Ends or Means?

Can one only determine if the ends justify the means by being able to see the end result of a means?

Can their be an end so great that it justifies any means neccessary? Is the end so great anymore after using brutal means to get it?

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Stuh505: Yes, that was the post I was referring to. Sorry if I didn't make that clear.
Of course everyone is defining things differently; This is a moral debate, and no two people have the exact same morals, so yes, you would be correct that all we're doing is bouncing our views back and forth. Join the game, won't you? Laughing

Also, what did you mean by:

Quote:

th way you go about it will never get that point across.

You know you can delete those double-posts, right?

Val: That's what I've been trying to communicate: the 'hierarchy of values'. And I agree that human life must be first, but once you're at the level of human life, are other people's lives "worth" more? Obviously you would value an infant over a middle-aged person, so who comes first?

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val wrote:

Joe
I think there is only one justification in your example. Sam kills the enemy soldier in combat, because he is protecting his own life.
And an war victory has nothing to do with moral.

Are you suggesting that all wars are immoral?

val wrote:

In our choices we find ourselves very often between different moral obligations.
I'll give you the known example from Plato: should we pay the money that someone lended to us? Yes. But if you know that the money you are going to pay, will be used to contract a killer to kill someone? Then, there are two moral values in confront: the obligation of paying the loan and the obligation of protect human life. The last is more important than the first. In this case, you should not pay, at least until you are sure that the money will not be used to kill someone.

Kant would have said the exact opposite.

val wrote:

So, the problem is to define something like a hierarchy of values. And human life comes first.

Always?

val wrote:

Your example is a little different. Your soldier has to decide between his own life and the life of the enemy soldier. In this particular case one human life will be destroyed. I think - and ONLY in this particular case - the survey instinct is not a bad criteria in order to make a decision.

You mean the "survival instinct?"

This is a bit off the point. The example of Sam the Soldier has to do with the question of ends versus means. In his case, does the end (i.e. winning the war) justify the means (i.e. killing another human being)?

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No, I am not suggesting that all wars are immoral. No war is moral or immoral. I said that wars had nothing to do with moral. No nation declares war for a moral reason (even when that kind of reason is used: in my point of view, that is nothing but a excuse).

About Kant: yes, you are quite right. Kant said the exact opposite, with the same exemple Plato had given. Although I considerer the first Critic of Kant the greatest philosophy book already written, I am strongly against his moral philosophy - in the 2nd Critic, for example.

About the example of Sam: winning a war has nothing to do with moral criteria.

Hierarchy of values: yes, human life always comes first, is the ultimate value - but I dont mean only individual life.

About survival instinct: it exists, we all have it. But it is not a moral decision.

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Quote:

No war is moral or immoral

If you agree, human life, no matter to what nation or creed it belongs to, is one of the most important value then I think some wars have been moral. And great many have been clearly immoral. Most often the wars have been faught for resources and geopolitical gain and of course under some self-serving moral disguise.

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all war has a moral value, it just depends on who is analyzing that value. Ex. Crusades, Holy War. They may have been the most moral thing a nation could contemplate doing with their free time at that moment, but the morality may transend to the other nation as the most under-handed, immoral justification for a war, turning there defense into a moral objective, also. Plus, if a country goes to war, it is usually to protect rights tht it feels itself (others in the US case) is being denied. Have ya'll hit much on the CI, and how it justifies itself by being moral to begin with?

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Suppose we closed down the philosophy dep't at Cambridge along with all it's off-shoots and spin offs and used the scarce resources saved to reduce the price of draught bitter would such a means justify such an end?This thread is going round in circles like the Cambridge thread.The only difference as far as I can tell is the renumerations.What we want is some use.When Veblen's law that use=odium and waste=status was laid down as a self evident truth we were supposed to take notice and do something about it.If beer was cheaper I could afford a window cleaner and a part-time gardener and that would reduce unemployment and the dons could go to WORK in the breweries to help supply the increased demand.I would say that in such a case the ends would justify the means.I could also afford to buy my lady friends the sort of fancy beverages that dons buy for their squeezes assuming they're not too dizzy.

Form a circle

spendius.

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Most of the time you can't predict one way or another what outcomes will be. In society as we know it, most people look at both the means and the ends as equally important and we make our decisions in that way. If simply the means were considered more important than everyone would basically be morally perfect because no matter what the outcome would be they would have to do what they felt morally right to do, but if they only looked at the ends, society could end up as a gang of murders and theives simply because they feel that the end result for themselves is more important. In all, I really do not see how somebody can argue that the means justifies the ends or that the ends justify the means because without giving each consideration, no sound decision can be made.

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The answer is yes.

The ends justify the means. Smile

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That is, assuming we need justification for our actions, the ends are certainly enough.

If you're going to try to justify things, actions are surely the only things that need justification. So means are actions. And ends don't need justification, so they are nouns, I think (states of the universe, maybe).

The actions we call means cause the corresponding states of the universe we call ends.

Killing, for example, changes the state of the universe such that now someone is dead. If killing didn't change the universe that way, nobody would care if people killed all the time.

So the point is, how could a means (an action) justify itself? The end of a means is the entire set of changes it causes upon the universe.

So if anything can justify an action, only an end can. (I got this part backward before, so I edited it)

But like stuh says, I think this is just an argument about definitions.

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Quote:

That is, assuming we need justification for our actions, the ends are certainly enough.

If you're going to try to justify things, actions are surely the only things that need justification. So means are actions. And ends don't need justification, so they are nouns, I think (states of the universe, maybe).

The actions we call means cause the corresponding states of the universe we call ends.

Killing, for example, changes the state of the universe such that now someone is dead. If killing didn't change the universe that way, nobody would care if people killed all the time.

So the point is, how could a means (an action) justify itself? The end of a means is the entire set of changes it causes upon the universe.

So if anything can justify an action, only an end can. (I got this part backward before, so I edited it)

But like stuh says, I think this is just an argument about definitions.

Good point, however I must comment. You're right in that this is probably just an argument about definitions. My argument is that the means is an action that leads to a certain result, an end. Now, if someone were to justify their action merely by "ends" then what if they kill all thieves to make society "better", is that an end that justifies the means? No, because the means itself is immoral. Thus, the end doesn't always justify the means for the means have to adhere to certain moral reasoning. Then again, you can argue that there are two ends here: that people are getting killed, and that society is better. Therefore the death of many is unacceptable and thus cancels out the other point.

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Quote:

That is, assuming we need justification for our actions, the ends are certainly enough.

If you're going to try to justify things, actions are surely the only things that need justification. So means are actions. And ends don't need justification, so they are nouns, I think (states of the universe, maybe).

The actions we call means cause the corresponding states of the universe we call ends.

Killing, for example, changes the state of the universe such that now someone is dead. If killing didn't change the universe that way, nobody would care if people killed all the time.

So the point is, how could a means (an action) justify itself? The end of a means is the entire set of changes it causes upon the universe.

So if anything can justify an action, only an end can. (I got this part backward before, so I edited it)

But like stuh says, I think this is just an argument about definitions.

Good point, however I must comment. You're right in that this is probably just an argument about definitions. My argument is that the means is an action that leads to a certain result, an end. Now, if someone were to justify their action merely by "ends" then what if they kill all thieves to make society "better", is that an end that justifies the means? No, because the means itself is immoral. Thus, the end doesn't always justify the means for the means have to adhere to certain moral reasoning. Then again, you can argue that there are two ends here: that people are getting killed, and that society is better. Therefore the death of many is unacceptable and thus cancels out the other point.

But as debater said, we must consider both.

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Ray wrote:

Thus, the end doesn't always justify the means for the means have to adhere to certain moral reasoning.

Says who? I'm amoral Smile

Morals just get in the way of making good decisions. Good on what basis you may ask, if not morals? Well, you tell me a situation, and I'll tell you the basis I'd use! Smile

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binnyboy

The word "good" has many senses. If you see someone trying to rape a child you can interfere or not. On the basis of a moral decision, I think the good decision would be to interfere and prevent the rape. But you may think that by interfering you put in risk your own life or integrity, so you go away. That would be a good decision in another level, an egoistic one. The problem with this kind of philosophy is that, when you need someones else help, you cannot expect it, according to your own belief. (I think that a life based on an amoral perspective is impossible, but that is another thing).

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Binny: Morals are often the best way of making decisions. When you say "morals" I think of my own moral code, which I evolved through logical thought, usually based on the "Golden Rule". There's nothing decision-prohibitive about that. Did I misinterpret your statement?

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I'm just sayin that every moral breaks down somewhere... as far as I've seen.

Like the golden rule... What if you'd like to be almost ravaged by every woman you saw? You wouldn't wish that on the next man, because he might be gay or something... or might just not like it.

Hehe I'll put out a challenge!!!
Anybody tell me one of their morals! I'll try to bust it apart!

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binnyboy

moral rules, in general, are justified by a previous philosophical (or religious) perspective. If you want to "bust it apart" you must begin with those foundations of a moral system.

But, seing you are eager "to bust something apart" I will give you a moral rule in which I believe:
There is no superior value than human life. Nothing, no other value, can justify the elimination of the humanity.

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Binny: I'll take that challenge! :wink:

If you have two friends who are dating, and one of them is cheating on the other, then my moral code tells me to first ask the cheater to confess to their "other", and if they do not, to tell the "other" myself. My rationale is that since I have a friend-based obligation to both of them, they cancel each other out, leaving me with a purely moral obligation to tell the truth.

That's another one: always tell the truth.

Good luck!

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Quote:

Says who? I'm amoral
Morals just get in the way of making good decisions. Good on what basis you may ask, if not morals? Well, you tell me a situation, and I'll tell you the basis I'd use!

Like Val said, good on what level? Morality is a concept of right and wrong and if you follow what's right no doubt you are making a good decision. Morality is formed by reason and is found within human beings and one of the things that we have that other animals don't, is empathy.

Virtue ethics train one to act according to morality and to know what to at a certain time at a certain situation. If you see someone about to be killed and you want to help but you can't since if you try the person is going to get killed anyways and you get killed too, then to do that anyways would be considered a vice to virtue ethics since it's not courageous but foolhardiness.

Quote:

I'm just sayin that every moral breaks down somewhere... as far as I've seen.

Like the golden rule... What if you'd like to be almost ravaged by every woman you saw? You wouldn't wish that on the next man, because he might be gay or something... or might just not like it.

Hehe I'll put out a challenge!!!
Anybody tell me one of their morals! I'll try to bust it apart!

If you want to be ravaged by every woman you saw, then that's saying that you like that, so if you were to examine this strictly by the Golden Rule, you wouldn't want someone else to be ravaged by other women if they don't like it because you wouldn't want someone to do something to you which you don't like. Anyways, Confucius' Golden Rule is stated in the negative, which I think is much more appropriate.
BTW you just made a moral reasoning yourself because you said you wouldn't want others to be ravaged by other women because the person might be gay. Thus you just made a moral decision, so perhaps you're not so amoral yourself :wink:

I don't believe in egoism. It's basically an inflation of one's ego and a denial of the world and it's irrational, to me at least.

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val, I agree on the first part even if that means I was wrong in what I said before (hard to think about)

On the second part, here goes!
What if I evolve into a cyborg (which I plan to someday) and then link with my friend taliesin and greyfox and val and ray and frank apisa and jlnobody and the rest (since they're cyborgs too), and we eventually merge our consiousness into a superbeing that's like a hundred people. Then we change ourselves into a sweeeeet biological creature through genetic engineering that's like a million pounds and eats algae and is all cool and stuff. Then our life would be superior to human life, by your standards. Cuz it'd be a hundred times as valuable. Smile

Ok I don't like that example but its all I got right now.

Taliesin, the first one is hard because it's based on some things like helping your friend is good... and since you said the other one I'm gonna go with it right now.
Lying is good sometimes, because there is a whole variety of cases where it has the best outcome. In some cases it hurts nobody but it helps more than one. Like plato's case, where a friend comes and wants to collect his weapons he's lent you and you're supposed to give them back, because that was the deal, but not only is breaking the deal the best way to go, but lying about not knowing where the stuff is is better too. Because you know your friend is just high on the crack-cocaine and needs a little time to cool off... and if you tell him the truth:"Im not giving it to you" there's no good effect... he just rips your arms off and beats you to death with them... and it all couldve been avoided by lying to him. Okay maybe that was an extreme case of plato's example Smile

Hmm Ray true enough on some of the stuff... but honestly, I don't believe in right and wrong. It's all about just what you like. And it's kind of arbitrary in that sense. I like to see peace and harmony and stuff. So I try to promote that. But that gets in the way of other things, like progress sometimes. A harmony of thought when you have a mistake is pretty bad. And localized peace when trouble is brewing elsewhere is like the eye of a storm... somebodys gonna lose their trailor house (I can talk... I used to live in one) pretty soon. But is it right to promote peace? That's like saying promoting peace is the answer to some question. But in my opinion there's no question.

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