I was listening to a lecture on what the speaker called "New Ethics" the other day. While he was talking about the implications of ability when it comes to ethics and morality, he made a statement that I thought was interesting:
"While 'is' doesn't imply 'must', 'should' implies 'can'."
He then expanded on what he meant. Briefly, he said that he meant that while observations of what is "natural" don't necessarily imply that the observed behaviours are moral or ethical (or even necessary), an ethical system necessarily has to take into account the capabilities of the person subject to that system. IOW, the ethical instruction "you should do 'X'" inherently assumes "you are capable of doing 'X'."
So... a question for all of you: do you agree?
And to tie this back to religion: something I've heard from many Christians is that the Atonement was necessary because it would be impossible for any human to fully meet all 613 laws of the "Old Covenant". If this is the case, and given the above, does this mean that the "Old Covenant" was not truly an ethical system?
"While 'is' doesn't imply 'must', 'should' implies 'can'."
He then expanded on what he meant. Briefly, he said that he meant that while observations of what is "natural" don't necessarily imply that the observed behaviours are moral or ethical (or even necessary), an ethical system necessarily has to take into account the capabilities of the person subject to that system. IOW, the ethical instruction "you should do 'X'" inherently assumes "you are capable of doing 'X'."
So... a question for all of you: do you agree?
And to tie this back to religion: something I've heard from many Christians is that the Atonement was necessary because it would be impossible for any human to fully meet all 613 laws of the "Old Covenant". If this is the case, and given the above, does this mean that the "Old Covenant" was not truly an ethical system?