Basic principles of ethics

[Deepeco]

What's so special about people? Well, inherently, nothing, really. But they're members of my own species. Is it wrong to feel attached to members of your own species?

Is it wrong to feel attached to members of your own ethic group or race? I'd say yes, if that means you don't give other individuals the rights that they deserve.
What you do is highly arbitrary: why the species and not the population (race), family, order, class,...? There are so many classifications. And there are other reasons why species boundary is not morally relevant (copy from my website)

Arguments against the species boundary
In order to avoid the risk of opportunism in our ethics, we should avoid adding arbitrary, farfetched or fuzzy criteria without good reasons.
1) The biological species boundary is arbitrary. Why pick out “species” in the list of biological categories? I belong to the kingdom of animals, the phylum of chordates and vertebrates, the class of mammals, the infraclass of eutheria, the order of primates, the suborder of dry-nosed primates, the infraorder of simians, the superfamily of Hominoidea, the family of great apes, the genus Homo, the speciesHomo sapiens, the subspecies Homo sapiens sapiens and the ethnic group of whites. It is arbitrary to pick out the species. Why adding this arbitrariness in our ethics?
2) The biological definition of species is very complicated and too farfetched to be used in a moral system. One of the many definitions of species refers to the possibility of interbreeding and getting fertile offspring. But why should this possibility be relevant? It is too farfetched to say that a being has rights if its close relatives could have get fertile offspring with some other morally relevant beings. (I refer to its close relatives because the being himself could be infertile.)
3) There is a potential fuzzy boundary: It is not unlikely that a human-chimpansee hybrid (humanzee or chuman) can be born. 10% of mammal species can form interspecies hybrids. We have seen lion-leopards, lion-tigers, camel-lamas, dolphin-killer whales, sheep-goats, grizzly-polar bears and off course horse-donkeys (mules). If these are possible, and if the genetic distance between humans and chimpanzees is not larger than the distance between those existing interbreeding species, it is possible that humanzees can be born. What would the moral status of this hybrid human be? Will it get rights? Also here there is an arbitrariness.
4) Species boundary refers to genes or appearance, and these are not morally relevant because there is no such a thing as an “interest gene” connected to all and only humans. Or in other words, there is no “essence” related to a species.


Arguments in favor of sentience
Each normative ethical system implies an argument for sentience. All the four arguments below have the same structure: starting with two assumptions (on fact and one value statement) one can derive that sentience is morally relevant
1) Virtue ethics and ethics of care
Fact: We can feel empathy in a meaningful way with all and only sentient beings (beings who can feel and have a well-being).
Value: Developing the virtue of empathy is good and important.
2) Welfare ethics (consequentialism) and fairness ethics (contractarianism):
Fact: Our own well-being matters to us.
Value: Impartiality is important. There is a thought experiment to check impartiality: imagine that you might be any other object or being, but you don’t know who or what you might be. You can be a non-sentient object without well-being, or a sentient being. How would you like to be treated? Sentience will imply a different treatment.
3) Rights ethics (deontologism):
Fact: a sentient being is a being that has interests and can subjectively feel its interests.
Value: protection of interests by respecting rights is important. Note that rights are tools to protect interests. So the coupling sentience – interests – rights is not farfetched.
4) Other ethics:
Fact: a consciousness is something very complex, vulnerable and unique in the universe.
Value: We should protect and respect something vulnerable, complex or unique. Having a consciousness is something much more remarkable than having the genes of an arbitrary species.

 

[Deepeco]

Who and how is this decided.

how? By using empathy (put yourself in the position of the others) or doing thought experiments of impartiality (such as the veil of ignorance of John Rawls: imagine that you don't know who you will be on earth; you don't know what you would like, which species you belong to, what mental capacities you might have,...). If we all start using these thought experiments and empathy, and we argue about specific situations, it will be the best that we can achieve.
Who decides it: I decide it, because the principle is according to my strongest moral intuitions. A lot of other people decide it, because they share the same moral intuitions (they value impartiality and empathy just as I do). And all moral beings (beings with a moral consciousness, in practice all mentally healthy adult and adolescent humans) should decide it.

How is this policed for example my son picks a flower to give to his mom on mothers day.

you can say that you regret that, that you feel sad that now the flower will be withered sooner,... true beauty cannot be possesed. But then also say that you love to see your son showing love for his mom.

What are the penalties for not complying and how are they enforced. For example I am going to eat meat no matter as long as I am free. Are you willing to lock me away somewhere to stop me.

at the end, the easiest way is to do the same as with people who slaughetr and eat humans. We can put them into jail in order to protect other potential victims. But now, let's focus on the arguments and the ethics. because I realize that it is impossible and unethical to put all current meat eaters in jail.

Nature itself does not alway's protect the biodiversity. So if nature decides to eliminate a species do we intercede.

If we can without doing more damage, yes. Compare biodiversity with a persons well-being. Nature does not always protect someones well-being: virusses,... So what to do? 1) Try to protect his well-being by medicins, but be aware of unhealthy side effects. 2) most importantly, don't give someone a dangerous virus. Our first duty towards a person is not to lower his well-being. Our first duty towards an ecosystem is not to lower its biodiversity.
There are more similarities between well-being and biodiversity. Both have intrinsic value (independant from use value), are difficult to quantify in one unit, but are ethically important.

And when this is not possible what do you do.

keep on striving for it, and in the mean time put the most unreliable person (the one who already commited a crime) in jail (if it was a serious crime) in order to protect others. Jail is a kind of self defense.

Love has so many meanings and definitions, even mothers kill there own children or sell them into salvery. My mother never had empathy for me and I was a good child. I do hope she at least respects me.

well, it would be very strange if a mother sells her child into slavery when she really loves her. Love implies empathy, respect, connection...

While I like this concept, it has many flaws for example I can see it morally good not to wear clothes at all in some climates but I would still not agree with it.

can you clarify this? So the rule would be "don't wear clothes in that climate"? And yet that is something I don't want everyone in that climate to do?

 

[bobhikes]

can you clarify this? So the rule would be "don't wear clothes in that climate"? And yet that is something I don't want everyone in that climate to do?

You started by saying this is a project. I am acting like the teacher if you say you want these ethic's you need to prove they are achievable.

I can declare anything an ethic and give positive examples of why it should be. The ethic is only valuable if others will practice it.

For example you yourself say not everyone will give up meat. What value is the ethic if 50% or more of the world refuse to pratice it. Like you said you can't put them all in jail.

Also your assumption that all mental adults can decide anything is flawed. Stay in the RF for sometime even when adults agree they don't agree completely and the smallest stupidest detail is the hardest to get them to agree on. Any ethic based on Human agreement is impossible.

Your comment was on a mother's love like it was a special love and true love. Look to the news mothers kill their babies, mother's sell their babies. I know first hand how a mother is capable of not loving her own son. If you base a ethic on something that is untrue what value is the ethic.

 

[Bob Dixon]

Is it wrong to feel attached to members of your own ethic group or race? I'd say yes, if that means you don't give other individuals the rights that they deserve.
What you do is highly arbitrary: why the species and not the population (race), family, order, class,...? There are so many classifications. And there are other reasons why species boundary is not morally relevant (copy from my website)

The species boundary is not morally relevant... as long as it's only animals that are respected? Plants and all others are fair game, it's only animals that you're supposed to not eat because they're more important and special than plants? Gotcha.

 

[Valjean]

Not more important.
They have self-interest.

 

[Pilgrim]

Please read 'The Vegetarian Myth' by Lierre Keith. I find the vegan diet reprehensible.

 

[Deepeco]

You started by saying this is a project. I am acting like the teacher if you say you want these ethic's you need to prove they are achievable.

I can declare anything an ethic and give positive examples of why it should be. The ethic is only valuable if others will practice it.

that's why I want to share my ethics

For example you yourself say not everyone will give up meat. What value is the ethic if 50% or more of the world refuse to pratice it. Like you said you can't put them all in jail.

it's like in history; there was a time that the majority of those in power supported slavery. But that could be changed, and so there is hope that people can change now as well so that only a small minority continue violating rights.

Your comment was on a mother's love like it was a special love and true love. Look to the news mothers kill their babies, mother's sell their babies. I know first hand how a mother is capable of not loving her own son. If you base a ethic on something that is untrue what value is the ethic.

I was not refering to all mothers. but there are really loving mothers; they exist. And it was those mothers I was refering to. And those mothers would not sell their babies

 

[Deepeco]

The species boundary is not morally relevant... as long as it's only animals that are respected? Plants and all others are fair game, it's only animals that you're supposed to not eat because they're more important and special than plants? Gotcha.

sentient beings are more important than non-sentient beings, yes, because I gave 4 arguments why sentience is important.
I do agree however that we should also grant non-sentient living beings some rights; that is why I included principle 2.

 

[Deepeco]

Please read 'The Vegetarian Myth' by Lierre Keith. I find the vegan diet reprehensible.

I have read that book, and there are a huge amount of errors, fallacies,... in it. I intended to write a comment on it, but don't have time yet.
I love the other ideas of Lierre Keith (feminism, ecology,...), but on veganism she is almost completely wrong.