Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.1 6/24/83; site umcp-cs.UUCP Path: utzoo!linus!philabs!cmcl2!seismo!umcp-cs!mangoe From: mangoe@umcp-cs.UUCP (Charley Wingate) Newsgroups: net.religion.christian,net.philosophy Subject: Re: The Harumpheror's Old Clothes Message-ID: <998@umcp-cs.UUCP> Date: Thu, 25-Jul-85 19:28:59 EDT Article-I.D.: umcp-cs.998 Posted: Thu Jul 25 19:28:59 1985 Date-Received: Sat, 27-Jul-85 00:33:30 EDT References: <1311@uwmacc.UUCP> <1281@pyuxd.UUCP> Followup-To: net.philosophy Organization: U of Maryland, Computer Science Dept., College Park, MD Lines: 96 Xref: linus net.religion.christian:938 net.philosophy:1851 In article <1281@pyuxd.UUCP> rlr@pyuxd.UUCP (Rich Rosen) writes: >Paul Dubois doesn't like my answer to the question: "Why should we >care about our own survival?" It seems that "a three year old could >have told you that". Sometimes three year olds say the most pro---found >things. (Really, I'll testify to that in court!) And the so-called >adults just ignore the implications of what the kids have to say. >Didn't someone once describe to beauty of Christian faith as "childlike" >and thus as a wonderful thing? Apparently that holds true until a >three-year old says something so "pro...found", the "new clothes" of >faith are rendered feeble by comparison. Ah, yes, endless streams of rhetoric..... As Tim Moroney points out, it all boils down to these intuitions anyway, so how can you justify your silly little attack? >> Now, we may infer that Rich places a good deal of weight on the value >> of objective judgment, as evidenced by this: >> > To whom have you produced convincing evidence of your argument? >> > Yourself? The reason no one can produce convincing evidence to support >> > YOUR argument might very well be that there IS none, in a real objective >> > sense. >> So we would expect that in the reply to Charley, we would >> see some reason and logic exemplefied. But instead we find: >> > Because we happen to like those things. Don't you? Don't survival, >> > continuing to live, and acquiring benefits bring pleasure to living? >> Thus, all the talk about objectivity, examination of presuppositions >> clung to in order to bolster a preconceived desired conclusion, >> wishful thinking, etc., etc. (many of you as well can no doubt mimic >> the usual phrases), is a complete smokescreen. >> Truly, Emperor Rosen has no clothes. When pushed back to his real >> reasons, he says: "because we like them". >Yup, because we like them. That happens to be as objective a statement >as you'll ever see. Why do WE value survival? BECAUSE WE LIKE IT. Because >it brings us pleasure to continue living and reaping benefits of life. >Death, I've heard, is a very painful experience, and after it happens, you >don't get to live life anymore. Thus, we value survival because we like >living, because we gain pleasure (whether you believe a soul gains this >pleasure or that the chemicals of your body predispose you to it) from it. >Now that Paul has allowed me to zip up the philosophical pants I was >already wearing, what exactly does he find UNobjective about that? And where >are HIS clothes? And I suppose that we should therefore do what we please? Rich, I'm sorry but you seem to be missing something very basic here. Morality is proscriptive and prescriptive; it tells you to do things you don't want to do, and forbids some things you want to do. "Because you like it" simply doesn't cut it, especially when you are talking about social interactions. You have in fact given me a very powerful weapon with which to DENY the validity of your moral system; I don't like it. No amount of rational argument can convince. As a matter of fact, I do NOT absolutely value the human race. Some things are more important than survival. Humans appear to be the only animals on earth which can evaluate and change their own nature. This is in fact where any moral obligation at all must come from. To say that we should perpetuate survival as a value simply because we like it is about as unobjective as one can get. The whole moral question is indeed whether liking to do something is sufficient grounds for doing it. It's rather unobjective to say that "we" like survival with some quantification; there is certainly a sizable minority who quite obenly state that survival is a curse. Rich's statement is an intuition, and not objective at all. >Who said anything about "making right"? (You did.) The question was why >do we value survival, why SHOULD we value survival. Seems to me like a >very reasonable answer. Why doesn't it seem that way to you? WRONG. You quoted me above and disproved this yourself. Let's talk about "maximizing freedom" for a minute. Examination of almost any stretch of history shows that for an important minority, minimizing other people's freedom has been a primary goal. You can hardly claim, after all the ranting you've done against the likes of Don Black, that everyone wants to maximize freedom. And it is a primary question: why should the oppressor care about what he does to his victims? Why should he care that they don't like being oppressed? "Because we like it?" Hell, we like to burn villages to the ground. You're arguing against yourself. >A twenty-nine year old just told YOU that. Why didn't you listen to the >three year old in the first place when he/she told you that? The kid sounds >a lot smarter than you, Paul. :-? Gee, I'm younger than you, Rich. Why aren't you liening to me? :-) You can't justify wanting survival. You either do or you don't. (At least you can't unless Ubizmo comes down and tells you "Survival is good".) Certainly one can construct non-theistic moral systems, even absolute ones. But eventually it all comes down to some sort of intuition about the nature of humanity, AND an intuition of what man ought to be like. These things are highly subjective. Charley Wingate umcp-cs!mangoe "Better get used to those bars, kid."