I’m not arguing that. Or, rather, I’m not arguing that so much as suggesting that each of us as individuals will determine [in our heads] which option is seen as better or worse; which option is seen as rational or irrational; which option is seen as moral or immoral.
And then beyond a particular concensus in a particular community, where can the philosophers/ethicists go?
Morality of course never goes away. Why? Because human wants and needs never go away. Morality is derived from the fact that embedded in the “human condition” is something rather obvious: that wants and needs ever come into conflict. Morality then is just a particular set of rules for a particular set of behaviors out in a particular world at a particular historical juncture. The rest is dasein, conflicting goods and political economy. That and opting for either “might makes right” or “moderation, negotiation and compromise”.
And, for folks like me, the dilemma embedded in dasein. Though I didn’t really “opt” for it. In fact, I wish I could figure out a way to “opt out” of it!!
There isn’t with language, a right and a wrong. There are many rights, and many wrongs.
Why can we not live in a world where both sides prevail?
How can we live in a world where the unborn are always brought to term and a world in which women are not forced to give birth?
There can’t be a decision that is right, because circumstances aren’t the same.
What is more moral to you, the death of a child, or a child being abused and neglected?
Some things are worse than death.
To me, the standard for moral isn’t “that which promotes life”. It is “that which promotes a thriving life”.
But that’s my point. What is seen as more moral “to me” may not be seen as more moral “to you”. Or “to them”. My argument then revolves how I perceive [and you perceive and they perceive] these conflicting value judgments from the perspective of dasein, conflicting goods and political economy.
After all, that which the ubermen construe as promoting a “thriving life” will not often be seen by the “sheep” as doing the same. The only difference then between law of the jungle thuggery and the KTS crowd is that Satyr, Lyssa, Magnus et al always feel compelled to dress up the part about “might makes right” by concocting these fantastical intellectual contraptions [an actual “philosophy”] in order to separate them from the…retards? If only in their heads.
There would appear to be three options:
1] a world where might makes right prevails
2] a world where moderation, negotiation and compromise prevail
3] a world where philosopher-kings are able to ascertain the one true objective moral obligation applicable to all rational men and women.
A world which allows for a man, the philospher-king of his own home, to determine the moral obligation of his household, and raise his children to uphold them and preserve them through #2, and when that fails, #1.
Imagine children being raised by the likes of Satyr and Lyssa! Or Magnus!! What’s the expression…“I weep for their future.”
As for an “end-game”, that too will be rooted in dasein. My own is now more or less embedded in distractions. I am living as comfortably and rewardingly as possible waiting for the inevitable abyss. Some call it “waiting for godot”. That works for me. But what can this possibly mean to others who have no possible clue regarding the life that I’ve lived…or who live their own life in a set of circumstances far, far removed from mine?
And yet I still spend a lot of time in places like this looking for arguments that might allow me to extricate myself from my own “dasein dilemma”.
How can I delicately put it… nobody cares.
The only reason anybody would want to try to understand what something means to you, is so that they can replace that understanding with one of their own.
We’re memetic viruses
Again, I believe that many objectivists react as they do to my “dasein dilemma” [some all but frantically] because they begin to sense that they are not really able to make it go away. “Oh, shit”, they’re thinking, “what if that is also apllicable to me?”
And, of course, if it is, then their carefully crafted world of words might come crashing down all around them.
I mean, look at the manner in which Satyr, Lyssa, Magnus and their ilk react to it…here and there!! Maybe not hysterically, but not all that far removed either.
Trust me: To think as I do here can be truly, truly demoralizing. “I” becomes merely [or largely] an existential contrapment/construction/fabrication swirling about value judgments that are not necessarily any more rational or moral than any others.
And that’s before you fall over into the abyss and are gone forever and ever.