From: johnny moral (johnnymoral@hotmail.com)
Date: Thu Jun 10 2004 - 18:07:43 BST
Hi Wim,
>From: "Wim Nusselder"
>I'm sorry. Your 9 Jun 2004 21:48:33 +0000 reply still doesn't make me
>accept
>your definition of morality as "whatever most people do" or "whatever
>people
>expect other people to do".
>If you use the word "cheating", you imply that it is immoral (despite that
>according to your definition it is moral in the situation you described).
>Otherwise you should have used a word that has no negative connotations in
>common parlance.
OK, if the word "cheating" implies immorality, then how about "using crib
notes, peeking at your neighbor's paper, sleeping with the professor, and
other forms of recording a higher grade than your knowledge of the subject
matter deserves." Apparently, that is moral now. Ought it be? No, it
ought not, and we should try to change morality back to honesty and honor.
>Expectations can change what people consider to be 'moral', but there are
>other influences too, so "expected behaviour" doesn't define "moral
>behaviour".
I'm saying it does, and I appreciate you objecting and giving me opportunity
to explain my thesis. I don't think it is a radical thing to say. Expected
means more than just predicted, it also means there is an exhortation to
follow the expectatoin becaues it is right.
If Dennis the Menace is "expected to behave himself at the wedding", mom's
not quite making a prediction, as that would be, in his case, wrong. She's
telling him what is moral, that she will be upset if he doesn't meet her
hopeful expectation. Meeting an expecation is always good, it is the basic
source of value, generic ontological value. Now, there are specific
expectations (Dennis will be a Menace) and general social expectations
(people shouldn't be menaces) and there are usually conflicts in meeting
both kinds of expectations. This same specific/general expectation also
applies across large spans of time and cultures, so that we can say that we
expect Nazi's to do their thing, and it is good in an ontological sense when
they meet their expectation, but it is also expected, on a grander scale,
that people reject genocide and facism and war, and we fully expect that the
world will ontologically reach that point as well, just as Dennis's mom
fully expects that Dennis will someday grow up and behave himself.
>You only can say that the MoQ is inconsistent itself if you don't
>understand
>that DQ and sq can both be Quality. They are a "contradictory identity", in
>the terms Scott first used on this list 16 Aug 2002 20:53 +0000.
Right, that's his out from the contradictions. My out is the difference
between specific and general expectations, and the principle of metaphysics
being by nature a degenerate, immoral activity.
Johnny
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