Moral vs. Ethical

[The Terrible Sweal]

Ownership is having enough physical force [at your disposal]to deter ( or conquer) others who covet what you are the curator of, or who have what you want.

That is one theory of property, suitable for a non-voluntary rubric (e.g. conquests or class systems)

In a voluntary rubric, property is whatever your society won't take (or suffer to be taken from) you because society values the use that you are putting it to above the uses that a taker would put it to.

The latter is more secure, more productive and more efficient.

[theloniusfleabag]

Dear The Terrible Sweal,

That is one theory of property, suitable for a non-voluntary rubric (e.g. conquests or class systems)

In a voluntary rubric, property is whatever your society won't take (or suffer to be taken from) you because society values the use that you are putting it to above the uses that a taker would put it to.

One must think 'outside Rubric's Cube', for 'voluntary ownership' (especially of land) legitimizes the force originally used to obtain ownership.

[The Terrible Sweal]

Huhn?

I don't see how. Voluntary would be voluntary. Legitimized force would fall under the force rubric.

[August1991]

A society requires it's members to contribute to it in order to earn standing within in it and determine that members allocation of scarce resources. That society runs out of productive occupations due to efficencies gained through various means. Making locks gives some members a chance to contribute where before they had none and determines how many resources they ought to recieve. Is lock making thus moral?

Why would a society ever run out of productive occupations? But if it did, then more the merrier. The purpose of life is not to work; the purpose of life is to have fun.

Frankly though, I suspect people will always find ways to deal with one another.

Both lockmakers and shoemakers provide a useful service. In an honest world, the lockmakers could become shoemakers and we would have better shoes.

The First Nations peoples (or aboriginals, whatever the pc name is nowadays) laughed when they 'sold' their land to the white man. They said to themselves, "Foolish white man, you cannot own land. You can't pick it up and take it with you!"

Native Indians co-operated with each other. They didn't do this anonymously but rather through their clan. They had no need for property rights nor prices. This limited tremendously the co-operation possible and they were extremely poor.

You see, here is something I don't like about discussion with you. I carefully apply and indicate a term 'net pleasure', but despite that you deliberately misconstrue it into "pleasure", is if you have no regard whatsoever for my comment. You know what? That's rude.

I don't know DAC at all but from his (her?) posts, I sense DAC is a patient, polite person. I hate to let you in on something, Terrible Swell, but the world will not always play according to your rules. Indeed, it is up to you to explain yourself according to others' rules.

Now, back to the point, your description of why you didn't hang up suggests clearly an implicit 'net pleasure' you derived... blah, blah...

We don't choose to obtain a certain net benefit. We choose to obtain an expected net benefit. That is, we live in world of risk (uncertainty). I suspect DAC thought that there was a chance some good could come of the conversation.

I didn't hang up, because the ethics I work on (biblical) teach me to sacrifice myself for the good of others, at least under some circumstances.

This is a recipe for unhappiness and frustration if I ever saw one. How do you know that your sacrifice is less than the good it will do another? Are you God? I suspect rather that you will be frustrated to learn that your loss leads to little benefit for another. When people want something, they usually ask. If they really want something, they are prepared to offer something else in return. That's what co-operation - indeed life - is all about.

Ownership is having enough physical force [at your disposal]to deter ( or conquer) others who covet what you are the curator of, or who have what you want.

That is one theory of property, suitable for a non-voluntary rubric (e.g. conquests or class systems).

In a voluntary rubric, property is whatever your society won't take (or suffer to be taken from) you because society values the use that you are putting it to above the uses that a taker would put it to.

The latter is more secure, more productive and more efficient.

I think I agree with both Thelonious and Swell. The notion of property requires some way to ensure its protection against theft - a loaded gun might be useful here. But why should a thief steal something of greater value to the thief than it is to me? If we trade, the thief will get it and make me happy in the process.

Voluntary rubric? WTF? [i really hate jargon. I have struggled to use proper English because it is so beautiful. Please don't defile it.]

----

The problem with all forms of co-operation is that there is a danger of cheating - opportunistic breach. Markets as such don't solve that problem.

But as long as property rights exist and are respected, markets with prices turn competitive greed into anonymous co-operation. They identify quickly with whom it is advantageous to trade.

[The Terrible Sweal]

Now, back to the point, your description of why you didn't hang up suggests clearly an implicit 'net pleasure' you derived... blah, blah...

We don't choose to obtain a certain net benefit. We choose to obtain an expected net benefit. That is, we live in world of risk (uncertainty). I suspect DAC thought that there was a chance some good could come of the conversation.

You are certainly right about expectation. But which and what benefits DAC expected, I don't hink matter. My point is he acted out of SOME expectation of benefit (or avoidance of cost/loss).

Voluntary rubric?  WTF?  [i really hate jargon.  I have struggled to use proper English because it is so beautiful.  Please don't defile it.]

WTF indeed. It's not jargon, it's two words used together to convey the meaning I intend.

"Voluntary: done, acting, able to act, of ones own free will"

"Rubric: established custom"

[DAC]

I believe that was the point. Any bold consideration other than the 'sum' is a 'whimsical variable'.

Sorry Thelonius. Can you try that one again. I'm not getting your point, perhaps because I'm not sure what you mean by a whimsical variable.

[DAC]

You see, here is something I don't like about discussion with you. I carefully apply and indicate a term 'net pleasure', but despite that you deliberately misconstrue it into "pleasure", is if you have no regard whatsoever for my comment. You know what? That's rude.

In the first place, T Sweal, you have never explained what you mean by 'net pleasure'. Since you used the word pleasure, I assumed it had something to do with what we commonly mean by pleasure. If you are going to use words with unusual meanings, you should define them, if we are to have rational discussion.

In the second place, because you put it in quotes, I presumed that there might be something unusual in your understanding of the term, and I responded with "pleasure", also in quotes, to try to communicate that so far as possible I was allowing for unusual meanings, trying as best I could in the uncertainty to match whatever you intended. My argument is not that I was unhappy about the situation (though I was), but that I derived no pragmatically measurable benefit from it.

Now, back to the point, your description of why you didn't hang up suggests clearly an implicit 'net pleasure' you derived. You didn't hang up because you are serving an ethic (as you put it). Your choose to accept the displeasure of the conversation for to avoid the greater displeasure of not living up to your what your beliefs require of you. I don't need to adopt your beliefs to see the rationale that underlies your choice. I merely need to know that they may provide incentives for you outside of the displeasure involved endogenously in the conversation. 

The trouble is that you are trying to argue for the validity of an ethic based on pragmatic assessment of the gains and losses. It is not sufficient to be able to see a rationale for my action. I have made no secret that I have a rationale for my action. For you to be able to say this is anything but bad, you have to be able to show that there is a pragmatic advantage to it.

The fact that I perceive an advantage does not make your point. Presumably Hitler saw advantage to his actions. No question that Al Quaeda saw advantage to mashing the World Trade Center. If you say my choice was ethically "good" because I perceived a benefit from it, then you have to make the same decision for the World Trade Center smash. I'm fairly sure you wouldn't want to do that.

[DAC]

In an ideal world, if an action benefits me then it should also benefit society as a whole. (This would be the case if all relations were voluntary.)

It's not an ideal world. It's a world in which thieves break in & moths and rust corrupt. The thief who succeeds is benefited, but it does not benefit society as a whole - despite theloniusfleabag's attempt to find a means of turning even that evil into good.

It's an assumption borrowed from Adam Smith. If people act in their own self-interest (net benefit to themselves) and their actions with others are voluntary market transactions, then this will lead to a benefit for all.

This is counter-intuitive and certainly contrary to Christian teachings.

I only know Adam Smith from secondary sources, but it's my impression that he did not assume that the measure of goodness was benefit to the whole society, but attempted to demonstrate that laissez faire capitalism was in the end beneficial to the whole society. In any case, growing up in 18th C Scotland, he certainly imbibed heavily from Christian teaching, wherever he may have gone with it later. The highly unusual thing about him was that he held that what might appear to be selfish action would actually work for the common good.

I agree that his views are counter-intuitive. I'd need to be convinced that they were contrary to Christian teachings. Christian teaching prescribes generosity, self-sacrifice to help the truly needy, but it prescribes fair practice, economic justice, in dealing with others.

But the ethics of pragmatism falls short in dealing with real need. I think that most long term material need can be best dealt with by enabling the needy to become economically productive, but there is a time and place when the only effective help is a handout. Many years back I stopped to check on a guy trying to wheel his motorcycle along the edge of a remote highway at night. He'd run out of gas, and had no cash. My personal self-interest would be to drive on by. Tough for him. But was it unethical for me to get him $5 worth of gas and let him be on his way? My loss, his gain, net economic benefit to society zero, because it was money I would soon have spent on something else. On your pragmatic scale, it was unethical on my part, or at best neutral, unless you can show a pragmatic rationale for putting others before yourself.

August, you said that my biblical ethics, which calls for self-sacrifice at times

is a recipe for unhappiness and frustration if I ever saw one. How do you know that your sacrifice is less than the good it will do another? Are you God? I suspect rather that you will be frustrated to learn that your loss leads to little benefit for another.

What you are saying to me, is that biblical ethics are in some ways counter-intuitive. But from my perspective, it doesn't matter in the end whether I build a great pyramid or win an Olympic medal or whatever. What matters to me is that I do the best I can to please the God who has given me so much love, so much mercy, that in all eternity I could never repay him.

The interesting thing is that when people are stirred by God's kindness to serve him, it does bring pragmatic benefits to the whole society. Slaves are set free. Women are valued. Workers gain improved working conditions. Knowledge is advanced. The society prospers. But it is a mistake to presume that the pragmatic results are the measure of the value of actions. Pragmatism does not succeed in giving an adequate basis for determining what are the best choices in may situations.

[August1991]

Here is an interesting article although I find this article even more-thought provoking.

I will answer your post in more detail when I have time.

[The Terrible Sweal]

... My argument is not that I was unhappy about the situation (though I was), but that I derived no pragmatically measurable benefit from it.

I think it changes the analysis substantially to venture into the question of "measureable". By 'net pleasure' I mean to convey the fact that choices involve not just securing pleasures, but also avoiding displeasures.

In your case, you stayed on the line out of an assessment that told you you would [expect to] avoid displeasure (e.g. failing to live up to your beliefs) and had some potential [expectation] for obtaining the satisfaction (pleasure) of tangibly helping the other person.

Accordingly, given your expected 'net pleasure' in the situation, you made the pragmatic choice that you would stay on the line and not hang up.

The trouble is that you are trying to argue for the validity of an ethic based on pragmatic assessment of the gains and losses. It is not sufficient to be able to see a rationale for my action. I have made no secret that I have a rationale for my action. For you to be able to say this is anything but bad, you have to be able to show that there is a pragmatic advantage to it.

There was a pragmatic advantage to it, for you, as discussed above.

The fact that I perceive an advantage does not make your point.

It is the beginning. The next phase of the assessment is to ask about the gain/loss occasioned to all from your individual pragmatic choice.

[August1991]

It's not an ideal world. It's a world in which thieves break in & moths and rust corrupt. The thief who succeeds is benefited, but it does not benefit society as a whole

No, it isn't an ideal world. Immorality exists. I would say it is immoral to steal, immoral to operate an unprofitable business and immoral for two people to live unhappily together.

Many years back I stopped to check on a guy trying to wheel his motorcycle along the edge of a remote highway at night. He'd run out of gas, and had no cash. My personal self-interest would be to drive on by. Tough for him.

I think the idea here is that if you stop for him, some time in the future, he may stop for you. The generosity of Muslims is notable. In a sense, these are examples of risky trades.

I have never understood whether the religious dogma encouraging such trades pre-dates market relations or was developed in response to markets. I suspect the latter.

What matters to me is that I do the best I can to please the God who has given me so much love, so much mercy, that in all eternity I could never repay him.

It is a simple practical fact that we would not enjoy all the comforts of life we do now if people were "motivated only by a love of God".

This message I am posting to you requires the co-operation of many people. When you purchase a simple lead pencil with an eraser top, you are calling on the co-operation of many people around the globe. This degree of co-operation can only be achieved through market pricing.

Developed some 5000 or 10,000 years ago, this was a radically different way of organizing human affairs. I think religions were in part a response to the changes wrought by the introduction of mathematics (prices or terms of trade) into human relations. On one hand, the definition of property became important (the Old Testament deals often with this, it seems to me) but on the other hand, the issue of wealthy traders (co-operation through markets) seemed to upset the older idea of co-operation by sheer generosity.

Christianity does not teach people to be greedy. (Even today, the North American Left has a puritan, moral repugnance of greed and profit - considering these to be immoral, or at least bad for the environment.)

Yet the inescapable conclusion is that when greedy individuals use market prices, they are led to co-operate perfectly amongst each other.

This idea is counter-intuitive, still radical and still unfortunately misunderstood.

Adam Smith had a wry sense of humour and I suspect he was aware of the contradiction between his radical observation of the effect of market prices and the Christian Church's dogma. But who knows.

In your case, you stayed on the line out of an assessment that told you you would [expect to] avoid displeasure (e.g. failing to live up to your beliefs) and had some potential [expectation] for obtaining the satisfaction (pleasure) of tangibly helping the other person.

We help friends because it feels good to do so, but also because we know that we maybe in need in the future. Our true friends are those who know life is a two way street.

I think it changes the analysis substantially to venture into the question of "measureable". By 'net pleasure' I mean to convey the fact that choices involve not just securing pleasures, but also avoiding displeasures.

Why does adding the word "measurable" change anything substantive? Like a novel as opposed to an oral story, the only difference is in precision.

As to pleasure or displeasure, I would be careful. Winning $100,000 is one thing; losing $100,000 is something else again. It is the potential outcome of an action that matters.

[theloniusfleabag]

Dear August1991,

Yet the inescapable conclusion is that when greedy individuals use market prices, they are led to co-operate perfectly amongst each other.

I disagree. Especially on the useage of the word 'perfectly'. The show 'survivor' (though I have proudly never seen it' supposedly 'perfectly' pits humans against each other, and rewards deceit and treachery, for it is the end that is glorious, and not the means. ( ala religion) Markets, too, reward transient ends and immediate goals over anything 'moral'.

It seems to me, your view of morality is 'if the means serve the end'. A very shallow view, but shared by many.

[DAC]

[Terrible Sweal: Sep 16 2004, 12:36 PM]

The fact that I perceive an advantage does not make your point.

It is the beginning. The next phase of the assessment is to ask about the gain/loss occasioned to all from your individual pragmatic choice.

I think you're dodging the issues, Terrible Sweal. You have given no reason for anybody to think that "gain/loss occasioned to all" has anything to do with an action being ethical. At this point, it's an arbitrary assumption. Assume you show that my action was beneficial to all, in some way. What makes that ethical?

Let's think about where this discussion has gone. It began with your claim that ethics could be established on a base free from religion. You laid out three principles which you claimed to be the principles of your ethical system. Later you added (in my estimation, though you claimed this was derived from the 2nd & 3rd principle) usefulness or pragmatism and fairness. Now you have added the concept of an action being beneficial to all (though I suppose you may think that derives from fairness).

I have repeatedly invited you to show two things: what there is about your principles which should cause others to accept them, and how they give a basis for ethical judgment. I challenged you with an action that most people would agree was good, and yet which had no pragmatic benefit except my subjective belief that it was the right thing for me to do.

You tell us that your initial principles derive from your study and thought, but you support them with nothing but an authority statement that they are valid. Oh, you do claim that if others think it out, they will see that your principles are good, but that statement is a blind faith claim - & you are supposed to reject faith claims in favour of evidence and logic.

You have given no reasons to show that usefulness or "fairness" are measures of ethics. You have backed yourself into a corner in your effort to show that my choice to listen to my friend for three hours late one night was "good". The rationale you accept as making it a legitimate action also applies to Al Quaeda destroying the World Trade Center and thousands of lives. It appears that my choice is "good" in your ethic because it satisfied my goals at that time. By that reasoning, the terrorists choices are also "good", Jack the Ripper's choices were "good"; pick whatever monstrous act you want from history, and that reasoning says that it was "good". [Note that I am using "good" in quotes as a means of indicating an action that was ethically positive in your system. You may object to the term, but at this point I don't know what term your ethics would use for that. Substitute for it what you would use, please.]

Aug 25 you wrote:

The basic principles:

1. There is an inevitable element of uncertainty (relativism) in anything I or my fellow entities conceive. Whatever does or does not 'truly' exist, we can never absolutely know.

2. It appears that the common state of each human being comprises a distinct consciousness, to some extent unbridgeably separate, from any other human.

3. It appears that the consciousness noted above imbues each human being with a capacity to discern various elements of their environment and formulate preferences to act upon.

...The rest is simply elaboration.

Sep 1 you wrote

Think deeper: the criterion of usefulness derives from and is measurable in terms of the preferences referred to in prop. 3. Fairness, meanwhile, on the one hand is instrumental to usefulness (extrapolation), and on the other hand necessary to give full effect to proposition 2.

I can see that proposition 3 would imply that people tend to make choices that they think are useful. But that says nothing about whether or not those choices are ethical, which is what this is all about, unless you are going to assume either that all choices are ethical, or only those which are actually useful (as opposed to appearing useful to the chooser) are ethical.

I do not see at all how you extrapolate from usefulness to fairness, nor do I see anything in the statement that we are distinct individuals which demands fairness. You may be able to demonstrate this (obviously I don't think so!), but thus far it appears only as an assumption, an authority statement on your part.

So let's go back to the real issues. To show that your principles establish a reasonable, logical, rational basis for ethics, you still need to do one of two things:

1. Show some axiomatic principle(s) which lead(s) logically to your propositions, or some principle which is so attractive that everybody will want to hold to it, which does that.

2. Alternatively, show logically how those propositions lead to universally desirable solution to ethical problems. How do they speak to us when tempted to steal or kill? What do they lead us to do when we contract to do a job, but then decide that the pay is not sufficient? How do they resolve the tensions between a woman’s concerns and her unborn child’s well-being?

You have claimed the three principles are a basis for ethics, but you have given no reason why I or anybody else should accept them in the first place, nor have you shown how they lead to ethical action. Until you do that, your claim is an authority statement, a faith claim. It may not be religious in the sense of worshipping some god other than yourself, but it is at root religious.

[DAC]

Many years back I stopped to check on a guy trying to wheel his motorcycle along the edge of a remote highway at night. He'd run out of gas, and had no cash. My personal self-interest would be to drive on by. Tough for him.

I think the idea here is that if you stop for him, some time in the future, he may stop for you. The generosity of Muslims is notable. In a sense, these are examples of risky trades.

August, I think you're stretching really hard to try to make a case for an ethic of pragmatism. Certainly in the instance in question, I was not expecting some future benefit from him. I remember it because the cyclist insisted he was going to pay me back for the help, though I told him it was a gift. I gave him my address so he could send me a cheque, even though I was certain he'd never send it - & he didn't. You may say it was pragmatically ethical because (apart from my expectations) it had the objective possibility of spurring him to help me sometime later, but it's a long stretch.

The articles you referred to in an earlier post were interesting. I think the first writer was correct in saying that Adam Smith's analysis may be broadly true in the market place, but doesn't establish an ethic, or cover every situation. The second writer did not give enough detail to be sure, but I think his Chicago storm story fell short of his aim. Yes, his second merchant got out there and got more food on his shelves - but did he have to double the prices to accomplish that? Doubling the prices did perhaps hold people back from stripping the shelves bare, but were they the only way to do it? Interesting though.

In the end it comes back to the ethical issue. Adam Smith describes how a free market works, in general. Does the fact that in the end it works out well for most people (not everybody) make it "good"? If so, why? From a materialist beginning (no formal religion), what is there about things working out well that makes it ethical? From the materialist beginning, this world and all of us in it are just a big a big, fancy accident. Why is common good "better" than pleasing myself? Especially when pleasing oneself may make an Osama bin Laden delight in causing a market crash and a depression, if he can.

It is a simple practical fact that we would not enjoy all the comforts of life we do now if people were "motivated only by a love of God". ....

Christianity does not teach people to be greedy. (Even today, the North American Left has a puritan, moral repugnance of greed and profit - considering these to be immoral, or at least bad for the environment.)

Yet the inescapable conclusion is that when greedy individuals use market prices, they are led to co-operate perfectly amongst each other.

No, Christianity does not teach people to be greedy. But it does teach people to work to provide for themselves and to be able to help those who cannot. That Protestant work ethic has a lot to do with the prosperity we take for granted today. Non-greedy individuals can also work together ...

Where is the evidence that "we would not enjoy all the comforts of life we do now if people were 'motivated only by a love of God'"?

[The Terrible Sweal]

Let's think about where this discussion has gone.

Good, because frankly, I've lost the thread of our bilateral discussion.

It began with your claim that ethics could be established on a base free from religion.

More than that. I distinguished the 'morality' (a received understanding of right and wrong) propagated by religions from 'ethics' (a derived understanding of right and wrong) acheivable through Reason.

You laid out three principles which you claimed to be the principles of your ethical system.  Later you added (in my estimation, though you claimed this was derived from the 2nd & 3rd principle) usefulness or pragmatism and fairness.

You didn't challenge that derivation, so far as I recall. I assumed it made sense to you. Perhaps this discussion can be resolved by an examantion of that derivation. Numbers 2 and 3 posit self-sovereign individuality and the existence of preferences in individuals. From this we can infer the concept of motive/motivation/purpose. Once we have purpose, pragmatism becomes a relevant standard of assessing choices.

Now you have added the concept of an action being beneficial to all (though I suppose you may think that derives from fairness). 

Well, no. I think you picked up on something I was adding to another discussion on this topic, and so its application in this line is inexact.

I challenged you with an action that most people would agree was good, and yet which had no pragmatic benefit except my subjective belief that it was the right thing for me to do.

I don't understand what your 'challenge' is. What are you asking???

Is this what you want: Your action in that case seems quite justified ethically in terms of the principles I suggested right at the beginning. What's the problem here???

... but you support them with nothing but an authority statement that they are valid.

If you find them invalid, I invite you to discuss why. Do you find fault with the three basics? Or is the the extrapolation you challenge?

You have backed yourself into a corner in your effort to show that my choice to listen to my friend for three hours late one night was "good".

Not in the least. As I see it, I have won that point.

The rationale you accept as making it a legitimate action also applies to Al Quaeda destroying the World Trade Center and thousands of lives.

Utter raving nonsense.

It appears that my choice is "good" in your ethic because it satisfied my goals at that time.

There is a miscommunication at work. Until this post, I had not given you an assessment of whether your choice was 'good'. By thinking that I had, you were led to think that I assessed your action as 'good' because it satisfied your goals. In fact that is not the sum total of ethics at all.

There. Do you agree with me yet, or is there more work to do here?

I can see that proposition 3 would imply that people tend to make choices that they think are useful.

Each person makes choices he or she thinks will serve his or her preferences. Whether these choices are ethical depends in part on whether they are useful in serving these preferences and the preferences of all other people.

I do not see at all how you extrapolate from usefulness to fairness, nor do I see anything in the statement that we are distinct individuals which demands fairness.

If fairness is useful, or if fairness makes something more useful, the extrapolation is sound. I argue that fairness is useful in allowing more people to serve more preferences. (Do I need to explain that one?)

To show that your principles establish a reasonable, logical, rational basis for ethics, you still need to do one of two things:

... 2. Alternatively, show logically how those propositions lead to universally desirable solution to ethical problems. How do they speak to us when tempted to steal or kill? What do they lead us to do when we contract to do a job, but then decide that the pay is not sufficient? How do they resolve the tensions between a woman’s concerns and her unborn child’s well-being?

When someone is tempted to kill, ethics could stop them by reminding them that: Each individual is 'sovereign' and has a preference for remaining alive.

As for 'stealing' it is very context-driven as to whether it is ethical or not. Same with contracts. Give me more specifics.

In the absense of an exogenous stakeholder (e.g. father, society), a woman ending a pregnancy, at least up to the point of viability, is not facing an ethical question.

[DAC]

It may be this thread is lost in time, now. Unfortunately, I have not had time or energy to get back to it before this.

But maybe we can recover by going back to basics.

Sweal's basic principles of ethics (as opposed to morality):

The basic principles:

1. There is an inevitable element of uncertainty (relativism) in anything I or my fellow entities conceive. Whatever does or does not 'truly' exist, we can never absolutely know.

2. It appears that the common state of each human being comprises a distinct consciousness, to some extent unbridgeably separate, from any other human.

3. It appears that the consciousness noted above imbues each human being with a capacity to discern various elements of their environment and formulate preferences to act upon.

In my summary:

1. Nothing is certain

2. Each human appears to be distinct

3. Human beings make choices

In the last post Sweal asked

Do you find fault with the three basics? Or is the the extrapolation you challenge?

If I have understood them, which appears to be a problem in our attempts at communication, I'd say the last two are fairly obvious. I have problems with the first because it makes an unsupported assumption that there is no God who can give us some certainty. My problem with the rest of our discussion is not the extrapolation, but the lack of extrapolation. Many statements have been made which are claimed to derive from these, but the derivation has never been demonstrated logically.

Then, other ethical terms have been thrown in, with no basis given for them.

Others should accept them because they are useful, fair, reliable, etc.

The three statements above are claimed to be basic principles. That means that other elements of ethics rest on them. But usefulness, fairness, reliability have not been shown to derive from them. What is your basis for using these to evaluate anything?

I can claim that usefulness, fairness, reliability are important for assessing issues, because they derive from the biblical teaching on which I found my views. But you reject such a foundation. So what makes fairness important in a world which is, on your perspective, essentially a huge accident? What is the meaning of reliability in a world in which, if you are right, "nothing is certain". If nothing is certain, nothing is reliable. Why, on your principles, should people say that usefulness is anything to care about? Many people would say beauty is more important, just to mention one alternative.

Somewhere along the way you added in the concept that an action's ethical value had to do with its value for many people, not just one. But you have nowhere shown that to derive from your basic principles. It comes as an arbitrary claim.

That's my basic problem with your argumentation. You make arbitrary claims which you say derive from your principles, but you do not show the logical derivations. So your arbitrary claims are supported by unsupported assertions that there is a logical derivation.

Let me go back to your first principle, which I question. Your principle is essentially Immanuel Kant's famous argument. You say nothing is certain. If it can be shown that there is no God who is capable of giving us certain knowledge, then we can move from our visible weakness to say that nothing is certain. But if nothing is certain, then it is not certain that there is no God who can give us certain knowledge. So we have to allow that there may be something which is certain. There may be knowledge given to some people by such a God.

Or let me put it more simply.

Nothing is certain.

Therefore the statement that nothing is certain is not certain.

Therefore there may be something which is certain.

The first principle you put forward is illogical in that it is self contradictory. It's like saying "Everything I say is a lie".

Beyond that, as I've said above, you have yet to show a basis for using fairness, etc, as measures. That means you have yet to establish a basis for your ethics.

Example:

When someone is tempted to kill, ethics could stop them by reminding them that: Each individual is 'sovereign' and has a preference for remaining alive. 

If each individual is sovereign, then the murderer is sovereign and can do what he pleases. Why should he care about another's preferences. You have not demonstrated that your principles say anything to compel him to consider others as anything but convenient tools or inconvenient obstacles to what he sovereignly wants.

[The Terrible Sweal]

In the last post Sweal asked

Do you find fault with the three basics? Or is the the extrapolation you challenge?

If I have understood them, which appears to be a problem in our attempts at communication, I'd say the last two are fairly obvious. I have problems with the first because it makes an unsupported assumption that there is no God who can give us some certainty.

If we go by my actual version rather than your summarized version, I don't think that's necessarily true. The way I put it, God may exist, but human imperfection leaves us always (to some extent) falling short of s/he/its perfect understanding.

The three statements above are claimed to be basic principles. That means that other elements of ethics rest on them. But usefulness, fairness, reliability have not been shown to derive from them. What is your basis for using these to evaluate anything?

You're mistaken. I have already explained the extrapolation of these things at length. Just because you may not understand or agree does not mean they have not been explained. Re-read.

So what makes fairness important in a world which is, on your perspective, essentially a huge accident?

I already explained that.

What is the meaning of reliability in a world in which, if you are right, "nothing is certain". [/quote

Reliability means consistent usefulness in this context.

If nothing is certain, nothing is reliable.

I don't agree.

Somewhere along the way you added in the concept that an action's ethical value had to do with its value for many people, not just one. But you have nowhere shown that to derive from your basic principles.

Yes, I have. I answered that in a reply to you, I believe.

That's my basic problem with your argumentation. You make arbitrary claims which you say derive from your principles, but you do not show the logical derivations.

You are mistaken. I have done so. If you have failed to understand them, please seek clarification.

Let me go back to your first principle, which I question. Your principle is essentially Immanuel Kant's famous argument. You say nothing is certain. If it can be shown that there is no God who is capable of giving us certain knowledge, then we can move from our visible weakness to say that nothing is certain. But if nothing is certain, then it is not certain that there is no God who can give us certain knowledge. So we have to allow that there may be something which is certain. There may be knowledge given to some people by such a God.

How would we know?

Or let me put it more simply.

Nothing is certain.

Therefore the statement that nothing is certain is not certain.

Therefore there may be something which is certain.

The first principle you put forward is illogical in that it is self contradictory. It's like saying "Everything I say is a lie".

No. Your fallacious, strawman summary of my statement may suffer from that problem, but my actual statement does not.

Example:

When someone is tempted to kill, ethics could stop them by reminding them that: Each individual is 'sovereign' and has a preference for remaining alive.

If each individual is sovereign, then the murderer is sovereign and can do what he pleases. Why should he care about another's preferences.

Because he wants to avoid conflict injurious to his own preferences.

You have not demonstrated that your principles say anything to compel him to consider others as anything but convenient tools or inconvenient obstacles to what he sovereignly wants.

I believe that I have said exactly what should compel him to do so.