Ends and Means

[erislover]

*Originally posted by Spiritus Mundi *
**How, since you subjugate your internal sensibility to your system, did you ever decide upon the system in the first place? ** What, other than an innate moral sense has guided you to this particular code of ethics above all others. You seem to be arguing for a Utilitarian ethos, but how do you determine that such is a proper guide?

Whoa.
IANAreductionist, so it is very hard to answer all of these questions in a way which you’ll appreciate, but I will attempt to do so. How did I decide upon the system? Through a process of self-questioning. What do I want? What do I like? Are there motifs in my life? That is, before I had a system I was still a human individual. What qualities did I have at this time? No value judgements are necessary here, merely statements of fact. The system which arose is one in which I found what seperated me from an animal, first of all.

Over time I came to some conclusions and I also then proceeded to see what motifs were present in my friends. how were these alike?

What I found to be alike was what formed the basis of this system. It all came from the single question, what is a man? Or woman, of course, but that need not be qualified, I think. (as well, I think we’ve hashed out arguments about validity more than enough to my satisfaction).

Once the creature man was qualified, it was a simple process to then create the start of valuations to behaviors-of-man. In this way I started with the idea of placing the hedonistic qualities first: desires are the basis of man, and what man desires is moral. This is not a matter of “steak vs ground beef” or “cashews over almonds”, or anything else so specific, but in a more general sense: what do we really want as individuals?

From here, these desires needed to extend to application…the means. What are we willing to do for these desires? And as such, the realm of the individual was extended to the level of interaction. And so on.

The quick pronouncements at thins point fall into: moral (that which goes along with these wants) and immoral (that which goes against these wants). Nothing can really be said, and indeed if we isolate man completely from interaction there is very little, if any, morality we can ascribe to particular wants.

So we then introduce the level of interaction and the morality of wants begins to shine. The equality of man is assumed in the beginning, way beck when I attempted to abstract wants and needs. Because of this, any want which is in direct conflict with another man’s wants is immoral. The use of force, for example, in relationships.

At any rate, it goes on like this. I just would like to note that no group unified by anything other than wants can be moralized. The moral judgement takes place at the level of wants, but specifically in wants with regard to interaction. Without anyone to interact with it seems silly to place morality there.

**Do you think your system is perfect? **

As should be clear by now, no. Can a system be perfect? No, with RE to our epistemology thread. Are systems arbitrary? NO. They cannot be, because they target a specific animal with specific characteristics. Knowledge may be arbitrarily based because of the wide abstraction of consciousness. However, human morality does not have that liberty.
So, no system can be perfect. however, any system which approximates man better at its assumptions will be a better system.
Is a system that addresses something other than wants a good system for morality? IMO, a resounding no. I find it makes no sense to discuss “should” and “shouldn’t” without reference to wants. I think they are, if not causal, then at least part of the same object.

how do you determine where your system might fail? Please note: How? What, if you value the ethical system above any personal moral sense, allows you to determine when the system breaks down? What value system trumps your ethical code? Why?

The system fails when there are no wants to address. “America demands this!” No, we don’t. America isn’t unified by specific, or even abstract, wants. It is just a country we are born into. There is no reason to think that people born into America automatically have similar wants above and beyond what I feel all humankind wants.
I know the system breaks down there because it relies explicitely on “wants,” and so any group which we would like to moralize which does not have “wants” to be addressed cannot, in fact, be moralized under my system.

No value system, if I am understanding you correctly, trumps the moral code since that is where such valuations come from.

When you reach a boundary condition, what do you do? When your semi-rigid code breaks down, what guides your actions? How did you determine that this substitution was the ethically correct course?

The first guide is to map non-want-based groups onto an approxiamte group with more defined wants; ie-stereotyping. The accuracy of any moral judgement is no greater than the extent which a non-want-based group can be stereotyped.
It is not “ethically correct” in a strict sense because we are placing value-judgements on a group which, by definiton, cannot be valuated.

This makes more sense in an example. Christianity. They are not a want based group. They are a belief based group. what they actually want is different from branch to branch. But are christians moral? Again, the question is meaningless. So we must, if we want to answer this question, stereotype christians.

Stereotypes themselves are also not immoral or moral, they are merely a method for approxiamting a group based on criteria which is relevant to the question; in RE to recent discussions, stereotypes create the context necessary.

If it is not ethically correct, is it ethically incorrect? Of course not. No ethics apply. It is an amoral process.

the tricky thing comes in when we have stereotyped and then proceed to evaluate our approxiamted grouping, and then come to a judgement there. This judgement must always be qualified because, again, it can be no more accurate than the stereotype itself. Thus, to continue the example, we stereotype Christians to be like Catholics. Saying that 40% of Christians are Catholics, then our moral judgement is 40% accurate assessment of Christians in general. When we meet a Christian, this must be in mind.

To avoid this and step from the realm of approximated morality based on stereotypes to an absolute morality is logically wrong. Is it immoral? Yes. We’ve fundamentally gone against the morality of interaction by wanting to give people qualities they did not possess. Instead of using this as a giude, we have used it as a principle.

The obvious question comes next. “Didn’t you just do that way back in the beginning when you abstracted humankind as a group with similar wants?” Bingo.

All moral pronouncements are approximate. This is why my “string” can be plucked…
Consider the system like a Fourier series, approaching the truth but never quite reaching it, as an analogy. We know where the series fails. We know it gives a good approxiamtion in some places. We know it is accurate to a VERY high degree in a few (namely with regards to me and my friends).

The only question that remains (apart from the rebirth of epistemological reasoning and the validity of moral systems) is…what the hell qualities did I attribute to man?

Interesting indeed, since you have also expressed conflict at the idea of placing moral value on an element (decision) in which any factors are outside of the individual’s control. Do you think that people are more in control of their desires than of their decisions?

Of course not. People are their desires. Because the “sum” of valuations based on all of an individual’s desires will most likely be a mish-mash of good and bad, people are usually not moral or immoral but both. Specific wants are immoral.

Well, I’m afraid this seems to be another case of cross-communication.

Perhaps even still. Is there, IMO, based on my morality, an economic system which addresses morality? Yes. Does the study of economics lend itself to the study of morality? No. Can one take any particular economic system and determine what sort of morality is behind it? Possibly, but not guaranteed. There are many “reasons” to choose an economic system, and morality may not be one of them.

There. That should have clarified everything.

Given my long-winded nature, I fear that I’ve only complicated things.

Perhaps we should head into a debate on holism vs reductionism. shrug BTW, have you ever read the ill-famed “The Illuminatus! Trilogy”? When it isn’t being extra-hippie it surely makes a few interesting points on morality, epistemology, and application of desire. Plus, the story is sort of amusing. Anyway…

[Spiritus_Mundi]

IANAreductionist . . . People are their desires.

[Inigo]
You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means
[/Inigo] [sub]sorry. I really couldn’t resist.[/sub] Seriously, though, what about thoughts, perceptions, physicality, etc.?

Actually, I see much that is similar in the way we have approached this quesiton, though you (as we both might expect by now) make some leaps that I find difficult to justify. If you will forgive me just a couple more questions . . .

Once the creature man was qualified, it was a simple process to then create the start of valuations to behaviors-of-man.

I assume these valuations are moral. If so, then how is it “simple”? I still don’t see how you go (without relying upon an innate sensibility) from describing a man to deciding that some behaviors of man are “good” while other are “bad”. You say you started with hedonism, which is understandable. How did you determine that “pleasurable” is “good”? And, more importantly, how did you then extend that principle to restrict my drive for pleasure when it conflicts with someone else’s. I understand that you base this upon a recognition of kinship with other humans, but how does this factor enter the good/evil evaluation in your system (or proto-system)?

I am familiar with ethical hedonism, but that does not seem to be what you are relying upon (i.e. a utilitarian analyses of pleasure benefits ot the individual through fostering social cooperation, etc.). You say, for instance, "The equality of man is assumed in the beginning, way beck when I attempted to abstract wants and needs. which seems to imply an empathic basis for valuing the lives, feelings, desires, etc. of others independent from personal hedonistic value. Perhaps you have something else in mind, though. How do you go from “equality” to “a necessary factor in moral evaluation”?

Is a system that addresses something other than wants a good system for morality? IMO, a resounding no. I find it makes no sense to discuss “should” and “shouldn’t” without reference to wants.

I agree with the second sentence, but I do not see that it implies the first. It is entirely possible to create an ethos that accomodates a concern for individual desires without eliminating all other concerns. That is a side issue, though. What I am really curious about is how you make the transition from “morality must address human desires” to “human desires are the appropriate object for moral evaluation”.

No value system, if I am understanding you correctly, trumps the moral code since that is where such valuations come from.

Hmmm, this is interesting. The case where you say your system breaks down is really in contexts that it has no meaning. “Groups” do not have desires and so cannot be evaluated on the basis of their desires. That isn’t really what I was trying to ask. Morality does not apply to chemical reactions, either, but that is not a breakdown of the system.

I was really asking whether the system was perfect within the appropriate millieu (individual morality). It sounds as if you are saying, “yes”. But then you say, “All moral pronouncements are approximate. This is why my “string” can be plucked…”. That seems unavoidable, as you recognized, so I guess my question really becomes: can you ever know when your moral aproximation is inaccurate? (And if so, how and what do you do about it?) [sub]note: I am not asking “when is your understanding of the desires involved inaccurate?” I am asking when the system fails in evaluating accurately described desires.[/sub]

on economics

Is there, IMO, based on my morality, an economic system which addresses morality? Yes. Does the study of economics lend itself to the study of morality? No

Hmmm, sed ‘s/lend itself to/impl/’ and I think we are in agreement. How did that happen?

other issues
I wanted to separate out these comments. Above, I am explicitely trying to understand your ethos, not criticize it. I do have some qualms, though, which I hope to express constructively here.

Primarily, I have concerns about associating morality with states of being which might be entirely beyond the control of an individual. Individual desires are strongly, perhaps deterministically in some cases, influenced by hereditary and social factors. Judging some of these “good” and some “evil” seems no more justified than judging facial hair to be “immoral” or small feet to be “moral”. Also, this emphasis on desire as the appropriate target for moral evaluation is quite contradictory to your ealrier qualms about passing judgment upon factors not under the control of the individual.

Now, I’m the last person to argue that one should never change a position, but the shift in your case seems quite sudden and not yet explained, so I wonder at the genesis.

any want which is in direct conflict with another man’s wants is immoral.

This strikes me as an unreasonable standard. In this case, the factor which determines morality is completely and irrevocably beyond the control of the individual. Remember the beer example? My desire remains constant – I want the beer. Is the morality of each scenario identical?

To reduce it even further (hey, I have to stay in characer):
I want the beer
You are not present, but you:
(a)want the beer
(b)don’t want the beer
I do not know your state of mind. Is my desire moral? Does it matter if you are present? Does it matter if you are present, but I am not awqare of you? Does it matter who the beer belogs to?

[Spiritus_Mundi]

BTW, have you ever read the ill-famed “The Illuminatus! Trilogy”?

Nope, though wife and many of my friends have. I keep meaning to, but it has yet to percolate to the top of my stack(s) of “things to read”.

[erislover]

*Originally posted by Spiritus Mundi *

sez me
Once the creature man was qualified, it was a simple process to then create the start of valuations to behaviors-of-man.

I assume these valuations are moral. If so, then how is it “simple”? I still don’t see how you go (without relying upon an innate sensibility) from describing a man to deciding that some behaviors of man are “good” while other are “bad”. You say you started with hedonism, which is understandable. How did you determine that “pleasurable” is “good”? And, more importantly, how did you then extend that principle to restrict my drive for pleasure when it conflicts with someone else’s.

I knew this was a hang up in the explanation. I leave the best parts out.

OK. Man alone is amoral, though he still has wants. Note that none of these wants can have anything to do with other people. The desire to murder other humans is impossible, for example.

So, the man wants things just for himself (what else is there?) and this is the hedonism. I am not sure that “pleasurable” is good, per se, other than it is a natural want to pleasure one’s self.

At any rate. When we introduce other people into it there is a clear clash of wants given finite resources. How do we determine the heirarchy of wants, and the reduction of specific wants to “good” and “bad” in light of competition?

Well, any want which fits both people simultaneously is obviously “more” right, but it is also not applicable here. When we have a clash of wants, we must find out: which want infringes on another want? Your beer example towards the end gives light of this. It is admitted that it is my beer. Now, does my want to keep my stuff mine trump your want to take it anyway? My state of mind is really unimportant. The good is claimed. In this way, were I to not exist, then neither would the beer (it is part of me as part of my wnats). So you would clearly be taking the step into violating me.
Is that clear? I feel its a little vague…

I am familiar with ethical hedonism, but that does not seem to be what you are relying upon (i.e. a utilitarian analyses of pleasure benefits ot the individual through fostering social cooperation, etc.).

Right. Hedonism only applies in derivation of wants…but not all wants are moral. Pleasure is not the Big Joker (if you’re a spades player…ie-the big trump card).

You say, for instance, “The equality of man is assumed in the beginning, way back when I attempted to abstract wants and needs,” which seems to imply an empathic basis for valuing the lives, feelings, desires, etc. of others independent from personal hedonistic value.

Empathic, yes, but the way you put it seems a little more touchy-feely than I mean it. We may very well act morally or imorraly (in this system) and not even consider it, unless one of your wants is to be moral. That is not, and cannot, be assumed as universal since morality only applies to interactions and the basis of the “universal” wants were gained from complete individuality. However, were one to try and evaluate the morality of any particular want in conflict, empathy is surely the undertone. Not empathy in the manner of, “How would I feel if someone did this to me?” but empathy in the more abstract form of “Can this act be performed without the other person?” Noted in the beer example above. Also, though, there are conflicting want situations which do not involve personal property. In such cases I think it revolves around the force issue, which is pretty fundamentally immoral (since freedom from force is guaranteed without others). I would hazard to say that any want-conflict which is equal (say, we both want to walk through a doorway at the same time) has no ability to be judged as moral or immoral. What would be judged is how we want to deal with that. I suppose cooperation, then, becomes the preferred choice, but I’m pretty shakey on that.

I don’t think these things out so much, so its good to hash it out in the presence of critique. My economics, I think, has calmed down a bit in a similar manner

It is entirely possible to create an ethos that accomodates a concern for individual desires without eliminating all other concerns.

I’m not sure about that…

…how you make the transition from “morality must address human desires” to “human desires are the appropriate object for moral evaluation”.

Hmm, yes. Pressed to the issue I think that it stems from this:
Desires are the motivation behind action. Without action there can be no conflict. Because we cannot divorce action from the actor, we also cannot divorce the actor’s wants from the action. That is, conflict is a result of wants themselves.
Hmm, tho.

The case where you say your system breaks down is really in contexts that it has no meaning. That isn’t really what I was trying to ask. I was really asking whether the system was perfect within the appropriate millieu (individual morality). It sounds as if you are saying, “yes”. But then you say, “All moral pronouncements are approximate. This is why my “string” can be plucked…”. That seems unavoidable, as you recognized, so I guess my question really becomes: can you ever know when your moral aproximation is inaccurate?

Probably not in that way. Apart from saying, “I do not apply here,” though, I have a hard time seeing that any explicit or partially explicit system will not have such a trouble too. That’s not justification, though.
I think maybe the problem doesn’t come in with the system itself but in personal interpretation of the system. Rationaliziation over rationality. That line is even fuzzier than the plucked string, though…

…I have concerns about associating morality with states of being which might be entirely beyond the control of an individual. Individual desires are strongly… influenced by hereditary and social factors. Judging some of these “good” and some “evil” seems no more justified than judging facial hair to be “immoral” or small feet to be “moral”.

Ah, can we be held responsible for our actions if they were not our choice? Can we be held morally accountable for our desires if our desires are a product of our environment?
Yeah. The empathy thing applies here in a grand way. Because you have a desire to live, killing is always immoral. There is no morality in killing. It may be justifiable, no one may punish you for it, but that doesn’t change the fact that it is an act of force on another individual which was stated as wrong above. Again, just because I have a moral system doesn’t preclude that I must follow that morality. Ever.

Also, this emphasis on desire as the appropriate target for moral evaluation is quite contradictory to your ealrier qualms about passing judgment upon factors not under the control of the individual.

In what way? Not all desires are the product of environment. Were that the case, 1984 would have happened already in some form. Clearly, due to the dynamic nature of human history, desires are not entirely the province of the environment.
Were we to try and seperate morality, and say “Well, it was ingrained in her to want to be good” or “to want to be bad” so those desires can’t really be good or bad is out of line… Remember the judgement falls on interaction based on the universal equality of humankind.

I think you’re bringing choice into the fray here, and this is where things are getting strange. You can choose to do or not do something, but the want was there. Can you choose to want or not want something? No… I can only repeat that people are their wants. There is no choice anywhere in the matter. The wants may have “come” from the environment or somewhere else or spawned like insects from mud (if you recall that old theory) but it really doesn’t matter.

any want which is in direct conflict with another man’s wants is immoral.

This strikes me as an unreasonable standard.

Well, I hope I explained it a little clearer. My broad strokes do that sort of thing…

In this case, the factor which determines morality is completely and irrevocably beyond the control of the individual.

Pretty much. Original sin? Again, you seem to be assuming that part of the morality is to want or care about morality in all situations. I don’t think that’s the case.

Remember, too, that the only way I can tell about your desires is through your actions and words. I can’t valuate you any other way. You’re only an original sinner to yourself, and only if you care.

I can’t say “You shouldn’t do that: its immoral.” I can only say, “You shouldn’t want that, and you are wrong for doing so.”

As a metaphysical question, it leaves me to wonder if a person can changel themselves…can a person stop wanting something? I said no before, but I think I’ll retract that upon further evaluation…

[Spiritus_Mundi]

How do we determine the heirarchy of wants, and the reduction of specific wants to “good” and “bad” in light of competition?

Well, any want which fits both people simultaneously is obviously “more” right

Obviously? According to what standard? This is exactly the type of assertion which I would expect to be grounded in an “innate sensibility” or a “divine revelation”. You deny both of those yet you still toss in these concepts as if they were simple statements of fact.

When we have a clash of wants, we must find out: which want infringes on another want? Your beer example towards the end gives light of this. It is admitted that it is my beer. Now, does my want to keep my stuff mine trump your want to take it anyway? My state of mind is really unimportant. The good is claimed. In this way, were I to not exist, then neither would the beer (it is part of me as part of my wnats). So you would clearly be taking the step into violating me.

This is another example: you move from ownership to some implied desire to keep your property. Not only was this desire not given in the example (in fact, in my second example it was explicitely denied) but you simultaneously declare the desire as a relevant factor and deny that your state of mind is a relevant factor. What is desire if it is not a state of mind?

But really, why complicate matters. Consider that the beer has no owner. There is a sign saying “free beer”. I want the beer. Look at three cases:
a) You do not want the beer.
b) You want the beer, but I am unaware of this.
c) You want the beer, and I am aware of this.
In which of those cases is my desire immoral?

Empathic, yes, but the way you put it seems a little more touchy-feely than I mean it. We may very well act morally or imorraly (in this system) and not even consider it, unless one of your wants is to be moral.

You have lost me entirely here. I mean by empathy nothing more than the dictionary definition (ref: the discussion with Jodi that I linked to earlier). If empathy is how your system bridges the gap between the acknowledgment of human kinship (similarity of desires) to the consideration of others in moral evaluation, then how can it be ignored in forming a moral evaluation. Are you just saying that something can be moral/immoral without the individual being aware of that state? If so, do you feel a morally aware individual bears a responsibility to act ethically?

I think it revolves around the force issue, which is pretty fundamentally immoral (since freedom from force is guaranteed without others). I would hazard to say that any want-conflict which is equal (say, we both want to walk through a doorway at the same time) has no ability to be judged as moral or immoral.

Why? Where does the idea that force is immoral come from? Absence of other people does not insulate us from force; it only insulates us from force initiated by other people. Beyond that, if the object of moral evaluation is the desire, then how can force even enter the equation? My desire is the same, whether or not I apply force to fulfill it. This is really the crux of my confusion, I think, you keep saying that the desire is the object of moral value, yet you also keep bringing in contextual elements independent of the desire which change the moral valuation (conflict, force, ownership). If the desire is the same and outside factors change the moral value, then it is not the desire being evaluated.

me
It is entirely possible to create an ethos that accomodates a concern for individual desires without eliminating all other concerns.

I’m not sure about that

But you have just described a system in which desire is considered yet other factors are also concerns!

Desires are the motivation behind action. Without action there can be no conflict.

But if the value is in the desire only, then the action is irrelevant. A desire might spur any number of potential “actions”. I might shoot you to take the beer. I might offer to share the beer with you. My desire is the same. My actions are different. Which facet carries the moral valuation? (I, of course, say neither – but we’ve been through that.)

I have a hard time seeing that any explicit or partially explicit system will not have such a trouble too.

I agree. That is one of my problems with rigid (or semi-rigid) systems.

can we be held responsible for our actions if they were not our choice? Can we be held morally accountable for our desires if our desires are a product of our environment? Yeah. The empathy thing applies here in a grand way. Because you have a desire to live, killing is always immoral. There is no morality in killing. It may be justifiable, no one may punish you for it, but that doesn’t change the fact that it is an act of force on another individual which was stated as wrong above. Again, just because I have a moral system doesn’t preclude that I must follow that morality. Ever.

Is “yeah” meant to be an interjection or the answer to the question? Can we be judged for desires that we cannot control? I am not saying that all desire is beyond human influence, but what about those that are? If my body is hot and dehydrated, then I will want that beer. I can make different decisions, take different actions, but I cannot make the desire disappear.

Your penultimate statement again brings up the question of whether a morally aware individual bears a responsibility to follow his ethos. You seem to be saying “no”, which I find very puzzling. Are you saying the desire to be immoral has no moral value?

Can you choose to want or not want something? No… I can only repeat that people are their wants. There is no choice anywhere in the matter.

So you are saying that people should be judged for factors beyond their control.

Again, you seem to be assuming that part of the morality is to want or care about morality in all situations. I don’t think that’s the case.

Well, close. What I am saying is that it is not ethical to willfuly ignore one’s ethos. In your terms that would translate to: “It isn’t moral to desire immorality,” I think. But you disagree. How does this reconcile with other desires being immoral? It is immoral to want to take the beer but not to want to want to take the beer?

can a person stop wanting something? I said no before, but I think I’ll retract that upon further evaluation…

I agree that some desires can be changed (or at least minimized). Buddhists strive for the elimination of all desire. I am not at all certain that is possible, though, in a corporeal being. I assum ethat you would find such a state definitively amoral, if it were achieved.

[erislover]

ME
**

How do we determine the heirarchy of wants, and the reduction of specific wants to “good” and “bad” in light of competition?

Well, any want which fits both people simultaneously is obviously “more” right

YOU
Obviously? According to what standard? This is exactly the type of assertion which I would expect to be grounded in an “innate sensibility” or a “divine revelation”. You deny both of those yet you still toss in these concepts as if they were simple statements of fact.

OK. If the want fits both people simultaneously, and morals are ascribed to desires between to people, if there is no conflict there can be no immorality. I think that’s obvious. No?

This is another example: you move from ownership to some implied desire to keep your property. Not only was this desire not given in the example (in fact, in my second example it was explicitely denied) but you simultaneously declare the desire as a relevant factor and deny that your state of mind is a relevant factor. What is desire if it is not a state of mind?

That’s why we own things…because we wanted to. In light of this I would have to say that some wants change, now. I don’t “move” from ownership to the disire to keep property. Ownership is continued desire to keep the property. If you didn’t want it anymore, you’d throw it out, give it away, forget about it…etc.

Shit, gotta go… more later tonight,

[Spiritus_Mundi]

The “leap” that I was asking to have explicated is the association of morality with desires that do not cause conflict (or with anything, actually). With the isolated individual you state: the man wants things just for himself (what else is there?) and this is the hedonism. I am not sure that “pleasurable” is good, per se, other than it is a natural want to pleasure one’s self. So, we do not have moral or immoral, only pleasure. Then you introduce other people and declare that desires which do not conflict are “good” and desires which conflict are “bad”. But when (and how) did you make the leap to those moral valuations?

If the want fits both people simultaneously, and morals are ascribed to desires between to people, if there is no conflict there can be no immorality. I think that’s obvious. No?

Well, apart from my qualms above it seems that once you get to this stage you have really only defined “immorality”. Desires which do not conflict would remain amoral, just like the purely hedonistic desires of an isolated individual. Now, I can actually imagine an extension of this to declare that desires which actively encourage/foster the desires of another are “moral”, but from what I know of your philosophy I doubt that you are prepared to argue that cooperatives are more moral than indiviidual free agents.

I don’t “move” from ownership to the disire to keep property. Ownership is continued desire to keep the property. If you didn’t want it anymore, you’d throw it out, give it away, forget about it…etc.

Actually, it is a move. Ownership is a legal recognition of a relationship. It can persist independent of the desires of the owner. If I abandon my car by the side of teh road, that does not absolve me from the responsibilities of ownership. Further, in the beer example I explicitely mentioned the possibility that you did not want the beer. This does not mean you (in the first example) did not still own the beer. Conversely, I might still desire to keep property after I had lost ownership (say, through foreclosure). I just don’t see that we can reasonably make ownership equivalent to “continued desire to keep teh property”.

[erislover]

Well, legality doesn’t have much to do with my morality. You would be under no moral obligation to care for the car…unless, of course, your want to rid yourself of it conflicted with where you left it (someone’s lawn, for example). What “society” deems legal and illegal are matters of practicality based on no specific principles.

Anyway, to continue where I left off.

But really, why complicate matters. Consider that the beer has no owner. There is a sign saying “free beer”. I want the beer. Look at three cases:
a) You do not want the beer.
b) You want the beer, but I am unaware of this.
c) You want the beer, and I am aware of this.
In which of those cases is my desire immoral?

None, really.

As far as where morality comes from, it isn’t just “lack of immorality” as you might have gathered from the opposites fiasco, and it isn’t from cooperation per se either (though nothing stops cooperation from being moral given the circumstances). Morality would be the wanting things to promote happiness which do not conflict with the “universal” set of wants.

For example, we both are about to die of thirst if we don’t drink this free beer. Both of us have a want, justly so, to drink this beer and live. Clearly there is no conflict of wants, or rather, there is every conflict: we want the same thing but there is a mutual exclusion between the two cases (say that sharing won’t enable us to both live). Our individual wants are completely moral…

Hmm. Here I must sort of tak a break from going on. I mean, there’s morailty of the individual and there’s morality of the situation at hand… neither of us would be immoral in wanting the beer. But the whole situation leaves us in an immoral state: the violation of life. I suppose it matters where you want to look at the situation from. Each individual doesn’t necessarily “want” to harm the other (indeed, we may not know the other is even there, given our delusional thirst-driven state) and so neither of us are being immoral.

Hmmmmmm. This is a sort of moral paradox… in either case we lose. If we continue to want the beer we are clearly violating life…but if we stop wanting the beer, we are still violating life.

But really, I suppose it isn’t a true paradox. For it to be one one would have to assume that in every situation there is a moral want and an immoral one. I think that is unsupported. But interesting…

Are you just saying that something can be moral/immoral without the individual being aware of that state? If so, do you feel a morally aware individual bears a responsibility to act ethically?

They don’t bear that responsibility, even if they are aware of this morality. And yes, as noted above, it depends on what level of abstraction we want to reach to determine the moral valuation. Do we judge the mob by its leader? As a series of individuals? As a group with similar wants (like a single entity)? I don’t think I can give a blanket statement that says where one should place the valuation.

No one is expected to act morally as a rule. Not that that ever stopped anybody, of course, including me. I moralize like a Baptist minister sometimes…

That is an interesting question to pose me, though…is it “good” to want to be moral? The tautology in me says of course, while the arl from the epist thread says that doesn’t make any sense.

My desire is the same, whether or not I apply force to fulfill it.

Not if it is your desire to use force, of course, which is admittedly a non-rare event. Popular moralizing takes the form of “We’re doing this for their own good” and “We don’t want to have to do this, but” bah. Action without want is, to me, impossible (from a consciousness). So you didn’t just want to, say, “Beat the Japs in WW2”, you wanted to drop a bomb on them. That’s why you did it. You wanted to use your force on other people, and that’s immoral. To which you may reply…

This is really the crux of my confusion, I think, you keep saying that the desire is the object of moral value, yet you also keep bringing in contextual elements independent of the desire which change the moral valuation (conflict, force, ownership). If the desire is the same and outside factors change the moral value, then it is not the desire being evaluated.

I can’t see how you are saying that. Want itself is based on the context of the situation. There can be a situation without wants but not a want without a situation. The context build the want itself. I’m not understanding this line at all. Of course changing the situation can change the morality…we can remove want conflict by changing the situation (by placing two beers there, in the earlier case, and thus there is a moral activity for each of us without an immoral implication). This seems obvious to me too, so perhaps I’m not understanding the problem. You say, “But you have just described a system in which desire is considered yet other factors are also concerns!” Have I cleared that up above?

It is immoral to want to take the beer but not to want to want to take the beer?

See the “Frosted Mini-Wheats” dilemma above. Wanting to be moral is not inherent as history bears out rather well, I think. Wanting to be immoral is probably an impposible state to acheive morality, but wanting to be moral might, as the no-win situation posed above shows, be impossible too.

Buddhists strive for the elimination of all desire.

Interestingly enough I was just hanging out with a buddhist tonight. Love talking economic morality with a buddhist Veitnamese lady who was raised primarily in the UK after age 8 and ended up here less than a few months ago. Talk about perspective…sheesh. Good dinner though.

[Spiritus_Mundi]

Well, legality doesn’t have much to do with my morality.

Ownership is a legal concept. If you want to apply it as a moral principle without the legal definition then you will need to supply a purely moral definition.

None, really. (of the beer examples are immoral)

But 2 out of 3 cases have desires in clear conflict (I want to drink the beer::you want to drink the beer). You have repeatedly said that desires in conflict with other humans are immoral. Now you say they aren’t. You obviously need to explain this in another way if I am to understand.

As far as where morality comes from, it isn’t just “lack of immorality” as you might have gathered from the opposites fiasco, and it isn’t from cooperation per se either (though nothing stops cooperation from being moral given the circumstances). Morality would be the wanting things to promote happiness which do not conflict with the “universal” set of wants.

But this is exactly the “lack of immorality” as you have defined it. Desire for happiness in a vaccuum has no moral value. Desire in conflict with others is immoral. I have no idea what you mean by the “universal set of wants”, though. You have earlier postulated that some wants (in an interactive situation) are moral, some are immoral. Are you constructing a circle here? desires are morral which do not conflict with the universal set of desires which are moral??

Both of us have a want, justly so, to drink this beer and live. Clearly there is no conflict of wants, or rather, there is every conflict: we want the same thing but there is a mutual exclusion between the two cases (say that sharing won’t enable us to both live). Our individual wants are completely moral…

What kind of wants are there other than individual? Human desire is an individual phenomenon. How can our want sbe completely moral and in direct conflict if immorality is defined as a desire in conflict with the desires of another person? (And we haven’t even begun to investigate the repercussions of that on having a desire in conflict with an “immoral” desire held by another!)

Each individual doesn’t necessarily “want” to harm the other (indeed, we may not know the other is even there, given our delusional thirst-driven state) and so neither of us are being immoral.

Where does “harming the other” enter the moral valuation? “Desires in conflict” is the only test for morality that I recall you introducing. Did I miss something?

Hmmmmmm. This is a sort of moral paradox… in either case we lose. If we continue to want the beer we are clearly violating life…but if we stop wanting the beer, we are still violating life.

Violating life? What does that have to do with desire?

I see no paradox, regardless. I simply see an illustration that using desire as the object for moral valuation is a poor choice.

But really, I suppose it isn’t a true paradox. For it to be one one would have to assume that in every situation there is a moral want and an immoral one. I think that is unsupported. But interesting…

Again, it was not posed as a paradox. It was as simple an illustration as I could construct at the time.

on the ethical responsibility to act ethically

They don’t bear that responsibility, even if they are aware of this morality.

This astounds me! You are saying that consciously choosing to violate ethics can be ethical.

Do we judge the mob by its leader? As a series of individuals? As a group with similar wants (like a single entity)? I don’t think I can give a blanket statement that says where one should place the valuation.

Um . . . huh?
Where did mobs come into the equation? I have never been speaking of anything but indiviual morality.

No one is expected to act morally as a rule. Not that that ever stopped anybody, of course, including me. I moralize like a Baptist minister sometimes…

Expected? As in “I have a real expectation that someone who recognizes an ethos will follow it invariably”? Of course not. I am not talking about outside excpectations. I am asking whether someone who recognizes an ethos as valid bears an ethical responsibility to act (desire?) accordingly. Is it moral, amoral, or immoral for me to take the position: I understand how to differentiate right from wrong but will not do so.

me
My desire is the same, whether or not I apply force to fulfill it.

Not if it is your desire to use force, of course, which is admittedly a non-rare event. Popular moralizing takes the form of “We’re doing this for their own good” and “We don’t want to have to do this, but” bah. Action without want is, to me, impossible (from a consciousness).

Hmmm – I begin to see a core discrepancy in our definitions. I apply want to “desire to drink the beer”. That is my desire. I do not have a desire to "kill arl. If you let me have the beer, I will not kill you. If you don’t let me have the beer, I will kill you and take it. To me, the desire in those alternatives is constant–beer. This is basic. “Popular moralizing” has nothing to do with it.

It seems to me that you extend the idea of want to the full spectrum of factors which determine action.

I think that may explain why I see you introducing contextual elements independent of want while you claim that you have not. To you, want is a much more inclusive “category”. In fact, I am hard pressed right now to see any factor in determining action which you do not group under the heading “want”.

You say, “But you have just described a system in which desire is considered yet other factors are also concerns!” Have I cleared that up above?

Well, I think so. Do you agree with my assessment above?

See the “Frosted Mini-Wheats” dilemma above.

Um . . . I can’t.

Wanting to be moral is not inherent as history bears out rather well, I think. Wanting to be immoral is probably an impposible state to acheive morality, but wanting to be moral might, as the no-win situation posed above shows, be impossible too.

I am not sure what “inherent” has to do with anything. I cannot for the life of me imagine a reason why wanting to be moral would be impossible.

[erislover]

I think we’re missing things here, but I can’t seem to place where.

My morality is a system to attribute valuations on desires. Desires come in two types. These are universal (not shifty, common to all mankind [sub]to a high degree[/sub]) and contextual (varies given current situation). If we were to change the context, we would change the desires because we would change the things available to be desired about (both mental desires and desires based on physical items).

A person is primarily under no obligation to act moral or to morally evaluate personal or others’ desires. I sorta misstated something earlier…it wasn’t that it is impossible to want to act moral, it is probably impossible that in any given context there is a moral desire. In some contexts there is a no-win situation, so to be moral in all situations is impossible.

People act on their desires, and the desire to be moral is a contextual one. The common, or universal, desires are a trump to contextual ones.

But 2 out of 3 cases have desires in clear conflict.

Depending on your level of abstraction. Again, “how far back” do you step when valuating morality? To an outside observer, the two people have conflicts since they desire the same thing but those desires are sort of against each other. To each individual, they are not in conflict at all. If both people know of the other person, this changes the context and then changes the want.

Perhaps you are looking at “wants” too simplistically. It isn’t just a matter of “wanting the beer,” you see, it is a matter of wanting the beer enough to want to stop the other guy from getting it because then I won’t have it. See, the context of the situation changes the wants.

As far as where morality comes from, it isn’t just “lack of immorality” as you might have gathered from the opposites fiasco, and it isn’t from cooperation per se either (though nothing stops cooperation from being moral given the circumstances). Morality would be the wanting things to promote happiness which do not conflict with the “universal” set of wants.

But this is exactly the “lack of immorality” as you have defined it. Desire for happiness in a vaccuum has no moral value. Desire in conflict with others is immoral. I have no idea what you mean by the “universal set of wants”, though. You have earlier postulated that some wants (in an interactive situation) are moral, some are immoral.

No, a lack of immorality is just that: no conflicting desires. Morality, is having desires which benefit ourselves but which do not conflict with other’s desires. Consider the free beer again, but neither of us want it. No conflicting desires, but no desires period based on the given context. This is neither moral nor immoral. It is a lack of morality period.

What kind of wants are there other than individual?

It depends on who is doing the moralizing. At what level are we willing to abstract to? Do we consider the situation of two people individually, as a set of wants, as a world-view? Again, we may broaden or constrict the context, and so change what the wants could be, and so change the morality we would impose.

Again, this system of morality is not inclusive of a methodology on how to apply the morality, just where it is appropriate to apply it: to wants and desires. That is, it isn’t a moral system about the system, Bertrand. Why not? Because it can’t be… the system is a descriptor and so doesn’t contain desires at all, so how could it be moral or immoral? I think this is clear, really.

Morality is not like “facts” and the way one applies morality might be different from how another applies it. I stick mainly to individual morality, but it is possible to look at wants in play from a larger level, a more complicated context. When we increase or decrease the complexity of the context we should not be suprised to see that the morality can change…because we’ve changed the context, we’ve changed the desires themselves! I’m not sure what upsets you about this, that the morality can be changed by considering new aspects? By valuating desires OR decisions this must be true, because if we change the context we change the desires, and quite possibly change the decisions. In either case, context is part of the “wanting” process.

Violating life? What does that have to do with desire?

Oh, how about the desire to live? Sort of a prerequisite to other wants (except the desire to kill ones’ self…).

Ownership is a legal concept.

It is an animalistic concept which has been transferred over into legality. Without a government there would still be ownership…the human equivalent of marking one’s territory. I think you’re stretching things a bit here.

This astounds me! You are saying that consciously choosing to violate ethics can be ethical.

Again, I’m not sure how much clearer I can make this. To want to want to do something immoral is not morally valuable (if that’s such a word)…not able to be valued in this moral system. Again…how could it? Morality is a descriptive system to create values. It is not a desire itself. any desires about it aren’t good or bad either. Its sort of a moral black hole. Consider a useful transition here. “I want to do something immoral (no value). Killing this guy is immoral (no valuation). Thus, I want to kill this guy (immoral).” I think its pretty simple.

It seems to me that you extend the idea of want to the full spectrum of factors which determine action.

Not action, just wants (which may or may not determine action—er, which definitely determine action but may or may not be acted upon, I should say). But yes, wants are not this simple beast. Your beer example serves to illustrate this easily enough: we change the context and we change the morality because we’ve changed the wants. Are you suprised that the morality isn’t the same in all situations? But then, that would be more than just a rigid code of ethics, it would be down-right absolutist. I’m not sure where you’re resisting this idea, or what displeases you…that it is rigid or that it isn’t? You seem to argue from both sides at once.

The Frosted Mini Wheats Dilemma:
I said, “That is an interesting question to pose me, though…is it ‘good’ to want to be moral? The tautology in me says of course, while the arl from the epist thread says that doesn’t make any sense.” Like Frosted mini wheats…the kid in me likes the frosting, but the adult in me likes…

[Spiritus_Mundi]

My morality is a system to attribute valuations on desires. Desires come in two types. These are universal (not shifty, common to all mankind to a high degree) and contextual (varies given current situation).

All desires are contextual. You have said so yourself.

A person is primarily under no obligation to act moral or to morally evaluate personal or others’ desires.

Obligation to whom? What possible function can an ethos serve if accepting the ethos does not provide any value to following the ethos? If an ethical code does not include the element “follow this ethical code” then it has no basis for ever condemning a violation of said code. The valuation of some act/choices/wants as good implies the a value for following that valuation.

People act on their desires, and the desire to be moral is a contextual one. The common, or universal, desires are a trump to contextual ones.

Make up your mind, please. Are only desires that are acted upon moral/immoral? How is this distinct from evaluating the actions?

Depending on your level of abstraction. Again, “how far back” do you step when valuating morality? To an outside observer, the two people have conflicts since they desire the same thing but those desires are sort of against each other. To each individual, they are not in conflict at all. If both people know of the other person, this changes the context and then changes the want.

???
What level of abstraction have I ever introduced into this example beyond “wanting a beer”? The desires conflict whether or not I am aware of your desire. The context that changes is our understanding/knowledge/empathy, not our wants.

Perhaps you are looking at “wants” too simplistically. It isn’t just a matter of “wanting the beer,” you see, it is a matter of wanting the beer enough to want to stop the other guy from getting it because then I won’t have it. See, the context of the situation changes the wants.

Perhaps you are introducing any number of things which are not “desire” and labeling them “desire”. Which approach is more simplistic? You have yet to introduce anything in your ethos which would justify eveluating a desire as “enough”. That does not keep you from including it in a moral evaluation as if it were a natural and inecapable progression from “conflicting desires” to “desires sufficient to provoke particular actions”.

I cannot find any way to say his more clearly: you include every factor that leads to action under the heading of “want”. Yes, if you do this it is inescapable that a moral evaluation has to occur at that level because you have left room for no other level. Anything that determines an action you label “want”. Any contextual influence you declare functions only by changing “what we want”.

No, a lack of immorality is just that: no conflicting desires. Morality, is having desires which benefit ourselves but which do not conflict with other’s desires. Consider the free beer again, but neither of us want it. No conflicting desires, but no desires period based on the given context. This is neither moral nor immoral. It is a lack of morality period.

AAAAAARRRRRRRGGGGGGGHHHHHHH!
You have maintained consistently that under your system the only place that moral evaluation can occur is at the point of desire. The only positive test you have given for moral valuation in your system serves to identify immorality. Thus, morality in the universe of things to which that label can be applied is the absence of immorality. You have supplied no other means for identifying morality.

Yes – lack of desire has no moral value. Neither does rock, or pink, or yesterday. You have explicitely stated that such things are not appropriate objects for moral valuation!

If I had noticed that you defined odd integers as those which are not even, would you counter “what about fractions?”

It depends on who is doing the moralizing. At what level are we willing to abstract to? Do we consider the situation of two people individually, as a set of wants, as a world-view? Again, we may broaden or constrict the context, and so change what the wants could be, and so change the morality we would impose.

Why do you insist on introducing complexities of group damics when we haven’t adequately covered individual cases? What is there in the beer example that spurred you to talk about mobs and social groups?

Again, this system of morality is not inclusive of a methodology on how to apply the morality, just where it is appropriate to apply it: to wants and desires.

Who asked?

That is, it isn’t a moral system about the system, Bertrand. Why not? Because it can’t be… the system is a descriptor and so doesn’t contain desires at all, so how could it be moral or immoral? I think this is clear, really.

I think you still do not understand Russell. When have I asked whether the system is moral? I have asked whether the desire to follow the system is moral. That is a desire, not a system. It involves no discrepancy of types.

Morality is not like “facts” and the way one applies morality might be different from how another applies it.

I thought your morality was a “semi-rigid” system. And why are you talking about individual applications again. I thought we were still trying to pin down the structure and bases of your system.

I stick mainly to individual morality

I only wish that were the case.

it is possible to look at wants in play from a larger level, a more complicated context. When we increase or decrease the complexity of the context we should not be suprised to see that the morality can change…because we’ve changed the context, we’ve changed the desires themselves!

Are you maintaining that changing the context from which we examine a situation changes the desires internal to the system? That is a pretty radical stance! I would ask you to defend it but I fear that way lies madness.

If you are saying that we can choose to focus our attention on different, already existing desires in the situation, then I agree. If you are saying that your system does not contain any guidance for integrating (or selecting from) those alternatives then I would say that is a serious deficiency.

I’m not sure what upsets you about this, that the morality can be changed by considering new aspects? By valuating desires OR decisions this must be true, because if we change the context we change the desires, and quite possibly change the decisions. In either case, context is part of the “wanting” process.

Upset me? Many things about this conversation frustrate me, in particular I find your terminology to be fluid and unclear. For instance, does the morality {value} change or does our moral judgment (evaluatin) change? If your definition of desires is broad enough that you declare all actions to be motivated by particular desire (I want to kill you in order to gain the beer that I want to drink) then what function does the word “choice” server? (I choose to kill you in order to gain the beer that I want to drink.) If I do not “choose” to kill you does that mean I do not “want” to kill you? What if I still want to kill you, but I want to stay out of jail more?

frankly, it seems more and more like you are placing the moral evaluation on whih “want” (under your broad definiiton) that we “choose” to enact.

Oh, how about the desire to live? Sort of a prerequisite to other wants (except the desire to kill ones’ self…).

No. Life is a prerequisite for wants. The desire for life may be absent without requiring the the desire for death to be fulfilled.

Really, though, I was wondering why you felt it necessary to include a life-or-death element in the simple example of conflicting desires for a beer.

It is an animalistic concept which has been transferred over into legality. Without a government there would still be ownership…the human equivalent of marking one’s territory.

Ownership is a legal principal through which claims for control of a resource are recognized by society. The primitive desire(s) you are talking about are possession and control.

Again, I’m not sure how much clearer I can make this. To want to want to do something immoral is not morally valuable (if that’s such a word)…not able to be valued in this moral system. Again…how could it? Morality is a descriptive system to create values. It is not a desire itself

this reasoning is spurious. Murder is not a desire, yet you have no problem declaring the desire to murder immoral. Your system evaluates desire (so you claim) not the object of the desire. I desire <object> is the syntax that you evaluate. Why is <to ignore ethics> a less proper object than <to muder arl>?

“I want to do something immoral (no value). Killing this guy is immoral (no valuation). Thus, I want to kill this guy (immoral).” I think its pretty simple.

Sure, if you set the anser to my question as an axiom of your syllogism. (Actually, you would need to develop a logic for your system, anyway, since I see no natural reason for two premises without moral value to result in an immorality.)

Beyond that, it is not generally considered sound logic to support an idea by “simply” declaring it to be true.

wants are not this simple beast. Your beer example serves to illustrate this easily enough: we change the context and we change the morality because we’ve changed the wants.

I tried once to politely explain where we were looking at the category “want” differently. I do not think I will do so again.

I’m not sure where you’re resisting this idea, or what displeases you…that it is rigid or that it isn’t? You seem to argue from both sides at once.

I have argued nothing at all about rigidness or lack of rigidity in your system. I have tried to understand the basis for your ethos and explore the ramifications of your ideas.

That effort appears to have been in vain.

[erislover]

A person is primarily under no obligation to act moral or to morally evaluate personal or others’ desires.

Obligation to whom?

Obligation to no one, there is no one to be obligated to.

What possible function can an ethos serve if accepting the ethos does not provide any value to following the ethos?

The system is set up to create what I feel is a reasonable means of making value-judgements on desires. If that is what you want then that is what you’ll do, most likely, and so you will THEN be under obligation to yourself.

It is not a dictatorial system of ethics. It is a semi-rigid system based on the interaction or lack thereof of wants between individuals. I have yet to find a moral system which compells a person to want to be moral, as you so strenuously suggest is required, or at least desirable. Merely putting that clause in there does nothing for the morality if the person doesn’t give a shit anyway. If the person gives a shit, then that clause is superfluous…they are going to want to be moral or immoral, and nothing to the contrary in the system itself is going to stop that.

If an ethical code does not include the element “follow this ethical code” then it has no basis for ever condemning a violation of said code.

OF COURSE. Because any means of enforcement is immoral…it implies a desire to do things to people which are in violation of their “rights” or “wants” or whatever term you would feel is broad enough to encompass what you see, pretty clearly[sub] that is, your assessment of what I mean when I say “want”[/sub], me saying.

What you want to do about infractions of morality is a matter of your own desires. The code does not provide rationalization or justification for retribution. You’ll have to do that on your own time. Essentially one would reduce morality in those cases to practicality, in that this person’s wants are clearly immoral, and that they are clearly in conflict with “our” wants. We’re going to go ahead and do this, even though it itself is immoral, for whatever reasons we’d like to tell ourselves we’re doing it for. I am NOT going to devise a morality which justifies breaking itself. That’s bullshit, IMO, plain and simple. “Why do we kill people to show people that killing people is wrong?” for example. Because it IS wrong. That doesn’t make us right, and that doesn’t miraculously cancel out the whole situation. Killing is wrong, why fuck around trying to justify one’s self over retribution within the moral system itself? We will never be “right” for killing another person, we can only talk ourselves into ignoring the immorality of it.

The valuation of some act/choices/wants as good implies the a value for following that valuation.

It implies a standard by which to judge desires based on equality of man. Where you stand on the equality of man will cause you to lean one way or the other on morality.

Make up your mind, please. Are only desires that are acted upon moral/immoral? How is this distinct from evaluating the actions?

Desires are immoral. THE REST OF THE WORLD can only judge desires by the person’s actions, or the person’s words (ie-he tells us what he desires). This is a matter of aaplication in lieu of psychic abilities.

What level of abstraction have I ever introduced into this example beyond “wanting a beer”? The desires conflict whether or not I am aware of your desire. The context that changes is our understanding/knowledge/empathy, not our wants.

The three points you make change the context of the question, and it was never explicit whether we in this conversation were evaluating the morality, whether the beer wanter 1 was evaluating the morality, or whether beer wanter 2 was evaluating the morality. From these different perspectives, and indeed these different contexts, the “obviousness” or “apparentness” of different desires are different. So we come to form different evaluations.

At the ultimate level of abstraction, or “pulling back”–ie, the level of considering all things in the universe at once-- all morality would be “true”. This level of abstraction is impossible, so we can only approximate by analyzing the available data to determine what the wants are. If it is ourselves our wants are clear. If we are an observer, the wants are not apparent. People are not wearing signs. Thus, to ascertain the wants and evaluate the system, we must look at the actions. How you do that is, again, up to you. This is not part of the moral system.

You have yet to introduce anything in your ethos which would justify eveluating a desire as “enough”. That does not keep you from including it in a moral evaluation as if it were a natural and inecapable progression from “conflicting desires” to “desires sufficient to provoke particular actions”.

Again, at what level of abstraction and who is doing the evaluating.

I cannot find any way to say his more clearly: you include every factor that leads to action under the heading of “want”.

Decisions are only relevant to external observers of the system. the more one “pulls back” from the situation to include more things, which they might feel are pertinent, the more things affect the want. Actions are only relevant to external observers.

No, a lack of immorality is just that: no conflicting desires. Morality, is having desires which benefit ourselves but which do not conflict with other’s desires. Consider the free beer again, but neither of us want it. No conflicting desires, but no desires period based on the given context. This is neither moral nor immoral. It is a lack of morality period. [emphasis added]

AAAAAARRRRRRRGGGGGGGHHHHHHH!..You have supplied no other means for identifying morality.

I feel that that definition exist independently of the definition for “immorality.” Are you upset that morality is the opposite of immorality, or that I haven’t referenced immorality in that definition, or what?

Why do you insist on introducing complexities of group damics when we haven’t adequately covered individual cases? What is there in the beer example that spurred you to talk about mobs and social groups?

At which level are we willing to consider the moral valuation to take place (if it is us, external to the sitaution that is doing the moralizing). What are you willing to consider is pertinent to the context of the situation? I was hoping to show that through those examples that morality is individually subjective but overall objective.

That is, it isn’t a moral system about the system, Bertrand. Why not? Because it can’t be… the system is a descriptor and so doesn’t contain desires at all, so how could it be moral or immoral? I think this is clear, really.

I think you still do not understand Russell. When have I asked whether the system is moral?
[/quote]

When you said, “I am asking whether someone who recognizes an ethos as valid bears an ethical responsibility to act (desire?) accordingly. Is it moral, amoral, or immoral for me to take the position: I understand how to differentiate right from wrong but will not do so.”

Morality is not like “facts” and the way one applies morality might be different from how another applies it.

I thought your morality was a “semi-rigid” system. And why are you talking about individual applications again. I thought we were still trying to pin down the structure and bases of your system.

Things you seem to be missing.

1. Who is doing the moralizing.
2. What is necessary to determine wants of a system when we are not a apart of that system determine how context changes wants.
3. What is necessary to evaluate our own wants is also sometimes contextual. (Do I want that beer?-Yes. Oh, that beer has a bug in it. Did my wants just change with the context? Yes, now I don’t want that beer, I just want a beer without a bug in it.)
4. The moral valuations achieved are as rigid (read: well-formed) as the approximation of desires understood in context. The better we understand the situation the better we understand the desires.

I stick mainly to individual morality

I only wish that were the case.

Qualifier: personally, in practice, outside of debating. I am mentioning the possibility that other people, were they to agree with some of this system, would not look at individual morality much but always abstract to a higher level involving local society and so on.

Are you maintaining that changing the context from which we examine a situation changes the desires internal to the system? That is a pretty radical stance!

Again, this is mainly a factor when we are not a part of the system being moralized. Even still, on a personal level, changing the context (as shown above) can change our wants.

It is an animalistic concept which has been transferred over into legality. Without a government there would still be ownership…the human equivalent of marking one’s territory.

Ownership is a legal principal through which claims for control of a resource are recognized by society. The primitive desire(s) you are talking about are possession and control.

Ownership is an animalistic principle in which the rest of the animals recognize territory based on physical objects. Possession is being in contact with what you own, and control is having primary influence over what you own. You may own something without being currently in possession of it or having immediate control over it.

this reasoning is spurious. Murder is not a desire, yet you have no problem declaring the desire to murder immoral. Your system evaluates desire (so you claim) not the object of the desire. I desire <object> is the syntax that you evaluate. Why is <to ignore ethics> a less proper object than <to muder arl>?

In general because it is not assumed that people want to act morally. BUT, you make a good point, and now that you’ve sort of beat me over the head with it it seems that I am implying, by definition of morality, that it is moral to want to be moral if you want to be moral. Maybe.

“I want to do something immoral (no value). Killing this guy is immoral (no valuation). Thus, I want to kill this guy (immoral).”

Beyond that, it is not generally considered sound logic to support an idea by “simply” declaring it to be true.

Please elaborate here. Where did I screw up?

[Spiritus_Mundi]

but I apologize for the tone of my last.

Bad day. Nothing to do with you. I should have controlled the fallout better.

[erislover]

Ah, no apology necessary…but thanks.

[sub]now I’m wondering if I was biting back in my post[/sub]