tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8462179374588422234.post8077218979830350042..comments2023-05-25T11:03:27.144-04:00Comments on e.m. cadwaladr: Liberal Values – An Alternative View (Part 2)Unknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger5125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8462179374588422234.post-41027190791104520892010-08-27T15:58:17.387-04:002010-08-27T15:58:17.387-04:00Universality of Fairness, continued
Finally, I fi...<b>Universality of Fairness, continued</b><br /><br />Finally, I find myself confused about your concerns of an "entrenched and militant" liberalism. Are you saying that forceful rejection of fascism is equally bad as fascism?<br /><br />You have already laid the groundwork for the refutation of your claim. As you stated, it is clear that systems are not functionally equivalent. All you need is a definite criteria for what "better" means, and we already have that. Better means fairer. Consider it: try to come up with a situation in which the most moral choice is not also the fairest choice.<br /><br />Once you've established that being fair is in fact what we mean by being moral, then conservative authortarianism is quickly revealed as less functional than liberalism. (I am curious what theoretical aspects of conservatism you find admirable, and whether or not that admiration will hold up to inspection.)<br /><br />In any case, it doesn't even matter. We both agree that nature picks the bigger, stronger dog. My entire point is that fairness is the bigger, stronger dog. The success of the American empire and the social technology (democracy) it exported is proof of this. That our "betters" in Europe came to ape us, that we defeated the finest collection of tyrannies ever created, even that Europe has gone on to improve the technology we gave them, all stands as a proof of the power of fair societies to produce wealth.<br /><br />And in the dog-fight of nations, wealth equals power. "Money is the sinews of war," after all.<br /><br /><b>Summation</b><br /><br />To sum up, I don't think our differences are as great as you think they are. Really, once we establish an objective measure of "better," and once we establish that the heart of moral reasoning (for humans) is fairness, then everything else falls into line. Of course I object to rabid Political Correctness, hypocritical multiculturalism, and internal contradictions. To the extent those exist in the liberal position they need to be addressed. And I freely admit I have met so-called Progressives who wanted a fascist state; their only complaint with conservatism was the particular lines along which that state would be built.<br /><br />But ultimately, as empiricists, we both agree that moral claims must be confirmed by the real world. From that essential agreement I believer our differences are resolvable. I would also point out that conservatism, particularly the religious kind, rejects that principle at the outset. To the religious, morality must be confirmed by supernatural concerns, not merely empirical ones. This is a position you cannot possibly accept; and so, even though you would like to remain neutral, you are inevitably compelled to choose the side that isn't bonkers.<br /><br />:)MCPlanckhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09239576472889126413noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8462179374588422234.post-64409994556254429482010-08-27T15:52:02.420-04:002010-08-27T15:52:02.420-04:00Universality of Fairness
You are correct, of cour...<b>Universality of Fairness</b><br /><br />You are correct, of course: I do view moral differences in terms of an absolute hierarchical process of improvement. That process has a name: it is called <i>evolution.</i><br /><br />Given that I assert that morality is merely an evolutionary strategy, it is of course no surprise that I grade moral systems based on how well they help the species survive. And improvement - in the sense of refining adaptation to environmental pressures - is a given feature of evolution.<br /><br />The view that moralities are gradable is an inescapable consequence of the view that moralities are evolutionary strategies. The problem for your position is not so much defending different moral systems as neutral alternatives as it is explaining <i>where morality comes from in the first place.</i><br /><br />The classic liberal position is to assert that morality is a purely arbitrary social arrangement. Any given population can have any given moral system, as long as the people are properly conditioned to it. While this allows for your neutral scheme, the staggering failure of the <i>tabula rasa</i> view of human nature is well-documented.<br /><br />The conservative position, on the other hand, is that morality is a product of divine revelation. I don't feel it is necessary to even address the failure of this argument.<br /><br />So before we discuss whether moralities are gradable on an absolute scale, we have to have an idea of what moralities are. If they are merely cultural constructions - then we have a very different discussion before us. On the other hand, if they are evolved strategies, then of course some work better than others. The only alternative is to posit some other source for morality.<br /><br />The RWA research is not supposed to focus on traits that are "personally abhorrent," but rather on traits that lead to dysfunctional moralities. As an example: rape is, at first glance, an evolutionarily successful reproductive strategy. However, on closer analysis it can be shown that this strategy only works in abnormal circumstances: once external factors are removed, human populations invariably punish rape to the point where it is less successful than legal cohabitation (which admittedly may be indistinguishable from rape to the woman; but it is still distinguishable by half the population, so it still qualifies as a different set of affairs). What the RWA is trying to show is that obsessive fear is an external factor that allows these dysfunctions to flourish.<br /><br />Your concerns about a homogenous, absolutely stable environment are misplaced. In any given instant the environment is stable for that instant, and in that instant there is an ideal morality. That the needs change later only means the ideal morality changes later. However, our environment (both physical and genetic) changes much, much more slowly than our culture. Genetically speaking, we've been pretty stable for the last 10,000 years, which is plenty of time to refine a morality.<br /><br />The variable goal is species existence. The purpose of humanity is to produce more humans. That human beings invent other purposes for themselves, built out of the machinery evolution gave them, is no more surprising than that humans have sex for other reasons than producing children.<br /><br />Fairness does improve humanity's chances of survival. This is so self-evident that I don't know how to explain it. Warfare - the violent imposition of unfairness - is clearly detrimental to the human species, given that humans take years to raise to productive age but seconds to kill. Those societies that eschewed perpetual warfare triumphed over those that did not. And so on. The American empire is not solely a product of vast natural resources - it is also a product of technological development, and <i>government</i> is a technology.MCPlanckhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09239576472889126413noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8462179374588422234.post-45318133744431644212010-08-27T15:18:04.507-04:002010-08-27T15:18:04.507-04:00Hmm. My 2nd post got lost. Is this supposed to be ...Hmm. My 2nd post got lost. Is this supposed to be technological progress? :D BTW, every time I post it complains that the URL is too large to process. I have no idea what that means.<br /><br /><b>Abortion</b><br /><br />Perhaps I phrased it inelegantly. I meant to say that rights are balanced: they not trumped by others nor do they trump others. The mere fact that someone is in mortal peril is not sufficient to curtail your Constitutional rights. This is how it must be: otherwise there would be a powerful incentive to manufacture mortal peril as an instrument for trumping rights. The power of economics cannot be ignored.<br /><br />This logic explains why one can be vegetarian and pro-choice. Allowing abortion is a necessary condition of respecting other people's rights; allowing the degradation of animals is not. However, should chickens be raised and slaughtered in a perfectly humane way, with no particular damage to the environment or economy, then the moral argument against eating chickens is undermined.<br /><br />The punishment of sex outside of marriage is not an unconscious goal for conservatives: it is a freely stated one. The unconscious part is that this maintains men's stake in childbirth. Most conservatives are happy to punish extra-marital sex for its own sake, without any regard to any larger issue, and will happily inform you of this. My point was that the reason this cultural behavior survived is because it met a real social need - binding men to the effort of raising children. People don't have to understand this function of their cultural mores for it to be true that it is the function of their cultural mores.<br /><br />Asserting that women are sometimes meek ideological slaves of institutions that oppress them is merely describing monotheism (Judaism/Christianity/Islam). Nothing controversial there, although I agree it is surreal.<br /><br />I do not believe in altruism. What we normally call altruism is really just extended self-interest. People do nice things because it makes them feel good; it makes them feel good because they evolved that response; they evolved that response because we are social creatures and altruism helps our species survive. You know, just like sex. Nobody takes the many, many times people have sex without childbirth in mind as a knock on the claim that sex evolved to reproduce our genes. Why should altruism be any different?<br /><br />On the other hand, imagine a truly altruistic person, who committed acts that derived them no benefit whatsoever. They are as likely to stab you in the eye as to give you a crust of bread, because those two acts are <i>indistinguishable</i> to them. Asserting that they will only do "good" acts begs the question: it presumes they can tell the difference between the actions, and that they arbitrarily select for the one that is "good" without any incentive to do so. Neither of these hold in "strict" sense of altruism.<br /><br />(Also, describing childbirth as "not necessarily life-changing" is not going to go over well with most women. Its permanent effects, both physical and psychological, are dramatic.)MCPlanckhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09239576472889126413noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8462179374588422234.post-53262272086675918702010-08-27T14:28:50.831-04:002010-08-27T14:28:50.831-04:00Abortion
Punishing women for having sex outside o...<b>Abortion</b><br /><br />Punishing women for having sex outside of marriage is not an unconscious goal for conservatives: it is an explicitly stated goal. Indeed, the pain of childbirth is described in the Bible as women's punishment for Original Sin.<br /><br />Asserting that women are sometimes meek ideological slaves to institutions that actively oppress them is merely describing Judaism/Christianity/Islam. Nothing controversial here, although I agree it is surreal.<br /><br />The unconscious part is that <i>punishing women for sex maintains male stake in childbirth.</i> Most conservatives are not aware that these two issues are related, and are quite content to punish women for having extramarital sex for its own sake. My point was that the social impetus that maintains this meme (sex is bad) is fueled by the pragmatic role it serves (men own babies too). By restricting sex to marriage, men are automatically given/assigned ownership and responsibility for offspring. By making pregnancy an unavoidable risk for sex, women are encouraged to withhold sex until the risk of having to raise a child is mitigated by the acquisition of a mate. Conservatives are not aware this is <i>why</i> they think sex outside of marriage is bad, but they certainly agree with the logic in this argument even when it is presented in this form. They just think this is true because God wanted it that way.<br /><br /><b>Roe vs. Wade</b><br /><br />Yes, I do intend it as a general principle, and so did the Supreme Court when it made that decision. Perhaps I phrased it badly, but what I was trying to say is that rights are equal; if other's rights cannot trump yours, neither can your rights trump theirs.<br /><br />The mere fact that another person will die is not sufficient reason to curtail your Constitutional rights. This is a well-established and indeed inviolate principle of our legal system and our freedom. If people are dying at a horrible rate due to exercise of Constitutional rights, then legally the only recourse is to amend the Constitution (which was supposed to be designed to minimize this problem).<br /><br />The preservation of life is not the highest principle. Fairness is the highest principle, which leads naturally to the preservation of life (since people want their own lives preserved). If we make preservation of life the highest principal - indeed if we make anything else but fairness the highest principal - then not surprisingly fairness is eroded. And all people, everywhere, recognize unfairness as bad (at least when the unfairness applies to them).<br /><br />Altruism has nothing to do with it: I don't even believe in altruism. I posit to you that a person acting with no benefit to themselves, however intangible, is a horrifying thing. It is the behavior of a psychotic, impossible to understand, predict, or cope with. They might as easily stab you in the eye as give you a crust of bread - either action is <i>indistinguishable to them.</i> What we usually call altruism - giving food to a beggar, etc. - actually merely very removed self interest. People do nice things because it feels good to do nice things, and it feels good because we evolved to feel that way, and we evolved to feel that way because social cooperation is necessary for our species. People are nice for the same reason they have sex - because it feels nice.<br /><br />(Also, just for the record, describing the nine month process of bearing a child and giving it up for adoption as "not necessarily life-changing" is not going to sell well to women ;P Just saying...)<br /><br />To sum up: you have rights, and mere mortal peril to others does not curtail those rights, particularly if it would also expose you to moral peril. The mere fact that the levels of peril are not equal is irrelevant; freedom entails the right to choose how much mortal peril you wish to expose yourself to. The rights you have are balanced, insomuch as they do not trump other people's rights.MCPlanckhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09239576472889126413noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8462179374588422234.post-82950521850665140342010-08-27T13:53:51.442-04:002010-08-27T13:53:51.442-04:00I do think my defense is representative of sorts o...I do think my defense is representative of sorts of the standard atheist liberal, with perhaps one major exception: I reject multiculturalism completely. I have no idea how otherwise rational liberals excuse things like genital mutilation based on "tolerance of culture," even though I've seen them do it.<br /><br />I'm not sure Christina is a multiculturalist either: the metaphysical naturalist wing of atheism is not all homogeneous on that point.<br /><br /><br /><b>Democracy</b><br /><br />Uncle Joe may have been the most powerful being ever, but he still had to couch his power in terms of service to the people. Contrast this to the monarchs of old, who did not (I mean pre-Magna Charter). Sure, empty rhetoric is empty; but its mere existence should be taken as a sign that things are different now.<br /><br />It is true that you could have more influence in a small tribe, but it was over a much smaller sphere. Just imagine trying to organize multiple tribes against an environmentally degrading practice (such as goat-raising). In that situation your influence will be able to change your daily life, but unable to affect your future. Contrast that to our situation, where your vote is unlikely to change your daily life but can have profound consequences on your future.<br /><br />But merely comparing these two situations is incomplete; because in our society you already have a lot of influence over your daily life. Indeed, more than any Stone Age tribesmen. You can choose to move to another continent/environment, voluntarily not eat an entire class of foods, never speak to strangers, and a whole host of other choices that would be suicidal in a primitive context.<br /><br />The fact that so many more people today can make so many more choices than ever before in history is concrete proof that yes, things are better. It is true that every evil of the past is still with us - slavery, monarchy, starvation - but it is also true that the percentage of people who have <i>significant choices</i> has exploded over any percentage in the past.<br /><br />In its simplest historical formulation, "wealthy" means owning more than one pair of shoes, one pair of underwear, and having a choice about what to eat for dinner. The percentage of people who have those choices today is vastly larger than the percentage who had them 1,000 years ago - and that trend shows no sign of changing direction (Chinese state-controlled capitalism included). This is progress.<br /><br />Now here I've made an argument for the advancement of wealth, not democracy: but since I consider democracy (i.e. personal freedom) to be one of the luxuries wealth allows societies to purchase, I don't see a contradiction. I'm not so much saying as people become democratic they will necessarily become rich; rather, I am saying as they become rich they will tend to become democratic. For exactly the same reason TV screens will continually get bigger as people get richer. China is no different; the more money their people have, the more pressure for freedom.MCPlanckhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09239576472889126413noreply@blogger.com