Quote:
Originally Posted by Sparrow
What's niggling me is that we haven't pinned down what ethics/morality actually is - it seems to have been shape shifting throughout this thread. Or, more likely, I just haven't understood what's been going on.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by TGS
That's a very good point and I think part of the "dispute" of the thread relates to just that.
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It seems to me that there has been a fair amount of talking at cross-purposes simply because different people have implicitly adopted one or other of these positions and someone else responded from a different position, and neither have been explicit about the position they are coming from.
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I agree. I've noticed some conflation of the idea of a moral concept with the moral value associated with it. A item may or may not have a specific quality of
color, and that quality may have a specific value - red/blue/green. In the same vein, an action may or may not have a moral quality, and the value of that moral quality may vary - good/bad.
1) I walk over and pick an apple from a tree.
2) I walk over and pick up your money from your desk.
Both actions are physically identical - but the 2nd one has a moral quality to it. The moral value [good/bad] associated with it differs depending upon a culture's underlying value system. eg. Native American cultures did not even have a concept of "
personal property", while most modern cultures do and would consider it "
theft" therefore "
bad".
Troy