"... a bit of background: My Ph.D. is in philosophy. My areas of specialization are meta-ethics, normative ethics and moral psychology. My areas of concentration are epistemology, philosophy of mind and formal logic. My dissertation, The Targets of Virtue: A Pluralistic Account of Moral Motivation, is, at its heart, a sustained critique modern moral philosophy from a virtue-ethical framework. I taught moral philosophy to undergrads for over a decade. Which is just to say that I know my response below will sound pedantic... "
All right, lets' bandy our credentials, shall we? My mentor was Prof Anscombe. I did graduate research with her at Cambridge in the 1980s and knew both her and her husband (Peter Geach) until her death; I was often at their home and we talked philosophy, for twenty years or so, after I finished my degree (M.Litt. cantab). I also knew Bernard Williams while at Cambridge, as well as Owen (classics dept.). My dissertation (on ethics in Wittgenstein's Tractatus) was published in a scholarly journal. Anscombe was arguably the person responsible for re-writing ethics in the 20th century. She tore CS Lewis apart in a well-publicized debate and pretty much killed off the Kantian system of ethics based on universalizable rules (childish, yes). I don't need to be lectured about agency in ethics; it was Anscombe who put it on the map.
So, there are are least two heavy-weights active on this thread. And we still aren't going to stop people in Waziristan from stoning adulteresses to death or midwives in No. Africa from performing female mutilation, are we?
"So let me try and summarize my stand:
1. I believe there are moral absolutes, ie some things are morally wrong for all people at all times.
2. I believe I know some of these moral absolutes. ie I am in possession of the truth about some of them, and anyone who disagrees with me on them is wrong.
3. I believe there is a certain amount of gray areas when actually interpreting morals and implementing legal systems that enforce morals.
4. I may not speak out about some immoral behavior (for a variety of reasons).
5. I believe that stoning a woman for adultery is immoral behavior in all societies at all times."
I would defend to the death your right to take that stand. I would also defend to the death someone else's right to disagree with that. If that seems inconsistent to you, so be it; then I am inconsistent.
Originally posted by moonbusWow. All those credentials, yet your explanations of your position have been all over the place as if you haven't really thought it through. I am still unsure about what your position actually is given that you keep contradicting yourself.
So, there are are least two heavy-weights active on this thread.
Originally posted by twhiteheadMy position is that the right question has yet to be asked.
Wow. All those credentials, yet your explanations of your position have been all over the place as if you haven't really thought it through. I am still unsure about what your position actually is given that you keep contradicting yourself.
The prior question is: is it moral for a society to execute people at all?
There are cogent arguments on both sides of the issue.
Once that issue has been settled, and assuming a society is prepared to execute people (at all), then the next question makes sense: for what crimes may that society execute people? Murder (or only for aggravated, or serial, or mass murder), treason, sedition, kidnapping, acts of terrorism, adultery, spying, cowardice or mutiny (in the military), etc.
Once those two questions have been settled, it makes sense to ask what means of execution are morally acceptable within that society: poison gas or injection, electrocution, firing squad, hanging, stoning, decapitation, etc.
On the first issue (whether, at all) there is substantial cultural/national difference: members of the EU have agreed that execution is not morally acceptable; all signatories to the relevant treaties have outlawed capital punishment. Several states of the U.S.A execute people, along with several other regimes (incl. Iran, No. Korea, China, Japan, Pakistan, Somalia, Sudan, Saudi Arabia). Several other (mostly central and west African) states apparently still have such provisions on their law books but have in fact observed a moratorium for at least ten years.
I am willing to allow for cultural variations on the issue, both whether and for which specific crimes.
The OP is: 'is stoning adulteresses immoral?' My answer is: the question cannot be answered without asking and answering at least two prior questions, each of which entails cultural/national-specific details.
Originally posted by moonbusBut this presupposes the existence of a universal morality, something you have repeatedly denied. Further you have claimed it is wrong to judge any society in any way unless you are a member of said society, and even then only under certain conditions.
The prior question is: is it moral for a society to execute people at all?
Originally posted by moonbusWhere do you stand on meta-morality, where by meta-morality I mean a universal code (for want of a better word) which culturally specific moralities derive from?
My position is that the right question has yet to be asked.
The prior question is: is it moral for a society to execute people at all?
There are cogent arguments on both sides of the issue.
Once that issue has been settled, and assuming a society is prepared to execute people (at all), then the next question makes sense: for what crime ...[text shortened]... nswering at least two prior questions, each of which entails cultural/national-specific details.
Incidentally my problem with the death penalty is practical rather than moral. First there's the difficulty of miscarriages of justice; according to a figure I read in the Metro about 5% of convictions in U.S. courts for all crimes are incorrect which implies that about 5% of murder convictions in States which have the death penalty are incorrect. This is an unacceptably high failure rate if one is going to kill the convicted person. I suppose you could argue that this is a moral position, but assuming there is a merit in convicting the guilty, even if they are only to face prison, one does not want the jury to find people not guilty when they are out of fear that the innocent will be executed.
If someone is to be executed for the first murder, then they will have an interest in using lethal force to avoid capture, and the second, third and fourth murders couldn't really be punished more harshly than the first - well they could, but do we really want to be torturing people to death to make the punishment harsher?
Originally posted by twhiteheadNo, it does not presuppose a universal anything. The OP defines a universe of discourse: ‘is x immoral?’ I accept that there is a moral issue here. But we have quite different ways of looking at this as a moral issue, not just different answers to the question. You think that the question (‘is x immoral?’ ) is simple and also that the answer must be simple (‘yes it is’ or ‘no it isn’t’ ). Whereas I think the question is compounded of several implicit questions, none of which is simple.
But this presupposes the existence of a universal morality, something you have repeatedly denied. Further you have claimed it is wrong to judge any society in any way unless you are a member of said society, and even then only under certain conditions.
I understand that you think I have not answered the question. That is because your position is timeless and mine isn’t; from the sub specie aeterni vantage point, any response other than ‘yes’ or ‘no’ appears to be answer at all.
The position that a certain specific practice is immoral for all peoples in all places and all times, would apply to an ideal, timeless world. But that is not the world people actually live in. The human situation is embedded in time and saturated with non-trivial particulars. As Dr. bbarr says, moral issues are matters for “practical reasoning”; practical reasoning is not an exact science, like geometry, it does not always admit of either a single right answer or a simple answer. In morals, there is often a range of acceptable courses of action, and a limit past which a given course of action is unacceptable. Both the range of acceptable actions, and where to draw the limit of what is unacceptable, may be open to debate (as it is here). A simple ‘yes’ or ‘no’ does not do justice to the issue. The world people actually live in is messy and complicated; so my answers to such questions are also sometimes messy and complicated.
Originally posted by moonbusAs phrased, yes it does.
No, it does not presuppose a universal anything.
The world people actually live in is messy and complicated; so my answers to such questions are also sometimes messy and complicated.
I agree, and have no problem with messy and complicated. I do have a problem with contradictory and incoherent which is how I find your posts.
DTh: "... my problem with the death penalty is practical rather than moral. First there's the difficulty of miscarriages of justice ... I suppose you could argue that this is a moral position, but assuming there is a merit in convicting the guilty, even if they are only to face prison, one does not want the jury to find people not guilty when they are out of fear that the innocent will be executed.
If someone is to be executed for the first murder, then they will have an interest in using lethal force to avoid capture, and the second, third and fourth murders couldn't really be punished more harshly than the first - well they could, but do we really want to be torturing people to death to make the punishment harsher?"
I agree that there are practical and political issues involved in assessing whether capital punishment is acceptable in any given society. I would not, for example, be in favor of Britain re-instating the death penalty (quite apart from its treaty obligations to the rest of the EU). Britain had a terrible record of “unsafe and unsound” convictions of Irish nationals accused of terrorist acts during the Troubles in NI.
I agree that miscarriages of justice which result in the death of an innocent person are woeful and at least one good solid argument against capital punishment in general. In the case of false imprisonment, the accused can be released and in some way compensated; this is not possible if the accused has already been executed. There is some merit to idea that a jury might be reluctant to convict a person if they knew the death penalty were a certainty, even if the evidence were “beyond a reasonable doubt.” Some justice systems incorporate a separate hearing to determine sentencing.
As to whether the threat of capital punishment makes a difference to a first or a subsequent murder ... The deterrent effect of capital punishment has been endlessly debated and there is no exclusively conclusive evidence either way, I think. Some studies suggest that the likelihood of apprehension has more deterrent effect than the punishment. Criminals who calculate in advance almost never calculate what the punishment might be; what they calculate is how to avoid detection and apprehension. I recall reading somewhere that one third of all murders in the U.S.A. remain unsolved; that’s a pretty weak deterrent, whatever the punishment may be. Another class of criminals consists of impulsive crimes-of-passion types. These too will not be deterred, neither by the likelihood of apprehension nor by any punishment. These are the ones who as often as not turn themselves in and confess.
Originally posted by DeepThoughtWell, what do you want a theory of meta-morality to do? Greene thinks Utilitarianism will allow us to impartially mediate moral disputes; disputes informed by a hodge-podge of intuitions and rendered intractable by in-group bias. But other moral theories (and here I'm thinking particularly of the neo-Kantian views of Rawls and Scanlon) have just as much a claim to impartiality as Utilitarianism. Even virtue-ethics could serve this role, if we take the virtues of tolerance and respect to be committed to the type of impartiality we want to bring to the adjudication of moral disputes. Utilitarianism isn't the only possible answer here.
I read the Wikipedia page on the trolley problems as it's linked to from Greene's, it's quite interesting, but I felt the obvious course was to pull the lever half-way in the hope of derailing the truck thereby saving everyone. The reason I mentioned him was to make clear what I meant by meta-morality, I'd never heard of him before I just searched for m ...[text shortened]... e survival consequences for them and so we evolved preferences for particular social behaviours.
Utilitarianism is impartial in the following way: It tells us to maximize utility (that which is of intrinsic value) in the world, but it doesn't matter how utility gets distributed among persons. This is why Rawls famously and rightly criticized Utilitarianism for not taking seriously the distinction between persons.
Further, it's not at all clear just what we're supposed to be maximizing. Different versions of Utilitarianism construe utility as pleasure, happiness, preference-satisfaction, flourishing, or some list of other things putatively of intrinsic value. Choosing between potential construals of utility will itself be informed by the very moral intuitions Utilitarianism is supposed to allow us to transcend.
Originally posted by moonbusEdit: "And we still aren't going to stop people in Waziristan from stoning adulteresses to death or midwives in No. Africa from performing female mutilation, are we?"
"... a bit of background: My Ph.D. is in philosophy. My areas of specialization are meta-ethics, normative ethics and moral psychology. My areas of concentration are epistemology, philosophy of mind and formal logic. My dissertation, The Targets of Virtue: A Pluralistic Account of Moral Motivation, is, at its heart, a sustained critique modern moral philosop ...[text shortened]... oning adulteresses to death or midwives in No. Africa from performing female mutilation, are we?
You aren't cause you have no clue as regards that matter per se
(Thus I have heard: To learn what is good a day is not enough; but to learn what is bad an hour is too long)
😵
Originally posted by moonbusThe demand for a cross-culturally acceptable account ("definition"? I thought you were a Wittgensteinian; please refer to the use of the term...) of 'egregious' is, in this context, question-begging. Of course the culture on the receiving end of moral condemnation for some practice will deny that practice is egregious. What does that show? Nothing.
“I believe there are facts about what sort of person we should aspire to be, what sort of lives we should seek to live and about what we should or shouldn't do in the circumstances within which we find ourselves. I believe these facts provide us with practical reasons.
I don't believe, though, that these facts completely determine or specify how a person ...[text shortened]... ldren Fund’; if it really bothered someone, he’d go there and bloody well do something about it.
Look, if "it's not ours to pass judgment on others" simpliciter, then MLK Jr. shouldn't have passed judgement on racist norms endemic to U.S. culture during Jim Crow. But you think that's OK. So, you mean that it's not ours to pass judgment cross-culturally. But then you have the Gandhi example: If Gandhi passed the same judgment MLK Jr. did and for the same reasons, then, if MLK Jr.'s judgment was justified, so was Gandhi's. You haven't responded to this counter-example, except to say that Gandhi's judgment could have been rejected by those he judged. Well, so what? MLK Jr's judgments could have been similarly rejected. In any case, the mere fact a judgment can be rejected doesn't entail, or even suggest, that the judgment itself is unjustified or inappropriate. But, you claim, the difference is that MLK Jr.'s judgments originate from within the culture whereas Gandhi's do not. Again, so what? You've given us no reason to think that difference matters. You could, perhaps, claim that we have a prima facie reason to take internal judgments more seriously than external judgments, since internal judgments will, presumably, be more culturally informed than external judgments. But that doesn't matter to the Gandhi example, since, ex hypothesi, his judgments are based on the very same reasons as MLK Jr. Yes, we should be careful about passing judgment on cultural practices we don't understand. But this doesn't entail such judgments are never justified. They are clearly justified in the sort of egregious cases I mentioned previously.
Your response to the female genital mutilation case is interesting. Yes, women are often the ones performing cliterodectomies, but what does this show? One of the most insidious features of oppression is its intellectual colonization of the oppressed.
You're right that it's difficult to fully understand the cultural rationale for female genital mutilation in the abstract. It's all tied up with a host of other norms and practices. But this doesn't render it immune to criticism. If anything, tracing these connections allows us to see more fully the extent to which these cultures are committed to some pretty vicious forms of misogyny. So much the worse for backwards, barbaric, immoral cultures.
Originally posted by moonbusTa da: Thread 161694
I started another thread under 'Debates.' Don't know how to link to it from this one though.
For future reference enclose the thread id number with [ threadid ] 161694 [ /threadid ] (except without the spaces).
Originally posted by moonbusIt wasn't.
The OP is: 'is stoning adulteresses immoral?'
My OP was asking if a law requiring such was immoral
(and since this debate is in Sprituality) whether all God-given
laws were moral (regardless of its content).
The morality of following that law is a different - but equally entertaining - debate.