Re: Part 2 The secret in a sin MY grand'pa said Its SIN to break the skin.
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Re: Part 2 The secret in a sin MY grand'pa said Its SIN to break the skin.         

Group: alt.philosophy · Group Profile
Author: Immortalist
Date: Sep 11, 2008 16:05

Morality or Slogans? These are the rules of utility or necessity? Is
there a possible naturalization justification?

These are the ten moral rules that all rational persons would want to
be part of the public system that applies to all rational persons. No
one should be surprised by these ten rules. These are all obvious,
simple rules that everyone is supposed to follow regardless of what
their personal goal in life is. Careful attention to these rules shows
that they primarily set limits on what one is morally allowed to do.
They do not provide a positive goal for life. This is done by another
part of the moral system, what I call the moral ideals.

By an evil or a harm, I simply mean something that you would always
avoid for your self or your friends unless you had some reason for not
avoiding it. I define a good or a benefit in a similar way, as
something you would not avoid for yourself and your friends unless you
had some reason to. I claim that, in the sense I have given to the
terms, we all agree on what the goods and evils are, i.e., we all have
the same basic values.

FUNDAMENTAL

Do not Kill
Do not Cause Pain
Do not Disable
Do not Deprive of Freedom
Do not Deprive of Pleasure.

DERIVETIVE

Don't Deceive
Keep Your Promise
Don't Cheat
Obey the Law
Do Your Duty--where Duty includes those actions you are required to do
by your job, your position, your family, your circumstances, etc.,
e.g., a teacher has a duty to show up for class.

THE MORAL IDEALS

Now I am going to make explicit the moral ideals. Moral ideals are
those precepts that tell you to help others, to prevent the suffering
of pain and disability etc. Following the moral ideals goes beyond
what is required by the rules, but that does not mean that in a
conflict between the rules and the ideals, one should always follow
the rules. For example, everyone agrees that you can break a promise
to meet someone at the movies, if it is necessary to save a life. The
moral ideal of saving a life justifies your breaking this moral rule.
The moral rules and moral ideals are both important, and sometimes one
should take precedence over the other, sometimes the reverse. It
depends on what rules and ideals are involved. It depends on the
particular circumstances. But there is an important difference between
the rules and the ideals. The rules tell you not to cause an evil,
e.g., do not cause pain; the ideals tell you to prevent or relieve
evil being suffered, e.g., relieve pain.

You will notice that the moral rules can be obeyed with regard to all
people, all of the time, equally. You can obey the moral rules
impartially with regard to all people all the time, twenty-four hours
a day, seven day a week, fifty-two weeks a year. You can obey them
when you are alone on a desert island, in fact, you cannot help but
obey them when you are alone on a desert island. The situation is
really different with regard to the moral ideals. You cannot be
following the moral ideals twenty-four hours a day. You have to sleep
sometime, and when you are sleeping you are not following the moral
ideals. This is a significant difference between the moral ideals and
the moral rules, e.g., all of you reading this essay are right now
obeying all of the moral rules, but none of you right now are obeying
any of the moral ideals. Reading this essay may lead you to follow
moral ideals, but right at this minute, you are not following them,
whereas you are obeying all of the moral rules.

This difference between the rules and the ideals leads to another
difference: it is appropriate to punish people for not obeying the
moral rules, but it is not appropriate to punish them for not
following the moral ideals. When would you punish them?

http://aristotle.tamu.edu/~rasmith/Courses/251/gert-paper.html
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