rjb@akgua.UUCP (R.J. Brown [Bob]) (05/18/84)
In response to Mr Akerlind's challenge awhile back, I have one
of my own for people of the Secular Humanist and Materialist
persuasions. (Note: Since Rationalist has a meaning inside
Philosophy, would it be fair to label the Rosen position
as Materialist since he and others who agree with him believe
that which is sensible with the usual five plus the mind
is all that there is in the Universe ? )
Or has Materialist already been used up too ?
Anyway, my challenge revolves around questions (not original with
me) of the following type:
1) Postulate Evolution of a self-existing Universe.
2) Man is the current end product of this progressive
process at least in our corner of it.
Question #1) Since man is purely a product of his genes and his
environment, on what basis is the statement
"I ought..." distinguishable from "I itch.." ?
(Thank You C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity)
Question #2) Following that line, how can responsibility for
personal behavior be assigned to anyone since
he or she is not really in a position to control
their genetic make-up (right now anyway) ?
Humanist documents and literature I have read extol the virtues
of individual freedom of choice and situational ethics that
promote the idea that you determine what is right for you
on a case by case basis.
Question #3) Is there a reference point in this system that
will prevent the tendency to drift toward anarchy
when you and I and a zillion other folks are doing
our situational ethics number on a grand scale ?
Question #4) Is there a need for the designations good and evil
(I think Rich Rosen dealt with this) and do they
have any meaning in this worldview ? (In light
of Questions 1 and 2 )
Question #5) Does this implicit exultation of self actually
succeed in making a livable society ?
(I expect to hear from Ayn Rand Disciples on this.)
Have I received a biased view of Humanism, in particular, since I
get the impression that it is extremely ME oriented ?
Humanism seems to me to represent the best efforts of mankind
to deify itself. Personally, selfishness has never been good
for me or anyone I've affected when I made it a full time pursuit.
Come on Humanists-Materialists you have a lot of articulate
contributors on the net - it is your turn.
Bob Brown {...clyde!akgua!rjb}
AT&T Technologies, Inc.............. Norcross, Ga
(404) 447-3784 ... Cornet 583-3784lied@ihlts.UUCP (Bob Lied) (05/19/84)
Aarrgh! Why does every challenge to humanism include the
assertion that humanism is selfish? It is not. The fundamental
rule of humanism is the Golden Rule.
The idea is simple: we have enough intelligence to foresee some
of the results of our actions. Therefore, we choose the actions
that seem the most beneficial. We can make this choice entirely
based on our previous experiences and our ability to reason about
the results. The reasoning includes considering effects on other
people and society in general. We do not need the heavy
baggage of absolute good and evil; we do not need the heavy
baggage of faith in untestable beliefs; we do not need the
heavy baggage of threat of punishment.
Humanism has flaws, but selfishness is not one of them.
Maybe next time I'll even answer the question that was asked :-).
Bob Lied ihnp4!ihlts!liedanthro@ut-ngp.UUCP (05/19/84)
..
Man is the current end product of this progressive process
, at least in our corner of it.
I've been reading a lot here and in net.origins about the 'progressive'
properties of evolution. Evolution is change, not progress. It is
attractive to look at the development of organisms thru time, and note
'progress' from the one-celled organism to complex plants and animals,
but another interpretation is that life expands to fill available niches.
Until there were one-celled organisms, there was no niche for multi-celled
organisms. The complexity of life forms matches the complexity of the
available context.
The notion that Homo sapiens is the apex of a long evolutionary path is
a simple expression of species focus. There is little difference in the
evolutionary success of H. sapiens and A. stephensi, indeed they are
related. You will have to look at criteria other than evolution to
'deify' man.
Mike Fischer, anthro@ut-ngp
rcd@opus.UUCP (05/21/84)
A few responses, but not complete... >Question #1) Since man is purely a product of his genes and his > environment, on what basis is the statement > "I ought..." distinguishable from "I itch.." ? In one sense, not very much, nor need it be. However, the matter of "ought" is a lot harder to learn than "itch". Genetics makes us what we are, then we get dropped into the environment. If the environment causes an irritation of the skin, we itch; recognizing the situation and identifying it with previous learning says "so, scratch" and we do. Similarly, identifying ethical situaitions (for example) we have encountered before elicits the "I ought" response. [I've tried to take Bob's words as I think he meant them; I don't want to deal with "I ought to scratch" and semantic quibbles.] >Humanist documents and literature I have read extol the virtues >of individual freedom of choice and situational ethics that >promote the idea that you determine what is right for you >on a case by case basis. Here, I think Humanism is misunderstood. Situational ethics is not (or should not be:-) equal to a "wing it" approach. It simply gives you the right/responsibility to think about what you are doing rather than reacting according to a strict code of predetermined action. Consider the preceding paragraph. If the situation is "I itch", the response is "Scratch" - BUT that doesn't work if the source of the itch is poison ivy. How do you know? Learning and experience. I think that the real point of situational ethics is that you have to be careful when applying your ethical code - make SURE it really applies. I have seen misinterpretations of situational ethics used as an excuse for people to do whatever they want - I think that may be what bothers Bob, and it bothers me too; I don't buy it a bit. >Have I received a biased view of Humanism, in particular, since I >get the impression that it is extremely ME oriented ? If you have that impression, you have indeed received a biased view of humanism. >Humanism seems to me to represent the best efforts of mankind >to deify itself. Personally, selfishness has never been good >for me or anyone I've affected when I made it a full time pursuit. My feeling is that this is a clash of theistic thinking with humanism. Are you, perhaps, looking at Humanism and saying, "Where's the deity?" There isn't one. Seriously, Humanism can as easily be condemned as condemning all of humanity to suffer on its own, with no hope of redemption and no guidance. -- ...A friend of the devil is a friend of mine. Dick Dunn {hao,ucbvax,allegra}!nbires!rcd (303) 444-5710 x3086
ka@hou3c.UUCP (Kenneth Almquist) (05/22/84)
Replies to Bob Brown's questions:
Question #1) Since man is purely a product of his genes and his
environment, on what basis is the statement
"I ought..." distinguishable from "I itch.." ?
(Thank You C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity)
"I ought..." is a moral statement or value judgement, while
"I itch..." is a statement of fact. (This answer is not an
attempt to sidestep the question, but I can't give a better
answer without knowing what you are driving at.)
Question #2) Following that line, how can responsibility for
personal behavior be assigned to anyone since
he or she is not really in a position to control
his or her genetic make-up (right now anyway) ?
The answer to this question has little to do with belief or
nonbelief in materialism. (Christians should of course replace
the phrase "genetic make-up" with something like "the spiritual
makeup given to the individual when he was created by God".)
I don't want to turn this into a dry discussion of definitions,
but I don't see how to avoid doing so. "Responsible" is defined
in terms of "cause," and assuming that we agree that a person
causes his actions to occur, the person is in some sense "respon-
sible" for his actions. However, that does not settle the matter
because we can generally think of an arbitrary number of causes
of any given event. For example, take the case of a person who
is mugged while walking down a New York city street. Do we blame
the mugger for deciding to commit the mugging, the victim for
walking around alone in New York, the police for failing to protect
the victim? Clearly, we must decide which cause is the most
meaningful. There is no one answer to this; for example if you
are giving advice to the victim it might be most meaningful to
concentrate on the fact that the mugging would not have occurred
had the victim not been alone. However, in my view, and probably
in the view of most of you, it is in general most meaningful to
view the mugger as causing the mugging to occur. (I will probably
write a discourse on the concept of "meaningfulness" at some
point, but not now.)
Since the question was probably intended to be about free will,
let me state that I (unlike some humanists) do not believe that
free will exists. The existence or nonexistence of free will
does not change the basic issues here. It may be easier to
argue that the mugger's past experiences, rather than the mugger
himself, were responsible for the mugging if you assume deter-
minism; but since most advocates of free will concede that past
experiences affect a person's actions, the same argument can
be made if you assume free will.
Question #3) Is there a reference point in this system that
will prevent the tendency to drift toward anarchy
when you and I and a zillion other folks are doing
our situational ethics number on a grand scale ?
I started to write a long essay about the nature and source of
ethical values, and didn't get very far, so let me try a brief
answer. If each individual has the ability to choose their own
moral values (and I believe that Christianity assumes that they
do) then by definition you have moral anarchy. Humanism's
response to this condition is that complete unanimity of moral
values is neither practical nor necessary. Humanism sets up a
basic guidepost by claiming that any moral system which does not
incorporate a respect of the value of all people is fundamentally
flawed, and deals with remaining disagreements by asking that
the rights of all people to their own opinions be respected.
This is adequate to form the basis of a harmonious society.
Question #4) Is there a need for the designations good and evil
(I think Rich Rosen dealt with this) and do they
have any meaning in this world view ? (In light
of Questions 1 and 2 )
Another brief answer. Stating that something is good or evil is
making a value judgement. People will always make value
judgements as long as they have both emotions and reason, thus
there is a need for these terms. Because there is a significant
amount of agreement between people about what constitutes good
and evil, it is obvious that these value judgements are not
completely arbitrary, and thus the terms have meaning.
Question #5) Does this implicit exultation of self actually
succeed in making a livable society ?
(I expect to hear from Ayn Rand Disciples on this.)
OK, I will leave the Objectivists to answer most of this one, but
let me make one point in advance. As I understand it, Ayn Rand
would say that if a woman gives up her life in order to save the
life of her child, the woman is sacrificing one of her lesser values
(her life) for one of her greater values (the life of her child),
and is therefore acting in her self interest rather than acting
altruisticly. I have no problems with this concept, but I don't
like the terminology because I think that most people would agree
that the woman is acting altruisticly. How about defining "altruism"
as assigning value to other people or the actions that flow from
such an assignment?
Have I received a biased view of Humanism, in particular,
since I get the impression that it is extremely ME oriented ?
Any philosophy that is concerned with the individual, Christianity
included, can be accused of being "ME oriented," but only by looking
at one facet of the religion and ignoring the rest. Humanism assigns
value to all individuals, not just "ME". Therefore, if I accept
humanism, I must value the welfare and happiness of all of humanity,
not just of myself.
Kenneth Almquist