(June 6, 2013 at 9:46 am)ideologue08 Wrote: Alright, apologies, I think I'm conflating the two. So, in your opinion, a gun to the head scenario people should always choose life. But in a fighting to the death situation, such as defending your beliefs/family/property/country etc. surely you can't think that's not worthwhile?
I think that there's a practical side to it that can make it worthwhile. I also think that most such choices are driven by emotion, which isn't always rational. In that case, what is worthwhile is entirely up to the individual.
The person who gives up his life in order to do something that saves many other lives would consider it a worthwhile sacrifice, and it's difficult to argue otherwise. The person who does so for an ideal may feel the same way, but whether we agree depends on what he did and what the ideal was. The soldiers on opposite sides of a battle may believe strongly in their cause and be ready to die for their country, but without context we would hesitate to claim that they both fight (and possibly die) for something worthwhile.
"Well, evolution is a theory. It is also a fact. And facts and theories are different things, not rungs in a hierarchy of increasing certainty. Facts are the world's data. Theories are structures of ideas that explain and interpret facts. Facts don't go away when scientists debate rival theories to explain them. Einstein's theory of gravitation replaced Newton's in this century, but apples didn't suspend themselves in midair, pending the outcome. And humans evolved from ape- like ancestors whether they did so by Darwin's proposed mechanism or by some other yet to be discovered."
-Stephen Jay Gould
-Stephen Jay Gould