In winter, the sun goes down early. I look up from my laptop and it’s dark. I’ve put on my jacket and watered the plants on the balcony, mixed up a cup or two of urid daal, a table spoon of tahina, a glove of garlic, lots of olive oil, salt and pepper for later, made some tea, and settled down with my other laptop, on the red sofa…
Yesterday, I finished listening to a fascinating podcast episode about Iris Murdoch on In Our Time. Also, strange to be listening to people talking about people who write instead of reading their works directly. A few years ago, I might have ordered a book. These days I already know that I have the time to listen to podcasts – but to whole books, nor time to read them. How different from the eighties and nineties without the Internet.
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the growing prominence of the philosophy of one of the most celebrated novelists of the 20th century, who developed her ideas in response to WWII. – Iris Murdoch, on In Our Time
What an interesting woman. One aspect I liked was the idea that good actually exists and moral judgements and ethics are not “all relative” as I might have said as a teenager. No, Nazis are objectively evil, and many others things are, too. I liked that you can use scientific reasoning up to the point when you realise that other people exist, and are not pawns to be used; and “love” in this context means that one makes that effort to step out of one’s own self-centered world and be genuinely interested in other people.
I found it particularly interesting because of a discussion I recently read about the benefit or uselessness of having discussions about ethics. For me, these are teaching moments. It’s how I learned when I was young.
Ideology, or in a wider sense, ethics, is all about what should be done. How we should live. These aren’t statements about the world, but opinions about what the world should look like. They aren’t true or false, and any argument against them always boils down to “I disagree!”. Arguing about ethical systems is some of the least constructive things a human can do. – A Polemic Against Internet Arguments
A Polemic Against Internet Arguments
“I disagree!” But then again, I also like philosophy. 😍
@tagomago mentioned that these are two fundamental aspects of ethics: the divide between consequentialism and dentology, whether we are judging the consequences of actions, or the intent of an action. Kant thinks that the only thing that can be shown to be good under all circumstances is good intentions. In this sense, perhaps Murdoch’s explanation has more staying power: some acts are clearly evil, and the good acts involve those selfless acts involving others.
Anyway, I want to return to the importance of having discussions about ethics in public. Mieum had an interesting point:
This is not to condone senseless arguing online, of course, but I think this is certainly no basis for hastily rejecting the general worth of arguments—and of those about ideals and ethics in particular—simply because they cannot always terminate in agreement, or even that they often amount to stalemates. … The values embodied in people’s perspectives, choices, actions—regarding licenses or otherwise—do not require reconciliation in some more encompassing ideal we can all agree upon. But appreciating the conditions and perceived consequences of the values implied in someone’s position *is* worthwhile if you want to understand them. – Licenses, Internet Arguments, and Adaptation
Licenses, Internet Arguments, and Adaptation
Avoidance (scroll down to “Ethics, Ideals, and Internet Arguments”)
And that takes me back to the Iris Murdoch episode where understanding and appreciating other people is central to being good.
Wikipedia links:
#Philosophy
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I loved “A Severed Head” so much. I had it as a postcard for years (talk about abridged! It was just the front cover) until I finally took the time to read the book and I’m so glad I did.
– Sandra 2021-11-04 06:20 UTC