The one thing needful
“David” (in quotation marks because we have lots of Davids, so it might be confusing if I just said David, as if you would know which one) asked in a comment the other day
Ever wonder what your “sacred cow” is? I have no idea what mine is.
No idea? Really? I can think of several at least semi-sacred cows of mine. Egalitarianism for one; separateness of persons for another; human rights for another.
He said that wasn’t quite what he meant, and did I mean just irrational and personal and impossible to articulate. I said no but
I know they are basic commitments that are at least somewhat immune to disagreement, and that the reasons I can give for them are well short of knock-down arguments.
I didn’t say, but will say now:
I am committed to them, I don’t want to give them up, I would resist giving them up.
What are yours? It might be interesting to make a list of core sacred cows. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights is probably a good source for many of them.
Another of mine is that the idea of a “god” we have a duty to worship and obey, despite some good aspects (inspiration, aspiration, motivation), is more bad than good. It makes people slavish and it distorts their views of morality and other people and this life.
On the other hand, what if it’s something better than that? And not a person? What if in fact it’s one or more of my sacred cows? What if it’s equality, or justice, or peace?
That’s different. It’s probably what humanists are getting at when they say (with varying degrees of exasperation) that atheism is not enough, and we need something “positive.” True enough. Freedom from the totem god is not enough.
What should it be? Justice? Equality? Kindness? Peace? Siblingity? Solidarity?
Maybe solidarity – which perhaps presupposes all the others.
In which case I’ve arrived back at Richard Rorty, which seems ironic.
OB: “…the idea of a “god”we have a duty to worship and obey…”
One of my problems with that idea starts with ‘worship’ and ‘duty’. (I know you’re not arguing in favor of either, I’m arguing against those who do and coming sideways at one of my sacred cows). I could make allowances for those who freely choose to worship something or someone, but my personal limit seems to be a high level of respect. Making worship a duty is much, much worse. I may have a duty to obey a law I disagree with but I have no duty to worship it, even if I agree with it.
I feel much the same about patriotism. Many in the USA say that we should be, must be, patriots and then want to dictate what follows from that. The worst abuses of the idea followed 9-11 when talk of peace or disagreeing with Bush were called un-patriotic and treasonous. I believe in many of the founding principles of the USA and many ideals we have added since, but I do not worship them and I do not follow them blindly. Patriotism seems to have too much “love it or leave it” and “my country right or wrong” to suit me. My respect for the very best parts of my country’s history fall well short of what I would call love. When people in my country fall short of ‘our’ ideals, I would prefer to correct things than “leave it”. When people acting on behalf of my country do wrong things, I will not meekly accept it. (the idea that anything the President does is legal because he is the President is tantamount to the Pope’s infallibility claim). I think that one of the factors in why the German people did horrible things in WWII is due to the downside of patriotism, the unthinking acceptance part, the ‘right or wrong’ part.
PZ and others have made the claim many times that we respect Darwin for the things he got right and giving us a giant step down the road of understanding the world we inhabit. We do not worship him, we do not think that he knew everything, or made no mistakes or cannot be improved upon. I agree with that and feel similarly about the USA and Issac Newton and Albert Einstein and so on.
I didn’t set out to write about patriotism, but I am now stuck on that track so I will take a time-out.
Free Speech
A certain amount of civil libertarianism
Basic Living standards and health care
Basic Equal opportunity notions
Moral individualism
Racism and sexism professional, political and legal contexts.
I would definitely not say solidarity as I think this is corrupting in certain circumstances
I can’t identify my sacred cows in accordance with my beliefs, since even my strong beliefs can be (and are) changed by thoughtful interlocutors. I guess a better expression of my “sacred cows” are the things that I endorse or applaud even when I know that I have stopped believing in them.
For instance, the Oxford Manifesto of 1947 articulates many things that I would not agree with (for instance, it glosses over class conflict in a breezy and unrealistic way). But to my mind it articulates my political hopes better than any other document has — it’s this thing I always go back to, a blueprint I keep trying to build on to generate more ideas. Similarly, I have high regard for “Utilitarianism” by JS Mill, despite the fact that it is careless on some issues (the argument for happiness as being of intrinsic value runs afoul of the is-ought problem) or unhelpfully dated (on taxation and distributive justice). I get irritated by bad critiques of these documents (and sometimes even good ones!), despite the fact that I can recognize that there really are fair and good critiques out there made by intelligent and sensitive people. In some sense, my sense of personal identity has been marinated in them, so I’ll never quite get the taste off.
By contrast, when it comes to many of the things I strongly believe — e.g., egalitarianism, meritocracy, etc. — I’m more amused by the transparently crappy quality of the arguments against them than I am worried about possible revisions. In these cases, my beliefs rise to the level of hubris, where I’m so supremely confident in the strength of these doctrines that I actively enjoy bending over backwards to find a devil’s advocate who can make even a semi-plausible non-strawman argument against them. These aren’t sacred cows as much as they’re daredevil posits (to coin a phrase).
Radiohead are better than Lady Gaga.
I think that people are more important than things or money. I think that the common good is more important than an individual’s luxury. I think freedom from pain and suffering and misery for the weak trumps freedom from inconvenience for the strong. I think that you can weigh all the issues against one another and find solutions that work at least pretty well for everyone, and that’s going to be a better answer than maximizing success for some at the expense of everyone else. I think that an ethical system needs to be built around the idea of designing it so that it works for you if you’re on the “losing” side of encounters, not just assuming that you’re going to have the upper hand all the time.
I.e. Veil of Ignorance.
Solidarity as potentially corrupting. True. I was thinking of it as a utopian ideal – global solidarity with all humans and all other thinking-feeling species (details to be decided). So, universal solidarity, not the partial and thus harmful kind. A Big Thing, a Totalizing Narrative, not a personal invested solidarity.
Veil of cake-cutting.
For me? The truth. This means recognizing when I am wrong, when I make mistakes. This means exposing myself to other ideas. This means doing my best to not be overly-confident that I already know the truth.
Why is this my sacred cow? Because if you want to do something, anything at all, you must first know how to do it. And if you are wrong, then not only may you not succeed, but you may in fact end up doing grievous harm that you would not otherwise wish to do. So to me, the truth comes first, because it is absolutely necessary for everything else.
And yet, Jason, there are exceptions…
(I know this from writing Why Truth Matters. We wanted to be careful not to claim too much.)
The Golden Rule is my sacred cow, it’s the source of all our high-minded abstract principles.
I don’t dig the “Golden Rule”… seems like everyone doesn’t necessarily want a Scotch and a foot rub done unto them, even though that’s what I want done unto me.
Just think if a stranger on the street offered you a foot rub. Creeeeeeeeeeeeepy.
Wow this is a first for me =)
I understand the intent of this post and I like it, except “Sacred cow” has a connotation for me that is somewhat different than what I think its being taken as here.
I’m not really sure how to explain it either but I will try my best. The first time I heard the term sacred cow was referring to basically rational logical people who were skeptics but believed in one irrational thing for no reason or for reasons that seemed for some reason to bypass their usual reasoning ability. Like a scientist who while otherwise brilliant about his field of study totally thinks bigfoot is real and all the sightings and pictures prove it.
I have a friend for instance who is a skeptic in almost all things but she wants so bad to believe in life after death so that she can think her mother is still somewhere that she believes in ghosts. She wont discuss it with anyone she does not go ghost hunting or anything but she simply will not consider any evidence against it.
Meh, the Indians have enough sacred cows for the lot of us. I’ll borrow one of theirs when in need.
Slightly less silly, I guess egalitarianism. I get all stroppy and irrational at that sort of stuff.
#12 Improbable Joe.
That’s a gross misrepresentation/misunderstanding of the principle, it’s essentially a model of mutual respect and obligations
Consider the so called ‘Silver Rule’ or ‘negative form’ or ‘Confucian’ form, that should allow you less scope for straw man mischief.
As to the Scotch and foot rub, my acceptance really would depend on the age and sex of the person offering the rub and the quality of the Scotch. That person would also understand I have the right to refuse or modify his/her offer, because if the situation were reversed, they would also have the option to refuse,and he/she would expect to be treated the same way. Geddit?
The term “Sacred Cow” itself is a Sacred Cow, since as Marvin Harris points out in his book “Cows, Pigs, Wars and Witches” the Cow in India serves a number of purposes besides meat, making the prohibition on killing them quite rational–and of course, plenty of people find a way around it when a particular Cow is burdensome.
As for mine, that’s a difficult question since I think every conclusion ought to be open to question (Maybe that’s it?).
David…oh right, I see. I’m probably misusing the term. Ah well. I hijacked it.
“Basic commitment[s]” is better, but it’s a tad dull. Ah well again.
Oh, and speaking of cows: ribeye, medium rare. I sure as hell count that as a basic commitment! :)
Interesting question.
Surely these words are just too broad and ambiguous for these purposes?
Maybe my spidey sense is tingling a little having just finished Tariq Ramadan’s “What I Believe,” but these terms in this context feel like weasel words.
Ramadan speaks in generalities, and the above phrases seem ripe for the picking when it comes to saying you’re for somethnig “good” all the while holding destructive views.
I can’t help but think of Eric Mac’s on going discussions of the use of the term “dignity” by religious leaders (heh).
Justice, in particular, seems like a strange word to hold as a sacred cow. Saying you think justice is a fundamental seems like saying that you believe in Morality, or that Morality is your sacred cow.
Likewise Equality. Equality of what?
I suspect I’m preaching to the choir here, to an extent, but yeah, it just strikes me that for something to be a “sacred cow” for me, it would need to be pretty darn specific. Otherwise it’s not even getting out the gate.
Well that part was a subset of the main question. I was poking at the idea of some kind of deference (if not worship or obedience) to something higher and better than human beings, other than god. For that purpose it had to be large and general. But that wasn’t meant to be the whole answer to the basic commitments question.
Full disclosure: I have not read the comments in question in full.
doh.
Whatevs.
There is a term “theory of mind” I am told that I do not “get” it. I do not believe people when they say things that are obviously wrong headed, I do not believe that deep down racists, bigots, and sexists do not know they are wrong. I don’t believe that the nazis thought they were the “good guys”. People justify bad behavior because it is what they want to do and our society ignores it.
That’s a hell of an interesting comment. I’m not sure I’ve thought of it that way before – as a failure of ToM.
I find Theory of Mind really interesting. I love watching the experiments – the child of 3 thinks the doll will think the candy is in the green bag, but the child of 4 gets that the doll will think it’s in the purple bag.
I don’t think what you’re saying is really failure of ToM though. We don’t know what other people know, think, have heard, etc. Other Minds are black boxes. We make guesses, but most of the time we don’t know. I think things like that all the time, and my ToM is actually pretty good, even though I am such a horrible person. I think about “Does X really think that was an ok thing to do? Does he really not get how wrong it was? Is he having second thoughts? Or is he just cheerfully going ahead convinced of his own swellness?” Then I apply all that to myself, then I repeat the sequence, then I get bored and go get something to eat.
Who are The Sacred Cows?
To me “sacred” means that which is non-arguable or which stands untouchable by unclean human hands. In principle, I’m not sure I have any such special cattle (just a lot of pet beefs), except perhaps the principle that nothing is sacred. That we should be able to freely discuss, question, criticize, and even ridicule any idea, institution or convention is pretty close to a “sacred” idea for me. Also maybe preserving conditions suitable for life on Earth, the home of all that is holy to us. We may already have irreparably defiled that sacred temple.
I try not to have sacred cows, though I’m sure I do have a tiny herd of them somewhere. One guard against them is to conceive of even important principles as limited. I’m sort of egalitarian but not to the extent of wanting to abolish wealth. I favor human rights but I’d put limits on freedoms. People should be equal before the law but equality is in other respects a virtuous fiction. Perhaps another way to suggest my approach is to say that while I find that I have beliefs, and must have some of them, I don’t really believe in belief.
Self-evident truths, perhaps, as in
“Egalitarianism for one; separateness of persons for another; human rights for another” are different to sacred cows or King Charles’s Heads. They can be questioned, though it would take powerful arguments against them tosway people I hope, and it is possible to argue as to what precisely they are and which are more important in particular contexts. Sacred cows, though, by definition, are unquestionable and in their admirers’ eyes more important than absolutely anything else in every circumstance.
I used extreme examples, but I actually do lack ToM, if a cashier is taking too long at a store I think shes doing it on purpose to spite me. When I am out and not really aware of what i’m doing my first reaction to even the smallest inconvenience (caused by people) is rage. Thankfully I don’t like looking or talking to people so that (usually) keeps me out of trouble. Funnily enough I even find it difficult to post on blogs, I go through short periods where I will post on a single subject or related subjects(I perseverate on some issues) and then stop for weeks or longer because I can’t bear to read responses to my posts anymore. and I think i may be totally off topic now and rambling again so ill stop now.
Language should be used to communicate ideas – and this is done more effectively when people hold common definitions of words and, and an understanding of context.
[…] Benson wrote a post yesterday about sacred cows. In it she asks readers what their cows are, and the responses are […]
Well, this went right over my head. I think I’ve missed the context.
That truth and beauty matter. I dislike the framing as “sacred”, though, since the two are trade-offable, and, if there’s a good which is substantially different from those, against it, too.
It looks like David’s clarified what he meant by “sacred cow”, and it was somewhat oblique to your own definition. But they both could be interesting to think about.
When you said “I would resist giving them up”, referring to your basic commitments – what I wondered was, what exactly would you be resisting? Is it implied that if something were compelling you to abandon these ideas, you would resist doing so, in a way that wouldn’t be true of alternative beliefs facing a similar compulsion?
Then, what form might such a compulsion take? Being threatened unless you verbally renounce them doesn’t seem very meaningful. But if we’re talking about resisting being provided with a compelling reason why you should abandon them… Well, then it sounds like a thought process worth examining and eliminating. I’m not sure there’s anything that’s worth believing if it can’t stand up to rational critique.
Obviously, I think the idea of defending human rights stands up particularly well against any critique I’ve yet encountered, and I’ve no idea what a sound logical argument against them could possibly look like. But if one were presented, should it be accepted? Or is it worth trusting blindly in one’s own irrationality, assuming we’re just right to keep valuing them anyway, and sticking our fingers in our ears until the ideology-destroying syllogism goes away?
This might not be an especially fruitful line of conversation. I’m just thinking aloud, and trying to get into the habit of joining in more in the comments of blogs I enjoy.
Well, I meant resisting abandoning them even when given [decent, good, possibly even compelling] reason[s].
That’s part of my point, innit.
Well then you’re in a happy position! But maybe you’re making it a little too easy for yourself. Try making it more difficult and see what happens.
Sound logical arguments aren’t the only defeaters. Suppose you were presented with facts that made human rights look less of a slam dunk? Suppose a really sound reliable survey that showed women are “happier” (by some non-crazy measure) in places like Pakistan and Saudi Arabia than they are in Sweden and Canada. Then what.
PS, I think it is a fruitful line. Do get in the habit of joining in more!
OB@13,
Maybe the stranger offering you the foot rub is mildly autistic and is therefor blameless! Besides, I’d love to get offered a foot rub so if somebody did it to me it wouldn’t be creepy to me. Ergo, it wouldn’t be creepy for me to offer one to somebody else! How am I supposed to rub anybody’s feet now, if I can’t proposition them in the street? Plus, don’t you know that children get their feet blown off by landmines?! By focusing on your mundane foot-related problems you are diverting attention from them.
/snark. Did I miss any?
I like Bruce S. Springstein’s idea regarding making “nothing’s sacred” into a sacred cow, but of course that means we’re using the “beyond question” definition of ‘sacred cow’ as opposed to the ‘fundamental commitments’ interpretation. Otherwise, the assumption of basic human equality and the view that truth matters for its own sake might be my own sacred cows.
I found myself thinking though about the difference between “sacred cows” (beliefs you hold firmly and resist questioning) and what might be called “sleeping dogs” (areas you ignore and resist inquiring into.) That second one includes, for me, large swatches of politics, health, and moral quandaries like vegetarianism and whether I really should stop using weed killer on the lawn. There’s a bit of willful blindness involved in dealing with both animals, as well as the hope that other people won’t suddenly start in on them. “Sacred cows” you protect; “sleeping dogs” you leave lie.
I dislike the idea of sacred cows, or unbreakable rules (though sacred cows in my mind implies false idols). While solidarity seems like a really interesting one, and it definitely sounds is better than the gods I’ve come across, as atheists, do we need to necessarily replace the totems of gods with other totems? I don’t suggest complete nihilism though, but I thought that part of getting away from gods is also abandoning absolutes in favor of contextualized understanding. But then again, maybe that’s what solidarity also imposes, I’m not very familiar with Rorty. Maybe a philosophical introduction to him is in order?
It is the pursuit of happiness, not happiness, that is said to be a self-evident human right.
RJW @ 11 & 16
While I approve of “model of mutual respect and obligations” that the Golden Rule is supposed to represent, I think the Rule is a bad formulation that leads to misunderstandings.
But my whole point is to put this whole thing under question (to borrow a bit of “Theory” jargon). I certainly haven’t announced that we need unbreakable rules and to replace gods with other totems. I’m asking questions and soliciting further thoughts.
Roger, I know that, but it’s not relevant to what I asked.
Roger #41 wrote:
I think you’re being mislead by archaic language. At the time the Declaration of Independence was written, the term “pursuit” had more to do with following than chasing. You pursue your pursuits, engage yourself in the doing of activities or hobbies. When pursuing happiness, you’re not so much striving after it but peacefully enjoying it. At least, this is what a professor of 18th century lit taught me.
Ophelia Benson #36 wrote:
I think you’ve run into one of those semantic contradictions like “but what if someone really wants to be raped?” Well, then it’s not really “rape,” is it? Not in this hypothetical world where we can set the premises and thus know their truth.
By definition, human rights involve individuals having the freedom to choose for themselves how they live. If a majority of women are indeed happier living in an autocratic system, then this is presumably what they would freely choose for themselves even given a genuine understanding of the alternatives. The human rights issue then comes up for that pesky minority. They ought to have the same freedom as the other women, if things are to be fair. A right is the flip side of a duty, and vice versa.
The concept of human rights then seems to be a bit circular, in that if you yourself would not choose to be allowed to make certain choices, then you still want the right to choose that. But maybe that sort of circularity is one of the warning signs of something really being self-evident. I don’t know.
Surely it is, Ophelia.
Assuming that all variables could be controlled, the result of such a survey would only show that a higher proportion of women in Pakistan and Saudi Arabia were happy compared with those in Sweden and Canada. It would not mean that the restrictions imposed on all women in Pakistan and Saudi Arabia should be imposed on all women in Sweden oe Canada, or even that it is right to impose those restrictions on women in Pakistan and Saudi Arabia. The happiness of those who like the way they live does not mean they have the right to force those who do not want to live that way to live that way. Equally, we are entitled to regard people who choose to live under absurd restrictions as damned fools, but we are not entitled to force them to live the way we think right.
“Pursuits and recreations”- you’re probably right, Shastra.
All the same, the [hypothetical] fact that the people who live in a certain way makes them happier than those who do not does not give them the right to force everyone to live as they think right. It does not even mean the others would be happier if they followed their example.
Another thought-experiment. It is proven that a god like that of of christianity or islam exists; a god that will give an eternity of joy and pleasure to those that love and worship it and an eternity of torture to those that do not. I, for one, hope that I would follow the example of Charles Péguy and choose to be damned rather than accept salvation on those terms. The pursuit- with both meanings- of unhappiness is as much a right as the pursuit of happiness
At the risk of sounding too, conservative, freedom. I don’t mean it in the “I would kill to protect my freedom” way. It seems to me all things flow from freedom. If we are all to be free to live, then we have to respect everything that goes into sustaining life, so that covers the environment. It also covers sharing and fairness and even irresponsible reproduction on the individual or societal scale. Freedom does not release you from responsibility.
Some people are happier being told what to do, but any system that includes that must maintain the freedom for those people to express themselves and change their minds, to negotiate their way out of whatever deal they made. I think we are a very long way from coming up with any universal rules for life, so we need to be encouraging the generation of ideas.
The thing about my sacred cows is the probably not unusual experience that I often don’t know what they are till I suddenly feel I just have to say something about X. Since I started commenting on one thing or another a few short years ago I have discovered that a small herd has been quietly grazing somewhere out of sight, and every now and then a pure white, golden-horned and — well — ox-eyed cow suddenly appears. It’s really very odd. But for now I want to talk about unicorns.
Marc Alan di Martino at #32 has reminded me that one of my sacred cows is shooting unicorns. When he put it like that, my first reaction was to say “What harm have unicorns ever done me? Unicorns are nice. Shouldn’t there be a campaign to protect unicorns from wanton destruction?” But when I think about it, I can think of at least two that I could wish were well and truly dead. It is precisely because unicorns are nice, and mythical, and also horned, that they can stand for all the nasty ideas and ideals that infect our minds.
Religion didn’t bother me when I believed it, and was probably good for me in an odd way when things were bad, but it didn’t really help in the long run because it definitely distorted my view of the world and of other people. Fortunately, for me, religion was inextricably entwined with music and resonant words and doing good, and it was religious people themselves who put me well and truly off religion, without in the least affecting my belief in music and resonant words and doing good, before too much damage was done. And when I began to read stuff on the internet I really began to wonder how it had been possible to remain so ignorant for so long of the appalling suffering that religion not only abets but actually causes. So that is one unicorn I have frequently taken determined pot-shots at.
Another one is “Adults know better, you’re only young” etc. This is one that really has done me harm, largely because people’s unicorns are definitely pink and definitely invisible. So it’s more comfortable to deal with a grieving, traumatised teenager by telling him that he should be grateful and just get on with his homework, and laying down the law, as if his parents hadn’t just died in appalling and appallingly prolonged circumstances. The unicorn of “he’s just a kid, he doesn’t understand, he’ll get over it” is comfortably pink and — to the extent that it is unexamined — comfortably invisible. It means not having to go through the tedious business of counselling and emotional support for some spotty-faced orphan. In fact, in those days, the very idea of emotional care for grieving children and adolescents was, I think, nonexistent. They did their best, but it was too authoritarian and rigid, and so their best was, frankly, rather bad. The exceptionally good, honourable and kindly person who looked after our “house” could not understand why it was that so many of the children who had been through the orphanage ended up so dysfunctional and regularly gave us sermons on the subject of ingratitude. It’s all about unicorns. She was a great believer, and I suspect that it was her beliefs about unicorns that gave her strength to go on. It was at that time, though I didn’t think of it in these terms, that I became a shooter of unicorns.
So that brings me to a third unicorn which invokes the cow of “shooting unicorns”: authoritarianism. It’s based on a presumption of absolute rightness. No humility: the law is, the good book says, tradition declares, we know what’s best: don’t answer back, we just know, so shut up.
The mother of all these unicorns is: this is how it is, don’t ask questions. BANG BANG BANG.
It was Ophelia and Jeremy who confirmed for me that truth matters. It matters what is the case, it matters what can be apprehended; what people are really doing is more important than what they think — or would like to think — they are doing. If it doesn’t matter, there is no point in trying to shoot any unicorns. It is precisely because truth matters that one can see those otherwise invisible unicorns, understand just how pink they are, and take careful aim…So this, for me, is the most golden-horned cow of all.
Well it still isn’t really what I was getting at, but I haven’t got the energy to type what I was getting at right now.
Ok got the weekly update and some other things out of the way.
Doesn’t it? Why not? Or rather, doesn’t it at least suggest that perhaps the society as a whole ought to be arranged so that more people are happy rather than so that everyone has “rights”?
This issue is basically why I don’t admire The Moral Landscape. It’s not clear why Harris would say no.
I would say no. I think rights for all are more important than more happiness for a majority. I can give reasons for that, but I don’t think they’re decisive. It’s a basic commitment.
Yeah, less happiness and less freedom! Woo!
Or rather, less “happiness” and less “freedom”, where those words seem to be corrupted or used in a way that leads to overall negative outcomes for individuals and society as a whole. Sometimes we need things that seem negative to people like higher taxes, more regulations, lower speed limits… are overall positives, and counter-intuitively lead to higher levels of happiness and freedom overall.
Dammit, Ophelia, if you ask people what their sacred cows are, they might very well tell you. Well, if shooting unicorns isn’t good enough, what about the meaning of shooting unicorns, which is, to try to see clearly and stand against anything that obscures the view? I can’t see how abuse of human rights can stand against a real determination to see exactly what is going on and try to do something about it. I can’t see how it is possible to go on living in a world of make-believe if people insist on being rational and looking at what we are actually doing. This is definitely my most sacred cow.
Surely “rights for all” has to be decisive because how else are we going to live? Everybody has to have enough, and nobody needs to have more than everybody else.
Then you don’t lack ToM, since you attribute mental states and motivations to others (they don’t have to be the right ones).
How about science as a sacred cow? There’s some overlap with ‘truth matters’ but maybe it deserves its own cow.
Yep. Science is definitely a very fine cow.
Ophelia, re Harris, the problem is that he has defined what constitutes “the good”. Big error. You can’t fit all those individual people into one tidy box. We can’t go on doing things that way. Society has to sort itself out with a few basic principles and learn how to cope — which is, after all, what sensible people normally do. If we have to rely on philosophers to give us absolute principles we’ll never get away from authoritarianism.
I didn’t mean yours wasn’t, Gordon! Sorry for unclarity. I meant the earlier replies.
Eeek.
Your unicorns are great ones, Gordon.
They do have to be independent of you though, don’t they? To have ToM you have to grasp that others don’t necessarily know what you know. What David describes does sound like not quite fully getting that.
It’s OK, Ophelia. Although I have read through everyone’s comments I was just too busy thinking about what I wanted to say. And it was past my bedtime, too.
Shredded carrot in orange jello.
I’m sorry, but just because they’re the same color doesn’t mean they make any sense as a combination. Just stop it, people. Stop it.
Also, stop biting your forks. Gives me chills. Use your lips.
I will never waver on these issues.
I am not saying that there are not far more important issues, just that my positions on those have evolved over the years. Not so with the jello/biting the fork stuff. Those are just wrong no matter how you look at it.
I demand evidence for the implication that shredded carrots do not go well with orange jello. Deliver this dish at my current residence!
I think I’m with Svlad. I’m skeptical of this claim. What is orange jello, after all? Does it taste like anything? Does it taste like anything so distinctive that it clashes with shredded carrot?
On the other hand – no on second thought I agree with Jafafa. I think this is an a priori claim. Even if the two don’t particularly clash…what is the point? What on earth is the point? Jello has no real point, except perhaps for embedding staplers and other office paraphernalia.
Interesting question. Going by my own interpretation of a ‘sacred cow’ as something to which one is committed perhaps slightly irrationally and in spite of an awareness that one might not be right, I suppose mine would be the idea that, insofar as it does not directly harm non-consenting third parties, consenting adults should be free to do whatever they want with and to each other, irrespective of any harm they may cause to themselves (I’m using ‘directly’ to deliberately exclude mental harm arising from knowing that others are doing something which one finds offensive/upsetting/degrading, though I accept that even this is a fuzzy definition, I can’t quite decide where this places the mother or father of children who wants to go free-climbing or take crystal meth of a weekend) Not because I can’t see that there are problems with this kind of ‘social libertarianism’ but because I find the alternative faintly terrifying…
Except in a very limited, personal sense, I’d also include a commitment to truth. An individual might have every right to ignore or avoid unpleasant personal truths (if I’m going to die an unpleasant painful death, I might prefer not to know for now), but I do not believe that there are truths about the world that society as a whole would be better off not knowing