General Mung Beans wrote:There are certain moral beliefs that virtually everyone regardless of religion supports. For instance virtually all people in the world (other than the mentally deranged) would agree that the intentional killing of a person without provocation is wrong.
Not at all. Plenty of people have no problem with killing people because they are the "wrong" religion, gay, wrong skin color, a "witch", had sex with the wrong person, because they are ordered to do so, or just because they have something the killers want.
They are mostly people in areas that are dominated by a fanaticism for a certain ideology (ie Christianity, Islam, communism etc.) or by people who are extremely selfish. But most people on the forum would, I suspect agree with the statement.
Even if that's true, so what? The forum is only a tiny, tiny slice of humanity; just because most members happen to agree on a moral issue doesn't make that opinion anywhere near "universal".
General Mung Beans wrote:
Kanastrous wrote:Not to mention societies like some that you can find in the Amazon and New Guineau and Africa in which killing other people without anything that you or I would recognize as 'provocation' is either morally neutral, or even positive. Those people are 'people' just as much as you or I. So your 'universal morality' obviously isn't.
There are such people but they are not exactly civilized-they have retained caveman morality while the rest of the world has moved forward.
As said, "universal" by definition includes everyone, "caveman morality" or not. I'm certainly willing to say that our system of morality is better; but "better" isn't "universal".
"There are two novels that can change a bookish fourteen-year old's life: The Lord of the Rings and Atlas Shrugged. One is a childish fantasy that often engenders a lifelong obsession with its unbelievable heroes, leading to an emotionally stunted, socially crippled adulthood, unable to deal with the real world. The other, of course, involves orcs." - John Rogers
Lord of the Abyss wrote:
As said, "universal" by definition includes everyone, "caveman morality" or not. I'm certainly willing to say that our system of morality is better; but "better" isn't "universal".
So if your sense of "morals" is just better compared to say that in Papua New Guinea would you consider for instance that unprovoked murder is not necessrily always evil?
El Moose Monstero: That would be the winning song at Eurovision. I still say the Moldovans were more fun. And that one about the Apricot Tree.
That said...it is growing on me.
Thanas: It is one of those songs that kinda get stuck in your head so if you hear it several times, you actually grow to like it.
General Zod: It's the musical version of Stockholm syndrome.
Lord of the Abyss wrote:
As said, "universal" by definition includes everyone, "caveman morality" or not. I'm certainly willing to say that our system of morality is better; but "better" isn't "universal".
So if your sense of "morals" is just better compared to say that in Papua New Guinea would you consider for instance that unprovoked murder is not necessrily always evil?
Not always. If I for example have to murder one person to save a thousand...
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Lord of the Abyss wrote:
As said, "universal" by definition includes everyone, "caveman morality" or not. I'm certainly willing to say that our system of morality is better; but "better" isn't "universal".
So if your sense of "morals" is just better compared to say that in Papua New Guinea would you consider for instance that unprovoked murder is not necessrily always evil?
Not always. If I for example have to murder one person to save a thousand...
Of course, you could claim that the thousand potential deaths counts as provocation, but such is the nature of utilitarianism. It cuts away at the linguistic baggage associated with morality and replaces vague or abstract concepts with units and values you can actually use and apply in a practical manner.
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It cuts away at the linguistic baggage associated with morality and replaces vague or abstract concepts with units and values you can actually use and apply in a practical manner.