Why do we value human life?

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4ever1friend
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Re: Why do we value human life?

Post by 4ever1friend »

HJCarden wrote: December 1st, 2020, 1:44 pm
Looking at that list of the reasons why we value those around us is interesting.
A couple of questions about that list
1. Do you believe that these reasons justify favoritism, or that they are just biases that have no real import (think of your mom/some stranger in a burning house: do you believe this justifies saving your mom instead of the stranger? or is this just a heuristic that is arbitrary?)
2. In the case of "everyone else", where do you think this empathy originates?

As for the broken bone being healed, do you think Morality is just a step in evolution, or an entirely new chapter in the history of our species?

To me I believe there are two ideas that are immediately attractive. Either
1. Our increased empathy is a product of the complex interdependency created in societies
-Why do we care about others? Because we need all the members of our society to do well in order for it to function
Or
2. We have "turned a corner" in which we have broken the shackles of survival being our only motivator
-why do we care about others? Because we have found a value of compassion that while it might be sacrificial, just ~feels~ right to us as humans

Interested in your response.
For the questions:
1) Yes, that is the reason of favoritism. Is natural to choose your closest person, in this case, the mom in front of a stranger. This is based on the history of engagement.
2) If we go to origins: fear of loneliness . In reality nobody could survive when is born if in the first months or year somebody is taking care of you. No matter how that part is taking care, but when you are new born, you cannot feed yourself. So you start to develop attachment feelings (love, hate, etc), but you are attached to that person. When you hear about something bad happen to someone, a question will pop-up: what if this will happen to me or to the person I care about?" . Why fear? Something bad happen to someone -> feel sorry, think might happen to you or someone you love(what if) -> Put your self in his/her shoes -> start to understand what is feeling-> identify with the emotion = empathy . Similar happen with something good, but in some of the cases there is a little envy when you put yourself in someone else shoes.

Broken bone being healed - is based on feelings: attachment and is a step. Morality is based on religion and that is an entirely new chapter in our history.
HJCarden wrote: December 1st, 2020, 1:44 pm 1. Our increased empathy is a product of the complex interdependency created in societies
-Why do we care about others? Because we need all the members of our society to do well in order for it to function
Or
2. We have "turned a corner" in which we have broken the shackles of survival being our only motivator
-why do we care about others? Because we have found a value of compassion that while it might be sacrificial, just ~feels~ right to us as humans
In case 1 - we are not yet there, that require advance understandings about "circle of life" and unfortunately we are far from there.

For case 2. Feels right, is a feeling defined into our subconscious by the education we receive while we were raised and later on by our own choices.
We are selfish beings and everything we do start from one selfish reason, which can be a positive selfishness (good for society) or a negative selfishness (bad for society).
I’ve wrote an article about this somewhere else: “why are people evil?” where I’ve explained the root cause and is all related to selfishness.
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Re: Why do we value human life?

Post by Jack D Ripper »

baker wrote: December 2nd, 2020, 10:55 am...

Like I said: I think the idea that things have inherent value has relevant political, social, psychological functions.
...

Since you have stated you do not care about reasons in this discussion, I will only reply to this bit with the observation that an idea can have political, social, and psychological functions while being false. Every religion has such functions, and since every religion contradicts every other religion, all but one of them must be false (they could all be false). Being false does not prevent ideas from having functions. If people believe falsehoods, they still act on them, and consequently those ideas have importance.

So your claim has nothing to do with my claims about the falsity of some of the ideas we have been writing about.
"A wise man ... proportions his belief to the evidence." - David Hume
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Re: Why do we value human life?

Post by Pattern-chaser »

baker wrote: December 2nd, 2020, 10:18 am ...make sure your're using only premises that are true: but the religious probably don't care. They don't play by such rules.
This was addressed to someone else, but I feel I must comment. Religious people care a great deal about truth. But they obviously understand truth differently from you. This is not surprising, if we think about it. Philosophers know that truth is nowhere near as simple and obvious as it first appears. So you can start by claiming that a religious person's concept of truth is flawed, but careful consideration shows that most/all conceptions of truth are flawed too....
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Re: Why do we value human life?

Post by baker »

Jack D Ripper wrote: December 2nd, 2020, 12:15 pmSince you have stated you do not care about reasons in this discussion,
??
Do copy-paste where I stated that.
I will only reply to this bit with the observation that an idea can have political, social, and psychological functions while being false. Every religion has such functions, and since every religion contradicts every other religion, all but one of them must be false (they could all be false). Being false does not prevent ideas from having functions. If people believe falsehoods, they still act on them, and consequently those ideas have importance.
As I've been saying.
So your claim has nothing to do with my claims about the falsity of some of the ideas we have been writing about.
I'm questioning whether it is possible to identify some ideas as false (such as "God" or "objective morality"). I'd go so far as to call them problematic, but not so far as to declare them false.

For example, if a religious doctrine stipulates that in order to know God, one needs to receive a particular initiation, then those without such initiation can't say anything much about God, other than perhaps sketch out the relative relevance of "knowing God" within a particular social context.

It looks like you're favoring the etic perspective, while I give primacy to the emic perspective.
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Re: Why do we value human life?

Post by baker »

Pattern-chaser wrote: December 2nd, 2020, 1:52 pmThis was addressed to someone else, but I feel I must comment. Religious people care a great deal about truth. But they obviously understand truth differently from you.
Like I siad earlier:
baker wrote: December 1st, 2020, 3:42 amIt's not like they have pledged allegiance to you. Remember, they have no other gods before their own.
It's naive to hold religious people to secular academic standards.
But they obviously understand truth differently from you.
I know they do.
Their understanding of truth has little or nothing to do with secular academic standards.
So you can start by claiming that a religious person's concept of truth is flawed,
I don't. I'm saying that their concept of truth is radically different than mine (or that of secular academia), to the point that meaningful communication of religious topics between me and them is impossible.
but careful consideration shows that most/all conceptions of truth are flawed too....
One cannot say that coherently. :wink:
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Re: Why do we value human life?

Post by Jack D Ripper »

baker wrote: December 2nd, 2020, 5:47 pm...

It looks like you're favoring the etic perspective, while I give primacy to the emic perspective.

For others who are reading this, here are a couple of links that you may need to use:

https://www.lexico.com/definition/etic

https://www.lexico.com/definition/emic


Yes. If you take the emic approach to religion, there is no possible way it is false. And that applies to pretty much all religions, regardless of the fact that they all contradict each other. Within each religion, that religion is true (and the ones that contradict it are false, excepting in cases where the religion is self-contradictory and claims that contradictory religions are true).

The only way a belief system is judged to be false is externally.

If you are serious about judging Christianity from an emic perspective, then you must regard Christianity as true. To do that properly, of course, you have to pick a specific version of Christianity and go with it. It is true and the others are wrong. That is your conclusion. If the version does not have a problem with contradiction, then taking that perspective, you cannot have a problem with contradiction. If, for example, you pick Catholicism, then in the Eucharist ceremony, the bread and wine literally change into the body and blood of Jesus. That is a fact, according to Catholicism. It is also a fact that there is a God. And it is a fact that the Pope is God's primary representative on earth, and the Catholic Church represents God generally. The other Christians are heretics who will burn in hellfire forever for their wicked rejection of God and HIs Church.

Now, if you take instead of the official version of Catholicism, the Catholicism of a particular Catholic, then you will have to adapt everything to whatever fool notions that person has.

So, you should be telling us that there is a god and so forth, if you are serious about taking the emic approach.


Also, on a philosophy forum, the general approach is typically etic. The reason being, philosophy is not an anthropological study (though one could study philosophers anthropologically, that would be doing anthropology, not philosophy). If, in a particular case, you are going to go with an emic approach, it is good to clearly announce that fact to avoid confusion. And it would also be a good idea to explain why you are doing that on a philosophy forum.
"A wise man ... proportions his belief to the evidence." - David Hume
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Re: Why do we value human life?

Post by baker »

Jack D Ripper wrote: December 2nd, 2020, 6:47 pmThe only way a belief system is judged to be false is externally.
And such judgment is irrelevant to insiders.
So, you should be telling us that there is a god and so forth, if you are serious about taking the emic approach.
Not at all, as I am not a monotheist.

With the etic approach, you simply juxtapose two positions, two doctrines, and then by what is no more than fiat, declare that one is flawed and the other is right. (Which is why fanatic atheists are epistemically no different from fanatic theists.)

Acknowledging the difference between the emic and the etic is precisely what can make it easier to put something troubling aside. Acknowledging that there are special, insider requirements for properly understanding some system of claims makes it moot to still bother with those claims when one doesn't meet those requirements. That's how I learned to stop worrying about eternal damnation and to love the bomb!
Also, on a philosophy forum, the general approach is typically etic.
Hence the emergence of p-zombies. :p
If, in a particular case, you are going to go with an emic approach, it is good to clearly announce that fact to avoid confusion. And it would also be a good idea to explain why you are doing that on a philosophy forum.
If you take such issue with the emic, then how do you justify being a subjectivist?
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Re: Why do we value human life?

Post by Jack D Ripper »

baker wrote: December 4th, 2020, 8:11 am...
If you take such issue with the emic, then how do you justify being a subjectivist?

Because looking for "objective" value is like looking for fairies in the garden. One does not find them.

For a longer answer:

viewtopic.php?f=3&t=16933
"A wise man ... proportions his belief to the evidence." - David Hume
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