Encore: On the Objectivity of Ethics.

Friedrich · November 2, 2004, 8:50pm

This is from a recent a recent article by Simon Blackburn:

… Nagel believes that the [skeptical] standpoint is impossible, and the relativism it is apt to engender is self-refuting: “we cannot criticize some of our own claims of reason without employing reason at some point to formulate and support those criticisms” (p. 15). The general message is that first-order thoughts, the elementary certainties of mathematics, logic, science, and ethics, “dominate” any attempt to displace them. The book ends with the peroration: “Even if we distance ourselves from some of our thoughts and impulses, and regard them from outside, the process of trying to place ourselves in the world leads eventually to thoughts that we cannot think of as merely “ours”. If we think at all, we must think of ourselves, individually and collectively, as submitting to the order of reasons rather than creating it.”

Like Peter Strawson, Thomas Nagel is a doughty champion of what we might call the everyday metaphysics of everyday life. His disdain for facile attempts to debunk that is surely admirable. Nevertheless, the actual argumentation is puzzling. Nagel tells us in the Preface that he has absorbed a lesson from Professor Ronald Dworkin, that skeptical positions about morality must be understood as entering moral claims, so that the answer to them must come from within morality. And if this is the playing field, it will seem right that first-order logical or mathematical or scientific or ethical claims “dominate” skeptical or relativistic counter-claims. Thus if I claim that it is not the case that p and not p, and am met by someone saying that perhaps it sometimes is the case, I have available the good, Moorean, response that my certainty is better warranted than his suspicion. Or if I say that a double-blind protocol for testing new drugs is more reliable than tests done without the precaution, and somebody tries to say “that is just us” (just Western science, or the patriarchy, or whatever), I win. It is not just us: there is no better protocol to use. If I say fervently the Holocaust was a terrible thing, and a relativist like Rorty tells me in view of the contingent and situated nature of all ethical opinion a light, ironic, aesthetic detachment is just the ticket, we are in moral opposition, and I am right and he is wrong.

detrop · November 3, 2004, 2:59am

So really the objectivist stands before the question: “good for what[?],” when he attempts to demonstrate a universal and absolutely imperative moral act that is ‘good’ under any circumstances. It isn’t that a relativist can deny the quality of goodness, but he might be inclined to search for an example where the imperative rule is violated and then with that exception, justify his relativistic position and tear the very foundation out from under the objectivist. He relies on the multitude of contexts in which ethical decisions take shape, and he holds that because of these unique situations there is no one unconditional solution for any one individual case. Both the objectivist and the relativist have already agreed that there is indeed ‘goodness,’ and they are past that problem, but the objectivist isn’t happy with the relativist claim that ‘goodness’ is negotiable, or that even in some cases what is ‘good’ for one is directly and blatantly ‘bad’ for another…but that’s okay because morals are relative to begin with, so says the relativist. In turn, the relativist doesn’t like the idea that there are unconditional ‘right’ acts that must be imperative by principle alone, even should it deter a very obvious ‘greater good,’ such as the quarantine of a diseased person to save a potential million lives, or the abortion of a fetus, or the assasination of a dictator, etc., etc. Any one case showing the dilemma of maintaining the imperative principle without violating an otherwise common sensical notion that sometimes there are no universal and absolute logical solutions for ethical events. That there is even some amount of improvisation, that we find, for example, virtues such as compassion and pity are not always productive. We execute criminals in the direct contradiction that ‘killing is wrong,’ and we do so by shifting the context of the situation so that there is at least one allowance for breaking the rule…but under any other circumstances it is not okay to kill people, so says the hipocrite who picks principles on a whim. From the start these two guys are really just in disagreement about the definition of 'objective,'and before their eyes they become quite morally charged in the confusion:

The relativist contradicts himself by becoming angry and placing blame on the objectivist for his being offended at the objectivists contradictive motion to insult when he himself believes that insulting is objectively wrong.

What a couple of clowns. No, not Rorty and Nagel, the two hypotheticals in the example.

Granted, these examples are very crude, but they are all that is needed to question the strength of each position.

My God, could there be a third position? Another alternative?

She · November 4, 2004, 3:33am

with that form of relativism in mind, I answer this question:

Yes.

Perhaps you have something more to say? I’m working on what I have to say on it.

detrop · November 4, 2004, 4:06am

The biggest problem with objectivism and its demands is that it doesn’t take into account the real practical everyday situations we find ourselves in. It would be one thing for objectivism to say “there is a right moral choice in this situation that you can select. You can do so by using reason, and you will certainly find it,” and another thing to say “there is a right moral choice in this situation that you can select. You can do so by using reason, but you can also choose wrongly with this use of reason, and if so you are bad.”

Do you see the problem? Look at the expectations. Objectivism acts like morals are cut and dried, like there is an obvious solution waiting in every conflict that exists. It places an unrealistic responsibility on people. It wants people to jump into the future and find out which choice they should make, then come back and choose it. Nobody can really practice objectivism. Its textbook material, not real life.

However, I’m not saying that the human race cannot understand their morals to be objective, but it certainly can’t be ‘objective’ in the sense that philosophy has considered so far. The principles are far to strict.

Friedrich · November 4, 2004, 4:04pm

de trop:

I understand your concern about the possibility of intolerance in objectivist positions, but I have seen an equal or greater amount of intolerance from the supposed opponents of objectivism. They are more intolerant of those who disagree with them, than those they criticize for that very practice. It doesn’t take long for the relativists I know to resort to tried and true philosophical methods of argumentation like: “Kiss my ass.”

To recognize that there is such a thing as the POSSIBILITY of being right with regard to a moral dispute is hardly intolerant and it is certainly not to claim that one has a monopoly on the truth. The very people who deny this are precisely the ones who, at the same time, affirm it most strenuosly.

She · November 4, 2004, 10:24pm

See the other thread from which that quote was taken for response.

All hail Fix-a-Flat.

Friedrich · November 5, 2004, 1:13pm

“It was not part of my argument (as if that needed to be said). I take it back since it was not received with the same humor in which it was meant.”

She:

It was received and responded to in exactly the spirit in which it was intended. I promise you that your essay will receive vigorous criticism.

detrop · November 5, 2004, 9:35pm

Friedrich,

I’m not talking about the personal dissapointment of an objectivist toward a relativist who cannot “live it by the book.” What I mean is that the philosophy isn’t useful in a real moral setting. Objectivism speaks of moral choices and there effects as if they were certain before they are commited.

“Life must be lived forward, but can only be understood backwards”- Soren

…sums it up quite nicely. You can instruct an individual as to how to proceed through moral reasoning using the tools of logic, but this doesn’t tell an individual what to do. Again, logic and rationale, as tools, are only useful in discerning the nature of ‘facts,’ ‘truths,’ ‘statements,’ ‘propositions’ and other orders of epistemology. One can use these tools only to consider the validity and coherency of indifferent conclusions such as:

If Joe steals the money, he might go to jail. It is true that he might not like jail, and that others might not like him any more.

This example of the reasoning going on in Joe’s head involves a complex of different logical applications:

He computes the chances of going to jail by using statistics and probability. He determines that jail isn’t fun by examining his own preferences and comparing them to the conditions within the jail enviroment. He decides that people might not like him by making an inquiry of their preferences, and the probable outcomes of their judgements against him.

But what are all these things lacking, Friedrich? What do these indifferent facts need? They are lacking in meaning, in passion and purpose. Joe needs to care, but logic doesn’t help him. Logic doesn’t convince him that he should or shouldn’t steal the money. It only serves to reason through how either event could take place.

Before Joe steals the money, and while all these thoughts are going through his head, he doesn’t establish what a ‘correct’ choice would be. He only deciphers through possible outcomes and consequences. None of this tells him what to do. That decision, I’m affraid, comes about existentially.

So before you abandon my project to find a third and more comprehensible plan for a system or morals, for me, let me assure you that our goals are not so far apart, so don’t bother defending objectivism before me.

I know it don’t work. I am going beyond and above it.

You, my friend, are wearing tired clothes. Strip them away, Freddy. Let’s rebuild.

Friedrich · November 5, 2004, 10:47pm

de trop:

It is you, the relativist, who is the king with an invisible new suit.

In philosophy, unlike politics, one cannot “cut a deal” so that irreconcilable alternatives suddenly become reconcilable.

You seem to have confused my message, which is not that moral life is easy or that we can live without tragedy, but precisely the opposite: What makes tragedy possible is the fact that persons, sometimes with the best of motives, make the wrong choices and behave immorally, or even criminally, like the corrupt politicians and back room boys I used to know.

The very idea of existential choice implies a real alternative – as Kierkegaard himself insisted, an either/or – with NO INTERMEDIATE POSITION. EITHER there is such a thing as doing the right thing, in which case the opposite must be true, OR there isn’t.

I think there is – and so do you. Someday, you’ll admit that.

I am about half-way finished with a book tentatively entitled, “Carl Jung, R.D. Laing and Radical Evil” which I expect to get to a publisher in Boston by December. In the course of working on it, I have learned a lot about evil and debated the very existence of the concept with relativists. (I usually win.)

People, like you, tell me that evil is too elusive a term and that it doesn’t really refer to anything. Nonsense. Even if evil is elusive as a concept, if not as an experiential reality, and even if the term is used brainlessly, nevertheless, evil is still there – a mystery, a black hole into which reason and sunshine vanish, because the good is its opposite, but nonetheless evil is present.

Talk to children in Sierra leone whose hands have been chopped off by the rebels there. It is as fatuous to deny the existence of evil as it is to toss the word around irresponsibly.

“The truth about evil that needs attention now,” writes Lance Morrow, 'is that shallow, deadly, fungus quality" – and I detect that quality in the fashionable dismissals of the trite campus relativist who has “seen through it all” because he has discovered that his parents and their values may be flawed.

It is time to grow up. There is good and evil. If you had been in my city on September 11, 2001 you would have seen plenty of both. I have.

detrop · November 5, 2004, 11:37pm

I am not a relativist. That title is played out. Let me tell you what the only successful, but equally absurd, front against objectivism is. Solipsism. Frankly, I’m not one to claim that only I exist. I assume you people do too, and if that is the case, we are all doing the same thing. You can have your objective morals, Freddy, but only after I’m done with them.

That’s funny. Thank you.

Slow down. You are getting ahead of yourself. Your rearrangement of the first part into your ‘precisely opposite’ second part is a slippery slope among other things. Then you cast away the only real thing worth consideration in evaluating morals: the motives, the intentions. You measure moral rightousness by the effects, not by the authors intent.

Look, try to trick me by misquoting philosophers whom I am not familiar with. Kierkegaard was not implying that the path of rightousness was so clear, in fact, it was the uncertainty of this that supported his entire mantra.

“The first thing to understand is that we do not understand,” as he coined the term ‘existentialism.’

In making moral decisions people wager their virtue on the passion of their choice, not on the clarity of the decision and the promise of rewards and justice. One says to oneself: I know not what I’m doing, but I mean well and that is what I DO know.

How dare you, Freddy. You take the single biggest edifice against objectivism, namely Kierkegaard, misquote him, and try to sneak him into your camp.

For shame(as Monooq might say)

Sure there is evil. It is hippocrasy. In fact, it wasn’t the burning buildings that proved this. It was the incentive behind the act. Religious martyrs commiting acts that they themselves were victims of.

The only real question is: what started it.

It wasn’t evil. It was hippocrasy.

Friedrich · November 6, 2004, 2:47am

de trop:

No, hypocrisy is not in the same league with Auschwitz-level evil.

I am afraid that you deliberately misunderstand me, as usual, but you should at least try to deliberately understand the thinkers that you claim to admire.

Kierkegaard was a Christian, not an unbeliever like yourself. He was in no doubt about the ultimate reality of goodness and evil, and the ultimate source of both. He doubted only his capacity to grasp intellectually, what he intuited emotionally. Hence, the aesthetic stage (where you are) was to be transcended by the ethical stage (where he would claim that Kant, Hegel and I are), only to achieve the leap of faith into Christianity.

Kierkegaard recognized that, in a tragic situation, whatever choice one makes will be “regretted,” but this does not diminish the reality of the choices.

There is evil. We all know it, especially when we experience it. Trendy, postmodernist or sixties-style existentialism nothwithstanding, few of us have any doubts about the basics: We don’t wish to be tortured or raped or murdered or to have such things done to those we love, because we recognize that it is evil to do such things and worse to enjoy doing them. This even applies to evil-doers themselves, who are masters at insisting on their rights.

No, I have no patience any more for the “it’s all relative” coffee house bullshit.

Besides, every version of relativism that I have come accross has been incoherent on its own terms, a string of cliches. People want an excuse or a justification for their disreputable behavior. I know all about it. I used to make such relativist arguments and anti-objectivist arguments much more effectively than I ever heard from any of my adversaries here. I have meant to post such an argument to demonstrate what I mean.

You have to live in a world in which people living in one country have a life expectancy of 40 years, while in another they live to be 74. It then is not very difficult, unless one is a total moral imbecile, to see that there are immediate concerns about inequality. There are places in the world where a young woman has a fifty-fifty chance of being raped before she is fifteen years-old.

Ethics is right in your face. It is not all that difficult.

Like I said, it is time to grow up.

She · November 6, 2004, 5:19am

“It was not part of my argument (as if that needed to be said). I take it back since it was not received with the same humor in which it was meant.”

She:

Well, that’s what I /thought/ until you repeatedly said it was part of my argument… “and you should kiss my ass, rather than trying to dance around it” – how is that not funny? Maybe I just have a weird sense of humor.

I look forward to it.

P.s. I personally think that if you ‘felt’ more grown-up, you wouldn’t need to be so condescending (for example, telling people what they should and should not admit… telling people to grow up…) … but that’s just my opinion. I can distinguish the genuine argument from the bullshit … sometimes ya just have to take the ‘good’ with the ‘bad’ (subjectively speaking).

Friedrich · November 6, 2004, 2:21pm

She:

For someone who responded to a serious philosophical discussion with the remark “kiss my ass” to complain when the same is thrown back at her, is to add cowardice to your moral confusion and rudeness. If you could distinguish the bullshit from the argument, then you would not bother posting so much of the bullshit in my thread.

To borrow a page from your book: “Kiss my ass.”

Friedrich · November 6, 2004, 2:23pm