The professor in your Harvard lecture is a charming and charismatic CON-ARTIST.
He's leading the students down his primrose-path, while dodging FUNDAMENTAL LOGIC, by presenting false-dichotomy after false-dichotomy.
The very definitions of "utilitarian" and "ethics" are MUTUALLY EXCLUSIVE.
This professor never considers basic definitions (PRIMARY AXIOMS).
This professor didn't even hint that the very definition of "murder" is critically flawed.
Then he calls KANT'S DEONTOLOGICAL ETHICS, "categorical ethics"? WTF?
Aren't all categories of ethics technically "categorical"??
The only person who made a lick of sense was the very last audience member who spoke about feeding their family. +PROHUMAN +PROFAMILY
There areprobably hundreds of problems with this entire discussion, but two very important topics which were 100% absent include "the fundamental attribution error" AND "human instinct".
They don't call it the trolley problem for nothing.
If you send the trolley down path (A) to save the people
in path (B) are you responsible for killing the people in (A)?
How can one decide or not decide knowing that doing either
will condemn one group to death while sparing the other group?
Notice I left out murder in exchange for killing because we common
folks tend to conflate the meaning of the two. Killing is more of an
amoral term, so we don't have to address the intention of the act.
Moral absolutism doesn't do so well when pitted with this one.
Here is another interesting one for you, it's about meta-ethics.
There are more than relativism vs. absolutism, and probably a
slew of sub-sects to consider as well, he covers a lot in ten mins.
different schools of thought and how they may see the Trolley problem.
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
This is a very impressive appeal-to-ignorance (don't get me wrong, I love watching this stuff).
Let's try this.
(1) Please make your personally preferred definition of "fact" explicit.
(2) Please make your personally preferred definition of "morality" explicit.
(3) Please tell me if you personally believe that (1) and (2) are mutually exclusive.
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
If moral absolutism could be compared
to theism and moral relativism to
atheism, then I'm agnostic.
I realize, those are big ifs.
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
What do you think of these "absolute" AXIOMS?
AXIOM #1 - PROTECT YOURSELF
AXIOM #2 - PROTECT YOUR FAMILY
AXIOM #3 - PROTECT YOUR PROPERTY
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit