[lit-ideas] Re: On being called a Lyre

A few replies to Phil E. on matters moral:


Quoting Phil Enns <phil.enns@xxxxxxxxx>:

> Walter O. wrote:
> 
> "As an independent topic, I am intrigued by the notion of an
> 'emotional moral approach.' 'Morality,' I would have thought, concerns
> the obligations we have to others and ourselves in virtue of being
> rationally autonomous agents.  Affective factors would seem to be
> irrelevant to such obligations or to the form of reasoning we require
> of ourselves and others when engaged in moral deliberation and
> judgement."


PE:
> My suggestion, as Walter already knows, is that moral deliberation and
> judgement require the input of emotional intuitions as grist for the
> mill.  Without these emotional intuitions, the wheels of moral
> deliberation spin wildly and uselessly.

WO: I see you've been drinking with David Hume and Adam Smith again (and who
knows whom else?)  But let's be clear. I do not deny that the emotions can be
motivating factors. It is empirically the case that many people's willings and
actions are caused by their feelings on this or that. My point is that such
motivation bears no moral worth and that such motivation is epistemically
irreleavnt. That is to say, moral judgement or principle cannot be justified on
affective grounds. This is the case with science, and it remains the case with
morality. 

I also believe it is the case with some people that choices they arrive at on
appropriate rational grounds will for the most part not hit the road, be put in
action, without a concomitant feeling or intuition that that is the right thing
to do. But this is a matter of motivation, not justification.


PE:
> This is not at all to lessen the importance of moral deliberation.
> Emotional intuitions are not moral.  When they are confused with
> morality, one finds the category mistake of confusing what ought to be
> done in the world with one's reactions to that world.  

WO: I believe most rational persons, with the exception of Mike G, would
concur.


PE:
>Instead, moral
> deliberation works most effectively when there is careful
> consideration of the various emotional intuitions interested parties
> bring to the discussion. 

WO: If the issue is now one of the "effectiveness" of moral deliberation, then,
yes, I agree. (People tend to take it personally when they find others ignoring
their emotional ejaculations.)

PE:
> What people agree ought to be done is not
> dependent on any particular affective factor, but such an agreement is
> not possible without those factors.

WO: If the issue here is the empirical matter of what facilitates agreement -
and I'm thinking this is what Phil means, since the other use of "possible" is
a transcendental one and I don't recall Phil being a card carrying
transcendental philosopher - then I would again concur, with the friendly
ammenment that "for many people" be inserted at the end of his motion. 

There are some people, this is to say, who claim, quite counter-intuitively I
grant, that what makes say, intentionally harming innocent persons wrong is
that the maxim could not attain agreement under conditions of ideal discourse
or that its denial could not be accepted on principles others could reasonably
accept (Tom Scanlon) or that it is self-contradictory. The more intuitively
obvious explanation of such wrongenss is to express disgust, resentment and
abhorrence of such actions - all emotions arising from the sight or thought of
persons being violated in one way or another. But while such emotions may be
motivationally ert in leading one to offer defense or aid to others, they don't
count as epistemically relevant to questions regarding the justification of
willings and maxims. Such is, I believe,  philosophical truth at times. Nobody
said an explanation of P had to be as simple or simpler than P, after all.

Walter O
MUN

> 
> 
> Sincerely,
> 
> Phil Enns
> Yogyakarta, Indonesia
> ------------------------------------------------------------------
> To change your Lit-Ideas settings (subscribe/unsub, vacation on/off,
> digest on/off), visit www.andreas.com/faq-lit-ideas.html
> 



------------------------------------------------------------------
To change your Lit-Ideas settings (subscribe/unsub, vacation on/off,
digest on/off), visit www.andreas.com/faq-lit-ideas.html

Other related posts: