Politics-Ethics Question

[fretelöo]

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says Kant, say most ethicists that endorse some sort of objective moral values.

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Appeal to authority

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Says someone who apparently has only a very dim idea about ho silly you sound if you pull that old argumentum e auctoritate against Kant.

Sorry, but if you want a serious response stop prying every half sentence of mine apart just to add a 4 word reply. I've got better things to do wthan work through your two-footer, having to go back to my original post each time to figure out what my general point was, then trying to figure out if you reply to just the half sentence you quote or the whole paragraph, then (if need be) correct that misunderstanding and then replying.

Make a few coherent points and stick to them.

[ShakeZula06]

You can't follow it? It's not that hard. The point of the way I replied is that it is easier to follow because it's point by point.
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Make a few coherent points and stick to them.

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How much time am I going to have spend just to get a response out of you? When i rebutted your not preventing death=murder line you did the same thing. Just because your arguments don't hold much weight doesn't mean you have to make up excuses every time I pick them apart.

[RJT]

The decision one way or the other is an ethical/moral choice. We as a society decided what we want for our collective selves. Theoretically the “rules” should be made in a vacuum, and preferably before an actual hypothetical (in this case, what do we do if a child is born sans arms and legs. - let‘s figure out what we want before such a kid is born. )

Once the “rule” is made we should not change it based on numbers. If our situation gets to the point of being broke, then it becomes a matter of prioritizing such things. But, so long as we are not broke and no wherewithal to about funds, then I don’t think we should change the rules based on the burden. If we don’t want the burden to begin with, then we should decide so before hand.

[Kibby]

So I didn't wade through all 13 pages of posts mostly because a large number of the posts were pointless (no, not yours). To thoughtfully answer the question posed going back to Sklansky's first assertion about the axioms and implications is useful. Let's taking a second to breakdown the question within that frame. I will quote it for reference purposes.

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Assuming the US has a population of 300 million and the wealth it now owns, should a baby born with no arms and no legs, (with no chance of being fixed), but otherwise healthy, be kept alive and healthy by the government if no one else will do it?

If you answered yes to that question, my second question postulates that ten percent of all children are all of a sudden born that way. Same answer? If so what would the percentage have to be for you to change your answer?

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I will generalize the two questions posed for simplicity.

Q1: With great wealth, should a group people provide comfort for a member of society that is likely to be unproductive throughout his life. Assume that the number of people requiring this assistance is small.

Q2: What if the number of people is large?

Here are the axioms I will use to make my argument.

1) Providing care for a person (personally) encourages others to provide care for other people.
2) When resources are expended to care for unproductive members of society, resentment can grow within those who are productive, but accumulate less wealth (don't make as much $$$)
3) The goal of government is to promote a harmonious, healthy society.

Those axioms in place, let's look at out choices in terms of the two questions. Between both questions, we either have the choice to expend resources on unproductive members of society to care for them or not to.

Q1- I believe the proper thing to do here is to care for the unproductive members of society. We do this because we wish to demonstrate that people are valuable and that its a good thing to ameliorate the pain of others. The burden, spread across the country, is minimal compared to our capacity to generate resources. (If someone wants to debate this point. . . good luck) There are plenty of examples of harmonious societies that care for unproductive citizens in this way. Moreover, those societies also tend to have lower crime rates and lower infant mortality rates among other indicators of a healthy society.

Q2- The government should not support these people. The implication would be that, on average, 1/9th of every person's labor would be going to support those who are unproductive. This would lead to instability as those at the lower ends of the economic ladder would naturally protest this situation. In terms of economic competition globally, this would cripple any society. While there may be an example, I can't think of any nation that has greater then 10% of its population unproductive from birth, supported that segment of the population and has sustained that support through a generation.


Thoughts?

[RedJoker]

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I didn't wade through all 13 pages of posts

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Go to your settings on the 'my home' page. Change posts per page to 99, then you only have two pages to go through.

[jogger08152]

kibby wrote:
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Q2- The government should not support these people. The implication would be that, on average, 1/9th of every person's labor would be going to support those who are unproductive.

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Out of curiosity, do you favor cutting existing federal taxes? I would guess that 1/9th of all dollars - that is, maybe 1/3 of all Federal tax dollars - are "wasted" already, no? A fun current example as far as tax dollars go is the death of Gerald Ford: American taxpayers are going to pay for every (non-military, presumably) Federal worker to take the day off on Tuesday to "mourn" ex-president Gerald Ford's passing. Figure that's about .5% of the work year essentially wasted. (My apologies to any federal employee who is genuinely deeply saddened by the loss of our ex-president Ford. I hope I didn't hurt either of your feelings.)

kibby wrote:
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This would lead to instability as those at the lower ends of the economic ladder would naturally protest this situation.

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The lower end of the economic ladder would (in our hypothetical) be comprised largely of legless, armless folks, many of whom would not protest their own ongoing maintenance.

[blackize]

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No human is obligated to help any other human. It might be better for society if we do...
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Disagree, disagree, disagree. You are, and not because it's beneficial for society. You are because you're a human being and see some other human being in need. Simple as that. I assume we won't reach agreement on this point, so we might simply let it rest.

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This is a belief that has been thrust upon you by religion, tradition, and culture.

The strong survive. Helping the weak only serves to weaken the strong. As a society we help eachother because we all give back in some way and that is better than each man trying to do everything on his own. Dogs hunt in packs because it is more efficient than hunting alone. Humans live in communities because it is more efficient and productive than living alone. Helping those who cannot help you or anyone else in any way only serves to weaken those who can be of use to society.

[blackize]

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What makes this 3rd world argument a bad one is that it doesn't, at the surface of it, takes into account the shere size of the numbers. You humanly can't help all of them. So whatever you do, you can only do a limited piece of good. But with that acknowleged, the whole argumentation changes considerably with regards to that one limbless child that we were originally talking about.


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Under your moral code you should give all that you can to help as many as you can. Size has nothing to do with it.


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From a practical point of view, there is (btw. that's why I said: in one sense yes, in many others, no. - I agree that philosophically, the two kids demand the very same ethical response from you.)
One resaon is, that you have a life of your own and a right to that life. Also, you probably have people around you, wife, kids, friends etc. Those (at least your kids and wife) have some sort of right to your existence as well.
If you now very nobly sell all your ownings and donate it to food for the world and silently die naked in the next forrest, you help them, but at the cost of your life, which is one thing. Just very, very rarely can you form a coherent argument that morally obliges you to give your life for others. But more, you also ruin the life of your wife and kids. So helping those African kids in this extreme way is out very easily.

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Well under your morales you don't give EVERYTHING you have obviously. You give everything that you don't need to sustain yourself and your family or until there is no one left to help. What you are arguing for is communism.

[blackize]

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Out of curiosity, do you favor cutting existing federal taxes? I would guess that 1/9th of all dollars - that is, maybe 1/3 of all Federal tax dollars - are "wasted" already, no? A fun current example as far as tax dollars go is the death of Gerald Ford: American taxpayers are going to pay for every (non-military, presumably) Federal worker to take the day off on Tuesday to "mourn" ex-president Gerald Ford's passing. Figure that's about .5% of the work year essentially wasted. (My apologies to any federal employee who is genuinely deeply saddened by the loss of our ex-president Ford. I hope I didn't hurt either of your feelings.)

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Many many tax dollars are wasted now. It's probably a very large percentage of tax dollars. I hate to see it, but there isn't much I can do aside from voting for people who don't believe in frivolous spending and writing my current representatives. Both of which I have done.

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The lower end of the economic ladder would (in our hypothetical) be comprised largely of legless, armless folks, many of whom would not protest their own ongoing maintenance.

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Well essentially it would create a new lower class composed of the handicapped folks. The people slightly above them would still be in poverty and complaining heavily.


On a related note and mostly directed to freteloo:

Do you believe that the government should support those who are capable of working but either choose not to or don't have the skills to get a job that would allow them to live above the poverty line?

[Piemaster]

Fret, you use the word 'obliged' a lot on your answers. Could you explain what 'obliged' means in this context? Do you mean that you are obligated to do so if your moral code dictates or do you mean that you should be forced to do it by law and punished if you don't?