Originally posted by rwingettBut different cultures disagree on all sorts of things. Western Culture is more or less committed to the claim that psychoses, for intance, result from neurochemical defect. Other cultures have, and perhaps still do, claim that psychoses result from being possessed by evil spirits. Just because cultures disagree about some state of affairs does not mean that there is no objective fact concerning that state of affairs. There is also the possibility that particular cultures are just flat out wrong about certain things. It is invalid to argue that because you and I disagree about X that there is no fact of the matter about X, so it is invalid to argue from the fact that cultures disagree about particular moral claims to the conclusion that there is no fact of the matter about the moral properties of certain acts. You could claim in response that although the argument is itself invalid, nevertheless the disagreeement between cultures gives good reason to think there is no fact of the matter about what is actually, objectively morally right or wrong. But then we'd need to investigate the actual disparity between the moral judgements of particular cultures. I don't see that much disagreement about moral principles, although I do see disagreement between who gets to count as a person. For instance, I doubt any culture would think that torturing an innocent purely for fun is morally O.K. But a culture could think that this only applies to people, and that those strange looking interlopers are obviously not people, so it isn't prohibited to torture THEM for fun. But then the inter-cultural disagreement doesn't concern moral prinicples, but rather who gets covered by those moral principles. And if THAT is what the disagreement is about, who gets to be considered a person, then it's clear that the world is actually coming to agree (slowly, painfully) about who counts as a person (consider the abolitionist movement and the civil rights movement here at home). And if we are gradually coming to agree that ALL humans are to be accorded the respect of persons, then it is very unclear the extent to which there IS cultural disagreement about moral principles, insignificant superstitions about respecting the dead (as though the dead have rights) notwithstanding.
Alright, I'll take a stab at this;
The difference between moral judgments and mathematics is that in the latter, there is an absolute standard, and it is true for all cultures. Two plus two equaled four for both Hitler and for Gandhi. ...[text shortened]... morality can not exist independently from man's conception of it.
Originally posted by geniusWe as people do need to agree and adhear to certain base rules and respecting other persons life is one of those. Also, respecting another persons freedom is one. This is agreed by all people in general. It is somesort of universal rule...
Our whole system of morality is based on prejudice. What we regard as a moral action is simply something which our instincts and our society guides us towards. Thus, our concepts of good and evil are entirely subjective, and can in no way be regarded as absolute.
Hitler believed that he was doing
ight. So did Stalin. So did Hitler. So does Bin Laden. Th ...[text shortened]... ve the arrogance to know for certain that we are right and they are wrong.
just an though...
Now what is good and evil certainly is subjective but it doesnt take away the right for a person to say that something is good or evil.
Why people like Hitler or Stalin or Bin Laden are considered "evil" in a very large part of the world is the fact that they are people who have stolen lives and the freedom from many people. They have used force to oppress and kill and jail people based on their own idea of right and wrong. This is where they can be called "evil", and I think rightly so. And it is not arrogance. It is just how world is. if people like the once named would be allowed to express their ideas in a way they did, this world would soon be in chaos. If they would be to only verbally express their ideas and respect other ideas, then these men wouldnt be thought "evil"...
why not? Why can't we assess what is right and wrong in our opinion or in the opinion the general public? I sure do think that as these concepts excist we have the perfect right to determine what they mean, may it be on an indiviidual levl or nation wide level or global level.
BUT to pass on judgement on what someone else might think right or wrong is not very insightful .
In anycase there needs to be rules, that is clear, as there are always some that do not uphold the standards of normal humanity for whatever reason it might be...
And of course we all have faults, but it should not stop us from using our brains.
I am not telling you to stop using your brain, I am just saying that it is very difficult to call someone evil, for they can all claim to have had legitimate reasons to act the way they did. For example Hitler's aims were in the interest of the German people, he wanted to give them prosperity. His killing of the Jews he thought was justified because he believed that they were reponsible for the death of Jesus Christ.
Originally posted by cum tokerWhy do we have to be faultless to pass judgement correctly? I'm not infallible when it comes to proofs by mathematical induction, but that doesn't mean I'm not justified when I derive a conclusion by way of a syllogism. In other words, we may make mistakes on the hard cases, but that doesn't mean we are not justified in our judgements about the easy cases (e.g., torturing innocents purely for fun is wrong).
Basically, as human beings, we cannot pass judgement on what is right and wrong, on what is evil and good. For none of us are faultless
Yes, all mad men have their justifications for what they do. Like does Bush now. But still, you can call hitler evil as what he did was evil. Its no excuse that he is crazy and thought he had a justification to do so....
But I understand what you are saying. evil is subjective. Still, its a term I think we can safely use for someone like Hitler. Or I will at least. I know it was all madness driven, but that does not change what happened.
Originally posted by cum tokerBut this is a different claim than the one you made earlier. Now you are no longer talking about passing judgment on whether an act is right or wrong, but whether a person is good or bad. The two notions, though related, are not identical, for a morally good person may on occassion act badly and a morally reprehensible person may, on occassion, act rightly.
I am not telling you to stop using your brain, I am just saying that it is very difficult to call someone evil, for they can all claim to have had legitimate reasons to act the way they did. For example Hitler's aims were in the interest of the German people, he wanted to give them prosperity. His killing of the Jews he thought was justified because he believed that they were reponsible for the death of Jesus Christ.
Might I suggest that passing judgement is in itself wrong? I think that perhaps as individuals we may evaluate the actions of a person and decide if the action was positive or negative, but we cannot judge the person itself. Likewise, the overall perception is subject to its limitations of understanding. For example, I may judge actions to be either constructive or destructive. I may find an action to be destructive and hence judge it to be immoral. I may also see that the destruction took place to further constructive ends and deem it moral.
Originally posted by Omnislashpassing judgement in itself wrong? How could it be? You must be talking about certain type of judgement? And then its only wrong by case. I do believe you can pass judgement as it basically mean that in your opinion something is wrong, right? Lets say I do believe I can pass judgement on a guy who killed a girl by braking her skull with several hits with a brick. I think its utterly wrong and the guy did a bad thing doing that.
Might I suggest that passing judgement is in itself wrong? I think that perhaps as individuals we may evaluate the actions of a person and decide if the action was positive or negative, but we cannot judge the person itself. Likewise, the ...[text shortened]... uction took place to further constructive ends and deem it moral.
Now, what I do with that judgement is different altogether. But in essense I do not beleive that passing judgement is wrong. We do have moral values each we work with and we evaluate everything based on them. So I do not think you can say passing judgement is in ITSELF wrong...
david loy has written an interesting article giving a buddhist perspective on the good versus evil debate, with reference to how we respond to issues such as 9/11 and the bombings in afghanistan. interesting reading
"For Buddhism, evil, like everything else, has no essence or substance of its own; it is a product of impermanent causes and conditions. Buddhism emphasizes the concept of evil less than what it calls the three roots of evil, or the three causes of evil, also known as the three poisons: greed, ill will and delusion. Let me offer what may be a controversial distinction: the Abrahamic religions emphasize the struggle between good and evil because the basic issue is usually understood to be our will: which side are we on? In contrast, Buddhism emphasizes ignorance and enlightenment because the basic issue depends on our self-knowledge: do we really understand what motivates us?
One way to summarize the basic Buddhist teaching is that we suffer, and cause others to suffer, because of greed, ill will and delusion. Karma implies that when our actions are motivated by these roots of evil, their negative consequences tend to rebound back upon us. That is true for everyone. However, the Buddhist solution to suffering does not involve requiting violence with violence, any more than it involves responding to greed with greed, or responding to delusion with delusion. From a Buddhist perspective, one cannot find justice for the deaths of some three thousand innocent people in New York and Washington with a bombing campaign that leads to the death of an even larger number of innocent Afghanis. Rather, the Buddhist solution involves breaking that cycle by transforming greed into generosity, ill will into loving-kindness, and delusions into wisdom."
see http://www.transnational.org/features/2002/Loy_NondualityGoodEvil.html