tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16594468.post6051828911457179354..comments2023-10-24T04:29:23.693-06:00Comments on Atheist Ethicist: Patricia Churchland: The Biology of MoralityAlonzo Fyfehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05687777216426347054noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16594468.post-73552358951267002582007-03-17T06:55:00.000-06:002007-03-17T06:55:00.000-06:00MichaelThe "reasons that I give" were not "making ...<B>Michael</B><BR/><BR/>The "reasons that I give" were not "making people kinder and more considerate of others."<BR/><BR/>The reasons I give are "the reasons we have for making people kinder and more considerate to others."<BR/><BR/>Some of those reasons are basic biological desires - aversion to pain, desire for food, desire for a comfortable place to live, desire for sex, desire for the well-being of one's children (which is a basic biological desire whose strength may be altered through social factors but that exists even without social factors).<BR/><BR/>Some of those reasons are acquired reasons (acquired desires) such as a desire to study astronomy, a desire to play football, a desire to write a novel.<BR/><BR/>All of these reasons give us reasons to be surrounded by people who are kinder and more considerate to others.<BR/><BR/>It is the reasons for being surrounded by people who are kinder and more considerate to others that I am referring to, not the kindness and consideration itself.<BR/><BR/>Note: I hold that <I>nothing</I> has intrinsic value. <I>All value</I> consists in relationships between states of affairs and desires. Even the value of a desire is determined by its relationship to (other) desires.<BR/><BR/>That is the part that Churchland missed out on - questioning the <I>value</I> (in terms of the fulfillment of other desires) of having particular oxytocin levels, to the degree that we can act in ways that influence the oxytocin levels in others.Alonzo Fyfehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05687777216426347054noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16594468.post-83345768104478806152007-03-16T23:10:00.000-06:002007-03-16T23:10:00.000-06:00i agree with your assessment of Churchland and the...i agree with your assessment of Churchland and the mess that ensues from sloppily mixing biology with ethics. Sober and Wilson, have a much better approach (of course, that's a philosopher and a biologist working together).<BR/><BR/>I do have qualms about your 'Alternative' to Churchland. You are justifying a certain 'ought' with propositions that give "more reason[s] to than reason[s] not to". However, the reasons you give, making people "kinder and more considerate of others" are themselves <I>moral</I> reasons, just less controversial ones than the 'both sexual practices go' reason that Churchland implicitly gave.<BR/><BR/>A yet better argument against Churchland would follow Hilary Putnam in explaining that facts of biology and values of ethics are fundamentally intertwined; thus Churchland's <I>definitions</I> of 'promiscuity' and 'monogomy' are <I>already</I> morally-influenced ideas that cannot thus claim to provide an unshakeable, scientific foundation for further ethical reasoning.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com