The Real Life Important Point about Being Moral or Ethical.

[David Sklansky]

Enough of this high falootin debate about whether there is absolute morality, whether we need God for that, or whether deep down we are all selfish and cannot formally prove we are better than Nazis. Because that isn't usually the reason why people disagree about what is right. As usual the problem is more likely that people are weak in math.

Geometry provides a good example. For thousands of years people thought that Euclid's axioms were absolute self evident truth about space. Later it turned out that you can use other axioms and deduce different results that are not contradictory to each other. Later still it became apparent that the axioms of some of these non Euclidiean geometries actually did a better job than Euclid in describing how space really is. So the axioms of geometry moved from absolute truth to simply axioms that most people agreed on.

But here is the important point. When a tough geometry question is presented to a group of people, the fact that they will get different answers rarely is because they are assuming different initial axioms. It is because some or all of them are screwing up the deductive chain of resoning that leads from the axioms to the conclusion.

The same goes for ethics and morality. Sometimes people will disagree on an issue because of a basic difference in values or axioms that forces that disagreement. But more often it is because at least one of those debating doesn't think straight. The fact is that whether you get your set of moral principles from God, once and future king, empathatic feelings, or just common sense, you will find yourself in agreement about those principles with almost all others almost all of the time, at least in this country. Which means when you find yourself disagreeing with others about a particular question, it is probably NOT because of a basic value difference but rather because at least one of you is not well enough versed in formal logic to accurately come to the conlusion that your initial principles actually imply.

When I said there was no intrinsic way to determine how generous we should be to our handicapped, or for what goals it is right to experiment on mammals, or whether Hitler is horribly evil, I meant this in a technical way only. Because axioms, without God, are technically a matter of opinion. But if everybody basically agrees on most moral principles, or at least the ones germane to the specific subject at hand, it is usually very possible to answer questions like the above, given those principles. Possible but not always easy. Just like geometry questions aren't always easy.

Bottom line. Before you chalk up a moral disagreement with somebody to their diametrically opposed outlook on life. (or before you chalk up your difference with somebody on how to play a hand to the supposed different reads you and he have on your opponent) make sure that you and him have used the proper methods of deduction to get to your conclusion. And if you don't know for sure what that means, learn.

[spaminator101]

i agree that this is something that the posters on this forum need to work on (including myself)

very good post David

[FredJones888]

man your nose is brown.

Sklansky thinks that morality should come from mathematical logic. If it makes sense logically to kill you he would do it and not even feel bad. By his "logic" if hitler had good intentions then he wasn't really evil.

[spaminator101]

i agree if he had good intentions but it is clear to us that hitler didn't have good intentions [img]/images/graemlins/smirk.gif[/img]

[andyfox]

No doubt some of us are not consistent in getting from point A to point B.

But I think your geometry example is not apropos. No question that when I get a wrong answer to a geometry problem, it's not because I am not using Euclidian geometry. It's because I've gone wrong somewhere in geting from some point to another.

But the same doesn't hold for ethics and morality. Because in ethics the same or similar values or axioms don't necessarily lead to the same conclusion. Unlike geometry, where an answer is either right or wrong, in ethics and real life there are degrees of rightness and wrongness, and competing rights and wrongs that won't necessarily lend themseles to a rigorous, mathematical or geometric answer that is indisputably right or wrong.

Three people are drowning: one's son and two strangers. (Sorry, Matt.) One can save either only one's son or both of the two others. We probably all agree that the morally correct thing to do is to save as many lives as possible. But we also probably all agree that we owe our family more than we owe to strangers. So here we have competing values that seemingly contradict one another and that are not easily resolved. What about if the two strangers are young children? Or if they are octogenarians? Or if one's son was recently diagnosed with a terminal disease?

Often enough, it would seem, solutions in real life may not be as clear and logical as you would have them. I do agree, however, that more often that most people think, lack of logical rigor is also a cause of moral clarity (and I myself am certainly no exception here). Just not quite as much as you think.

[spaminator101]

andyfox, you are taking this discussion towards absolute morality which is exactly where it was not intended to go
stop and think what the results of your post will be before you post it

[PairTheBoard]

I don't think Andy is headed toward "absolute" morality at all. In fact he said pretty much what I said in David's Africa thread.

There are often moral principles that compete with each other. An example of two, "It is good to help others" and "It is good to help yourself". What people do in practice is apply both principles using their best judgement to find some kind of balance. There may be a whole complex of principles and personal experience that go into that judgement. That's what causes the differences in opinion.

The personal decision process is based on mental processes that aren't even understood, much less modeled mathematically. The fact is that mathematics is a very weak tool when it comes to handling really complex systems. However, human beings can be very good at coming up with workable insights, conclusions, and decisions in the midst of a relatively chaotic mixture of information. They may very well be unable to give a logical line of inferences for how they arrived at their gestalt. If Sklansky induces them to try he can often make short work of them. But that is not because their thinking process is flawed. It is because Sklansky's method of linear logical inferences is inadequate to the task.

PairTheBoard

[siegfriedandroy]

Wow, pair the board. I am very confused by your last sentence, but i instantly recognize it as genius. How often should Sklansky attempt to induce such arguments, to maximize his profits from such a play?

why is andy fox choosing from these competing moral arguments? why doesnt he balance between what is best for him and what is worst for everyone else. or what is worst for him, and will simultaneously ruin as many lives as possible. what meaning is there in anything he chooses. why doesnt fox just sit by the river all day, play his guitar, and sing christmas carols all day long. why does fox even exist? does fox even exist? what did fox get on the sat? what the *elll am i talking about? peace.

[PairTheBoard]

[ QUOTE ]
siegfriedandroy --

Wow, pair the board. I am very confused by your last sentence, but i instantly recognize it as genius.

[/ QUOTE ]

While I cannot prove it I have consulted an Oracle and she assures me that your intuition agrees with the pattern formed by the knives she threw at me when I questioned her about it.

PairTheBoard

[Timer]

[ QUOTE ]
There are often moral principles that compete with each other. An example of two, "It is good to help others" and "It is good to help yourself".

[/ QUOTE ]

Why is it good to help others? Why is it good to help anyone? If there is no absolute morality, then there is no good and there is no bad. There is no right and there is no wrong.

Without absolute morality there is nothing--chaos. We have order. We might not understand that order, but it is there none the less.

Hence, God exists.