- The ground of human ethics is found in being, in existing. That you exist is your right to exist. You are born belonging to all that exists.
- You were born belonging to a lineage of DNA constructions. You develop, grow, function by means of constraints and leeways of chemical activity.
- You are a self as a particular example of a given species. You survive only as self interacts with what is other than self.
- Recognizing your rights to be, to belong and to develop and to function are also the rights of any other organism is the catalyst for human ethics.
- The human instinct toward altruism is fleshed out by remembering the interdependence of all that exists and that you are a part of all that exists.
- Consciousness of self extends to ego, the critical eye with which a self sees and judges itself by contrast or camparison with other selves.
- Since ego can enhance activity and activity can be ethical, ego does not have to be at odds with altruism. Altruism does not diminish any given rights.
Great post. This is very much in line with my thoughts about altruism, but I’ve never quite put it into these terms before. I especially like how you’ve brought into question the more conventional notions of the ‘self’.
The ‘self’ includes, but is not limited to, to the ego. A larger ‘circle of self’, so-to-speak, affords a greater capacity and potential for altruistic behaviors.
Good post. I often wonder what the ego ‘is’, weather it is some manner of entire being or just some idea of self based on how we perceive ourselves to be. I think of altruism as recognition of consciousnesses ~ perhaps as like us, though I feel it extends beyond that as we may not see animals and insects as like us in that way, yet we feel empathy towards them.
There may be evolutionary reasons for altruism originally, things like preservation of the pack or simply teamwork, but recognition via higher human consciousness takes us beyond an idea of empathy [in terms of ‘its good for me too‘], and onto something that’s a genuine sense of community and others as part of what we belong too ~ even if the latter cannot be described. Almost like a 6th sense, but I wont detract from the thread lol.
You have no right to exist. Nothing does. Society grants you some rights but these are each conditional and limited. Life forms exist to the extent they function adequately with respect to survival needs. For man, this involves socialized, collectivized banning together to protect individuals, to give to them a better survival potential and opportunity. This is fine, but do not confuse this with “a right to exist.”
Altruism does not begin with awareness or “remembrance” of “interconnection of all that exists”, but with the mammalian protective instinct sublimated to the level of social conscience, sympathy. Social utiliity, for itself as well as the individual, is the reason for this sublimation.
Or we do, and that’s everything we and all other things fight for. Seems fundamental to me.
It depends if we see all things as distinct objects, or if we live in a world which really is not like that. Creatures have all manner of symbiosis, I’d expect science to be able to explain that in its terms, but like consciousness that’s not the fundamental thing going on here, the reality for living things is in the connectivity, that we are alive and tuned into one another.
Sry if a tad off topic and a bit hippy, but that’s the most fundamental level of experience, I don’t see why it should be ignored, reality is very much more connected and communicative [even with creatures who have no words] than evolution assumes.
I disagree… more on this later.
Yet this is nowhere evident in nature. Does the universe value human life? Do foxes… do rabbits? We’ll see how much people value your life, when government controls are removed, during a political, economic or geological crisis.
Yet no one has the exact same DNA as you, we’re all individuals, that can be further abstracted into races, that can be further abstracted into the human race, which can be further abstracted into life, and existence. Would you grant an ant the same rights you grant humans? How 'bout a snail, or a worm? Does existence itself… have rights?
This does not entail we must interact with everyone in order to survive, directly at least, nor does it entail we must act with everyone ‘positively’ in order to survive. This is karma, and it is not an absolute, not even an elemental law (as opposed to a compound law, like karma) such as gravity, is an absolute, there are exceptions.
Once again, where are these absolute rights, do they exist outside of human nature and the natural world, in your imagination, or in some book you’ve read?
Am I dependent on a retard for my existence? Am I depedent on an African living in Africa?
Ok
There is no such thing as a selfless/egoless action, categorically.
Individuals primarily look out for themselves, and by extention, their families, friends and allies.
I agree with Aletheia, rights are relative, some rights are afforded by some individuals and some governments to some individuals and some governments, and they can, and often will, conveniently revoke them at their discretion. You do not have the right to call me an asshole in person. Likewise, I do not have the right to speak to some Africans in person about some of my racial views, even if I do so politely and respectfully.
I suggest you try thinking outside of your imaginary absolutes.
First, I do not believe in absolutes, just process. I’m currently reading Schweitzer’s "Civilization and Ethics’. He claims that nature is not the ground of ethics for two reasons. 1. As Tennyson noted, “Nature is red in tooth and claw”: and 2. finding a ground in nature for ethics is imposing teleology on fortuity. Both of the objections, as reiterated by Alathea and Eyes in the Dark, do not get into the concept of a whole of being. It’s so simple that, fortuitous or not, I exist as do snakes and tigers. This should be the ground of any search for an ethics that could be considered universal. What is universal does not have to be absolute. IMHO, those philosophers here and elsewhere who start their considerations of ethics from a societal or egoistic POV have begun from the wrong end. The ground that exists in extensions they categorically deny or neglect. Ethics is how I treat anything other than myself. Whence comes that treatment? It is certainly not society which these days is hell bent on self-destruction. Since I and a worm both exist, both have the right to exist. Arguments that deny this are from the ego, which is not the ground of ethics.
Stat & Quetz, thanks for understanding.
Awesome OP.
If these had been the rules, word per word, instead of the ten commandments and stuff like that, we would be in a different world.
Shit, this should be stickied and re-named “rules of conduct and undisputable facts of ILP.”
Even the part about having rights I agree with. Here, Ierrellus has given a concrete bio-scientific foundation for altruism, which is usually not given the same biological standing as egoism.
Now, on to my own opinion: Another reason for altruism might be instinctive (non-rational) egoism itself. We see ourselves in others, and thus we “feel their pain” when they suffer and get a rush of endorphins when they succeed; with the respective exeptions of them having “messed with us” or them succeeding in a way that marks superiority over ourselves in an area that we would like to be the superior ones.
Here is my proof.
It is in one sense yet nature largely specialises in order to avoid potential conflict, you get many kinds of birds in one tree because they don’t tread on each others toes. Perhaps we focus too much on the tooth n claw side of it, when that’s taking note more of death than living. It may be a balance of harsh nature/pleasant nature, but I wouldn’t say it is either one of them over the other.
Indeed we simply ’are’, AFTER that we compose rights according to how the set of beings interact.
As our interactions change between each other, our environments, and other species, then there may not be an overall set, yet there remains the need for rules of interaction [rights].
Its fluid but it is water! 
_
Oh boy…
Yeah… right
Very good
Huh?
Saying the right to exist, follows from merely existing, is like saying debt, outstanding warrants, property taxes, celemency, a mortgage, duties, obligations and responsibilities follows from mere existence. Who… what… where… when… why… how? You might as well say, a worm exists, therefore it has legs, or a banana exists, therefore it has eyes. Just as these statments are irrational, and unempirical, so too are your statements irrational, and unempirical. Rights, debts, duties and obligations, aren’t anything like a worm, relatively speaking, other than rights, debts, duties and obligations, are thought to exist in somewhere the world, to a degree/extent, so it is an irrational statement. Is it an empirical statement? Do we often find rights (the belief that worms should be protected, the belief that a worms autonomy/sovereignty shouldn’t be interfered with) in the world? No, we do not, not even in your little head. Are you suggesting I shouldn’t go fishing, are you suggesting I shouldn’t eat? What about rocks and plants… they exist… do they have… rights? A right is, me, or you, wanting to protect someone, their life, their liberty, their property. Therefore, we cannot find the wanting to protect someone, in a rock, or a plant, we could only find it in a sentient. Do sentients want to protect worms? No, they do not, not even you do, regardless of what you may believe about yourself. Therefore, the statement, worms absolutely or universally (show me the difference) have rights, is empirically, false.
You just don’t like the world very much… do you?
Stop trying to impose your nihilist ethics on my brothers!
Perhaps I can clarify some misconceptions.
Hume’s contention that an “ought” cannot be deduced from an “is” came from a mind that had reached a sufficient physical expansion to produce assumptions about the similarities and dissimilarities between Self and Other. The physical expansion, that of a large prefrontal cortex, distinguishes humans from other animals.
Chimpanzees, for example, have 97% human DNA, but lack our enlarged cortex. It is possible, then, that a chimp knows no sense of “ought” other than what is imposed by chimp society. Domestic animals can be taught “ought” through rewards and punishments.
This is merely to note that societal-ethical mandate is primitive in both man and beast. The questions then become whether or not a sense of ethics can evolve beyond primitive social mandates. Does this evolving involve an "is "becoming an “ought”, not by deduction, but by necessity? Does the social “ought” evolve into awareness of ecological necessities? Is anything of ethics instinctual.
Too much has been said here of what I am not saying.
Eyes in the Dark,
Teleology simply means purpose. Naturalists usually deny a teleological approach to the natural world and opt for fortuitious events. Humans need a sense of purpose. Other animals may not.
Your world-view appears negative. I can repect that. But what have the world-negation views of both Christianity and Eastern religions done to stop greed and war? Shouldn’t we be looking at what we are and why we seem hell-bent on self-destruction as a species?
Negative… me? Would you accuse me of being negative if I told you Santa Clause doesn’t exist… how 'bout the easter bunny?
I don’t need an objective purpose… I’m doing just fine without one. I don’t need the universe to tell me what to think, and who, what to care for, about. I don’t need a God, or a logos, I make my own way in the world. Tell me, where is your objective purpose, is it falsifiable? Is it hinding in a tree… or beneath a rock? Before you eat, or kill a fish, does God send angels warning you to stop? World negating religions, eh? Funny, that’s exactly what you seem to be doing here, negating the world, and yet you accuse me of nihilism. As for violence, human on human violence has decreased exponentially in the last several centuries, as wealth and power have been consolidated. Consequently, human on animal and plant violence has increased tenfold.
We are not created for any grander purpose than the ants that are there or the flies that are hovering around us or the mosquitoes that are sucking our blood.
Society or culture or whatever you might want to call it, has created us all solely and wholly for the purpose of maintaining its continuity and status quo.
Every cell in our body is selfish to the core but at the same time it has to coexist because its existence depends upon the survival of the cell next to it. Likewise, your survival and my survival depend upon the survival of our neighbor.
