You seem to be suggesting some sort of moralitocracy (a word I just made up), that is akin to a theocracy in that it posits that the ultimate goal of a society is to be as moral as possible. — Hanover

Well, if you have followed my posts on morality you will know that I view modern approaches to morality as flat-footed, so I think you've started off your journey in the wrong direction here (e.g. "The Breadth of the Moral Sphere").

I apologize if I've over-extrapolated your position from what you've said, but this analysis follows from the suggestion that the democracy must set it's objectives due to some some higher good that stands above the democracy dictating what is good. — Hanover

When you yourself say, "I don't think that a democracy always gets it right," you are already subordinating democratic decision-making to some higher good: in this case "rightness." You are saying that the purpose of democracy is, at least in part, to try to get it right.

That is, why can't Society A decide gender equality is its highest good and then set policy from there without having to contend with objections from a small minority who believe that military might is the highest good? The measure of Society A's policy would not be whether it effectively promoted military might (as that is not it's goal), but whether it effectively promoted gender equality. — Hanover

You cannot consistently claim both that democracy might "get it right" and that there is nothing to be gotten right. If you sit on that fence then you will be able to play both sides, just as you did in our discussion on determinism vs. free will in the thread Fate v. Determinism.

Either there is a correct proportion between gender equality and military effectiveness or there is not.

To erase the ideosycratic desires of a society in exchange for some type of objective ideal that must be obtained seems problematic to me. . It would suggest that if the democratic belief were 99% in favor of allowing its citizens to choose their gender and then to compete athletically with members of their chosen gender it couldn't do that because the minorities' viewpoint, even though microscopic in terms of acceptance, is correct, so, as a matter of inalienable right, the minority viewpoint would need to be imposed upon society. — Hanover

This is really the question of whether democracy is the best form of rule. Obviously a minority viewpoint does not hold sway within a democracy.

And this isn't to suggest there aren't rights and that minorities don't receive protection from majority rule, but it also doesn't take the polar opposite extreme to suggest everything is a matter of right. — Hanover

That strikes me as an odd dichotomy. We seem to conceive of rights as free-floating things, like celestial bodies that might crash into each other at any given moment. I don't know if that is a great way to think about rights.

My view is that female identifying XYs shouldn't compete athletically with XXs because I don't believe that equality is a virtue worth pursuing. I don't think society is better off if we think men and women the same. I do think XXs should be provided their own bathrooms and their own playing fields, free from the athletically superior XYs. I see no value in blurring the male and female distinctions. — Hanover

I agree, but the question here is whether you think that you are right. Whether you think your answer is the right answer, and that if the democratic process arrives at the opposite answer then it has arrived at the wrong answer. Of course one could claim that the democratic process arrived at the wrong decision while at the same time abiding by the decision, but there is a difference between democratic relativism and democratic objectivism.

I also don't think I have the right to be king of Hanoveria and dictate that my vote prevails because it's right. I'm just one guy with one vote with all sorts of reasons I hold dear, and so I cast my ballot and watch things unfold. But, again, that's not to say that there are no rights at all. They just don't extend all the way down the line to where an XX has the god given right to compete only against XXs. Let the nuts in San Fran do as they will and let the right thinking folks in my neck of the woods do as they do. — Hanover

The question of inalienable rights is an interesting one, which I believe will become more pressing as secularization continues. In my opinion inalienable rights have very little to do with democracy, and are in important ways anti-democratic.

You seem to agree that individuals being judged on their own merits (individual data) is superior to judging individuals based on their being a member of a group (group data). That's my main point (which I predicted above that "you knew already").

Arguing whether inferior data is of no benefit, marginal benefit or minimal benefit is a perfect example of a distinction without a (practical) difference. — LuckyR

The false premise in your thinking is the idea that we always have access to superior individual data, and therefore never have need of recourse to group statistical data. If everyone were omniscient your argument would be valid. There would be no need for statistical generalization. Given that we are not omniscient, your argument fails.

The question of inalienable rights is an interesting one, which I believe will become more pressing as secularization continues. — Leontiskos

Inalienable rights are guaranteed by Nature. It's basically stoicism.

But seeing beyond what can be seen, beyond the arbitrary faux limits of what men think can be, is what separates the philosopher, the rightful ruler, whose proclamations or "truths" that are not based on so-called rationale propped up by inorganic states of detestable action, a dynamic of perpetual hypocrisy to simply maintain but a foothold in the mind of man instead of a persistent truth intrinsic to men rich and poor and even in infancy can recognize, the True Sovereign, from the commoner. Being alive, or open, knowing "statistically" (based on the view of the majority or "what is apparently, if not glaringly, seemingly-evident") is but a transient state of affairs that can be turned on its head in a moment's notice. — Outlander

I like your thinking here. It reminds me of my favorite psychologist, George Kelly:

“…when we sit down to try to figure out what will happen in the future, it usually seems as if the thing to do is to start with what we already know. This progression from the known to the unknown is characteristic of logical thought, and it probably accounts for the fact that logical thinking has so often proved itself to be an obstacle to intellectual progress. It is a device for perpetuating the assumptions of the past. Perhaps at the root of this kind of thinking is the conviction that ultimate truth -at least some solid bits of it - is something embedded in our personal experience. While this is not the view I want to endorse, neither would I care to spend much time quarreling with it. It does occur to me, however, that one of the reasons for thinking this way is our common preference for certainty over meaning; we would rather know some things for sure, even though they don't shed much light on what is going on.

To me the striking thing that is revealed in this perspective is the way yesterday's alarming impulse becomes today's enlivening insight, tomorrow's repressive doctrine, and after that subsides into a petty superstition. It is true that a person so caught up in the tide of circumstances, or so committed to the control of them, can scarcely be accredited as an unbiased observer. But, from the standpoint of constructive alternativism, the issue is not bias versus unbias, but the question of what the bias is
and how long it takes to see things in a new light.

The false premise in your thinking is the idea that we always have access to superior individual data, and therefore never have need of recourse to group statistical data. If everyone were omniscient your argument would be valid. There would be no need for statistical generalization. Given that we are not omniscient, your argument fails.

Now you're just trying too hard. (As you know) I never stated that individual data is always accessible. Merely that (when available) it's superior to group data. Thus when making important decisions, the prudent judge seeks out the best input. Not controversial.

- Stop fooling around. Your conclusion has always been an opposition to judgments based on group statistics. Your whole point about the superiority of individual data is to undermine group data:

Arguing whether inferior [group] data is of no benefit, marginal benefit or minimal benefit is a perfect example of a distinction without a (practical) difference. — LuckyR

When you yourself say, "I don't think that a democracy always gets it right," you are already subordinating democratic decision-making to some higher good: in this case "rightness." You are saying that the purpose of democracy is, at least in part, to try to get it right. — Leontiskos

I'm not suggesting there isn't a correct answer for how one is to get from point A to point B. I'm only saying there isn't a single correct destination to desire.

If there were but one right preference, then every nation would have the same buildings, roads, military, houses, healthcare, etc. Not every prohibition is a malum in se, but plenty are instead malum prohibitum. That is, we can create objectives for our society that have no moral value but are just expressions of our preferences caused by our particular histories, happenstance situations we find ourselves in, mythologies and whatever else. We then arrive at ways to achieve those objectives, and that decision can either be right or wrong.

This isn't to say we can't form immoral objectives, but it is to say there are a variety of flavors of moral choices we can choose from.

It's not strikingly obvious to me that a society that wishes to promote gender as a matter of personal choice is an immoral one. I also don't think it's immoral to wish to promote the opposite. Others do, which I think is the cause of polarization, arising from moralizing everything.

If someone believes the proper objective for society is to free its citizens of male/female assignment based upon biological sex, that's neither a moral or immoral objective. If that is achieved through a weakened military, then that's a rational way to achieve that goal. This has nothing to do with morality. It has to do with personal choices and the effective way to achieve them.

You cannot consistently claim both that democracy might "get it right" and that there is nothing to be gotten right. — Leontiskos

There are moral choices and immoral ones. That holds true for single individuals and legislative bodies. When you walk down the street, there are thousands of immoral, moral, and morally neutral things you can do. Democracies can select their objectives from the buckets marked "moral" or "morally neutral," but not "immoral."
That would be wrong.

Obviously a minority viewpoint does not hold sway within a democracy. — Leontiskos

Except all democracies I am aware of offer protections for minority rights.

I agree, but the question here is whether you think that you are right. Whether you think your answer is the right answer, and that if the democratic process arrives at the opposite answer then it has arrived at the wrong answer. Of course one could claim that the democratic process arrived at the wrong decision while at the same time abiding by the decision, but there is a difference between democratic relativism and democratic objectivism. — Leontiskos

I think certain laws are preferable because they advance my interests and ideologies, but I don't believe every opinion I hold aligns with God's will or that God cares which side of the street I drive my car.

And, as if said, sometimes God (so to speak) does care. That my objective might be to corner the agricultural market doesn't mean I get to have slaves. That choice is wrong regardless of pragmatic merit. The cereal aisle has plenty of healthy and unhealthy choices to choose from. I can only properly choose from the healthy ones.

The question of inalienable rights is an interesting one, which I believe will become more pressing as secularization continues. In my opinion inalienable rights have very little to do with democracy, and are in important ways anti-democratic. — Leontiskos

The right and left both hold rights near and dear to their hearts. They just argue over what they are, but not whether they exist. The left says abortion is a right, the right says guns are. Neither denies ights exist though.

Uummm... if acknowledging the reality that groups stats are designed to describe groups and don't describe individuals as accurately as individual statistics do, is "undermining", then I guess you're right, I'm an underminer. Though just to be clear the relative strengths and weaknesses of the two would still be the case if I never posted in this thread. It's not about me.

- All of the arguments you have offered for why we cannot make inferences from group statistics to individual cases have turned out to be invalid. Your red herring that knowledge of a group is not as predictive as direct knowledge of an individual within that group in no way justifies your claim that inferences to individuals from group data are unacceptable or otiose.

Let's address the sophistic claim again:

Arguing whether inferior [group] data is of no benefit, marginal benefit or minimal benefit is a perfect example of a distinction without a (practical) difference. — LuckyR

There are so many problems with this sort of claim, so it's hard to know where to start. Perhaps we should just start with the fact that group statistics are enormously powerful and influential in modern life. They are of great benefit. But the question of whether they have predictive power is of course a distinction with a practical difference. Your counterargument is, "Ah, but if we had data for each individual in the group, then that data would supersede the group data for understanding individuals." Sure, but the fact is that we don't have data for each individual in the group, and that's why we use the group data. You should look up "random sampling" to understand how group data is generated, for it is the key to understanding how the generalization occurs and why it is useful and powerful.

Your counterargument is, "Ah, but if we had data for each individual in the group, then that data would supersede the group data for understanding individuals." Sure.

That's the point I'm making. Glad we agree.

My comments stem from the very common dismissal of members of groups based on their group membership alone when individual data is available, typically in the form of an application form, CV or test score.

As an aside, I've acknowledged several times that group data excels at describing groups (what it's designed to do). Though I haven't focused specifically on the idea that in the absence of individual data that group data is better than nothing. Just as you haven't that when using group data on individuals, one should continue to collect new individual performance data as the chance of an initial miscalculation is moderate.

Though I haven't focused specifically on the idea that in the absence of individual data that group data is better than nothing. Just as you haven't that when using group data on individuals, one should continue to collect new individual performance data as the chance of an initial miscalculation is moderate. — LuckyR

Sure, but given that we are discussing the legitimacy of individual inferences from group data, your omission here is the problematic one. I claimed the inference was valid, you objected and gave a few different arguments, but eventually settled into this idea that:

LP1: <If we have an individual statistic and a group statistic for some individual, then the individual statistic will be more predictive>

The problem is that this idea of yours fails to connect to the larger issue of inferences from group data to individuals. In that sense it is a red herring and also invalid. This form of sophistry brings back memories of OnlinePhilosophyClub. In order to avoid these problems you would need to address how things like LP1 relate to the larger discussion we are having.

Phrased differently:

• Leontiskos: An inference from group data to individuals within that group is not necessarily invalid or irrational. {Not all X is Y}
• Lucky: Sometimes such an inference would be otiose given LP1. {Some X is Y}

Even if we ignore the equivocation between what is invalid and what is otiose, your response that <some X is Y> fails to contradict the claim in question that <not all X is Y>. You are attempting to disagree with my claim, but anyone who is paying attention knows that your arguments haven't managed to do so. The conclusion you need is not <some X is Y>, but rather, <all X is Y>.

I'm not suggesting there isn't a correct answer for how one is to get from point A to point B. I'm only saying there isn't a single correct destination to desire. — Hanover

But I preempted this at the outset, "This is a problem beyond the instrumentalization of reason..." (). Again, "Now you might say that it is not necessarily irrational to prefer death to inequality (in the military), but is it irrational to deny mathematical facts?" ().

The primary question here is whether it is irrational to deny mathematical-statistical facts in favor of a progressive agenda, and this is not a question of "a single correct destination to desire." You keep wandering down a road that was preemptively addressed.

-

The related problem here is your construal of these disputes as a matter of values or arbitrary moralities. You are saying, "Well if they value gender equality more than military deaths, then who am I to tell them that military deaths should be given more weight?" But sexism is not ultimately a matter of values. It is a matter of reason and rationality. If two people are equally capable of doing something, then it is irrational to claim that they are not equally capable of doing that thing. It is this kind of argument that undergirds sexism, racism, etc. It is not some arbitrary value. Anti-sexism is originally a rational argument, not an arbitrary imposition of a value. It is something like, "Women are equally capable typists, therefore it is irrational to discriminate between women and men when it comes to typing."

If there were but one right preference, then every nation would have the same buildings, roads, military, houses, healthcare, etc. Not every prohibition is a malum in se, but plenty are instead malum prohibitum. That is, we can create objectives for our society that have no moral value but are just expressions of our preferences caused by our particular histories, happenstance situations we find ourselves in, mythologies and whatever else. We then arrive at ways to achieve those objectives, and that decision can either be right or wrong. — Hanover

The key point you are missing is that instrumental reason is also not determined to one effect. For example, when a nation decides that cars should drive on the right or left side of the road it is a way to achieve an objective, and neither way is right or wrong. The objective of safety is objectively good, but the indeterminacy in this case comes from a legitimate plurality of means, not from a plurality of ends. Binding that indeterminacy up with value relativism (i.e. an indeterminacy of ends) is incorrect.

It's not strikingly obvious to me that a society that wishes to promote gender as a matter of personal choice is an immoral one. I also don't think it's immoral to wish to promote the opposite. Others do, which I think is the cause of polarization, arising from moralizing everything.

If someone believes the proper objective for society is to free its citizens of male/female assignment based upon biological sex, that's neither a moral or immoral objective. If that is achieved through a weakened military, then that's a rational way to achieve that goal. This has nothing to do with morality. It has to do with personal choices and the effective way to achieve them. — Hanover

I don't think it has anything to do with morality either, so I don't know why you brought up morality. I would not even feel comfortable venturing the question of what you mean by "morality."

The point is that if we promote gender equality at the expense of mathematical facts, then we are being irrational. I have not made any points about so-called morality.

Except all democracies I am aware of offer protections for minority rights. — Hanover

You are doubtless limiting your sample to modern democratic forms.

There are moral choices and immoral ones. That holds true for single individuals and legislative bodies. When you walk down the street, there are thousands of immoral, moral, and morally neutral things you can do. Democracies can select their objectives from the buckets marked "moral" or "morally neutral," but not "immoral."
That would be wrong. — Hanover

But if you are talking about something that democracy might get right or wrong, then you are obviously not talking about morally or rationally indifferent things.

The right and left both hold rights near and dear to their hearts. They just argue over what they are, but not whether they exist. The left says abortion is a right, the right says guns are. Neither denies ights exist though. — Hanover

Actually plenty of democratic political philosophers hold that natural rights do not exist, and it is logically impossible for a democratic vote or consensus to generate a natural right. I think you are conflating democracy with liberalism. Not all democracies protect minority rights, and that all liberal democracies protect minority rights has everything to do with liberalism and nothing to do with democracy. I would say that democracies invariably reject minority rights in large and small ways.

The problem is that this idea of yours fails to connect to the larger issue of inferences from group data to individuals. In that sense it is a red herring and also invalid.

Well, given the extreme frequency of ecological fallacies when Real World inferences to individuals from group data is attempted, one practical solution involves using individual data (LP1).

But you don't have to take my word for it, how about the National Academy of Sciences?

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6142277/

- Your posts in this thread have been highly disappointing. Once upon a time you were capable of valid arguments.

Your posts in this thread have been highly disappointing. Once upon a time you were capable of valid arguments. — Leontiskos

Yet highly effective as they turn even your own into such of similar nature.

You feel the need to neglect reason, virtue itself in condemning your fellow man. Sure if one is correct such factual arguments are a mere commodity.

Why is he wrong? If you are so evidently correct, such reasoning should be a natural repertoire, riposte, even. Yet you present nothing. Why is that?

I totally understand where you're coming from. It's naturally frustrating when real life statistics don't match up with theory.

Though I have to admit that this is the first time I've observed a reference to a journal article on an online Forum being labelled as an invalid argument.

Have a nice day.