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Moral Truisms

By Noam Chomsky at Aug 10, 2004

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There is no doubt that people have moral intuitions, and research -- serious research is in very early stages -- reveals that they are quite uniform without experience in complex situations, and in many ways surprising. There is little reason to doubt David Hume's observation that they are grounded in our nature -- as we would restate it, adding nothing much substantive, in our genetic endowment. We can learn little bits about these topics by the methods of science, but the issues of human life so vastly exceed the range of scientific understanding that we are almost always proceeding on the basis of moral intuition, which is subject to reflection, debate, sharpening, etc., but cannot be grounded... The same is true of the epistemological intuitions that guide scientific research, in fact. Why should we seek what by our cognitive standards are simple, elegant theories? In brief, we have to live our lives, without immobilizing ourselves by posing questions that are very remote from answers, or even coherent formulation. That's not to say we shouldn't think about them, but without being immobilized by them. What I've called truisms I think are moral truisms: for example, that we should apply to ourselves the same standards we apply to others (in fact, more stringent ones). Suppose I run into someone who doesn't agree: say, someone who thinks it's outrageous for someone to cause severe harm to us, but just fine for us to cause far more severe harm to them? Then discussion is pretty much at an end. However, I think this situation is very rare. The usual situation is denial that we are causing severe harm to them; rather, we are doing our best to help them, but sometimes failing because of our naivete, innocence, tendency to sacrifice ourselves too much for others, etc. That's the essence of what in honest days used to be called "propaganda," and is now called "news," or "information," or "sober commentary by public intellectuals," or "scholarship," etc. I think that is overwhelmingly true. One rarely comes across someone who says "I'm a Nazi and proud of it." But if so, that reveals that there is something of a common moral ground, and a basis for constructive interchange -- which may, and sometimes does, sharpen moral intuitions as well. We all know that very well in fact. It's not that long ago, after all, that it was considered not just tolerable but in fact deeply moral to have slaves, beat one's wife if she is disobedient, lash children, torture a poor person who robbed a crumb of bread, etc.

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By Tolsen1, R4d20 at Dec 16, 2004 05:53 AM
"No society condones unjustifiable killing. No society places cowerdice in high esteem. No society looks down upon bravery. No society celebrates unjustified dishonesty. No society condones taking advantage of its own members to an unreasonable extent." Different societies can have VERY different opinions of what is or is not "unjustifiable". A legit killing in one scoiety can easily be murder in another. Same with lies. Cowardice is defined differently. Some cultures believed in "He who fights and runs away...", while others saw any retreat or anything except face-to-face, hand-to-hand, combat as cowardly. Bravery to some is foolhardiness to others. "Unreasonable".. Whats with all these subjective qualifiers?

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Re: Moral Truisms

By Tolsen1, R4d20 at Dec 16, 2004 05:47 AM
Now if we are to be guided by our prejudices, who shall be without a guide? What need to make comparisons of right and wrong with others? And if one is to follow one's own judgments according to his prejudices, even the fools have them! But to form judgments of right and wrong without first having a mind at all is like saying, "I left for Yueh today, and got there yesterday." Or, it is like assuming something which does not exist to exist. The (illusions of) assuming something which does not exist to exist could not be fathomed even by the divine Yu: how much less could we? How can Tao be obscured so that there should be a distinction of true and false? How can speech be so obscured that there should be a distinction of right and wrong? Where can you go and find Tao not to exist? Where can you go and find that words cannot be proved? Tao is obscured by our inadequate understanding, and words are obscured by flowery expressions. Hence the affirmations and denials of the Confucian and Motsean schools, each denying what the other affirms and affirming what the other denies. Each denying what the other affirms and affirming what the other denies brings us only into confusion.

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Re: Moral Truisms

By Maahaadave, Gurudave at Sep 21, 2004 03:39 AM
My point(preaching?), is that there are no universal moral truisms in society. Morality is in the eye of the beholder. It was morally correct for the Nazis to eliminate "lower races". It is morally correct for "higher caste" to pull political strings to avoid military dangers, which they supported for the "lower caste". Why? The higher caste has a self assigned "divine right", much like the moral right people think they have to treat animals viciously i.e corporate "farms". On the last episode of "The Apprentice", a person was kicked out because of his bravery, corporate society punishes bravery. Honesty is anathema to the corporate/political/Media social class i.e Plutocrats. Honesty can get you fired..or worse. The 1st world believes in their right to exploit the 3rd world.

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Re: Moral Truisms

By Argonaut84, Godcopbadcop at Sep 20, 2004 09:44 AM
8. I was too verbose, and come off as a cock.

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Re: Moral Truisms

By Argonaut84, Godcopbadcop at Sep 20, 2004 09:42 AM
Thats the kind of stuff Chomsky is talking about. Well, there are a few uniform observations that can be made here. 1. The words unjustified and unreasonable are employed here to take into account the successful employment of a "reasonable sacrifice factor" by one who wishes to engineer the basic views of morality to achieve pardon from morally reprehensible actions. 2. The above are rights against (accept for the cowardice and bravery concepts). Meaning that understandings of fundemental human rights are probably inborn concepts. 3. I'm tired of writing this - I have home work to do. 4. Gurudave should stop preaching. 5. Very little of this is my own. Most concepts are stolen. 6. I'll get back to this tomorrow or some other time. No one is going to read it anyway. 7. Only 1200 characters per post.

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Re: Moral Truisms

By Argonaut84, Godcopbadcop at Sep 20, 2004 09:42 AM
O.K. sally, lets speak plain English here, for Orwell's sake if no one else's ("Politics and the English Language"). I want you to tell me from where this amazing presonally relative morality originates from . . . It is impossible that a person's genes will ultimately determine their morality. Now, on to what Chomsky was talking about. Chomsky was saying that there are basic universal morals that all societies seem to abide. Such as the following (And these are almost exclusively ripped from Theodore Schick's essay on universal morality, which is online should anyone want to read it.): No society condones unjustifiable killing. No society places cowerdice in high esteem. No society looks down upon bravery. No society celebrates unjustified dishonesty. No society condones taking advantage of its own members to an unreasonable extent.

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Re: Moral Truisms

By Maahaadave, Gurudave at Sep 15, 2004 02:04 AM
The leading lights of the plutocratic social class are people who by definition, have a different moral view then that of the traditional view of morality held by society. The moral highground has been hijacked in the public sphere, by the psychopath arm of the plutocratic cliques. We can easily see this in what is legal and illegal in todays society, what is considerd moral and immoral by some "long held" supposed consesus of morality. Self worshipping demagogues and privateers roam the halls of power, like made men at a mafia reunion. Abject ruthlessness is respected, kindness, compassion and equality are scorned at and thought of as signs of weakness. Predators are their moral heroes, anyone else who balks at the orgy of self worship and moral degeneracy, belongs to the world of the "losers", the "suckers", the have-nots. By self worship, I mean: They are the God, in their universe. Everything and everyone in their universe is meant to be used for their purpose, and to serve them. The only moral ambiguity they may have, is based on emotional, not moral thought. Have no illusions who the leaders of todays society are and how they view the world around themselves.

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Re: Moral Truisms

By Sgiacosanzio, Sally at Aug 20, 2004 00:54 AM
Morality is subjective. It originates within the individual as agent. Morality is intuitive and arises out of conscience--individual conscience--which we seem to be born with. Morality is doing the right thing, even when it is not in our own self-interest. Knowing what is right is a function of one's conscience.Internally people suffer. A human being's main concern consists in fulfilling a meaning. But we cannot do this alone. For this we need others and possibility of self-transcendence. How do we act? confronts us everywhere. It is a moral truism that no one has the right to do wrong, not even if the wrong has been done to them. After all, not every abused child grows up to abuse others, for example. We have free choice and freedom within the undeniable limitations and conditions of human life. Within the limitation of death we are still free to choose how we will act at any moment. I am convinced that it is in these small, silent, internal choices that we all make every day that we have the possibility of living a moral life. Or consider the irreversibility of our lives. We have memory but we cannot physically go back to the past. We certainly can refer to decent people.

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Re: Moral Truisms

By Bostrom, Jay at Aug 13, 2004 00:02 AM
Do you find "morality" to be subjective? Or, what about a highly moralistic term such as: "patriot"? Do you believe there is a need for operational definitions of these concepts? Why? I've been listening to professors in the school of education try to define what a "moral" teacher is. They claim that one can be outlined by "virtue theory," and that an operational definition is necessary. Why, I don't know. I could be that it makes their job relevant. However, whenever I try to introduce the ideas of David Hume that morals are "more properly 'felt' than judged of," or as he describes that "vice and virtue are not discoverable merely by reason," the assertion is made that in order to proceed we cannot reduce science down to pure subjectivity and that an operational definition of a moral person is needed. Why? Is this going to make me a better teacher? It makes me feel that intellectuals set on defining morality are telling me what is 'expected' of me. Am I irrelevant as a moral agent? Why define these concepts? What is a "patriot"? I get the feeling, more and more, that I don't ever want to be one. The desperation to define-or maybe "confine"- these concepts strikes me as insecurely contrived instead of scientific, or more accurately, it seems that the two schools of education that I've been involved with are more concerned with a science of "social engineering."

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