Thomson's Violinist

[GE Morton]

It is not I who am making a claim about monkeys understanding the concept of "fairness". It's the experiementers, who designed the experiment specifically to test whether monkeys (in the video I found, they were capuchin monkeys, not rhesus) and other animals have a concept of "fairness:. I assume the scientists working with the monkeys have a better understanding of them than you or I.

That would be a rash assumption. Scientists as a group, and especially behavioral scientists, are not particularly astute philosophers. The latter are notorious for anthropomorphizing animal subjects. And by championing their claim you take ownership of it.

As far as whether rules of grammar must exist for intelligible speech to exist -- even if that is the case (which I doubt) . . .

You do? What factors other than semantic and syntactic rules would you propose marks the difference between intelligible speech and random verbal noises?

. . . the rules are not "formulated", as you suggest is necessary for entry into the exalted category of "moral agent".

You only need to formulate a rule when some situation arises the existing rules don't cover (a timely example is the fetal viability rule for when an abortion is permissible, which rule the US Supreme Court is currently reviewing). Every moral rule was formulated by someone, at some time, and every moral agent is capable of formulating them, should the need arise. Animals (and fetuses) can neither formulate nor understand moral rules, or any other rules. They may sometimes be observed to follow certain rules that we understand, but they're not guided by them (see Quine on the difference between "rules that fit and rules that guide"):

"My distinction between fitting and guiding is, you see, the obvious and flat-footed one. Fitting is a matter of true description; guiding is a matter of cause and effect. Behaviour fits a rule whenever it conforms to it; whenever the rule truly describes the behaviour. But the behaviour is not guided by the rule unless the behaver knows the rule and can state it. This behaver observes the rule."

---Methodological Reflections on Current Linguistic Theory

https://kingdablog.com/2015/04/13/quine ... -or-rules/

Arguing with you is like arguing with a Fundamentalist, GE. You are so invested in your system of principles, that you cannot accept any evidence that will shake its credibility.

Oh, my, again you resort to ad hominems to evade the arguments made --- namely, that resentful behavior in monkeys is NOT evidence that they grasp moral concepts.

If monkeys cannot be moral agents -- we must define moral agency in such a way as to exclude them.

So you're still disparaging the concept of moral agency. Apparently the link I gave for an explanation of it didn't satisfy. Perhaps you can explain just why you're having such a problem with it, and suggest some other term or concept we might adopt to mark the distinction that one tries to make.

Anyone who has ever owned an intelligent dog knows that non-human animals can feel "moral obligations". At least they ACT like they can. They act guilty when they've done something wrong. They understand rules and follow them. They act altruistically (even wild canines do this).

Animals can certainly feel and express (behaviorally) emotions. But emotional responses are not evidence that they understand moral concepts or moral rules. Your dog's "guilty" behavior arises from fear of scolding or punishment, not from any internal judgment that his behavior was morally wrong (i.e., a violation of a moral principle he understands and accepts). And, yes, they can act altruistically --- because they have emotional bonds of some sort with the animal they're helping (such a mother dog with her pups). Altruism as a moral principle does NOT rest upon or derive from emotional bonds; it derives from moral arguments.

As for your silly claim about "society" being irrelevant to murder, I clearly meant laws are designed to protect OUR society.

You're again conflating moral injunctions with laws. You claimed that the moral prohibition against murdering babies rested upon their being "members of society." Which is absurd.

By the way, the only people who think that paying some people more than others for the same work is "fair" are GE MOrton, two Neo-Nazis in Idaho, and three Yahoo Moonshiners flying Confederate flags from their pick-up truck. Any five-year-old child could inform GE that if he got paid ten cents for making his bed every day, while his brother got paid $1 for doing the same, that would be "unfair".

That child would be correct, because he (correctly) believes that his parents have the same nurturing obligations to both of them. An employer, however, has NO nurturing duties to his employees. Unlike the child's parents, employers have no a priori responsibility for their employees' welfare, beyond assuring a safe workplace. Employer and employee are both independent agents, free to enter any sort of transaction they wish, on any mutually agreeable terms. An employer has no more obligation to hire Alfie at $20/hour because he previously hired Bruno at $20/hour, than you do to pay Safeway $10 for a six-pack of beer, though they're offering it for $8, because last week you paid Kroger's $10 for a six-pack of the same beer.

[Belindi]

It's a sad and sombre occasion when a woman has to consider elective abortion. The alternative is sometimes even worse, and so when proper doctors are not permitted to abort a foetus the woman has to go to an illegal abortionist. Poor women are unable to afford the cost of an efficient illegal abortionist.

[figliar0]

But as I commented earlier, what I find ridiculous is that we live in a society that is still debating, still legislatively fighting, etc. over whether we should allow women to have abortions. Again, if men were the sex/gender that became pregnant (and sexes/genders otherwise had the same statuses they do not), there would be no debate about it. You'd easily be able to get abortions everywhere. No one would care about arguments about it. It would be like arguing over the ethics of whether one should have their wisdom teeth removed. No one does that.

Exactly. If men became pregnant. If human could empathize and fully understand others. If the Earth weren'ŧ overpopulated. If... then we wouldn't ever need to fight. But earth is overpopulated, so endless animal fight for survival evolved to sick political fights to gain more power, thus force own will and prioritise own interests. Funny, is it?

[Ecurb]

That child would be correct, because he (correctly) believes that his parents have the same nurturing obligations to both of them. An employer, however, has NO nurturing duties to his employees. Unlike the child's parents, employers have no a priori responsibility for their employees' welfare, beyond assuring a safe workplace. Employer and employee are both independent agents, free to enter any sort of transaction they wish, on any mutually agreeable terms. An employer has no more obligation to hire Alfie at $20/hour because he previously hired Bruno at $20/hour, than you do to pay Safeway $10 for a six-pack of beer, though they're offering it for $8, because last week you paid Kroger's $10 for a six-pack of the same beer.

So say you. The laws of most countries, however, differ. You cannot pay a black man less than a white man just because you can get away with it any more. You cannot pay a woman less than a man just because you can get away with it. You are legally required -- and, in my opinion, morally required-- to avoid such discriminatory business practices, profitable though they may be.

Of course you are correct that non-human animals cannot "formulate moral principles". That's because they don't manipulate language with the facility of humans (although the more we learn about animals, the more we become aware that they do communicate in sophisticated ways). Since you appear to discount any evidence (which abounds) of animals having a sense of morality, you are really saying, "Only sophisticated language users can be moral agents." By translating that simple sentence into "moral agents must be able to formulate moral principles" you are obfuscating the essence of the principle -- which is that only language users can be moral agents. This is the crux of our disgreement. A person who loves other people, who is naturally kind and altruistic, and who does unto others as he would have them do unto him is a moral person even if he has never formulated a moral principle. A capuchin monkey may not be able to articulate a "principle" -- but he appears to know what is fair and what is unfair.

The notion that principles are the foundation of morality is, I think, incorrect. ONe doesn't build morality on the base of the principles; one builds the principles on the base of moral behavior. The principles do serve a purpose -- to catch contradictions in gray areas of morality. But they are not the essence of moral behavior. (Since this is standard Christian ethics, I'm not sure why you seem unable to understand it. "Do unto others...." is a standard Christian principle, but one need not "formulate" it, or even know it, to practice it.)

[GE Morton]

That child would be correct, because he (correctly) believes that his parents have the same nurturing obligations to both of them. An employer, however, has NO nurturing duties to his employees. Unlike the child's parents, employers have no a priori responsibility for their employees' welfare, beyond assuring a safe workplace. Employer and employee are both independent agents, free to enter any sort of transaction they wish, on any mutually agreeable terms. An employer has no more obligation to hire Alfie at $20/hour because he previously hired Bruno at $20/hour, than you do to pay Safeway $10 for a six-pack of beer, though they're offering it for $8, because last week you paid Kroger's $10 for a six-pack of the same beer.

So say you. The laws of most countries, however, differ. You cannot pay a black man less than a white man just because you can get away with it any more. You cannot pay a woman less than a man just because you can get away with it. You are legally required -- and, in my opinion, morally required-- to avoid such discriminatory business practices, profitable though they may be.

You continue to respond to moral arguments with government edicts. That X is illegal in some jurisdictions has utterly no bearing on the morality of X. The obligations to which I referred above are moral ones. To refute them you need to offer some moral arguments, not legal citations.

Of course you are correct that non-human animals cannot "formulate moral principles". That's because they don't manipulate language with the facility of humans (although the more we learn about animals, the more we become aware that they do communicate in sophisticated ways). Since you appear to discount any evidence (which abounds) of animals having a sense of morality . . .

Not any evidence. Animal behavior which appears to conform to some moral principle we accept is not evidence of a "sense of morality" on the part of the animal. A "sense of morality" entails understanding of some general moral principle. Anger over receiving a less desirable treat is not evidence of that --- or, at least, not sufficient evidence. For that you would need to observe that the animals follow that principle in their own interactions with others, more or less consistently.

By translating that simple sentence into "moral agents must be able to formulate moral principles" you are obfuscating the essence of the principle -- which is that only language users can be moral agents. This is the crux of our disgreement. A person who loves other people, who is naturally kind and altruistic, and who does unto others as he would have them do unto him is a moral person even if he has never formulated a moral principle.

Yes, that is close to the crux. As I've said several times, I take a morality to be a set of principles and rules governing interactions between moral agents in a social setting. Those principles and rules may be either rational --- based on empirical evidence and logical arguments --- or emotion-driven, i.e., reflective of the emotional responses of some people to some states of affairs. The problem with the latter, of course, is that such "principles" are necessarily subjective and idiosyncratic, because people's emotional responses to various states of affairs differ wildly. So you can't have a workable, univeralizable, moral principle that assumes --- or prescribes --- that everyone love everyone else, is kind to everyone else, is altruistic, etc. You can't have a workable moral principle that depends upon everyone having certain personality traits, emotional response spectra, or common interests, tastes, or goals. Those differences are endemic to the species (and many other species) and are ineradicable. Any "morality" that assumes otherwise is bound to be parochial, fanciful, and not rationally defensible.

(BTW, in some of the animal studies of the type you mentioned, the authors note that not all of the monkeys displayed the resentment behavior. Like humans, monkeys also differ in their emotional responses).

The notion that principles are the foundation of morality is, I think, incorrect. ONe doesn't build morality on the base of the principles; one builds the principles on the base of moral behavior.

Question-begging. What you count as "moral behavior" will necessarily be behavior which conforms to some moral principles you've adopted.

Since this is standard Christian ethics, I'm not sure why you seem unable to understand it.

Oh, I do understand Christian ethics. I reject it, as it is one of those parochial, fanciful, and rationally indefensible vernacular moralities just mentioned.

[Ecurb]

You continue to respond to moral arguments with government edicts. That X is illegal in some jurisdictions has utterly no bearing on the morality of X. The obligations to which I referred above are moral ones. To refute them you need to offer some moral arguments, not legal citations.

Oh, come on! If you can cite "common law" to support your notions of property rights, I can cite the agreement of most legal systems to support my notions of morality. Laws are based on moral concepts.

Question-begging. What you count as "moral behavior" will necessarily be behavior which conforms to some moral principles you've adopted.

The moral principles are based on what behaviors we admire, not the other way around. I'm off for a couple of days.

[GE Morton]

Oh, come on! If you can cite "common law" to support your notions of property rights, I can cite the agreement of most legal systems to support my notions of morality. Laws are based on moral concepts.

Oh, no. The common law and statutory law have wildly different origins. Common law is evolved law; it consists of legal rules made by judges in actual cases over the centuries, and is usually based on customary principles commonly understood and accepted at the time --- principles which were then adopted by other judges because they were seen as delivering justice. They've stood the test of time. Statutory laws reflect the parochial or self-serving interests and momentary passions of the legislators or their patrons or constituents, and rarely have any defensible moral basis. (Not all of them of course).