I suppose we might have reached a philosophical impass, Mr. Jesus. I’d like to ask one more question to try and get to the root of this disagreement. In a completely theoretical situation, disregarding any real world examples: Is there any action that could not be justified morally should the eventual end be an equal or greater good. Or, in other words, is there anything at all that you would not allow should the ends justify the means?
Increasingly repugnant actions must have increasingly disproportionately beneficial results to balance them out, I would say. There’s nothing that I would automatically disqualify from a utilitarian analysis, but the more repugnant the action, the less likely there’s any real-world justification for a scenario where that’s the lesser evil out of the choices presented.
But again, my argument is not an absolute assertion of “Roman conquest was good”, and I initially rejected the argument entirely precisely because it is a different argument from the question of Roman rule entirely, my argument is that the conflict of Roman and British polities and the conquest that resulted does not have the very modern dynamics you are ascribing to it.
Ah, ok I understand. Personally I do think we can project our morals backwards and judge historical figures and cultures. I think it helps us analyse them so long as it doesn’t result in us misconstrueing the truth. I think remaining completely objective can result in repeating the past, or excusing morally reprehensable things in the present. I come from a litarary background, so maybe I’m predisposed to that kind of analysis.
But i see your side as well, I’ll admit how alien the past can be and how different the idea of morality can be from culture to culture.
I suppose we might have reached a philosophical impass, Mr. Jesus. I’d like to ask one more question to try and get to the root of this disagreement. In a completely theoretical situation, disregarding any real world examples: Is there any action that could not be justified morally should the eventual end be an equal or greater good. Or, in other words, is there anything at all that you would not allow should the ends justify the means?
Increasingly repugnant actions must have increasingly disproportionately beneficial results to balance them out, I would say. There’s nothing that I would automatically disqualify from a utilitarian analysis, but the more repugnant the action, the less likely there’s any real-world justification for a scenario where that’s the lesser evil out of the choices presented.
But again, my argument is not an absolute assertion of “Roman conquest was good”, and I initially rejected the argument entirely precisely because it is a different argument from the question of Roman rule entirely, my argument is that the conflict of Roman and British polities and the conquest that resulted does not have the very modern dynamics you are ascribing to it.
Ah, ok I understand. Personally I do think we can project our morals backwards and judge historical figures and cultures. I think it helps us analyse them so long as it doesn’t result in us misconstrueing the truth. I think remaining completely objective can result in repeating the past, or excusing morally reprehensable things in the present. I come from a litarary background, so maybe I’m predisposed to that kind of analysis.
But i see your side as well, I’ll admit how alien the past can be and how different the idea of morality can be from culture to culture.
Dunno who downvoted you, but I upvoted you, I enjoy a good argument.
Haha thanks man, same. If we came to the internet expecting everyone to agree with us we’d go insane pretty fast.