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lukeprog comments on Are Deontological Moral Judgments Rationalizations? - Less Wrong
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Comments (168)
That's not the issue for me. I do, basically, claim the same argument that Greene makes. I was only trying to say that I can't add every qualification and clarification without the post ballooning to something like 40 pages. But I'm happy to respond to individual questions and objections outside the main body of the post, as I did above.
So now your objection is to my tone? That's only DH2 on the disagreement heirarchy. I'll take another look at my tone, but it's not much of a disagreement if we're disagreeing about tone.
I already responded to this in my last comment. The point isn't that consistent pro-lifers would charge abortionists with murder even though the current laws don't consider abortion to be murder. The point is that consistent pro-lifers who think abortion is murder would seek to change the laws so that abortion would legally be considered murder and abortionists could legitimately be charged with committing murder (or with paying a doctor to commit murder).
Edit: I did notice some confusing language in my fourth paragraph, which I've updated thanks to your comments.
Luke, I think you often come across as defensive. I think it is difficult to avoid since you write a lot and thus put yourself out there for people to criticize and people do often comment in an aggressive fashion, but I think you should be aware of it anyway. I think avoiding seeming defensive would be useful to you because seeming defensive seems to make discussions more adversarial.
The phrase that gives me that impression here is
I am a neutral observer of this conversation; I've only read the last two comments.
Thanks for your feedback. For whatever reason, this turned out to be one of the most impacting comments I've received this year.
Glad to be of service :)
I have established to my satisfaction that you will not engage with the criticisms I intended to present without at least one of us putting in more effort than we want to. Good day.
I think the downvotes to this comment are coming from people who are interpreting it to say "this discussion has convinced me that you are low status, and not worth engaging with anymore". I believe the intended meaning is (Alicorn correct me if I'm wrong) closer to "we are not communicating effectively, and synchronizing our methods of communication would take too much effort given the low importance of the disagreement", with much less (if any) implication of blame.
Your interpretation is correct.
Were there additional criticisms that you did not state already above? If so, I would appreciate at least knowing what they are (without necessarily engaging in a discussion about whether they are sound), so that I have an idea of where the strongest sources of doubt lie (in order to arrive at an appropriate level of confidence in the article's thesis, which I am predisposed to believe).
My objections, summarized from my comments and made more direct, are:
It is unfair to impugn someone's commitment to a moral position based on the fact that they do not attempt to prosecute violations as crimes, when the violations are not, legally, crimes.
There is not a simplistic "the deontological answer". To suggest that there is (or to quote someone who does and move on without disclaimer) is to be uncharitable to deontologists.
Luke's responses, summarized as I understand them:
His article was too long anyway and I should read the rest of the quoted author, rather than expecting that Luke would mention it or abridge his selected quotes differently if he was aware of the issues therewith and wished to disclaim them.
The mentioned simplistic deontology is "characteristic" of deontology, and it is reasonable to draw conclusions about it as a category therefrom.
Why aren't anti-abortionists trying to press murder charges against abortionists and the women who hire them?
Me:
The way Luke presents quotes implies that he endorses them as they stand, and it is cheating to defer responsibility for their content when they were originally presented so plainly.
The article snipes at deontologists, and this appears to serve no purpose (does not present neuroscience more interestingly; does not convince deontologists; does not convince consequentialists more).
Aren't anti-abortionists trying to make abortion illegal, just not through the silly method Luke proposes? Are there other cases of people using said silly method to make other things illegal?
Luke:
Yes, he does endorse his quotes, but they are complicated and he didn't want his article to be too long, so he's only responding to specific complaints about them rather than quoting more cautiously in the first place.
It is wrong of me to complain about his tone. (Introduction of the word "tone" is his.)
He "already responded to" the abortion thing. (No he didn't.)
Alicorn,
I'm pretty confused by how you're interpreting my words. Three examples:
ONE
What i said, direct quote:
What you heard me say (disconnects from what I actually said, in italics):
TWO
What I said, direct quote:
What you heard me say (disconnects from what I actually said, in italics):
THREE
I'm similarly confused with the abortion thing. Here's the play-by-play as I see it above:
You point out that one reason pro-lifers wouldn't press charges against a woman who has an abortion is that it's not illegal.
I ask:
You repeat the previous point about not "charging women with crimes the scope of which does not legally apply", even though I had just moved the question to: "Why not change the laws so that the murder charge does apply to women who commit abortions (either via a courts victory or new laws passing)?"
I point out that I've already moved beyond the point that the 'murder' charge doesn't apply (because abortion isn't currently illegal or counted as murder) by asking instead why pro-lifers don't seek to make abortion illegal (and murder).
You claim I still haven't responded to your point.
...Is one or more of us just too tired to follow a conversation or something? Outside help wanna chip in?
On the third matter, one problem is that you seem to display confusion about the structure of (U.S.) law:
Laws are not created in courts by means of attempted prosecutions being successful; they are created by a vote in a legislative body (and then sometimes struck down by courts as violating a meta-law). Currently, there is no law against abortion, so a prosecution could not be brought (not just that it wouldn't be successful). Furthermore, there is also currently a meta-law against making abortion illegal -- so it would be futile for pro-lifers to simply petition their legislatures to do so. What they would have to do is first attempt to get the meta-law reversed, and if you follow American politics at all, you will be aware that there has indeed been an active movement to do this for a number of decades now.
Having said all that, I consider your basic point to stand in light of this.
I'm thinking of an (overreaching) Supreme Court decision.
This response, while not uninformative about your thinking, suggests to me that you merely skimmed my comment rather than reading it carefully and integrating the detailed information it provided.
If I had to identify the source of this impression, it would be your apparent failure to recognize that the Supreme Court had been specifically referenced (albeit not by name) -- as was the fact (seemingly not as familiar to you as I would have expected) that pro-lifers have indeed been actively seeking a decision in their favor (this is the primary reason that judicial nominations are usually controversial in contemporary America).
I don't mean to be critical (I much appreciated the post), but I just hate it when people underestimate the information content of my words.
Having grown up a midwestern evangelical Christian, I assure you I'm familiar with the decades-long attempt to overturn Roe v. Wade, and indeed once signed a petition in support of such an overturn. What I'm saying is that overturning Roe v. Wade with a new Supreme Court decision wouldn't be the same as an even greater overreaching Supreme Court decision that set a precedent for considering abortion to be murder, with those committing abortion being subject to the usual punishments for murder.
That's what I would have thought! Thanks for the clarification. However, you did seem to be wondering why pro-lifers don't try to pursue their goals in court; and seeking to overturn Roe is the only way they can do that.
Well, the Supreme Court could use the "murder" rationale to reverse Roe, if it wanted to do so; and were the decision to be reconsidered in a new case, do you have any doubt that pro-life groups would file amicus briefs urging them to do just that?
I've stated that I don't want to continue having this conversation with you. The summary in the grandparent was for komponisto.
For the people down who would down vote this, is it better if she did not respond to lukeprog's post at all? Acknowledging someone when they attempt to communicate to you is considered polite. It often serves the purpose communicating a lack of spite and/or hard feels even as you insist on ending the current conversation.
Sure. See the two chapters - in MSv3 - immediately following Greene's article, and see Greene's response to them (in the next chapter after that). They are not easily summarized.
At no time was my primary point to critique your skills at summary.
Huh? Each time, I quoted each of your objections separately and responded to them directly. I also updated my post twice in response to your comments.