janw@inmet.UUCP (09/06/86)
[Presumably by Piotr Berman] >While Wingate chooses to believe in super-natural and an >absolute 'good and evil', you deny the super-natural and conclude >that the notions of 'good and evil' fully relative, i.e. fully >dependend on 'social-political structure'. But that makes it im- >possible to critisize an existing structure. I do not know the context, but would like to introduce a distinction. 'Good and evil' being relative is not the same as being fully dependent on the 'social-political structure'. In a fully relative ethics, where good and evil are a matter of individual taste, social-political structure can *still* be criticized - not from the position of natural rights, but from the position of personal convictions. "Here I stand, I cannot otherwise" - this stance doesn't require *any* external sanction, natural or supernatural. Two persons of the same ethical tastes could still band together to change the social order. Moreover, tastes can be educated: i.e., change through an exchange of information. E.g., when netter A says to netter B : but would you stick to your principle in the following extreme situation ? - it is a legitimate attempt to help B's *personal* morality evolve in A's direction. No appeal to natural rights or revealed principles is involved. I am not arguing against general ethical principles - I think them necessary. I don't think, however, they *precede* all par- ticular moral judgements. They evolve from particular cases; the system grows bottom-up as much as top-down. And they evolve in *individuals*, by different, though somewhat convergent, paths. "Society" as a whole needn't enter into this at all. Neither need supernatural entities. Neither need a "natural order of things". Jan Wasilewsky
berman@psuvax1.UUCP (Piotr Berman) (09/15/86)
> [Presumably [and, indeed] by Piotr Berman] > >While Wingate chooses to believe in super-natural and an > >absolute 'good and evil', you deny the super-natural and conclude > >that the notions of 'good and evil' fully relative, i.e. fully > >dependend on 'social-political structure'. But that makes it im- > >possible to critisize an existing structure. > > I do not know the context, but would like to introduce a > distinction. 'Good and evil' being relative is not the same > as being fully dependent on the 'social-political structure'. I may be dumb, but not that dumb. The quoted text referrred to 'social-political structure' as the only (possibly by omition) source of values. > In a fully relative ethics, where good and evil are a matter > of individual taste, social-political structure can *still* > be criticized - not from the position of natural rights, > but from the position of personal convictions. > I do not know what to do with the phrase 'fully relative ethics'. Personal value of the day? It reminds me a student of mine who tried to convince me that I should weight tests more, and homeworks less than I promised in my syllabus. After the second test, he modified his proposal: first test should count more than the second. (Competitiveness, what a nice virtue!) It sounds like no ethics. > I am not arguing against general ethical principles - I think > them necessary. I don't think, however, they *precede* all par- > ticular moral judgements. They evolve from particular cases; the > system grows bottom-up as much as top-down. And they evolve in > *individuals*, by different, though somewhat convergent, paths. > > "Society" as a whole needn't enter into this at all. > Neither need supernatural entities. > Neither need a "natural order of things". > > Jan Wasilewsky I fully agree here with Jan. In mine point of view, general ethical principlea should change slowly, and should be beyond the scope of manipulations of a single individual. Indeed, the evolution described by Jan must be rather slow, and yet it inevitably occurs. Piotr Berman