Re: Mind's Eye Re: Towards a modern morality

" world peace " and " world based on modern morality " ...

Any formal morality would have to bring in the police and justice
system, not unlike what we already have. There too many variables to
prevent violations and transgressions... one's environment and
upbringing, which can have "values" or cases unrecognisably different
within each; country to country, community and societal, differences;
mental and spiritual weaknesses from individual to individual; etc.

Strictly speaking, the route to enforcing uniformity in such variety
or diversity will always tend to fascist structure. The grand vision
will only be willingly internalised by one, at most by few.

And I have the impression that more people talk of world peace, the
more wars they bring upon us.

The informal morality is different... being specific to the individual
and much like clarifying one's own intent and guiding one's own action
to 1) respecting diversity and life everywhere enough to contribute or
do no harm to the potential of each attaining their own fullness 2)
believing, instituting, simple and well known universal values as may
be found in French constitution or are included in Declaration of
Human Rights 3) accord with agreed global programs to prevent hunger,
limit population, promote and provide basic sanitation and drinking
water needs, food growth, education, democratic ways, livelihood, etc.

Whatever "modern" morality may be... it may be educative but not
enforceable without structures to oversee, prevent and punish
transgression.

On May 30, 10:53 pm, archytas <nwte...@gmail.com> wrote:
> My rather lengthy response has just blown up!  My view is the world is
> a rotten place and 'moral blather' serves more to cover this up than
> change anything.  This is easy enough to say.  The conundrum is we do
> know people should live in peace - but to say this is to 'enforce
> liberalism' - often one of Gabby's points - one that is found in the
> Lyotard-Habermas debates.  Once ideology is extirpated as Habermas
> wanted, one must act on what is left.  How do we know this isn't just
> a rationalist fantasy?  Even the Nazi's self-justified as "rational".
> Habermas had been caught up in the Hitler youth as a kid (as we all
> would if German at the time), but was as anti-Nazi as any intellectual
> could be.  He wanted us to act against and ideal-type free speech
> situation where only the power of Reason was in play.  The key problem
> with this is there are no rational humans.  Habermas knew this - hence
> the 'ideal-type' (which comes from Max Weber).  Once you know the
> rational in any totality you are doomed to act in accordance as their
> can be no decision (there may be alternatives as in quadrilateral
> equations with two solutions).  This itself may be no more than
> 'rational terror' (and of course just another control group pretending
> to be objective but really acting on their hidden agenda).
>
> I have little doubt science has shown up humanity as irrational and
> just a more dangerous animal than others.  The question for me is how
> we develop a real live and let live morality that recognises some form
> of peaceful policing has to be in effect because we are inclined to
> cheat and exploit.  We have a world in which much we think of as human
> rights (e.g. breeding) lead to disasters like overpopulation - the
> tragedy of the Commons writ large.  Who amongst us really wants to
> deny a couple a child, or yet another carbon foot-print to exist?  Yet
> which of us wants to allow another birth into grinding poverty and
> early death?  These matters look unanswerable in our current
> morality.  Yet at the centre of evil Catholicism, Italy has
> constrained its population growth without 'Chinese law' - so maybe the
> moral argument is defeated by economics (kids are expensive, ruin
> female figures etc.) - though even such population curbing leads to
> older societies and a shortage of productive workers (etc.).  I would
> not have been born as a third child under more restrictive population
> control - though it's likely there would have been room given the
> broader lack of breeding in my own country.  What of those people who
> think procreation is work done for god?
>
> My sense of current morality is that it dodges the issues we need to
> address - from world peace and lack of terror to work ethic.  I'll try
> and find time later to draw up a glimpse of a world based on modern
> morality later (Lee's suggestion).  We could all do this - not to come
> up with the solution - but fictions from which we might track back to
> what would need to change to make them possibilities.
>
> On May 30, 5:14 pm, Allan H <allanh1...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> > To use do no harm,, really means one must look at your actions and
> > take responsibility for them..  It seems that the people start writing laws
> > they are trying to figure out  how to get around  the concept thus trying
> > to avoid responsibility.
> > Allan
>
> > On Wed, May 30, 2012 at 6:03 PM, malcymo <malc...@gmail.com> wrote:
> > > That to understand just what is causing harm is sometimes beyond our
> > > capabilities. Are not some issues so interwoven that to unravel them
> > > and be absolutly  sure that a particular stance is doing the least
> > > harm is very difficult. The chinese seem to understand the ideas of
> > > good "bad thought" and bad "good thoughts" which is their way of
> > > handling the dilema.
>
> > > Having said this, as far is the environment is concerned it seems
> > > pretty clear to most that inorganic shit should not be thrown around
> > > willy nilly. This like many other examples seem to be self evident.
> > > But maybe only in the sense that they are good for our survival.
> > > Nature itself, in some ways, is totally without morallity.
>
> > > Sometimes I think that the best we can do is to be selfless and try to
> > > act for our perceived good of nature AND hope that our perceptions are
> > > right.
>
> > > On May 30, 1:33 am, Allan H <allanh1...@gmail.com> wrote:
> > > > The law of do no harm is not impossible but rather a simple guideline
> > > that
> > > > is very workable. I know people are always coming up with things like
> > > > killing and animal for food is causing harm. the concept is really use
> > > what
> > > > you need and not destroy the enviorment doing it,  the questions should
> > > be
> > > > if you are a family  of four do you need a 10,000 sq ft house.
> > > > the other part comes form living a luxurious life style at the expense of
> > > > others especially the poor, or wear the latest fashions that are made by
> > > > slave labor in the USA or else where.. and yes they do exist. or
> > > eliminate
> > > > employment so you can have a fatter salary.
>
> > > > The real problem is  understanding just what is causing harm..  the
> > > > solution does not lie in creating laws. just so people can break them. It
> > > > seems most laws today are written  to allow people to get around this
> > > very
> > > > law.
> > > > Allan
> > > >  On May 29, 2012 12:03 PM, "Lee Douglas" <leerevdoug...@gmail.com>
> > > wrote:
>
> > > > > Do no harm is broad brush, and kind of impossible to live by though
> > > innit?
>
> > > > > On Friday, 18 May 2012 05:13:01 UTC+1, archytas wrote:
>
> > > > >> My stance towards most moralising is one of incredulity, yet I'm a
> > > > >> moraliser and believe most of our problems lie in our lack of personal
> > > > >> and collective morality.  Economics as our political and business
> > > > >> class practice it is fundamentally immoral against a scientific world-
> > > > >> view,  My view of science is that it is full of values and the notion
> > > > >> of it as value-free is a total and totalising dud.  Only lay people
> > > > >> with no experience of doing science hold the "value-free" notion of
> > > > >> science.
>
> > > > >> You can explore some of the moral issues arising in modern science in
> > > > >> a lengthy book review at London Review of Books -
> > > > >>http://www.lrb.co.uk/v34/n10/**malcolm-bull/what-is-the-**
> > > > >> rational-response<
> > >http://www.lrb.co.uk/v34/n10/malcolm-bull/what-is-the-rational-response>.
>
> > > > >> The book's topic is climate change.
>
> > > > >> Coming up to 60 I regard the world as a abject failure against the
> > > > >> promises I thought were being made in politics.  I'm a world-weary old
> > > > >> fart now, tending to see the generations coming up as narcissist
> > > > >> wastrels who don't know what hard work is (etc.) though I think the
> > > > >> blame is ours, not theirs.  I think the problem is our attitude
> > > > >> towards morality.  The tendency in history is to focus on religion for
> > > > >> moral advice - this is utterly corrupt and we have forgotten that much
> > > > >> religious morality is actually a reaction against unfairness and the
> > > > >> wicked control of our lives by the rich.  It is this latter factor
> > > > >> that is repeating itself.
>
> > > > >> Much moralising concerns sex.  This all largely based in old fables
> > > > >> for population control we can still find in primitive societies such
> > > > >> as 'sperm control by fellatio' (Sambians) and non-penetrative youth
> > > > >> sex (Kikuyu) etc. - and stuff like 'the silver ring thing'.  The
> > > > >> modern issue is population control and that we can achieve this
> > > > >> without sexual moralising - the moral issues are about quality of
> > > > >> life, women as other than child-bearing vessels and so on.  We have
> > > > >> failed almost entirely except in developed countries - to such an
> > > > >> extent the world population has trebled in my lifetime despite
> > > > >> economic factors driving down birth-rates in developed countries
> > > > >> without the kind of restrictions such as China enforced.
>
> > > > >> We are still at war.
>
> > > > >> Our economics is still based in "growth" and "consumption" and notions
> > > > >> human beings should work hard - when in fact the amount of work we
> > > > >> need to do probably equates to 3 days a week for 6 months of a year.
> > > > >> 75% of GDP is in services and only 6% in really hard work like
> > > > >> agriculture.  We could have a great deal more through doing less and
> > > > >> doing what we do with more regard for conservation and very different
> > > > >> scientific advance.  My view is it's immoral that we won't take
> > > > >> responsibility for this and review our failures.  I believe this
> > > > >> failure inhibits our spiritual growth and renders us simply animal.
>
> > > > >> Human life may be much less than I value it at and just a purposeless
> > > > >> farce.  The first step in a new attitude towards morality is to
> > > > >> consider living with a scientific world-view.  The implications of
> > > > >> this are complex and probably entail shaking ourselves from a false-
> > > > >> consciousness to be able to see what is being done in our name.  We
> > > > >> need a modern morality not based in the creation of fear and demons to
> > > > >> enforce it, or the feeble existential view of the individual.  We are
> > > > >> social animals and need to get back to some basics developed with
> > > > >> modern knowledge, not in past religious and empire disasters.
>
> > > > >> Religion has a role in this in my view - religion we might recapture
> > > > >> from sensible history - I'd recommend David Graeber's 'Debt: the first
> > > > >> 5000 years' as a read here.
>
> > --
> >  (
> >   )
> > |_D Allan
>
> > Life is for moral, ethical and truthful living.