Thursday, December 04, 2008
Bill Vallicella on why Russell's Teapot leaks
This also might explain why the Flying Spaghetti Monster has so much trouble flying.
Hate is hate, period.
Hate is not moral disagreement. It is not hateful to oppose gay marriage, or to support it. But hate can crop up on all sides of the political and the religious spectrum.
This is a link to an account, on Thinking Christian, of an attack on a church by gay fanatics. But the problem isn't the church or the gays, it's the hate. Period.
This is a link to an account, on Thinking Christian, of an attack on a church by gay fanatics. But the problem isn't the church or the gays, it's the hate. Period.
Wednesday, December 03, 2008
Is morality relative to the society
This links to the text of the Dred Scott decision. It was accepted by large portions of our society. Was this a moral error, or is morality just subjective. I mean, who's to say what's really right or wrong.
Was Jesus Crucified
The Muslim position seems to be no. God wouldn't let something like that happen to a true prophet.
D'Souza debates Peter Singer
peter song, n. Related to the patter song (e.g., "Birds do it, bees do it, even educated fleas do it.") a popular ditty exhorting one to love all creatures great and small, except those born deformed. Hence peter singer, n. a singer of peter songs.
The Queerness of Morality and the Queerness of Logic
In response to some new replies on the Ethics Without Metaphysics post. The link tracks back to the original post.
RD said:
The argument you've given is very close Mackie's argument from queerness, posited in "Ethics: Inventing Right and Wrong." For Mackie, an error theorist, the argument purports to be a problem for all moral realists, whether they happen to be theists or atheists. Why is it a problem specifically for atheists?
Gordon Knight said:
The argument from queerness is a bad argument. By the same lights, mathematics and logical truth are "queer."
RD and Gordon: Yes, to my mind, a "matter-first, mind-later" ontological hierarchy is going to have trouble with the mathematics and logic, that's what is known as the argument from reason!
However, naturalism puts a restriction on what can be fundamental properties of objects in a naturalistic universe. Moral properties are not permitted. Mental properties are also not permitted. They have to be "system properties" that arise at a higher level of organization, when brains show up. However, while there is something incoherent about the idea of a piece of matter being intrinsically morally good, there is nothing about God being intrinsically morally good that is incoherent. So I think this is an asymmetrical problem that afflicts the naturalist but not the theist.
RD said:
The argument you've given is very close Mackie's argument from queerness, posited in "Ethics: Inventing Right and Wrong." For Mackie, an error theorist, the argument purports to be a problem for all moral realists, whether they happen to be theists or atheists. Why is it a problem specifically for atheists?
Gordon Knight said:
The argument from queerness is a bad argument. By the same lights, mathematics and logical truth are "queer."
RD and Gordon: Yes, to my mind, a "matter-first, mind-later" ontological hierarchy is going to have trouble with the mathematics and logic, that's what is known as the argument from reason!
However, naturalism puts a restriction on what can be fundamental properties of objects in a naturalistic universe. Moral properties are not permitted. Mental properties are also not permitted. They have to be "system properties" that arise at a higher level of organization, when brains show up. However, while there is something incoherent about the idea of a piece of matter being intrinsically morally good, there is nothing about God being intrinsically morally good that is incoherent. So I think this is an asymmetrical problem that afflicts the naturalist but not the theist.
Tuesday, December 02, 2008
Christianity and Wicca
I run into either Wiccans or Wicca dabblers rather often in my classes. This article says that Christians should pay more attention to Wicca.
More on Conservatism and Economic Luck
In response to Mike.
This isn't an argument exactly. It's more of a challenge. I am trying to raise some questions about the absolute sense of ownership that conservatives often appeal to when they oppose even modest redistributionism.
The graduated income tax is already a little bit redistributionist. Obama made a comment about "spreading the wealth around" but McCain did not come out for a flat tax, and along with Obama and the Bush administration signed the bailout package. So by the time McCain started using the "Joe the Plumber" anti-redistributionist argument, it seems to me he was being a tad hypocritical. But one can be a more consistent conservative than McCain is.
If you read what conservatives often say, the implication is that redistribution of any kind takes money from those who merit and and places it in the hands of those who don't. I am asking whether this is a bit of a naive picture, given all the effects of economic luck which result in my having more than the Smiths but less than the Joneses.
Conservatives have to either say:
1) There is no economic luck. (Not plausible).
2) The extent of economic luck is overrated. Differences in income reflect differences in desert to a much larger extent than liberals are willing to admit.
3) Economic luck is real, but the losses incurred when you use government to correct that economic luck are not worth it.
By the way Mike, I am glad someone finally tackled this.
This isn't an argument exactly. It's more of a challenge. I am trying to raise some questions about the absolute sense of ownership that conservatives often appeal to when they oppose even modest redistributionism.
The graduated income tax is already a little bit redistributionist. Obama made a comment about "spreading the wealth around" but McCain did not come out for a flat tax, and along with Obama and the Bush administration signed the bailout package. So by the time McCain started using the "Joe the Plumber" anti-redistributionist argument, it seems to me he was being a tad hypocritical. But one can be a more consistent conservative than McCain is.
If you read what conservatives often say, the implication is that redistribution of any kind takes money from those who merit and and places it in the hands of those who don't. I am asking whether this is a bit of a naive picture, given all the effects of economic luck which result in my having more than the Smiths but less than the Joneses.
Conservatives have to either say:
1) There is no economic luck. (Not plausible).
2) The extent of economic luck is overrated. Differences in income reflect differences in desert to a much larger extent than liberals are willing to admit.
3) Economic luck is real, but the losses incurred when you use government to correct that economic luck are not worth it.
By the way Mike, I am glad someone finally tackled this.
Monday, December 01, 2008
The Stanford Encyclopedia paper on Desert
But when it starts talking about "the ingredients of desert" I ask "what dessert are you making?"
Conservatism, Liberalism, and Economic Luck
In reading the responses of conservatives to what they consider to be the threat of socialism, there is the presupposition, which I have yet to see specifically defended, that what ends up in our pockets before taxation is genuinely distributed in accordance with merit. People who work with their brains earn more, and deserve more, than people who work with their hands. Therefore, deliberate use of the tax system and government welfare to "spread the wealth around" are bad, because they are in effect theft. The money was where it belonged in the first place, and those dirty socialists want to put it somewhere else that they think is fair.
This view has a tendency to deny, or downplay, the role economic luck plays in the distribution of wealth and income. I seem lucky to have been born in America than in the Congo, had I been born in the Congo, chances are I would be a good deal poorer than I am today.
John Rawls seems to think that the influence of economic luck is quite extensive.
"It seems to be one of the fixed points of our considered judgments that no one deserves his place in the distribution of native endowments, any more than one deserves one's initial starting place in society. The assertion that a man deserves the superior character that enables him to make the effort to cultivate his abilities is equally problematic; for his character depends in large part upon fortunate family and social circumstances for which he can claim no credit. The notion of desert seems not to apply to these cases" (Rawls, p. 104 A Theory of Justice).
I never see this issue of economic luck explicitly debated. Yet, what people think of ecomonic luck pushes a lot of people toward one of the other of the major parties.
This view has a tendency to deny, or downplay, the role economic luck plays in the distribution of wealth and income. I seem lucky to have been born in America than in the Congo, had I been born in the Congo, chances are I would be a good deal poorer than I am today.
John Rawls seems to think that the influence of economic luck is quite extensive.
"It seems to be one of the fixed points of our considered judgments that no one deserves his place in the distribution of native endowments, any more than one deserves one's initial starting place in society. The assertion that a man deserves the superior character that enables him to make the effort to cultivate his abilities is equally problematic; for his character depends in large part upon fortunate family and social circumstances for which he can claim no credit. The notion of desert seems not to apply to these cases" (Rawls, p. 104 A Theory of Justice).
I never see this issue of economic luck explicitly debated. Yet, what people think of ecomonic luck pushes a lot of people toward one of the other of the major parties.
Can the Pro-Life position be defended on secular grounds?
Tom Clark, of the Center for Naturalism, says no. Yet many of the pro-life arguments seem not to be especially religious.
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