[lit-ideas] Re: Giving Reasons and Morality
- From: Jack Spratt <dosflounder@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Sat, 2 Sep 2006 15:41:32 -0700 (PDT)
Mike, when you state "-- pariahs are seldom loved" you may be pushing your
argument too far. Martin Luther, Hitler, Muhammad and Stalin were all pariahs
in their societies at one time in their life but eventually millions of people
loved them. History does not show that killing people for minor infractions
necessarily makes one a pariah. Beware line jumpers.
J.S.
The one thing we lack is a handy utopia.
Mike Geary <atlas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Being more common than sensible, I'll give you my common reply: it is both.
First it's version A. We're taught not to hit baby sister with the toy
truck just as we're taught to eat with a fork. Both to us have the same
moral import -- i.e., Mama likes us more when we do as she says. The reason
in all this -- mother's love -- is not a reason to us intellectually, but
emotionally. Unless our Mama is Joan Crawford, we give her the benefit of
the doubt, what choice do we have knowing nothing else and accept her as the
Divine rule giver being as she's the food giver. As we expand our social
milieu and learn this and that, we learn (and not just intellectually by any
means) that there's more than mother's love to motivate us -- there's money,
there's self-respect, there's renown, there's sex, there's sex and then
there's sex, etc. Indeed as our social milieu increases we find that Mama's
love doesn't carry us very far at all. But we still need approval whether
from Mama or our boss or Jesus or Allah or just from ourselves because were
all just little wads of insecurity wanting Mama's love. But there are
sooooooooo many moral decisions to be made in the course of a day, moral
decisions on which love might well depend. Do I kill the asshole who just
broke line or what? Probably everyone there would approve, but there are
complications -- there are social mores, there a laws, etc., worst, there's
the stigma of being a murderer -- pariahs are seldom loved. So we think it
through, as it were, best to just complain aloud and let it go, but -- or so
I contend -- the reasoning all goes back to Mama's love and approval.
Socialization -- especially education -- helps us expand Mama's rules to
line-breakers but essentially the process is just a confusion of her will
with reasoning which we learn further to call Categorical Imperatives, 10
Commandments, the Law, Principles, etc, etc. Nobody really believes any of
them, but they help get us through the day. It's incumbent upon me to pay
my taxes because I live in a society from which I benefit greatly and which
needs the financial support of all -- but, then EXXON doesn't pay any, so
it's OK for me not to. All men have an unalienable right to life,
therefore... We sticky it all up with logic and call it Moral Principles,
but it's really still Mama.
Mike Geary
author of
Moral Philosophy for Dummies
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Sent: Saturday, September 02, 2006 3:06 PM
Subject: [lit-ideas] Re: Giving Reasons and Morality
>I beg the indulgence of those who still await a (probably long over-due)
>reply
> to their posts on threads in which I have been involved as I postpone
> those
> replies yet again in an effort to meet a looming administrative deadline.
> My
> being able to meet that deadline hinges on getting clear on a matter that
> has
> been befuddling me for some time now. I seek input both from the
> philosophers
> as well as from those blessed with common sense. (I grant, of course, the
> intersection of those classes.) It has to do with the relationship between
> giving reasons and morality. Here are two possible versions of the
> relationship.
>
> Version A
> Moral principles and norms having to do with equality, autonomy,
> reciprocity and
> universality are general criteria which we apply to different contexts,
> actions, policies, etc.. Reason-giving is one particular activity or
> language-game. We can do it either in accordance with the above stated
> moral
> norms or we can engage in the activity while violating those same norms.
> Moral
> principles originate within our socialization into a particular culture,
> set of
> traditions, etc.. So we, for example, come to learn to respect the equal
> freedom of all persons and then we apply this norm within our particular
> activities, one of which is reason-giving. (Or we fail to do so.)
>
> Version B
> Moral principles conceptually originate within the activity of giving
> reasons.
> The former necessarily presuppose the latter. Without this practice, we
> could
> not learn, nor would we have, moral concepts such as equality, autonomy,
> right
> and wrong, obligation, etc.. It's not that these moral principles and
> concepts
> are available to us first, learned first within acculturation, and then
> applied
> to various activities and contexts, one of which is reason-giving. Rather,
> what it means to respect others as free and equal persons, what it means
> to
> have an obligation, etc., are intelligible to us only because we
> understand
> what it means to give reasons.
>
> That's a quick and rough way of putting it, I realize. But any commentary
> on
> which version is the correct one would be appreciated. I'm assuming
> they're
> mutually exclusive, but perhaps not? I'm not attributing either of these
> views
> to any particular writer as I don't want to get embroiled in textual
> hermeneutic matters.
>
> Walter C. Okshevsky
> Memorial U
>
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