Comment by jondeval | Hacker News Reader

Comment by jondeval | Hacker News Reader

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> Evidence: How many, many animals live and thrive is deeply immoral by human standards.

The fact that non-human animals live an existence of violent survival does not seem to be prima facie evidence for the nonexistence or incoherence of human morality.

Human beings are rational animals. The term rational here is being used in a specific and technical sense. Non-human animals are subject to the laws of nature in a manner that acts more directly on their passions. Human beings are also subject to the laws of nature, but the forces of nature are mediated by our rationality.

Animal Act: (1) Offspring are hungry (2) brings food to offspring

Human Act: (1) Offspring are hungry (2) Reflects and Decides to provide food (3) brings food to offspring

An act is deemed immoral if it is a misuse of the rational faculty for ends that are not in conformity with the laws of nature.

Human Act (immoral): (1) Offspring are hungry (2) Reflects and Decides not to provide food for selfish reasons (3) offspring go hungry

Animals suffer but they are not moral agents like human beings since there is no mediating rationality that can be misused for ends that are not in conformity with nature's laws. The phrase Nature's Laws is being used broadly to include physical, biological or evolved social laws intertwined with the essential characteristics of the species.

> The fact that non-human animals live an existence of violent survival does not seem to be prima facie evidence for the nonexistence or incoherence of human morality.

You missed the point. Morality is a human invention, much like computers are (albeit philosophical, not physical in nature).

Like computers, it didn't exist before consciousness evolved.

Talking about morality as a universal truth, and there being some invisible scales of justice which will eventually even out is thusly irrational.

Apologies if I'm missing the main point. I certainly agree that consciousness + rational choosing must be a prerequisite for moral acts.

But I wouldn't concede that morality is a human invention like the computer. That would imply that it's accidental and not grounded in anything fundamental to our species or nature's laws.

Do you believe that choosing to feed your kids, or choosing to not kill someone are simply created constructs like the computer or the airplane?

Also, I think these two statements can be true at the same time: (1) The Moral Law is real and exists outside of our subjective experience and historical cultural evolution and (2) concepts like Karma are without evidence.

> Do you believe that choosing to feed your kids, or choosing to not kill someone are simply created constructs like the computer or the airplane?

The actions exist obviously.

My point is that in the absence of consciousness there is no positive or negative value ascribed to them.

Let's take the example of feeding your children, but use the opposite extreme. What you see plenty of in nature is a mother eating her children. Sometimes for no reason at all (Octopus, Guppies, rodents).

Are there certain species that are fundamentally immoral? Maybe so, from our perspective. But without our perspective no value is assigned. It is just another thing animals do without any moral weight.

I don't think the concept is morality is relevant in those extreme cases. It looks like we are more or less saying the same thing.

I am not sure we're saying the same thing. Extreme cases are how we test to see if our worldview holds up. But anyways, Happy Holidays!

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