When judging the consequences of an action, you can say they are good or bad in a moral sense there something morally valuable being increased/decreased/promoted/protected/restricted/violated. The tornado wasn't "right" to turn away, but the outcome was good. — Dan
All of these choices are choices about what to do with the mind, body, and property of the person making them, not that of others. — Dan
That was not my definition, that was how you incorrectly interpretted my definition. The choice to steal a car isn't yours because the car isn't yours. The choice of what to do with my car is mine because the car is mine. The choice to play a game with me isn't per se yours, but the choice to agree to play a game with me, to play games with those who will play them with you, is yours because it is a choice of what to do with your own mind and body (maybe property depending on the game). If I don't want to play, like in the case of you taking my car, you don't get to make that choice for me. But if we are both choosing to participate in the game, we are both making choices about what we do with our own minds and bodies, and that's no problem. — Dan
Again, it's always been the same definition. You just seem to be having trouble grasping it. I feel like I've been pretty clear, so I must wonder if it is in some way intentional. — Dan
We have a deep difference as to what constitutes "morally valuable" In my understanding, what provides moral value to the consequences of an act is the intent of the conscious agent. If you remove the necessity of intent, then choice is only relevant in an accidental way. This would make it very difficult to justify your principle that choice is the best measure of value. If we can produce morally good results without making choices, why should we protect the ability to make choices? — Metaphysician Undercover
As I said, all decisions to act, or do anything at all, are choices about what to do with one's own mind, body, or property. That someone else's property might also be involved is accidental. This includes my decision to steal your car, as an example you said was not a choice which belongs to me. It now appears to be a choice which belongs to me because I am using my own body and tools. However, now you insist that stealing is not a choice which belongs to me because there is no consent. You really have provided absolutely no principles to distinguish between a choice which belongs to a person, and one which does not. — Metaphysician Undercover
You simply introduce these terms, "consent", "agree", and you act as if whatever it is which is referred to by them magically converts a choice which appears to be one which does not belong to a person into one which does. We are talking about the ability of a person to understand and make one's own decisions. How does you giving me consent to borrow your car, affect that ability of mine, in relation to my choice to use your car without your consent? You are making no sense. — Metaphysician Undercover
You have not been clear at all. First, you insisted that "one's own choice" was a very special sort of choice, such that if I chose to steal your car this is not my own choice because it was a choice which involves your property. Now you insist that all choices I make which involve my own mind, body and property are my own, even if they involve your body or property as well. This implies that any choice I make, to do anything at all, including stealing your car, is my own choice, because it involves doing something with my own body and mind. But now you've arbitrarily added a constraint, "consent", or "agree", as if this makes a difference. How many other arbitrary constraints are you going to add, to mold and shape this concept "one's own choice", to suit your purposes? Will you make a new exception every time a situation comes up which your principles cannot deal with? — Metaphysician Undercover
No, the moral value in the consequences does not require intent. This is very much the point of consequentialism. Whether you meant to push the kid out of the way of the bus or whether you just thought it would be funny to push a child over, the consequences are just as good. I've already explained why I think we should use the ability of persons to understand and make their own choices as the measure of value, and that reason wasn't because intent is necessary to result in good consequences. — Dan
That being said, if you did obtain my consent to use my car, then that would make the use of my car morally permissible because I have made the choice that you can use it and it is my car, so you haven't taken my ability to understand and make those choices which belong to me away from me through your use of it (which you would have in the case where you stole it) — Dan
The choices which belong to you are the choices of what to do with your mind, body, and property. — Dan
Sorry, are you really surprised that in a theory that focuses on the ability of persons to understand and make their own choices, that what those persons agree or consent to is relevant to what it is morally acceptable to do to them? — Dan
Without wanting to sound like too much of a jerk, I think if you look over our previous conversations with the assumption that I have been saying the same thing the whole time, they would make more sense to you. — Dan
This example is not comparable. Pushing the kid is an intentional act, whether or not the intent is to kill the kid. Since it is an intentional act, the perpetrator is held accountable. If it was done as a joke, and the possibility of death was completely unforeseen, then the punishment would likely be less than if it was a planned murder. Regardless, the joke and the murder are both intentional acts. In you other example, the tornado does not act intentionally, so the consequences of its activities are not judged for moral value.
If this is what you really believe, that the consequences of inanimate activities can be judged for moral value, then it constitutes a significant difference of opinion between you and I. — Metaphysician Undercover
See, your principle of "a choice which belongs to the person" is exactly as I say, based in moral judgement. When the choice is to do something "morally permissible" with another's body or property, then it qualifies as "my own choice". When the choice is to do something not "morally permissible with another's body or property, then it does not qualify as "my own choice". Therefore, just like I told you earlier, your goal to protect persons' ability to understand and make their own choices, is not a goal of protecting freedom at all, it is a goal of protecting moral restraint, i.e., to choose only what is "morally permissible". — Metaphysician Undercover
This is not true. You now admit to allowing that choices of what to do with another's body or property also qualify as choices which belong to you. This consists of things like a shared game, consensual sex, using borrowed property, etc.. It seems like so long as the choice is to do something morally permissible, it is one's own choice. So it is becoming more and more clear that your principle is not to protect the ability of people to understand and make their own choices (to protect some sort of freedom), but to protect the ability to understand and make choices which are morally acceptable (some sort of moral restraint). — Metaphysician Undercover
No, I was a little surprised that a theory which claims to protect one's freedom of choice, is really a theory which only supports morally permissible choices. I'm not too surprised now, because I brought this to your attention, at the beginning of our engagement. I thought I'd give you a chance to explain yourself though, but we're not getting anywhere. — Metaphysician Undercover
You aren't saying the same thing though. Before, you said that choices which belong to a person are choices concerning one's own mind body and property. You continue to assert that, but your examples show clearly that choices concerning the mind, body, and property of others are also choices which belong to the person. This appears like inconsistency, but it's not necessarily. If we surmise that your principle is really "the ability to understand and make choices which are morally permissible", rather that "the ability to understand and make one's own choices", then the appearance of inconsistency is resolved. — Metaphysician Undercover
I mean yeah, those consequences can still be judged for moral value in the sense that they can be consequences that are morally good. It doesn't make sense to say the tornado "acted" rightly, but the consequences that occur, the situation which results, has higher moral value than what would have occurred in the situation where the tornado destroyed your house. — Dan
That doesn't follow at all from what I said. My ability to understand and make my own decisions isn't restricted by me freely making a decision to allow you to use my car. Rather, it is exercised. — Dan
That is neither what I said nor what I meant. Consenting to sex is a choice that belongs to you, but having it is not (in the sense that if no one is keen to participate in that activity with you, your ability to understand and make your choices has not been restricted. — Dan
It is a theory of what choices are morally permissible, but that all flows from whether those choices protect or violate the ability of persons to understand and make their own choices. Making their own choices is (usually) morally permissible, but not all morally permissible choices are choices which belong to the person making them. — Dan
For example, I haven't said that choices concerning the mind, body, and property of others belong to the person at all. — Dan
I really do not understand what you could possibly mean by "higher moral value" here. Perhaps you could explain. Suppose I\m watching the approach of a tornado. I see that it misses all the houses in the neighbourhood, and rips through a forest instead. You say that there is moral value in this situation. Can you explain what you mean? Is it because the tornado could have killed people, but didn't? I could have got hit by a bus yesterday, but didn't. Does that mean there is moral value in the consequences of the bus not hitting me? Does any situation which can be judged as either negative or positive have moral value? — Metaphysician Undercover
But the example does not concern your ability to make your own decisions, it concerns the question of whether deciding to use your car in this situation is a choice which belongs to me or not.
Or, are you now distinguishing whether a choice belongs to me or not, by how it affects others' ability to make their own choices? That's what it appears like. If my choice doesn't restrict your ability to make your own choices, then the choice belongs to me. That would be very problematic. — Metaphysician Undercover
Again, it appears like you are defining "one's own choice" in relation to whether the choice restricts the ability of others to make their own choices. This would lead to an infinite regress without ever determining what it means to make one's own choice. — Metaphysician Undercover
Sure, but in order for this principle to have any meaning, and to be able to be brought to bear on any real situations, we need to know what "their own choices" means. First you said that these are choices which concern one's own mind, body, and property. Then you allowed that in some situations, such as consent or agreement, choices concerning another's mind. body, or property also belong to the person. Now you seem to be saying that so long as the choice doesn't restrict another's capacity to make one's own choice, then the choice is one's own choice. This gets me no closer toward understanding what you mean by one's own choice. — Metaphysician Undercover
OK, so we've gone around a big circle. Let me get back to the issue as it was then. In general, choices which are judged as morally good, are not choices which belong to the person at all, if this means concerning one's own mind, body, or property. This is because morally good choices are about the mind, body, and property of others. So, how do you justify wanting to protect choices which belong to the person? And please, don't go off on a tangent again, speaking about how choices which belong to the person may affect the body or property of another in an accidental way, because the morally good acts, which we want to consider, are when we intentionally act in a good way. Why have a principle which promotes protecting the ability to make one's own choices, when a much better principle would be to protect the ability to make morally good choices. Neither of these principles is about protecting freedom of choice, so that idea is just a ruse anyway. — Metaphysician Undercover
Consequentialism is all about judging the consequences of actions by their moral value in order to determine if that action is right/wrong/permissible/etc. — Dan
There are lots of intentional acts one could make that affect others but are entirely that person's own choice. If I beat you in a contest, I have affected you with my choices, and in ways you would presumably prefer I didn't, but I haven't restricted your ability to understand and make your own decisions. It wasn't your choice whether you won the contest or not, so my denying you that opportunity doesn't affect you in a morally relevant way. These restrictions you are worried about are of your own invention. — Dan
I have explained why the choices to be protected should be restricted to one's own choices. I don't think it is vague to say you get to decide what to do with your own mind, body, and property. I think the limits of that (eg, your mind, body and property, not mine) are pretty clear. — Dan
You breaking my bone very much affects my ability to understand and make choices about my own body, such as whether I want my bones broken. — Dan
Emotional distress, on the other hand, just isn't in itself morally relevant. If someone is made sad, or happy, it doesn't matter morally. — Dan
As the examples we've discussed demonstrate, your goal is to impose a very arbitrary, and not at all well defined distinction between different types of "effects on others". Based on this ill-define distinction, you say that some types of choices belong to a person (are one's own), and other types of choices do not belong to the person (are not one's own). Your claim, that these "limits" are "pretty clear", is blatantly false. As evident from the examples, the proposed limit is arbitrary and weighted to your personal preferences. For example, when I damage your property (steal your car) this is weighted towards "not a choice which belongs to me", but when you damage my ego (beat me in a competition), this is weighted towards "a choice which belongs to you". — Metaphysician Undercover
Please refer back to our earlier discussions about how education, and the establishing of habits of thinking, is a means by which people exercise considerable influence over the minds of others. The effects which education has are very significant, therefore choices made to educate others ought not be classed as one's own choice. Furthermore, any time that a person asks another for assistance, this would not be based in one's own choice. — Metaphysician Undercover
The issue is, that since we live in a communal world, then once we start to apply your proposed principle of distinction in a consistent way, we end up with very few choices which are actually "one's own". This leaves the question of why do you want to protect the ability to make such choices. How are such choices at all valuable? — Metaphysician Undercover
You appear to be totally neglectful, and ignorant of the temporal nature of choices, which was discussed earlier. Choices relate to future possibilities, we must consider the past as determined. After you've had a bone broken, you cannot choose not to have it broken. You can wish that it did not happen, but such wishes must be separated out from, and dismissed as irrelevant to, the decision making process of a healthy mind. — Metaphysician Undercover
In Christian ethics, the separating of the past, from decisions toward the future, is very important, and this manifests in the confession/forgiveness process. "Jesus died for our sins" is a proposition which allows us to separate ourselves from the mistakes of the past, and move forward with a clear conscience. — Metaphysician Undercover
Like the beginning of your post, this at the end, is also blatantly false. Emotional distress is of immense moral importance. Anger for example is a contributing factor to a vast array of immoral acts. The angry person may act in a vengeful way, and this would mark a turning from making "one's own choices", toward choices which do not belong to the person ( even by your standards). Therefore it would be very foolish to dismiss emotional distress as not morally relevant. For example, if I injured you (broke a bone in the other example) this may send you into a condition of emotional distress (anger), and even though you maintain the ability to understand and make your own choices, you start to make choices which do not belong to you (revenge). — Metaphysician Undercover
Do you really want me to explain why stealing my car prevents me from being able to make choices about what to do with my stuff, but beating me in a competition does not, or are you just being facetious? — Dan
But just like when you said this the first time, you're just wrong that habits and education reduces someone's ability to understand and make their own choices (though miseducation of the kind that leads to people not understanding their own choices would obviously be morally relevant). — Dan
You aren't simply applying it in a consistent way, you are insisting on applying it either in such a way that our own choices can't affect others at all or in which any choice that you make with your own mind (which is presumably all of them) are your own choices. These are not the only options, and neither is one I would endorse. — Dan
There's a few issues here. First, what choices one has access to and what choices one ought to have access to are not the same thing. Second, the choice is taken from me in the moment of arm breaking. It's no use saying that I don't have the choice once you've taken it from me, that is precisely the problem. — Dan
Again, we are getting into trouble because I am saying that the emotional distress is not morally relevant in the sense that it does not have moral value or disvalue that contributes to the consequences of an action being good or bad, are you are reading that as saying something else. Hopefully I have cleared up that misunderstanding. — Dan
That is not the issue. "One's own choice" is defined as a choice concerning what to do with one's own mind, body, and property. It is not defined as a choice which does not prevent someone else from making one's own choice. The latter is not a definition, it is a fallacy of a "circular definition", a self-referential definition. And I've already explained to you why the choice to steal your car is just as much a choice concerning my own mind, body, and property, as are the choices which lead to beating another in a competition.
Anyway, I explained to you how hurting another emotionally may lead to anger, or other feelings which could result in an attack on the person, or some other vengeful activity. So I do not think you have any argument there — Metaphysician Undercover
Again, you misrepresent the issue. It is not a matter of whether teaching a person "reduces someone's ability to understand and make their own choices", it is a question of whether the decision to teach a person is a choice about one's own mind, body, and property. Clearly, the choice to teach a person is just as much a choice concerning someone else's mind, as the choice to steal a car is a choice concerning someone else's property. — Metaphysician Undercover
Sure, there are other options, like making an arbitrary distinction like you have, which as I explained, has principles weighted by your personal preferences. You think for example, that stealing a person's car has more moral significance than educating a person does. I think it is very clear that the opposite is true. Stealing a person's car has a one time, flash-in-the-pan effect on the person, which is very minimal in the scale of a person's lifetime, but educating a person has a lifelong effect on the person. — Metaphysician Undercover
I spent a long time, at the beginning of this thread, trying to explain to you how any choice which a person makes limits that person's options, therefore restricting the person's freedom. Now you seem to be starting to understand, expressing how another person's choice may limit one's freedom. To fully understand this principle you need to recognize that a person's own choice limits one's freedom even more than the choice of another does. — Metaphysician Undercover
Oh sure, earlier you refused to distinguish between the choice, and the action which follows from the choice. Now, when it serves your purpose, you separate the act from the choice, to say that emotional distress does not contribute to the goodness or badness of the consequences of an "act". However, it is simply trickery, sophistry, to dismiss emotional distress in this way. Anger clearly contributes to the choices a person makes, producing consequences which are bad, bad actions. Therefore it has moral value in relation to choices. I am surprised that a person of your intelligence level would resort to such a sneaky trick, just to try and support a failing theory. — Metaphysician Undercover
First, it isn't circular to suggest that the limits of rights (or freedoms) should be where they abut upon those same rights (or freedoms) of another. — Dan
Second, anger doesn't "result" in attacks on other people, or other vengeful activity. People are morally responsible for their actions even when angry. Anger doesn't "make" people act violently, they choose to. — Dan
If you choose to say something on the street corner, that thing might affect me, but it is a choice of what to do with yourself, not what to do with me. — Dan
I have not made an arbitrary distinction, but a principled one. — Dan
What I am saying is that emotional distress is not a consequence which is relevant to determining the morality of an action (or choice). Does that make sense? — Dan
Yes it is circular. It's a self-referential definition, as I described. And that's a huge problem for the concept of "rights" in general. The definition of any specific right is always having to be reinterpreted because of that circularity. It's not a rigorous definition because every time that it reflects back on itself in an unwanted way, the definition has to be adjusted to the situation. This is why it's not a real definition, it is intentionally allowed to be adaptable because a rigid definition would run into problems. — Metaphysician Undercover
Dan, you continue with the very same trickery, to turn things around. Anger is the consequence here, not the cause. The question is whether a choice which causes another person emotional distress is one's own choice. I believe that causing another person emotional distress, such as anger, is just as morally relevant as causing another person to lose one's property, through theft. In fact, I would go even further, to state that I believe that the reason why things like theft are morally relevant, is because they cause emotional distress. If theft did not cause emotional distress, no one would care about it, and it would not be designated as bad.
I am starting to think that you are being ridiculous. Instead of listening to the problems of your ill-fated theory, you have gone into denial about its problems, and are now resorting to trickery in an attempt to get around the problems. — Metaphysician Undercover
This is blatantly incorrect. When I choose to say something to you, this is a choice of what to do with you. When I engage you in this way I am anticipating a response. The act of engagement is not about itself, it concerns the eliciting of a response. The intent of the act is to get a response from you, therefore it is "a choice of what to do with you". This is even more evident in my example of education, which you seem intent on ignoring. "To educate" is what you do to another. — Metaphysician Undercover
Your principles are arbitrary. You assign greater moral value to a person's property than you assign to a person's mental well-being. Stealing a person's property is "morally relevant", but causing a person emotional distress is not "morally relevant". Not only are your principles arbitrary, they are completely backward from accepted moral philosophy. — Metaphysician Undercover
No, this makes no sense at all, for the reasons explained above. One's emotional well-being, and mental stability is of the highest value. Therefore emotional distress is a consequence which is of the highest degree of relevance to determining the morality of an action. As I said above, the reason why stealing one's property is morally bad is not because it leaves you without a specific object, it is because it causes emotional distress. — Metaphysician Undercover
Self reference does not, in-itself make for circularity. Eg, the moral relativist might coherently say that there are no objective normative truths and no objective metaethical truths except this one. That references itself but is clearly not circular. Likewise, it isn't circular to say that one's freedom of movement does not include blocking someone else in such that they cannot move. Especially given that other people's choices are not the extent of what defines what choices belong to a person. — Dan
They are not aribitrary, they are based on the ability of persons to understand and make their own choices. It is certainly true that I am going against accepted moral philosophy but accepted moral philosophy is wrong. — Dan
The problem I pointed out involved using self-reference in a definition. What happened was that you first defined "one's own choices" as a choice relating what to do with one's own mind, body and property. Then I pointed out that every choice which a person makes, relates to what to do with one's own mind, body, or property. And, what is really at issue is how one's choice to do something with one's own body, affects others. You moved to define "one's own choice" based on how a person's choice of what to do with one's body, affects others. So you came up with, if the choice doesn't limit another's ability to make one's own choice, then it is one's own choice.
Clearly, what you have proposed is a self-referential definition. I prefer to characterize it as infinite regress rather than circular. Q. How do we know if the choice is one's own? A. if it does not limit another's ability to make one's own choice. Q. How do we know if another's ability to make one's own choices has been limited if we do not know what it means to make one's own choice, other than that it is a choice which does not limit this ability of another? See, we cannot ever get anywhere because we do not know what it means to make one's own choices, other than that it doesn't affect another's ability to make one's own choice. But we cannot make that judgement as to whether it affects another in this way, because we don't know what it means to make one's own choice, other than that it doesn't affect another's ability to make one's own choice. — Metaphysician Undercover
You have been unable to even adequately define your primary principle "the ability of persons to understand and make their own choices". Your attempts have been reduced to a meaningless self-referential definition. — Metaphysician Undercover
According to the op, you have spent the better part of ten years trying to resolve the issues of your moral theory. You have become so stymied that you now offer $10,000 to anyone who can resolve the problems with your theory. I suggest that it is high time for you to consider that the reason why you cannot solve the problems is that your theory is simply wrong, therefore there are issues which are impossible to resolve. — Metaphysician Undercover
I'm fairly sure I didn't propose any of that. I think I pointed out that choosing to steal my car is a choice of what to do with my car, not your body. It's a choice that belongs to me, not you. — Dan
I have of course considered that I might be wrong, but I think we have good reason to think this is our current best bet. Certainly you misunderstanding me is not good reason for me to change my mind. — Dan
We're very far apart on this. What I pointed out to you, is that to steal your car is a choice of what I want to do with my own body. That it is your car being stolen, is completely accidental. I want to get myself from A to B, so I grab a car, or I want to make some quick cash, so I grab a car, and sell it. Whatever the case, what I want, and what I am doing with my own body, is the primary motivation here. Theft is fundamentally a selfish act. That it is your car which enters into my plans and not some other thing, or things, is purely accidental. There is no essential relation between my choice and your car, so my choice to steal your car is not at all "about your car", it is about my own selfish wants and desires, what I want, for myself. The choice shows complete disregard for you and your property, rather than your representation of it, as a choice about what to do with your property. — Metaphysician Undercover
You are simply in denial, refusing to accept that I completely understand you, after weeks of quizzing you, but I also completely disagree with you. You have demonstrated very clearly that the concept of "one's own choice" which you propose, cannot be made to be coherent. That you insist it to be coherent, when I've demonstrated its incoherency, shows not a misunderstanding on my part, but denial on your part. — Metaphysician Undercover
You are confusing the motivation for the act with the act itself. Your stealing my car is very much about what happens to my car. — Dan
Your principle, "one's own choice" states that the choice concerns one's own mind, body, and property. This implies that the motivation for the act, as that which concerns one's "mind" is just as much a determining factor as one's property. The car thief uses one's own mind, one's own body, and one's own tools, to achieve one's own ends. As I said, most all choices ought to be considered "one's own choices", by the dictates of your primary definition. — Metaphysician Undercover
However, you do not accept your own definition — Metaphysician Undercover
Furthermore, you then place undue restrictions on your judgement as to which ways that one's choice affects others, are to be prioritized, to match the prejudice of your preference. — Metaphysician Undercover
I doesn't imply that at all. Motivation is not important in FC. — Dan
It isn't my definition. It is your definition. Again I did not define it this way. I am not overriding anything, I was never suggesting that anything you do that in some way involves your mind, body, and property is your choice. I was suggesting that you get to choose what happens with your own mind, body, and property, and not what happens to the minds, bodies, and property of others. — Dan
There are quite a few effects on one's mind that one could have which would be morally relevant. But someone being upset is not one of them. — Dan
Motivation is a large aspect of "one's mind". If it is not important to FC, then your principle, "one's own choice", defined by you as a choice concerning one's own mind, body, and property is not consistent with FC. — Metaphysician Undercover
You are changing the goal post. You spoke about protecting a person's ability to make one's own choices. When I suggest that stealing your car is a choice I might make, you said it is not my own choice to make, because it concerns your property. Then you defined "one's own choice" as a choice about what to do with one's own mind, body, and property.
Now you have turned things completely around, saying "you get to choose what happens...and not what happens to...". You are now not talking about "one's own choice" in any stretch of the imagination. You are now telling everyone what they must and must not choose, so you are imposing your own choice onto the minds of others, "you get to choose...". How could this be a choice which belongs to you, to impose such restrictions on the choices of others? — Metaphysician Undercover
As discussed, I strongly disagree with this. And it is things like this, and your complete disrespect for conventional moral philosophy, (saying that it is wrong), which make me realize that you truly are way off track. — Metaphysician Undercover
Again, the goalposts are where they always are. I'm not sure what you think I am turning around here. Is it "you get to choose" that you are taking issue with? What do you take that to mean that is different? I think you may be reading something different than what I am writing as I have been saying the same thing (though sometimes in different ways in order to clear up any confusion) from the off. — Dan
This seems to be to be the fallacy of appeal to tradition. Also, on a related note I'm not sure I would consider saying something is wrong to be "complete disrespect" — Dan
It's a "turn around" because at first you were just distinguishing between choices which belong to a person and those which do not, and claiming to protect the ability to make the one type. Now you imply that there is a mechanism in place which would restrict one's decision (therefore one's mind), to only make choices which one gets to make. So instead of looking forward to the future "I want to promote the ability to make one's own choices', you are now looking back at the past 'there is a mechanism which has been put in place which prevents one from making choices which are not one's own'. — Metaphysician Undercover
But dismissing it as wrong, without showing these reasons, is to show complete disrespect. — Metaphysician Undercover
No. I am not claiming any such mechanism. I meant "you don't get to" in the sense that it is morally bad for you to make my choices for me. — Dan
If you would like me to explain why I think why much of moral philosophy is barking up the wrong tree, I can do it, but that might be getting rather off topic. — Dan
But it isn't morally bad to make another's choice. That's what we already went through. It is generally good to save a person's life, for example. That's where your theory ran into problems, and you had to make all sorts of exceptions to allow that making another's choice is sometimes good. So, you do "get to" make choices which are not your own. Then this whole distinction (choices which do belong, and do not belong to the person) falls apart as meaningless, because what you are really trying to protect is choices which are morally good. — Metaphysician Undercover
Actually, I think that might be very helpful if we are to get anywhere in this discussion, because it might help me to understand why we are so far apart. On the other hand, you seem firmly attached to your beliefs, and I to mine, so it's unlikely we will get anywhere anyway. — Metaphysician Undercover
You've made a category mistake. Making someone else's choice for them, taking it away from them, is bad. It might not always be wrong (for example, killing one to save five) but it is always bad. It always counts against the action. There are lots of choices that aren't yours that would be good and/or right to make, but not belonging to you is not the same as belonging to someone else. — Dan
In briefest of brief, moral philosophy tends to rest on assumptions that I think are either incorrect or at least unfounded. — Dan
That there is some end that all humanity is aimed at or some goal that all humanity pursues — Dan
* That it is rational to do what is moral (and sometimes vice versa) — Dan
* That is is irrational to make an exception of yourself or treat your own ends as more valuable than those of others (this one can be a bit more complicated than this and the extent to which I have an issue with it depends a lot on how this is fleshed out) — Dan
You're really losing me Dan. How can there be a choice which does not belong to me , and yet does not belong to someone else? Who's choice is it? What type of existence does this choice have? I can see how it might be considered as a possibility, but how is it a choice? — Metaphysician Undercover
Wow, you do have strange beliefs, don't you? — Metaphysician Undercover
How could you justify cooperation without common goals? — Metaphysician Undercover
Since human beings are rational animals, how could they be inclined to do what is moral, if it is not rational to do what is moral. Your claim makes not sense. — Metaphysician Undercover
This is the issue I took up with you already. I do not see how your position could be justified. When one decides that another's end is as valuable as one's own, this is just to make another's end one's own. It is logically impossible to make the ends of others as valuable as one's own, because all this means is to adopt another's as one's own. So only the ones judged as being valuable enough to be adopted as one's own are truly seen to be as valuable as one's own, and this is only by way of actually making them one's own. Therefore to keep moral principles aligned with truth, we must hold that one's own ends are always the most valuable to the person. — Metaphysician Undercover
The latter (what you propose), provides no basis for judgement of the ends of others, because they already must be assumed to be just as important as one's own. — Metaphysician Undercover
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