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Are you now obligated to act?
Real life ethics question. Don't read this unless you want to make a choice.
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Keizer_O
Initiate Usergroup: Members Joined: Apr 08, 2009 Total Topics: 1 Total Posts: 5 |
 #61
Mako wrote: As has been stated by myself and in similar terms by Wolfman in earlier posts, one's obligations should not overwhelm/overburden the individidual. Morality's requirements should be practicable/achievable. We are after all, beings with limited capacities and those limitations weigh against the burdens of moral obligations. Speaking more strictly for myself, obligations should not be 'unilaterally' imposed (say, by merely making someone 'aware' of a distant wrong/injustice). Obligations arise from mutual bonds where one party carries the obligation and the other party has a 'right' to enforce the obligation (reciprocity and symmetry). Moral obligations should be, in my view, commensurate with one's ability to fulfill those obligations. The potentially limitless stock of unjust/harmful situations in this world obviously overwhelms any one particular person's capacity to remedy those injustices/wrongs. You've made clear that nobody can live up to ALL possible moral obligations, but to how many and which ones can/should you? Who determines? An obvious awnser would be yourself. After all, you know your own limits best. But should you stretch your moral obligations to those limits? And if one determines his own obligations, could he also determine he has none? If this awnser is true, then moral 'obligation' is really no obligation at all. There would be no difference between someone acting purely on what he thinks is right, and someone acting on what he's morally obligated to do. |
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xzJoel
Ennui Elucidator Usergroup: Sponsors Joined: Aug 30, 2005 Location: New Jersey Total Topics: 46 Total Posts: 1626 |
#62
Mutemaler, I started a long response to you, but have not had sufficient time to finish it up. I will post what I had written but then decided was probably too OT, but you may want to read it anyway. ____ After re-reading your post I realize that I gave undue weight to Libet’s experiment, but I don’t want to delete what I wrote so I stuck it at the end. Ignore it if you like. I agree that my questions are tending towards cognitive psychology. More particularly, how does intention result in action. I suppose I've done a poor job at steering clear of that question, but I'll address it briefly. The Libet experiment which you reference is either problematic or inapplicable. Libet's experiment indicates that the geneses for action takes place before the intention of action. (His "awareness of urge") Taking the experiment for what people want it to say (and I haven't read the paper to know one way or the other), Libet stands for the proposition that the mind either permits an initiated action to continue to fruition or prevents the action (vetoes it). Assuming that this chain continues from birth to death, there is really no moment at which a person's will is responsible for the initiation of action. So we have two meaningful points in time: a) The moment before the action is initiated. b) The moment after the action is initiated but before it is executed. Libet seems to indicate that consciousness/the will resides in b) and serves as a go or no go for the initiated action. Most people prefer to think that will resides at a). It seems to me that whether it is a) or b), will still plays a role in action. If the will plays some roll, that means that action still owes its existence to will. That being the case, there is no reason to think that Libet type cognition changes the way in which action is to be understood (is action willed or not), rather it raises an interesting question of whether our will can create action or just permit already initiated action to develop into complete action. The problem: if an action is never initiated by the will, but is only presented to the will for it to permit or deny, what does a person's moral theory have to do with a person's failure to meet obligations if the action was never initiated? The inapplicability: we have the experience of will predating action and often plan activities well in advance of doing them. Whatever the cognitive mechanism, our sense of the world does not match one in which the will plays second fiddle (if any) to already initiated action. We readily think of our actions as the actions that belong to our will and it makes little difference how precisely those actions came to belong to our will. Mind you I am aware that I am skirting dangerously close to a discussion of free will/determinism, but I'm betting that everyone involved in this conversation buys at least into the illusion of free will. If you don't think that we are anything but caused/random beings that has no "I" to speak of, so be it. “If a person truly believes that God is good and that everything God does is good, that person can’t be sad. Sadness is actually a sign of atheism.” The Baal Shem Tov I must be the biggest atheist of them all. |
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ThirdWorldRevolution
Initiate Usergroup: Members Joined: Sep 10, 2009 Total Topics: 1 Total Posts: 11 |
#63
At first thought, one would instantly buy these girls freedom. However, this would be a grave mistake. I am assuming that we are "buying" these girls from someone who is holding them prisoner. Maxing out your credit card and giving all your money to the girls captors would be counterproductive if you think its wrong. It'd give the people facilitating their slavery more money to capture more girls. They'd grow faster once you provided them with their lifeblood, money, and thanks to you they will capture and sell exponentially more girls. Then they will begin to control everything because money is power. Giving these people money is giving them power. By giving money to free these girls, you enslave every free girl that those captured aspire to be. You destroy the very thing you try to create. Freedom. In trying to achieve freedom for these girls, you achieve the opposite. Do not do anything because it is "moral", no such thing exists. The second we start reacting on emotion and abandoning logic we doom ourselves to a futile existence because emotion knows no logic. You will not achieve the greater good you believe you are achieving, all you will achieve is injustice. Morality is subjective and because it is, it is a logical fallacy when used to rationalize an action. You cannot be the moral authority because no such thing exists. You may think that some morality exists universally but it does not. There's only you and me and what we both believe to be moral is in line with our beliefs and that alone. |
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mutemaler
Professor  Usergroup: Members Joined: Jun 17, 2006 Total Topics: 8 Total Posts: 724 |
#64
Hi xzJoel, I was waiting for your post, noticed that I took far too long to tell you I was willing to put the other point on hold (I could really have said that in fewer words). Because this interests me far more, and I think you too, just how things work in general, and that will incorporate those situations with moral relevance, but a good model should not treat that differently, it should not create exceptionalism. And I take this a step further, because I don't want to create exceptionalism for humans, I want our actions also to be consistent with a larger 'principle of creation' (or principle of occurrence), that is what I referred to, this 'toy' which I play with and find so easy, so robust. Above all one that doesn't create all the irresolvable problems which has the strict determinists/free willers engaged in endless discussions. I just think their starting point is wrong, the assumptions they are making. And it goes literally nowhere, always around and around in the same circles. I need to take another stab at explaining something though, and then have you take a hard look at it, critique it. In the Libet experiment (I have to read it also, I only know it in summary form) I wonder if they are taking into account the difference in processing times. Conscious deliberation is slow, instinct and/or intuition considerably faster. If you are thinking in terms of 'at this point in time a decision was made and who made it' then you have a problem, and so Libet is forced to conclude that conscious deliberation will plays a follow-up role, can only halt, not inititate (if I understand you correctly). But notice what happens if you take the dispositions as I outlined. There is going to also be a point at which the action is initiated, but lets even call that just 'released' instead of initiated or triggered, because of what I said about it being random within a probability distribution. This disposition includes what conscious deliberation has been 'willing' a short time before THAT. So if we hold concentration, 'will' an action OVER TIME (which we are not registering as such, because it is still too short for our concentration to notice), that this is already sitting in the dispositions, and this 'flooding' of the disposition I was talking about does work. But that also there is not really line between things like instinct, intuition, and consious deliberation, they continually interact and modify each other. So if you 'will' something often enough (exhausting), if will eventually work its way into intuitive action, increase the likelihood of a particular response, make this spontaneous (in my model literally spontaneous), and these are habits, but also skilled performances, there are better from the whole being perspective because of the energy conservation involved for one, but also that we need to be able to respond quicker than conscious deliberation is capable of doing in some situations, or that there are many situations where conscious deliberation is inappropriate, would actually interfere with the most likely and/or best action. And that is another point where I have to depart from the standard converstion (along with strict determinism, I simply don't agree with it), all of the homonculus variations, or that only this self-aware conscious state is somehow the real "me", and must be in absolute control (or there is no "free will"). Because I see more relation, that all is interconnected, influence goes both ways, is reciprical. We come along with this very narrow view of objects and causes, and want to see a singular force acting on another in a purposeful way no less, and I am just uncomfortable with that, it creates irresolvable conflicts, is incoherent in that way. And then come along and want to split off a part of ourselves (artificially) that 'transcends' this strict determinism and to me honestly, that makes no sense. Better to start with a general principle and stay consistent with it than immediately create exceptions to it. To me we are a whole being anyway, and all of these processes important, and it kind of irks me to try and separate out one part as the 'true ruler'. Plus a year or so ago I have troubles with depression, and thought about things like 'will power', conscious deliberation and company, where to place them in the whole picture. And that also probably plays a role here when I keep talking about the energy various processes require, the difference in processing speed, and what they are they for, that they are optimized for certain types of situations. I think we overstate our will, our 'I', consciousness, somewhat along the lines of Julian Jaynes (read his intro to his book if you have a change, he lays out his case very well that consciousness is overstated; where he then takes that is controversial, and I sometimes agree, largely don't though). So to me there is no second fiddle, not conscious deliberation, not intuition, not instinct, AND conscious deliberation can quite obviously influence the likelihood of possible action, to the point of making it a virtual certainty. And that fits with occurrence as "spontaneous within a probability distribution". No need for any exceptionalism, not for will which is quite real and not illusion, not for humans. What I would be most interested in is faults you might see in a model like that. I don't see any, but then I am biased. |
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mutemaler
Professor Usergroup: Members Joined: Jun 17, 2006 Total Topics: 8 Total Posts: 724 |
#65
In the stray thought department: We internalize repeated actions (or repeated thoughts, repeated anything), make them intuitive, practiced and spontaneous action. Are then "disposed" to act in certain ways given a concrete situation (or a distribution of them as probabilities). Now consider the case where there is an action where which can be seen as having moral implications. Along comes a situation, we react spontaneously, with no intervention by conscious deliberation, we then at some point evaluate it consciously, say yes indeed that was the "right" action from some particular moral perspective. Or do we? Are they those who say that morality must be "caused" (or even "solely") by direct conscious intervention, and that this action then does not qualify? Edited by mutemaler on Sep 11, 2009 - 3:15 AM |
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kerravon
Initiate Usergroup: Members Joined: Feb 19, 2007 Total Topics: 1 Total Posts: 4 |
#66
First of all, I'm an amateur here, so apologies in advance if I say something amateurish. However, I have an opinion on this topic anyway. :-) ThirdWorldRevolution wrote: At first thought, one would instantly buy these girls freedom. However, this would be a grave mistake. I am assuming that we are "buying" these girls from someone who is holding them prisoner. Maxing out your credit card and giving all your money to the girls captors would be counterproductive if you think its wrong. It'd give the people facilitating their slavery more money to capture more girls. They'd grow faster once you provided them with their lifeblood, money, and thanks to you they will capture and sell exponentially more girls. Then they will begin to control everything because money is power. Giving these people money is giving them power. By giving money to free these girls, you enslave every free girl that those captured aspire to be. You destroy the very thing you try to create. Freedom. Well said sir! In trying to achieve freedom for these girls, you achieve the opposite. Do not do anything because it is "moral", no such thing exists. I don't see how this follows. Surely we can agree that giving freedom to that girl, so long as there is no side-effects, is a moral action? By definition? And that enslaving her is immoral? The second we start reacting on emotion and abandoning logic Isn't this a false dichtomy? Surely the most moral thing is to have the emotion in the first place, and then use cold hard logic to solve the problem? we doom ourselves to a futile existence because emotion knows no logic. You will not achieve the greater good you believe you are achieving, all you will achieve is injustice. Sure. But can't we agree that achieving the greater good (let's say it was theoretically possible to prove this), is moral? Surely we can say that freeing the world is in fact the greater good and desirable and moral? Even if we quibble about the best way to achieve that. Morality is subjective and because it is, it is a logical fallacy when used to rationalize an action. You cannot be the moral authority because no such thing exists. You may think that some morality exists universally but it does not. There's only you and me and what we both believe to be moral is in line with our beliefs and that alone. Surely we can use the Golden Rule in this situation and ask if the enslaver would be happy for the roles to be reversed, and if so, then reverse them immediately? Surely this whole situation can be derived from the Golden Rule and the Ideal Observer? (Correct me if I'm using the wrong terminology). If I was an ideal observer, about to enter the earth as a random creature, and in full realisation that I could be that girl, what would I want? Obviously my first reaction would be to want the entire world to free me, and then give me all their money. But I may not be that girl. I might instead be one of those female political prisoners in Iran who got raped, or is still being raped. In that case, I want the entire world to free me, and then give me all their money. But I may not be either of those girls. I might be Bill Gates. In which case, I want everyone to keep on giving me all of their money. :-) So as an ideal observer, I would want resources allocated in a logical order so that even if I'm not freed immediately, I am on the schedule to be freed, and that freeing schedule is happening at as quick a pace as feasible. Treat the freeing as a scientific question. The logic you mentioned above. What is the most logical way to get freedom on the march? 1. We need to recognize that only a small amount of money is available for charity. So it must be spent very wisely. 2. If that girl was to be freed, would she end up simply being enslaved again? First priority should be to ensure that a government is in power to protect her in the future. Otherwise it's a futile waste of valuable resources. 3. Make social ranking in western countries be based not on how much money you throw into a black hole in Africa, but instead how much effort is spent on changing those governments. 4. The moral thing is then to support those who change governments, such as Paul Wolfowitz, Donald Rumsfeld, George Bush, etc, and encourage them to liberate more people. That's roughly why I (as an Australian) supported the Bush administration. Obviously some people will dispute that Iraq is better off now than then, and they would take the position that the most moral thing to do is oppose the Bush administration (and presumably support what method instead?). But surely this is where the debate should be? The best way to free the world? As for the $50, I didn't give my money to that. I gave my money to support Iraqi and Afghan bloggers so that for the first time ever we could hear people in those countries saying that they appreciated being liberated, which would hopefully produce more liberations. It didn't work out that way, but it's what I personally considered to be the ideal path to a free world. I couldn't see any better way, so with the various assumptions in my reasoning, I came to that moral conclusion and acted on it. By the way, like I said, I would appreciate having a better understanding of what category my personal philosophy falls under. I know everyone has their own philosophy, but is there some sort of questionairre, similar to the Myers-Briggs for personality, that would tell me what my philosophy is? From looking at Wikipedia, I'd say some sort of Utilitarianiasm? |
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