dr_who@umcp-cs.UUCP (08/01/83)
From Tom Craver (trc@houti.UUCP): Suppose that [one can care equally for self and others] - is it going to be true in all cases? If so, on what basis does one decide how to act morally - since the choice between acting for one's own benefit or for that of the other is arbitrary under the moral system this would imply. It will NOT always be possible to act for the interests of both, nor will the benefits to be gained usually be equal. Yes, in all cases. Drop the term "morally" from Tom's second sentence, since it is not appropriate. One who cares equally about self and others will have no unsolvable problem deciding how to act -- he will act for the maximum benefit, regardless of whose welfare is concerned. Suppose, for example, that you care equally much about your wife's welfare as you do your own. Suppose you have a certain amount of money which you were hoping to spend on a new car, but your wife needs a pain-reducing operation. If she doesn't get it, she will be in moderate pain a lot of the time, but she won't complain to you and you'll hardly ever think about it, so you decide that you would actually be happier if you bought the car. However, you decide that your wife would be happier if you paid for the operation, and also that looked at objectively, her pain relief is more important to her welfare than your car is to yours. You decide to pay for the operation. In doing so, you are not valuing your wife's welfare any more, intrinsically, than your own -- you are just acknowledging that there is a *greater amount* of her welfare than yours involved. Further, by "equal concern", do you mean that concern for the sum of all other individuals' needs is equal to your own, or that each other individual's needs deserves equal concern with your own? ... If the latter, then any two others can always claim greater concern ... [and] you would have to act in a self-sacrificing manner for any gang that laid claim to you. (Besides, you argued strongly in the first note for the morality of loving others with no equal concern for oneself.) I meant the latter (except, replace "deserves" by "gets"). However, you wouldn't have to act in a self-sacrificing manner for any gang that laid claim to you. Their laying a claim to you is totally irrelevant, since it has nothing to do with how much you can help them, or how this compares to how much you can help yourself. Instead of having to respond to the demands of others, you would simply find out who you could help most effectively (which would inevitably include yourself), and do so. As for the "besides," that is simply not true. You claim that you have some other reason for loving others - that benefits are "emphatically NOT . . . my reason for loving". What *is* your reason then? Why love others? In my experience, the reason I love someone is because of what kind of person s/he is. The reason I act in a loving manner toward that person is the benefits to THAT PERSON as well as myself, but I usually think about the benefits to myself of a loving act reflectively, after the act, whereas I think about the benefits to the loved one during the act. Promises and bargains *are* obligations - agreements freely entered into by choice, you *are* speaking of an "obligation" to fulfill an obligation - which you deny doing. That's a new one on me -- I thought free agreements *created* obligations. Also, although I don't want to say that the distinction between descriptions and norms is exclusive, aren't you changing a normative term (obligations) into a descriptive one? After all, if "obligation" just *means* freely-entered-into-agreement, then it becomes reasonable to ask, "should I fulfill my obligations?", whereas if "obligation" means what I think it means, this is a silly question. But let's see how a selfish person would answer the allegedly equivalent question, "should I keep my agreements?" Thus, a rational, selfish person will seek to stay on good terms with the other members of society, and will want to fulfill obligations because that is necessary for the beneficial society to continue. I agree that a selfish person will keep *most* of his agreements, but I don't see why he would keep those agreements he knows he can get away with breaking. And I think there are some agreements in almost anybody's life which he knows he can get away with breaking. I did not ignore your statement to the effect that considering something moral does not imply that one thinks others must be coerced into it. I had already quoted your statement that you "do think that people should sometimes be coerced to benefit others", and I felt that that was fair evidence of either your "real" opinion, or of an inconsistency in your views. That is indeed evidence of my real opinion -- *my* real opinion. But many people, for example my friend George, disagree with me. My views are not the only ones that you ought to be fair to. --Paul Torek, U of MD College Park