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| Re: Editorial: ''De Blasio's Subway Follies'' (1445066) | |||
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Re: Editorial: ''De Blasio's Subway Follies'' |
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Posted by Nilet on Fri Jul 28 18:11:56 2017, in response to Re: Editorial: ''De Blasio's Subway Follies'', posted by New Flyer #857 on Fri Jul 28 13:39:57 2017. Main Point: Just keeping the traffic system optimal does not necessary equal everything being optimal.Except it does. The whole point of the analogy is that the traffic system is everything; there is nothing but the traffic system in existence. Because the traffic system is a metaphor to describe morality. Morality is applicable universally (and thus incredibly complex), which is exactly why I invented a tiny and simple world with a correspondingly tiny and simple universal morality to help explain the principle. I disagree. Why must morality be concerned strictly with desires? That is your definition, and not equivalent to the "right" and "wrong" language of the dictionary. Put another way, why must "right" and "wrong always be based on what people want? The dictionary doesn't explain what "right" and "wrong" are in a moral context, but morality is concerned with desires because those are the fundamental drivers of human behaviour. If some higher calling exists, only those who desire it will pursue it, and those who don't desire it will not feel their lives diminished by its absence. If morality is going to impose rules on human behaviour, it needs to account for what drives human behaviour at an incredibly immediate level. A moral system that can't survive contact with human nature isn't much use. Is it just to gain respect for the system. . .that is, is it just that you are sacrificing the optimal for the limited optimal that exists when everyone's desires are treated equally (before arriving at the intersection)? Well that's actually a very important issue right there. A moral system will always require buy-in. There's no external authority to enforce moral rules, which means a moral system can only work on a largely-voluntary basis; it doesn't require literally every person on the planet to agree to it, but it requires a large enough supermajority that the handful of holdouts are forced into going along lest they be cut off completely. (Remember, there can be no free riders; a lone holdout who opts out of morality is in turn denied the benefits of moral consideration.) So the "limited optimal" that arises when people get their way most of the time is as optimal as we're going to get. A system that grants everyone's desires is impossible, and a system that appeals to some non-universal higher purpose will never get enough buy-in to function. I don't need to because I am not making any positive claim. I am criticizing the idea that "basic morality" and "basic rights" "just exist" in a cloud for governments to reach up and find, or even in the middle of a crowd of people and their desires for governments to sift through. I've already made the case for this before. You have desires. You want them fulfilled. However, they conflict with other people's desires, and other people will likely deny you the chance to fulfill them much of the time. However, a particular set of rules which reduce fighting and encourage cooperation can guarantee that people, as a whole, get their way more often than any other system would allow. You, personally, stand to benefit (statistically) from that system, and have a strong incentive to see it implemented. Everyone else has the exact same incentive. Since everyone wants to see the system implemented, the rational choice is to implement the system. Under that system, certain things are guaranteed to you by the rules such that it is never legitimate to deprive you of those things. You may object to calling the system "morality" (basic or otherwise) and the things it guarantees you "rights" (basic or otherwise) but that's the definition I've used. The rule is established; it's legitimacy is established, so what it's called is hardly relevant. There is no reason for me to believe this and I think one who asserts it should defend it instead of just expecting everyone to accept it on authority. Except you're doing exactly that; you want everyone to accept morality on your authority. So wait - morality is no longer about (an attempt at) fulfilling the desires of the population (in this case, just me)? What is it for then? In this case, you are the population; there is no one else. Fulfilling your desires is the same thing as fulfilling the desires of the planet's lone human inhabitant. That said, morality exists to mediate between people with conflicting desires. A single person whose actions cannot possibly affect anyone else poses no issues for morality to consider in the same way that a single car in an otherwise-empty traffic circle poses no issues for the traffic control system to consider (other than the trivial "do as you wish"). I stated that I believe morality and rights are divinely ordered. I have neither the time or energy here to substantiate that claim and I admit that. I thus do not impose it on you or anyone for immediate acceptance. It's fair that you don't want to sidetrack (or drag on) this thread, but I can't help but ask... If you believe morality is divinely ordered, presumably you feel God has laid out the rules for us. Can I get the rules directly from God? If I must get the rules from some other source, can I ask God to authenticate them? Even if God personally vouches that I have the correct copy of the rules, why should I accept them? You yourself denigrate the idea of accepting a moral system on authority. Getting closer to the divine will, which purifies our desires to the extent that we have a level of happiness that what we thought we wanted would never have obtained for us. I don't think that's physically possible. Desires are a function of extensive brain activity, all of which is connected with feedback from external responses. It isn't really possible to alter the mechanisms that generate desires— nor is it possible to alter the mechanisms of happiness. It also sounds really skeevy. Be very wary of those who tell you they know better than you what will make you happy; by those very words, they ask to deny you autonomy. We can probably clarify a whole lot between us if I understand you just on this point: Do you consider morality itself an objective good? Well, it depends on what you mean by "objective good." If you mean happiness, (which you seem to imply; it's why we should pursue divine will in your example), then essentially yes. Happiness is, we seem to agree, an objective good. We don't know exactly how to attain it, but the best method we have is to fulfill our desires. We can't do that exactly, but the best method we have is contingent on morality. So morality is necessary (but not sufficient) to get as close to true happiness as possible given physical limitations that cannot possibly be surmounted. Not necessarily "an objective good," but at least an indispensable part of one. Because if it isn't, then there's no objective reason for me to follow it or support it. I can do so if I'm in the mood, but there's no good reason. That's just it— morality is fundamentally selfish. It may not be elegant, but appealing to self-interest tends to be far more effective than any other means. If you want things and morality gives you the best shot at them, that is an objective reason to support it. And if you're not in the mood to accept a moral system? The people who did accept it can force your hand by making life as a lone holdout intolerable. If it is, then you are declaring the wants of humanity, exclusively, to inform morality, which means that morality will always be changing with the wants. No human desire is permanent, not even the desire to live life as we know it. Morality is constant because morality is the function that transforms a list of desires into a list of outcomes and prescribed behaviours. Yes, its outcomes change with desires, but isn't that desirable? Humanity is not static; any system which we participate in needs to be able to change with us. In the traffic example, if most cars want to get to Exit A, the traffic control system might forbid the use of Tunnel 7 on the grounds that it would clog everything up. If, just an hour later, most cars wanted to get to Exit B, the traffic control system might advise any car bound for Exit B to use Tunnel 7, but ban the use of Service Road 9 which cuts across the Exit B ramp. The outcome has changed, but the traffic control system itself does not— and the change in outcome facilitates the goal of moving traffic smoothly given the change in traffic patterns. Is that what you are saying, that "rights" can switch in and out of being fundamentally moral? Well, some human desires are rather thoroughly entrenched. The desire for autonomy, the desire for survival while healthy, the desire to avoid pain and oppression and deprivation, have been with us since we existed and will never go away. Rights arise from these universals. The rights don't change because the universals don't either. |
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