dr_who@umcp-cs.UUCP (08/14/83)
George Weinert is a senior at Case Western Reserve U. He is a friend who, if I didn't have, I would have invented. I am not asking anyone to respect his views regardless of content, but merely to acknowledge that his views exist, that many share them, and that they are different from both mine and Tom Craver's. Why am I concerned to defend or even state someone else's views? 1. Because if -- purely hypothetically -- Tom Craver could convince me that utilitarianism was wrong, I still wouldn't be convinced that Objectivism is right. 2. More importantly, because I want net.philosophy readers to reject Objectivism even if they also reject utilitarianism. And I know well that many people find utilitarianism unpalatable (I once did). There are many positions in the "middle ground", and I believe that it is better for human welfare that people choose some of the other main middle ground positions, than that they choose Objectivism. George and many others would be uncomfortable with any association with "morality" at all. Also, many feel that (as Alan Wexelblat puts it) "all moral principles are, at base, arbitrary," i.e. that no moral position is rationally required. I strongly disagree. However, I do not want such people to think that because "altruism is a moral principle" (so you say), that they have to have moral beliefs in order to have intrinsic concern for others. Some people prefer not to view themselves as acting from moral beliefs, and I want them to realize that they can satisfy this preference and still be middle-grounders. --Paul Torek, U of MD College Park