Recent Responses
Is it better to fight fairly and risk higher casualties than to fight unfairly and thereby reduce casualties? I think many of us have the intuition that war nowadays, despite incurring many fewer casualties than wars past, is much more disturbing for the fact that killing (e.g., by dropping bombs) (1) is so easy and (2) typically does not allow opponents any real self-defense. Is there anything to be said for a fair fight in war, or should our sole moral object be to minimize overall casualties?
Joseph Levine
April 10, 2008
(changed April 10, 2008)
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First, I would take issue with the claim that war nowadays causes many fewer casualties. While this may be true for soldiers in the armed forces of modern industrial societies, it is clearly not so for the civilian population or even for the soldiers in "third world" nations. The Vietnam War... Read more
In reference to question 1655: "How come pain is in the hand, an arm distance away, but the pain processing is in the brain? I don't feel my hand in the brain, I feel it at 40cms away from my eyes, on the keyboard." I'd have thought that there might have been some consideration in the response to the location of nerves in hand. We can have cuts, say, on parts of the body that are low in nerve density and have no feeling of pain at all. Or if the nerves are severed somehow, then there is no sensation or "projection by the brain" of the pain. Is not the nervous system an extension of the brain? It's made of the same material. Pain and throbbing in the hand is then located in the hand and of course acknowledged by and registered in the cortex for any subsequent actions that may be required. Would this mean a redefinition of "brain"? Perhaps some brain processing is more "distributed" in nature and an end to the "brains in a vat" models...
Joseph Levine
April 10, 2008
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In some sense of course the nervous system is an extension of the brain, and precisely where one sets the boundary of the brain is somewhat arbitrary. However there is a point to distinguishing the function of the nerves in the hand that detect the damage in question - say, a cut - from the fu... Read more
Imagine this situation. For some reason, Jack knows that by committing suicide in a very painful way, he can make Jill a little bit happier. Jack wants to do this. In a few minutes we will have our memories erased of this situation & Jack will continue to live a happy life. Now I have control over whether I allow Jack to go through with the suicide. What is the moral thing for me to do? On the one hand, if I let him commit suicide, there will be less net happiness (Jack suffers much while Jill gains little) but more preferences satisfied (one). On the other hand, if I prevent him from doing so, there will be more net happiness (Jack much more happy, Jill a bit worse off) but less preferences satisfied (one less). I suppose this is a complicated way of asking which is more important (or which is important full stop)- preference satisfaction or happiness? I'm not entirely sure why, but I wanted to illustrate the question in this way, even if it is a little confusing! Worth a shot. Thanks, Holly M.
Matthew Silverstein
April 10, 2008
(changed April 10, 2008)
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There are a number of challenging issues here, in part because there are a number of different ways in which things (such as happiness or the satisfaction of preferences) can be important. One way in which such things can be important is by contributing to an individual's well-being (that... Read more
Is the use of torrent sites to download TV shows wrong? Or is it OK on the grounds that it makes a stand against the invasive advertising techniques used on television?
Matthew Silverstein
April 10, 2008
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The "invasive advertising techniques used on television" would make torrenting TV shows justifiable only if we had some sort of right to watch these shows without advertising. But I don't think we have such a right. TV shows are produced or purchased by networks at some cost, and they rec... Read more
Do very large corporations have a duty to be ethical and to involve themselves in charity? Is the duty of a pharmaceutical company which makes life-saving drugs more than the duty of a company which produces 'unnecessary' items, like a company that produces sparkly party hats, even if both are the same size, make the same profit, etc?
Matthew Silverstein
April 10, 2008
(changed April 10, 2008)
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This is an interesting question. Actually, I think you're asking two different questions here: (1) Do corporations have a duty to behave in an ethical manner, and (2) Does ethical behavior necessarily involve charity?
The answer to the first question is certainly that corporations do have... Read more
How can abortion be so easily accepted in a civilized society? Sure, it is important that a woman or any person be able to have control over their body, but the fetus is a separate entity, a new person completely, as is logically shown by the fact that a mother can give birth to a male child. Anyone can tell this without having to use the available scientific evidence which proves my point. So, what gives any person the right to kill someone else so that they can live the way that they want?
Peter Smith
April 11, 2008
(changed April 11, 2008)
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Allen Stairs rightly queries the claim that the foetus is already a new person: killing an early foetus is not straightforwardly killing a person -- it is at most killing something that would otherwise become a person.
Still, you might be tempted to say -- indeed, many people do say -- killing a... Read more
It’s been said that philosophy can help develop useful critical thinking skills, and analysis of argument, concepts, and hypotheses, etc. seems to be much of what philosophers do. But what about the creative aspect to their work? Can studying philosophy help us to better hypothesize, speculate, generate more and better ideas or problem solve generally? Critical thinking can be studied separately from philosophy, but are there resources for exercising this creative aspect? It would seem to me that this area is just as useful and transferable to other disciplines as critical thinking, yet not much seems to be said of it. Or is it that creativity is something that a person just has (like a talent) in a certain area and it’s not easily transferred form one area to another? For example an artist can be very creative with her paintings but stumped when it comes to generating ideas for resolving her business problems. How do the really good philosophers come up with the great unifying theories, persuasive arguments or thought experiments?
Kalynne Pudner
April 10, 2008
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Studying philosophy can indeed encourage the development of synthetical skill as much as analytical skill. Very often philosophers will apply a concept or way of thinking common in one area to another, just to see what will happen. A historical example might be Thomas Aquinas applying Aristo... Read more
How we can be accountable for our actions if we cannot possibly predict the consequences of them?
David Brink
April 10, 2008
(changed April 10, 2008)
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Surely, in some cases we do know what the consequences of our actions would be. I know that if I break your arm that I harm you. In such cases, there is no excuse of ignorance. Both law and morality also assume that I can be held responsible for adverse consequences of my actions that were rea... Read more
My question relates to Second Life and sex. Many people in Second Life gender-swap - that is, men create female avatars and women create male avatars. It is estimated that up to 80% of the "women" in Second Life are actually men. Some heterosexual men who engage in sex in Second Life worry about having sex with female avatars who are actually men. Is this logically and philosophically consistent? Given that Second Life is a virtual world and that nothing is real, is there any point in worrying about the real sex of an avatar? If your male avatar is attracted to a female avatar, what is the point in considering the real sex of that person? Shouldn't the relationship be taken at face value, the same as the rest of the (virtual) environment?
Kalynne Pudner
April 10, 2008
(changed April 10, 2008)
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This is, I think, an utterly fascinating area of philosophical inquiry, and some new work is tackling this very issue. (David Velleman, for example, has a paper draft on virtual agency that considers what it means for an avatar to do things we ordinarily ascribe to real people, like "have se... Read more
Imagine two men. One of them is an honest, lawful and ethical person. However, nobody notices and his actions are not appreciated by society. So he's treated like an outlaw. The other man is a cunning criminal who manages to make his actions appear like good deeds. He's treated like a king. Which one of them lives the happier life? As an alternative question: Why should I behave ethically when nobody takes notice and I'm not struggling with a guilty conscience? (I'm aiming at the benefit for the individual here, not at the common good for a society.) Is ethical behaviour itself a good thing or do we only behave ethically for the sake of the consequences?
David Brink
April 10, 2008
(changed April 10, 2008)
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This is exactly the question Plato addresses in book II of the Republic, using this and other hypotheticals to pose the question. Glaucon and Adeimantus concede that justice is good for its consequences, in particular, that it helps secure the justice of others toward oneself, but want to be sho... Read more