Empathy, Compassion, and Consequences
I think that being compassionate and feeling empathy is a good thing.
Empathy, the ability to put yourself in another’s shoes, is what makes human society function well.
Usually, when someone commits a crime, or breaks the unwritten rules of society there are consequences, or more normally potential consequences. Sometimes those consequences can have a domino effect.
For example in the UK, minor crimes are often tried in a magistrate’s court. The maximum prison sentence that can be given is 6 months. In the great scheme of things, 6 months is not that long - it’s not long enough for a rehabilitation programme or anything - but it is long enough to potentially lose your home, your job, your partner and your children.
Lots of people are (as they should be) compassionate where they thing the initial consequences do not fit the crime. I think it’s also a good thing to be compassionate, and have empathy, when you do think that the initial consequences fit the crime. After all, the person involved may have taken on the risk of the subsequent consequences, but that still doesn’t mean that they are fair.
Leaving aside fairness of punishment though, I think it’s good to have empathy, even where the punishment does fit the crime. Not sympathy. Not wishing that you could help them avoid the consequences. Empathy. Being able to put yourself in their position as far as you can, and still treating them like the human that they are.
What’s your take?
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41 Responses to “Empathy, Compassion, and Consequences”
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My take is that empathy and compassion are overrated. They are frequently correlated with morality and serve as useful approximations most of the time, but ultimately correct reasoning will lead you astray less often. (Thus the origin of expressions like “you sometimes have to be cruel to be kind.” Sometimes you do.) I’m not knocking empathy, which is a fine thing, but I’ll take a wise and virtuous person over an empathetic one.
To give a quick example, modern culture of late seems to have all sorts of empathy for adulterers. In the end, this has to mean having no empathy at all for the betrayed spouse. I cannot agree with this. Any friend of mine knows that if he cheats on his wife, he’d better not let me find out about it because I’m going to call him a scoundrel. My empathy is for his victim (victims if he has kids), not for him.
My sympathy is for the victim. My empathy is for everyone.
I think my point is that being able to put yourself in someone else’s shoes is good. Maybe that means that you wouldn’t change anything, and they have no excuse. Fine. They are still a person, just like you.
Empathy is most helpful when trying to work out what to do about the root causes of problems, rather than the immediate consequences that should be applied.
I don’t think empathy can be overrated. I think it’s the most important aspect of morality, because without it everything is relative. Correct reasoning will obviously lead you to different moral assumptions depending on your assumptions.
I think the disctinction between sympathy (which is more like compassion) and empathy is important. Sympathy is feeling sorry for others, empathy is feeling what others feel. It’s sharing in people’s suffering and their joys.
I would take an empathetic person over a wise and supposedly virtuous one. I think morality is basically about whose side you are on. I don’t believe in a procedural or legalistic morality.
Empathy doesn’t mean you take anyone and everyone’s side, it means you are in a better position to understand the outcome of actions because you know better what the human effect of them is. Empathy should mean that in a case where someone has committed adultery, you understand why - and certainly if it’s for selfish gratification, you take the betrayed spouse’s side because you know. How do you know this? Because you have empathy with both people and you know that the pain you feel because of the betrayal outweighs any limited sense of pleasure you get from the instant gratification. Now no-one is completely empathetic and so reason has a clear role to play, but our ability to “objectively” reason is limited too and I think empathy is a more reliable connector between people (by definition it is a connector, whereas everyone reasons in a slightly different way because words have slightly different associations for every person).
For Christians, empathy is what God displayed by becoming human and by dying on the cross. Empathy is what Christian love means (or should mean!)
sorry, missed out part of a sentence - should say something along the lines of “because you know intuitively that hers is the right side to take” in the penultimate paragraph
Actually, our two views probably touch on more points than you might think. The assumptions that I begin with are what I call moral intuitions. These intuitions, while not infallible, are so forceful and immediately plausible, that I begin with those as my premises. To give you a rather banal and completely uncontroversial one, “you should not torture little children just for your own sadistic pleasure.”
You could argue that these intuitions arise out of empathy. I am not inclined to this view, but if I were, then I would agree with you that empathy is the most important aspect of morality. Certainly, I believe these intuitions are the cornerstone of morality and all moral reasoning begins with them.
However, it is not clear to me whether your morality is compatible with mine on all counts. You say, “it means you are in a better position to understand the outcome of actions because you know better what the human effect of them is.” This seems to suggest a consequentialist morality whereas my morality is deontological. For example, I do not believe there is any excuse for adultery. Not even a single one. (I restrict myself here to those cases of adultery where it is a betrayal and the breaking of a promise. I have a live-and-let-live attitude to people in open marriages. Whatever floats your boat.) Even if your marriage is irretrievably broken, I do not see any good reason why you can’t keep your promise, restrain your libido, and wait until you have secured a divorce. All acts of adultery are for selfish gratification. There might be some cases of extraordinarily exceptional circumstances, like abandonment or disappearance of a spouse where divorce might take years to legally secure because your spouse can’t be located. A consequentialist morality may be able to find more exceptions to this.
I also think empathy can lead you to make disastrously wrong choices. E.g. you have a friend and you know her husband is running around on her. With empathy and thinking to yourself that what she doesn’t know can’t hurt her, you stay silent. But it can hurt her and it is hurting her. Her marriage has serious problems and she can’t even address them because she doesn’t know about them. Part of the reason she doesn’t know about them is because you won’t tell her “for her own good.” Now, I’m not saying that all empathetic people will act like this. Many of them won’t, but some of them will.
I think morality is basically about whose side you are on. I don’t believe in a procedural or legalistic morality.
I would like to comment on this, since it does seem like a serious difference, but I honestly have no idea what you’re saying here.
You are right that my morality is a consequentialist one.
By “about whose side you are on” I mean that my morality is better characterised as about who you act to benefit, about who you are in solidarity with (eg in your example, do you support the adulterer or the betrayed spouse) than it is about following a set of procedural rules about how you act (don’t do this, do do that).
Btw, I think you are right that my viewpoint will probably make more exceptions for adultery than yours. But I think an empathy-grounded view will in some cases (ie where the adulterous behaviour is causing a great degree of suffering) take it even more seriously than your view.
It’s also worth noting that in a world where there is a lot wrong and no one person can possibly fix it all, empathy assists a moral person in deciding what course of action to take to make the greatest possible difference. Of course reason is important too, but it would be difficult to make choices about the relative importance of different causes without empathy. So it is a great prioritiser.
I am skeptical of consequentialist moral theories. To quote W.D. Ross:
“[Utilitarianism] seems to simplify unduly our relations to our fellows. It says, in effect, that the only morally significant relation in which my neighbours stand to me is that of being possible beneficiaries by my action. They do stand in this relation to me, and this relation is morally significant. But they may also stand to me in the relation of promisee to promiser, of creditor to debtor, of wife to husband, of child to parent, of friend to friend, of fellow countryman to fellow countryman, and the like; and each of these relations is the foundation of a prima facie duty, which is more or less incumbent on me according to the circumstances of the case. When I am in a situation, as perhaps I always am, in which more than one of these prima facie duties is incumbent on me, what I have to do is to study the situation as fully as I can until I form the considered opinion (it is never more) that in the circumstances one of them is more incumbent than any other; then I am bound to think that to do this prima facie duty is my duty sans phrase in the situation.”
I cannot take seriously a moral philosophy which claims that I have an identical duty to, say, you as I have to my wife. I believe virtually any consequentialist philosophy will be aiming toward an end in which you and my wife are both equally happy. Now I do not object to this end; I have no doubts that it is laudable and a fine thing. But I do object to a morality which claims that I have an equal duty to make you happy as I have to make my wife happy (or, for that matter, myself happy).
I do believe that I have a duty of beneficience, as your empathy insists. But I also believe I have duties of fidelity (to promises I have made), reparation (to atone for wrongs I have committed), gratitude (to repay good deeds done to me), and non-maleficience (to do no harm). All of these duties are more compelling than beneficience.
Now, you seem perhaps to believe something similar - thus, your rather confusing comment about “whose side you’re on.” If by this, you mean that I should benefit first those people who have benefited me or to whom I have made promises, etc., then I agree. However, it’s not clear to me how empathy has anything to do with this.
I absolutely believe that morality can be summed up in procedural rules (my moral intuitions), though I do not believe there is any algorithm that can be invented to decide issues when two rules conflict (which they do all the time). This is a matter of moral judgment, of wisdom if you like, and I know of no shortcut than experience and reflection. A consequentialist also believes in rules, but they believe in one rule which trumps all others (for the utilitarians, it is the greatest good for the greatest number, but others have been proposed).
To sum up on empathy, I am not saying that empathy should be ignored. With all emotions, we should pay careful attention to what they are trying to tell us. There is often wisdom in emotions. If you’re feeling badly, it is very likely that you’re doing something wrong. But I think it is just as much a mistake to allow yourself to be ruled by empathy as it is to allow yourself to be ruled by any other emotion. I believe our emotions must be subordinated to our reason.
Not all consequentialists are necessarily utilitarians. I wouldn’t describe myself that way. I would be happy to self-define as a communitarian, however.
And yes, because of the position I occupy in society (eg as father/mother/brother/sister/friend/employer etc) I have particular responsibilities to discharge. It is sensible for us to utilise the sense of paternal responsibility most fathers have towards their children to benefit those children, although we need to put in safeguards to make sure some children are not benefited much more than others, or at least reduce the prevalence of it..
Empathy does not preclude realistic judgements about what it is possible for me to do. It does not insist I benefit everyone in the world equally, but it does inspire me to try and make sure the aggregate of human actions benefit everyone in the world equally.
The idea of subordinating emotions to reason suggests that reason is somehow objective. I believe that ultimately reason (within certain boundaries, eg those established by the language we think in) is just a means of justifying our own self-interest, often unconsciously. Empathy is the only way to break out of that.
Also, I think your idea of duty is weaker than empathy. Empathy makes us feel what others feel and thus identify our own self-interest with theirs. That is more likely to make us act than a sense that we “should” do something, except where that should is incredibly rigidly enforced by societal expectations.
I certainly agree that not all consequentialists are utilitarians. I mentioned it simply because it is a popular consequentialist philosophy. I would be happy to entertain another if you tell me what the final goal is supposed to be. (Your statement that “it does not insist I benefit everyone in the world equally, but it does inspire me to try and make sure the aggregate of human actions benefit everyone in the world equally” seems to be some form of rule-utilitarianism, which is a deontological ethical system derived from a consequentialist one.)
Reason is indeed objective. It is a popular belief that rationality is equivalent to rational self-interest. This is not the case. I.e. some people will ask me what I do when reason and morality conflict. My answer is that they never do conflict. If you tell me “X is the moral thing to do, but not-X is the rational thing to do,” I will respond that the definition of “the moral thing to do” is what I ought to do. It is irrational to suggest that I ought to do instead what I ought not to do. So reason and morality are always in perfect harmony. The equation of rationality and self-interest is false.
Again, empathy is not the only way to break out of it, or even the primary way. Moral intuitions are. One of those moral intuitions is that I do indeed have a duty of self-improvement.
I do agree that my definition of duty is probably weaker than empathy. In my view, there are an awful lot of choices that we make every day that have no moral content (for example, my decision to read this blog). I think a determined consequentialist believes there is moral content in virtually every action. Every morally neutral act that I perform means a morally virtuous act that I did not perform, and therefore I acted wrongly. My view of morality is one that I believe is appropriate to humans, rather than gods or angels.
Yes, I certainly believe there is moral content in every action, and not just because every morally “neutral” act means a morally virtuous act that I did not perform, but because we are all far more connected that most liberal moral theories recognise.
I’m not arguing that “rationality is equivalent to rational self-interest” but that when we reason we do so using means and from assumptions that will defend our own self-interest, whether we realise it or not. “It is irrational to suggest that I ought to do instead what I ought not to do” it caricatures my position, because in fact what I want to say is that “I ought to do instead what might not be in my own self-interest”, or even more accurately, “I ought to put myself in a position where my own self-interest is more closely tied to the self-interest of another, so that I naturally act to further the self-interest of the other, when if I had not put myself in that position I might simply act to further my own separate self-interest”. (This is what comes of being a consequentialist and a determinist!)
Similarly since I believe moral intuitions are conditioned by the society we live in and reflect a combination of our own self-interest and the maintenance of the status quo, I am likely to be sceptical of them.
As to whether my view of morality is more appropriate to humans or gods, well perhaps in one sense it is more appropriate to gods. It is one we certainly fail in all the time. But unless I blame myself all the time for failing in it, what is the problem? If the pass rate in an exam is 40 and I score 41, have I done better than if the exam was the same, the pass mark was 70 and I scored 48?
“I ought to put myself in a position where my own self-interest is more closely tied to the self-interest of another, so that I naturally act to further the self-interest of the other, when if I had not put myself in that position I might simply act to further my own separate self-interest”
Just to clarify, my argument still holds. You are claiming that the above is the moral thing. If that’s true, you cannot argue that it is rational to do something else instead, because you would then be arguing that it was rational to do what you ought not to do.
Similarly since I believe moral intuitions are conditioned by the society we live in and reflect a combination of our own self-interest and the maintenance of the status quo, I am likely to be sceptical of them.
This is a curious argument in our context. I doubt I accept a single moral intuition which you wouldn’t also accept. Your own morality is quite clearly much more complex and more strenuous than mine. This doesn’t prove who’s right one way or the other, but it does seem odd that you appear to be arguing that my morality is more credulous. Most of your above argument is for moral intuitions which I do not find obvious.
btw, sorry plonkee to take over a second thread in a discussion with Andrew Stevens!
“Just to clarify, my argument still holds. You are claiming that the above is the moral thing. If that’s true, you cannot argue that it is rational to do something else instead, because you would then be arguing that it was rational to do what you ought not to do.”
Except that if you do not put yourself in a position where your self-interest is inextricably bound up with the self-interest of those you “should” be benefiting, but allow yourself to get into a position where your self-interest is diametrically opposed to those others, it is rational for you to do what you ought not to do.
So, for example, if you occupy a position of management where your prospects of future promotion rest on carrying out a redundancy programme (for the sake of argument, in a company whose profits were healthy, so it cannot be said the redundancy programme would secure the jobs of others), it would be rational to do what you ought not to do. But if instead you had refused the management position and become a union rep for your workplace instead, you would not have got into this position and it would be in your self-interest to act to protect the jobs which were under threat. So in the former case it would be rational to do what you ought not to do, but in the latter case rationality and what you ought to do necessarily coincide.
Of course, you might disagree with my example depending on your politics, but you can at least see my reasoning!
I do see your reasoning. Let’s break it down and see why this disagreement is persisting.
In your example, you have a gentleman whose self-interest requires him to do things that we, for the sake of argument, will agree are immoral. You are saying that it is rational for him to do these immoral things. And if all he cares about is his own self-interest, then I agree. It is instrumentally rational for him to pursue this immoral course. But is it rational for him to only care about his own self-interest? The answer to that, I believe, is quite clearly no. And so the gentleman (if we can call him that) is not in fact acting rationally, though he is pursuing his irrational goals with a perfectly rational strategy.
We could also say that if you want your face to be permanently blue, then it is rational to have a tattoo artist ink your face entirely in blue. In your sense, the person who is doing this is acting completely rationally. While agreeing that his course is a rational one given his goal, I question the rationality of his goal.
Perhaps I’m just more cynical than you!
I do think it’s rational for him to only care about his own self-interest. There will be an extent to which he cares about things not obviously in his own self-interest, but this will be the result of two things:
1) socially inherited standards which have arisen either from historical accident, the need for particular social groups to maintain the status quo to preserve their self-interest, or which further nearly everyone’s self-interest (albeit some people’s more than others, eg measures which limit lawlessness such respect for police uniforms)
and yes, you guessed it…
2) empathy!
I appreciate you continuing to discuss. I like hearing both your opinions as it clarifies my own thoughts. I wonder the extent to which rationality is reasonable, in relation to this. In unrigourous conversation, you might say that someone has acted irrationally based in empathy - is it really irrational or just against their own self-interest? Does empathy (in practice, for some) trump rationality?
Ah, but Tim, I disagree with your theory. I believe we have rational intuitions about moral reality which are correct guides, more important than self-interest. And, if these intuitions are not true, then it probably doesn’t make sense to talk about self-interest being rational either. To put it simply: if morality is true, then morality and reason can never conflict because it would never be reasonable to do an immoral thing (what you ought not to do). And if morality is not true, then morality and reason can never conflict (since there’s no such thing as morality). Morality and self-interest can conflict, reason and self-interest can conflict, but morality and reason never can.
I believe that your system is one in which morality is probably condemned to be relativistic. I.e. morality doesn’t appear to really exist in your system. Both of the options you gave are mind-dependent moralities. All such systems are subject to the Euthyphro dilemma. I.e. they cannot escape arbitrariness.
Plonkee, I believe acting on empathy would only be rational if it meant adhering to actual morality. I believe empathy probably is a good rough guide to morality, but I think it’s dangerous to use it as a substitute for moral reasoning.
Yes, you can argue that morality doesn’t really exist in my system, only the language of morality.
Under your system, how do you account for people whose intuitions about morality are clearly wrong? (People who are convinced they are doing the right thing, and as a result do terrible things - perhaps an SS officer who truly believed the holocaust was right, etc) Are they just wired wrong? Are they exceptions which prove the rule?
Most of the examples I commonly hear are not errors of moral intuition, but errors of moral reasoning. E.g. Hitler had no moral intuitions about Jews. His reasoning was based on empirical evidence which (he believed) demonstrated that Jews were evil.
Nevertheless, I concede that intuitions (moral or otherwise) are not infallible. E.g. many people seem to have the intuition that “all causes are local; there is no ‘action at a distance.’” (Einstein’s main objection to quantum mechanics was the “spooky action at a distance.”) This intuition appears to be false since I know of no local theory which actually satisfies quantum mechanics - there must be action at a distance.
My philosophy states that we have certain moral intuitions which appear to us to be true. These intuitions are very basic, very banal, and I’ve never heard of a society or even a person (barring psychopaths) who doesn’t agree with them. (Psychopaths, by the way, are a curious case. My theory is that their moral intuition is “broken.” They do understand societal standards, relative morality, if you will, but they do not intuit moral values themselves and thus do not feel the force of morality. I would liken them to people born with a disability, like being born blind.)
My theory about these intuitions is that they are defeasible by a sufficiently certain argument, but that they are prima facie justified. I.e. because many of them seem to us to be as certain as just about anything is, it is rational to accept that they are true. I have an intuition that it is wrong to torture little children just for your own sadistic pleasure. This intuition is so forceful that it’s hard to imagine any argument you try to make against it succeeding. Every argument I have heard relies on accepting premises which seem less certain to me than that intuition is. (I am always interested in such arguments, however, since I want to know the premises so I know which one to reject. I have learned a great deal from such arguments in the past.)
I do grant that, on occasion, you might be able to find someone (such as a psychopath) who does not share a particular moral intuition. It seems odd to me that this should be seen as a fatal objection. I’m sure there exists at least one person who cannot see and refuses to accept that multiplication is commutative. Nevertheless, multiplication is commutative.
Your ideas seem to preclude the possibility that people are motivated by power and greed and that if people pursue these things it’s because they are derived (either by correct or mistaken reason) to do so? Is that fair? It seems unlikely to me. It seems more likely that people co-opt mistaken morality to justify power and wealth than they want power and wealth simply because they’ve got their sums wrong about the good it will do.
Although in thinking through your ideas I already realise I’m tainting them with my own consequentialism - I suppose you might argue that there is nothing wrong with having wealthy and power providing you have not gone against other moral intuitions to get them and you do not break any in your use of them (however impossible I might think that). Forgive me if I’m putting words in your mouth here; just trying to think how you might perceive it.
At any rate I’m interested in where you think these moral intuitions come from. If they’re not sociological, are they biological? Do we share them with animals?
I think the reason that most of us tend to be strongly opposed to torturing children for sadistic pleasure is down to a combination of empathy and societal pressure (we don’t want our own kids to be tortured for sadistic pleasure, we don’t see any value in it either, so we’ve created a strong taboo against it).
It’s also worth noticing that relatively few people get sadistic pleasure from torturing anything (unless torturing arguments counts :p ). That doesn’t have to be because we have a strong moral intuition against it; it could just be because torturing isn’t particularly pleasurable. Adultery is a more interesting example because on some level it might be pleasurable.
Finally, would you put psychopaths in an entirely different category to other human beings or are they the extreme end of the scale (eg probably some moral intuitions are broken in all of us, but in the case of psychopaths it’s the most extreme intuitions that are broken).
Your ideas seem to preclude the possibility that people are motivated by power and greed and that if people pursue these things it’s because they are derived (either by correct or mistaken reason) to do so? Is that fair? It seems unlikely to me. It seems more likely that people co-opt mistaken morality to justify power and wealth than they want power and wealth simply because they’ve got their sums wrong about the good it will do.
It was certainly not my intent to preclude the possibility that people can be motivated by power or greed. Reading again my above comment, though, I certainly see how you got that impression. (I did not wish to argue, by the way, that Hitler merely reasoned badly about Jews. I am saying that the justifications he gave were bad moral reasoning. I do not deny the strong possibility that he had other reasons for his actions, possibly including simple irrational hatred, desire for power, and desire for a convenient scapegoat. If he truly believed the things he said, then he was a bad moral reasoner. If they were merely a conscious or unconscious rationalization for his actions, then there were other things going on.)
People ought to be motivated only by doing the right thing (or at least by refraining from doing the wrong thing); by no means does this mean that this is the only thing which motivates people. While certainly some people do evil because “they got their sums wrong” and think they are doing good (”they can do the worst of things without being the worst of men”), a great many people do evil knowing full well that it is evil and just not caring that much. Just because we have moral intuitions, it certainly does not mean that we are compelled to obey them. Nor must we obey our own moral reasoning.
Although in thinking through your ideas I already realise I’m tainting them with my own consequentialism - I suppose you might argue that there is nothing wrong with having wealthy and power providing you have not gone against other moral intuitions to get them and you do not break any in your use of them (however impossible I might think that). Forgive me if I’m putting words in your mouth here; just trying to think how you might perceive it.
I do, in fact, agree with the position you adumbrated. I do not believe wealth and power are bad things in themselves. (Indeed, I want the world to have a lot more wealth than it currently does and I’m not convinced that an anarchy would be the best of all possible worlds, so some people must have at least some power, no matter how circumscribed.) I don’t believe that a blanket condemnation of wealth and power is formed by any intuition. It is derived by a chain of reasoning which may very well be correct, but if it is, this has never been made sufficiently clear to me for me to agree with it.
At any rate I’m interested in where you think these moral intuitions come from. If they’re not sociological, are they biological? Do we share them with animals?
This is a very good question and I’m afraid I don’t have a very good answer for you. The simplest explanation, to me, is moral realism. Moral values actually exist and inhere in states of affairs. In our modern dogmatically materialist age (and I’m saying that as an atheist), such a thing sounds absurd, but I nevertheless believe it is the most likely solution (and I do not rule out the possibility of their materiality). However, I also do not wish to dismiss out of hand the theory that they are biological in origin. This presents serious philosophical dilemmas though, since if that’s true, morality is just relative and arbitrary after all. I do think some animals might have a rudimentary moral sense, but I am certainly not convinced of that.
I think the reason that most of us tend to be strongly opposed to torturing children for sadistic pleasure is down to a combination of empathy and societal pressure (we don’t want our own kids to be tortured for sadistic pleasure, we don’t see any value in it either, so we’ve created a strong taboo against it).
It’s also worth noticing that relatively few people get sadistic pleasure from torturing anything (unless torturing arguments counts :p ). That doesn’t have to be because we have a strong moral intuition against it; it could just be because torturing isn’t particularly pleasurable. Adultery is a more interesting example because on some level it might be pleasurable.
I’m not at all convinced that you’re factually correct on this. I will point to the popularity, in previous ages, of various rather sadistic activities - gladiatorial games, public executions, even modern-day boxing might qualify. I don’t think humans are particularly bloodthirsty, but I don’t think it’s as uncommon as you seem to think it is. Few people in our modern age indulge this appetite because, as you say, it is very socially unacceptable. But that unacceptability is not universal. (However, as far as I know, all societies have condemned torturing little children for sadistic pleasure. This comes with the usual caveat. Not all societies have recognized members of other nations or tribes as being people at all. The major advance in morality over the ages has been the expansion of the “in-group” to which we grant rights. Our modern sensibility is that all people should be classified as people and not just members of our own nation, tribe, race, or religion, but this was not always so. For example, the Aztecs didn’t sacrifice other Aztecs, as a general rule. They sacrificed their enemies.)
I object to the sociological explanation because it’s quite clear that we can distinguish between those things our society countenances with no particular moral content (let’s call them manners) and actual moral values. (The so-called moral/conventional distinction.) E.g. even a five year-old can tell the difference between those things which the teacher can make okay by saying it’s okay (talking during naptime) and things which the teacher cannot make okay (pushing another child down and stealing his lunch money).
All right, you can counter, this shows that empathy trumps all. We say that it is rude, but not evil, to belch during dinner because it does no harm to anyone if you do belch during dinner. And empathy is the basis of morality. This also doesn’t seem right to me. We have at least some values - honesty, for example - which don’t seem to have much to do with empathy. We believe people should be honest, not just about things which may hurt other people if you lie about them (fraud), but also about relatively unserious things (false boasting, for example, claiming you did something you never actually did). Because the latter is not tied to empathy, we may not have a powerful emotional reaction to that kind of liar like we do to a conman, but I think very few people say that the latter is perfectly acceptable. Empathy seems to suggest we should go the other way on that. (If it makes him feel better to claim he did things he never did, and nobody’s getting harmed by it, why should we care? Indeed, he may be performing a highly moral act, boosting his own self-esteem without deflating anyone else.)
Finally, would you put psychopaths in an entirely different category to other human beings or are they the extreme end of the scale (eg probably some moral intuitions are broken in all of us, but in the case of psychopaths it’s the most extreme intuitions that are broken).
I think it’s pretty much an all-or-nothing deal. There aren’t many basic moral intuitions, probably no more than a few hundred, and they seem to be almost completely universal. Most moral disagreements aren’t disagreements about morals, but factual disagreements. E.g. here is a simple argument against abortion. 1) It is wrong to kill an innocent human being, 2) A fetus is an innocent human being, therefore 3) Abortion is wrong. The pro-abortion argument is usually a straightforward denial of premise 2, the factual premise. Only very rarely do I hear anyone deny premise 1, which is the moral premise. (They tend to do so on consequentialist grounds. It’s okay to kill an innocent human being if it leads to a higher good.) Similarly, we all agree that it’s not okay to slaughter and eat Grandma. Only the Hindus think Grandma may now be a cow and therefore forbid the slaughter and eating of cows. Purely a factual disagreement.
The psychopath seems to be missing all moral intuitions, not just some of them. Psychopaths, it is said, don’t understand morality at all. They understand manners. They understand that society disapproves of particular actions. They just don’t understand those actions which are not just wrong by convention, but wrong by nature. (Perhaps I should say that they do understand that people consider them wrong, but they don’t understand what the word “wrong” means because they lack the intuition.)
Having said all that, I do not wish to rule out the case that some people have better moral intuitions than others. I suppose that might be true, though I’d have no idea how to go about demonstrating such a thing. It is certainly a fact that some people are better moral reasoners than others. They are better, to use your phrase, at “doing their sums.” Some people have more moral courage than others and are more inclined to do the moral thing rather than taking the easy way out. And some people have better moral discipline than others and can keep their competing appetites (for money, power, or what-have-you) under better control.
Fascinating.
Obviously I don’t accept the difference between manners and moral intuitions, or much else of this, but it’s not because it’s not consistent within itself, just because it seems less plausible than the way of thinking about morality I’ve suggested (and I imagine you feel exactly the same way about my thinking!)
As a very materialist (and aggressively secularist) Christian I am absolutely intrigued by your notion that moral values exist in themselves - it’s a completely foreign and impossible idea for me, but very interesting. It seems to me an act of faith on the same level as faith in a God, and seems to relegate the difference between atheism and theism to a personal preference based on what seems more likely - an intuition, if you will. I’m not sure whether I agree or disagree with that, but most atheists I know would disagree vehemently with it.
(btw, I don’t have a problem with power and wealth in themselves, it’s the distribution of them that matters to me. I have a problem with hierarchical systems where power relationships between people are unequal, including capitalism)
I wouldn’t call it an act of faith. It is inference to best explanation. Obviously, not everybody agrees that this is the correct inference, though it’s not as unusual as you might think (in philosophical circles anyway). The view is known as “common sense moral intuitionism,” and it was promoted by G.E. Moore, W.D. Ross, and H.A. Prichard. In modern times it’s defended by Robert Audi and others. Most of these philosophers were atheists, though I believe Audi is a Christian.
I submit that the theory that moral propositions are actually true or false is no more (nor less) strange and mysterious than the theory that mathematical propositions are actually true or false. In modern culture, the former is usually rejected and the latter uncritically accepted. I know of no good reason for this divide.
I don’t necessarily argue that a non-realist view of morality is implausible, so much as it makes debate rather pointless. If there’s no good reason to believe the moral proposition “you ought to believe only what is true,” then I can believe anything I like, no matter how preposterous or false and who’s to gainsay me? Thus, I submit, it’s perfectly rational to believe in moral realism regardless. Because it’s true, if it is true; and because it makes no sense to talk about what one ought or ought not to believe, if it’s false.
As for materialism, it is a necessary and proper assumption of science. We assume that all things are material and amenable to scientific study. This is quite correct and I have no wish to disturb this assumption. It would be quite improper to throw our hands up and say, “It must be due to immaterial causes which I cannot study” just because we are stymied. But it’s just an assumption; it is not a discovery of science. In fact, the doctrine of materialism isn’t even scientific. I know of no experiment which could conceivably prove it or refute it.
Andrew, deontologist Immanuel Kant argued that it is always wrong to lie, even if a murderer is asking for the location of a potential victim. What’s your take on that? Are you a moral absolutist in that some actions are wrong no matter the consequences? Ross said the consequences of an action sometimes make doing the “immoral” thing “right”. Perhaps there’s “moral intuitions” conflicting each other here: lying is wrong versus killing (through assisting a murderer) is wrong? Perhaps moral intuitions and empathy (for the potential victim in this example) complement eachother rather than being opposites perse.
I’m also curious about your thoughts on the following case with regards to your abortion example. Let’s assume we both agree on the “factual premise” that the unborn child is an innocent human being, and that it’s immoral to kill an innocent human being. Then what if not aborting would kill the mother due to problems with the pregnancy? Interestingly, both moral reasoning and empathy seem to fall a bit here.
“seem to fall a bit short” was what I meant to say in the last sentence.
Marc, these are good questions. It seems to me that Kant is clearly wrong here, if indeed he actually said that. (Did he say that?) The duty to prevent a murder is clearly a stronger intuition than the duty not to lie. I don’t think either intuition has much to do with empathy.
As for abortion to save the life of the mother, I think you’ll find that there’s almost never a conflict here. If the mother’s life is in danger, the fetus is almost certainly doomed. It cannot live in any event. This is a clear-cut exception if indeed abortion is wrong (which, by the way, I have taken no position on in this thread - I have merely outlined the argument). Interestingly, the usual other exceptions that pro-life people will give (rape and incest) are not nearly so clear-cut.
Andrew, Kant indeed said that: “Truthfulness in statements that one cannot avoid is a human being’s duty to everyone, however great the disadvantage to him or to another that may result from it… If I falsify… I… do wrong in the most essential part of duty in general by such falsification… that is, I bring it about, as far as I can, that statements (declarations) in general are not believed, and so too that all rights which are based on contracts come to nothing and lose their force; and this is a wrong inflicted upon humanity generally… For a lie always harms another, even if not another individual, nevertheless humanity generally, inasmuch as it makes the source of right unusable.” There’s some very thought-provoking discussions on the web concerning Kant’s position.
As for the abortion issue, I have to confess I didn’t think of the obvious fact that if the mother dies, the baby most likely also will (note that I’m also not taking a position on abortion here). However, I think this aspect offers a somewhat convenient way out of the dilemma (by the way, I think empathy for the rape victim is a major reason why even many pro-life people do consider that a valid exception). So here’s another case: if it’s wrong to kill an innocent human being, is it then wrong to kill oneself? The dilemma in the suicide/euthanasia debate is the relative importance of not killing versus self-determination.
Some posts back you said “You could argue that these [moral] intuitions arise out of empathy. I am not inclined to this view, but if I were, then I would agree with you that empathy is the most important aspect of morality.” To be honest, I do think these intuitions arise out of empathy, or perhaps more accurately, they arise out of the Golden Rule: “Do onto others as you would wish them do onto you” (or its negative). What’s your stance regarding the Golden Rule?
Going back to the earlier posts, I agree with you that adultery is immoral and doesn’t deserve any sympathy, so consequences will usually rightfully follow (e.g. the spouse leaves). But one still has to be empathetic in knowing that all humans are fallable (which by the way is also a liberating notion for the betrayed spouse, for blame is poison). I think that’s more or less what plonkee was getting at.
Thanks for giving the source on Kant. He does seem pretty unequivocal there. Kant’s general error, in my opinion, was that, like many other ethicists, he privileges one particular moral insight (in his case, something akin to the Golden Rule) over all other moral insights. I believe this is always a mistake. Properly, morality is a balancing act where we have to weigh competing duties against each other and reason to the correct conclusion.
I believe you’re 100% correct about empathy and exceptions for rape. But this is by no means a slam-dunk position. The fetus, after all, did not rape the mother and is completely blameless. So, if you believe that a fetus is a human being, you are saying it’s okay for the fetus to bear the sins of its father. Their position is that it would be monstrous to force a woman to bear a child she never wanted nor even consented to the possibility of having simply because she was overpowered and forced. Obviously, we can all have a great deal of sympathy for this position. It is not clear that it overpowers the moral intuition that it is wrong to kill an innocent human being.
Suicide and euthanasia seem to be a completely different matter. If a person wants to die, it’s by no means clear that it’s wrong to kill them (or let them kill themselves). Our intuitions about murder have much to do with the presumed lack of consent from the victim. If this lack of consent doesn’t exist, I’m not sure we have an intuition at all anymore. Moreover, in the case of euthanasia, there is a different intuition. We value human beings because of their capacity for future human experience. While we might be sad when a 100 year-old person dies, we are less sad than if an eight year-old dies. We are sadder if a healthy person dies than we are if a person in continual pain dies (with no chance of recovery). In each case, it’s because of the capacity for future human experience. If an old, sick person with very little such capacity dies, this is not so great a tragedy (though they’re being old and sick might be). So I do think our intuitions support euthanasia. I think even the anti-euthanasia crowd is against euthanasia primarily because of “slippery slope” arguments or theological arguments. I believe they share my general intuition about euthanasia.
My stance regarding the Golden Rule is that it’s probably a useful rule of thumb. I mentioned earlier that Kant’s categorical imperative is pretty much the Golden Rule writ large. I object for a couple of reasons to the use of the Golden Rule as the fundamental moral truth. 1) It’s not self-evident. It is not an intuition of mine that I should treat others as I’d like to be treated. I might be able to reach the Golden Rule through moral reasoning and I do, in fact, get 90% of the way there which is why I say it’s a useful rule of thumb, but I can’t get all the way there. I might very well treat a child in a way I would not like to be treated by another person and full well believe that I’m still doing right by that child. For another example, I am relatively insensitive to criticism. I prefer that people be completely candid and blunt in their criticisms of me. (If you say to me, “I think you’re a jerk and here’s why,” I might not agree with your assessment, but I will thank you for your honesty and consider carefully whether this is a valid criticism.) It took me some time to curb my natural impulse to candor and learn to couch my own criticisms of others in ways that they seem to find more helpful and sensitive. For myself, I want none of that. Just tell me the truth directly. 2) The Golden Rule is insufficient. “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you” begs a rather straightforward question. How should we desire others to treat us? Now, I agree that we can answer this question through other moral intuitions, but it shows that the Golden Rule cannot be the whole of morality.
Yes, yes, all humans are inherently fallible. It does not therefore follow that they are inveterately so and it certainly doesn’t follow that we shouldn’t hold them accountable for their mistakes. If someone commits adultery in a moment of weakness, regrets the affair, cuts off all contact with the person he/she had the affair with, and does his/her best to make amends for it with his/her spouse, then that’s one thing. If someone has repeated affairs or a long affair or leaves his/her spouse “for love” or any nonsense like that, it’s quite another thing. I do not agree that blame is poison, though continually held anger is rarely helpful. I should say that I do not necessarily believe that one should leave one’s spouse purely because of an affair, particularly if all of my earlier conditions hold.
I agree that morals are a balancing act, and that the Golden Rule (as any “rule”) should not be applied in an absolutist way. Definitely I think it should not be taken literally, as indeed sometimes I may well want to be treated differently than “most” others would want. By the way, it’s interesting you say you like people to be brutally honest with you. The problem with that communicative style is that it has little to do with honesty, but everything with opinion. And our opinion of others is by definition hampered by limited perceptions and thus simplistic. As a side-note, it’s an interesting dilemma how to evaluate the value of someone’s critisisms without absorbing all of it (low self-esteem) nor rejecting all of it (arrogance). Concerning your point 2 critisism of the Golden Rule, that’s certainly true. The base moral intuitions as to how we want to be treated ourselves probably all simply have to do with promoting a safe life (don’t kill me, don’t steal from me, don’t lie to me, and so on). Put bluntly, the Golden Rule (and empathy as its emotional carrier) is just an implementation of post-Neanderthal self-serving altruism (if I don’t steal from you, I enhance my chances of you not stealing from me, and then we’ll all be happy). This is where psychopaths differ, they innately choose short-term self-serving behavior over a long-term societial investment in the form of altruism.
As for the fetus bearing the sins of the father, I see your point, but I disagree with the deduction. The fetus is indeed totally blameless, but that’s an unrelated issue. I believe people in favor of abortion in case of rape just tend to empathize more with a mother that is an active member of society, than with an unborn fetus. The fetus is merely in the wrong place at the wrong time, so to speak. Of course how far the pregnancy is mattters a lot to most people, but that just has to do with how people judge the infant’s neurological ability to experience things (and perhaps arbitrarily even how human it “looks”). For strict Christians that tends to be irrelevant, as they’re concerned with the “human potential”, even if the fetus is still just a few cells.
About euthanasia, that was actually what I was just curious about, whether your intuition about killing being wrong was absolute in that sense or not. Indeed theology makes it absolute for some, and these people oppose both euthanasia and abortion (typically also in the case of rape). An interesting issue with euthanasia is still the question in how far a person is really “free” in his choice, but that’s another discussion.
Of course humans being fallable doesn’t make them any less accountable, I didn’t suggest that. It just means that we can choose to forgive them if it’s an occasional error. So from that empathic realization I for sure agree that we shouldn’t perse leave our betraying spouse, that all depends on the circumstances. Like you suggested, the adulter’s remorse is probably a major determinant for most betrayed partners. However, it seems more and more people no longer perse see it as a “moment of weakness”, and rationalize their adultery. As in “You don’t own eachother”, “It may benefit your relation because no one person can give you all that you need”, “By being with someone else, you may actually reaffirm that your partner really is the one”, and so on. Crap, if you want that, then choose to be in an open relation.
Oh, and let me rephrase the thing about blame, I think it’s poison to REMAIN STUCK in blame. Blame is a natural and healthy part of any recovery after a traumatic event. But staying there is a problem. This notion in no way diminishes the responsibility of the wrongdoer, which is why I actually very much oppose the modern day’s “forgiveness” of telling a wrongdoer he’s forgiven even if he didn’t repent at all. However, remaining stuck in blame keeps the wrongdoer in power. The opposite of love is not hate, it’s indifference.
By the way, it’s interesting you say you like people to be brutally honest with you. The problem with that communicative style is that it has little to do with honesty, but everything with opinion. And our opinion of others is by definition hampered by limited perceptions and thus simplistic. As a side-note, it’s an interesting dilemma how to evaluate the value of someone’s critisisms without absorbing all of it (low self-esteem) nor rejecting all of it (arrogance).
I don’t know if I’d describe my style as brutal honesty, so much as simple candor. Manners sometimes stops us from telling people things they actually want (and maybe need) to know. If I have food stuck in my teeth, I’d rather you told me than let me walk around the rest of the day looking like a fool. I am different from most people in that I’m relatively immune to hurt feelings or embarrassment, however. I love to be disagreed with, for example, and I have a hard time realizing that most people feel defensive if they’re disagreed with. You seemed rather dismissive of opinions, but opinions are valuable and many of them are true. I take very seriously my wife’s criticisms of me, for example, and she has learned to be honest and forthright with them. Not only does this improve our relationship, it is also a great help to me because she can tell me about ways that I behave which are fine with her, but might be off-putting to other people. Other people’s opinions, however, are also valuable. They might see things she misses.
Concerning your point 2 critisism of the Golden Rule, that’s certainly true. The base moral intuitions as to how we want to be treated ourselves probably all simply have to do with promoting a safe life (don’t kill me, don’t steal from me, don’t lie to me, and so on). Put bluntly, the Golden Rule (and empathy as its emotional carrier) is just an implementation of post-Neanderthal self-serving altruism (if I don’t steal from you, I enhance my chances of you not stealing from me, and then we’ll all be happy). This is where psychopaths differ, they innately choose short-term self-serving behavior over a long-term societial investment in the form of altruism.
I probably agree with you here. I certainly think our moral intuition evolved because it was a useful survival mechanism. It overshot the mark (due to morality, we frequently act to the detriment of our genes - the moral evolutionists call this “misfiring” which I think is a rather inadequate response). I certainly agree with you about psychopaths. So long as most people act morally, there are survival benefits to being in the minority who are immune to morality. An interesting point about psychopaths - unlike sociopaths, psychopaths are capable of living productive, prison-free lives. I’m convinced that some of them even reason themselves to morality even though they don’t share our basic moral intuitions. (They simply take these as axioms even though they don’t “feel” them.)
As for the fetus bearing the sins of the father, I see your point, but I disagree with the deduction. The fetus is indeed totally blameless, but that’s an unrelated issue. I believe people in favor of abortion in case of rape just tend to empathize more with a mother that is an active member of society, than with an unborn fetus. The fetus is merely in the wrong place at the wrong time, so to speak.
Keep in mind that I was describing the point of view of people who are otherwise pro-life, but make exceptions for rape. I’m not sure that position is a consistent one. You seem to be describing the psychology of the pro-choice crowd. That may very well describe their position, but I was trying to understand a much more complicated position.
About euthanasia, that was actually what I was just curious about, whether your intuition about killing being wrong was absolute in that sense or not. Indeed theology makes it absolute for some, and these people oppose both euthanasia and abortion (typically also in the case of rape). An interesting issue with euthanasia is still the question in how far a person is really “free” in his choice, but that’s another discussion.
I’m certainly not opposed to killing, full stop. If a man threatened my wife, I’d put him down like a mad dog (were I able) and I’d sleep well that night. I am opposed to the taking of an innocent life and suicide and euthanasia seem like pretty clear exceptions to this.
Of course humans being fallable doesn’t make them any less accountable, I didn’t suggest that. It just means that we can choose to forgive them if it’s an occasional error. So from that empathic realization I for sure agree that we shouldn’t perse leave our betraying spouse, that all depends on the circumstances. Like you suggested, the adulter’s remorse is probably a major determinant for most betrayed partners. However, it seems more and more people no longer perse see it as a “moment of weakness”, and rationalize their adultery. As in “You don’t own eachother”, “It may benefit your relation because no one person can give you all that you need”, “By being with someone else, you may actually reaffirm that your partner really is the one”, and so on. Crap, if you want that, then choose to be in an open relation.
I knew you didn’t mean that fallibility means no accountability, but I couldn’t let that get in the way of my rhetoric. Unlike virtually any other moral issue, I have real problems with the way modern culture deals with adultery. I see good arguments on both sides of abortion and most other issues of great controversy. In those where I believe one side is clearly wrong (the anti-homosexuals, for example), it’s crystal clear that those people are in the minority. On the softness and tolerance toward adultery, however, the current majority is the side that is clearly in the wrong. And it’s worse, we get nonsense like The Bridges of Madison County which glorify adultery and try to make it “cool.” As a consequence, I can get vehement about the issue. People blather on about “sexual morality.” As C.S. Lewis said, adultery is not an offense against some special sort of morality called “sexual morality.” It is an offense against honesty, an offense against gratitude, and an offense against common humanity. I believe we are all morally weakened any time adultery is seen to be condoned and I think it’s seen to be condoned almost continually nowadays. However, given your own statements on the subject, I appear to be preaching to the choir and we seem to have substantially similar views. (Again, if two people choose an open marriage, more power to them. They can people their beds with sheep for all I care. If adultery is not a betrayal, then my intuition no longer classifies it as wrong since it is no longer an offense against honesty, gratitude, or common humanity.)
Oh, and let me rephrase the thing about blame, I think it’s poison to REMAIN STUCK in blame. Blame is a natural and healthy part of any recovery after a traumatic event. But staying there is a problem. This notion in no way diminishes the responsibility of the wrongdoer, which is why I actually very much oppose the modern day’s “forgiveness” of telling a wrongdoer he’s forgiven even if he didn’t repent at all. However, remaining stuck in blame keeps the wrongdoer in power. The opposite of love is not hate, it’s indifference.
Nothing to disagree with here. As I said above, continual anger is rarely helpful. I actually go so far that I never even say, “I forgive you,” unless I really mean it. I.e. I have to honestly believe that it was so trivial an offense, or so out of character, or so thoroughly repented, that I fully expect to forget all about it in short order. What I will not do is say that I forgive somebody and then continue to hold a grudge or treat them differently than I would have if they had never done whatever I’m claiming to have forgiven them for. I should say, though, that this only very, very rarely comes up. I forgive people very easily and very quickly. Of course, I never have to worry about your advice here since indifference comes naturally to me and I don’t think I’ve ever hated anyone in my life, no matter how grievously they have wronged me.
“You seemed rather dismissive of opinions, but opinions are valuable and many of them are true”. What can I say, that’s just your opinion! Just kidding here. Seriously, I totally agree that other people’s opinions are often very valuable and can promote personal growth. And heck, I’d surely tell you when you have food stuck in your teeth. However, there seems to be a fine line between candor and brutal honesty. If one is continually “just being honest” and expressing perceived wrongs in others, it becomes overbearing. I guess it has to do with the intent behind one’s candor: are you trying to help the other person out of care and respect, or are you trying to place yourself one-up, in order to avoid having to face your own shortcomings. It also has to do with the difference between pointing out how another’s behavior affects you, versus telling how you think (s)he “is” as a person. For example, it’s not very helpful to “honestly” tell your wife that she is fat and lacks confidence…
I agree that more and more people become lenient towards adultery, but I don’t think it’s the majority of people. I believe by far most people still principally object against adultery, but that doesn’t mean they will perfectly live up to their own standards always. I concur the problem with adultery is mainly the breech in honesty. Even if the adultery is never discovered, the dishonesty was there. And with it the relationship bond and its genuinity is effected. While they sound plausible to me as such, would you mind elaborating on your “gratitude” and “common humanity” arguments?
It’s intriguing how you mention that indifference comes natural to you. Do you mean indifference to the people that don’t matter to you, or to anyone? It seems the latter would preclude love, and would also contradict how you value the opinion of others. A further thought, wouldn’t true indifference mean that you CAN’T be “grievously wronged” (at least emotionally; I don’t mean physical or material offenses)?
I agree with most of your distinctions between candor and brutal honesty. Most of the time, I never express my opinion of other people’s flaws because, frankly, I don’t care that much if they correct them and I realize that most people suffer embarrassment from having their flaws pointed out. However, I am always interested in other people’s opinions of my flaws because it gives me something to consider and I am never offended by hearing them, which isn’t to say that I’ll necessarily agree with them.
I agree that, in theory, most people agree that adultery is wrong - polls show that fully 80% of the population believes that adultery is always wrong. However, in practice, adulterers almost never suffer any opprobrium for their actions. Because, being human, we have all been subject to the temptations of adultery, even if we haven’t given in to those temptations, there seems to be an attitude that adultery is not that heinous a sin. I’m not sure why this is so. We are also all tempted by the acquisitive impulse and yet we have no problems excoriating thieves or frauds or greedy corporations.
While the breach in honesty is the most important one, most people are deeply indebted to their spouses. If my wife cheated on me, my first thought wouldn’t be “how could you be so dishonest?” but “how could you do this to me whom you owe so much?” There are many cases in our marriage when it would clearly have been in my own self-interest (at least short-term) to abandon her if I only had been thinking of myself. During her cancer, for example. I have also had many opportunities over the course of our marriage to commit infidelity myself and thereby explore other possible relationships which might have proven superior (for me) to our relationship. I did not do these things because I made certain promises. For keeping these promises, against my own self-interest, I expect gratitude. Just as I owe her gratitude for similar actions. As for “common humanity,” I didn’t think that one needed much explaining, though it might be redundant. Your spouse has the same humanity as you do and is due all the considerations and benefits that any human being owes another. A man who abandons his wife after twenty years of marriage may very well be ruining his wife’s life, merely in pursuit of his own selfish gratification. This is the sort of thing no person should do to another person, spouse or no.
Indifference comes naturally to me for anyone, really. I can go years without ever thinking to call my mother though I am always delighted when she calls me. I suppose I have the usual mathematician’s preference for processes over people.
This is why I object to the theory that it is compassion that rules morality. I meet people all the time who are oozing over with compassion, commit all sorts of flagrantly and obviously immoral actions by thoughtlessly acting on whatever their emotional impulse of the moment is, and then try to justify them by saying that at least “their heart was in the right place.” Meanwhile, there is me, with my heart carved out of granite and stuffed with microchips, with no particular passions, just a profound sense of duty. I certainly wouldn’t describe it as so extreme that I can’t be emotionally harmed or incapable of love. It took her a while to get used to my undemonstrative style, but my wife is now infinitely more pleased with my passionless and coldly analytical love than she ever was with the other sort. I am, for example, entirely reliable. The problem with conducting one’s life based on one’s feelings is that one’s feelings change from day to day. My wife always gets complete consistency in my actions, because they are based on my judgment and my morality rather than on my feelings. I have no doubts that for some people, particularly the sorts who are ruled by their emotions, being married to me would probably constitute some sort of living hell. Fortunately, my wife is not one of those people.
I do confess that the grievous harms I was thinking of were physical or material offenses. I cannot name a time in my life when I was grievously harmed emotionally, though I probably could if I thought about it long enough. (As I said, I have a tendency to forgive and forget quite easily. And I mean really forget; I just stop thinking about the incident entirely.) I value the opinions of others entirely based on how likely they are to be true. I don’t value opinions for their own sakes; I value them because they might help me learn about reality.
I think I’m starting to see where you’re coming from. I do believe for most people morality comes largely from empathy. That doesn’t mean it has to be that way for everyone, including you. It seems to me you hold high moral standards. However, your self-proclaimed indifference almost makes you sound antisocial, but definitely without the direct self-serving aspect found in bullies and tirans. I’m just wondering, could it be you have Asperger’s? Anyway, from your comments I see a lot of good in your “granite heart”. I hope you too can appreciate the qualities of those “emotional” people that truly have their heart in the right place. In that respect, there’s a big difference between people blindly following their emotions, and those who know how to observe their feelings with a distant curiosity, while wisely choosing their behavior in response.
I’m definitely not anti-social. I like people and enjoy being around them; I just don’t need them. Give me problems to solve and an Internet connection and I’ll count the rest of the world well lost. As for Asperger’s, my own diagnosis would be that I’m certainly closer to that end of the spectrum than “normal” people, but I’m not close enough to actually be considered Asperger’s. I actually believe that my detachment and preference for analysis over emotion wasn’t in-born, but a conscious choice. I suppose a psychologist might argue that this was a defense mechanism caused by a difficult childhood, but I’m not convinced as I believe it was actually a rational decision.
As I’ve said earlier in this thread, I’m not knocking empathy or compassion. All of that’s great and I think it’s perfectly fine for people to feel as much empathy and compassion as they like. But ultimately I don’t think it’s much of a basis of morality and moral decisions should be made with your reason and not your emotions. You actually said it better than I yet have with “In that respect, there’s a big difference between people blindly following their emotions, and those who know how to observe their feelings with a distant curiosity, while wisely choosing their behavior in response.” That’s probably the best way to describe my typical emotional state. It’s not that I don’t have emotions; I just view them with a “distant curiosity” and largely refrain from fully experiencing them.
To be honest, from your pre-last post I did have the impression you were knocking empathy a bit. Maybe it’s just that you’ve had many people knocking your alternative views. Anyway, I actually meant my comment about viewing emotions from a distance slightly different than you perceived them. You seem to mean staying distant from your emotions, while I meant in fact on the contrary fully experiencing them, while at the same time being able not to pass automatic judgement and taking accompanying knee-jerk actions. For example, I could be totally angry with you, while still keeping my cool. I’d figure out why I feel the way I feel, and then take whatever non-controlling action is required to resolve the situation. That is, on a good day….
I think it’s impossible to make moral choices strictly without emotion. And I think your views have more emotion in them than you’re willing to admit. The emotion is right there in your “intuitions”. For example, if you say that adultery is wrong because one shouldnt be dishonest, and because your partner is human and therefore needs to be treated respectfully, or because partners owe eachother gratitude… anyone could simply disagree by saying those notions are abstract and subjective. There is no absolute reason, no law of the universe that says these things are so. That’s why unfortunately there’s plenty of psychos out there that can choose not to care about hurting other people. As discussed before, the only “reason” behind these moral intuitions is that of “I won’t hurt you, if you don’t hurt me”. Come to think of it, empathy is probably not so much the determinant of what is moral or not. Rather, it’s the sensing device that allows you to understand when you might be hurting someone, which would be immoral by the aforementioned logic. Of course, people should also learn to express their feelings to others, as empathy is fallable and not everyone has it to the same degree.
I think it’s impossible to make moral choices strictly without emotion. And I think your views have more emotion in them than you’re willing to admit. The emotion is right there in your “intuitions”.
Not true. These intuitions have nothing to do with emotion and cannot have anything to do with emotion. Hatred is also an emotion. Why is love more valuable an emotion than hate? The reason cannot be within the emotions themselves, which say nothing about their value.
For example, if you say that adultery is wrong because one shouldnt be dishonest, and because your partner is human and therefore needs to be treated respectfully, or because partners owe eachother gratitude… anyone could simply disagree by saying those notions are abstract and subjective. There is no absolute reason, no law of the universe that says these things are so.
Your last sentence is an arbitrary assertion which I reject. I believe moral intuitions tell us actual facts (moral facts) just as mathematical intuitions tell us actual facts (mathematical facts). The reason most (though not all) people disagree with this is because they have arbitrarily assumed a materialist worldview. But there is no evidence for this assumption and very good reasons to think it false. (I freely grant that it might be true.)
As discussed before, the only “reason” behind these moral intuitions is that of “I won’t hurt you, if you don’t hurt me”.
This strikes me as arbitrarily privileging one intuition (and not even an intuition, but a moral conclusion, that of the Golden Rule). I take moral intuitions as brute facts, needing no reason behind them. (Some people will now object “but you have to have a reason to believe something” to which I ask, what reason do you have for believing that?) When I say that it is wrong to torture little children just for the fun of it, and you ask me what reason I have to believe that, my answer is that it’s just obvious. Why do I need a reason? I have never heard a philosophical argument against this intuition which does not rely on premises which are not as certain as the intuition that it is wrong to torture little children just for the fun of it. You seem to have an intuition that moral facts cannot exist. (You may have a similar materialist intuition that mathematical facts cannot exist.) But is that intuition as certain as the intuition that it is wrong to torture little children just for the fun of it? I doubt it; it certainly isn’t the case for me. So I reject the less certain premise in favor of the more certain one.
Not true. Your intuitions have everything to do with emotion. I’m not sure what you were trying to say concerning love being more valuable than hatred. It’s both psychologically and philosopically questionable whether that is actually true.
Anyway, this all is kinda the same type of discussion as “does God exist?”. While I can’t rule out that God exists, it’s simply not a given fact that God does exist. You can “intuit” there is a God, but it makes discussions with others who don’t believe that rather problematic. You claim something “just because”.
It’s the same with your moral intuitions. You say it’s obviously wrong to torture children. Of course I agree, but there are many empathic and logic reasons for that. In a strict sense however you don’t KNOW if this is so. You may BELIEVE there IS a cosmic rule that says so, but this is not a demonstrable fact. It is your BELIEF that the premise of torture being wrong is more certain than the premise that torture is ok. But again, strictly speaking this is not a fact, and hypothetically speaking some people might disagree. I’m not saying that there for sure are no cosmic moral rules, but I just don’t see reasons to a priori believe that. That has little to do with a materialist worldview, but everything with being a natural skeptic (I don’t like the idea of everything being relative). It’s perfectly fine for anyone to believe (= feel!) certain things “just” are wrong, but of course it makes discussions on what’s right and wrong with others rather abstract.
If you can give reasons as to why you think something is wrong, it makes debating the case with others possible. Again, I’m not saying that one has to perse have reasons for ones moral standpoints. Everyone has their ideas about what’s right and wrong without perse knowing why. But to get ahead in moral debates and to for example define proper policies, you will have to do better than just say “just because”. To answer your question, that’s why people believe it’s a good idea to have reasons for one’s beliefs.
So, I don’t have an intuition that moral facts don’t exist, I just don’t have the intuition that they do. Just as I don’t have the intuition that God does not exist, I just don’t have the intuition that (s)he does. You may believe certain moral standpoints are moral facts, but those “facts” may simply not always be mine. Who are you then to say your views are factual and mine are not?
By the way, the Golden Rule is not arbitrary at all. As I said before it’s for sure not all there is, but it’s one of the better ideas I’ve come across of safeguarding a safe life for all. That’s not arbitrary, as moral thinking has to with how to live, so safeguarding that very life is a logical prime consideration within moral thinking (unless perhaps one believes in having several lives, a blissful afterlife, or indeed the non-existance of material life).
New topic out of curiosity: how do you feel about ethics in relation to animals? Do the same basic rules apply? E.g., is it ok to hurt an animal just for fun? Is it ok to use animals for food or medical experiments? It seems the moral development of society as a whole is evolving to include groups that were exempt in the past. I think this has to do with the evolution of empathy, where also other living beings are taken into consideration even though the Golden Rule is not directly applicable.
Another great response, Marc. Let’s see what we can do to reason together and resolve our differences here.
Anyway, this all is kinda the same type of discussion as “does God exist?”. While I can’t rule out that God exists, it’s simply not a given fact that God does exist. You can “intuit” there is a God, but it makes discussions with others who don’t believe that rather problematic. You claim something “just because”.
I’m going to quibble a bit here. I believe it is a fairly rare position for people to argue that they have an intuition that God exists. For one thing, it’s fairly clear that men do not have this intuition generally. I don’t have it and most civilizations didn’t have it either. While most human beings have had some sort of religion, the forms have varied so wildly that it’s really impossible to claim that God is an intuition. We do appear to have some sort of intuition about the existence of the numinous. (Full disclosure: I do not have this intuition myself, but I am willing to concede that I may very well be abnormal. Most people do seem to have it.) I believe most arguments for the existence of God rely on revelation (either personal or that the evidence of someone else’s revelation should be taken seriously). There are also, of course, logical arguments for the existence of God as well, from Aristotle to the present.
I agree with you that the discussions become problematic. If someone denies what I think is obvious, there isn’t anywhere for me to really go. However, I don’t see how this is an objection to my theory specifically so much as it is an objection to any and every argument. For all arguments, we all rely on certain intuitions and we all rely on premises that we find plausible. We must at least grant the laws of logic. What I am saying is that the most powerful moral intuitions seem as certain to us as anything is. I expect you to have the same intuition. E.g. I expect that you grant “on the issue of the truth and falsity of the existence of moral values, we ought to believe only what is true.” Our very argument only exists because you believe it, but it is a moral proposition.
We can, for example, imagine someone who doesn’t believe that we ought to believe what is true. Perhaps he will argue that we ought to believe what is convenient. In such a case, I can’t imagine how I would go about arguing him out of this belief. It is, after all, very convenient for him to believe it and he couldn’t care less whether it’s true. I would assume that we had reached an impasse and the argument would end.
It’s the same with your moral intuitions. You say it’s obviously wrong to torture children. Of course I agree, but there are many empathic and logic reasons for that. In a strict sense however you don’t KNOW if this is so.
Your definition of knowledge is perhaps too restrictive. I define knowledge, along with most philosophers, as true justified belief (with no defeaters). I do believe the things I claim, I also believe that I am justified in believing them, and I also believe that they’re true. Therefore, I do believe that I know it. You may be hung up on a more ancient definition of knowledge, bequeathed to us by the Greeks, which claims infallibility as the standard of knowledge. I reject this standard since it is an inappropriate standard for men. I also believe it is self-refuting. The claim would be, I guess, “you cannot claim to know something unless you know it infallibly.” To which, I give the obvious response: do you know that? Do you know it infallibly? I’m pretty sure it’s false so I can’t see how on earth you could claim to know it infallibly.
You may BELIEVE there IS a cosmic rule that says so, but this is not a demonstrable fact. It is your BELIEF that the premise of torture being wrong is more certain than the premise that torture is ok. But again, strictly speaking this is not a fact, and hypothetically speaking some people might disagree. I’m not saying that there for sure are no cosmic moral rules, but I just don’t see reasons to a priori believe that. That has little to do with a materialist worldview, but everything with being a natural skeptic (I don’t like the idea of everything being relative). It’s perfectly fine for anyone to believe (= feel!) certain things “just” are wrong, but of course it makes discussions on what’s right and wrong with others rather abstract.
You are correct, of course, that these are my beliefs and my beliefs are defeasible. I do not know them in the sense that I know them infallibly. Nevertheless, I do claim to know these things. You might rightly be wondering, what is this guy’s standard for knowledge claims? I’m not sure there is one correct answer to that question, but I generally go with “beyond a reasonable doubt.” You are quite correct that I could meet a hypothetical person who said, “I do not have the intuition that it is wrong to torture little children just for the fun of it.” In such a circumstance, I have no response. I cannot see a way to actually argue with such a person. In a similar way, I can imagine a hypothetical person (perhaps mentally disabled) who says, “I do not have the intuition that the shortest distance between two points in Euclidean space is a straight line.” I might try to get them to explain to me a shorter distance (which they would fail at), but nothing’s stopping them from arguing that it is not a proof of the axiom just because we haven’t found a counter-example. However, I expect most people to share my immediate intuition, not just that we don’t have a counter-example, but that a counter-example is impossible.
So, I don’t have an intuition that moral facts don’t exist, I just don’t have the intuition that they do. Just as I don’t have the intuition that God does not exist, I just don’t have the intuition that (s)he does. You may believe certain moral standpoints are moral facts, but those “facts” may simply not always be mine. Who are you then to say your views are factual and mine are not?
I’m going to argue that you do in fact have an intuition that moral facts exist, not any sense of how they exist (that, I agree, is not any sort of intuition), but of the facts themselves. You have a belief, pre-philosophically, that it is wrong to torture little children just for the fun of it. I am not arguing that this belief is proved, but that we should take these moral beliefs at face value, just as we ordinarily take our memories, perceptions, and other thoughts at face value. I agree that they are defeasible. If somebody were able to prove, either empirically or through logical argument, that it is impossible for moral facts to exist, then I would agree that I stand refuted. In fact, I’m fairly sure that my view can’t be empirically refuted (I can’t imagine the scientific experiment which could do so). A scientist might object that this makes my theory unscientific. However, just because it’s unfalsifiable doesn’t make it false; it just makes it unscientific.
If you can give reasons as to why you think something is wrong, it makes debating the case with others possible. Again, I’m not saying that one has to perse have reasons for ones moral standpoints. Everyone has their ideas about what’s right and wrong without perse knowing why. But to get ahead in moral debates and to for example define proper policies, you will have to do better than just say “just because”. To answer your question, that’s why people believe it’s a good idea to have reasons for one’s beliefs.
You will find, however, that my moral intuitions are very banal. While my moral reasoning may force me to take positions where my morality is controversial, the moral intuitions I use to construct this reasoning is almost always of the sort that I expect everyone to agree with. I do not have a moral intuition about abortion, for instance. Nor do I have a moral intuition about the death penalty. Nor do I have a moral intuition about bigamy or a whole host of issues. I have no moral intuition about adultery, even. (My argument is one of moral reasoning.) I do have a moral intuition that on the subject of the existence of moral values, we ought to believe only what is true. I have other similarly banal intuitions: you should not kill an innocent person (or at least not without a tremendously good reason), honesty is a virtue, etc. All of my brute intuitions are such that every society has agreed with them (though not necessarily every individual).
So, I don’t have an intuition that moral facts don’t exist, I just don’t have the intuition that they do. Just as I don’t have the intuition that God does not exist, I just don’t have the intuition that (s)he does. You may believe certain moral standpoints are moral facts, but those “facts” may simply not always be mine. Who are you then to say your views are factual and mine are not?
I would be quite surprised if you disagreed with any of my moral intuitions. I would not at all be surprised if you disagreed with some (perhaps many) of my moral conclusions, but that’s a different issue entirely. Then we have to determine who is reasoning correctly and who is reasoning incorrectly. Such disputes are not easily resolved, but they are not, in principle, irresolvable.
By the way, the Golden Rule is not arbitrary at all. As I said before it’s for sure not all there is, but it’s one of the better ideas I’ve come across of safeguarding a safe life for all. That’s not arbitrary, as moral thinking has to with how to live, so safeguarding that very life is a logical prime consideration within moral thinking (unless perhaps one believes in having several lives, a blissful afterlife, or indeed the non-existance of material life).
I never said the Golden Rule was arbitrary. If you read carefully, you’ll see that I said you were arbitrarily privileging it. I find it to be a useful rule of thumb, as I said earlier in this thread, but you seemed to be making the case that it was the basis of all morality. I don’t want to press this case too much. You are, in fact, mostly agreeing with me and we are only disagreeing about what the rock-bottom intuition is. (You’re claiming it’s “I won’t hurt you, if you don’t hurt me” while I’m claiming that this is actually a conclusion derived from more basic premises. But this is surely tangential to the argument and perhaps you are right and I am wrong.)
New topic out of curiosity: how do you feel about ethics in relation to animals? Do the same basic rules apply? E.g., is it ok to hurt an animal just for fun? Is it ok to use animals for food or medical experiments? It seems the moral development of society as a whole is evolving to include groups that were exempt in the past. I think this has to do with the evolution of empathy, where also other living beings are taken into consideration even though the Golden Rule is not directly applicable.
This is a very interesting question. One of the strangest things, when you think about it, is that the pro-fetus people and the pro-animal people are nearly never the same people. This is strange since we’d expect people with an expansive view of rights to favor both views, but not so. I must confess that I eat meat and wear leather. I often worry that I am rationalizing my beliefs in this regard in order to avoid an inconvenient moral conclusion. I do think obligate carnivores (like cats) present some problems for a theory of animal rights, but I don’t think that’s an insurmountable objection.
One major objection that people are forever making to my moral philosophy is that it does not give you an algorithm to solve all moral dilemmas. I agree that this is true, of course, but should we expect a moral theory to provide such an algorithm? So the short answer is that I have no answer to your dilemma. I never said morality was easy. While I think morality has the same basic character as mathematics, mathematics is very easy and moral reasoning is very hard.
Well, no worries about being abnormal Andrew. Given the stuff we’re discussing out here there’s no doubt we’re both considerably abnormal
You should be aware that I never said that it IS an intuition (as you define it) that God exists. I was merely describing a hypothetical person that does have that core belief. In my experience a lot of people do have that intuition, but I don’t know if it’s the majority. By the way, I don’t think the plurality of religions is an argument, as all deities (and “nature”, “the universe” and so on) are variations of the same basic theme to me. But anyway, again, it’s not my point that belief in God IS a generally held intuition. I was merely trying to say that such a belief can’t be reasoned with logic. If I don’t believe in God, I don’t believe in God. End of discussion.
That’s where you missed the point in my argument. You were suggesting that I think that knowledge and beliefs have to be infallable, but I never made such an argument. My argument was in fact aimed at what I perceived to be YOUR stance: that you don’t like emotions to rule morals, but that morals should instead have to be reasoned. All I’m saying is that your intuitions can NOT be reasoned. They are your beliefs, not logical certainties.
Note that this is not a value judgment. I in no way believe that you have to “infallably prove” your basic moral beliefs. In fact, it’s absurd if people object to your philosophy because it doesn’t provide an algorithm to solve all moral issues. I have yet to discover any philosphy that does…
All I’m saying is that you have basic moral beliefs (”intuitions”) on which you base your further moral reasoning. Those basic beliefs themselves are not a matter of reason, but of what you FEEL is right. Hence my point that your intutions are of an emotional nature (WHY you feel those particular intuitions is another debate, and I’ll get back on that below). I hope you see my simple point. I think in fact we agree far more than suspected before. It may just be a matter of terminology.
Now, from your reply it seems that you define “moral truth” as those intuitions that you share with most other people. If I understand you right you say: most people tend to believe this or that because the corresponding intuitions ARE the “cosmic” truth. While I would say: all people believe this or that because of sociobiological evolution (memes and our brain’s hardwiring). In other words, I think species on another planet may well have different moral intuitions than us here on earth. While I suspect you think they share the same values because it is what is universally “TRUE”.
So I have to disagree with you, I truly don’t believe that universal “cosmic” moral facts exist. Again, that’s not to say that I believe that they DON’T exist, I just don’t see a reason to believe that they do. I do however fully agree that there are overwhelmingly widely accepted morals on this planet, across all cultures. And yes, we probably both agree on virtually all of these core beliefs. But again, I don’t see them as laws of physics, but as the result of evolution. You’ll just have to excuse a Ph.D. student in neurobiology for this view
I know you didn’t say that the Golden Rule is arbitrary. In fact I meant to say “My choice for mentioning the Golden Rule was not arbitrary”. And in the pre-last discussion I also messed up with my words (hey, I’m not a native speaker), as I meant to say “The only reasoned (=logical, non-emotional) argument for these moral intuitions -that I can see- is that of the Golden Rule”. I am not privileging the golden Rule there (I’m not saying it’s better than other theories). To me it just seems to be the only non-emotional argument I’ve come across.
Anyway, we’ll probably never totally agree, but I’m pretty sure our views on morality are actually quite similar. Just that perhaps we have the cause and consequence of moral intuitions and their prevalence among people the other way around. I have to focus my attention on more mundane things again now, but many thanks for the thought-provoking and fun discussions Andrew.
Marc, it has been an enjoyable discussion. My only remaining disagreements are that I think moral intuition is a subset of reason, not emotion, just as logical and mathematical intuitions are.
I do not buy the evolution theory of morality. Of course, I believe that our moral intuition evolved, just as our mathematical intuition did, because it was useful to our survival, but it doesn’t seem likely that’s the whole story. There are two main problems to the evolutionary theory.
1) It doesn’t seem to actually explain a great deal of morality. A human being is often quite willing to sacrifice his life for a child who is a complete stranger. Evolutionary moralists explain this as “misfiring.” (Dawkins calls morality which is contra-survival “blessed, precious mistakes.”) More problematic, human morality is generally disapproving of evolution on moral grounds. (Dawkins himself is.) Why would evolution select for creatures who do not wish to further evolution and improve the survival of their genes at all costs?
2) If morality is purely the result of evolution, there is no good reason for obeying it. You can say, “we ought to do X because X is what evolution selected us to do.” But why should we care what evolution selected us to do? Why should we value the survival of the species? Now, this does not falsify the view, but a moral evolutionist is just as trapped in the subjectivist’s dilemma as any moral relativist.
I believe our moral intuitions are themselves evidence for the existence of moral facts, just as our perceptions are evidence for the existence of reality, our memories are evidence for the existence of the past, etc. Our moral intuitions provide us with prima facie justification for our moral views. While these views are defeasible, I have yet to see them defeated. I probably agree that the evolutionary morality argument is the strongest current challenger to such a view. (And they do defeat them, as I pointed out in point 2 above. If the evolutionary morality theory is correct, there is no particular reason to obey our moral dictates or to do anything at all.)
And, of course, I’m sure we do agree on most moral issues. However, both of our theories would seem to predict this, so it doesn’t help us resolve the dilemma.