BrianBaru wrote: ↑Thu Jan 25, 2024 11:34 pm
I will posit the idea that there are moral absolutes. These absolutes do not limit our choices because we have free will, and we can do what we want. But we can apply a fairly simple standard to know if what we do is moral.
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Those are biggies and obvious examples of immoral behavior – actions that do not continue the species. Other actions need more thought.
So, your ultimate standard of morality is the continuation of humanity? That sounds reasonable. Here's what I suggest you do if you really want to follow that standard of morality:
1. Kill off every world leader who is interested on their own gain and power rather than the good of humanity, since they can't be relied upon to not do something like destroy the human race if it means they become more powerful.
2. Destroy the nuclear arsenal of every country on Earth. Also kill off everyone who knows anything about nuclear theory to prevent them ever making such a weapon and risking the planet's destruction. Oh, that includes 90% of those of us in first-world countries, by the way, who paid minimal attention in chemistry class. Similarly, make sure that no highly destructive technology is in the hands of the public where it could be used by power-hungry individuals or terrorists in order to destroy everyone.
3. Formally take control of the world as a supreme dictator. Now, you are mostly free from the dangers of any desire for power you might have, since you have absolute power. You might feel tempted to kill off a few peasants now and then who you really despise, but that's okay. After all, it's for the good of humanity.
4. Set up a limited group of people to keep an eye on everyone else, all of whom report directly to you and are under some form of mind-control (very severe threats may also work). Better yet, use machines, since they definitely won't betray you and risk destroying the world and everyone on it.
5. Start a eugenics program where you breed humans for maximum physical capabilities and minimum mental ones. After all, if we are all brain-dead, we are unlikely to reinvent weapons of mass destruction.
Now, chances are you (and everyone else on this thread) find the scenario I just proposed horrendous and immoral. Why? Sure, it involves the death of a billion people or so, but we're currently struggling with an overpopulation crisis, not an underpopulation one. Furthermore, this would kick the world back to a pre-industrial society, and pre-industrial societies tend to be more stable in terms of population. Underpopulation wouldn't be an issue, either, then. This plan, if followed completely, has a high cost in human capital but would prevent our death as a race by nuclear war, accidentally causing a hostile alien species to hate and destroy us, extreme-scale terrorism, etc.
BrianBaru wrote: ↑Thu Jan 25, 2024 11:34 pm
And so on. Yes, a simple standard.
My point is this: it isn't. If morality is to ensure the survival of humanity, then the best way I see to do it involves mass murder, violation of individual freedom, and so on.
BrianBaru wrote: ↑Thu Jan 25, 2024 11:34 pm
Abortion. If everyone aborted their young, we would not bear children, and we would die out after a short time.
Homosexuality. Similar to abortion, the species would die out if everyone only had sex with the same sex.
For this, let's presume that it is moral to ensure that humanity will survive. By that logic, there was a time when abortion and morality were certainly both evil. If even 25% of people had been homosexual and aborted all their pregnancies 2000 years ago, humanity would have been at risk of dying out within a few hundred years because the life expectancy was so low and the mortality rate so high.
These days, however, we have the opposite problem. Populations are too high to live comfortably. I would argue that this is why most people don't have any problem with abortions or homosexuality these days. After all, your personal choices are not likely to destroy a race of 8 billion people and counting. Once our population peaks and begins to decline again, perhaps abortions and homosexuality will be viewed as "wrong" again, and the population will slowly return to equilibrium. After all, I'm not aware of any gene that guarantees a desire to have abortions or be homosexual: these are qualities that are suppressed by a society in which they are actively harmful, but keep a wealthy, overpopulated society from destroying itself. If everyone was homosexual, the birth rate would be extremely low, right? But, Brian, are you homosexual? I would expect not, from what you've said. Even if you are, I presume you have chosen to still lead a heterosexual life. Likewise, I highly doubt that everyone will suddenly get up and choose to become homosexual, thus dooming humanity. It reminds me of an analogy I heard once. A couple is sitting in their dining room, and they read an article in a newspaper that says that a supervised drug consumption site is opening in their neighbourhood. Are they going to suddenly go get high because its been opened? No.
BrianBaru wrote: ↑Thu Jan 25, 2024 11:34 pm
Stealing. If everyone stole, there would be no incentive to produce, since the fruit of the labor would be taken. Not unlike Margaret Thatcher’s admonition that “The problem with Socialism is that eventually you run out of other people’s money.” If everyone simply took what they wanted, producers would stop producing, or “Go Gault”
Here you're presuming a capitalist, industrial society, and then demonstrating that socialism doesn't work in such a society. However, there have been numerous societies in which there was no concept of money or property. With technological advancements, these societies have become more and more rare, but it still doesn't make sense to presume that our concept of money and ownership is the only one in existence. I'm reminded here of stamp scrip, a currency in which each dollar bill (for example) needs a stamp a day or else it loses its value. Each stamp, in turn, costs 1 cent. This is a perfectly reasonable economic system, which has been historically very effective at combating inflation. Of course, it's a system which isn't in common usage because the rich and powerful generally don't like becoming less rich and powerful. Ironically, the payment of scrip of any kind was made illegal in the US in 1938. Did this protect some workers who were being paid useless wages? Yes. Did it also ensure that any "socialist" system of managing currency such as stamp scrip or—God forbid—outright communism run on the foundations of human decency wouldn't be successful? Also yes.
Sure, theft isn't a very effective survival strategy for humanity. But property itself isn't a fundamental human constant in the way most of us view it today. We're so tied up in our own biases that we think the world is obvious, but it really isn't. What is obvious is our own biases and presumptions. It's why politics and religion are so controversial.