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dfaultuzr wrote:i feel like a moron

me too

dfaultuzr wrote:this kind of threads is the reason i love snh

kay wrote:This just kicked off another thought in my head: Could the difference simply be due to pheremones? Compared to most other animals, humans have a notoriously poor ability to detect pheremones. Either that or human pheremones are simply less detectable than others, or there is a smaller range of pheremones. Could that have made it much easier for non-familial units to band together? Whereas if neanderthals retained the more normal ape-level of pheremone sensitivity, they would be a lot less inclined/able to handle the presence of other tribes.

Could it all just be down to a poor sense of smell?

I like this quite a lot, especially after my track record of giving up on girls I'm otherwise attracted to because they smell a bit strange up close... maybe we're just immune/insensitive enough to get along.

Out to all the head-scratching Ninjas.

magma wrote:

kay wrote:This just kicked off another thought in my head: Could the difference simply be due to pheremones? Compared to most other animals, humans have a notoriously poor ability to detect pheremones. Either that or human pheremones are simply less detectable than others, or there is a smaller range of pheremones. Could that have made it much easier for non-familial units to band together? Whereas if neanderthals retained the more normal ape-level of pheremone sensitivity, they would be a lot less inclined/able to handle the presence of other tribes.

Could it all just be down to a poor sense of smell?

I like this quite a lot, especially after my track record of giving up on girls I'm otherwise attracted to because they smell a bit strange up close...

Needed to be done, to give these guys a rest after putting their degrees to use, just.

sauce?

Laszlo wrote:

noam wrote:good discussion tho

Thread got jacked hard!

Does anyone fancy answering the following? -

Is a religious persons action less moral than that of a person of no religion because they're doing it out of fear of a deity?

In that respect, can morality be quantified?

I think that a religious person who adheres to the prescribed moral code due to fear of a deity/higher power is less moral than a religious person who adheres to the prescribed moral code due to their own inclinations. I think that the latter is equally moral and practically the same as an agnostic/atheist who adheres to a prescribed moral code.

Which leads to your second question regarding quantification of morality. I believe that morality can only be meaningfully quantified when referenced to specific sets of conditions. For example, you have Christian morality, western morality, etc. Morality can only be judged when there is a set of rules to judge it by. What is moral by one set of codes could be immoral under a different set. Adultery is considered immoral in many modern viewpoints on morality. But if you chose to live your life according to the tenets of natural selection and gene propagation, then adultery might be considered a virtue (having said that, such a society would probably not not have developed institutions such as marriage and the term "adultery" would probably not even exist).

In another way of looking at it, consider a society where there is no concept of ownership (I'm lifting this straight from Ursala le Guin's "Disposssessed", which contrasts the "Possessed" with the "Dispossessed"). Stealing cannot be an offense insuch a society, and would never even exist. They would not even have a word for it. Someone from such a society would find it very difficult to understand how a society such as ours works and both societies would have very different moral codes.

So, that's why I think that morality can only be quantified and contrasted when there is a societal/cultural framework for it to be considered in.

dfaultuzr wrote:this said, i'm going back to lurking mode, cause magma, noam and kay are on fire and i feel like a moron with my lack of vocabulary, this kind of threads is the reason i love snh

I don't think you should feel like a moron, and you should contribute and discuss as you want to even if you think you might have difficulty in getting your point across. I mean, why not? I'm just spewing stuff out of my head as it comes along. Discuss, and we all learn more!

I think what i'm really asking is, if any given moral action has an imaginary value of 10, is the value of that action increased to 11 or 12 if the person carrying out the action is disadvantaged in some way? Example - a man helps an old woman cross a busy road. 10 morality points. A man with one leg helps an old woman cross the road.
11 morality points?

Laszlo wrote:I think what i'm really asking is, if any given moral action has an imaginary value of 10, is the value of that action increased to 11 or 12 if the person carrying out the action is disadvantaged in some way? Example - a man helps an old woman cross a busy road. 10 morality points. A man with one leg helps an old woman cross the road.
11 morality points?

depends on whether or not he's wearing his prosthetic leg at the time, if he is sans leg then obviously it has an increased moral value as its fucking difficult to walk on just one leg

I'm allowed to make that joke as my stepmum is actually an amputee, if anyone else said that it would be immoral

Which brings me to my next question - is it immoral to laugh at the misfortune of others?

Laszlo wrote:I think what i'm really asking is, if any given moral action has an imaginary value of 10, is the value of that action increased to 11 or 12 if the person carrying out the action is disadvantaged in some way? Example - a man helps an old woman cross a busy road. 10 morality points. A man with one leg helps an old woman cross the road.
11 morality points?

Again, i think you're referring to subjectivity...possibly

If there was a scale , a single unit for one person could be worth 2 for another.The idealist morality of society is everyone's scale of 10 added up.

Then again, the comparison is only made by the subjective observer anyway

If only it was as simple as a points thing though we would actually be able to see how we were doing ha.

I guess that's what statistics are for but sadly we're not all big on them enough to always pay full attention regardless of what correlating trends they seem to indicate .

If you're going to quantify or measure any 1 thing, you have to take into consideration everything else and you can't really exclude anything. It's our tendency to 'exclude' and separate things we see as non-essential which leads to our subjective perceptual obstacles. To define something is to also recognize nothing basically. It's all very paradoxical hence the Dual continuum idea.

If it sounds like i always arrive back at duality, it's because with enough deconstruction it generally always does. (which in turn leads to newer updated models of construction)

So you and Kay are saying morality is purely subjective... I see now.
So therefore it has no (universal) value at all?

And when you mention duality, are you talking in terms of ontology?

Laszlo wrote:



Which brings me to my next question - is it immoral to laugh at the misfortune of others?

that would depend on the nature of the misfortune, i would probably laugh if someone fell over and banged their knee, i wouldn't laugh if a plane full of food aid crashed into a childrens hospital

particle-jim wrote:a plane full of food aid crashed into a childrens hospital

I genuinely lol'd at that.





Fuck, am I evil?

Laszlo wrote:

particle-jim wrote:a plane full of food aid crashed into a childrens hospital

I genuinely lol'd at that.





Fuck, am I evil?

Well if you are then I am too, I was creasing up as I was typing it haha

no1 will be laughing when I make it happen though

I don't know why that tickled me so much but i'm still creasin at it!

Laszlo wrote:So you and Kay are saying morality is purely subjective... I see now.
So therefore it has no (universal) value at all?

And when you mention duality, are you talking in terms of ontology?

Subjectivity doesn't necessarily indicate any 'lack' of universal value. To say it does (or even to say it doesn't funnily enough) is still rooted in subjectivity. Nothing is truly lacking in the universe and nothing is in too large of a quantity. It's the subjective observer that see's it in this way because we are always subject to our own subjectivity when considering any given object...including ourselves. 'you can't bite your own teeth'

I think true deconstruction in its' lowest common denominator always arrives back 2 halves. It's all about opposites and universal Polarity (hence the duality thing) Every subject contributes to the object (the universe)

when i talk about Polarity and Duality, i'm talking about multiple disambiguations within them too and not just in a philosophical sense.

It's both a very backwards and a very forwards way of thinking that both hurts and 'rewards' your head every time you trigger the flip-switch. Actually explaining it with words and language which are again subjective in their own nature is very difficult because of the inherent dual contradictions and polar oppositions we find in anything including these words.

With that being said it's very easy to see why it's easy to get lost into obscure and mute tangents so bringing it back down/up and converting it into some actual useful and applicable information for society is the challenge.( as i have demonstrated with this dual ramble. saying a lot but also saying nothing )

particle-jim wrote:a plane full of food aid crashed into a childrens hospital

At least none of them went hungry

When I say something has no universal value, I mean one moral action could be considered 10 on the morality scale by one and 11 by someone else. Moral action only has the value that one places upon it. So it's subjective.
Does that make sense or have you already answered that. A lot of what you posted had me doing mental back flips.

d-T-r wrote:Actually explaining it with words and language which are again subjective in their own nature is very difficult because of the inherent dual contradictions and polar oppositions we find in anything including these words.

This is the very reason I tend to stay quiet in these sorts of discussion. I have my own theory on things but if I try and explain it, words tend to fall short.
Then Noam accuses me of over simplifying things

Also, do you have an Ontological standpoint?

Laszlo wrote:I think what i'm really asking is, if any given moral action has an imaginary value of 10, is the value of that action increased to 11 or 12 if the person carrying out the action is disadvantaged in some way? Example - a man helps an old woman cross a busy road. 10 morality points. A man with one leg helps an old woman cross the road.
11 morality points?

I think both cases would earn him the same 10 points, but he would get more kudos points/pats on the back if he only had 1 leg. Your physical wellbeing shouldn't enter into a morality question as you're still taking the same moral stance.

particle-jim wrote:that would depend on the nature of the misfortune, i would probably laugh if someone fell over and banged their knee, i wouldn't laugh if a plane full of food aid crashed into a childrens hospital

Laszlo wrote:This is the very reason I tend to stay quiet in these sorts of discussion. I have my own theory on things but if I try and explain it, words tend to fall short.
Then Noam accuses me of over simplifying things

Probably all the more reason to talk more and explain more often. That's probably the only way you'll ever be able to fully express what you think, especially when it's a complicated personal mental construct. And talking about things can actually help you build up a clearer ideal in your mind. Concepts that pass through our minds don't necessarily take the form of words so it is sometimes difficult to crystalise thoughts. However, language can shape how minds and ideas develop. Different languages can actually shape your ideas differently, and some ideas are better expressed in some languages than others.

kay wrote:

Laszlo wrote:I think what i'm really asking is, if any given moral action has an imaginary value of 10, is the value of that action increased to 11 or 12 if the person carrying out the action is disadvantaged in some way? Example - a man helps an old woman cross a busy road. 10 morality points. A man with one leg helps an old woman cross the road.
11 morality points?

I think both cases would earn him the same 10 points, but he would get more kudos points/pats on the back if he only had 1 leg. Your physical wellbeing shouldn't enter into a morality question as you're still taking the same moral stance.

Can you then please tell me why those godawful programmes on itv are so popular? - child hero of the year awards, or whatever they're called.
Am I the only one who doesn't give a fuck about some kid saving it's epileptic mum from biting her own tongue off. Or do I just lack empathy? Does that make me a psychopath?

kay wrote:

Laszlo wrote:This is the very reason I tend to stay quiet in these sorts of discussion. I have my own theory on things but if I try and explain it, words tend to fall short.
Then Noam accuses me of over simplifying things

Probably all the more reason to talk more and explain more often. That's probably the only way you'll ever be able to fully express what you think, especially when it's a complicated personal mental construct. And talking about things can actually help you build up a clearer ideal in your mind. Concepts that pass through our minds don't necessarily take the form of words so it is sometimes difficult to crystalise thoughts.

Yeah, I get your point but by definition it's impossible to explain the ineffable. Also, a lot of these conversations I have with people end in the same brick wall that most people find when talking to religious folk. I can't defend what I believe so i've just learned to keep it to myself.