You 'ought' to behave this way

[BigBallinStalin]

The point is you seem quite capable of saying that the acid storm would be worse for you, and totally incapable of making the simple empathetic step to reasoning that the acid storm would be worse for everyone who shares the same objective reaction to the acid (i.e. restricting activities to avoid burning/dissolving) as you do (as in every human being). You have consistently displayed a complete inability to consider more than one perspective on any situation throughout the thread. Don't feel bad (not that I'm sure that's even possible), you didn't choose to be the way you are, by really do get some professional help for the sake of those around you...

Haha. Yeah yeah, I don't agree with you so I'm crazy. Keep up the good work!

In fairness, considering only your own point of view and not taking the time to imagine how others feel about it, pretty much is the classic definition of sociopathic personality disorder.

Mrswdk's not expressing empathy. It doesn't follow that she's neurotic. Besides, for all those who express empathy, it might not be sincere. Instead, it could be them conforming with social desirability bias. Is being cognitively biased somehow better?

Note: psychologists tend not to use the term "sociopath" because it's meaningless. Look up the DSM-V for more accurate disorders/"disorders"].

Surely you do split the finest of hairs. Whether one calls it socipathic personality disorder (as indeed many psychologists do) or antisocial personality disorder (as it is called in the DSM-V) or dissocial personality disorder (as it is called in the ICD-10) it boils down to the same thing -- an inability to be concerned about the suffering of others. Homo sapiens is a social animal, naturally programmed to recognise distress in other members of the species and respond to it in some way. A failure to do so is aberrant, no matter what you call it.

What you said was irrelevant. I just made a note about that; it's not something worth arguing... instead, there's better points to address--e.g. the problem of social desirability bias...

Besides, how many people in here sincerely care about others--especially in faraway places like Delhi? It's cheap to say, "I surely care!" But, how much MONEY do they spend on charitable programs to help total strangers? For the US, it's about 2% of total income per year (much of which includes saving money to pay for the education of one's own offspring's, which isn't entirely altruistic). Would you like to conclude that most Americans are sociopaths? (Of course not. Mrswdk's being honest, and very likely her opponents on the acid rain 'dilemma' are engaging in cheap moral talk. Look at them chide her for being so rude, but I wonder: how many of them are hypocrites?).

You've jumped into the debate mid-stream and are making completely unwarranted assumptions about what is being debated.

Whether one's ethics should be more or less altruistic is not the issue at hand. Ethics does not require altruism. If I choose not to steal, yes that might be motivated by altruism. On the other hand, it could be motivated by a whole swarm of other considerations, most of which are primarily selfish. The vast majority of ethical systems engage in some kind of "social contract" logic -- I won't steal from you with the unspoken agreement that you won't steal from me. But an ethical system might be even less altruistic than that. At least some systems -- as diverse as Buddhism and Randian Objectivism -- teach that it's wrong to steal because to do so is to diminish oneself. It is entirely possible to see not-stealing as a completely selfish act.

The degree of one should convey might be an interesting thing to debate, but it is NOT what is being debated here. What mrswdk is saying is that it is not possible to construct ANY ethics whatsoever, that's one's actions will always be driven only by immediate self interest with no over-riding ethical principle at all, and that any system of ethics is illusory.

Of course it isn't possible to care about millions of anonymous people in any real sense. Our brains just don't have room for that many. But single out an individual from the masses, and you should be capable of caring about that individual. It doesn't require altruism. Meeting a starving man, you might decide to offer him a job, and knowing that he's starving, you might decide to pay him less than the average wage, figuring he's desperate enough to take it, which he probably is. It's a completely selfish transaction on both ends. The starving man just wants to eat, and you want a cheap worker, and through your own selfish considerations you both come out ahead. But even if you find a completely selfish solution to the problem, don't tell me you didn't feel some degree of sympathy for him. If you really didn't, then something is wrong with you.

Again, you're not really addressing the main points of my post. To reiterate, there really is great evidence for self-interested behavior, which has implications for the possibility of "non-sociopaths" faking sincerity (even though they verbally express an altruistic statement, in action they are hardly altruistic). That's the issue. Your summary of mrswdk's stance and your weird segue into altruism and selfishness aren't helpful.

[Dukasaur]

Besides, how many people in here sincerely care about others--especially in faraway places like Delhi? It's cheap to say, "I surely care!" But, how much MONEY do they spend on charitable programs to help total strangers? For the US, it's about 2% of total income per year (much of which includes saving money to pay for the education of one's own offspring's, which isn't entirely altruistic). Would you like to conclude that most Americans are sociopaths? (Of course not. Mrswdk's being honest, and very likely her opponents on the acid rain 'dilemma' are engaging in cheap moral talk. Look at them chide her for being so rude, but I wonder: how many of them are hypocrites?).

You've jumped into the debate mid-stream and are making completely unwarranted assumptions about what is being debated.

Whether one's ethics should be more or less altruistic is not the issue at hand. Ethics does not require altruism. If I choose not to steal, yes that might be motivated by altruism. On the other hand, it could be motivated by a whole swarm of other considerations, most of which are primarily selfish. The vast majority of ethical systems engage in some kind of "social contract" logic -- I won't steal from you with the unspoken agreement that you won't steal from me. But an ethical system might be even less altruistic than that. At least some systems -- as diverse as Buddhism and Randian Objectivism -- teach that it's wrong to steal because to do so is to diminish oneself. It is entirely possible to see not-stealing as a completely selfish act.

The degree of one should convey might be an interesting thing to debate, but it is NOT what is being debated here. What mrswdk is saying is that it is not possible to construct ANY ethics whatsoever, that's one's actions will always be driven only by immediate self interest with no over-riding ethical principle at all, and that any system of ethics is illusory.

Of course it isn't possible to care about millions of anonymous people in any real sense. Our brains just don't have room for that many. But single out an individual from the masses, and you should be capable of caring about that individual. It doesn't require altruism. Meeting a starving man, you might decide to offer him a job, and knowing that he's starving, you might decide to pay him less than the average wage, figuring he's desperate enough to take it, which he probably is. It's a completely selfish transaction on both ends. The starving man just wants to eat, and you want a cheap worker, and through your own selfish considerations you both come out ahead. But even if you find a completely selfish solution to the problem, don't tell me you didn't feel some degree of sympathy for him. If you really didn't, then something is wrong with you.

Again, you're not really addressing the main points of my post. To reiterate, there really is great evidence for self-interested behavior, which has implications for the possibility of "non-sociopaths" faking sincerity (even though they verbally express an altruistic statement, in action they are hardly altruistic). That's the issue. Your summary of mrswdk's stance and your weird segue into altruism and selfishness aren't helpful.

Lol, you jump into a debate, send it on an irrelevant tangent, and then bitch that I'm not addressing your points.

How about you address the OP: do you, or do you not, believe that it's possible to construct and objectively-supportable system of morality?

[BigBallinStalin]

I'm not complaining. I'm just stating some explanations which you don't want to address, I make a note of it, and then you respond with negativity. I think it's pretty important to note the backlash against mrswdk when the "backlashers" are possibly insincere weak hearts. How much money/resources do they dedicate to their altruistic concerns? I'd guess: very little, if any. Their talk is cheap, and you seem to be wrong about mrswdk anyway, but whatever, bro.


Is it possible to construct an objectively-supportable system of morality?

Sure, it's possible. All events range between 0 and 1 in probability, but that's an obvious yet boring observation.

The issue boils down to (a) universality, (b) measurement, and (c) practicality:

(a) are there certain moral claims which are universally true? There seems to be a trade-off between universality and specificity: the more vague, the more universalizable (but vague propositions aren't too useful). So, there's that constraint.

(b) Questions on morality will inevitably come down to basic axioms from which a standard of good arises. It seems unlikely that we can get reasonable people to agree on basic--yet specific--axioms and also to agree on an objective standard for measuring 'good'. And, even if you have the standard, how can it be measured? Is that even possible? (again, see (a), and the following:
viewtopic.php?f=8&t=211243&start=75#p4639542
viewtopic.php?f=8&t=211243&start=75#p4639546

(c) Practicality. Suppose we could find the best moral claims evar. How then do you get people elsewhere to follow them? Transplanting institutions has beguiled the international aid industry for decades, and their efforts seem to be largely a waste of resources--and they are usually not in the business of changing institutions (e.g. building a well, or subsidizing some dictatorship with medicine and food). Then, even if you got the proper blueprint, there's other factors which will counter it--e.g. the USG is going to continue subsidizing corrupt regime A because that regime plays ball with the USG.

[BigBallinStalin]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Is%E2%80%93ought_problem#.22Moral.22_oughts

Is there any valid way of establishing a moral goal that ought to be achieved, or are people who subscribe to a system of morals just expressing what they want to see achieved?

Sure. Here's one: don't kill people for stupid reasons--e.g. because I wanted their shoes. There's more efficient ways to get shoes, which benefits a society. Now, it comes down to standards of proper behavior: e.g. efficiency, social good, etc.

Well yeah, any society establishes a set of rules that will support the way in which it wishes to exist and function, but that doesn't mean that behavior which falls outside of those rules is 'immoral' or 'wrong' - it's just contrary to the system which people wish to establish. We prohibit driving above a certain speed in your car or selling things on the sidewalk not to prohibit 'immoral' behavior, but to reduce the risk of serious road accidents and to stop clowns cluttering up the pavement with their junk while people are trying to walk. We prohibit jaywalking not because it's 'immoral' but because widespread jaywalking is enormously disruptive to traffic flow.

Similarly, societies prevent KKK lynchings and Nazi genocides not because they are 'immoral' but because lynch mobs and genocides are not conducive to helping those societies progress in the way they want. That's why society's can comfortably ignore lynchings and genocides that occur in far away places - they are not making any moral judgements about these happenings, and so they make their decision to act (or not) based upon the effect that intervening would have on their own society. The moral relativists apply moral relativism and argue that it's the other society's decision whether or not they slaughter their open people, but that position is hypocritical (we think it's wrong, but not when they do it) and belies how wholly useless attempting to produce moral standards is (because the moral standard is so full of loopholes as to have no consistent application).

We're largely in agreement, but there's one stumbling block with your post: concerns of efficiency are just one factor in the creation of rules. There's plenty others--especially amoral ones--which are also at play--e.g. prohibiting sidewalk vendors from selling stuff restricts competition, thereby benefiting the sellers who rent/own stores on the street. Rent-seeking itself doesn't have much to do with morality, but of course morality can be used as an ad hoc rationalization (which further complicates the debate on morality, rules, and outcomes).

Then there's another issue: the outcome might not be the product of rational, intentional design, but rather (to some degree) the result of unintentional decision-making. People grope around in the dark and stumble into outcomes which they deem desirable--e.g. all market prices which affect consumption and production. (This is why I don't buy the "society is making rule X cuz it's efficient").

It's much more straightforward to just state that you wish to develop whichever system will have the most overall utility for your society. Not only is this system actually consistent, but such a system isn't prone to the emotional or social desirability biases that you mentioned in reference to the acid rain example.

Again, we've run into the measurement issue, and even if it is "scientific," cognitive bias will still play its emotional role. Basic example: all of social science. Economists can use the same model and same assumptions to reach different conclusions which conform with their different ideologies.

[Dukasaur]

Surely you do split the finest of hairs. Whether one calls it socipathic personality disorder (as indeed many psychologists do) or antisocial personality disorder (as it is called in the DSM-V) or dissocial personality disorder (as it is called in the ICD-10) it boils down to the same thing -- an inability to be concerned about the suffering of others. Homo sapiens is a social animal, naturally programmed to recognise distress in other members of the species and respond to it in some way. A failure to do so is aberrant, no matter what you call it.

Who said I am incapable of feeling any empathy whatsoever? Sure, I don't care about the fates of the beggars who sit outside my nearest subway station, but I care about the well-being of my partner, parents, siblings and a few of my friends.

The starving man just wants to eat, and you want a cheap worker, and through your own selfish considerations you both come out ahead. But even if you find a completely selfish solution to the problem, don't tell me you didn't feel some degree of sympathy for him. If you really didn't, then something is wrong with you.

What I believe is not possible, is to come up with any objective reason to desire an outcome.

Our primate brains are only wired to care about 40 or 50 people at a time

How do you manage to believe that there is something wrong with BBS if he doesn't feel sympathy for a starving stranger, while at the same time believing that there is no objective reason why BBS should feel any sympathy for that man and that the human brain is only capable of caring for a limited number of people in the first place?

There's no problem there. I don't believe there's any objective reason for feeling the way we do. I believe there is a very strong subjective reason. Namely, we are Great Apes, and Great Apes are social animals where the stronger members of the tribe defend the weaker members.

See, most people make decisions based on dumb animal instinct, but they don't want to be honest about it. They want some God or some Universal Law to act as a Great Yardstick and tell them they're doing the Right Thing based on some universal constant.

I don't have that problem. I'm completely capable of acknowledging the fact that my behaviours are simply the behaviours of any Great Ape. I don't need any objective yardstick. Some people are absolutely desperate to prove that their animal desires are not just animal desires. They do the most fantastic gyrations to prove that there's some coldly intellectual reason for why they do things. They have a preference for avocados, and they go through some grand cockamamie song and dance about how avocados are objectively superior to other foods. I don't. I'm comfortable interpreting my behaviour as normal primate behaviour, and intellect as simply a tool to be used. If I like avocados, it's my animal instinct telling me I want them, and my intellect is just there to devise the most efficient way of acquiring them.

So, back to your antisocial behaviour. It's aberrant because that's not how our species survives. All Great Apes are social, but Homo sapiens is even more social than others. There is strong archeological evidence that we survived the Ice Ages and other hominid species did not, because of our extreme socialization. When an unfortunate member of our species doesn't have a spear to hunt with, we lend him our second-best spear, and the entire tribe is stronger as a result.

If we were tigers or grizzly bears, your "every man for himself" ideal would be natural, but we are not and it is not. We are social animals. We have demonstrable emotional responses to the suffering of others, and if you don't have those responses then you are aberrant. It's quite simple, really. I'm not saying you're objectively evil, because I don't believe there is any objective evil other than entropy itself. All living things in one way or another are fighting against the slings and arrows of entropy, and in that sense we are all in the same boat together. Only some of us know it and some of us don't.

[mrswdk]

We're largely in agreement, but there's one stumbling block with your post: concerns of efficiency are just one factor in the creation of rules. There's plenty others--especially amoral ones--which are also at play--e.g. prohibiting sidewalk vendors from selling stuff restricts competition, thereby benefiting the sellers who rent/own stores on the street. Rent-seeking itself doesn't have much to do with morality, but of course morality can be used as an ad hoc rationalization (which further complicates the debate on morality, rules, and outcomes).

Well yeah, but the issue of how interest groups try to twist the rules to their immediate advantage (and how we protect against that) is separate to the question of whether or not morality has a legitimate role in guiding the rule-making process.

(and on a side note, in the era of internet auction sites I don't buy that hawkers are being cut out of the competition by being told that they're not allowed to sell their junk on the sidewalk)

Then there's another issue: the outcome might not be the product of rational, intentional design, but rather (to some degree) the result of unintentional decision-making. People grope around in the dark and stumble into outcomes which they deem desirable--e.g. all market prices which affect consumption and production. (This is why I don't buy the "society is making rule X cuz it's efficient").

There are limits to how well any society can be planned, but we might as well hone our system to the furthest extent that we can.

It's much more straightforward to just state that you wish to develop whichever system will have the most overall utility for your society. Not only is this system actually consistent, but such a system isn't prone to the emotional or social desirability biases that you mentioned in reference to the acid rain example.

Again, we've run into the measurement issue, and even if it is "scientific," cognitive bias will still play its emotional role. Basic example: all of social science. Economists can use the same model and same assumptions to reach different conclusions which conform with their different ideologies.

Well yeah, social science does always inevitably suffer some sort of bias caused by the researcher. But kinda relating to what you've been saying in nietzsche's weird free will thread, while in social research especially there's nothing that can be said to be 100% reliable, accurate or useful, we can at least develop some benchmarks that will help us sift out the brain farts in favor of the stuff that's more practically useful and trustworthy.

[mrswdk]

How do you manage to believe that there is something wrong with BBS if he doesn't feel sympathy for a starving stranger, while at the same time believing that there is no objective reason why BBS should feel any sympathy for that man and that the human brain is only capable of caring for a limited number of people in the first place?

There's no problem there. I don't believe there's any objective reason for feeling the way we do. I believe there is a very strong subjective reason. Namely, we are Great Apes, and Great Apes are social animals where the stronger members of the tribe defend the weaker members.

See, most people make decisions based on dumb animal instinct, but they don't want to be honest about it. They want some God or some Universal Law to act as a Great Yardstick and tell them they're doing the Right Thing based on some universal constant.

Just because a lot/the majority of people rely on emotion or subjective reasoning doesn't mean that it is wrong not to do so.

I don't have that problem. I'm completely capable of acknowledging the fact that my behaviours are simply the behaviours of any Great Ape. I don't need any objective yardstick. Some people are absolutely desperate to prove that their animal desires are not just animal desires. They do the most fantastic gyrations to prove that there's some coldly intellectual reason for why they do things. They have a preference for avocados, and they go through some grand cockamamie song and dance about how avocados are objectively superior to other foods. I don't. I'm comfortable interpreting my behaviour as normal primate behaviour, and intellect as simply a tool to be used. If I like avocados, it's my animal instinct telling me I want them, and my intellect is just there to devise the most efficient way of acquiring them.

So, back to your antisocial behaviour. It's aberrant because that's not how our species survives. All Great Apes are social, but Homo sapiens is even more social than others. There is strong archeological evidence that we survived the Ice Ages and other hominid species did not, because of our extreme socialization. When an unfortunate member of our species doesn't have a spear to hunt with, we lend him our second-best spear, and the entire tribe is stronger as a result.

If we were tigers or grizzly bears, your "every man for himself" ideal would be natural, but we are not and it is not. We are social animals. We have demonstrable emotional responses to the suffering of others, and if you don't have those responses then you are aberrant. It's quite simple, really. I'm not saying you're objectively evil, because I don't believe there is any objective evil other than entropy itself. All living things in one way or another are fighting against the slings and arrows of entropy, and in that sense we are all in the same boat together. Only some of us know it and some of us don't.

I am aware that there are many more people out there necessary to support my life as I wish to live it. If migrant workers get treated so badly that they stop moving to cities, I will suddenly find that free same day delivery, cheap restaurants, street food and many other handy services would vanish from my life, or become significantly more expensive. I'm well aware that my life relies on the greater society I live within, and on some basic standard of treatment for various members of that society. That still doesn't mean I have to have emotional interest for each and every migrant worker sob story I hear though.

[Symmetry]

I am aware that there are many more people out there necessary to support my life as I wish to live it. If migrant workers get treated so badly that they stop moving to cities, I will suddenly find that free same day delivery, cheap restaurants, street food and many other handy services would vanish from my life, or become significantly more expensive. I'm well aware that my life relies on the greater society I live within, and on some basic standard of treatment for various members of that society. That still doesn't mean I have to have emotional interest for each and every migrant worker sob story I hear though.

This sounds pretty close to the clinical definition of a psychopath.

[mrswdk]

I am aware that there are many more people out there necessary to support my life as I wish to live it. If migrant workers get treated so badly that they stop moving to cities, I will suddenly find that free same day delivery, cheap restaurants, street food and many other handy services would vanish from my life, or become significantly more expensive. I'm well aware that my life relies on the greater society I live within, and on some basic standard of treatment for various members of that society. That still doesn't mean I have to have emotional interest for each and every migrant worker sob story I hear though.

This sounds pretty close to the clinical definition of a psychopath.

Blah blah. Scroll up, we've been through this one already.

[Symmetry]

I am aware that there are many more people out there necessary to support my life as I wish to live it. If migrant workers get treated so badly that they stop moving to cities, I will suddenly find that free same day delivery, cheap restaurants, street food and many other handy services would vanish from my life, or become significantly more expensive. I'm well aware that my life relies on the greater society I live within, and on some basic standard of treatment for various members of that society. That still doesn't mean I have to have emotional interest for each and every migrant worker sob story I hear though.

This sounds pretty close to the clinical definition of a psychopath.

Blah blah. Scroll up, we've been through this one already.

I'm not surprised that I'm not the only person to have noticed. Roughly speaking, how many people would you say have noticed this in your life?