[1] Provide a secure place for children
[2] Support families
[3] Protect weaker people from stronger ones
[4] Provide for the well-being of members of the group
[5] Promote the stability of the group
[6] Protect members of the group from hazards from outside — T Clark
The poster child for abhorrent practices is Nazi Germany, although the same wind has blown all throughout history. Nazi practices were based on beliefs; do you think they and similar beliefs are irrefutable? (Without attempting to hang too much on the hook of irrefutability - that's why I think most argument is of limited value, and that it take an especially strong argument to make people change.) I think they must be refutable. If not, then the Holocaust becomes "reasonable," Either that or it is not susceptible or resolvable within reason. Of course Kan'ts imperative comes in here: if it's ok for us to kill them, it must be ok for them to kill us. — tim wood
In a previous post I laid out an impressionistic list of basic human values I think could form the basis of a legitimate relativistic moral code. — T Clark
Look at the way you guys are arguing over the definition of "relativism," and compare that to your behavior when it comes to math. Suppose you were having this argument over dinner and then split the check. It might take a few tries, but you would agree on an answer within minutes, after arguing for hours about the definition of a single word. — Srap Tasmaner
Yes, we could split the bill with few issues. We could just as easily agree that it was morally or ethically wrong when Tim Wood snuck off without paying. Absolutism vs. relativism doesn't really change much on a day to day basis. — T Clark
How would moral codes be "legitimate" or "illegitimate" in your view? — Terrapin Station
I think you're wrong about the other bit. It's just as easy to imagine one of you excusing him and one of you not, for all sorts of different reasons. But it's inconceivable that you would different "points of view" about the math. — Srap Tasmaner
That of course is not an argument about the math, it's an argument about "what's fair." — Srap Tasmaner
Math questions are easily answered without conflict not because they are special, but because they are, at this level, trivial. They are matters of fact like the capital of France or the number of ounces in a pound. We used to argue about that type of thing all the time. Now, with iPhones, calculators, and Google, we can't do it anymore. — T Clark
I'm really glad you brought this up though, because I think I have an idea now why math is different. What counts as a fact, what we assert as true, is intimately related to what counts as evidence for it, and people can predictably disagree about evidence and its interpretation, and some of those debates are just unresolvable.
But think about math. The connection between a mathematical fact and the evidence for it is really quite different from everything else. — Srap Tasmaner
at the level we are discussing, i.e. restaurant bills and similar situations, math is just arithmetic. It's trivial. The capital of Israel is complicated in the same way that me paying for your lobster when all I had was a hamburger is complicated. When human judgment gets involved, nothing is easy. This web site provides dozens, hundreds, of examples of that. We'll argue about anything. — T Clark
Let's consider the trivial notion that 1+1=2. It is five symbols strung together that is inherently meaningless. It has as much truth as covfefee. It is when one attempts to ascribes meaning to it that relativism floods in. — Rich
if nothing of these is absolute, then what grounds them? One answer: their absolute presuppositions - their unarticulated, unexplicated fundamental axioms — tim wood
Nazi practices were based on beliefs; do you think they and similar beliefs are irrefutable? (Without attempting to hang too much on the hook of irrefutability - that's why I think most argument is of limited value, and that it take an especially strong argument to make people change.) I think they must be refutable. If not, then the Holocaust becomes "reasonable," — tim wood
2) justified based on testable hypotheses about human nature. — T Clark
even Terrapin is not going to assert that 2 + 2 = 5, or, more importantly, something like "To me, 2 + 2 = 5, even if for you 2 + 2 = 4." — Srap Tasmaner
I would point out that the truth value of the cognitive relativist's claim that their statement "all truth is relative" is only relatively or subjectively true for them would likewise be only relatively or subjectively true for them, and thus can be disregarded at will by the non-relativist (or other cognitive relativists, for that matter). Little, if anything, a cognitive relativist says can carry probative force.It's not though. If I say, "'All truth is relative' is true," as a relativist, and as a truth-value subjectivist, I'm not saying that "'All truth is relative' is true" is anything but relatively, subjectively true to me--I'm reporting my judgment about that proposition to you. Certainly other people can and do assign "false" to that statement instead. And assigning "true" and "false" to it are nothing other than judgments that we make as individuals. I'd not be claiming that the "is true" part of "'All truth is relative' is true" is something other than a judgment that an individual makes.
Often what's happening there is that the truth-value non-relativist is reading their non-relativistic framework into the statement; they're not parsing it under whatever the relativist's notion of truth is. — Terrapin Station
I would point out that the truth value of the cognitive relativist's claim that their statement "all truth is relative" is only relatively or subjectively true for them would likewise be only relatively or subjectively true for them, — Arkady
thus can be disregarded at will by the non-relativist (or other cognitive relativists, for that matter). — Arkady
Do you have an example in mind of an alternative interpretation of "1 + 1 = 2"? — Srap Tasmaner
1+1=2 is essentially 5 arbitrary symbols strung together that we are taught in elementary school to accept by rote. Inherently it has as much meaning as any string of symbols. Without further meaning one can just stare at it with bewilderment. It is when one starts applying meaning to it, e.g. one apple and another apple is two apples that we begin to inject relativism. Exactly what makes two apples? You would have to start defining an apple and then all heck breaks loose. — Rich
For the purpose of this thread, it might be worthwhile to characterize other fields of argument by how they differ from mathematics. — Srap Tasmaner
I don't think, for instance, you can 'refute' the idea that one 'race' or 'people' is inferior to another. You can critically undermine the terms, and demonstrate that what might be left of the idea lacks evidence in its favour. Then you can commit - the existential moment - to anti-racism, as lots of people do. But that's not going to amount to a 'refutation' that would be likely to prevail against a broad sincerely-held belief. — mcdoodle
Thanks for slugging it out with me. I'll get the check! — Srap Tasmaner
1+1=2 is essentially 5 arbitrary symbols strung together that we are taught in elementary school to accept by rote. Inherently it has as much meaning as any string of symbols. Without further meaning one can just stare at it with bewilderment. It is when one starts applying meaning to it, e.g. one apple and another apple is two apples that we begin to inject relativism. — Rich
No, no, I insist. — T Clark
the fact that people can disregard things — Terrapin Station
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