Ethics

[suggs]

Well, thats completely fair enough.
But unfortunately it has no real bearing on this thread -since Nobou is trying to establish an OBJECTIVE principle of morality, that can be used as the foundation for everyone's ethics.
You are talking about subjectivism.

[jonesthecurl]

True, pretty much. But it's where I got to after a lot of thought.
Incidentally, rereading my first post here, don't I type well when I've had too much beer?
Though I seem to have had some trouble with Gurdjieff.

[MeDeFe]

Or Jones, from another angle: what if I admire people that physically hurt people to get their own way? By your definition, if I acted consistently by by own moral standards, i should physically hurt people as well.
And yet, intuitively, that doesn't sound very moral.

That's why it isn't the categorical imperative, but more akin to the golden rule.

And I, too, am interested in hearing more about this concept of simplicity. If i understood you correctly, Nobua, you claimed that both the theist and the atheist in Suggs' example acted ethically, because they had lived different lives and had different viewpoints, but if that's the case, how can they then both be correct and your proposal still be objective?

[Nobuo]

First, suggs, when I say simplicity I am referring to societal simplicity, nothing else. I already gave a fairly simple (no pun intended) definition of simplicity in the opening paragraphs of my first post. That is, societal complexity = arms races, societal simplicity = the social contracts (ala Locke, et al) and the trust necessary between people to prevent arms races of crime, arms races of distinction, arms races of greed, etc.

Therefore simplicity mandates restraints on selflessness that you wouldn't normally have under pure altruism; unnecessary suicide, sleep deprivation, and other problems that egoists would say are implications of selflessness would not promote simplicity under my system because they would be inefficient means to ethical value (in this case, happiness). Furthermore, simplicity would necessitate that people be honest with one another so that trust could be fostered--something that transcends selflessness.

I know I kind of use simplicity as a catch all--it represents everything that governments have a responsibility to tend to as well as everything that is wrong with unrestrained selflessness--but it does work well in this capacity.

Your definition of ethics is good, jones, and incorporates the considerations of selflessness, responsibility, and respect that mine does. However, there must be some broader constraints on selflessness, hence simplicity. What if you were selflessly helping some country or organization (and we're assuming that you do have some significance on an international stage so that your actions are being noticed) that was once considered a terrorist country by the UN (though currently you are sure their intentions are just and noble). There are people starving and dying all over said country and so you feel compelled to use your billions of dollars (don't ask me how you made said fortune) to aid them. However, there are members of the UN with residual hostilities towards said country who are convinced you are directly funding the building of nuclear weapons and therefore begin building nukes in response. Feeling threatened, the poor country has no alternative but to actually build nukes itself and so nuclear proliferation becomes rampant all over the world, leading to no one being happy because no one can trust one another. Therefore, simply being selfless is not an adequate definition of ethics because the building trust and simplicity is a more important concern.

Finally, meddy, didn't I already answer why my theory was objective in that same post that you are referring to? It is actually not as big of a leap to go from relativism to objective ethics as you are making it out to be. All I'm saying is that as far as governments are concerned, there is a very clear, more absolute principle driving their decisions, the promotion of simplicity. As far as individual ethics are concerned, things are a bit more uncertain as every individual has had a different upbringing and are therefore in different situations when they make decisions so that their decisions might very well need to be different (all that objective ethics say is that there is a right thing to do in every situation).

As I said in my first post, you can base ethics off of motivations, actions, or consequences. You're assuming that the only form of objective ethics is one in the form of Kant's where there is an objectively right action to do in every circumstance. All I'm saying is there is an objectively right mindset to have in every circumstance--looking at the decisions with respect to the five ethical considerations. Therefore we can't really decide whether the actions of individuals (when they do not have greater societal ramifications) are ethical unless we know their thoughts (something suggs didn't reveal in his post).

[heavycola]

A while ago I tried to set up a [insert topic here] thread and failed pretty miserably--the whole thing never rose above taunting on all sides

Welcome to the CC forum.

[MeDeFe]

So you're more talking about ethics on a national and global scale than on an individual? Because I don't think you've been at all clear in your definitions so far.

[Nobuo]

Sorry if I haven't been clear--these things seem clearer to me than they actually are as I've spent so long devising and refining them and expressing them in ways that make sense to me. What I'm saying is that on national/global/societal scales there are such things as ethical actions--ones that promote simplicity (lack of "arms race" situations, though the "arms" could be anything from "coolness" to murder to actual weaponry). On an individual level one should be mindful of these constraints then go about creating an ethical mindset.

If you have any other uncertainties express them clearly as I wouldn't be able to see them myself. Do you understand how there could be other forms of objective ethics beyond Kant's deontology + obedience theory? That if we all have the same mindset when we act, this is objective ethics regardless of whether we make the same action?

[suggs]

I think that the problem with "simplicity" is that it begs the question.
Look at all the examples you use as evidence of simplicity in action (social contract as oppossed to arms race etc).
All of your examples are, in fact, the BEST OUTCOME already.
You are saying "Ah, simplicity is a criterion for good behaviour. How can we tell if it is good behaviour -well, it will have the criteria of simplicity".

So i think your whole argument is circular, and thus, doesn't tell us anything about how we should act.

[Nobuo]

You're right about that--I hadn't thought of it in quite that way. Simplicity says very little about how we should act because it assumes that we know what the consequences of our actions are (but if we knew that we would know how to act).

Of course, this is a common complaint lodged against any ethical system by intuitionists (what is good? I say good what's good is such and such... well is such and such good? yes, I just said it was good... but your reasoning for that is only the definition you just gave me, etc.). The thing is we can never really know what the consequences of our actions are--I pointed out near the beginning of my first post that we are not omniscient and omnipotent beings. This hinders the practical implementation of ethical theory but it in no way suggests that there can't be objective ethics--it just wouldn't completely work unless we all knew everything.

That being said, we can see that arms race situations do exist and we might not know when or how they might arise but this does not mean we should just throw up our hands and never work to prevent obvious arms races. Furthermore, you mistake my argument a tad and miss my very necessary bit of value relativism that I have conceded was necessary. I am not saying "simplicity is a criterion for good behavior because good behavior has the criteria of simplicity," I am saying "simplicity is a criterion for good behavior because I have arbitrarily fixed ethical value to be happiness and simplicity furthers happiness." Without religion, ethics requires this little bit of subjectivity but I don't think anyone will want to really argue with the notion of an objective system to further everyone's happiness.

[suggs]

The problem is the old one of I doubt whether an objective system is possible.
I don't think "simplicity" is a good thing - you do -whose to say who is right?

Don't get me wrong, i intuitively dislike relativism, because it smacks of wanky Sixth Form "aaaah, but how do we know" stuff.
But, in ethics, this sort of stuff is fundamental.

Perhaps one of my principles might be libertarianism -which would maike me recoil from pretty much ANY government intervention.

[Nobuo]

I'm not saying anything about simplicity being "right" or "good" because those terms are too unspecific. I'm saying that there are certain times when competition helps none of the parties involved (this is a fairly common concept in social contract ethics--it's not as if I'm pulling this out of a hat).

Let's say two companies both want the maximum amount of a resource. This resource regenerates slowly so they can harvest it indefinitely if they do so at a rate less than this. However, both are trying to maximize the amount they receive because they are frightened their competitor is going to collect everything while they sit around slowly harvesting. Therefore, they both harvest as quickly as they can and fully deplete said resource.

Let's say two countries want security. They both build up weapons in order to prevent the other from destroying them if war ever breaks out. However, both see that the other has more weapons now then they had before and so they build more weapons in an effort to have more than their opponent so that they will deter an enemy invasion. This continues and as a result of the increased stockpiles, both are much less secure.

Let's say a firm of lawyers all want raises but their boss (for some reason) only gives bonuses to those who dress the fanciest. Therefore, they all rush out to buy the most expensive accessories and clothing but soon realize that they need to buy even fancier clothing to set themselves apart from everyone else. This escalates and escalates because if any of them stops buying more stuff, it will make meaningless everything they've bought so far. In the end, one person gets a raise that slightly exceeds the amount they've spent while everyone else is reeling in debt.

In all these situations, if the entities involved had made an agreement to limit competition between them or if they had trusted one another, they would have more completely attained their original goal (resources, security, and wealth, respectively)--this is an objective truth. This can be extrapolated to crime, dishonesty, etc. I don't quite see why, if you assumed the ethical value you had chosen for society was ideal, you would want negative competition to happen that reduced that ethical value. As far as I can tell, libertarianism acknowledges the necessity of interfering in individual affairs when needless complexity would otherwise be generated (such as preventing murder and theft); though it doesn't always admit how similar the reasons are for preventing traditional crimes to lesser forms of negative competition.

[MeDeFe]

ok, but why do you call that "simplicity"? Social contracts and win-win situations can be highly complex things.

[Nobuo]

Mainly because I'm using it to describe two different things.

1. The establishment of a maximum level of competition so that everyone will get more of what they want through this "simpler" level of competition.

2. Ensuring that the society is adaptable and is not overly fragile from too many institutions and levels of government--making sure that the well being of all does not rest on a single entity that if destroyed would send the whole thing tumbling to the ground.

Thus, "simplicity" is state of moderation between unproductive selfishness and unproductive selflessness, between paranoia and greed, between libertarianism and communism, etc. If you can come up with a better term for this, I'd be eager to hear it. But as far as I can tell, the condition reached by the implementation of these two concerns is one of simplicity even if the legislation, agreements, and enforcement required to reach this condition are complex.