Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.1 6/24/83; site cbscc.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!cbosgd!cbsck!cbscc!pmd From: pmd@cbscc.UUCP (Paul M. Dubuc) Newsgroups: net.philosophy Subject: Re: support for areligious moral codes Message-ID: <5953@cbscc.UUCP> Date: Sun, 22-Sep-85 15:47:37 EDT Article-I.D.: cbscc.5953 Posted: Sun Sep 22 15:47:37 1985 Date-Received: Mon, 23-Sep-85 00:48:46 EDT References: <623@hou2g.UUCP> <5884@cbscc.UUCP> <1154@mhuxt.UUCP> <5906@cbscc.UUCP> <233@umich.UUCP> <5933@cbscc.UUCP> <241@umich.UUCP> Reply-To: pmd@cbscc.UUCP (Paul M. Dubuc) Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories , Columbus Lines: 91 In article <241@umich.UUCP> torek@umich.UUCP (Paul V. Torek ) writes: >>>Ahem. The reason for morality is that lack of it causes harm to >>>individuals such as myself. I think it becomes crystal clear why the >>>areligious person ought to support an enforced public morality. (Reasons >>>to be moral as an individual are a little more complex, but just as >>>explainable under areligous assumptions as under religious ones.) >> >>OK, then explain them. Also you should give examples of what particular >>moral codes should be enforced and what binds the individual to obey >>them. It doesn't necessarily follow that I will be harmed by not obeying >>moral codes. How do you know I will? [I didn't say that; see below --pvt] > >Non-religious reasons to be moral derive from (a) sympathy for others as >part of a normal human psyche, which can seen to be rational from the facts >(a1) that humans are similar in ways relevant to concern about our own and >others' welfare, and (a2) sympathy is part and parcel of a set of dispositions >and affections which enrich our lives, in part by enabling us to feel joy or >sadness at our own fortune or plight; (b) the way a rational being acts in >accordance with norms because those norms are (believed to be) valid for >all rational agents, which commits one to a certain sort of impartiality >(e.g., "Everyone should serve *me* because I'm *me*" is ruled out). > >Whew. Now all of the above merits more detail; but I would rather recommend >a few good books on the subjects than type all year. But it should at least >be crystal clear that if others don't follow at least a "minimally decent" >(specific examples: no rape or murder allowed) behavior-pattern toward >others, you and I will suffer. That is what I meant when I said "lack of >it [morality] causes harm to individuals such as [you and] myself": not that >you'll be harmed by *your* immorality, but by *others'*. THE LATTER IS >ALREADY SUFFICIENT REASON to compel others to obey a moral code. You are right in that it merits more detail and you can recommend books if you like. But, concerning point (b) above, what is the basis for the belief that certain norms are valid for all rational agents? Fine, we may compel others to obey a certain moral code because we may (although not necessarily, think of the ones who watch street crimes take place and don't want to get involved. Do the really believe they will be hurt if they don't intervene?) get hurt if we don't. But why is our perspective more important than the perspective than the one we are constraining to obey? So we may be hurt; that is sufficeint reason for self defense, but not for legislation. The one we are trying to constrain has a different perspective, and I don't think sympathy is sufficient to enforce ours upon him. >>>>Religious codes do provide the transcendent authority. >>> >>>Wrong! (I take you to mean that religious codes do supply valid reasons >>>for a moral code, over and above any reasons that might be supplied >>>without religion. If you did not mean this, your statement does not >>>address Sonntag's point.) [...] >> >>You are just saying I am wrong without showing me how I am wrong. [...] > >To quote a famous philosopher: "Yes, that's my implication. But you've >shifted the burden of proof ...". The burden's on YOU to show how >religious codes "do provide the transcendent authority" i.e. provide >reasons for an individual to be moral *over and above* the reasons ("if >any", if you insist there are none) human reason provides. Prove that >you're not "in the same boat" as we agnostics are in! > >But since you asked: religious codes can't supply any independent reasons >because, as Socrates rhetorically queried Euthyphro: > Is a thing good because the gods approve it, or do the > gods approve it because it is good? >Two millenia later, the score remains: Socrates 1, Euthyphro 0. Too bad Socrates didn't read Dostoyevsky. :-). Really now, Paul, is it only you that gets to play iconoclast? My point is not that religious codes can supply independent reasons. I fully agree that they only provide answers within their own framwork. But that is a transcendent framework, and so the compulsion to obey moral codes makes sense from within it. But, I contend that that compulsion does not make sencse even from within the agnostic's or atheist's own framework. This is the way the score looks to me: Religiously based moral codes cannot produce independent reasons for obeying them, but can produce dependant reasons. Areligious moral codes can produce neither independant or dependant reasons. So, Paul, I think it is up to you agnostics to prove that you *are* in the same boat with us religious believers. My conviction is that the authority of any moral code must be dependant on a transcendent religious belief. Since neither areligious or religious moral codes can produce independant reasons for obedience, and only religious ones can produce dependent reasons, the argument that the public implications of a religious moral code may be ignored solely on the basis of it's being religious is unfounded. may -- Paul Dubuc cbscc!pmd Brought to you by Super Global Mega Corp .com