What can we agree on?

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/13/magazine/13Psychology-t.html?ref=review&pagewanted=all

According to Pinker the short answer is "No". Even if a "moral sense" is universal, its contents are a function of shifting social context.

no

That is a valid point, could this be the reason something like say the bible's morals are constantly argued about. The moral content pre-dates it's social context.

theres 2 ways in life, positive or negative.


moral to me is being positive, and or constructive.


who knows.




im lost like the rest of us.

But who decides what is positive and constructive?
And who must it be positive and constructive for?

We decide what is positive, it is constructivefor us. The human race has taken giant leaps in cultural/moral evolution. 200 years ago people were being legally beheaded and burned. Nowadays we see much less of this and many more moral people/countries. Ofcourse there are still many immoral countries where they carry out the death penalty and torture people (e.g America, China), but I think we have largely evolved into a more moral race. I think it is an advantage to us if we are a more moral race because in that way more people live and less people die, we have become more moral for our own good (I think the fact that we are moral may be a product of evolution?), it aids our survival.

A moral law that everybody would agree on but certainly not obey would be that you must not to kill anyone. These days the only reason people would kill others is when they are pushed to the limits and must do it to protect themselves or when they are psychotic, in any case if they do they are promptly eliminated from society for the well-being of you and me. The decrease in capital punishment shows how we are evolving culturally and morally as a human race. We can agree on many things but these things are usually very deep things that run down to the core of our existence, everyone here agrees that it is wrong to kill...I think/hope

The bible's morals is a contradiction in terms.

I have to admit it, some of my best friends on a2k I rarely agree with, doesn't stop me from being friends though.

Yes. Many. Problem is that any idea can be expressed in so many ways that total comprehension as a result of argumentation or explanation is a matter of chance to some extent.

In such cases the discussion is often a string of modifications to statements already made, a process of repeating ideas in so many wordings that the initial meaning of the conveyer is as near to unmistakable as possible.

Other times everyone is in agreement. Those discussions end. It seems that disagreement is a requirement for a good discussion. If all parties agree, then there's nothing more to talk about, which explains dyslexia's statement about the people he rarely agrees with. Those are probably the ones he spends the most time with :wink:

I think we can probably all agree that you can't unlock a door using only a banana.

Dyslexia says: "I have to admit it, some of my best friends on a2k I rarely agree with, doesn't stop me from being friends though."

Thanks, B. That's good to know.

I can't disagree with Agrote's proposition regarding pragmatic propositions--they can be tested, but this thread is about non-falsifiable normative rules.

Hahaha yes... Hardly a moral though.

Also Cyracuz, you are exactly onto it there are things we would all testify to be correct but how would you word it in order to avoid arguements.

But I ask all of you deep down do all humans have a conscience?

I think we developed consience over time and given the right circumstances our conscience can be taken away. A great example of this is in Lord of the Flies by William Golding where the characters are stuck on an island, in this context all morals are taken away and the only important thing is survival. So I think in the right context a perfectly normal person with normal morals can turn into an evil person in order to survive.

Moral code takes a back seat when our survival is threatened.

Yes our instincts for survival generally will overpower our moral obligations. With the exceptions of those people with very strong (and martyr-like) moral convictions. But generally most people can tell if they have done something "wrong". I don't think we have developed it, I believe we have always had it but the context changes. People for some reason have an innate want to sympathize with other beings and even things.

But surely over time we have become more moral as a society, we dont hang draw and quarter people these days. Countries are abolishing the death penalty and some people are trying to stop us eating meat. This shows that we are actually thinking about others (even animals) and becoming more moral. Surely these days we are more moral than the old days.

But you would define these things as abhorent today because of your own morals. There is no objective measure of morality.

EXACTLY, these days people find executions abhorrent and objectionable because of their own morals. In the past hang draw quarter was a routine thing and wasn't opposed. Now it is unheard of and totally unnacceptable.

My morals are similar to most other peoples morals I think so it should be fair to say that in this moderns age we find things in the past unacceptable because we have more morals now.



but there is an objective measure of intelligence, we are much more intelligent these days than before, maybe morality is linked to intelligence?

No intelligence and morals are not linked.
If they were we would be killing everyone with mild abnormalities because it is smarter for our race. We do not have more morals now, we have different ones.It is difficult to classify if they are better?

No I mean with increased intelligence we are increasingly moral and caring. criminal geniuses are quite rare. Our intelligence may have made us a more morally correct race?

Ok we have different morals but they are better on a moral scale. The morals we have today are more "good" than the morals we had before. just look at the victorian times.