12-29-2005, 09:56 PM
Chaerophon,Dec 29 2005, 07:30 PM Wrote:You seem to take issue with my position that what is held to be morally "true" in one context is not so in another....I do not know, since my linguistic knowledge is limited, whether distinction is necessary between ethics and morals, when discussing standards of behavior that are upheld by different groups of people. I would, however, contest whether truth, moral or otherwise, may be dependent upon popular consensus - for then how is "truth" more than "popular opinion"? Should this ever become the case I imagine there would be the sudden death of all fields of knowledge and study; the opinion pollster only would survive to poll people and tell them that what they think is true is true, and what they think is right is right - this would seem to be naught but solipsism magnified to monstrous proportion.
What might be problematic is my claim that no particular set of moral claims is or could be justifiably said to be the single, absolute, correspondently true set - not in this world where so many people hold such radically different beliefs.... However, at the very least, even if there is a "true set", how could we positively distinguish it so as to claim with justifiable confidence that it is correspondently true to those who believe otherwise? On what basis would we do so? Perhaps you have an answer?
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What defines correct behavior if one rests it upon a societal standard demands one answer what is a society? Is it a certain number of people? 100,000? 10,000? 1000? 100? 10? 1? If the answer is 1 then what is moral "truth" - correct behavior - is no more than what I say it is. Or, perhaps there is a certain threshold number of like-minded people needed before truth may be discerned?
I am not suggesting that context for action is to be disregarded - someone striking a match had best know if his context is that he is standing in a puddle of gasoline - but I would suggest that consensus - the number of people who cheer while the man standing in gasoline strikes the match - has no bearing upon the rightness, or moral truth of an action.