest sense. That the species is preserved in the same way that the individual is.(In this one example)

Glory


Glory

[ September 24, 2002: Message edited by: Glory ]</p>

Amos

But all sentient beings are social animals to a greater or lesser extent because all sentient beings have a soul and are therefore divided between their own soul and their social identity.

This makes the degree of being social evidence of their degree of soul aliention.

Of course it is true that such groups of animals need their social interaction but that does not indicate that non-social animals will soon be extict (which was my only objection to the suggestion made by K).

Glory

Says you.



Do you have any idea what the term social animal means?

This was not implied in any way. The loners K was referring to are individuals who strike out on their own from or are driven out by the social groups to which they are supposed to belong. Hermitts and lone wolves. He wasn't referring to animals which are not social. Of course you have this notion that all animals are social. You're wrong in this context.

Glory

echidna

One of the commonest “mistakes” posted in MFP is the Naturalist Fallacy.

“It happens naturally (in Nature) therefore it’s morally OK”

Quite valid, as long as one is willing to genuinely accept amorality over morality. Quite valid as long as one is willing to be locked up for behaving as such.

People who don't understand the wrongness of the Naturality Fallacy are one reason why people create religion.

Kantian

~excerpted from my essay on the ethical perspectives of Kant and Nietzsche~

...Kant was a systematic thinker, the first professional thinker who set the bar for all subsequent thinkers to follow, and his writings reflect that fact: a heavy academic style with a proclivity for technical terminology that produced arcane jargon foreign to the unwitting trespasser who happened across his books. As a virtuoso in the tradition of scientific and mathematically based philosophy, (Descartes, Spinoza, Locke) Kant employed the tools of argument and rational criteria instead of faith or revelation.

Kant designed to discover a universal ethic, an a priori principle of morals that was as absolute and certain as mathematics, yet he want to show that "pure reason can be practical; i.e., can of itself determine the will independently of anything empirical." With the belief that moral judgments are universal imperatives that apply to all rational beings, Kant was a prescriptivist. A prescriptivist believes that the grammar of a language must establish rules of application, or what to conform in practice. In a way, Kant's entire moral program is a response to the British skeptic Hume. David Hume held two things: one, there can never be a legitimate derivation of an "ought" from an "is," that moral judgments can never truly describe how things are, thus the lack of scientific justification and two, that the only motive or spark for an action is desire, and that renders reason bereft of impulse, intention or direction. In fact, the only rational justification for any action is that it supplies to the approval of the agent's wishes. Both of these premises deny the possibility of objectivity in ethics.

If and only if an objective reason for action is possible, then that relegates the is-ought dilemma superfluous, and consequently morality will receive independent rational basis from the empirical realm. This led Kant to exhume the antiquated distinction between theoretical and practical reason. Kant says that theoretical reason guides beliefs while practical reason guides action. When legitimate, theoretical reason is the understanding, but once it becomes illegitimate, it becomes pure reason. Practical reason distributes imperatives that are acted upon, but they cannot be subject to truth or falsehood. Here Kant introduces two types of imperatives- the hypothetical and the categorical. Hypothetical imperatives have conditional antecedents, but lack objectivity. Similar to Hume, the motivational force of desire generates hypothetical imperatives, but the empiricist does not think there is anything else, that there is another function of reason than hypothetical imperatives. However, the categorical imperative lacks empirical conditions in order to be verifiable. In the meta-ethics classic, the Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals, Kant declares that an exclusively empirical philosophy has nothing to say on morality, and allow emotions free reign, self-love or whatever is enlightened. There is an abyss between impulse and moral principles, Kant thought, and proposes that rational action is possible by defining a good man as one who acts upon the assumption that there is an unconditioned or objective moral standard that applies to all men as rational or autonomous beings.

Kant's proposal of a metaphysical claim that there exists an a priori foundation in morality called the categorical imperative is a member of the policy category. The removal of all contingent state of affairs leaves behind the categorical imperative as the sole reason for decision or action. Kant declares a tautology, that "if a law is to have a moral force, i.e., to be the basis of an obligation, it must carry with it absolute necessity." Reason alone will dictate action, whereas individual passions and interests are a non-factor. Another aspect of reason is that all rational beings have access to reason, that they must treat one another as equals by respecting each other. Since everybody is a rational, autonomous entity, nobody may be subject to the role of means to an end. People are not instruments but ends in themselves. Everyone is equal in judgment over one another's actions inasmuch the rational person judges himself.
The following argument is a synopsis of Kantian morality:

• Premise 1: The idea of abstraction itself gives rise to the content of the categorical imperative.
• P2: Man is a rational, autonomous being (A moral being, who is free, rational and capable of self-legislation, and the bearer of rights and duties)
• P3: The categorical imperative is the a priori proof of morality
• Conclusion: Human morality has an a priori proof.

That the premises do support the conclusion proves the validity of the argument- which is a deductive one- that of a definition. However, despite its brilliance, the premises posit a sterile black and white world that does not exist in today's splotches of gray. Exactly who, in this world of capricious, passionate, desiring, and charismatic individuals, is a rational, autonomous being? Kant fails to illustrate how does reason become a motivating role in morality or ethics and in this respect, and has not adequately supplanted Humean morality. In the preface of the Groundwork of the Metaphysic of Morals, Kant proceeds with an entirely unjustified assumption that morality must come from a priori reasoning. Nowhere does Kant prove that the meaning of moral claims must be derived from reason alone.

Kant probably expected too much from his audience, given that he was already at an advanced age when he produced his masterpieces. Once his first Critique was published, reviewers interpreted Kant's philosophy as something Berkeleyean, which he took umbrage to and set about to re-editing his book with a new refutation of idealism. Despite the verbosity and prolix terminology, or perhaps precisely because of them, Kant's books set philosophy upon its head and began to dominate German thought for the next hundred years, and that led to one arrogant philologist from Basel....
~Transcendentalist~

Amos

In that case "loners" just die and we cannot speak of extinct.

All animals including non-social animals are social when they mate.

K

Glory:

Thanks for defending my position while I was away. You did a better job than I could have if I had been here.

Amos:

I've been talking about social animals - those animals that live the majority of their lives in social groups. Humans definitely fall into this category. Given the relatively long time it takes for human offspring to reach maturity and the lack of natural defenses, socialization is a must. Now you could argue that we lost our natural defenses through evolution after we became social (I actually believe this is probably the case). But the fact remains that the huge advantage provided by humankind's considerable use of socialization has allowed an animal with few natural defenses to completely dominate this planet.

Pug:

I never said that there was an "ought" involved. Given my take on morality, I'm sure it's apparent that it's ridiculous to believe in some kind of transcendant "ought". I've been trying to say that I believe there are evolved drives that aid in the preservation of the species that influence the way we act. The drives that allow us to work as social animals we call "morals". I think many people think there is more to these drives than there really is (eg. many believe in objective morality). I don't believe there is any objective value to preservation of the species. I do value it highly subjectively - but that's an entirely different matter.

Starboy

pug846, you make it sound as if there were some absolute source of morals. If there is can you tell me where? If there is no absolute source and morals exist because we are social animals, then we make them up on the fly and they undergo a natural selection process. Societies with poorly functioning morals either change them or become dead culture.

Starboy