Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/3/84; site teddy.UUCP Path: utzoo!lsuc!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!mhuxr!mhuxt!houxm!vax135!cornell!uw-beaver!tektronix!hplabs!qantel!lll-crg!seismo!harvard!talcott!panda!teddy!lkk From: lkk@teddy.UUCP Newsgroups: net.politics.theory Subject: Re: Reason gets no respect from Berman Message-ID: <1784@teddy.UUCP> Date: Mon, 9-Dec-85 13:37:06 EST Article-I.D.: teddy.1784 Posted: Mon Dec 9 13:37:06 1985 Date-Received: Fri, 13-Dec-85 20:59:48 EST References: <1538@hound.UUCP> Reply-To: lkk@teddy.UUCP (Larry K. Kolodney) Organization: GenRad, Inc., Concord, Mass. Lines: 70 In article <1538@hound.UUCP> rwsh@hound.UUCP (R.STUBBLEFIELD) writes: > >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. The Anguilo brothers, who are now on trial in Boston for Mafia racketeering, amassed a multi-million dollar fortune using force. How would you indicate to them that they are worse off than if they had become steveadores or somesuch? >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. I am reasonable, yet I can see instances where (given a certain value system) inconsistency could be used productively. Particularly if you don't care about the well being of those you are being inconsistent with. I would "reason" as follows. I want A, but in all likelyhood, I will never have enough money to get A. I can however, get A by robbing X, and I have very little chance of getting caught. Therefore, it is in my best self-interest to rob X. Q.E.D. > >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. What if I "rationally" decide that, while I can't do a detailed analysis in every instance, there is no philosophical system which adequately explains the world either, therefore I will depend on raw intuition, which seems to work as well as anything else? > >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. The reasons I'm not a mugger have much more to do with my socio-economic status, my socialization during my childhood, and so forth, than with reason. Any "rational" reasons I give for not being a mugger are just that, "rationalizations", after the fact. If I was starving, and felt that there was no alternative, you can bet your last dollar that I'd be a mugger. That is why I try to make a society in which people don't find themselves in such a situation, because I can't really blame them if they are. > >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? The same way people have dealt thru all of history. Either thru force (not preferable), or by compromise. -- Sport Death, (USENET) ...{decvax | ihnp4!mit-eddie}!genrad!panda!lkk Larry Kolodney (INTERNET) lkk@mit-mc.arpa -------- Life is either a daring adventure, or nothing. - Helen Keller