I notice you keep saying emotions this emotions that but I never mentioned emotions or anything to that effect. "Just cuz" doesn't translate to emotions. You and I believe that A + B = B + A just cuz, there is not further explanation. — khaled

Sorry, I misunderstood you. I thought your “just cuz” was supposed to indicate an emotional reaction.

Anyway, A+B=B+A is an axiom that’s not derived from a previous premise, that’s true, but it doesn’t mean it can’t be explained and that all you can say is “just cuz”. Put an apple and an orange on a table, the apple to the left and the orange to the right. Now, reshuffle them and place the orange to the left instead. You will see that the same fruits are still on the table, the weight is the same and the colors haven’t changed. That’s an illustration of A+B=B+A. If the student still doesn’t agree or understand, I could do it even more slowly and elaborate until he gets it.

I think if someone could have blinked and saved the world from nuclear armageddon, but chose not to do so, he is completely not at fault (provided of course he didn't cause the armageddon) — khaled

I’m really curious how you would justify that. If you knew that one blink of your eye would prevent an armageddon, but you refused to blink, that would be an extremely immoral behavior according to my understanding of morality. I could argue for it, but I want to hear your explanation first.

How can you do a favor to NOTHING? — khaled

True, but I was just turning around your argument. The same applies to what you’re saying. How can you harm nothing?

Most people would have chosen to be born, or don’t you think so?
— Congau
That question makes no sense. If there are "people" then they've already been born, they can't choose to not have been born. — khaled

Well, some people sometimes say: “I wish I had never been born”. If that’s possible, one could also say: “I’m glad I was born”. I think most people would choose the second sentence.

Well, I don’t believe any ethical demands are valid from an objective standpoint. Ethical demands fail to take into account the perspective of the person to whom you are making these demands. So at best, what you refer to as an ‘ethical demand’ is merely an expression of an ethical perspective. A sound ethical system in my book would enable you to understand why someone would choose to do what they shouldn’t, and to guide them towards doing what they should - without requiring you to do what you shouldn’t. Otherwise, how can it be the truth? — Possibility

It’s exactly because it’s valid from an object standpoint that it can be called a demand. It’s not my subjective understanding of what is happening to person about to make an ethical choice that makes up the demand. I may be wrong so I’m not making any demands, only the ethical system that I subscribe to is making demands. If I support a system that demands Thou shalt not lie (just an example), I’m only saying that if x is a lie, you shouldn’t tell x. I’m not making a judgment about whether x is actually a lie in a particular situation, so I’m not making a concrete demand on you.

A sound ethical system, in my opinion, should do exactly what you are saying, namely take into account the perspective of the actor. I don’t know what makes a person choose to act a certain way, so I have no right to judge or demand anything in a concrete case. All I can say is that IF x, y and z are the case, then the ethical system I subscribe to demands action A to be taken.

This thread is about the distinction between positive and negative ethics and my claim is that negative ethics (the system, not a mere person like myself) can make demands, whereas positive ethics is mostly restricted to make recommendations.

So am I to understand that your aim is to convince others to subscribe to a system of behaviour that is limited by such demands - but not because those demands correspond to any broader understanding of reality? The important thing for you is not to approach reality or truth, as such, but that the system of behaviour is adhered to - that one’s perspective of reality must be limited by what is ‘right’, and one must ignore, isolate or exclude what is ‘wrong’ according to these stated limitations. — Possibility

Of course the demands must correspond to a broader understanding of reality. Any ethical system worthy of the name is based on a perceived truth. I would naturally try to convince people to subscribe to my understanding of reality since I believe it’s the truth (if I didn’t believe that, I wouldn’t have that understanding) and follow the commands that I think belong to a sound ethical system. I’m quite sure you do the same and even people who never tell others directly what they shouldn’t do, have a perception of valid ethical demands.


What if I could do something that would cost me a negligible effort but be extremely beneficial for you, wouldn’t it be bad if I didn’t do it? Suppose I couldn’t ask you if you agreed, but I was pretty sure you would, do you really think I shouldn’t do it? If I have no one to ask but my own judgment, what else can I do than what I think is best for you?
This is the situation for someone who chooses to procreate. They think they are doing their unborn child a favor, and in most cases they probably are. Most people would have chosen to be born, or don’t you think so?

By defining the doing of the ‘don’t’ as ‘wrong’, given that it doesn’t prevent the doing, what do you hope to achieve? — Possibility

If people agree that it is an ethical requirement to act in a certain way, the demand has achieved its purpose. All precepts of negative ethics are demands (not my demands but demands that the followers of a system subscribe to). Whenever there’s a “don’t” and the followers know it, they are not in doubt that they should abstain from doing it.
Positive ethics, on the other hand, often deals with recommendations instead of demands. Then the followers don’t necessarily have to act in a particular way.
Sometimes, however, also positive ethics uses demands that must be obeyed. (“Honor thy father” for example).

I don't think you can do that forever. I think there will be premises you can't take back further. Example: A + B = B + A. Try to take that one back further — khaled

Everyone would agree with that, right? No, need to take it further back. (And if they don’t, well, I’d be wasting my time talking to them anyway.)
A+B = B+A is an example of a logical axiom. It’s definitely not just my emotions that make me believe in it.

What if someone claimed that he lived in heaven before he was born? — khaled

I could come up with an answer to that too, which would be pretty much along the same lines as the previous answer, and I’m sure you could produce a strawman objection to that too, but what’s the point? I have never heard anyone claim something like that. For any realistic conversation I have now produced a first premise that people would agree with.

if negative ethics includes both ‘don’t harm others’ and ‘don’t use force’, then wouldn’t you need to allow one to be violated in order to uphold the other in this situation? — Possibility

There’s no reason to equate negative ethics with rule ethics. Whenever I judge that for whatever reason you would be doing something morally wrong if you did x, I claim that I have the right to demand that you abstain. “Demand” doesn’t always amount to much, though, I’m merely using the word to distinguish it from a mere recommendation. I by no means think I have the right to use force against you every time you transgress ever so little. I could say “don’t lie to your spouse about your whereabouts last night”. In a sense I can demand that you don’t, even though it’s not really my business and quite frankly I don’t care. In fact, I probably shouldn’t even tell you so to your face, but I would still call it a demand. My dictionary doesn’t mention anything about force in connection with “demand”. “Demand” can be used when it’s imperative that you do x (or don’t do) whereas “recommendation” is for cases where there are also other possibilities. In negative ethics the “don’t” indicates that there is no other possibility, doing it would be plain wrong. In positive ethics the “do” is not the only possibility. (It would be good to give your money to charity, but it would also be good to spend it on your child’s education.)

The first premise of the argument is not a random belief. It’s something so obvious that everyone agrees on it.
— Congau
I'm highly skeptical of the use of "everyone" there. First off how do you know it's everyone? — khaled

The point was to show that I’m basing my argument on something more than just “this is something I just feel like” or “just because”. I start with a premise that seems so obvious to me that I think everyone would agree with it. If the person I’m talking to still doesn’t agree, I’m taking yet another step backwards until we find a common point of agreement.

"No one has a headstart on anyone else" does not logically translate to "no one has the right to make demands". — khaled

I only roughly outlined my argument here. It’s in the middle of the reasoning process, and that’s exactly where you can attack me if you find my conclusion implausible, not at the first premise.

if they had a previous life, we don’t know about it
— Congau
Someone might claim they do. How do you prove them wrong? — khaled

In that case he would disagree with my first premise and I’d have to take a step back. I’d say, ok, maybe you think you know that, but if the person had had a previous life, he would actually have been a different person in that life. If Peter used to be the prince of Persia in his previous life, that prince would have been something different from the current Peter. This Peter started when he was born. Do you agree? If he does, we have found a common basis, if he doesn’t, I have to make another effort. Again, it is not just an emotion that I have.

Oh so at least we're considering it a gamble now. Good. This is honestly further than most people are willing to give for antinatalism.
Can I buy a house with your money without telling you? — khaled

If life is almost always worth living, there isn’t much of a gamble. If the odds were a million to one to win a big prize, I think I’d be justified to gamble with your money (especially if you didn’t have much money anyway). What are the odds that the unborn life will not be completely miserable? It’s up to you to judge.

they’re doing nothing commendable by their passivity. — Possibility

Of course they’re doing nothing commendable by their passivity. I have already said that such a passive life is not a virtuous and moral life. It only escapes the demands of negative ethics but not the recommendations of positive ethics.

This ignorance is what is ‘wrong’. The delivery boy could get beaten by suppliers every time he has to pick up the delivery - they won’t know that or be able to do anything to prevent it if they don’t interact. — Possibility

For all we know, we may be in the same situation. Although we are more aware than that vegetable-like person, a lot of things escape us, and we could always make an effort to be more aware. Who knows what you might have done to the delivery boy last time you ordered something.

An effective positive ethics, in my view, has a corresponding negative ethics and vice versa - but neither gives us the right to make demands on people. — Possibility

In negative ethics we have indeed the right to make demands. I have the right to demand that you don’t murder your next door neighbor, even though I don’t know you nor your neighbor. I don’t have the means to prevent you or punish you, but the abstract right to demand is not dependent on that. If I caught you when you were about to commit the murder, I would have the right to stop you, don’t you agree?
You couldn’t say: “I’m a free person so you have no right to stop me or demand that I refrain from murdering.”
However, since you are a free person, I can’t demand that you do what is recommended by positive ethics. I can’t demand that you give money to charity for example.

Agreed. But every argument has to have premises. And at some stage you can no longer break the premises down into other arguments. At that point it is a matter of opinion. I'm saying that positive vs negative ethics is one of those irreducible presmises. Just keep asking "Why do you believe this" and eventually you'll have to answer "Just cuz" — khaled

The first premise of the argument is not a random belief. It’s something so obvious that everyone agrees on it. (And if they don’t you can go even further back until they agree.)

Let’s take my argument about positive ethics as an example. I’m saying that we can’t make concrete demands about what people must do, only that they abstain from doing. Why? Because everyone is born equal and therefore no one has an initial right to demand anything from any other.
Why do I say that people are born equal? Because either they were all nothing before they were born, or if they were something, if they had a previous life, we don’t know about it. Therefore no one has a head start on anyone and so no one has a right to make demands.

You see, I never said “just because”. The argument goes back to an obvious first premise (we don’t know about any previous life)
Of course everyone still wouldn’t agree with me, but that’s because they think they find a fault somewhere in the middle of the argument and not at the first premise.

So it's fine if I gamble with your money without consent? After all you COULD win. I think that if an action risks harming someone else and there is no good incentive to take said action then it is wrong. Even if there is a chance the person in question benefits — khaled

If you have a positive view of life, you will think there’s a greater chance that the unborn child will be more benefited than harmed by life. Then you don’t consider it a great gamble.

Having said that the utterly passive life is not a moral life, implies that it has a negative impact on the world. But you can’t pinpoint exactly what that person is doing wrong. He could for example have worked for the poor in the slum, painted his neighbor’s house, played music to cheer people up or an infinite number of other possibilities. Positive ethics doesn’t specify what is wrong. There are no specific demands.

The passive person doesn’t cause suffering directly and that’s why we can only reproach him through positive ethics (without making specific demands). He produces garbage, like everyone else, but no one in particular suffers because of that. Besides you and I produce garbage too, are we doing something immoral then? Yes and no, indirectly, but what exactly are we doing wrong. We could certainly reduce our consumption, but how much is it reasonable to expect from us. It is open-ended, non-specific and thus no absolute demands can be made.

Contributing to suffering is not the same as causing suffering. If you are one out of millions of people who hurt the environment with your garbage, in this respect no one suffers because of your existence. If you dump garbage in your neighbor’s back yard, your neighbor suffers because of you. In the first instance we can only encourage caution (positive ethics), in the second we demand that you stop (negative)

So asking "what justifies a positive ethics" is ultimately only answerable by "because it makes sense to me" — khaled

There’s never an independent third-party judge to settle anything, but that doesn’t mean we can’t make objectively reasonable arguments.
Imagine two scientists arguing whether the Earth is round or flat. No one can settle that discussion for them, but I for one believe, based on thoroughly convincing arguments, that the Earth is round. I arrive at conclusions about ethics in the same way, through convincing arguments. There’s no difference.

the sufferer not existing at the time the action was caused is irrelevant, the end result is the same, someone got hurt — khaled

I was referring to procreation as such. You don’t know if the future child will predominantly suffer or be happy, so procreation as such is not bad.

A government, king, authority, etc CAN still demand it — Possibility

I meant of course “can” as in “having the moral right to”.

A person who does absolutely nothing is not far off dead. In the meantime, their very existence - breathing in and out the way they do, consuming oxygen and energy, displacing air, etc - can be seen by some as inadvertently causing suffering, depending on your perspective. If you exist and do not make effective use of the suffering you will cause just in choosing to live, by finding something to do that will offset your unavoidably negative impact on the universe, then what are you still doing here, and why make more like you? — Possibility

“Negative impact on the universe” is really something so minuscule that it doesn’t count. Besides, you can only cause individuals to suffer not the universe in general.
If you avoided all interaction with other people, lived on a deserted island or isolated in house (say you had a fortune and paid a landlord and a delivery boy, making them happy), it would be possible to live without causing suffering, but it wouldn’t be a good and a moral life. We can’t demand (meaning we don’t have the moral right to demand) that that person does something specific. In positive ethics we can only make general recommendations, many things would be good to do, but none of them is necessary. For negative ethics we can (have the moral right to) make very specific demands: Don’t kill Peter! Don’t do A!

Again, some people genuinely disagree with this. They believe that just being born is grounds for making demands of someone. Again, I agree with you but you can't say anything justifies either of our beliefs other than a shared sense of empathy (or whatever you wanna call it). There is no objective basis for this stuff. — khaled

Of course we can say there is something that justifies our beliefs. Whenever we make a philosophical argument attempting to be rational and logical, that’s our justification. Sure, another person would disagree and present logical arguments for his views, and since there is no third-party judge we can never settle once and for all who is ultimately right, but that doesn’t mean there’s no justification. If you think everything is just emotional bias, there’s no reason to do philosophy. (This goes beyond this thread, though, and would merit a separate thread.)

The reason some people think that we can demand something from everyone, that is, that everyone has duties, is probably because they observe that in real life everyone lives in some kind of society of which they have indirectly chosen to be a member. They unavoidably get involved with others and thereby it’s demanded that they somehow pay back. This starts happening shortly after birth, but not at birth, but since it happens so early it may look like the demands are given as a consequence of birth. Therefore, I maintain that a demand that is derived from birth is illogical. (It’s not just an emotional reaction on my part.)

The procreational decision is the only one where we can perfectly prevent harm without any collateral damage. Someone might say here that if you are supposed to help alleviate suffering, and then cause suffering, then why not the same for procreation? — schopenhauer1

The procreational decision would be much the same as any other well-meaning act that also may cause collateral damage, wouldn’t it? The only difference is that procreation is not in itself good or bad since the potential sufferer or happy person is not yet existing. If you think life in general is more well-being than suffering, at least procreation can’t be that bad.

From the outset, we can’t demand that anyone does anything, but we can demand that they abstain from doing.
— Congau
Why not and why? I agree with you but not everyone does. — khaled

A person has not chosen his birth therefore it would be very unfair to make demands just because he has been born. On the other hand, if you apply for a membership in a club, they can make demands on you as a condition for membership. Then you can choose if you accept it or not.

We can demand that a person involuntarily born abstains from doing since other people who also happen to have been born are present and from the plain fact of birth no one takes precedence. From that common starting point, we can’t allow that anyone takes up space at the expense of others. It can only be allowed later when more facts are added.

You can demand that people pay taxes, for instance. — Possibility

No, you can’t demand that people pay taxes if they have never worked. If a person chooses to be a vegetable, you can’t demand anything from him.

From the outset, we can’t demand that anyone does anything, but we can demand that they abstain from doing.

The ideal amount of suffering that a person should cause is zero – an absolute specific number. There is no ideal amount of well-being to be caused. We can only say “the more the better”. However high a number you make (for example the number of people you have made happy in any way) you can always make it higher, and you will never get closer to any perceived perfection.

Causing zero suffering can conceivably be a duty. You will fall short, but at least you will know when you have transgressed. It wouldn’t make sense to claim that we have a duty to cause as much well-being as possible. You would never come any closer to having fulfilled this duty.

Ethics by no means stops at negative ethics. A person who does absolutely nothing, is not a good person although he doesn’t cause any suffering. Also, when actively doing something to promote well-being, there will inevitably be missteps on the way that will cause suffering, but it is to be hoped that the suffering will be much less significant than the well-being.

There are many words that defy a clear definition, eg species, yet this does not mean that they are not useful terms. — A Seagull

Not only are there many words that defy a clear definition, most words do. (Even very simple words. What’s the exact difference between a shoe and a boot, for example)

The special problem with “ownership” is that it has a very clear legal definition. It is artificially clear, in fact, since legal language has to make up clear definitions that don’t necessarily exist in natural languages. The legal definition of ownership has then been transferred back to the natural language and we now tend to believe that that is its real meaning.

The definition would be something like: “Ownership is the legal right to control an object.” That is also probably what we mean in daily language when we say we own something. “I own my car” means I (and no one else) has the legal right to control this car. I can’t say “I own my wife” since I have no legal right to control her.

But if there were no state and government this definition would be meaningless, and the question was what ownership really means. Would there be no ownership if there were no state? Well, there is no definition of ownership at all outside of the state, so that means that ownership doesn’t really exist as a natural quality.

Ownership can unambiguously exist only when it is defined and protected by the state through its laws. But let’s say the state dissolved itself or abolished all property laws by the stroke of a pen, would ownership then cease to exist? If so, then ownership is as artificial as the state and it’s meaningless to say (as Locke does) that the state was established to protect property since property didn’t exist before the state.

Outside of the state ownership only signifies a varying degree of association with a person, and the possessive pronoun is used to indicate such associations. My hand, my clothes, my car, my child, my wife, my country. If we disregard state laws and any preconceived ethics, there is no reason to assign ownership only to some of those items and not to all or none.

Your body parts are closer to you and therefore more yours than anything else. The clothes you are wearing are more yours than the ones in your closet. The house you are living in more than the one you are renting out.

Your wife may be closer to you than your car and therefore more yours. Does that mean that you own your wife? You may answer that you don’t have the right to control your wife, but aside from law and ethics there are no rights, so ownership can’t be evaluated in those terms.

It could perhaps be assessed according to degree of attachment you feel to an object. What would hurt you more, the loss of your car or your wife? The answer would be what is more yours.

In any case, “ownership” is a very elusive term, and outside of the state it’s not possible to define it. That means it doesn’t really exist, right?

You dont seem to think anything has intrinsic value, is that correct? — DingoJones

Yes, that’s what I’m saying. Nothing can have intrinsic value, it’s nonsensical, I don’t even know what it would mean. Something is supposed to have value even though no one wants it. That is, it’s valuable without being valued. That is, it is valuable even though it’s not valuable. A = not A is obviously a fallacy.

When you say that happiness has intrinsic value, the meaning of “intrinsic” is different. We want happiness because we want it itself, not because we want to use it to gain something else. We certainly want it, it’s the thing we want the most, so it’s extremely valuable. The other things that some say have intrinsic value (in a different sense) no one may want at all, and then it can’t be valuable.

I used the comatose person as an example of case where it is possible for a life to have no value. But sure, if someone for whatever reason still values that thing in a vegetative state, even that has value.
You see, although I don’t think life has intrinsic value, I do think it has value in most cases, so it’s a little difficult to come up with an example of when it hasn’t. Like I said earlier, something, a life, can have value for itself, being appreciated by itself, and that’s not the same as intrinsic value.

I had included a caveat, the subject is society at large. So your points about the “self subject” or “someone subject” dont really address the question. — DingoJones

You set up two possibilities: Life having intrinsic value (it being sacred) or life having value through merit (for society at large). My purpose (and conviction) was to deny both of them as a source of value, but I was still trying to answer the question how a life may have value. In my view, the only way anything can have value is as an object towards a subject. “Self subject” as you call it, someone appreciating himself as an object is one possibility, so it does address the question.

Also, you end up broadening the scope to include the value we place on anything at all. Of course you are welcome to do that but it negates my question, its moot at that point isnt it? — DingoJones

Broadening the scope may seem irrelevant to your question, but I did it to illustrate the nature of value. There is nothing fundamentally different about valuing a life and valuing anything else.

Also, your last sentence contradicts at least some of what you said. By your own standards that person in a coma can have value to someone else, could it not? It cannot also be true that the coma person has no value — DingoJones

The coma person can have no value when the intrinsic value of life is denied. That person, or rather that thing, can have no value for anyone for what it is. Someone may think it is valued when confusing it with the person it used to be or for having the false hope that it will wake up, but it is hardly possible to value the coma person for just what it is. (Unless you want to imagine some perverted reason.)

I’d say: Life has no intrinsic value and its value is not based on merit either.

“Value” always means that something is appreciated by something else or by itself. It is wanted by something or someone. (Money is valuable because we want it.) The object that has value needs a subject, therefore nothing can have intrinsic value.

The life of an evil person is at least appreciated by himself. (The object has an appreciating subject even though they happen to be identical. It’s not the same as intrinsic value.) Therefore, his life has some value and if there’s no other compelling reason to kill him, it would be wrong to kill him.

Any organism, any human or animal life, and even plant life has the potential of being valued/appreciated. But not only that, an artificial organism, a machine that is, or even a thing has the potential of being valued. That simply means that we shouldn’t destroy anything if we have no particular reason to do it. Everything is somehow valuable.

Now of course there would be hierarchy of things depending on how strong a capacity they have for being appreciated, and there’s good reason to believe that a human being usually has a stronger capacity for that than an animal or a worm or a cup. Therefore, human life is usually very valuable, but not always. A person in a coma who will never wake up, has no value.

Populism is nothing new. In any election anywhere in the Western world there have always been attempts at exploiting the simplicity of the voters by inventing external threats and promising quick solutions to complicating problems.

The antipole of populism is always the establishment and its attraction is stability. People don’t get overly excited by it, but their conservative instinct make them lean towards what they already know.

These two opposing mechanisms are always present in a population. The establishment will normally have the upper hand until a time of crisis occurs or until it has exhausted its internal potential.

In all mature democracies we see how the established parties gradually move towards the middle where most of the voters are found. The major parties then become increasingly similar and that may cause an existential crisis within them. Why fight for one particular party or candidate when the others are almost the same? Enthusiasm wanes and more extreme populists take advantage of that.

This has been a gradual process in European countries during the last decades as most of them have seen the rise of populist parties.

In America there has always been a stronger element of populism within the established parties, which until recently kept full blown populism at bay. However, it was always latent, and with the accidental arrival of Trump, its potential was exploited.

Those are the formal demands at the moment (at first it was only the extradition issue) but obviously such dry formalities alone could not ignite this amount of popular support. The demonstrators are anti-Chinese just like Catalonians are anti-Spanish and some Scots are anti-English, but at least they possess enough realism not to seek outright independence.

Not all civil battles are won, just as not all military battles are won. But if the goal is sufficiently worthwhile, it is worth the risk of failure — Bitter Crank

I strongly hold that no battle, civil or military, should be fought if there’s no chance of winning it. That would be the same as deliberately causing misery and achieving no good, the very definition of an immoral act from a utilitarian standpoint.

If the situation in Hong Kong were so miserable that there was really nothing to lose, resistance out of sheer desperation could be permissible. The Uighurs in Xinjiang may be in such a position, but the people of Hong Kong are not that bad off. They have more civil liberties than mainland Chinese and materially they are far from desperate.

Your lickity-boot approach only makes sense if nothing much is at stake. — Bitter Crank

If those demands were really what it is all about, there wouldn’t be much at stake. It makes no sense to risk getting yourself crushed just to make sure that prisoners can stay in your local jail. Evidently that’s not the real issue.
What’s at stake then? Either nothing much or something utterly Utopian and for that they risk losing what they already have.

Why are they demonstrating in Hong Kong when defeat is certain? The Chinese government will soon step in and crush the uprising, and then nothing will be left of it. Beijing’s grip will be tighter than ever before, and not only will the demonstrators have gained nothing, they will be left with less than they had. That is the most likely scenario.

So why are they doing it? Is it possible to defend an action, any action, that is overwhelmingly likely to fail?

They are fighting against windmills. No, worse, they are risking utter defeat to fight someone who can’t be defeated. Is that ever permissible?

Even if you are fighting for a good cause, it’s unethical to fight if you risk great casualties and there’s no chance of winning.

Maybe if your life were intolerable anyway, such suicidal behavior could be excused, but that was hardly the case in Hong Kong.

Hong Kong has much more political freedom than the rest of China, and that is not the real issue in this conflict. They simply want more independence from the mainland – a wish that is completely unrealistic.

In the West we enjoy giving support to principles, especially when they have no substance.

Progress means improvement, that something gets better.
Human progress in general means that human life in general gets better.
The only thing that can make human life good, is happiness. (The only thing that is good in itself, that is, the only thing that is not wanted for the sake of anything else, is happiness. See Aristotle)
So, to ask if there has been real progress in human history is to ask whether humanity is happier today than before.

Development in science and technology does not in itself make us happier. The more technologically advanced we get the more the demands and expectations increase. Improved transportation, for example, means that we can go farther and faster, but it also means that we need to get go farther and faster. More opportunities only cause more needs, and we remain on the same level of happiness/unhappiness.

The only improvement that has unambiguously contributed to human happiness, is the progress in medical science. Many diseases can now be cured and physical suffering alleviated. Increased longevity means that there is less sorrow caused by the premature loss of loved ones.

All other candidates for progress are such that for every advantage you can name a disadvantage.

You shouldn’t call people just anything. They like to be called by a name they like. That’s true, but there’s a big difference between addressing someone and referring to someone. When you address someone, you should certainly be careful what name you choose. A person may not like to be addressed as Peter when he wishes to be called Paul. But when we are referring to people, talking about them and not to them, it’s completely irrelevant what they might think. If Peter has recently changed his name to Paul, we may still think of him by his former name and it’s therefore more convenient for us to continue to refer to him as Peter.

The only requirement when choosing a word is that it is understood in the same way by speaker and listener. If the person Peter/Paul comes more readily to mind when we refer to him as Peter, then Peter is the name we should use.

Inventing new pronouns only makes communication more difficult. We already have a common reference, we know who the pronoun is pointing to, and that’s all we need.

Referring to people is no different than referring to chairs and rocks. Only the people conversing should have a say in what is said.

We may question if the behavior of crows and other animals can really be called rational, and if it can, it may be possible to construct an alternative definition of rationality that only includes the human kind of rationality.

Rationality, or intelligence, deals with the recognition of patterns. The ability to recognize two objects as identical, may not be based on pattern recognition at all, but just the ability to spot the plain reappearance of an object. Maybe the crows identified a distinct smell or sound for example, and that made the masks irrelevant.

The crows’ problem-solving ability, if it’s reality that and not an instinct, is probably of a very specific kind that cannot be transferred to many areas. The pattern recognition is very limited, whereas for humans, even stupid humans, recognition can be applied to a vast area. Now, is this an essential distinction or just a matter of degree?

If the capacity for “philosophical thought” is the distinctive feature, the term must be interpreted very liberally so that it includes all humans. There may for example be a human “philosophical” sense of self-awareness that goes beyond the mere recognition of oneself in the mirror.

The extended sense of purpose, of seeing one’s own life in perspective, may be another such “philosophical” ability that the most simpleminded human has, but not a crow.

This “philosophical” ability is also pattern recognition above the crow level, and if you think it’s an essential difference (not just by degree), we could call it rationality proper and maintain that that is the distinctive feature of human beings.

I suppose when you’re asking what something is like, you’re asking about its essential characteristics. Humans come in different colors, black, white or yellow, and never green and purple, but that’s hardly an essential observation. They are two-legged, but so are birds. They lack fur, but so do frogs.

What distinguishes humans from any other creature is their rationality. That’s the one essential feature. If something is rational, it’s a human.

However, small infants are hardly rational, but are called humans. Well, they have the potentiality for rationality. But then, what about severally mentally handicapped… humans?

I could suggest this definition: A human is a rational creature or the offspring of rational creatures.
(If I were talking to an alien who was also rational, I would have to add: …and an inhabitant of planet earth.)

But is that really how we think about humans? While walking around town today, I saw many humans, and quite frankly I don’t know for sure if any of them were rational. Still, by looking at them I jumped to the conclusion that they were humans. That means, it’s not rationality that makes us identify something as human. Nevertheless, rationality remains the essential feature, if only we can focus on what is essential…

I’m not so concerned about what a person is and whether a fetus is a person. Whatever name you give it, it doesn’t change the argument. It’s enough to say that it will be something and that something is considered valuable. (That again is valuable because it has the potential of remaining valuable.)

Something is valuable when it has the potential of being appreciated. That is really the basic meaning of value. Money is valuable because we appreciate it and want it. Intrinsic value is a rather dubious concept, because it is not supported by anything: It’s hanging in the air. Something must be valued by something to have value.

What would it mean that a person has intrinsic value? A person is a person according to certain criteria, and these criteria are supposed to make it valuable, but why? Because it has rights? What does that mean? Where are the rights coming from? A government can distribute rights, but it can do it in any arbitrary fashion. If it were decided that chairs and tables had rights, it would be so.

If people have value, it’s because they can be appreciated by others and by themselves. Dogs and chickens can also, but probably to a lesser degree and therefore they are less valuable.

That would imply people who have a terminal illness are less valuable — Echarmion

Exactly, it does imply that. Terminally ill people are less valuable because they don’t have any potential. If you were forced two kill one person, either one who only had an hour left live anyway or one who might have years ahead of him, I don’t doubt that you would kill the former. We value things for their potential more than for what they are at the moment. Would you pay a lot of money for something you knew would disappear tomorrow? Even our own lives are only valuable only because they have potential – because we expect to be alive tomorrow.

Your life has value as a specific potential, that is as the continuation of what is now you.

Things that have the potential of being valuable should be preserved. (because we want what is valuable, “valuable” means that we want it)
A person is already a thing and has the potential of being a person in the future, so it should therefore be preserved. (if you value persons)
A fetus is already a thing and has the potential of being a person in the future, so it should therefore be preserved. (if you value persons)
An egg and a sperm that are not combined are not a thing.

A thing that has potential is a thing that now exists, and has in itself, through continued existence, the potential of becoming a similar or a different thing. Any combination of elements that might be brought about in the future, is not a thing now.

It’s not a matter of potentiality as such, but of things that have potential.

It requires substantial effort on the part of the mother and her support folk in order to reach birth; and thereafter more effort is required for it to reach maturity. — Banno

Usually the mother will give birth to the baby unless she does something actively to abort it or it gets aborted by itself. Do you think she can just decide not to make the effort and then it will not be born? What are abortion clinics for then?

Granted, after the child is born it takes an effort to keep it alive. Does that mean it’s permissible to let it die? The newborn infant is not yet a person – it’s not a self-conscious rational thing. It’s only a potential.

imagine disk drive containing all the information to run this forum. It has the potential to become the forum. But of course, much more is needed — Banno

Your disk drive needs something added to it in a very different sense. The forum consists of the disk drive, a computer, different components, the internet, posts etc. A person doesn’t consist of a fetus, an infant, food, care, sleep, warm clothes etc.

how would you balance the real, undeniable personhood of the mother against the mere potential of the foetus? — Banno

What balance is there to make? The personhood of the mother is not threatened. If you let both live, both personhoods are secured. Of course, it is a different matter if the mother’s life is at risk. Then you need to sacrifice the one for the other. The emotionally natural thing to do would of course be to let the mother live, but not because the fetus is merely a potential. You already know the mother, and anyone would sacrifice a stranger for someone known.

And eggs and sperm? — Banno

Eggs and sperm don’t have a potential for anything in particular. They are like bricks that can be used for anything or nothing. There would be nothing bad about throwing away a rock you found lying about even though that rock could be used for building a house or making a statue or whatever, but it would certainly be bad to walk into a building site and throw away a rock that was being used as a brick for a house in progress.

A fetus at its earliest stage already contains all the data of the fully developed human being. The potential is real and specific.

It’s a shame to ruin anything that has the definite potential of becoming something valuable and especially when you know that it will be if only you leave it alone. You don’t destroy a work of art in progress if it looks promising, even if it hasn’t reached its finished form yet.

If you think it’s wrong to murder people because you think they are valuable in themselves, it would also be wrong to kill potential people.

Potentiality is no less valuable then actuality since what is actually existing also derives its value from its potential for continued existence.

Life, like anything else, does not really have value for what it is, but for what it will be. The only reason our lives have value is because we expect to be alive tomorrow. Large banknotes wouldn’t have any value if they were expected to burn the next instant.

A fetus has value because it is expected to become a human being like we are – a self-conscious thinking thing. Whether or not you want to call it a human being already, is irrelevant, since it is not valued for what it is.

A newborn baby is not a self-conscious thinking thing, but it should also be valued for what it will be. Why is it often considered wrong to kill a newborn baby, but not wrong to kill a fetus? They should both have the same moral status since they are both potentially self-conscious thinking things, but potentially only.

Any rules for when abortion should be allowed would be completely arbitrary. At any stage the fetus looks more like a human being than at the previous one, but so what? We may feel that the looks of it makes it more or less valuable, but that feeling has no rational basis.

Johnson may have been nominated by the Tory MPs, but since the ultimate responsibility was out of their hands, they don’t have any strong allegiance to him. That even happened to Theresa May, who was a moderate and could have been chosen under the old system of exclusive MP election as well. Since they were not uniquely responsible for giving her the power, they didn’t have to go along with her proposals. It’s quite unheard of in the history of British parliamentarism that MPs from the ruling party have consistently voted against their own prime minister, but now, with the change in the leadership election process, that has become possible.

The whips still have that power - hence the 20-odd expelled Tory MPs. — Tim3003

On the contrary, the expulsion of the twenty Tories proves the new impotence of the whip. In the past the whip had power because he could threaten consequences in case of non-abidance. There was no need to carry out the threat.

The fact that an MP rebellion is also seen in the Labour party and concerns issues that have nothing to do with Brexit, shows that the link between the MPs and their leaders has been severely weakened.

It’s being argued that power of Parliament has increased in the process, but the opposite is the case. Parliament, a body elected by the entire populace, used to have the sole power to appoint the prime minister, but now it has to share it with some random party members. When the PM came from Parliament only, that distinguished assembly had the ultimate responsibility for all government policy and thereby all the power.

No, the diminishing sense of party loyalty is not just about Brexit. It’s clearly seen regarding other issues as well, and in both parties. The Labour leader is also facing rebellion for different reasons, among them anti-Semitism. That would not have happened prior to 2015 when the leader was first directly elected by party members.

Party loyalty is not a basic instinct among MPs, it follows logically from what is at stake for them personally. When the leader was elected by them, they had to be loyal or else they would be responsible for the failure of their own favoured policy. Now they don’t have much to lose by voting against their leader since he was never their real leader in the first place.

In America there’s very little party loyalty and that’s not for any psychological reasons but simple because the election process is different. It’s a perpetual state of American politics and it’s not at all restricted to important issues. They don’t need to be loyal to their president. Now that the British PM has got his base removed from Parliament he has unfortunately become more like a president. A wedge has been driven between Westminster and Downing Street and its name is not Brexit.

It's a problem caused by the hung Parliament — Tim3003

No, the hung parliament is not the problem since many conservative MPs have also voted against the various deals proposed by May and Johnson. In the old days, when the prime minister was elected by parliament and not by party members, the whip had power and could force his MPs into line with their leader. It was in their own interest to support the PM from their own party even if they didn’t agree with him a hundred percent. Those days are gone. By introducing this foolish rule that the leaders must be directly elected by party members, the unintended consequence has been to turn the distinguished British parliament into a messy American Congress where every representative is on his own without responsibility for the overall functioning of government. No plan can be expected from a group of people without a common purpose and they certainly don’t feel obligated to support a leader they have not chosen themselves.

A hung parliament is uncommon in British politics, but it’s very common on the continent and even there the representatives almost always support the countries leader when he is from their own party. That’s the natural thing to do in a parliamentary democracy. Britain is not a parliamentary democracy anymore, but a strange American hybrid.

Not Johnson, he’s working for what he believes in
— Congau
What's that then? — Evil

A quick Brexit whatever the cost

How odd that parliament could pass a law that forced the prime minister to act against his deepest conviction. Has that ever happened before? Usually when the PM doesn’t have the backing of parliament on an important issue, he threatens to resign and then he either gets his will or parliament appoints another PM from its midst (or there’s reelection).

The whole messy Brexit process signifies a crisis of parliamentary democracy and the Westminster model. Because this PM was not elected by parliament but by party members, the assembly is not responsible for executive policy anymore, and therefore it can afford to act irresponsibly. Parliament doesn’t need a plan. It can now be perpetually destructive.

If this novum of direct election of the party leader had not been introduced, Britain would now have had a PM supported by parliament (like it has always had throughout its history) and his Brexit plan, whatever it had been, would have been accepted a long time ago.

As it now is, no one is to blame for the mess. Not Johnson, he’s working for what he believes in, and not parliament, it doesn’t need to believe in anything. The new unbritish system is to blame.

If a phenomenon is found in pretty much all cultures and more or less all human beings seem to have it, there is strong reason to believe that it is natural. But this is just inductive reasoning. One also needs a theory of psychology to argue for it, and of course many such theories exist. If you want final and conclusive evidence, you will not find that in any theory anyway, so I’m not sure I understand your ultimately problem. If there are convincing arguments that a certain preference belongs to universal human psychology, I see no reason why I wouldn’t believe it.

Now I’m sure there are psychological theories arguing that procreation, or the desire to produce offspring, is sufficiently prevalent in human psychology to make it more than just a personal or cultural preference. (It can also be supported by evidence from the animal kingdom.) You may still have a vague suspicion that it is culturally driven, but how much evidence do you need for anything?

Granted, no fine line can be drawn, but procreation would probably be found well inside realm of what is natural.

What crosses the boundary? That you never know. Exactly how much hair do you need to lose to be bald?

It depends on how generally or particularly you express the inclination in question. The wish for a maple tree in the front yard is a particular inclination, but the wish for beauty is a general one. The former is then personal and the latter is “natural”. But we see here that the same object can be both personal and natural depending on how you phrase it. I could say: I have a natural need for a maple tree because all human beings need beauty. It is thus consistent with human psychology to want that tree, and so it is natural. If, on the other hand, the sight the tree made me furious and homicidal, that would be an abnormal reaction and belong to abnormal psychology, and so it would not be natural. So even though both reactions may be seen as mere preferences, one is natural and the other is not.

“Natural” is whatever is consistent with human psychology.

I don’t see why animal survival instincts should be considered more strongly natural, unless we are restricted to the realm of biology. The philosophical notion of “natural” would probably include all psychology, but I think you are right in excluding contingent social norms.

You behave morally (according to your own moral system) because you have already decided that it’s the right thing to do. You do what you think is right because you think it’s right. It’s an obvious tautology.

But then there are those many cases when we know what we think is right, but still do the opposite. How is that possible? Well, there’s the weakness of the moment and the wish for instant gratification, but in that case, it’s recognized as an irrational slip, and it’s easy to dismiss it as such.

It’s odder when a person seems to admit that he did the wrong and immoral thing but adds that he doesn’t regret it and that he would do the same thing again. This is just a misunderstanding of language, however. He doesn’t mean to say that he actually finds his action wrong and immoral, but that other people do. What he in fact says is that he knows it goes against a moral system that he doesn’t subscribe to.

A person’s morality is what is right for him, and correctly understood it is also what he considers to be good for himself. A person of strict personal morality thinks that following his own precepts would be good for him (make him more satisfied) and considering that it’s not hard to see why a person might choose to act morally.

If there is no similarity between a transgression and the punishment for it, how can it be anything but arbitrary? How many years of imprisonment is equivalent to a murder? What’s the connection between imprisonment and murder anyway? Is it suffering paid with suffering? How is the suffering of imprisonment to be measured against the suffering caused by murder? There’s no likeness whatsoever.

As to what is reasonable, different societies at different times make very different conclusions about that. There is nothing inherent in the crime that makes one measure of punishment more reasonable than another. Therefore it is arbitrary when referred to the crime alone.

“Reasonable” is in reference to society, existing laws, custom and expectation. It is in the context of external circumstances. What kind of reaction is necessary in order to preserve the existing order and minimize future crimes? That’s the only relevant consideration that can make the conclusion reasonable or not.

Could you tell me what would be a reasonable punishment for murder, not in your society or in any other society in the world today, and not in any specific society at any specific time? The question is abstract and meaningless, and your answer would be arbitrary.

All forms of punishment are bad since they don’t fit the crime. What kind of basic sense of justice would suggest that a certain crime, robbing a bank or killing a man, is equivalent to x years in prison, a measured amount of torture or a stay in the pillory. Unless punishment is distributed according to the principle “an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth”, it’s completely arbitrary and offers no resemblance of what anyone might reasonably deserve. A god could perhaps perform the equation, but not a human being.

Still, we punish, and we have to. No other way has been found to make the members of an organized society conform to its demands. Without some sort of compulsion, it would be impossible to keep society from falling apart. It should therefore be the task of the legislator to find the balance of necessary evils. What would be the minimum amount of inherently unjust punishment necessary to keep social institutions alive and thriving?

With this in view we shouldn’t worry too much about someone being acquitted for a crime committed. The effect of punishment on the individual has vanished when the misdeed is already a fact, and justice will never be fulfilled anyway.

Objectifying other people normally means that we undervalue their likeness with ourselves. We probably assume that they are thinking and feeling beings, but we choose to ignore they feelings and their capability of getting hurt. That’s why we are rightly taught that it’s wrong to objectify others.

Are you giving the word a slightly different meaning then? You want to see a beloved person the way you look at a jewel, perhaps? Something that is simply valuable without any further explanation? Perhaps, but wouldn’t you ultimately have to go back to what is truly special about this person, that is her personality, her mind. You don’t have to think that through every time. You habitually react to her image, that is her object, and since you have already worked through the “subjectified”, true reason, for your love, you may not have to activate it every time. But that doesn’t mean that her subjectivity is not the real reason for you your love, does it?

What do you gain from this so-called objectifying? You actively put the appreciation of her inner qualities on a hold. Is that necessary? If your point is that we shouldn’t try to justify our affections all the time, you are probably right, though.