I always found the argument that "each generation thinks it's getting worse, therefore it's not getting worse" hilarious. It's like saying "people are saying it keeps getting better for 50 years now, therefore it ain't so."
But this surely takes the cake: "People are thinking morality keeps declining, which means morality keeps declining, and morality is getting better."
The real deal is this: peeps have arguably been getting better at science. It's just that they have become mind-numbingly bad at thinking.
The fact that every generation says things are getting worse is a good reason to suspect that they are wrong, especially given all the many ways in which we've made progress both materially and morally.
You can of course argue that we made progress both materially and morally, and that those who say things got worse are wrong. But I can't see the logic in the first part of your sentence.
How does a group of people that believe there is no such thing as objective morality provide commentary on the moral trajectory of a society? You need a foundation/baseline for what constitutes moral behavior before you can gauge what direction you are trending away from the baseline. If you you are progressive and your baseline for morality changes every decade in ways you can't foresee, how do you ever know if moral progress is being made?
"Moral principles are guidelines that people live by to make sure they are doing the right thing. These include things like honesty, fairness, and equality." (Although I don't know how 'equality' got to be a moral principle)
Add Don't kill people, steal or be a bully and you have pretty much covered morality.
No one can, in any sane world, debate or deny that given the above is good and moral, the 'western' world has dropped precipitously in the last 40 years. Merely watch old movies and compare to modern ones.
What is missed is that morality is one of the first things to decline in a declining culture. The Greeks complained about the decline of morals, as did the Romans, the British and every single society just before it all fell apart.
Once the society hits bottom, and is usually conquered or plundered by another that is 'more' moral, then austerity brings about a strong moral society.
Men become men and take control, (so I am a misogynist, sue me) why? Because it takes the willingness to punish those who are not moral, and that means pain and suffering, sometimes terminal, to those who are immoral.
Let me tell you, there is no theft in Kuwait, they don't cut off hands, they don't need to, the threat is sufficient. The people in prison (4,000 in a population of approx 5 million) are there for screwing up rather than property or violent crimes and 90% are not Kuwaitis.
Society (and nearly everything else) follows a sine wave, for a while they are moral and successful, then they fall prey to hubris and immorality, and the society fails, only to start again once they discover that Morality is the basis of all societies.
I always laugh when atheist people talk about morals and what people should follow. But I always ask them that if there's absolutely nothing after our death why should anyone follow any moral principles? Moral principles and 'doing the right thing' only makes sense in a Transcendental-future promised to you. So if you do the thing you get eternal life etc. Otherwise why a person shouldn't cause harm? It's only temporary and anyway comes nothing after the pain so...
Nowhere does Morality and Ethics 'require' a religious base.
"Virtue is its own reward"
Doing something because it is morally or ethically correct should be more important and satisfying than receiving some kind of tangible reward for doing so.
Justice, fairness is seen in many animal societies.
Ants and Bees etc. work tirelessly and sacrifice themselves for the good of the community. Monkeys are angry at injustice. Mothers (and Fathers) of all species sacrifice and are willing (usually) to face death for their offspring.
Your problem is that you are 'externally' oriented.
The world is divided into those that (want to) tell other people what to do and those that trust in their own judgement and allow others the same privilege.
Spartans chose Lycurgis to instruct them in how to live. He had travelled the known world and studied what made societies (cities) successful. He gave them a set of standards to live by that created a society that lasted 700 years and was copied (partially and therefore unsuccessfully) by dozens of other city states. They had no "Gods" and no religion as such, merely morals and actions based on that morality.
I do not expect rewards or punishment after death and yet I am moral.
“I know that my plainness of speech makes them hate me, and what is their hatred but a proof that I am speaking the truth?”
Unfortunately you do not understand my point. IF there's absolutely nothing after death then making our society/environment better, to make it flourish is absolutely and utterly pointless. To achieve what? To let atoms, particles, cells to form groups, let electric signals run down on nerve paths, to let hormones cause 'feelings'. What purpose does this serve?
I understood your point perfectly. You believe that the only possible motivation is some form of external reward. Either in this life or the next (if any)
That is why, and I realise that you do not comprehend the concept, I quoted
"Virtue is its own reward".
Many of us do right because it is the right thing to do. We do not require reward, recognition, adulation or anything else. We do it because it is 'right'.
Religions and cultures reward many different types of behaviour, many of them immoral and 'wrong' but inside each person and many if not all life, there is an acknowledgement of what is right and moral and what is wrong and unethical.
Cultures may teach that stealing is good and the best way to progress, but internally everyone knows it is wrong. You do not need a preacher or priest to tell you this and even if your culture promotes theft and even if you accept it as a way of life, you still know that it is 'wrong'.
And "Life" does not need a reason, life is, it exists and that is sufficient.
"It can only be, then, what these academics count as instances of immorality don’t match what the people they interviewed think is immorality."
Well yes, but also they ignore their own claims of immorality in those they oppose. Take any contentious "left" issue and those that oppose are accused of being racist, sexist, transist, all of which are proxies for immorality. I realize they don't like the word "moral", so they hide it in the isms.
These guys sound like the double-talk you get from an alcoholic or an addict:
"I could quit anytime that I wanted to, it's just that there's not enough incentive for me to do that just yet. I mean, sheesh, I don't currently feel like quitting, because things are so very rosy for me. But be sure, if things ever did get really bad for me, then I'd quit on the spot. This means that there is no point for you to engage in any further observation or speculation about my choice to remain under the influence! Nothing to see here. Move along."
The only difference is that their double-talk is part of a body of group-think approved by authorities.
I recall that Stephen Pinker wrote a book arguing that violence has declined and the world is becoming more moral. Neither is so if Pinker believes it.
Violence (within a social setting) has declined because people have become less moral.
“He who is not angry when there is just cause for anger is immoral.
Why?
Because anger looks to the good of justice.
And if you can live amid injustice without anger, you are immoral as well as unjust.”
St. Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274)
So instead of hanging or burning politicians (See O Cromwell for details) we accept that they lie constantly about everything. This leads to acceptance of lying and stealing in every sphere of life. We no longer expect people not to lie, not to steal and cheat.
When such things are seen by a 'Moral' man and his anger is directed at the immoral, then the law comes down like a ton of bricks on the moral man and not on the immoral.
"When you see that in order to produce, you need to obtain permission from men who produce nothing; when you see that money is flowing to those who deal, not in goods, but in favors; when you see that men get rich more easily by graft than by work, and your laws no longer protect you against them, but protect them against you. . . you may know that your society is doomed."
Dead serious question to all the bright academic minds: What does the recent twitter shitstorm in response to missing Titan sub tell ye about morality?
Right, a couple of people showing their boobies by the White House is obviously way worse than back when we enslaved people, beat children, cut off people's hands for stealing an apple, and on and on.
I don't take advice on morals from people who don't believe morals exist and don't bother to understand what moral concepts mean to people. The watered-down pro-social liberalism coloring everything these idiot academics take for granted as "moral" has nothing to do with the real thing. They're studying circles while telling us they're studying squares.
I'm sure some Roman scholar in the 2nd century made a similar argument and that turned out just fine didn't it.
Is there any baby in the bathhouse bathwater of academia?
One could say they are all babies.
I always found the argument that "each generation thinks it's getting worse, therefore it's not getting worse" hilarious. It's like saying "people are saying it keeps getting better for 50 years now, therefore it ain't so."
But this surely takes the cake: "People are thinking morality keeps declining, which means morality keeps declining, and morality is getting better."
The real deal is this: peeps have arguably been getting better at science. It's just that they have become mind-numbingly bad at thinking.
The fact that every generation says things are getting worse is a good reason to suspect that they are wrong, especially given all the many ways in which we've made progress both materially and morally.
You can of course argue that we made progress both materially and morally, and that those who say things got worse are wrong. But I can't see the logic in the first part of your sentence.
...yet sharp-minded good at investigating wrongthink 😇
How does a group of people that believe there is no such thing as objective morality provide commentary on the moral trajectory of a society? You need a foundation/baseline for what constitutes moral behavior before you can gauge what direction you are trending away from the baseline. If you you are progressive and your baseline for morality changes every decade in ways you can't foresee, how do you ever know if moral progress is being made?
"Moral principles are guidelines that people live by to make sure they are doing the right thing. These include things like honesty, fairness, and equality." (Although I don't know how 'equality' got to be a moral principle)
Add Don't kill people, steal or be a bully and you have pretty much covered morality.
No one can, in any sane world, debate or deny that given the above is good and moral, the 'western' world has dropped precipitously in the last 40 years. Merely watch old movies and compare to modern ones.
What is missed is that morality is one of the first things to decline in a declining culture. The Greeks complained about the decline of morals, as did the Romans, the British and every single society just before it all fell apart.
Once the society hits bottom, and is usually conquered or plundered by another that is 'more' moral, then austerity brings about a strong moral society.
Men become men and take control, (so I am a misogynist, sue me) why? Because it takes the willingness to punish those who are not moral, and that means pain and suffering, sometimes terminal, to those who are immoral.
Let me tell you, there is no theft in Kuwait, they don't cut off hands, they don't need to, the threat is sufficient. The people in prison (4,000 in a population of approx 5 million) are there for screwing up rather than property or violent crimes and 90% are not Kuwaitis.
Society (and nearly everything else) follows a sine wave, for a while they are moral and successful, then they fall prey to hubris and immorality, and the society fails, only to start again once they discover that Morality is the basis of all societies.
I always laugh when atheist people talk about morals and what people should follow. But I always ask them that if there's absolutely nothing after our death why should anyone follow any moral principles? Moral principles and 'doing the right thing' only makes sense in a Transcendental-future promised to you. So if you do the thing you get eternal life etc. Otherwise why a person shouldn't cause harm? It's only temporary and anyway comes nothing after the pain so...
Nowhere does Morality and Ethics 'require' a religious base.
"Virtue is its own reward"
Doing something because it is morally or ethically correct should be more important and satisfying than receiving some kind of tangible reward for doing so.
Justice, fairness is seen in many animal societies.
Ants and Bees etc. work tirelessly and sacrifice themselves for the good of the community. Monkeys are angry at injustice. Mothers (and Fathers) of all species sacrifice and are willing (usually) to face death for their offspring.
Your problem is that you are 'externally' oriented.
The world is divided into those that (want to) tell other people what to do and those that trust in their own judgement and allow others the same privilege.
Spartans chose Lycurgis to instruct them in how to live. He had travelled the known world and studied what made societies (cities) successful. He gave them a set of standards to live by that created a society that lasted 700 years and was copied (partially and therefore unsuccessfully) by dozens of other city states. They had no "Gods" and no religion as such, merely morals and actions based on that morality.
I do not expect rewards or punishment after death and yet I am moral.
“I know that my plainness of speech makes them hate me, and what is their hatred but a proof that I am speaking the truth?”
Socrates
Unfortunately you do not understand my point. IF there's absolutely nothing after death then making our society/environment better, to make it flourish is absolutely and utterly pointless. To achieve what? To let atoms, particles, cells to form groups, let electric signals run down on nerve paths, to let hormones cause 'feelings'. What purpose does this serve?
I understood your point perfectly. You believe that the only possible motivation is some form of external reward. Either in this life or the next (if any)
That is why, and I realise that you do not comprehend the concept, I quoted
"Virtue is its own reward".
Many of us do right because it is the right thing to do. We do not require reward, recognition, adulation or anything else. We do it because it is 'right'.
Religions and cultures reward many different types of behaviour, many of them immoral and 'wrong' but inside each person and many if not all life, there is an acknowledgement of what is right and moral and what is wrong and unethical.
Cultures may teach that stealing is good and the best way to progress, but internally everyone knows it is wrong. You do not need a preacher or priest to tell you this and even if your culture promotes theft and even if you accept it as a way of life, you still know that it is 'wrong'.
And "Life" does not need a reason, life is, it exists and that is sufficient.
Poor Pinker.
Left disapproves of him because?
Beats me. He's one of THEM and has Harvard's credentials to prove it.
Perhaps he claims too much academic freedom for the wickedly intolerant to tolerate and resists their ideological enslavement.
In any case, the right does not want him either.
"It can only be, then, what these academics count as instances of immorality don’t match what the people they interviewed think is immorality."
Well yes, but also they ignore their own claims of immorality in those they oppose. Take any contentious "left" issue and those that oppose are accused of being racist, sexist, transist, all of which are proxies for immorality. I realize they don't like the word "moral", so they hide it in the isms.
These guys sound like the double-talk you get from an alcoholic or an addict:
"I could quit anytime that I wanted to, it's just that there's not enough incentive for me to do that just yet. I mean, sheesh, I don't currently feel like quitting, because things are so very rosy for me. But be sure, if things ever did get really bad for me, then I'd quit on the spot. This means that there is no point for you to engage in any further observation or speculation about my choice to remain under the influence! Nothing to see here. Move along."
The only difference is that their double-talk is part of a body of group-think approved by authorities.
I recall that Stephen Pinker wrote a book arguing that violence has declined and the world is becoming more moral. Neither is so if Pinker believes it.
Violence (within a social setting) has declined because people have become less moral.
“He who is not angry when there is just cause for anger is immoral.
Why?
Because anger looks to the good of justice.
And if you can live amid injustice without anger, you are immoral as well as unjust.”
St. Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274)
So instead of hanging or burning politicians (See O Cromwell for details) we accept that they lie constantly about everything. This leads to acceptance of lying and stealing in every sphere of life. We no longer expect people not to lie, not to steal and cheat.
When such things are seen by a 'Moral' man and his anger is directed at the immoral, then the law comes down like a ton of bricks on the moral man and not on the immoral.
"When you see that in order to produce, you need to obtain permission from men who produce nothing; when you see that money is flowing to those who deal, not in goods, but in favors; when you see that men get rich more easily by graft than by work, and your laws no longer protect you against them, but protect them against you. . . you may know that your society is doomed."
Ayn Rand - Atlas Shrugged
Very nice PJ. Very nice.
Beliefs conjure up reality out of thin air (or is it whole cloth?). Sounds perfectly legit to my untrained ear 🤨
We live in a circus.
Love the photo of White House pool party.
Two captions:
1) Brandon surprises happy White House intern;
2) Hunter demonstrates that cocaine builds biceps.
Dead serious question to all the bright academic minds: What does the recent twitter shitstorm in response to missing Titan sub tell ye about morality?
Swap morality for quality of academic output—and see if you can keep the laugh going a skosh longer 😁
How do The Science appreciators even pretend to objectively research something as philosophical as morality?
Mostly they do not recognize they are dong it. There are too many scientists, meaning the average one isn't that bright.
Right, a couple of people showing their boobies by the White House is obviously way worse than back when we enslaved people, beat children, cut off people's hands for stealing an apple, and on and on.
I don't take advice on morals from people who don't believe morals exist and don't bother to understand what moral concepts mean to people. The watered-down pro-social liberalism coloring everything these idiot academics take for granted as "moral" has nothing to do with the real thing. They're studying circles while telling us they're studying squares.
I'm sure some Roman scholar in the 2nd century made a similar argument and that turned out just fine didn't it.