tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8310450667755637519.post4341742299861074392..comments2023-10-14T09:40:06.690-05:00Comments on Jean Kazez: "Science Can Determine Moral Values"Jean Kazezhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00592593002719828153noreply@blogger.comBlogger5125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8310450667755637519.post-32421159572587825272010-03-31T16:44:07.169-05:002010-03-31T16:44:07.169-05:00I withdraw the adjectives in the name of civility....I withdraw the adjectives in the name of civility. I also agree that Aristotle and Nussbaum give us key pointers about what path the conversation on ethics should take. I know little about science, but evolutionary psychology is very new, very trendy and is questioned by many.<br />If psychologists cannot agree on whether depression has a genetic base or not, it is a bit risky to base s. wallersteinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17448905469871566228noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8310450667755637519.post-71904436444345313972010-03-31T15:56:30.050-05:002010-03-31T15:56:30.050-05:00Amos, I think Sam Harris sometimes comes across a...Amos, I think Sam Harris sometimes comes across as inordinately hostile toward religion, but I have no reason to see him as "arrogant" or "pretentious." I think his first book was great.<br /><br />I don't think it's true that equating science and ethics means we now know all the answers. Science is incomplete. Also, there's no telling that a science-based Jean Kazezhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00592593002719828153noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8310450667755637519.post-75507684055094747622010-03-31T15:47:21.166-05:002010-03-31T15:47:21.166-05:00Being "hard-wired" to think these ways i...Being "hard-wired" to think these ways is indeed, I think, how moral realists tend to think about these things. Somehow our "intuitions" in both the generic, and as Taylor brings in, the Kantian sense, put us in contact with moral "truths." <br /><br />I see moral realists frequently talking about human normativity as though human beings were like engines, in the Faustnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8310450667755637519.post-26868346040888906202010-03-31T12:33:35.875-05:002010-03-31T12:33:35.875-05:00It is pretentious and arrogant to imagine, as Har...It is pretentious and arrogant to imagine, as Harris does (but then pretentiousness and arrogance are his trademark), that science has finally discovered true morality (as others insist that it has discovered all nutrients) and that true morality conveniently coincides with the values of Harris's circle of liberal Northamerican academics. <br />Would that ethical reasoning were so simple s. wallersteinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17448905469871566228noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8310450667755637519.post-35643960298102043672010-03-31T11:21:53.619-05:002010-03-31T11:21:53.619-05:00My own tentative view is a mixture of Darwin and A...My own tentative view is a mixture of Darwin and Aristotle. We are moral by nature because, as Darwin argued, sympathy and mutual aid are naturally selected for in social species. (God doesn't come into it unless you believe that God made Nature.) Aristotle was right to link ethics to the flourishing of individuals according to their natures. Martha Nussbaum emphasizes that this connection Taylornoreply@blogger.com