Alas, even philosophers get ill from time to time, and not just from consuming bad logic. Having read your comments on last night's blog posting, I'm getting the sense that a great many of you find ethical relativism appealing - and not just appealing, but right.
Ahhh....verrrry, verrry interesting.
I did note one or two minor hesitations: for example, Alyssa T.'s comment included the caveat "I do believe that there are some things, such as murder and rape, that are just plan [sic] wrong regardless of morals".
Now that you've all given serious thought to the issue, and come up with your very best reasons for believing as you do, here's tonight's prompt for your (HW) comments:
Maybe I'm missing something, but it seems to me that, if I accept ethical relativism, I should allow everyone to "do their own thing," and my having a different (moral) opinion than someone else doesn't give me any right to impose my own morals on him or her. I wonder, then, on what basis could we possibly call murder and rape "wrong," if morals are nothing but personal opinion? Put another way, if I think that (at least sometimes) I should interfere with someone else's actions, and prevent his or her doing something (say, committing rape or murder or genocide), how can I justify my interference, if moral principles are merely opinions?
And to really bake your noodle: if I decide to simply stand back and allow something I consider wrong to happen (without interfering), aren't I just doing exactly what ethical relativism says I should? On what basis, for example, would Paul Rusesabagina have a legitimate moral reason for doing as he did - interfering with the moral beliefs of the Hutu regime?
2 days ago
If you really want to get down to the stone-cold, rock-bottom, basis for all this, there is no true reason for stop a rape or murder, other than that empathy for other people has been hard wired into our brains via thousands of years of hunter/scavenger lifestyles by humans and their ancestors. I have empathy for other people i.e. I would stop the rape/murder anyway, but I know that this is simply because way back when, the tribes with people who helped on another survived better. I kind of wish I could give a more beautiful awnser, but I just can't think of any other reasons that make sense to me.
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ReplyDeleteA person's life and innocence are two , for lack of a better word, things that should not be taken away. Whether your morals force you to cherish these or not, they are the most important. Life is not something to be taken lightly because without life, there is no person. I love stating the obvious! Innocence is harder to describe, but it is almost as important as life. To take away life and innocence is to take away basic parts of human existence.
ReplyDeleteWhat qualities does an innocent person possess, that a person who is not innocent lack, I mean specificaly. If someone witnesses a man robbing a store, does that destroy their innocence? or do they have to be doing the imoral action themselves to count it as a loss of innocence. By your argument, making some assumtions about the concept of innocence, then just about everyone on the planet is not a complete person...Interesting.
ReplyDeletewell if u think about it relativism is what most people of the world do today we are all are push overs and no one realy cares what u do but there are those certian ones that most people care about like murder... and adding on chrisses post some inocents do get trimatized from these incounters with bank roberys and murders so do these people get corupt???
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