Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83 based; site hound.UUCP Path: utzoo!lsuc!watmath!clyde!cbosgd!ihnp4!houxm!hound!rwsh From: rwsh@hound.UUCP (R.STUBBLEFIELD) Newsgroups: net.politics.theory Subject: Reason gets no respect from Berman Message-ID: <1538@hound.UUCP> Date: Fri, 6-Dec-85 08:41:50 EST Article-I.D.: hound.1538 Posted: Fri Dec 6 08:41:50 1985 Date-Received: Sat, 7-Dec-85 15:24:15 EST Organization: AT&T Bell Labs, Holmdel NJ Lines: 45 The Degradation of Reason Piotr Berman and others hold a vastly different concept of reason from mine. They claim that being a mugger is reasonable. Apparently, as long as someone uses his mental faculty to arrive at a decision, they call it rational--no matter what knowledge the actor evaded and no matter what the long range consequences. I think that reason requires a lot more effort and a much better result. In the case of deciding to be a mugger, there is an abundance of evidence that he would be better off by living productively; but that would require the effort of inducing that conclusion--of identifying that fact of reality by integrating conceptal knowledge (based ultimately on sensory evidence)-- i.e. of using reason. There is even a simpler path. The potential mugger could note that consistency demands that he not treat others as he does not want to be treated; but this would require that he value consistency--the specialty of reason. To see the extent to which criminals are irrational--deny the pain to their victims, have a fragile inflated opinion of their self-worth, choose to ignore long range consequences, and treat themselves as an exception to every rule they believe holds for others--read Stanton Samenow's *Inside the Criminal Mind*. Samenow also describes the way to help a criminal habilitate himself (and tells why criminals can not be *re*habilitated): he has to change his thinking-- especially to think and act on principle. An ethical principle is a guide to action. Man needs principles to guide his actions because he does not have time to perform a detailed analysis in every instance nor does he know automatically what to do. But to recognize that fact and to choose to live by it is reasonable; to do otherwise is irrational. I assume (as each of you implicitly does when you post) that there is one ethical principle I share with each of you: the value of reason; but I am amazed at the number among you who are potential muggers. As long as you treat reason as a floating abstraction, you are in danger of sacrificing it to some momentary desire. When someone confesses "to me it is clear that the final judgments cannot be justified by reason alone," how will he deal with me when his final judgment conflicts with mine? FORCE IS THE OPPOSITE OF REASON. -- Bob Stubblefield ihnp4!hound!rwsh 201-949-2846