Submitted by simonperry955 t3_yuv3c5 in philosophy
eliyah23rd t1_iwgthlb wrote
I enjoyed your post. It motivated me to look at your previous posts and I found your e-book, which I hope to find more time for soon.
I would like to ask a basic question about your methodology.
You seem to make little distinction between the population of humans through time and an individual human being situated at specific moment such that the history of even that individual is secondary to an analysis of the specific subject.
For example, in this post you say:
>There is a basic existential pressure within every organism to do the
things that will lead to an increased chance of thriving, surviving
and/or reproducing.
Certainly an individual at a specific instant may experience a drive to survive, but this is just one among multiple motivations competing for salience among many others. For much of the time, today, it is quite dormant due to lack of threats. Similarly, many spend most of their time uninterested in reproducing because what was once an instrumental goal has now been disconnected from its origin by the availability of contraceptives. The fact that the goal can be analyzed as instrumental matters less than that it figures so centrally in the programming of the human machine as it exists now.
Survival is a selection-oriented statistical drift within a population rather than in individuals.
I see that from your starting point you seek to explain the broader picture, but that serves as a genealogy of morality. Would it not be better to start with the individual as they are at a specific moment and proceed to their goals, limitations and frustrations?
simonperry955 OP t1_iwh80cp wrote
>You seem to make little distinction between the population of humans through time and an individual human being situated at specific moment such that the history of even that individual is secondary to an analysis of the specific subject.
I'm glad you enjoyed the post. As for this point: on the contrary, I follow the premise that for a trait to evolve, it has to benefit the individual in some way (increase its fitness, ready for natural selection); and I believe that the individual is at the centre of morality, as the ultimate decision-maker. However, it's true that morality operates on intrapersonal, interpersonal, and cultural / collective levels.
To thrive is to increase one's viability, or ability to survive. There is pressure to survive because our ultimate genetic purpose is to reproduce, and we need to live long enough to do so. As such, we have a sexual instinct that orients us in the direction of reproduction, even if we never reproduce or even intend to. We just love sex because it's the way we can fulfil our ultimate purpose (that love being instilled by evolution, to make it attractive to do). This is Freud's Eros or the erotic insinct. Likewise, the Pleasure Principle exists because thriving makes us feel good, and there is a pressure to thrive, and therefore a pressure to feel good. See: p. 16, "Pleasure", and p. 243, "Emotions". Because of motivational autonomy, each pressure takes on a life of its own: e.g., we want to thrive, as an end in itself.
>Survival is a selection-oriented statistical drift within a population rather than in individuals.
Again, on the contrary: try asking any individual whether or not they want to survive, and fear death.
eliyah23rd t1_iwmaq10 wrote
Thank you so much for your reply.
I can't really accept either point, but I don't think we actually disagree all that much. Let's say that we are looking at the same scene but from two different angles. Let me try and explain in a different way why, to me, while your answer addresses many great questions, it doesn't address mine.
Suppose I do just want to make other people happy. I just want to help end suffering for other people. As you say on page 20, "a primary value is an arbitrary choice". I understand that a researcher like you is interested in how that came to be. However, that genealogy is not "my" reason for my motivation. It is a cause not a reason. A value is considered by me as the ultimate goal. I don't look for justifications for the value; for other facts that, by virtue of being true, make my goal become valid. I don't care.
I understand what you're doing. For the last 160-odd years people have been given the message that their essence is to survive and out-compete. You are following others who explain that their thinking is an incorrect understanding of evolution. Of course, an "is" does not follow from an "ought". The fact that their understanding might lead to a destruction of our civilization, does not make their thinking wrong. You just show that, in fact, the more desirable interpretation is the correct one.
It's good that you're countering the "be-selfish" brainwashing (if you will), but is it necessary? You are what you are. You will always do what you want to do. The question is only how should we structure our society around that, so that we are all most likely to succeed at our own goals. How do we not step on each other toes? Not because it is bad to step on the toes of other people but (a) many of us don't want to and (b) it will get all our toes burned up if we do.
simonperry955 OP t1_iwn1cq3 wrote
>Suppose I do just want to make other people happy. I just want to help end suffering for other people.
That's being prosocial. You wish well for others. I have formalised this propensity in terms of evolutionary ethics, in "Perfect Compassion", p. 33. The opposite is to thrive at the expense of others, whether knowingly, or unknowingly, and whether or not it is enjoyable to do so, sought out, etc. That is called D, the Dark factor of personality ("Dark and light traits", p. 182).
The two extremes are joined by a continuum of how generous one is, or its opposite: how exploitative and harmful. See a diagram of sorts: "Unconditional love", p. 178.
I don't actually evaluate either one from any kind of viewpoint - I only describe them. Most people are prosocial (p. 193), and that's the way I personally like it.
>You are what you are. You will always do what you want to do. The question is only how should we structure our society around that, so that we are all most likely to succeed at our own goals.
I am sadly pessimistic that the corrupt and wicked will not end up killing the world. Narcissists rule the day and cause the most destruction and chaos.
eliyah23rd t1_iwqi07r wrote
I think the best way to describe our difference is that your project is descriptive and mine is prescriptive. You want the to discover the cause and I am looking for solutions.
However, that simplifies our position a little. In order to propose solutions, I look to build the descriptive case correctly. I am very minimalist about descriptive assumptions, but I cannot avoid them all.
You, on the other hand, seem to propose a sort of “Inference to Best Explanation” argument for motivating the genealogy that you propose. This is a classic descriptive project strategy. However, your last comment highlights that there is a prescriptive wish behind your project, an agenda, if you will. While you present your evidence irrespective of moral outcome, you seem to be motivated by a belief that should your view be accepted, the world would be a better place.
One last point, if I may. You use the word “ought” a number of times. On page 20 you even use it with reference to Hume. However, like de Waal, your use of “ought” seems to be the hypothetical (IF you want X you ought to Y) meaning of “ought” and not the categorical (You ought to Y). To me it seems clear that Hume is very clear that he is referring to the categorical “ought”. I’d be interested to know whether you agree that (a) you are using the hypothetical and (b) Hume is using the categorical.
simonperry955 OP t1_iwqzevl wrote
You're right, I take a descriptive approach. My personal view is that the world would be a better place (all concerned would thrive more) if everyone was prosocial and moral (i.e., enforced norms).
The descriptive case to be made depends on surely what you want to achieve. If it's mutual benefit, then prosociality is the way to go.
My understanding of the is-ought problem has moved on since I wrote the entry in the ebook. I provide a descriptive ought, not an imperative ought. I describe the fact that people feel they ought to X, and give natural reasons why they feel this way. To move to an imperative ought, one possible goal or imperative is the thriving or flourishing of the self and others, optimally. After all, each organism experiences a pressure or imperative to thrive or flourish.
Each entry in this list of features of morality, is a source of moral oughtness, including instrumental oughtness, which provides the original pressure to achieve goals. Moral oughtness is derived from the pressure to achieve goals jointly. So, moral oughtness comes from others towards me (partner control) as well as from me to others (responsibility).
eliyah23rd t1_ix48b3j wrote
I know that I'm responding to your post from three days ago but I've been thinking a lot about our discussion.
In the light of your response, I think the categorical-hypothetical distinction is not sufficient. The pressure that one person exerts on the other (partner) is to accept a categorical. Since this pressure may be a direct appeal to a non-linguistic "irrational" motivator, it may not be saying explicitly "IF you want to partner THEN you must seek X". For example the parent just encourages "seek X" even though the unwritten motivator is that the child desires to align with the parent.
However, this still leaves the analysis in the realm of the descriptive. The researcher identifies these pressures between partners.
But when I switch out of the role of observer to the rational subjective, I am not considering the observed objects. I ask only whether my partner has any hypothetical suggestions for me given the goals I already have. I reject any attempt to request the categorical (without a justifying hypothetical) as manipulation. As a rational actor I still have no reason I "should" accept a new categorical or modify the goals I already have.
The idea that I should accept any categorical because it has in the past been the cause of the current state of affairs, holds no appeal for me. That is the naturalistic fallacy.
simonperry955 OP t1_ix9kcxg wrote
I think the categorical / hypothetical imperative distinction is a good one. If I want to thrive and survive, then I need to do it *this* way (which may be instrumental or moral, depending on whether I need to do it with others).
eliyah23rd t1_ixdgl80 wrote
Oh, I wasn't retracting on the value of the distinction. However, you had made me realize that the descriptive project can record the fact of one partner pressuring the other to accept a categorical and not just a hypothetical value.
I think I need to retreat to a usage that involves logic/reason. My position is that this pressure cannot succeed at a logical argument for accepting a categorical but only a hypothetical. It can try, but it must fail. However, limbic, non-lingustic pressure to accept a categorical is found everywhere.
simonperry955 OP t1_ixe8xks wrote
That's probably because the limbic system accepts thriving and surviving as an unquestioned goal. Anything that promotes these, to the limbic system, is a categorical imperative.
simonperry955 OP t1_iwym6ry wrote
>Would it not be better to start with the individual as they are at a specific moment and proceed to their goals, limitations and frustrations?
Do you mean, how does an individual make moral choices, within a certain environment? I choose what I think will bring me long term thriving: physical, psychological, social, moral. But think about the people who live in Iran. If they do the right thing, they end up in jail. To bring about the best long term thriving for me, is a prudential instrumental matter. To go against one's culture to stand up for what I believe in (e.g., human rights, women's rights) can lead to my thriving being curtailed, yet I still do it. I think that for certain people, some values are sacred: of infinite value. They see these values as more important than anything else, including popularity, or personal thriving.
eliyah23rd t1_ix4aeqh wrote
Not quite clear what specific issue you are getting at here. It might come to me with more reflection, but I'll give my best answer for now.
I am not arguing that my current values are necessarily selfish. They might not even be for the purpose of "thriving". They are what they are regardless of how these values came to be. These values may be sacred to me and I would lay down my life for them. Yes, a researcher might identify a causal pathway that included the search for meaning or the pressure of my parental context. I might even be aware and accept the findings of the research. However, regardless of cause, the sacred remains sacred and may take precedence over any thriving.
So what would be the agenda of my prescriptive research?
- To identify the structure of the values I do have. For example, to highlight the fact that there is usually a multiplicity of values that could easily conflict in practice. Or to highlight that consistency and universalism are some of my goals.
- To figure out ways multiple people, each with their own and differing goals can work together.
For both these goals the prescriptive and descriptive researchers must collaborate. Or, at least, the descriptive researcher has much to teach the prescriptive practitioner.
simonperry955 OP t1_ix9ld2u wrote
If you want me to be prescriptive, then I prescribe: if you want to be prosocial, then cultivate cognitive empathy (p. 163) and sympathetic joy (ps. 164, 165) and Perfect Compassion (ps. 33 and 42). These are based on the virtues of truth and compassion, or wisdom.
I think to figure out how multiple people can achieve their differing goals together, respect for the fact they want to thrive and flourish is a good place to start.
I don't prescribe being anti-social ("dark"). If you want to try it, see how far you get ...
eliyah23rd t1_ixdhhc7 wrote
So as we have agreed I think, the prescription is hypothetical.
I think the prescription you offer uses both 1 and 2. 1. You may think you only have value X, but you also have unspoken values Y and Z. 2. The best way for both you and I to achieve Y and Z is to cultivate empathy and sympathetic joy
simonperry955 OP t1_ixe9d1d wrote
That way, everybody wins (in theory). Perfect Compassion treats the well being of individuals as the highest good. People who hold other values sacred, may violate Perfect Compassion.
I think cognitive empathy can be cultivated.
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