[lit-ideas] Re: On being called a Lyre [dilemmas]
- From: Donal McEvoy <donalmcevoyuk@xxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Mon, 22 Sep 2008 12:52:57 +0000 (GMT)
--- On Sun, 21/9/08, Eric Yost <mr.eric.yost@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> These dilemmas always seem to presuppose facts not in
> evidence for persons living outside of thought
> experiments. (This is one. The Baby or the Botticelli
> is another.)
Might it be fair to say that far-fetched thought experiments may be useful and
interesting in many fields (e.g. quantum physics) but they are rarely this in
the field of ethics? They seem almost non-ethical in that they remove ethics
from its roots in practical problems and dilemmas and try to transport it,
unconvincingly to some, into the soil of supposed logical analysis of different
dreamt-up situations and our 'intuitions' about them. As iff.
Ethics is not a field for idle speculation but for understanding the
complexities of practical moral problems, which a little thought often shows
raise complex dilemmas - what 'ethics' can teach is to be better attuned to
these difficulties and not ride on our moral high horse roughshod over them.
As to issues about the role of 'emotion' of 'reason' in having moral
intuitions, is it not that both are necessary but neither are sufficient
conditions of having moral sense? And is it not that they are inextricably
linked in most human thinking, particularly moral thinking? And that talking as
if the answer to these questions is 'no' is unreal?
Donal
High-balling on crack
Govan
------------------------------------------------------------------
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:
