ARe their no evil moral principles? Hitler could be seen as following moral principals. I am sure he thought so — Coben
ARe their no evil moral principles? Hitler could be seen as following moral principals. — Coben
And how do we evaluate how well something like a moral is working? what's the time frame? and isn't that a moral value in itself, that the good will make things better for the group? This would mean for example that the group would never,jeapordize its survival in a moral cause. I think many would say that could be immoral. Of course everyone thinks that their morals are good, though they often think other people's are not. In fact, usually they do. If there is difference, the others are wrong, unless it is something fairly trivial.But if a moral is a way of behaving that contributes to the success of a group, that throws it forward into the future so that it thrives even further, then does it have to be moral in the sense of being good, or right, as we understand it? — Brett
Some would certainly think so. And on the individual level, simply working from the idea of survival is generally seen as at best limited morally and usually as selfish. Also your model is consquentialist. Good actions lead to X consequences. But much of the world, in fact all of us on some things are deontologists. X is wrong regardless. Would it be ok to rape a child to save one's tribe?It does seem that the societies or communities that have this concept of morals are the most successful. But what if, for instance, it becomes necessary to reduce the world population in order to survive, does that become the right moral decision? — Brett
No. I am arguing that saying someone has moral principles is a descriptive statement. Psychopaths do not have moral codes. They do what they want and if they act morally it is simply to avoid certain consequences. Hitler had very strong morals. That is descriptive. He thought X was good and Y. And he tried very hard to be good and to make others good and punish the bad.Isn't that like asking "are there no bad good people? — TheMadFool
To me that's as if you have access to objective morality. Which of course most people believe, as did Hitler. He has a moral philosophy, a very rigid one in fact. Other people with other moral philosophies judge his as evil. Even between republicans and democrats there is tremendous difference between ideas of what a good person is and should do. I think it's problematic if we just assume 'we' have the objectively morality and can say, that person has no morals. We can certainly say their morals are bad ones.As for Hitler, he can be "explained" not by a moral philosophy but a morally deficient ideology - racial supremacism. Even then he was "good" to the Aryans. — TheMadFool
And how do we evaluate how well something like a moral is working? what's the time frame? and isn't that a moral value in itself, that the good will make things better for the group? This would mean for example that the group would never,jeapordize its survival in a moral cause. I think many would say that could be immoral. — Coben
I would tend to agree. But we have to also notice that contradictory morals have lasted a long time in different groups and even sometimes inside more complicated groups. Tribes, for example tend to have the same morals throughout, but larger groups, like those in what gets called civilization, may have different moral centers - government and religion or even various religious groups, as one more obvious example - with differing moralities.It seems to me that morals have a function, otherwise they would disappear over time with the tribe/community they didn’t serve well. — Brett
In times of crisis or scarcity a certain moral or set of them may be more useful that others. I don't think a generation is enough. Nor does it work if broader changes - brought about by technology or even societal successes or by increases in population, or changes in neighboring populations or changes in climate or whatever - changes the needs and processes of a society. Think of the changes in the US under the few generations between founding in the late 1700s and the end of the 1800s. What 'works' is going to change. Also different people and subgroups are going to have different opinions about what 'working' means.The moral value isn’t that the “ good’ will make things better for the group, it’s that what makes things better for the group becomes the moral value. — Brett
I would think some would. We know this happens at the individual level.Would any group jeopardise it’s survival in a moral cause? — Brett
But we have to also notice that contradictory morals have lasted a long time in different groups — Coben
larger groups, like those in what gets called civilization, may have different moral centers - government and religion or even various religious groups, as one more obvious example - with differing moralities. — Coben
I don't think a generation is enough. — Coben
Would any group jeopardise it’s survival in a moral cause?
— Brett
I would think some would. We know this happens at the individual level. — Coben
Large portions of fundamentalist protestantism consider Catholicism to be evil. I would guess that most members are fairly decent to individual Catholics they meet. There are huge differences on the ideas of who get to represent the ideas of God and must they be celibate. Can women be intermediary experts with God. There are huge disagreements on abortion, with the liberal protestant churches having values quite opposed to conservative P churches and C churches. I am not even bringing Islam in, where there are vastly more traditional values about the role, intelligence, veracity and morals of women. Then, since I mentioned government and religions, we have incredibly different ideas about sexual mores, drug taking mores, parenting mores. There is an incredibly battle around the rights to free speech. How about the new laws and school and organizational rules related to transpersons? I could go into huge differences regarding foreign policy between interventionist factions and those against it. Tulsi Gabbard has been implicitly accused of being evil by both dems and republicans for taking non-interventionist stances. There the arts, and what is acceptable to be in an art work. How about firearms?Is that really true? Are their moral centres that are different? — Brett
...served the community well in a certain period of time, but perhaps not after that. IOW an moral approach to free speech or privacy might work fine until the internet is used by most people. And then a shift in those morals in response to a technological change or a political change - say the Patriot act changes after 9/11 - might take hundreds of years to be shown to be disastrous. It might take only a much shorter time. But i can't see setting any threshold where we decide 'it's been working for X years, so it is beneficial'.I meant that a set of morals could deteriorate in a generation, an evolving set of morals would take longer, but only if they served the community well. — Brett
Perhaps, perhaps not. Hitler would have been able to focus on the USSR. Perhaps in the end it would have gone for Britain, perhaps not. Hitler considered them closely related race wise to germans. They were not particularly communist. I think we can say Britain took a moral stand which its leaders knew was taking a direct and immediate risk regarding their countries sovreignty. Yes, a longer term risk was certainly there and Germany might have been in a much stronger position later. But I think that is not quite seeing the types of decisions even large groups are capable of making.I think this is true, but not in the numbers to be considered as human nature. This is more of a sacrifice. It could be said that Britain risked its survival fighting against Naziism in the name freedom. But it had no choice, it’s survival was under threat. It did not purposely risk its survival. — Brett
Countries can explain and justify made decisions by a moral stand, but that justification hardly is the reason why they would do something that puts them into peril. With something that isn't as dangerous, isn't very risky, one can indeed put what is morally right on a pedestal on go with that because of domestic politics.I think we can say Britain took a moral stand which its leaders knew was taking a direct and immediate risk regarding their countries sovreignty. — Coben
Countries can explain and justify made decisions by a moral stand, but that justification hardly is the reason why they would do something that puts them into peril. — ssu
I wasn't arguing that anyone should trust Hitler.In 1940 it was truly about existential questions, not a moral question that Chuchill took. At hindsight it's totally obvious that you could not trust someone like Hitler. Just look what trusting Hitler gave Stalin. — ssu
The existence of national sovereignty or the existence of the state is usually that "higher value". After all, extremely seldom does the enemy literally think of genocidal extermination of the people and to make an "artificial desert" of the area. (Even if that has happened in history, unfortunately)Of course. I just don't think we can rule out countries and certainly not groups choosing to put themselves at risk for a higher value. Higher according to them. — Coben
And the most evil things people can do is when opposing 'evil'. Evil in itself implies that one cannot understand it, one cannot reason it. Otherwise one oneself would be evil too. Fighting evil means that you have a firm view that you are right and that your opponent is wrong. Not wrong in the way that his objective as bad, but that they are wrong also in moral terms. This goes to the heart to the issue how you face "an enemy": is your opponent a person fighting on the other side, following his or her flag and people, is your opponent just an advocate of an ideology you don't believe in or is he or she truly evil.I do think however that groups are willling to fight what they consider evil, even if given the option not to. — Coben
And the most evil things people can do is when opposing 'evil'. — ssu
And note, I am not saying these morals or the sense of honor need be good. Do gooding has perpetuated all sorts of horrible things. — Coben
I am not saying that people should fight what they consider to be evil. I am not saying that evil exists. (And then note that this statement does not fit well with the other one.....Fighting evil means that you have a firm view that you are right and that your opponent is wrong. — ssu
)And the most evil things people can do is when opposing 'evil'. — ssu
I fully agree. The whole notion of talk at the 'national level' is difficult. After all, the whole idea of nationhood is invented, yet however 'artificial' people say it is, it is quite real. And a functioning idea of a nation joins together quite different views on just what that nation is about.I said above that the shift to discussing morals at the nation level is problematic since these are not groups with a single set of morals. — Coben
At least I'm not saying that. The vast majority of people will make sacrifices that cannot be said to be done in self-interest, and there you can observe just how complex humans interacting in societies are to compared to anything else.I think it is a mistake to view morals as, really, just self-interest. That's where I came into the argument. This is now being taken as me advocating for moral crusades. — Coben
Not actually.Even if a war with the US would likely be one sided and devastating. — Coben
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