Has anyone else read Mein Kampf?

[kiki1982]

Mutatis, it seems that I misunderstood you. I still don't get it, but I suppose it'll come to me one day. I will only be wiser than the day before that.

And it seems indeed we are going around in circles.

Morality is not absolute and people can get somehow torn away from what is right. Citing people like Schindler and a few others does not hold up in the face of al those millions who evidently did not even consider the wrongness of what they were doing or chose not to think about it, for whatever reason.

Evil exists and corrupts, does not consume.

[Darcy88]

My friend, you have a mind.



To be fair, I'm pretty sure Alex's first language is Italian.



That, and evolutionary psychology also accounts for "evil." If one monkey bashes another's brains in and steals his banana, the one who's willing to kill has a higher likelihood of passing on it's genes. Evolutionary theory could be used to explain and support any aspect of human behavior, that's it's flaw when one is attempting to use it in debate.

If we can't use evolutionary theory in a debate then there is much that we cannot debate. Evolutionary psychology accounts for good and for evil. In a morally relativistic view everything is good or everything is evil or everything is neither of those.

Does no one really see what I mean when I talk about this stuff? There is a reason we are not all sociopaths. If we all had sociopathic genes our species never would have evolved. Compassion and brotherhood and fluffy sounding things like that are actually biological imperatives that have enabled us as a species to survive and evolve. In good or ideal circumstances I believe most people choose kindness and love towards other members of their community and not random violence. Why is this? Because its how we have evolved.

[Darcy88]

Its like my philosophy professor said: "its objectively wrong to randomly kill newborn babies." Little moral relativist that I was I thought he was full of ****. Now it seems beamingly obvious that he was right. He said anyone who disagrees with such a statement is someone you can't discuss moral issues with."

[kiki1982]

Then your philosophy professor held a particular opinion and he is welcome to it like you are, but it does not make someone else's opinion wrong, does it. There may be a lot of situations where killing babies may be right (and the Greeks and Romans did it apparently, only outlawed in 374AD!) so therefore, Socrates would have proved him wrong if he was there. A philosopher should know better.

As a species we have maybe cared for our old and weak, but there were moments where we did not because it was necessary. Even Jews beat each other in the camps for food and you can see that kind of stuff happening when the Red Cross goes to places where there has been famine for a while. Man just turns into beast at that point and he does not care for his neighbour, if only he has food to feed his and his own.

In good or ideal circumstances we do not do that, no. And why? Because there is no need for anything else. That's why.

[Darcy88]

Then your philosophy professor held a particular opinion and he is welcome to it like you are, but it does not make someone else's opinion wrong, does it. There may be a lot of situations where killing babies may be right (and the Greeks and Romans did it apparently, only outlawed in 374AD!) so therefore, Socrates would have proved him wrong if he was there. A philosopher should know better.

As a species we have maybe cared for our old and weak, but there were moments where we did not because it was necessary. Even Jews beat each other in the camps for food and you can see that kind of stuff happening when the Red Cross goes to places where there has been famine for a while. Man just turns into beast at that point and he does not care for his neighbour, if only he has food to feed his and his own.

In good or ideal circumstances we do not do that, no. And why? Because there is no need for anything else. That's why.

Okay, so you think there is nothing inherently objectively wrong with "randomly" killing newborn babies. You don't think there is anything inherently objectively wrong with raping one's own mother. That's your opinion. Its a worthless opinion in my view, the opinion of my professor vastly superior.

If we are to take Plato's earlier dialogues as any indication of what Socrates was all about then we must recognize that Socrates posited the existence of an objective human moral good. Anyone who doesn't has their head stuck where the sun doesn't shine. Courage and cowardice, love and spite, strength and weakness, industriousness and laziness, no, nothing objective to the particular values we ascribe to such things. Its all relative. The weak hateful coward is according to another perspective just as good as the strong loving man of courage. Who am I, who is anyone to make categorical statements. Okay then.

[Darcy88]

There may be a lot of situations where killing babies may be right (and the Greeks and Romans did it apparently, only outlawed in 374AD!) so therefore, Socrates would have proved him wrong if he was there. A philosopher should know better.

Yes, infanticide was common among the Romans. That's why they demonized the Carthaginians for sacrificing newborns to Baal. The exceptions prove the rule Kiki. The part I quoted in bold only shows that you do not grasp morality and have no business discussing it.

[JuniperWoolf]

Evolution accounts for co-operation, but it equally accounts for violent competition. You're partially right, having a genetic pre-disposition to excel at co-operation would have enabled our early ancestors to depend on each other for survival in times of peace which would have allowed them to survive their environment, in spite of their lack of physiological benefit (claws, fangs fur, ect.). Humans are pack animals, but resources (food, mates, ect.) have always been limited, staying alive has generally always been very difficult. We evolved under circumstances which would put us in direct competition with other tribes for resources that our tribe needs to survive. If our tribe had people in it who were willing to kill and enact cruelties then we stood the better chance of winning. What you call "good" was most beneficial to our ancestors when resources were plentiful, and what you call "evil" was most beneficial when resources were scarce and they had to kill the other in order to have enough to survive. Well, we warred a lot and that's how these genes would have came to be perpetuated. Plus I don't think I need to explain the benefit of rape in passing on one's genetic information, but I guess I will if you want me to. This is all disturbing, but that doesn't make it any less true.

Does no one really see what I mean when I talk about this stuff? There is a reason we are not all sociopaths. If we all had sociopathic genes our species never would have evolved. Compassion and brotherhood and fluffy sounding things like that are actually biological imperatives that have enabled us as a species to survive and evolve. In good or ideal circumstances I believe most people choose kindness and love towards other members of their community and not random violence. Why is this? Because its how we have evolved.

In good or ideal circumstances, yes. We live in good circumstances right now which is why we're able to have this conversation, but most humans that have ever lived have not, and we're their offspring. It sounds like you're either operating under the naturalistic fallacy (what is natural is always "good") or a religious belief that "good" and "bad" come from a larger source than genetic inheritance. It's fine if it's religion, but call a spade a spade.

However, taking all that I've said into account it's still important to note that we are higher cognitive beings, the first on Earth actually - we aren't slaves to our genetics. To assume that because we evolved with violent genes we are destined to act violently would be deterministic fallacy. We're humans, so we have rational minds that we're free to exercise once theyve benn properly fed and watered. Rationally, we have come to realize over the years that humans tend to not act excessively cruel or violent in times of plentiful resources. When societies have their act together normal people aren't forced into acting violently and naturally violent people are suppressed, so the key to living peacefully and prosperously is to ensure that no humans are forced into impoverished situations. That's what we have to focus on, not impotent rage at dead people and other useless sentiments.

Also I'd just like to quickly mention that I don't want to talk about Hitler. This is intended to be a thread aside regarding evolutionary theory in regards to human morality.

[cafolini]

Morality can be discussed endlessly. But not as kiki1982 does it. It seems to me that kiki is a nihilist as to what entails the common good. Kiki bases all judgements on what we endured and takes for granted that what we endured is inevitable and right for the times. Right or wrong plays no role in the arguments. But isn't the whole of history a struggle for the hegemony of right over wrong? And isn't all progress a battle which right has eventually won? And how did we win? Didn't every bit of progress come about as a result of law and order? Giving kiki a value apart from the right to free speech would put us back in prehistory or even worse, bad history and inability to transcend it.
I will have to stand upon my head 'till my ears are turned red to buy such assumptions.

[Darcy88]

Evolution accounts for co-operation, but it equally accounts for violent competition. You're partially right, having a genetic pre-disposition to excel at co-operation would have enabled our early ancestors to depend on each other for survival in times of peace which would have allowed them to survive their environment, in spite of their lack of physiological benefit (claws, fangs fur, ect.). Humans are pack animals, but resources (food, mates, ect.) have always been limited, staying alive has generally always been very difficult. We evolved under circumstances which would put us in direct competition with other tribes for resources that our tribe needs to survive. If our tribe had people in it who were willing to kill and enact cruelties then we stood the better chance of winning. What you call "good" was most beneficial to our ancestors when resources were plentiful, and what you call "evil" was most beneficial when resources were scarce and they had to kill the other in order to have enough to survive. Well, we warred a lot and that's how these genes would have came to be perpetuated. Plus I don't think I need to explain the benefit of rape in passing on one's genetic information, but I guess I will if you want me to. This is all disturbing, but that doesn't make it any less true.



In good or ideal circumstances, yes. We live in good circumstances right now which is why we're able to have this conversation, but most humans that have ever lived have not, and we're their offspring. It sounds like you're either operating under the naturalistic fallacy (what is natural is always "good") or a religious belief that "good" and "bad" come from a larger source than genetic inheritance. It's fine if it's religion, but call a spade a spade.

However, taking all that I've said into account it's still important to note that we are higher cognitive beings, the first on Earth actually - we aren't slaves to our genetics. To assume that because we evolved with violent genes we are destined to act violently would be deterministic fallacy. We're humans, so we have rational minds that we're free to exercise once theyve benn properly fed and watered. Rationally, we have come to realize over the years that humans tend to not act excessively cruel or violent in times of plentiful resources. When societies have their act together normal people aren't forced into acting violently and naturally violent people are suppressed, so the key to living peacefully and prosperously is to ensure that no humans are forced into impoverished situations. That's what we have to focus on, not impotent rage at dead people and other useless sentiments.

Also I'd just like to quickly mention that I don't want to talk about Hitler. This is intended to be a thread aside regarding evolutionary theory in regards to human morality.

There is absolutely nothing impotent or useless about my rage towards Hitler. People seem to be regarding the holocaust as just a word with really awful conotations, they aren't trying to relive the horror of those who endured it. All six million I'm sure would have in their last moments hoped that those responible for their senseless brutal deaths would forever be the recipients of extreme contempt.

I'm not really commiting the naturalistic fallacy. If I was then I would be condoning what I call "evil acts." I just know that words like "good," "virtue," "compassion," "honor," are not mere faith-based metaphysical abstractions but rather deep patterns of thought and behavior ingrained into us by millions of years of evolution. A saintly species would have been as short-lived in evolutionary terms as an evil one, but a species operating according to some moral logic, that doesn't objectively regard raping one's own mother as equivalent to having intercourse with one's mate, is what we are and what evolution has made us.

[JuniperWoolf]

There is absolutely nothing impotent or useless about my rage towards Hitler.

Well then, what do you hope to accomplish?

[Darcy88]

Well then, what do you hope to accomplish?

What do I hope to accomplish? If a man shot up a primary school in your town, killing 50 kids, and then in a cafe a few years later you overheard someone making weak excuses for the guy, what would you do?

Someone says Hitler was not evil and I feel obligated to oppose such demented malarky. Heck, my own great-grandfather died in the war that Hitler played a pivotal role in bringing about.

[cafolini]

Well then, what do you hope to accomplish?

No, no, no. JW. That question is for you. It is very obvious to me what Darcy is trying to accomplish. History will back him with more in his favor than against. He is not under natural fallacy or anything of the kind. But you? What are YOU trying to accomplish? Hope you are joking, or actually playing advocate.

[Darcy88]

I think she's just tired of hearing me pontificate for 20 plus pages.

[cafolini]

I think she's just tired of hearing me pontificate for 20 plus pages.

\
Could be. I didn't think kiki could ever turn you to Maximus.

[Darcy88]

Heck I'd say I actually have direct personal reason to hate Hitler. It was his agressive war policies which led to my great-grandfather getting blown to bits when his ship was torpedoed by a German U-boat. My grandfather grew up without a father, his mother forced to fend for herself with a 1 year old and a 2 year old, something that no doubt contributed to the psychological mess that he became. He goes on to become an abusive alcoholic and then a suicide when my mother was 14, and this really messed her up, and her being messed up no doubt helped mess me up.

There you go. **** Hitler.