Re: No education (was purity)

[ioannis@flinet.com]

On Wed, Dec 03, 1997 at 08:04:00PM +0200, Kai Henningsen wrote:
> ...
> > wrong way,  they discard it. This is not a satisfactory way to proceed if we
> > want to  discover the truth -- if there is such thing. How an idea strikes
> 
> With regard to ethics, there is good reason to believe that there actually  
> is no better way - different people will have different reasons for liking  
> or disliking those ideas, but as far as I can see, the important  
> difference between ethics and physics is that there simply is no universal  
> truth you could find out about. 


  This is ONE theory only. This is latest fad in the coffee shops in 
  Paris, I assume.  

  
> (Note that this sentence can be  
> interpretedtwo ways - either there is no truth, or else you can't find out  
> about it. Let me point out that this difference is of absolutely no  
> practical importance at all.)
> 
> Now, without an universal truth, what is the basis for deciding which  
> ideas to adopt and which to reject?
> 
> It's all pretty much arbitrary.


You are speaking about the NATURE of things. Suppose all you say is true, 
even so,  this says nothing about how one should behave. 
(the violins are crying...)


> 
> Personally, I think that there are two general positions here, one being  
> "good is what I want", the other "good is what minimizes social conflict",  
> and most strategies are some mix of these two basics - sometimes in really  
> strange ways.


 Many of your other countrymen said lots of other things too. 
 Now, Kai, do you think their contribution was of no account and they were
 deceivers in the most extreme terms?  Why should they be out-of-fashion,
 if what they said was no better that those who are presently in in-fashion?


  
> >  find such theories. Considering that these theories have been around
> >  for thousands of years, for most of them do resurface
> >  under different name, it is (I think) unlikely that we will ever prove
> >  anything that is of practical use. But what else can we do?
> 
> See above :-)


 What is this that you say,  where is the beef?   :-)

  

 We disagree in all and everything.  We got to stop before we be
 proven a great nuisance to the rest.



 Ioannis
 

> >  To form and resolve sound arguments requires training, Aristotle
> >  was saying.
> 
> That, however, is not the same as training in ethics. For example,  
> everyone with a solid science education should have the necessary training  
> for it.
> 
> >  philosophers
> 
> Well, let's say I'm seriously underimpressed by these guys.
> 
> You know how people look at pictures from Picasso, and say "my kid could  
> do this"? (And it's not completely wrong, either, even if things aren't  
> quite as simple as those people think.)
> 
> When I look at output from philosophers, I usually tend to think "not only  
> _could_ I do that, I could do it better". Of course, I fully expect (most  
> of) the philosophers to disagree.
> 
> >     Ethics, like others have said, is a very touchy subject and I will
> >  definetly will not start discussing it on this list ( though I have given
> >  three lectures to students last year and only one was insulted).
> >  I stand by what I said, for it this subject is not too different than
> >  geography, physics, or statistics. The only difference is that there has
> >  not been much progress.
> 
> It's extremely different. That you don't see this means, to me, that _you_  
> are completely unqualified to talk about it. Of course, I don't expect you  
> to agree.
> 
> 
> MfG Kai
> 
> 
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-- 

Ioannis Tambouras
ioannis@flinet.com, West Palm Beach, Florida
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