No. I’m not arguing for open-ended dialectics. I’m arguing for arriving at some suitably definite dichotomy where just is defined with precision in terms of its “other”.

Negation doesn’t work as just vs unjust tells us very little about this still unnamed other. A metaphysical,strength dichotomy would be pairings like discrete-continuous, chance-necessity, local-global, vague-crisp, flux-stasis, etc.

If we can’t think of something to pair with just in similar fashion - as that which is logically mutually exclusive AND jointly exhaustive - then this in itself an argument for it being not a metaphysically general kind of distinction. It ain’t working as a bounding absolute when it comes to our dialectically formed vocab of ultimate abstractions.

Equality and balance are more robust terms, more overarching terms, as same-different is one of those standard dichotomies that concretely arose out of Greek philosophy. Justice and fairness are more parochial terms. As we have discussed and agreed, you can have the confusion of whether we are meaning equality of opportunity or equality of outcome.

Opportunity implies the competition that will result in a statistical range of outcomes. Lucky for some, unfair to others? Outcome implies a range of individual differences will be averaged over so that none are different by the end. Is that kind of communism just? Does one dream of the kind of discipline that leaves us as equal as an army marching in lockstep?

It is amazing that anyone could bandy these terms around - good, fair, just - as if they were already metaphysically robust … even if we can get by with them as socially coercive appeals in our everyday social politicking. Just claiming that goodness and justice is what your side represents and what your foe doesn’t. — apokrisis

What if they're not doing metaphysics, though?

I'd situation "equality of..." within Liberal theory. "Equality" is understood within the thoughts of the likes of Hobbes and Locke. The liberals were so successful that the calls for equality no longer mean the same as they once did: Equality then was before the law, so that the King didn't have a separate court from the people.

But as Kings diminished and the bourgeoisie rose "equality" took on new meanings.

Now, on TPF, "fair and just" will have all those resonances coming along-with. We can clarify as we go along to specify what we mean in a dialogue rather than relying upon a wide system to define our meanings. But I reach for liberal theory because liberalism -- in the classical sense -- is the dominant political philosophy to the point that it's in The Background. So we are stuck with these notions of opportunity vs. outcome, for instance, by virtue of our own history and context that we come from.

I think that where you would say: "Equality and balance are more robust terms, more overarching terms, as same-different is one of those standard dichotomies that concretely arose out of Greek philosophy. Justice and fairness are more parochial terms", the person seeking justice or goodness will say "But equality and balance are not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about the parochial terms. That's ethics"

Do you see the difference there?

Since I have no formal training in philosophy, ↪apokrisis's posts are often over my head. So, in that sense, I may not have extremely "abstracted notions". But Fairness and Justice are fairly commonsense notions aren't they? — Gnomon

They kind of are, until you start to get into the details it seems.

They're kind of like "Freedom" -- everyone loves freedom, but wars are fought over which version of Freedom is going to rule.

Perhaps, as you said, it would be helpful to place "limits" on our thinking : to define our terms. One definition of "world" in this context might be simply "human culture", as the relevant element of ethical concern. — Gnomon

That definitely narrows the scope down from some kind of ontological Fairness or Justice, but there might be some difficulties here still.

What would your commonsense notion of Fairness or Justice look like, within this human world? Is it specifiable, exactly?

An inanimate object is a being-in-itself whereas a human is a being-for-itself (self-creating). — I like sushi

I think the object is still being-for-itself. An object is already quite meaningful: even rocks are more meaningful than being-in-itself. The Being-in-itself/Being-for-itself distinction is the most basic dualism of Sartre's which is offered as a means for resolving various paradoxes, but like all basic distinctions in a philosophy, it's hard to define it explicitly.

A human, I think, is not quite a being-for-itself -- there is no a being-for-itself -- Being-for-itself is a fundamental ontological category. After the distinction between being-in-itself/being-for-itself we can then come to understand that there is an ego, but the objects -- the equipmentality of Heidegger -- are still being-for-itself by my understanding.

The paradox here is that if someone has 'bad faith' how can we tell? — I like sushi

The Hazel Barne's translation has an introductory essay by her in it, and the following paragraph is (part of) her interpretation of Sartre on our relationship to others (and also our self -- think, if we're able to lie to self, which is a kind of Bad Faith, then we must also have this same "gap" you mention not just from our self to Others, but also between our self and our self) (page xxxviii)

Sartre has not
repudiated the Ego; he has only made of it an object of the pre-reflective
consciousness rather than contemporary with it. But it exists just as much
as objects in the world exist. Also Sartre never denies the existence of an
active, organizing (constituante), individual consciousness any more
than does William James, who likewise rejected consciousness as an
cntity. He merely insists that it is essentially a Nothingness which is
individualized by its objects but never wholly determined by past objects
to an extent which would prescribe what it will do with present or
future ones. Consciousness can never blot out the fact that it has been
aware of certain objects (part of which it has unified within the ideal
unity of the Ego); at times it may even let itself be trapped by the Ego
and not actively realize its ability to change its point of view on past
o,bjects. But the possibility is there. When Sartre speaks of inter-subjective
relations, of the phf::nomenon of bad faith, etc. he is referring to
the free conscio'lsness which has been directed toward certain objects,
",:hich usually asserts itself consistently with the general "character" of the
Ego, but which is not forced to do so. In ordinary experience consciousness
for all practical purposes fully asserts itself through the "I", but
anguish occasionally warns us that this familiar "I" is only a screen..
Ncvertheless consciousnesses are particular since they appear at a definite
time and place, thus nihilating Being from a particular point of view.
Sartre has warned us, as we said earlier, that strictly speaking one should
not say "my consciousness" but "consciousness of me." But if I say "consciousness
of me" and if you say "consciousness of me," our consciousnesscs
are as distinct as the Egos of which they are conscious.

Oh definitely! That's how I'd have preferred to set it out, but then I saw it was just easier to type it out :D -- but I like truth-tables because they just show it all laid out. They're mathematically clunky but conceptually useful for showing the structures for learning.

And, yes, I agree with your rendition of the composite proposition. I just find it easier to think of material implication in terms of the equivalence between: A -> B <-> not A or B (Who said that philosophers never agree on things? As long as we stipulate the definitions... :D )

A contradiction is of the form "P ^ ~P"

"A implies B" =/= "A implies not-B", and so the conjunction is "P ^ Q" rather than "P ^ ~P" -- the contradiction would be "A implies B" and "A does not imply B" -- the "not" would have to apply to the logical connective "imply".

Implication (EDIT: i.e. "A implies B") is logically equivalent to "~A or B", so...

Let
P = A implies B
Q = A implies not-B

then...
P = not-A or B
Q = not-A or not B

P =/= Q, and therefore you cannot derive the form "P ^ ~P", and so they do not contradict.

Combining P and Q what we instead obtain is: not A or B or not B (EDIT: or, we should say, not-A or B and not-A or not B), and since "B or not B" is a tautology we can simplify the expression to "not-A" -- the "B" is a sideshow because it doesn't matter if it's true or false when we put P and Q in conjunction, all that matters ifis the truth value of A.

Anyone who cares about their philosophy would make the effort to ground their use of terms in this dialectical fashion. They wouldn't just grunt and gesture – as if pointing is enough and no explaining is required.

Proper definition is counterfactual and must point to what is present in terms of what is absent. But how does the grunter and gesticulator point to that which is the absent? What use is such a person on a philosophy forum? — apokrisis

Ask not what use a person is, but how beautiful the uses being pursued are and whether or not we ought to change the uses we're pursing. There's the pragmatic ground of active values, and there's the possibility of changing what we pursue: the beautiful allows us to say "while this is useful-for, I think we ought do something else" (or, perhaps, the ethical). I think it's the latter question that physics cannot give a good answer to, though of course -- in the dialectical sense -- one has to know things about the world we're in in order to make pragmatic choices, and values, in turn, constrain the world in the sense that we'll only find what we're looking for (and pass over what we're not), and many a metaphysician is in fact speaking about an ethic and vice-versa.

I find Hegel pretty clumsy. Peirce tried to tidy him up. — apokrisis

I find Hegel frustrating, but he's still sort of the guy to go to when talking about dialectic and process -- it's not the dialectic of Plato, but a process whereby one doesn't have a worked out syllogism but rather the syllogism is placed within a context which starts a dialectic (or, really, the syllogism is replaced by process, and one goes from one idea to the next in a dialectic)

He's very open to interpretation, and inspired all kinds of philosophy after him so he's a good reference point for thinking through these problems of process and big systems and what-not -- a touchstone, more or less, for you and I to think through dialectics. In a lot of ways I see his system as the last Big System really worth considering (because not even Marx's system is really complete, exactly, and Marxism spans across many writers -- but Hegel really did just write The Big Idealist Philosophical System, so if that's the goal of philosophy he's kind of the go-to)

So when you say:

So this is Hegel+, perhaps. Sublation is what an action reveals by managing to leave that further somethingness behind. But from a fully relativistic point of view, attention is drawn to the mutality or logical reciprocality of the deal. Both are revealing their other as a "leaving behind". One isn't the first move, the other the second. It is a dependent co-arising. — apokrisis

I'm good with that. You can argue for co-arising in Hegel, as well. Your paragraph talking about Being and Nothingness sounds very much like Hegel in The Science of Logic -- so I mention him as a touchstone only, and Hegel+ -- so I believe -- is what every interpreter of Hegel has in mind :D

Science hasn't even had the final word on science let alone ethics. But that doesn't mean it ain't thundering down the line. — apokrisis

Heh, I don't see science as coming close to understanding science or ethics. Science understanding science is basically the 20th century philosophy of science -- what could be more consistent? -- and I believe it fails when it comes to ethical questions. I sometimes wonder about dithering is/ought, but then -- like The Subject -- it seems to come back around even if we "pass over" the distinction.

And everyone just jumps to the idealism of the Platonic kind of fair, balanced, equal, just and good that inhabits a realm of contextless abstraction – then wonders why they can't draw any kind of line back to the real world that must ground these as pragmatically useful distinctions. — apokrisis

Good point. Though I'm fine with it being useless, :D -- in the end I'm not a pragmatist.

But in what sense? What context? Can you define these terms as you contextually understand them. — apokrisis

In the context of a thread on TPF asking for a general reflection :)

So, yes, I think you're right to say:

the very broad metaphysical question of whether the real world in general is "fair and just". — apokrisis

Is the question posed, and even highlighting difficulties in answering -- or highlighting possible ways of thinking about the question -- is enough of an answer.

So, is the world fair and just?

I'm going to highlight where I see you answering the question more directly, whereas before what I was reading looked to be so different from the question I was struggling to see how it addressed it -- basically it seemed that is/ought ought to apply, and you were firmly coming down on an "is", but now I'm seeing the possibility of a bit more.

We are getting somewhere when we can see they are polarities that encode a spectrum of state that constitute "the world inbetween" their limiting extremes.

This is the power of metaphysical logic. It dichotomises to arrive at a unity of opposites. Mind and matter denote to opposing limits. A useful distinction which gives us the measure of all things inbetween to the degree they seem either more mindful or more material. Our definition of terms is precise to the degree it has been framed as a logical reciprocal relation. — apokrisis

Proper definition is counterfactual and must point to what is present in terms of what is absent. — apokrisis

Right then. The work begins. And perhaps some terms are so soaked in idealism (or physicalism) that there is no rescuing them?

I myself tend towards systems jargon like constraints and freedoms, plasticity and stability, vague and crisp, chance and necessity, etc, etc. I already inhabit a dialectical paradigm where work has been done to create robust reciprocal distinctions. There are a ton of terms that bridge the divide that reductionism creates. Those in system science speak their own language for a good reason. That is how they can share the same general mindset as a community.

If the talk turned to justice, this would be understood as some kind of optimising balancing act – as illustrated by a set of scales. Differences can be converted to equalities. A pound of cheese can be measured in terms of its equivalent – some sum of money being what matters to the shop keeper with physical goods to trade for hard cash.

Weighing the value of goods is prosaic. The exchange of money acts as the most impersonal way of establishing a biosemiotic connection between a society and its entropification. Definitions of a fair, just, balanced and equal deal seem to be synonyms of each other as the gap being bridged is so habitualised and ritual. Just read the price and pay the money. Or don't.

But then where we get to "moral" decisions that weigh the individual and their actions against their society and its norms, the weighing of the scales becomes a lot more difficult and complex. Pile up the sin on one side and what then is the good that can be placed on the other?

Is it an eye for an eye or juvenile rehabilitation? Does a crime of passion deserve an automatic market discount?

You have to see through these abstracted notions – fair, just, balanced, equal – to discover the pragmatic complexities they are supposed to encode. And that is even simply in the everyday human social context let alone when someone poses the very broad metaphysical question of whether the real world in general is "fair and just". — apokrisis

's post strikes me as someone who does not have abstracted notions, and is wanting to see the limits of thinking on the subject, so this is a perfect sort of response, isn't it? Rather than my first guess, it sounds to me like you're saying the question cannot be answered without first answering some other things, such as the definitions we're using in the question or the context in which the question is being asked, and it cannot really be answered "in general" -- one has to go through the dialectical process, and as such, engage in the dialectic rather than ask for a final answer that let's us check a box "yes" or "no" -- "just" or "unjust"

***

Now, in my context, I'll just flat out answer that the world isn't just, but I'm a Marxist so there's that :D

But my systems view doesn’t draw one way lines. That is the reductionist expectation where reality is just a tale of bottom-up material construction.

The systems view says reality is a growth process in which a stable existence arises from a complementary balance of two polar opposites. It is dialectical. A system is formed by its lived interaction between its top-down constraints and its bottom-up freedoms. Global constraints shape the local freedoms that then in their turn - statistically, on the whole - reconstruct that prevailing state of constraint. — apokrisis

Let's try to answer the titular question with this in mind.

It sounds to me like you'd have to say that the real world is fair and just, and that fairness and justness have a counterpart of some kind. If it's dialectical then how do you intend "complementary balance of two polar opposites"? Mostly interested in what "opposites" are in this.

Are polar opposites are simply the negation of some concept, like Justice/not-Justice, or if Justice is contrasted with injustice, or if Justice stands alone in relation to Fairness?

So if we take Hegel's philosophy we get a dialectic where the negation of the negation does not lead to the original concept, but instead is a process of sublation -- in which case I'd be inclined to think that Justness and Fairness are the teleological ends (top down constraints) and our human choices are the bottom-up freedoms. Or something along those lines.

But in a systems view I imagine that the dialectic must work differently? What is the system? What are the constraints and freedoms that would allow us to say something about the state of the world?

I'm guessing that we'd say something along the lines that you have to accept the good with the bad, so that the world is neither wholly just nor wholly unjust, and the same would go for fairness. Since we're always in a state of growth or becoming it's going to be the case that we'll find ourselves on the side of injustice as well as justice as we progress.

How does that sound?

So to draw a line from physics to moral choices is a complex and evolving tale, but perfectly doable.

My argument here is that to start the discussion, you first need to realise that we are indeed already caught in a choice between two poles of the "distribution game".

In one panel of Banal's diptych is everyone standing on the equality of a ground that never changes for anyone. The other panel represents the "fairness" of everyone being allowed as many boxes as take their fancy.

Assumed is that the world has some supply of boxes in the first place. And this particular world as pictured further assumes that only three boxes are enough to make everyone equally happy so long as the said boxes are distributed with the "fairness" of a maximum inequality.

So much to unpack as so much has been already assumed in the parable of the three boxes. As usual Bang-on pretends something is so obviously true it needs no further explication on his part. And as usual, he could not be more wrong. — apokrisis

I can spell out what I think it means -- I don't think it's very deep. I think it's comparing two versions of equality -- the equality of opportunity and the equality of outcomes.

I don't think it's much deeper than that, though. And if it needs be deeper then that's perfectly fine, but the question has less to do with the set-up -- boxes, firms, ownership, whatever -- and more to do with the question "How do we draw a line from physics to moral choices?" -- if it's doable, then can we do it?

Or is the statement of two sides enough to demonstrate that physics can draw a line to moral choices? What does this "drawing a line" consistent in?

Any scenario will do -- I'd be interested in hearing how you go from physics to ethics (as generally I don't think it can be done)

And, in my opinion, the best philosophy changes the way you read. For reading can be active form of thinking. — Fooloso4

I agree with that too!

Often I find myself in a kind of dialogue with the ideas, and sometimes the ideas are very confusing at first but then when it clicks the text changes -- Nietzsche reads like this, though I'm thinking that the aphoristic or poetic writers probably have an advantage here (or disadvantage, as preference may dictate).

But that's still a real pleasure when a text teaches you a different way to read that also opens up the text to a deeper understanding.

What do you want and expect from philosophy? — Fooloso4

Reflection, criticism, argument, and also storytelling.

The best philosophy, in my opinion, changes the way you think as you read it. It untangles a thought I didn't even know I was holding onto or offers another viewpoint or way I would not have considered without someone else having taken the time to put it into philosophical form. Sometimes that's a little uncomfortable but I've always found being exposed to a new way to think about the world worth it.

And so:

Has the philosopher outgrown the need for stories? — Fooloso4

No, but it's also not something I think we need to "grow out" of, exactly. Philosophy is full of stories! :D How else would we convey ideas? In setting out a context or a counter-example, so even in a bare-bones dialectical sense of philosophy, we'd still have to have some kind of narrative apparatus: The Trolley starts at point A then gets to Point B (the lever) which will lead to Point C or D, depending on what the actor in the story does. A beginning, a Climax, and a Resolution -- narrative.

On the whole, folk have voted for growth. And yearned for steady state. They want 3% as a basic forever rate of economic improvement and then they bellyache at the yawning inequality gap that such a regime creates simply as its equilibrium outcome. They remember the good old days when incomes were almost Gaussian flat. The good old days being the post-war anglosphere and not the pre-industrial era when GDP had flat-lined for millenia.

So there is the moral conundrum. The physical world foots the entropic bill. Fossil fuels are the explosive basis of modern economics and its scalefree social complexification. Peasants and serfs can now be pickleball professionals and influencers. — apokrisis

I think this expresses a good contradiction, and helps me understand between the two -- I really wasn't sure.

My guess is we're all on board with the Gaussian economy, yeh?

Enough of that, please.

What you are not answering is which equilibrium do you have in mind? Gaussian or scalefree? — apokrisis

Does it matter?

You and I can choose Gaussian or scalefree -- but that's not the philosophical question. the question is: Which do you choose?

Yeah?

Also, your criticism was a bit vague so idk if your suggesting guiding action is impossible due to moral realism or what not. If thats the case then the above wont really matter to your argument and I'll need to provide something else in response. — Ourora Aureis

Going over the exchange back to the OP I see I'm latching onto "maximize", which I generally associate with mathematics, and so utilitarianism, and so measurement -- but I missed that you're going against that sort of thing. At least to explain why I asked about how you could measure experience: I now see you weren't meaning it as literally as I took it.

But then my second question remains relevant, I think: How can egoism serve as a guide to action?

Usually I'd say that if I'm doing what I want then I'm not really deliberating about what is good or moral or ethical. I'm already decided. It's when I have to make a decision that I start to wonder about ethics.

Though the better way to put the question is: How do you know what you want?

I think that's a solid challenge. Thanks for telling me. Interested in the thread, or good to leave it there? I'm satisfied at this point.

In adult surgeries, sure, but apart from that not really. — Leontiskos

In terms of changing people, though -- calling them to action, effecting guilt to persuade them to change themselves, excising spiritual tumors -- I'd say that's pretty much on par with adult surgery. At least if we're keeping the medical analogy between physical doctors and moral doctors.

But then you aren't talking about ceding professionals coercive tools at all, which is what we were discussing. — Leontiskos

In the story you linked the professional was a Prophet of God. Which I think fits on par with Jesus, which is where I started :D . We could start there.

Since we haven't any of those available today:

In my parenthesis I mentioned texts. We have traditions we come from and can reflect upon and on and with and through, but there is also the whole breadth of philosophy to think through, too: ones we don't necessarily come from, even. Though that gets along with me thinking there isn't really one true philosophy.

I don't think any of us are professionals at anything more drastic, though. I don't really see the point in shaming someone on the street, for instance, for something I hold dear. If they didn't trust me or care about it, what would it do anyways? What would the point be? Even if we were professionals who could help someone, could we really do it here? Is that the sort of philosophy that ought to operate in a public discussion board?

I'm super-interested in these ideas as ideas, but I'm fairly doubtful that someone has really figured out how to be a doctor of the soul to the degree that we could just trust them to make a call on when it's ok to lobotomize someone to turn them from serial killer to saint, as a real example from the history of psychology. Sometimes I think doctors are a little overly confident in relation to how little we know. It probably helps them make decisions on the fly, but it doesn't mean I think it's thought through. I include all the doctors of the soul, there -- it's just human nature.

It's more because the doctor's of the soul are just as human as the patients that autonomy is so important -- be they psychologists, priests or family members. The best of intentions and hell and all that rot.

In terms of the board here, though:

I'm motivated to defend pluralism here because I'm interested in hearing how other people think through these problems for the same reason I'm interested in the plural philosophies -- they are beautiful ways of deliberating about what to do. But in the end our community here will only be able to help with things like reflection, consistency, understanding the ideas, and respecting one another's various viewpoints to the best of our capacity, too: so in a way these are the ethical considerations of what we can do here, which is all an ethics can be about between people, I think.

Though even it, I'd suggest, could be seen as a philosophy-for-this-board: perhaps there are philosophies that are better suited for other spaces. In fact, my pluralism would require it.

What do you think punishment is? — Leontiskos

Punishment is what you do to someone who breaks a rule.

Okay, but you still require a principle which explains why things change in the extreme case. Many of us have brought up the extreme case precisely because it disproves the OP. The extreme case disproves the claim that one can never transgress another's will. — Leontiskos

Why do you require a principle? Couldn't you just say "Yeah, that seems to break the rule, I'm not sure I know what to do with that but OK"

The question is whether they are bad per se; whether they are ethically permissible. To say that they are expedient doesn't answer that question. — Leontiskos

I thought I answered it in the negative -- they are merely expedient, they are the things we do as a society now, though I don't see them as good.

The idea that morality has to do with acting according to one's intrinsic nature is diametrically opposed to the idea that "ethical thinking occurs between persons who respect one another." This is what the serial killer example shows. — Leontiskos

Only if we're asking for a universal morality, I'd say.

I like principles, but I do kind of poke fun at the idea of not lying so that the serial killer can know the truth since that is how we respect his humanity. I believe in exceptions that can't be specified in a philosophy.

...I'm somewhat overloaded so I will probably need to start drawing myself out of some of these conversations. I suppose the main idea here is that extreme individualism which prizes autonomy and consent ends up being opposed to social living. The members of a society necessarily bump into one another and in doing so change one another's trajectory. A position which rejects this fact of life is simply unrealistic. It doesn't matter whether that position is premised on morality, or autonomy, or consent, or "Taoism," etc. — Leontiskos

No worries I understand. There's a lot of threads going through my mind just from this exchange, and it's been nice to have a spring board of sorts, just so you know. Cheers!

That's a good point.

What I'm thinking, roughly, Against the Golden Rule:

"Do unto others' as you would have them do unto you" is the version I'm thinking from.

One thing, all by itself, is that it doesn't really say much.

Nobody asked me, but I hate the Golden Rule — Joshs

:D

No worries -- I'm interested in hearing a proper go at refutations of the golden rule.

It perpetuates the very violences it is designed to pre-empt, by assuming that morality is a matter of motivation and intent rather than understanding. — Joshs

I'm interested. Is there more?

As I've tried to make clear, when I talk about "personal morality" I'm talking about how I, myself, come to what might be called "moral" decisions. I wasn't saying I expected, or even wanted, others to do the same. That being said, I've never come across a moral principle I found convincing or satisfying except, perhaps, the golden rule. — T Clark

What part of the golden rule is dissatisfying, do you think?

Asking since you said "perhaps"

For myself I at least like a commitment to honesty with self and others'. But it's merely a preference.
 

When everything is working correctly, so-called "moral" decisions present themselves to me as emotions, intuitions, understandings, insights, or intentions, not usually as rational arguments. Sometimes they skip those steps completely and go directly to actions. As I mentioned, that's what Taoists call "wu wei," acting without acting. Perhaps that's a bit misleading. In the world Chuang Tzu and Lao Tzu came from, that's where all action, whether or not we call it moral, arises. — T Clark

When is everything working correctly?

I'm not opposed, it's just sometimes these states seem a little mythical to myself: they're idealizations which sound pleasant, but I can say I like the articulations and deliberations because I'm not always acting without acting -- sometimes I'm wondering "Hrm, so what now?"

It shows a way in which consent is important and it shows a way in which consent isn't important. — Leontiskos

Seems to me that the default is "requires consent" and so we have to justify why it is we are ignoring consent in some circumstance.

Then I have to wonder if you were being honest when you proposed that it is, "best to leave such [coercive] tools to the professionals." This is because when I asked you who these professionals are you said, "No one." — Leontiskos

No one when it comes to hard in fast rules. I clarified the kinds of persons I'd point to in a circumstance parenthetically, but I value autonomy in that process of selecting who the professional is.

To reform someone against their will is simply one form of punishment. C. S. Lewis argues persuasively that it is the worst form of punishment, and is deeply contrary to human dignity (link). — Leontiskos

"Against their will" would have to incur a pretty strong justification for me, given my respect for autonomy. But serial killing is pretty extreme. We've been dealing in some extreme examples where the question is when to use coercion.

While I understand the need to do so, I don't think we can get away with saying "And this is why we're good"

If someone fully consents to a punishment then they are not being punished. What you say here makes me think that you do not understand punishment. And of course the general view being represented here does lead to the eradication of punishment, which leads to yet another societal impossibility, and to my mind counts as another reductio. — Leontiskos

I'm admitting in this question that I don't see the appeal of punishment, yes.

What's the appeal?

I agree, but many in this thread are saying that they should not be socialized. Socialization involves moral admonition, after all. — Leontiskos

Hrrmm, I think it's just a disagreement about what is entailed by socialization -- is it a process of moral admonition, or a process of learning to think for yourself, or a process of collective deliberation, or a process . . . I think what's being said is that there are some forms of socialization which are not preferred; these other ways over here are preferrable, to the extent we can pursue them. Or, rather, a kind of ideal for living together.

Perhaps the more obvious case of those who wield moral tools are legislators and policemen. T Clark seems to think that the serial killer might be acting rightly, according to his "intrinsic nature." The legislators and the police don't think he is acting rightly, and they will throw him in prison because of it. — Leontiskos

I don't see legislators or policemen as moral tools.

Where we see eye-to-eye is with respect to the importance of community.

But hierarchy and coercion are generally things I don't think of as ethical, but rather expedient: they are political, not moral tools. They are useful to this or that end, but that doesn't mean they're good, per se. They are the decisions we've made so far, most of which were an inheritance to begin with.

The serial killer might be acting rightly to his intrinsic nature. But that's also a pretty extreme case for thinking ethically -- it's not on my radar as a thing I have to consider very often. I tend to believe that ethical thinking occurs between persons who respect one another, at least, so these are just difficult circumstances rather than cases against some approach.

When I think of my intrinsic nature, I just think of the sorts of things which bring harmony to my life, which is different for different people, and is still a worthwhile ethical topic in a world where serial killers exist.

Philosophically I don't think there is such a thing, really, as an intrinsic nature. For myself I'm coming at it more from the existential side. The "intrinsic nature" is created along the way, and changed with circumstances.

The beauty in ethical thinking, then, is in being able to deliberate. (Hence the value of many philosophies)

Again, the "ignorance" card doesn't play. Insofar as an intellect-based case is made for autonomy, that case is based on knowledge, not ignorance. It is based on the idea that I have more knowledge about what is best for me than anyone else does. And that is precisely what I challenged in my last post. — Leontiskos

It does, because, generally speaking, we are ignorant -- it's only in relationship with others' that I have any sort of knowledge of them, and such relationships reveal that there's much more under heaven and earth than what in my mind.

But to be in relationship we have to have some basis of trust. Family can point out flaws because we have a relationship of trust and shared values and a long history with one another.

That is -- in order to have rules and moral admonition, first we must have trust and reciprocal respect. (Or, at least, insofar that we don't, I can tell you I don't see the appeal)

For example, libertarians and those who champion autonomy have a great deal of trouble understanding how to parent children, and how it is that children should be answerable to adults.

Do they? Or do they just have different answers?

No, not necessarily. Medical procedures often do not require consent when the person in question is not capable of consent. — Leontiskos

Doesn't that show how consent is important? We only operate when the person is not capable of consent, and so we should have some basis of judging for when that's the case?

In questions of moral admonition consent is tangential and not especially important. This is in part because one will not consent to the punishment that will be forced on them if they continue to act poorly (e.g. imprisonment, fines, etc.).

Do you imagine that I want to punish people who will not consent to the punishment? :D

Well, I don't really. I'm one of those "Reform, to the extent possible" sorts, although there are all sorts of thorny questions along the way.
 

Oh? Well who do you consider a professional? I think it's clear that many people are ignorant of themselves, and that especially close friends and family will see more clearly than they do their own actions. This is as it has always been, and it is why socialization is so important. Those who do wrong are very often ignorant of their wrongdoing, whether culpably or not. It has always been considered a mercy to make them aware of it - to help them avoid what will only become a bigger problem for them and for others. — Leontiskos

For making hard-and-fast rules? No one :D

Hence the emphasis on autonomy.

I do value autonomy a great deal, and I think we all ought to. I base this on our general ignorance (... though in general I'd point to psychologists and priests and family: people who a person is close to and builds a trusting relationship with -- but it would ultimately be up to them who they choose to trust: philosophically speaking it wouldn't be I, that's for certain)

I agree that the community can see you better than you can see yourself, though that doesn't mean that your close friends and family won't have biases either. Sometimes a lack of closeness could clear the eyes, and sometimes the distance obscures certain details. I don't think we really get to not socialize -- everyone who can think of themself as a distinct person in a community who makes choices is socialized to some degree, right?

But I don't think the community can take on the role of doctor, exactly, no.

For some it's priests. For some it's a guru. For some it's a text. For some a feeling. For some an MD.

But given my belief about our general ignorance about how to go about helping people, philosophically at least, I put autonomy as a pretty high priority.

So, what do you do if you suspect your child of having committed a crime? — Vera Mont

In my tradition? Pray.

:D

Philosophically -- no answer. These are ways of reflecting on choices, not answers to choices.

Well there was that little bit about principles, convictions and knowing what's right. But no philosophy - just observations and experience. — Vera Mont

If I just know what is right and make observations and experience then where does asking questions for advice come in? Why deliberate about what is right if I just know what is right?

Seems a bit much to me. I like to know why other people do things. Sometimes they have a point.

Sounds to me like there's no philosophy to be had at all in your view, then. Follow your heart and do your best between the competing desires until you no longer have to or can.

Yes?

I suppose that, in the end, I'd still allow more principles than you do, though I think principles are the sorts of things one commits themselves to. I value moral autonomy.

But I am very interested in the role of emotions in ethical thinking, and also clarifying differences between different ways of thinking ethically (or even further specifying when it is we are thinking ethically)

Well, that's a beginning. Sounds like following our heart can include limiting ourselves, then.

We'll need a better reductio of following our heart as a rule than cases like murder, rape, and all the rest I think, in that case: most heart-followers are good on those, are able to articulate exceptions, and even being in conflict with oneself it sounds to me: Do we need anything more complicated than that to think through ethics, or does that about cover it?

The devil in the details I see here will be "OK, but when are we stupid, destruct, or spiteful? To what do I oppose this when that's the case? My heart?" -- and maybe that's not so bad after all, because we see that while we might want to kill someone, we also want our freedom and so we choose our freedom: there may be the brief flash of anger to do violence, but our attachments to other things are the desires that we can act upon to choose something else.

Makes sense to me, what's wrong with it?

What we ought to do is whatever we believe to be right at the time of decision. On most of those occasions, we'll chicken out or compromise or fudge, because the principled action is too dangerous, difficult, expensive, uncomfortable, unpleasant or inconvenient.
If we live up to our highest expectations once in ten tries, we're doing pretty well — Vera Mont

So follow our heart?

Linked, yes, but very often as antagonists wrestling. — Vera Mont

Also, this part always seems weird to me. If I'm antagonistically related to this or that ethical principle and am both at once then I'd prefer to either let go of the emotion or the ethical principle or rectify it in some manner. Why bother holding onto an ethic which is antagonistic towards feelings?

Well, the feelings would have to be bad in some way. Fair enough, sometimes they are bad.

Are they always bad, or can we ever feel good when thinking about ethics?

I suppose the part I'm missing here is: where is the adult?

We are influenced by what we grow up around.

Sure.

So, what ought we to do? Whatever our mother told us?

Relationships between parents and children are variable. — Vera Mont

Right.

But so far all I've been given here the relationship to mothers as a kind of point of departure for thinking ethically, at least conceptually -- and it seems we agree that, yes, we grow beyond our parents and see them as human, rather than superhuman, and at least in a loving relationship we come to love them in spite of the flaws: which seems to me to indicate that the mothers are not all the Others, but that there is a community that is much wider than the family unit.

Basically, as important as they are, it's not the whole picture -- and furthermore, it seems to me that what we were as children isn't as important to what we are now, though you can see some similar traits that live on over time if you know someone long enough.

Loving people is not an ethical decision; it's an emotional fact. What you do for parents at any given moment, in any given situation, those may be ethical decisions at any age. Calling every Tuesday to see if they're all right. Listening to your father's jokes the seventeenth time. Praising the fruitcake you never really liked. Spending Christmas with them instead of going to Bermuda. Driving the old lady to her bridge game when it's really not convenient. Taking a weekend to install a wheelchair ramp. If you love people, most of these decisions are not ethical - you just do things to make them safe and happy, because their safety and happiness matters to you. — Vera Mont

Aren't the two linked? Ethics and emotion? (coincidentally, or not, that was the impetus to a lot of this thinking: that question of ethics and emotion)

Now that ending there: That sounds like something I ought read. Thanks!

You are imputing bad motives again — Leontiskos

Not bad motives -- just ignorance.

For example, a surgeon can use a knife to cut away a malignant tumor, and guilt can be used in much the same way. Now some who are beholden to a strict form of autonomy might say that we should only be able to perform moral operations on ourselves, but I would say that there are strong similarities between the moral order and the physical order. Just as there are physical surgeons, so too are there moral surgeons, and there are tumors which cannot be self-excised. For an example of a moral surgeon, see Nathan in 2 Samuel 12. — Leontiskos

I understand the concept; but even a surgeon asks permission before excising a tumor, right? Autonomy is an important part of any medical approach to ethics: especially judging when someone is no longer autonomous or in need of intervention.

For my part I tend to think we're pretty ignorant of one another, so it's best to leave such tools to the professionals. (EDIT: Or, really all I mean here, is that they are dangerous and not cues to knowledge -- they are tools that can be used to shape the soul, but the soul can be shaped as well as it can be mis-shaped, too, and if we're ignorant then which is to happen? )

It's the part before that that's more important : "If I'm certain of this or that, then I'll interpret your acts (speech and otherwise) into my frame."



-- "Guilt" becoming a tool, like a knife, to shave away parts of another in the name of the good has it backwards to my mind.

Rather, I have to grab the knife to cut away from myself when I see the need.

Now, in a particularly drastic situation, perhaps, this ideal can't be followed. But it is better that way because using a knife to cut the soul without having any idea how any of it works may or may not help someone after all.

I don't know about all this.

A life lived to please one's mother sounds alright enough, but does that strike anyone as ethical? Isn't ethical maturity reached by coming to see your parents' as equally human, weak, and pathetic as yourself? And loving them anyways, in spite of the flaws you know all too well?

***

Levinas' philosophy, if we read between the lines, indicates this occurs after having children: Now you are the parent and you care about the son in a manner that isn't the same as your elemental projects.

But I suspect that people can come to care about others' without having their own children. Growing up is this process of taking on cares outside of the self, no?

What’s the difference between ‘I’ and ‘other’? — Joshs

That's where I get stuck a lot. Recently I've been thinking about this distinction by blending Sartre with Levinas -- Sartre has the "I", and Levinas has "the Other" figured into their philosophy, as a whole, but there are bits here or there in each philosophy that I sort of shy away from, and this sort of "synthesis" between them is a way of attempting to "fill in" the "gaps" (from my perspective, of course -- not for everyone) in each philosophy with each philosophy.

So the "I" is myriad: The cogito of "I think, therefore I am" doesn't follow because "I think" isn't the same "I" as in "I am": thinking is being-for-itself ,but the I-am is being-in-itself.

The Other, though, is exteriority (like Levinas' -- so "outside of experience" rather than "internal/external) -- the face-to-face relation is our recognition of the alien outside of ourselves as more important than our elemental attachments. (The non-self "I", ipseity, is that which is attached to: though of course ipseity is never alone unto itself and is also only known through attachment)

Is the ‘I’ a single thing or a community unto itself?

Both a single thing and a community! :D

Communally we recognize ourselves as responsible agents, as "I's" who are responsible or culpable for various things.

But if the community didn't care for such an "I", then the I would change.

We have bank-accounts and property rights to our bodies which give us a sense of individuality because the legal framework is set up to give individuals power over themselves.

In a lot of ways "Individuality" is a communal dance of respect for others', and Robinson Crusoe is no "I" except in relation to his past.

Perhaps the difference between self and other is an arbitrary distinction we fabricated , and it’s really a matter of degree?

I think so! Though for good reason, probably too. It's arbitrary, but with a point: understanding myself as a person who needs this or that, and another as a person or needs that or this, and that these things are equally valuable requires me to develop this sense of self and other -- else I'd just continue on in my own projects, absorbed in a world away from everyone.

In other worlds, the notion of selfishness is incoherent, because it isn’t a unitary ego we are protecting, but the ability to coordinate the myriad bits within the community of self that makes up our psyche so that an overall coherence of meaning emerges. the sense of a unified self is an achievement of a community , not a given.

Bingo!

Or, at least, it only becomes coherent upon a social dance that we're participating within where selfishness is seen as something to be avoided such that (this that or the other -- some communities prefer asking for forgiveness with various rituals, and some are fine with no more than an acknowledgement)

Whether we do things for ‘ourselves’ or for ‘others’ , the same motive applies, the need to maintain integration and consistency of meaning. None of us can become altruistic, generous, selfless, sharing unless we can find a way to integrate the alien other into ourselves. This isnt a moral achievement , but an intellectual one.

Exactly! At least, this is the sort of thing I'm going for.

The moral achievement is in the doing.

Intellectually speaking we can see that the Other is always radically alterior, and as such my own elemental projections of what the psyche is aren't always going to apply. The intellectual achievement is in coming to be able to distinguish between self and other (collectively?) and realizing that Alterity, Otherness, is not the same as badness -- it's discomforting, but a mature, moral sense of self emerges from recognition of this alterity and giving it moral weight in our deliberations.

Yes! though I'm hesitant with "conflict" because, in some sense, we are all of these at once -- the contraries conflict with one another: I am guilty and innocent ,and comprehend each emotional moment within some frame of evaluation. But I am the one who feels the conflict and am this conflict. In some sense I am both-and.


Or, to use a less-moralized emotion than guilt, if a song triggers anxiety, I am the anxiety now, the memory of anxiety past, and the present knowledge that this anxiety isn't related to anything but the song which happened to be playing during a traumatic event. The attachment is to a very powerful memory which, in turn, triggers the psychosomatic associations of a panic attack.

No one thinks someone who undergoes a panic attack is culpable, exactly, for that panic attack, which is why I'm bringing it up as an analogy to the lines of thinking on guilt that I'm attempting here. I'm suggesting that guilt trips are similar to panic attacks, and that these sorts of events suggest that emotions need not be attached to some rational basis. These emotions can be Pavlovian, where the bell is rung and so one feels guilt (and so a guilt-tripper moves in to ask for something to relieve the guilt)

Of course they can be sensible. When I feel guilty because I've done something I believe to be wrong then I go about and attempt to rectify it, and have no problem with such feelings -- they make perfect sense. But this is a different sort of guilt than what I mean -- it's a sensible guilt based in relationships with others, whereas I'm thinking our emotional lives, while they can develop into these communal and loving relationships, also can develop into irrational brambles and strange, senseless shapes.

And why shouldn't you do what you want? A question that should be taken seriously. — Banno

Indeed. I think that's our first morality. We do what we want to do, more often than not.

Sometime down the line we may want to care for others, though. Or at least want more than one thing and have to make a choice.

Generally I think there are moral sentiments we're attached to, and so (attempt to) enact.

But what those moral sentiments are for an individual -- I'm hesitant to say much. It'd be more beneficial for me to know what an individual believes than what I believe. If we're thinking ethically then already I think that's the viewpoint we've adopted, in some sense. Suddenly there's more to the world than me and my wants, and even though I do not want something it may still be important to me.

And that's when ethics becomes an interesting endeavor: Suddenly I have deliberations and choices not just about what I want, but also others' desires (including different moral sentiments)

I’m not inclined to separate guilt as physiological arousal
or somatic sensation from guilt as cognitive assessment. I think the former are meaningless without understanding their basis in the latter. If guilt , or emotion in general is irrational, then rationality itself is irrational. — Joshs

I'm not opposed to that conclusion.

I think that the somatic response is meaningless, though it's also always connected to some cognitive judgment that brings it meaning.

We try to make sense of these feelings, but ultimately it's our culture around us which helps us to make sense of them -- it's the village we're a part of where sense is made, and it's pre-made for us -- there's already a long history of guilt established and judged of when one ought to feel guilty and when one ought not to feel guilty.

I believe the basis of affect is the assessments that come from our attempts at sensemaking, the extent to which we are able to experience events as intelligible, recognizable, coherent with our aims. Emotion is the barometer that indicates whether we are falling into hole of confusion or confidently assimilating events. Whether a culture invokes guilt or not, an individual will not experience guilt unless they perceive their actions to violate their standards for themselves, regardless of whether this conforms to society’s expectations and norms. Guilt is a crisis of identity that is triggered whenever we discover that our actions dont conform to what we consider our values to be. Guilt is an emotion reflecting the growing pains of personal transformation. To make any significant change in one’s outlook is to risk feelings of guilt.

I suppose that doesn't make sense of trigger-events, to me.

There is a rational guilt, we could say -- a guilt with a story attached and what that means for myself in relation to others (or God) -- but any emotion, guilt or otherwise, can be elicited by any trigger. We aren't rational by default, but grow into those roles through our communal stories of what a rational individual does.

I think I'm tempted by a notion that how we feel can be given a name -- and so separated at least conceptually -- but that feeling can be attached to anything. (been trying to think through a philosophy of emotion recently, and it's fairly rough); in a sense who we are just is these attachments. Without attachment there'd be no reason to do anything at all, and when our attachments change so do we.

Guilt can be elicited through these stories due to our cultural rituals surrounding acts being blameworthy or priaseworthy, but the story that comes from the guilt isn't the guilt. Our culture invokes guilt in particular circumstances as a means for teaching people to be good (or obedient, or whatever) and the stories arise from that basic manipulation. The particular circumstances of ones own guilt is the narrative, but guilt is an emotional response from an attachment of some kind (the attachment could be as simple as "See clouds:Feel guilt:Explain guilt" -- it needn't make rational sense for the guilt to be there.)

Now, a lot of us happen to have mothers, and parents have an enormous amount of power over children, so it's little wonder that parents influence how children grow (for better or worse), and furthermore that since we're a sexual species it ought not be surprising that children are sexual, too. I give that much to Freud.

And here:

Whatever one does in the light of their understanding of others' outlooks may be regarded as their role. In guilt, our falling away from another we care for could be spoken of as an alienation of oneself from oneself. When we feel we have failed another, we mourn our mysterious dislocation from a competence or value which we associated ourselves with. One feels as if “having fallen below the standards [one has] erected for himself”

It follows from this that any thinking of guilt as a `should have, could have' blamefulness deals in a notion of dislocation and distance, of a mysterious discrepancy within intended meaning, separating who we were from who we are in its teasing gnawing abyss. — Joshs

I think this is a good story, too. Though it's not the guilt, per se, since guilt can be attached to anything at all -- though these are the common sorts of stories which people feel are right about guilt (and I'm not sure any of them are wrong, exactly, though perhaps overgeneralized)

So I'm attached to an image of myself as a good person and furthermore that image is attached to guilt whenever what I do does not match that image within this particular ethical framework where guilt is attached to principle or character.

But guilt could also be attached in other ways, naturally. "Guilt" seems almost like a basic emotion in the same way I'd be tempted to call "red" a basic color -- it's a feeling on the tapestry of consciousness, but it can be configured in so many ways.

Yes, Mummy only says "be good for Mummy" when she has assigned 'badness'. In fact you have it backwards; one is told to be good, and thereby learns to assign guilt to oneself. Because if one was good, one would not need to be told. Children are helpless and dependent on people who assign them to be ... — unenlightened

I'm not so sure. Guilt need not be so narratively driven -- it can be triggered by any number of events and memories, and need not make any kind of sense. I can feel my guilt is unjustified, because I know that the person guilt-tripping me is eliciting a response -- I still feel the guilt, but that doesn't mean I'm really sorry or think of myself as not-good or needing-to-be-good.