(April 4, 2012 at 11:29 pm)ChadWooters Wrote: You have no foundation on which to build a high moral ground. Your argument is is not logically sound, because you are saying that evolutionary based empathy is a valid basis for morality. Consider the following:
1) Evolution is an amoral process.
2) Empathy is a by-product of evolution.
Thus:
3) Empathy is amoral.
To avoid conclusion 3, either premise 1 or 2 must be false. If premise 1 is false, then evolutionary results are moral, i.e. 'might makes right.' If premise 2 is false, then empathy comes from outside natural selection. If it exists at all, morality exists despite evolution, not because of it. To secure the 'high moral ground' you cannot appeal to some vague "moral sense" that itself has no inherently moral basis.
Actually, 3 is an invalid conclusion. Empathy may be a by-product of evolution - that does not mean it inherits all of evolution's characteristics.
