(March 15, 2021 at 10:37 am)The Grand Nudger Wrote: Harsh, lol. Threads like these could help us to more clearly and accurately communicate our moral positions, and better understand other moral positions.
For example, we've learned that Seax doesn't actually believe that naturally advantageous things -are- the set of morally good things - rather the other way around. Goods things can be naturally advantageous. That this explains some portion of our moral development and positions on good which can be ascribed to the effect of selection.
However, assuming that morally good things can be naturally advantageous - and that societies and breeding populations will privilege and police the boundary of that advantage.... as they see it, we've multiplied the original problem, not resolved it. Now we have to contend with moral relativism and subjectivism, as well, at least descriptively.
The criteria of benefit, as employed in defense of volcanoes, may not help us here - as we can conceive of some benefit to any item of moral import deemed good or bad by any criteria (and just about everything not of moral import, too - we're endlessly creative at finding a use for things).
One killing benefits, another does not.... whether that's the individual, a breeding population, or society. Is there a moral difference between these two killings, and if so, what?
A broader version of the same question might be - suppose that one breeding population or society determined, accurately, that it would be beneficial to them to eradicate the other? If we contend that this would be bad in some sense that other breeding populations or societies would strike us down - then it seems to be the case that failing to eradicate the other society is the bad making property? If they rise up and beat you down that just goes to show that misdeeds are punished.....but if you secure the benefits and prevent any hope of reprisal, then a Very Good Deed has been accomplished. Carthago delenda est.
I just wrote up a great response, then clicked something wrong & lost it. 😭😭[url=https://emojipedia.org/loudly-crying-face/][/url] I'll try & rewrite it as best I can, but I'm rather crestfallen so this probably won't be as good a response as it ought to be. I'll just briefly restate the points I made in the original.
There is the natural order of nature, a natural morality, if you like, and then there is our human morality. I reject the so-called 'naturalistic fallacy' argument because our morality is an evolved trait, a product of what is. Our morality is subordinate to, and a product of nature. It serves a natural purpose. When I say that volcanos are not immoral I mean that they serve a natural purpose, and that is is foolish to try and apply human morality to the nonhuman. This also means that we cannot necessarily apply things that might serve nature's end on the grand scale within a smaller microcosm; like survival of the fittest. Darwinian struggle is a natural and good thing, because it serves nature's purpose; God's purpose. But trying to apply it to human society by eliminating all safety & labour regulations destroying all social safety nets so only the strong survive would be a mistake, as humans are a social species that maximises fitness through coöperation and social cohesion. It would be pathological, maladaptive, immoral and would not serve nature's purpose.
