About Rationally Speaking


Rationally Speaking is a blog maintained by Prof. Massimo Pigliucci, a philosopher at the City University of New York. The blog reflects the Enlightenment figure Marquis de Condorcet's idea of what a public intellectual (yes, we know, that's such a bad word) ought to be: someone who devotes himself to "the tracking down of prejudices in the hiding places where priests, the schools, the government, and all long-established institutions had gathered and protected them." You're welcome. Please notice that the contents of this blog can be reprinted under the standard Creative Commons license.

Monday, May 07, 2012

Michael’s Picks


by Michael De Dora

* Are there circumstances under which it is immoral to have children? If so, why? Those are the questions Elizabeth Kolbert takes up in a wonderful new essay in the New Yorker titled “The Case Against Kids.”

* In his review of Harvard University philosopher Michael Sandel’s new book, What Money Can’t Buy: The Moral Limits of Markets, Weekly Standard columnist Jonathan Last says we need to accept that economic systems impose moral values.

* On a similar note, Mike Tudoreanu, writing in The Daily Collegian at the University of Massachusetts, says the idea that government should be morally neutral is an old myth. 

* In case you hadn’t heard, Facts finally kicked the bucket last month “after a long battle for relevancy with the 24-hour news cycle, blogs and the Internet.” Well, they had a good run. 

* The Vatican is reprimanding American nuns “for focusing [their] work too much on poverty and economic injustice, while keeping silent on abortion and same-sex marriage.” 

* The New York Times recently announced an essay writing contest in which readers were invited to make the strongest possible ethical case for eating animals. The contest is now over, and the panel of judges — Mark Bittman, Jonathan Safran Foer, Andrew Light, Michael Pollan, and Peter Singer — has released what it thought were the best six entries.

* TED has posted a new talk by Emory University primatologist and ethologist Frans de Waal on his work with primates and the evolutionary origins of morality. 

* And in a bit of shameless self-promotion, I recently celebrated the one-year anniversary of the launch of my blog, The Moral Perspective!


9 comments:

  1. I as hoping that "Justify your dinner" contest would produce something new and/or worthwhile (despite the well-published and well merited, objections to the judges). I was disappointed: a few "raise them right" and "earth balance" types and others who don't seem to be arguing to justify meat-eating at all. Nothing to change my vegan way of life, it still makes more sense than these essays do. Perhaps there really ISN'T any justification for killing-and-ruining-the-planet to eat?

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    1. Actually, per the "peas" column in the NYT, even if its author overhypes recent findings, vegans don't have much room for moral food superiority.

      You want to feel superior about what's on your dinner plate or not? Become a "sky-clad" Jain and deliberately starve yourself to death.

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  2. Well, I can think of one: Is fucking delicious.

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    1. Agreed, and in addition, why should I give a shit about the physical suffering of chickens or cows?

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    2. Eamon,

      Well, by that token, why should you give a shit about the suffering of any animal capable of suffering, including humans?

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  3. Massimo,

    Our disagreement begins at base with what we take the nature of morality to be. I subscribe to a moral error theory because I see no extra-linguistic reality that corresponds to moral propositions. So, in a strict sense, I take all moral propositions to be false. It seems to me you, like Singer, are a moral realist (in some sense, at least) and wish to make some pretty metaphysically significant moral claims. So, e.g., you think one has a moral duty to reduce suffering when possible (or when the reduction does not correspond to some increased suffering on your part), and I do not. Morality, for me, is a strategic means-end reasoning process for agents similarly disposed as us. Empathy of course plays a significant role in so-called moral reasoning, and we can explain why humans have empathic responses to other sentient beings, especially humans, but empathy does not make true moral propositions. The ability to empathize is simply one aspect which contributes to the moral reasoning process.

    That said, do you really believe that if I do not malign non-human animal suffering I cannot consistently malign human suffering? Why can I not malign human suffering with something like: "Well, I myself would like not to suffer. If I intentionally cause (or attempt to cause) suffering in others, they may cause (or attempt to cause) suffering in me. Thus, I ought not to cause (or attempt to cause) suffering in others."

    As is obvious, such a reasoning process would exclude non-rational sentient life.

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    1. I could go on and argue that since I myself would like others to intervene and reduce my suffering when feasible should such a state of affairs occur, I should assist in alleviating the suffering of others when feasible should such a state of affairs occur. Again, you see how chickens, cows, and horses are not a part of this equation.

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    2. Eamon,

      that's a long discussion, but no, I don't think of myself as an ethical realist in that sense. My views are more along the lines of ethical reasoning being like mathematical reasoning: IF you start with certain assumptions THEN certain things follow. (Of course, as you know, there are mathematical realists out there...)

      So one of my starting assumptions is that using people exclusively for personal advantage is not good, and another is that causing unnecessary pain to sentient beings is also not good. And when I encounter people who embrace too much of an exploitative / cause suffering ethos I simply avoid them.

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  4. Great column by Kolkert; finally reading somebody who agrees with me! That said, I'm "shocked" that an economist from George Mason (aka U. of Chicago east) makes a conservative moralistic argument for breeding like rabbits.

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