Dan M wrote: > > Of course, I knew there was another strain in libertarianism that was > based in morality. This was an ideological commitment to maximize > individual freedom. Basically Aleister Crowley's "Harm no one and do > what thou wilt", with the "harm no one" clause being > optional--particularly when doing business. > >> That's not a moral principle. That's principled amorality, an abandonment > of social >responsibility. At best it is mysticism; faith that we don't > have to do anything for our >neighbors because the universe will take care > of them (if they deserve it, or whatever). >Morality an antidote, not a > synonym, for self-centered pragmatism.
The antecedent for "you" in this thread isn't clear. I suspect it is not Trent Shipley, but I will provide my input anyway. > Well, how do you define what a moral principal is? I'd argue it is an axiom > of a system of ethics. Now, from your arguments, I suspect you and I both > strongly differ with some of the basic axioms of, say, Objectivistic ethics, > but that does not keep it from being an ethical system. I make a distinction between moral principles that are often religious or more folksy and ethical principles that tend to come from high theology or philosophy and are usually more formal. <example> Given: Slavery is legal. Given: You are CEO of a publicly traded company. Given: The company will make a lot of money if it uses slaves. Then: Using slaves is immoral (the CEO commits a sin). But not using slaves is unethical because the CEO deprives his shareholders of wealth. </example> Futhermore, there are ethical systems, but morals are never systematic. Instead one should talk about an individuals moral collection or a group's hegemonic morality. > You can't prove or disprove ethical, moral principals. Ethical principles are subject to rational and logical dispute. Moral principles, on the other hand, are dealt with using apologetics and are beyond proof. > You can either posit > them explicitly, or implicitly. Personally, I prefer explicit, because the > principals are out there to be discussed, and the implications of those > principals can be arrived at logically and more clearly. > > Dan M. The trick is that moral principles and the relations between them are seldom explicit. Discovering moral principles and making them explicit requires cultural, linguistic and symbolic analysis. The same applies to ethics at one remove where discovering an ethical system's deep structure, unstated assumptions, and meta-morality require analysis. _______________________________________________ http://mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com
