absolute relativism

Philosophy Forums Religion and Spirituality
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I think there needs to be a call for moderation. Too often we are pulled to the sidelines of the extremes, as they whisper in our ear the way we should be. It’s not the way we should be, it’s the way they want us to be.

To be blunt, the extremes are nuts.

A wise man once said that we are all slaves to sin. And the extremes both interpret this differently. The one extreme says, that sin is specific behaviour you must guard yourself from. If you believe in christ, you’ll be forgiven.(1)

The other extreme tells us there is no such thing as sin. Any behaviour is okay, because … “who can really say what is right and wrong?”

All of us can. BUT, that doesn’t make it absolute. While there are absolute rights and wrongs, they are still relative to our experience. While there is sin, it’s not sin in the traditional sense. Sin isn’t specific behaviour… Sin is self-judgement, and laziness. In that regard, we are all slaves to sin. We can’t even begin to know others in this state, because we hardly know ourselves. We our living our grandfathers and fathers story.

Don’t you think it’s time we made our own story? To say relativism doesn’t exist is as bad as saying absolutism doesn’t exist. Pragmatically speaking, it’s asinine. The interpretation of the bible has constantly changed over the millenia, as society has changed. If anything is a relative standard for morals, it’s the bible… at the same time, the murder of innocents was wrong then as it is today. The rape of a man or woman is wrong today as it was yesterday.

There are absolutes. And there is relativism.

The absolutist, tries looking at everything as rigid and black and white… but the world isn’t black and white. The absolutist lie, involves rampant self judging.

The relativist, tries looking at everything as gray. The relativist lies to themselves also, telling themselves that they have no right to judge the behaviour of others.

The truth like all things lies in the middle of the extremes. We should engage in self judging, but not to the extent that absolutists preach.

We should engage in judging others, if someone commits a wrong, we must stop them from doing so. If a gathering of 10,000+ people shout death to Israel, Death to America… we need to listen and stop that behaviour.

I think both parties are blinded to their own idealogies though…

(1) There is one unforgiveable sin. Doubting the holy spirit.

2

Moderation is nuts, and it makes for lazy thinking too. Furthermore, it excites no-one. Unless that is, it is actually an adapted form of another extremism dressed in the guise of moderation.

People who think they are balanced and can make fair moderate decisions often have their own underlying agenda to impose their will on others. At the end of the day it usually ends up being little different from any of the polarized extremes moderates make fun of.

For example, take the Middle East. On the one hand you’ve got the Arabs yelling “death to Israel”, and on the other the Israelis who believe that God gave them the land. What can moderation do to solve this conflict? Well, it usually stands on the sidelines wringing it’s hands and asking for people to please stop fighting. Or alternatively it decides for itself that westerized democracy is the true pathway of moderation (even if it is unwanted) and then invades the country, kills lots of people and imposes it’s moderate will on the “extremists”. Fantastic. Let’s hear it for moderation!

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How so?

Ya…I wouldn’t call that moderation but I feel as if you cannot have ideal anything when man controls it. But you should never stop trying tho…right? :unamused:

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Well, ask yourself what happens when the “extremists” outright reject the so called “moderate” position? Everyone has an agenda, even moderates in any discussion.

Take Joe Lieberman. He tries to be a political centrist, and calls himself a moderate. He loses an primary election to a more extreme liberal. So what does he do? Take a conciliatory position? No, he threatens to run as an independent even though he risks tearing his party apart or losing his seat to republicans. His “centrist” view is thus so extreme that he’ll do anything to push it forward. (By the way, other than making the odd joke about George Bush, I don’t really care about US politics, both parties are useless as far as I’m concerned). I’m just trying to point out the “extremism” inherent in those who say they take a balanced moderate posiiton. It’s just another extremist view jockying for position and unwilling to listen to any dissent. Joe might not be the best example but he springs to mind.

Actually, moderates have another problem. They usually fail to see that they themselves have an agenda and are therefore blind to their own brand of extremism. Those who advocate an extremist view usually do so knowing that their view will be opposed. Moderates always seem suprised when no-one listens to them. And then they come out swinging…

Does that make any sense? I guess I’m arguing that there is no real moderation. Or that the true moderate would say absolutely nothing and is therefore pretty useless to any discussion.

5

Thanks Ned, I understand what you mean.

Yes, it would seem humanity is constantly struggling with itself on moderation. Which is why most political systems would not work (the flaws of humanity) .

Leave it to us to mess up anything.

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joe lieberman is hardly a shining example of a moderate. If anything he’s not as extreme.

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Maybe not to you, but thats what he calls himself.

And he’s probably one of the few democrats who work with republicans, so as far as US political life goes he’s probably a centrist/moderate. Whether you agree with his politics or not, the point is the same, at the end of the day those who call themselves moderates have an agenda. And if people disagree with them they usually start to do the same things that extremists do. So, what’s the difference? People are people. And “moderate” people who make fun of “extremists” are laughing at themselves in a different context.

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No matter the labels, the underlying problem is that we all have to be somewhere, and that somewhere is always a contravention of someone elses somewhere. Relativist? Absolutist? Who cares? They’re just perspective points. Whether in our personal lives or in the widest social setting, it is finding near balance with good outdoing bad by just a little. Is this moderation? Call it what you will, I call it finding balance.

You will notice that I’m ignoring the fact that I’ve just presented yet another perspective point, no more valid than any other. But that’s my story and I’m sticking to it.

9

I’ve called it finding common sense, but balance is a good term too.

I agree… and further,

ned,

well, I’m sick of being told I have an agenda by presenting my opinion. I’m not forcing my opinion down your throat, you chose to click on the link, then chose to rip apart my opinion… why?

Does my lack of extremities bother you that much?

Stop taking things so personally, and everyone in the world would get along much better.

AT THE SAME TIME, I know that we cannot sit by and watch the world be destroyed by the extremist who would not adopt a position of moderation.

HENCE, the common sense part of my view.

NO, he said he was going to run as an independant, NOT a moderate.

The difference between the two is wider than the distance between the Earth and the sun. The only reason he’s running as an independant with his extremist views, is because his party is nuts and doesn’t recognize the dangers of terrorism. AT THE SAME TIME, the other party is not handling the problem correctly either.

because he chooses to compromise on ONE issue he’s a centrist?

that’s not moderation, that’s realizing that terrorism is an important issue to confront. That’s realizing his consituents are concerned more about terrorism than his nutty party thinks.

Here’s the problem with that statement ned… you are projecting your own agendas onto mine. you see, each of us tells a story within our heads about the way the world works. We are the central character and we create surrounding characters of the people we know, and barely know (like online)… the truth is we don’t know them at all… they are all projections based upon what WE see.

That’s all my post is. The world from my eyes. No agenda to get you to think my way. I don’t want everyone to think like me, then I’d be no different than every other cult leader on the extremes.

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duplicate post.

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You put forward an opinion. I have a completely different opinion and said so. Simple. This is a discussion forum isn’t it?

If you had read my posts you might have understood that my point is that you DO have an agenda and that I see no inherent value in your “moderate” point of view over that of any given “extermist”. So your question is irrelevant. Plus, I never discriminate against those who have no extremities!

I’m not taking anything personally. I simply disagree with your viewpoint. And I also disagree that if we all hold hands and share a coke the world will “get along much better”. On the other hand, the world just might get along better if we all shared a nice malt whiskey…just a thought.

So, what are you going to do? Bore him into submission, beat him into submission, or simply bomb the living daylights out of his house and family?

One man’s common sense is another man’s extremism. It makes perfect sense to a young radical muslim to strap on explosives and kill those who oppose Allah. Your particular brand of “common sense” has no more inherent value than his.

I’m going to ignore your comments on politics. I can’t be bothered having a discussion about what Joe Lieberman is or isn’t. It was simply an illustration that other people understood but that you obviously misunderstood or disagreed with. Having a political discussion will bore me and probably everyone else too. So I’m not going to start.

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Scythe -

If you lack extremities, how do you type?

There is nothing wrong with having an agenda. It only means that you have something to say. Not a dirty word.

By the way, I have an extreme aversion to intense pain and death. I’ll try to moderate that. Maybe intense pain and death are worth looking into.

13

Now that was funny!

It also makes me think that I should moderate my morgage payment. The loan company is taking a rather extremist view compared to my more moderate opinion…

14

Ideology is just the word you use for every belief system but your own. Since we all have a belief system (if we’re sane and competant), then I fail to see why the idea of an ideology gets all this attention. What, some people won’t listen to beliefs outside their ideology? Almost everyone is like that- so what? Where’s the harm? It’s makes for a bad philosopher, but surely we’ve noticed that not everybody is or should be philosophizing anyways.
for example,

How is this an example of 'moderation' of anything? It sounds like a completely distinct, stand-alone viewpoint that may or may not be true. On it's own, it's neither moderate or extreme. Also, I'm not sure that you can moderate beween absolutism and relativism. Both 'sides' in that sort of dispute seem to agree that if you admit a little bit of one, it completely eliminates the other. 

Flanders is right to an extent. Moderation is often a tactic for someone that has an agenda. If you want to know if someone is pushing an agenda, look at their effort, not their approach- if they are bothering to put time or energy into discussing an issue, chances are really good they've got some goal they are pushing. Not only is a moderate stance not oftentimes different from an extreme stance, but in fact, it usually IS an extreme stance, making a temporary concession to get things the way they want them in the long run.

Suppose you think the proper course of action is 1, and I think it’s 100. The moderates step in, and decide the answers should be 50. Fine. So a decade goes by, and I start fighting for 100 again, whereas my opponents want things to stay at 50. What, is the new ‘moderate’ 75?

Scythekain:

Come on, now. Your entire opening post was, “Thinking this way is stupid, thinking that way is stupid, it would be better if people all thought this here other way.” Again, nothing wrong with having an agenda, but a person can’t seperate it out like that.

15

You do have an agenda if you’re presenting your opinion. If you had no motivation, why would you do it?

There are a whole lot of extraneous opinions presented in your opening post. If I ignore those, I think your main idea is basically that people should take other people’s positions into account, not think in terms of a single absolute force, and derive a flexible stance thereof. This doesn’t sound very unreasonable to me. The topic you based the thinking around, though, is a very bad example of how moderation can be useful; absolutism and relativism don’t really mix, and they’re probably ideologies that only think they’re talking about the same ballpark, when they’re really playing different games.

I think Ned is talking about how taking this reconciling, compromising, and moderating too far can be dangerous; i.e. when it is an end in and of itself, things go very wrong. However, in an environment in which ideas and positions are presented clearly and discussed by everyone involved, I think a compromise is the best answer for the group. So, in order for people to be moderate correctly, they need to be honest about their actual agenda–what they want–otherwise, they’re only protecting the idea of coming to terms on differences, rather than actually realizing and coming to terms with differences.

16

so one cannot present their opinion without having an agenda?

There are things that are absolute and things that are relative. While it’s nice and useful and agreeable to be relative, and or subjective it cannot work in every circumstance.

In the same breath, there are many subjective things that cannot be put under the umbrella of objectivity. So while this sounds like a contradiction in terms, there is a middle road that’s possible… does saying that mean I have an agenda?

NO, I’m not trying to convert anyone to my POV, such would be futile… we each have our own dream of reality, and it’s completely dependant upon our central character. US. I. ME. When we let someone else lead the story we aren’t being true to ourselves. Such is the situation of many extremist/fundamentalist religions. The two are flip sides of the same coin. Atheists/secularists (the ones in power) have replaced biblical apocolypse, with apocolypse by mother earth. The religious are still looking forward to the day when non-believers are roasting in hell.

Is moderation important?

I think so… but remember that’s from my perspective. I can no more tell you that god doesn’t exist than you can tell me he does. God is a personal subjective experience. I’m not trying to change the way you think… or the way anyone thinks. And that’s why my statements are not agenda.

All I ask is that you consider. Dualism is not impossible. Free will co-exists with determinism, in the same way that absolutism can co-exist with subjectivism.

17

I’m sorry; my definition of “agenda” is a lot broader than yours. I didn’t intend to say you were trying to change the way people think.

Again, I think we’re talking about a disagreement in terminology. Relativism, to me, means that every idea and experience a person has is exclusively their own; there is no way to separate what is real outside of the individual from the individual with total certainty. And, because we’re all individuals, there can be no absolute understanding, that is, rightly holding something with total certainty. However, there are degrees of probability; using faith to justify treating things like they are absolute unless doubt is cast upon them is necessary and meaningful to most avenues of life and society. In that sense, the concept of an absolute and relative truth can be composed together.

I think dualism is dependent upon the definitions involved and the environment in which they ought to coexist, but I think I agree with the spirit of your argument.

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It looks like you do to me… what do you think of my above examples?

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followed by…

This doesn’t sound very moderate to me. It sounds more like anti-religion extremism.

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Scythekain

You really need to work out what you mean by subjective.  If you think you had waffles for breakfast, and I think you had toast, that doesn't make your breakfast subjective. The fact that two people can disagree about something doesn't make it subjective.