A little bit of trouble about previous lessons
I would like to briefly address two points that have been raised in previous lessons.
A. In the last lesson, you brought up the parable of the sheep (1 Isaac) in which you tried to show that morality is not a matter of consequence nor is it an innate tendency in us. Morality is a voluntary response to a moral command that obliges us to act/not act.
After all, no one thinks a sheep is “better” than a “wolf.” I agree with the analogy, but I wanted to point out that usually when we say a sheep is not “better,” we mean that it is unaware of the consequences of its actions and does not intend to do good. It simply responds to its subconscious instincts.
There is room to say, (not necessarily, but not necessarily otherwise), that man’s advantage over animals is that he is aware of the act and its consequences, and that he aims in his moral behavior to benefit/not harm others, that he is compassionate, caring, and loving, and that this is the fundamental motive for his moral behavior. In this view, choice is not a necessary condition for determining a person’s character, perhaps on the contrary, the more his character is like this, the more inherently compelled he is to act like this, the more consistent he is with himself, the more his behavior expresses his personality.
In a fundamental argument that you made against radical empiricism, which claims that what cannot be proven, we cannot be certain that it is indeed true/correct. (I hope I phrased it correctly). You argued that this law in itself is sweeping, and therefore it also needs proof according to this principle, and since its truth cannot be proven, we have no way as faithful empiricists to say that what cannot be proven is not certain.
Here I am trying to answer that the empiricist principle is not a positive principle, and therefore it is exempt from certainty. That is, we can decide that it is not necessarily true and still accept it as a guiding principle, it is argued that this principle is uncertain but that no other idea that has not been proven is certain either. Where does that come from? I don’t know, but I also can’t know otherwise. And again we have reached the same place, we have no certainty about something that has not been proven. Lest you say, but I think that there are principles that do not need proof. Here we have left the logical world that allows us to examine such a claim, because the claim exempts itself from being put to any test. And if so, even without the principle of refutation (let’s say for the sake of the matter that it has not been proven either) I have no reason to accept it. Either I think so or I don’t.
In 2. How do I know that what my intuition perceives is true, since many intuitions (such as in places where people disagree with me and not only) are necessarily incorrect (assuming there is one truth) and if so, how do I know that my intuition is correct and not another, or none of them. Or in the words of W. James. We know for sure but we do not know that what we are certain of is indeed so. And this is not only a statement of principle, but also validated by the fact that we do observe incorrect intuitions (no matter their relative percentage).
Thank you and have a nice day.
Discover more from הרב מיכאל אברהם
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
Discover more from הרב מיכאל אברהם
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
Yes, in the philosophical workshop.
Thanks for the answer.
Regarding A. What I am trying to argue is that an analogy to a sheep can illustrate to us that morality needs awareness. What is awareness? You will argue that it is awareness with a choice, while I will argue (at least) that choice is at best an excess weight, what is important is the action out of awareness of its result. The desire to do good and not necessarily compliance with a moral command that requires doing good.
B. Why can I accept something that is not proven? And as a continuation, intuition is often misleading and therefore cannot be trusted. I agree that the main error is not in the moral intuition itself but in the perception of reality to which it relates, but this skepticism can continue on to the perception of reality itself. Then we just changed the field of judgment and did not get out of this skeptical circle. Instead of asking who said that my intuition is correct, I will ask how I perceive reality correctly.
A. Awareness is irrelevant in no way. If a person has no choice, why does it matter whether he is aware of what he is doing and the results? It is not in his hands.
B. When I answer this question itself, you can continue to ask me: Where do you get it from? So what is the point of engaging in it? Either you have faith or you don't. I have faith. Furthermore, our intuition usually does not deceive us. On the contrary, the places where it deceives us immediately go into articles that explain them, that is, these are isolated and special cases. I have discussed the meaning and reliability of intuition in entire books (Two Carts and Truth and Unstable). Someone who does not have faith in intuition cannot have faith in anything. Therefore, there is no possible answer to the question of why to believe in intuition (because this answer itself would be exposed to the same attack).
I will start with B. I agree with the understanding that an intuitive perception can be valid even without proof. I tried to show that there is no logical fallacy in the sentence “What has not been proven is unacceptable”. That is, the sentence itself does not need proof.
A. This awareness is not in the role of an outside observer, it is an active and active part of the chain, alongside the desire (emotional in this narrative) it motivates the practical action. On the other hand, it is forced by prior internal reasons (character, etc.). Or external. Choice means the ability to decide differently. It can be argued that he could not have chosen differently, but it is still “he” who wanted and motivated himself to act.
And I answered that. This sentence does need proof. And if you accept it only as a guiding rule, then I can say about every claim of mine that it is only a guiding rule. I do not argue with guiding rules but with claims.
I will come back again. If it is motivated by reasons I have no responsibility because I could not have done otherwise. It is very simple and I do not understand what the discussion is about. It has nothing to do with the question of awareness. Even if I am aware that I am forced to think or do something, I am still forced to do it.
Leave a Reply
Please login or Register to submit your answer