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Old 11-13-2007, 02:07 PM
VarlosZ VarlosZ is offline
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Join Date: Mar 2004
Location: Manhattan
Posts: 1,694
Default Re: Moral relativity

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If not, and here is the trap for the yes voters, then you must be an ACist.

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Jesus [censored] Christ. Are you serious?

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My morality (which I believe is objective) says taxation is wrong. You lose nothing if you switch to my morality (as all morality is equal) so logically you must switch to my morality. Right.

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Incorrect. I lose the morality that I prefer, the one that seems best to me given my (ultimately arbitrary) standards, and the one that gives me the most satisfaction. This is really obvious.

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So your morality is objectively better than mine . . .

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No. My morality is subjectively better; i.e., it is preferred by me.

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. . . and your objective standard is "whatever gives me (you) the most satisfaction".

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Absolutely not. My subjective standard is "whatever creates the most overall utility."

As a self-interested actor, I lose a great deal by sublimating my morality to yours. I go around thinking that I'm causing harm all the time and calling it justified: misery ensues. And since I think that I'm causing harm, there's nothing to counterbalance my misery -- in fact, the harm I'm doing to others only adds to the negative side of the ledger, and at the realization of that, my own misery grows even stronger.
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