On Sep 1, 2008, at 8:18 PM, Dan M wrote: > A number of atheists as well as theists have ideals they hold to be > true. > They believe in human rights. For example, most atheists that I > know accept > some form of the Golden Rule. I think its accurate to say that most > folks > on Brin-L believe in the Golden Rule in one form or another. > Now, IIRC, Charlie had some quibbles with "do onto others as you > would have > them do unto you." He noted, correctly, that others may want and need > things differently from your own needs and wants. (Reminds me of > the old > story of the monkey who killed a fish while "saving it from > drowning)." > > But, I think taking that statement in a more general and not > literalistic > sense is all that's needed. One should try to understand the truth > that > (according to my memory) Charlie wrote on this topic in one of our > previous > discussions. > > My personal favorite version is "love your neighbor as you love > yourself" > because this balances the importance of neighbor and oneself. I > know people > who are so self-sacrificing that they neglect themselves. How best > to do > this can be the subject of tremendous debate, since we do not have > enough > information to know outcomes. But, that's not my central point > here. My > central point is that the Golden Rule is an axiom; inherently > unprovable. > The only way to prove it is as a theorem from another axiom that's not > provable: e.g. because we are all made in the image and likeness of > God we > must love one's neighbor as oneself.
Minor quibble: the Golden Rule is not an assertion of truth or falsehood, grammatically speaking, so it's not something that does or does not need to be "proven" per se. It is an admonition, specifically, advice on a basic ethical standard of sorts .. the "truth" or "falsehood" of it would be a measure of how well it succeeds as such an ethical standard, which is ultimately a social science question and not easily reducible to a "yes" or "no" answer. It's good advice under most circumstances, but as noted, there are exceptions. > Well, that wasn't as long as I feared. So, let me end with some > general > questions. Who here accepts the Golden Rule (even with some > quibbles) as > valid in at least one of its forms? How many folks are true > post-modernists, who think there is no better, no worse, just personal > desire and politics? I would go so far as to say that I do believe in a general principle of reciprocity when it comes to personal ethics -- I wouldn't impose rules on others that I was not prepared to obey myself, and I wouldn't make demands of others that I wasn't prepared to meet myself if asked, and so on. Since the Golden Rule is basically a fairly literal expression of that principle of reciprocity, yes, in a way, I tend to follow it. I don't "believe in" it, necessarily, as an article of faith, but it does tend to lead in the right direction a large part of the time. Personal desire is a fairly poor moral compass, because it completely fails to account for situations where people's desires conflict .. and history is full of examples of what happens when personal desire is the only consideration. (Nero's Domus Aurea in Rome, built on the ashes of the former aristocratic houses on the Palatine, Esquiline and Caelian hills, and whose construction was financed by a sizable portion of the empire's tax revenue, is a particularly good example.) Reciprocity at least provides a reason to preserve a boundary between one's own right to pursue one's desires and the rights of others to do the same, and provides a logical basis for negotiating disputes when those desires run head on into each other. "I think we invested time and money teaching her how to fly a warplane which, it turns out, she does very well, and there aren't that many who do, so I'm gonna go ahead and pick national security over caring who she sleeps with." -- Toby Ziegler _______________________________________________ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
