He won. The “West Wing” scenario played out exactly as–
Uh oh.
Has anyone checked on Joe Biden?
PAD
456 comments on “I’ll be darned”
State’s Rights is just an argument for ignoring Federal law, which could lead to laws in a few states creating equal-but-separate drinking fountains for Gays and straights.
You might not have gotten to the civil rights era in your education, but the supreme court ruled laws enforcing segregation unconstitutional in Brown v Kansas, overturning the equal-but-separate justification established at the turn of the previous century.
In response to Micha’s excellent post, I have one quibble and one substantive disagreement.
Quibble: We don’t murder other people not because somebody presented us with a logical argument about mudering, we do it because we care about life. a sociopath might understand logic, but he doesn’t understand that.
Actually the smarter ones will understand that but just not give a dámņ. In fact, their recognition that other people feel that way sometimes gives them another tool/weapon to play with.
The bigger problem, though, is that I don’t entirely accept utilitarianism. There are two problems with it, as I see it. One is that it’s impossible. As you note, happiness and harm are subjective states of mind. The problem then becomes that weighing, for instance, whether, for instance, “A: It is wrong to deny gays the happiness of marriage as it does not cause any harm that would justify denying them the good of marriage” or “B: It is right to deny gays the good of marriage as it is harmful for society” requires us to quantify and balance things that are both subjective and impossible to quantify. For one thing, it’s not like we can whip out a Utility-O-Meter (TM, patent pending) to measure units of happiness and harm. It’s not clear whether all people experience harm and happiness the same way. It’s entirely possible that some people suffer inordinately, and would not such a person suffering a loss in happiness count extra in the balance? Epistemology totally screws over utilitarianism.
The other reason is that utilitarianism is utterly unprincipled. If happiness is promoted, individual rights are completely negotiable. John Stuart Mill tried to make an argument for absolute free speech rights on the theory that, in the long run, happiness is maximized by promoting free speech. The problem is that it is based on an empirical claim; what happens if it can be shown that happiness is maximized if we have absolute free speech but with three exceptions? The happiness/harm principle dictates that we allow those exceptions, and if necessary lie to the public about it to promote the happiness that comes from free speech “guarantees.”
There is one form of utilitarianism that I don’t think any rational/sane person can disagree with, and that’s Pareto efficiency. Basically it stands for the proposition that if at least one person benefits from position X vs position Y, and nobody benefits from Y vs X, then the Pareto maximal result is X instead of Y. That’s essentially the reasoning behind my support for gay marriage. At least some people (gays who want to get married) gain some benefit, and nobody loses anything except hurt feelings, which is a harm for which I have almost complete disdain. Therefore I think gay marriage is something we should move toward. Here in the real world, that may mean a gradual adoption, but I’m fairly convinced that there is an ultimately “right” answer.
I’m not kidding about my disregard for hurt feelings, by the way. It’s much the same reasoning behind my opposition to college speech codes. I remember my freshman writing handbook had an assignment wherein we were supposed to rewrite a section of Mark Twain’s Old Times on the Mississippi to make it more gender neutral and inclusive because its use of the generic “he” excluded women. In fact, we weren’t supposed to use the term “freshman” in “freshman class” because the term had too much baggage. My basic response was “oh, grow the hëll up.”
In response to Micha’s excellent post, I have one quibble and one substantive disagreement.
Quibble: We don’t murder other people not because somebody presented us with a logical argument about mudering, we do it because we care about life. a sociopath might understand logic, but he doesn’t understand that.
Actually the smarter ones will understand that but just not give a dámņ. In fact, their recognition that other people feel that way sometimes gives them another tool/weapon to play with.
The bigger problem, though, is that I don’t entirely accept utilitarianism. There are two problems with it, as I see it. One is that it’s impossible. As you note, happiness and harm are subjective states of mind. The problem then becomes that weighing, for instance, whether, for instance, “A: It is wrong to deny gays the happiness of marriage as it does not cause any harm that would justify denying them the good of marriage” or “B: It is right to deny gays the good of marriage as it is harmful for society” requires us to quantify and balance things that are both subjective and impossible to quantify. For one thing, it’s not like we can whip out a Utility-O-Meter (TM, patent pending) to measure units of happiness and harm. It’s not clear whether all people experience harm and happiness the same way. It’s entirely possible that some people suffer inordinately, and would not such a person suffering a loss in happiness count extra in the balance? Epistemology totally screws over utilitarianism.
The other reason is that utilitarianism is utterly unprincipled. If happiness is promoted, individual rights are completely negotiable. John Stuart Mill tried to make an argument for absolute free speech rights on the theory that, in the long run, happiness is maximized by promoting free speech. The problem is that it is based on an empirical claim; what happens if it can be shown that happiness is maximized if we have absolute free speech but with three exceptions? The happiness/harm principle dictates that we allow those exceptions, and if necessary lie to the public about it to promote the happiness that comes from free speech “guarantees.”
There is one form of utilitarianism that I don’t think any rational/sane person can disagree with, and that’s Pareto efficiency. Basically it stands for the proposition that if at least one person benefits from position X vs position Y, and nobody benefits from Y vs X, then the Pareto maximal result is X instead of Y. That’s essentially the reasoning behind my support for gay marriage. At least some people (gays who want to get married) gain some benefit, and nobody loses anything except hurt feelings, which is a harm for which I have almost complete disdain. Therefore I think gay marriage is something we should move toward. Here in the real world, that may mean a gradual adoption, but I’m fairly convinced that there is an ultimately “right” answer.
I’m not kidding about my disregard for hurt feelings, by the way. It’s much the same reasoning behind my opposition to college speech codes. I remember my freshman writing handbook had an assignment wherein we were supposed to rewrite a section of Mark Twain’s Old Times on the Mississippi to make it more gender neutral and inclusive because its use of the generic “he” excluded women. In fact, we weren’t supposed to use the term “freshman” in “freshman class” because the term had too much baggage. My basic response was “oh, grow the hëll up.”
I went to a yellow-dog-liberal art school in NYC, and we had nothing resembling a PC police. So when people complain about college political correctness, my default question is “why the hëll didn’t you just go to a sane school?”
Thanks for the compliment David.
1. “The bigger problem, though, is that I don’t entirely accept utilitarianism.”
Neither do I. My knowledge in ethics is very limited. But the impression I got from my studies was how difficult it is for philosophy to come up with a nice neat coherent system of morality. Every system ends up feeling wrong, having holes, being counterintuitive.
However, I do think that that the basis of any human morality is the subjective feeling of harm/wellbeing. Morality cannot be found anywhere else.
So utilitarianism starts from the right place, but when you start trying to take in in a systematic quantitative direction things start to fall apart.
Moreover the assumption of utilitarianism of maximizing wellbeing to everyone is not rationally based either.
2. “As you note, happiness and harm are subjective states of mind. The problem then becomes that weighing, for instance, whether, for instance, “A: It is wrong to deny gays the happiness of marriage as it does not cause any harm that would justify denying them the good of marriage” or “B: It is right to deny gays the good of marriage as it is harmful for society” requires us to quantify and balance things that are both subjective and impossible to quantify. For one thing, it’s not like we can whip out a Utility-O-Meter (TM, patent pending) to measure units of happiness and harm. It’s not clear whether all people experience harm and happiness the same way. It’s entirely possible that some people suffer inordinately, and would not such a person suffering a loss in happiness count extra in the balance? Epistemology totally screws over utilitarianism.”
3. True, the idea of utilitarianism of systematically quantifying and measuring harm and happiness doesn’t seem to work. Yet at the same time, strangely is seems that regular everyday human morality involves weighing and balancing harm and happiness, but not in a mathematical systematic way.
4. “The other reason is that utilitarianism is utterly unprincipled.”
Not unprincipled. It’s just that the principles of utilitarianism don’t seem to fit our everyday morality. It’s kind of strange: philosphers try to come up with a system of morality, but when it doesn’t fit the morality that they already have –but which is not systematic — then they reject utilitarianism as insufficient.
5. “If happiness is promoted, individual rights are completely negotiable. John Stuart Mill tried to make an argument for absolute free speech rights on the theory that, in the long run, happiness is maximized by promoting free speech. The problem is that it is based on an empirical claim; what happens if it can be shown that happiness is maximized if we have absolute free speech but with three exceptions? The happiness/harm principle dictates that we allow those exceptions, and if necessary lie to the public about it to promote the happiness that comes from free speech “guarantees.””
This is one of the cases where utilitarianism seems at odd with our everyday concept of morality. Yet, what is the justification for free speech? It is not justified for its own sake but because (a) denying freedom is considered a form of harm to individuals (b) free speech is considered beneficial to society, which means that it increases the well being (better term than happiness) to the members of society. Moreover, what are the justifications for restrictions of free speech in modern democratic society? Mostly considerations of harm, no? (Libel and slander also involve the concept of truth, but why does truth matter? does it stand on it own, or is it also connected to wellbeing/harm? Whatever the case, it does seem that truth matters because it matters to us, and not because it has objective value).
7. “There is one form of utilitarianism that I don’t think any rational/sane person can disagree with, and that’s Pareto efficiency.”
That’s because it fits with our regular morality. But the thing is that we regularly don’t reach the moral conclusion of this system by solving a mathematical of logical equation.
8. “Basically it stands for the proposition that if at least one person benefits from position X vs position Y, and nobody benefits from Y vs X, then the Pareto maximal result is X instead of Y. That’s essentially the reasoning behind my support for gay marriage. At least some people (gays who want to get married) gain some benefit, and nobody loses anything except hurt feelings, which is a harm for which I have almost complete disdain. Therefore I think gay marriage is something we should move toward. Here in the real world, that may mean a gradual adoption, but I’m fairly convinced that there is an ultimately “right” answer.”
Yet, you weigh against the happiness of gays other legal and social considerations which seem to you (perhaps correctly) to justify delaying their happiness. This is not criticism. You did not apply utilitarianism as a system, but at he same time you did weigh and balance and measure considerations of happiness and harm.
However, I think the people who oppose gay marriages do believe it will cause harm. Although another twist to the problem is what constitutes harm — harm to society? harm to gays themselves? harm to their immortal souls? to something sacred? Our argument is about whether their is harm, and if there is, is it suficient to justify restricting the happiness of gays.
9. “I’m not kidding about my disregard for hurt feelings, by the way.”
I don’t think you do. It’s not like feelings don’t matter. human interaction does involve caring about he feelings of others. You don’t go around insulting people just for the fun of it. But again the harm of hurthing someones feelings is measured against other considerations. That’s also part of human interaction.
In the case of political correctness it went even beyond that, because the feeling was that the sensitivity behind it went beyond a certain acceptable degree and/or was insincere and politically motivated.
10. The point of this whole discussion is this: on the one hand it seems difficult if not impossible to come up with a sure system of morality. Yet at he same time here we are having an intelligable moral discussion. Strange but true.
Thanks for the compliment David.
1. “The bigger problem, though, is that I don’t entirely accept utilitarianism.”
Neither do I. My knowledge in ethics is very limited. But the impression I got from my studies was how difficult it is for philosophy to come up with a nice neat coherent system of morality. Every system ends up feeling wrong, having holes, being counterintuitive.
However, I do think that that the basis of any human morality is the subjective feeling of harm/wellbeing. Morality cannot be found anywhere else.
So utilitarianism starts from the right place, but when you start trying to take in in a systematic quantitative direction things start to fall apart.
Moreover the assumption of utilitarianism of maximizing wellbeing to everyone is not rationally based either.
2. “As you note, happiness and harm are subjective states of mind. The problem then becomes that weighing, for instance, whether, for instance, “A: It is wrong to deny gays the happiness of marriage as it does not cause any harm that would justify denying them the good of marriage” or “B: It is right to deny gays the good of marriage as it is harmful for society” requires us to quantify and balance things that are both subjective and impossible to quantify. For one thing, it’s not like we can whip out a Utility-O-Meter (TM, patent pending) to measure units of happiness and harm. It’s not clear whether all people experience harm and happiness the same way. It’s entirely possible that some people suffer inordinately, and would not such a person suffering a loss in happiness count extra in the balance? Epistemology totally screws over utilitarianism.”
3. True, the idea of utilitarianism of systematically quantifying and measuring harm and happiness doesn’t seem to work. Yet at the same time, strangely is seems that regular everyday human morality involves weighing and balancing harm and happiness, but not in a mathematical systematic way.
4. “The other reason is that utilitarianism is utterly unprincipled.”
Not unprincipled. It’s just that the principles of utilitarianism don’t seem to fit our everyday morality. It’s kind of strange: philosphers try to come up with a system of morality, but when it doesn’t fit the morality that they already have –but which is not systematic — then they reject utilitarianism as insufficient.
5. “If happiness is promoted, individual rights are completely negotiable. John Stuart Mill tried to make an argument for absolute free speech rights on the theory that, in the long run, happiness is maximized by promoting free speech. The problem is that it is based on an empirical claim; what happens if it can be shown that happiness is maximized if we have absolute free speech but with three exceptions? The happiness/harm principle dictates that we allow those exceptions, and if necessary lie to the public about it to promote the happiness that comes from free speech “guarantees.””
This is one of the cases where utilitarianism seems at odd with our everyday concept of morality. Yet, what is the justification for free speech? It is not justified for its own sake but because (a) denying freedom is considered a form of harm to individuals (b) free speech is considered beneficial to society, which means that it increases the well being (better term than happiness) to the members of society. Moreover, what are the justifications for restrictions of free speech in modern democratic society? Mostly considerations of harm, no? (Libel and slander also involve the concept of truth, but why does truth matter? does it stand on it own, or is it also connected to wellbeing/harm? Whatever the case, it does seem that truth matters because it matters to us, and not because it has objective value).
7. “There is one form of utilitarianism that I don’t think any rational/sane person can disagree with, and that’s Pareto efficiency.”
That’s because it fits with our regular morality. But the thing is that we regularly don’t reach the moral conclusion of this system by solving a mathematical of logical equation.
8. “Basically it stands for the proposition that if at least one person benefits from position X vs position Y, and nobody benefits from Y vs X, then the Pareto maximal result is X instead of Y. That’s essentially the reasoning behind my support for gay marriage. At least some people (gays who want to get married) gain some benefit, and nobody loses anything except hurt feelings, which is a harm for which I have almost complete disdain. Therefore I think gay marriage is something we should move toward. Here in the real world, that may mean a gradual adoption, but I’m fairly convinced that there is an ultimately “right” answer.”
Yet, you weigh against the happiness of gays other legal and social considerations which seem to you (perhaps correctly) to justify delaying their happiness. This is not criticism. You did not apply utilitarianism as a system, but at he same time you did weigh and balance and measure considerations of happiness and harm.
However, I think the people who oppose gay marriages do believe it will cause harm. Although another twist to the problem is what constitutes harm — harm to society? harm to gays themselves? harm to their immortal souls? to something sacred? Our argument is about whether their is harm, and if there is, is it suficient to justify restricting the happiness of gays.
9. “I’m not kidding about my disregard for hurt feelings, by the way.”
I don’t think you do. It’s not like feelings don’t matter. human interaction does involve caring about he feelings of others. You don’t go around insulting people just for the fun of it. But again the harm of hurthing someones feelings is measured against other considerations. That’s also part of human interaction.
In the case of political correctness it went even beyond that, because the feeling was that the sensitivity behind it went beyond a certain acceptable degree and/or was insincere and politically motivated.
10. The point of this whole discussion is this: on the one hand it seems difficult if not impossible to come up with a sure system of morality. Yet at he same time here we are having an intelligable moral discussion. Strange but true.
• 
You might not have gotten to the civil rights era in your education, but the supreme court ruled laws enforcing segregation unconstitutional in Brown v Kansas, overturning the equal-but-separate justification established at the turn of the previous century.
In response to Micha’s excellent post, I have one quibble and one substantive disagreement.
Quibble: We don’t murder other people not because somebody presented us with a logical argument about mudering, we do it because we care about life. a sociopath might understand logic, but he doesn’t understand that.
Actually the smarter ones will understand that but just not give a dámņ. In fact, their recognition that other people feel that way sometimes gives them another tool/weapon to play with.
The bigger problem, though, is that I don’t entirely accept utilitarianism. There are two problems with it, as I see it. One is that it’s impossible. As you note, happiness and harm are subjective states of mind. The problem then becomes that weighing, for instance, whether, for instance, “A: It is wrong to deny gays the happiness of marriage as it does not cause any harm that would justify denying them the good of marriage” or “B: It is right to deny gays the good of marriage as it is harmful for society” requires us to quantify and balance things that are both subjective and impossible to quantify. For one thing, it’s not like we can whip out a Utility-O-Meter (TM, patent pending) to measure units of happiness and harm. It’s not clear whether all people experience harm and happiness the same way. It’s entirely possible that some people suffer inordinately, and would not such a person suffering a loss in happiness count extra in the balance? Epistemology totally screws over utilitarianism.
The other reason is that utilitarianism is utterly unprincipled. If happiness is promoted, individual rights are completely negotiable. John Stuart Mill tried to make an argument for absolute free speech rights on the theory that, in the long run, happiness is maximized by promoting free speech. The problem is that it is based on an empirical claim; what happens if it can be shown that happiness is maximized if we have absolute free speech but with three exceptions? The happiness/harm principle dictates that we allow those exceptions, and if necessary lie to the public about it to promote the happiness that comes from free speech “guarantees.”
There is one form of utilitarianism that I don’t think any rational/sane person can disagree with, and that’s Pareto efficiency. Basically it stands for the proposition that if at least one person benefits from position X vs position Y, and nobody benefits from Y vs X, then the Pareto maximal result is X instead of Y. That’s essentially the reasoning behind my support for gay marriage. At least some people (gays who want to get married) gain some benefit, and nobody loses anything except hurt feelings, which is a harm for which I have almost complete disdain. Therefore I think gay marriage is something we should move toward. Here in the real world, that may mean a gradual adoption, but I’m fairly convinced that there is an ultimately “right” answer.
I’m not kidding about my disregard for hurt feelings, by the way. It’s much the same reasoning behind my opposition to college speech codes. I remember my freshman writing handbook had an assignment wherein we were supposed to rewrite a section of Mark Twain’s Old Times on the Mississippi to make it more gender neutral and inclusive because its use of the generic “he” excluded women. In fact, we weren’t supposed to use the term “freshman” in “freshman class” because the term had too much baggage. My basic response was “oh, grow the hëll up.”
In response to Micha’s excellent post, I have one quibble and one substantive disagreement.
Quibble: We don’t murder other people not because somebody presented us with a logical argument about mudering, we do it because we care about life. a sociopath might understand logic, but he doesn’t understand that.
Actually the smarter ones will understand that but just not give a dámņ. In fact, their recognition that other people feel that way sometimes gives them another tool/weapon to play with.
The bigger problem, though, is that I don’t entirely accept utilitarianism. There are two problems with it, as I see it. One is that it’s impossible. As you note, happiness and harm are subjective states of mind. The problem then becomes that weighing, for instance, whether, for instance, “A: It is wrong to deny gays the happiness of marriage as it does not cause any harm that would justify denying them the good of marriage” or “B: It is right to deny gays the good of marriage as it is harmful for society” requires us to quantify and balance things that are both subjective and impossible to quantify. For one thing, it’s not like we can whip out a Utility-O-Meter (TM, patent pending) to measure units of happiness and harm. It’s not clear whether all people experience harm and happiness the same way. It’s entirely possible that some people suffer inordinately, and would not such a person suffering a loss in happiness count extra in the balance? Epistemology totally screws over utilitarianism.
The other reason is that utilitarianism is utterly unprincipled. If happiness is promoted, individual rights are completely negotiable. John Stuart Mill tried to make an argument for absolute free speech rights on the theory that, in the long run, happiness is maximized by promoting free speech. The problem is that it is based on an empirical claim; what happens if it can be shown that happiness is maximized if we have absolute free speech but with three exceptions? The happiness/harm principle dictates that we allow those exceptions, and if necessary lie to the public about it to promote the happiness that comes from free speech “guarantees.”
There is one form of utilitarianism that I don’t think any rational/sane person can disagree with, and that’s Pareto efficiency. Basically it stands for the proposition that if at least one person benefits from position X vs position Y, and nobody benefits from Y vs X, then the Pareto maximal result is X instead of Y. That’s essentially the reasoning behind my support for gay marriage. At least some people (gays who want to get married) gain some benefit, and nobody loses anything except hurt feelings, which is a harm for which I have almost complete disdain. Therefore I think gay marriage is something we should move toward. Here in the real world, that may mean a gradual adoption, but I’m fairly convinced that there is an ultimately “right” answer.
I’m not kidding about my disregard for hurt feelings, by the way. It’s much the same reasoning behind my opposition to college speech codes. I remember my freshman writing handbook had an assignment wherein we were supposed to rewrite a section of Mark Twain’s Old Times on the Mississippi to make it more gender neutral and inclusive because its use of the generic “he” excluded women. In fact, we weren’t supposed to use the term “freshman” in “freshman class” because the term had too much baggage. My basic response was “oh, grow the hëll up.”
I went to a yellow-dog-liberal art school in NYC, and we had nothing resembling a PC police. So when people complain about college political correctness, my default question is “why the hëll didn’t you just go to a sane school?”
Thanks for the compliment David.
1. “The bigger problem, though, is that I don’t entirely accept utilitarianism.”
Neither do I. My knowledge in ethics is very limited. But the impression I got from my studies was how difficult it is for philosophy to come up with a nice neat coherent system of morality. Every system ends up feeling wrong, having holes, being counterintuitive.
However, I do think that that the basis of any human morality is the subjective feeling of harm/wellbeing. Morality cannot be found anywhere else.
So utilitarianism starts from the right place, but when you start trying to take in in a systematic quantitative direction things start to fall apart.
Moreover the assumption of utilitarianism of maximizing wellbeing to everyone is not rationally based either.
2. “As you note, happiness and harm are subjective states of mind. The problem then becomes that weighing, for instance, whether, for instance, “A: It is wrong to deny gays the happiness of marriage as it does not cause any harm that would justify denying them the good of marriage” or “B: It is right to deny gays the good of marriage as it is harmful for society” requires us to quantify and balance things that are both subjective and impossible to quantify. For one thing, it’s not like we can whip out a Utility-O-Meter (TM, patent pending) to measure units of happiness and harm. It’s not clear whether all people experience harm and happiness the same way. It’s entirely possible that some people suffer inordinately, and would not such a person suffering a loss in happiness count extra in the balance? Epistemology totally screws over utilitarianism.”
3. True, the idea of utilitarianism of systematically quantifying and measuring harm and happiness doesn’t seem to work. Yet at the same time, strangely is seems that regular everyday human morality involves weighing and balancing harm and happiness, but not in a mathematical systematic way.
4. “The other reason is that utilitarianism is utterly unprincipled.”
Not unprincipled. It’s just that the principles of utilitarianism don’t seem to fit our everyday morality. It’s kind of strange: philosphers try to come up with a system of morality, but when it doesn’t fit the morality that they already have –but which is not systematic — then they reject utilitarianism as insufficient.
5. “If happiness is promoted, individual rights are completely negotiable. John Stuart Mill tried to make an argument for absolute free speech rights on the theory that, in the long run, happiness is maximized by promoting free speech. The problem is that it is based on an empirical claim; what happens if it can be shown that happiness is maximized if we have absolute free speech but with three exceptions? The happiness/harm principle dictates that we allow those exceptions, and if necessary lie to the public about it to promote the happiness that comes from free speech “guarantees.””
This is one of the cases where utilitarianism seems at odd with our everyday concept of morality. Yet, what is the justification for free speech? It is not justified for its own sake but because (a) denying freedom is considered a form of harm to individuals (b) free speech is considered beneficial to society, which means that it increases the well being (better term than happiness) to the members of society. Moreover, what are the justifications for restrictions of free speech in modern democratic society? Mostly considerations of harm, no? (Libel and slander also involve the concept of truth, but why does truth matter? does it stand on it own, or is it also connected to wellbeing/harm? Whatever the case, it does seem that truth matters because it matters to us, and not because it has objective value).
7. “There is one form of utilitarianism that I don’t think any rational/sane person can disagree with, and that’s Pareto efficiency.”
That’s because it fits with our regular morality. But the thing is that we regularly don’t reach the moral conclusion of this system by solving a mathematical of logical equation.
8. “Basically it stands for the proposition that if at least one person benefits from position X vs position Y, and nobody benefits from Y vs X, then the Pareto maximal result is X instead of Y. That’s essentially the reasoning behind my support for gay marriage. At least some people (gays who want to get married) gain some benefit, and nobody loses anything except hurt feelings, which is a harm for which I have almost complete disdain. Therefore I think gay marriage is something we should move toward. Here in the real world, that may mean a gradual adoption, but I’m fairly convinced that there is an ultimately “right” answer.”
Yet, you weigh against the happiness of gays other legal and social considerations which seem to you (perhaps correctly) to justify delaying their happiness. This is not criticism. You did not apply utilitarianism as a system, but at he same time you did weigh and balance and measure considerations of happiness and harm.
However, I think the people who oppose gay marriages do believe it will cause harm. Although another twist to the problem is what constitutes harm — harm to society? harm to gays themselves? harm to their immortal souls? to something sacred? Our argument is about whether their is harm, and if there is, is it suficient to justify restricting the happiness of gays.
9. “I’m not kidding about my disregard for hurt feelings, by the way.”
I don’t think you do. It’s not like feelings don’t matter. human interaction does involve caring about he feelings of others. You don’t go around insulting people just for the fun of it. But again the harm of hurthing someones feelings is measured against other considerations. That’s also part of human interaction.
In the case of political correctness it went even beyond that, because the feeling was that the sensitivity behind it went beyond a certain acceptable degree and/or was insincere and politically motivated.
10. The point of this whole discussion is this: on the one hand it seems difficult if not impossible to come up with a sure system of morality. Yet at he same time here we are having an intelligable moral discussion. Strange but true.
Thanks for the compliment David.
1. “The bigger problem, though, is that I don’t entirely accept utilitarianism.”
Neither do I. My knowledge in ethics is very limited. But the impression I got from my studies was how difficult it is for philosophy to come up with a nice neat coherent system of morality. Every system ends up feeling wrong, having holes, being counterintuitive.
However, I do think that that the basis of any human morality is the subjective feeling of harm/wellbeing. Morality cannot be found anywhere else.
So utilitarianism starts from the right place, but when you start trying to take in in a systematic quantitative direction things start to fall apart.
Moreover the assumption of utilitarianism of maximizing wellbeing to everyone is not rationally based either.
2. “As you note, happiness and harm are subjective states of mind. The problem then becomes that weighing, for instance, whether, for instance, “A: It is wrong to deny gays the happiness of marriage as it does not cause any harm that would justify denying them the good of marriage” or “B: It is right to deny gays the good of marriage as it is harmful for society” requires us to quantify and balance things that are both subjective and impossible to quantify. For one thing, it’s not like we can whip out a Utility-O-Meter (TM, patent pending) to measure units of happiness and harm. It’s not clear whether all people experience harm and happiness the same way. It’s entirely possible that some people suffer inordinately, and would not such a person suffering a loss in happiness count extra in the balance? Epistemology totally screws over utilitarianism.”
3. True, the idea of utilitarianism of systematically quantifying and measuring harm and happiness doesn’t seem to work. Yet at the same time, strangely is seems that regular everyday human morality involves weighing and balancing harm and happiness, but not in a mathematical systematic way.
4. “The other reason is that utilitarianism is utterly unprincipled.”
Not unprincipled. It’s just that the principles of utilitarianism don’t seem to fit our everyday morality. It’s kind of strange: philosphers try to come up with a system of morality, but when it doesn’t fit the morality that they already have –but which is not systematic — then they reject utilitarianism as insufficient.
5. “If happiness is promoted, individual rights are completely negotiable. John Stuart Mill tried to make an argument for absolute free speech rights on the theory that, in the long run, happiness is maximized by promoting free speech. The problem is that it is based on an empirical claim; what happens if it can be shown that happiness is maximized if we have absolute free speech but with three exceptions? The happiness/harm principle dictates that we allow those exceptions, and if necessary lie to the public about it to promote the happiness that comes from free speech “guarantees.””
This is one of the cases where utilitarianism seems at odd with our everyday concept of morality. Yet, what is the justification for free speech? It is not justified for its own sake but because (a) denying freedom is considered a form of harm to individuals (b) free speech is considered beneficial to society, which means that it increases the well being (better term than happiness) to the members of society. Moreover, what are the justifications for restrictions of free speech in modern democratic society? Mostly considerations of harm, no? (Libel and slander also involve the concept of truth, but why does truth matter? does it stand on it own, or is it also connected to wellbeing/harm? Whatever the case, it does seem that truth matters because it matters to us, and not because it has objective value).
7. “There is one form of utilitarianism that I don’t think any rational/sane person can disagree with, and that’s Pareto efficiency.”
That’s because it fits with our regular morality. But the thing is that we regularly don’t reach the moral conclusion of this system by solving a mathematical of logical equation.
8. “Basically it stands for the proposition that if at least one person benefits from position X vs position Y, and nobody benefits from Y vs X, then the Pareto maximal result is X instead of Y. That’s essentially the reasoning behind my support for gay marriage. At least some people (gays who want to get married) gain some benefit, and nobody loses anything except hurt feelings, which is a harm for which I have almost complete disdain. Therefore I think gay marriage is something we should move toward. Here in the real world, that may mean a gradual adoption, but I’m fairly convinced that there is an ultimately “right” answer.”
Yet, you weigh against the happiness of gays other legal and social considerations which seem to you (perhaps correctly) to justify delaying their happiness. This is not criticism. You did not apply utilitarianism as a system, but at he same time you did weigh and balance and measure considerations of happiness and harm.
However, I think the people who oppose gay marriages do believe it will cause harm. Although another twist to the problem is what constitutes harm — harm to society? harm to gays themselves? harm to their immortal souls? to something sacred? Our argument is about whether their is harm, and if there is, is it suficient to justify restricting the happiness of gays.
9. “I’m not kidding about my disregard for hurt feelings, by the way.”
I don’t think you do. It’s not like feelings don’t matter. human interaction does involve caring about he feelings of others. You don’t go around insulting people just for the fun of it. But again the harm of hurthing someones feelings is measured against other considerations. That’s also part of human interaction.
In the case of political correctness it went even beyond that, because the feeling was that the sensitivity behind it went beyond a certain acceptable degree and/or was insincere and politically motivated.
10. The point of this whole discussion is this: on the one hand it seems difficult if not impossible to come up with a sure system of morality. Yet at he same time here we are having an intelligable moral discussion. Strange but true.