I like the freakanomics correlation between abortion legislation in the ~70s and the drop in crime rates that followed in the ~90s
I like the freakanomics correlation between abortion legislation in the ~70s and the drop in crime rates that followed in the ~90s
Do you have the data for that?
Best I know of is that crime reduction has been steady for quite some time and no cause has been determined
kingnat, are you armed?
I see it more that mass media and mass communication ultimately quelch crime. I'd say that's the biggest factor. Crimes are only committed when the general public can't see them, that's exceedingly hard in today's world.
Hey KingNat,
I thought this thread was about you being an abortion escort. Not arguments about morality. Sorry I misunderstood!
.Quote:
Originally Posted by bigred
Bigred and Chelle seem to be pretty amoral.
I have no doubt that this has happened at other clinics but I haven't ever witnessed it happen. Most of the protesters do believe that they are there to help "council women" if you ask them. There are also tons of places that are set up to mislead women into thinking that they can't get an abortion because they are further along than they actually are or giving them other misleading information. They very often have advertising signage that is set up near to where abortion clinics are and use slogans like "you have options". Even though they're not offering anything of the sort.Quote:
Originally Posted by spoonitnow
Am I armed when I escort? No. I don't think that would be a particularly good idea to do that either.Quote:
Originally Posted by OngBonga
I'm a pretty big guy though, so while I'm not playing the big strong tough guy while I'm there, I do use my size and the volume of my voice to my advantage. I'm quite certain that I'm an intimidating presence for the old white men who are there protesting. And in case you didn't know old, white men make up the majority of protesters.
I found that chapter to be particularly interesting. And logically it makes a great deal of sense. But I would've appreciated to seeing more of the data that he used to frame that argument. I don't know how you can find anything but the correlation in the data but as I recall they went through and systematically eliminated a huge number of other variables that didn't correlate.Quote:
Originally Posted by d0zer
Quote:
Originally Posted by kingnat
Can confirm. When this man wants a hello hug there is no escape.
Yeah I noticed you say old guys were the typical protester. I'm assuming you're USA right? Respect for not being armed. I agree it wouldn't be a great idea, but at the same time you have to balance the risk that one of those protesters has a gun, certainly if you're States. It's less of a concern here in the UK of course, but even then I think I'd feel vulnerable without some form of defence. But then again I'm not a big guy and do not have an intimidating presence.Quote:
Originally Posted by kingnat
Why do you do this? Serious question. I find it odd that you'd do a risky job for nothing. Is this because it will look good on your CV or resume or whatever you guys calls it? Or because you want to help protect vulnerable women from nasty pasties like these old men with nothing better to do?
What is the address of the bubble you live in?Quote:
Originally Posted by jackvance
Belgium. I imagine he kind of has a point when it comes to a small European nation with a small population. I wouldn't be surprised if it's easier to get away with a lot of crimes in a large country like the States, compared to Belgium, simply because large parts of the States are so remote.Quote:
Originally Posted by spoonitnow
Quote:
Originally Posted by wufwugy
You seem opposed to this conclusion for no reason other than your previous acceptance of the contrary.
I'm opposed to the conclusion because otherwise it means that quarks and gluons and gravity and hydrogen have moral purpose
Fundamental, universal morality is an incredible claim. Probably as incredible as the claim of the existence of god
We are a bit off track here. You claimed the universe is amoral. I insist this is not true since the universe does not only consist of everything outside of ourselves, but includes us as well-- and we have morals, relative or not. And I think if we trace the root of this derailment back to a relevant source, we find an amoral universe vs a universe which has (likely relative) morality.
Does a rock have a moral compass? Does a black hole? A molecule of water? I feel safe saying, "no," but the fact that things within a set are without a quality, this doesn't mean the whole set is without that quality. Throwing your hands up and saying "Your god isn't real, and the universe doesn't care!" is both unproductive and intellectually lazy. And, for what it's worth, I don't mean that as an insult, but as a critique-- you've contributed a lot to this discussion and much more than most have the capacity for, including myself. If you have a frustration point with this discussion and that's the way out that lets you feel better, that's fine, but I'll still call you on it.
Morals aren't exclusive to humans. A situation has been observed where a chimpanzee showed moral indignation. A female was seen beating a much bigger and stronger male, who let it happen and did not react. This is pretty unusual. The female chimp was hitting him because previously he had watched her being abused by some other chimpanzee and did not intervene. So here we can see what morals really are: they are a socially motivated behavior which comes from the neocortex which is capable of storing patterns which use other patterns as their building blocks.
So we can say, no brain = no morals. A brain but no neocortex = no morals. A brain and neocortex = these have some semblance of morals and the morals will be more complex the more neocortex there is.
My nut muck has morals.
Sadly the case for the folks making the legislation on the subject as well...Quote:
Originally Posted by kingnat
I've never received a KingNat hug :(Quote:
Originally Posted by bikes
So incomplete
Much better way of putting things in perspective than what I've saidQuote:
Originally Posted by jackvance
I think it may be possible to expand the definition of morality to include more than this, but I'm not sure. It would probably just be a marginal expansion at most. Too much expansion and the word loses its meaning, similar to how agnostics or atheist-enthusiasts are sometimes unwilling to say "god does not exist" because they're expanding the definition of god to include something almost entirely meaningless yet still trying to call it god
Thanks. Also it's a good thing to call me out. When I said that, I was saying that I didn't know where further to take it, but that doesn't mean there isn't somewhere further.Quote:
Originally Posted by boost
Probably the only good point from what I said is that the fundamental belief in god (specifically, a god that hates abortion) is a major creator of the kind of anti-abortion sentiments that cause more harm than good. So when it comes to the incorrigible, it may be a good idea to address that. Granted, it probably isn't a good idea, since the last thing people want to give up is their god
I guess my nutshell of what to do about the incorrigible bible-bangers is as follows:
1. Use science and logic to show them it isn't murder
2. Appeal to their sense of personal freedom by convincing them even if they are right, it is still wrong to tell other people what to do. They already mostly believe it is right to show people the way but wrong for the government to force them.
3. Appeal to their sense of religious sanctity by convincing them that their religion is theirs, not anybody else's. This is the root of the Protestant Reformation, but the Moral Majority has tried to forget it. The Protestant's relationship with God has always been a personal one, and judgment is for God to determine, not his followers
4. Appeal to their common sense by convincing them that it is wrong to not let women abort but then turning their backs on the children, who ultimately suffer greatly because they were brought into a world that essentially doesn't want them
Yeah, I agree with this post in its entirety.Quote:
Originally Posted by wufwugy
Since when did science and logic ever matter to bible bashers?
There is an inherent danger that scientific findings and critical thinking will contradict religious teachings, so religious authorities have a vested interest to instill skepticism and doubt of the scientific method and critical thinking. So, yeah, there tends to be a barrier built up to block out well reasoned ideas that conflict with their beliefs, but that barrier isn't impenetrable.Quote:
Originally Posted by OngBonga
In short, what I said to wufwugy applies to your comment: don't encroach on the religious' attempt to monopolize intellectual lethargy.
I would argue that science and logic matter a lot to bible-bashers. The issue is that opponents simply do not address them and their framing
I feel like I have a unique perspective on this since I used to be a bible-basher and my entire family is bible-bashing. Their arguments are rational. In fact, they go out of their way to make sure their arguments are rational. If you can show them where their arguments are not rational, they try to find a rational way of returning
Look at Intelligent Design. It's an attempt by bible-bashers to be totally rational. They are trying to say "this therefore this therefore this" instead of "this therefore this therefore MAGIC therefore this". I think it appears that they're still assuming magic in the formula because they virtually never have people who understand what it takes to change their views ever really try. They can be convinced of rational flaws, and they usually don't forget it
Don't forget there's a ton of terrible logic on the "pro-science" side. It could be argued that environmentalists believe in more devastatingly bad things than fundamentalist christians. Xtians think they have morality and common sense on their side (they're mostly wrong), and environmentalists think they have science and logic and their side (they're also mostly wrong)
Donahue and Levitt used arrest rates instead of arrests per capita, lolwut?!?!Quote:
Originally Posted by Renton
Yeah, I feel bad for derailing, but also don't want to end the discussion because it's interesting. Request to mods to split thread?Quote:
Originally Posted by bigred
As I said earlier, there are three branches of Philosophy: what is stuff and how does it work (Physics and Metaphysics), what can we know about stuff and how (Epistemology), and what is the value of stuff. The two most study aspects of the third branch are Aesthetics and Ethics (that is, the value of willful actions) because they're the ones with most practical implications. Why aesthetics is a worthwhile study is irrelevant to this discussion; why ethics is valuable is that we (presumably) have some intellectual control over our actions, so if we can teach the intellect how to optimize those actions, then our actions will improve.[1]Quote:
Originally Posted by wufwugy
Of course quarks and gluons and gravity and hydrogen have varying values to the various things they come in interaction with; I absolutely reject that they're a-value, and evaluating them would (hypothetically, if anyone bothered to do it) fall under this third branch of Philosophy, and it'd be semantics to debate if it falls under "ethics." But whether the activity of gravity is good or bad gets into stoner territory: regardless of whether or not gravity is good, it exists and it's going to happen to you, so whether or not a hypothetical world without it is better is not nearly as useful as learning the mathematical laws that predict it.
If we could influence gravity--if, for example, we were constructing a new universe--the morality of physics[2] would be a crucial branch of discussion.
________________
An entirely other can of worms is whether determinism exists, in which case there is no "willful" or "influenceable" action. This is possible, but its possibility is nothing more than a probabilistic weight that is placed on moral discussion. I discussed this in great length with (I think) spoon a long time ago and can dig it up if it's a sticking point to you.
[1] That's more an example than an underlying reason. We can also influence other people's actions through societal structures, for example. The point is that willful action is influenceable, so learning about optimizing it is interesting, if not extremely practical.
[2] Not to be confused with the Metaphysics of Morals, which is already a crucial discussion to have :P
Now we're getting somewhereQuote:
Originally Posted by surviva316
Would it be a crucial branch of discussion? How does somebody propose that the laws of thermodynamics are worth moral considerations?
Replace "morals" with capacity for moral judgment (or, synonymously, a system for evaluating actions), and I agree. This is pretty much what we imply when we say something does or doesn't have "morals" (the noun), so that's fine.Quote:
Originally Posted by jackvance
In both cases, I seek a practical definition of the term.Quote:
Originally Posted by wufwugy
**[SIDETRACK:] Not to get too sidetracked, but with the "god" term, I always set the terms as 1) something that I can know about and 2) something that is important to know about. Basically, it's cardinal for there to be importance in the knowledge of god, or else what the fuck is the difference between a theist and an atheist and a deist and a buddhist (whatever the fuck those guys are) anyway?
So I agree that it's obnoxious when the terms get expanded so much that the term becomes meaningless. A couple of mundane facts are used as premises to prove that some technical definition of "god" exists, and suddenly I'm supposed to get down on my hands and knees and give a shit? Oh, "god" is anything that provides order to our world, you say? So then the only thing that you prove when you prove "god" is that there is order in this world, which was (95% of the time) your premise in the first place? Cool beans. Oh, "god" is any "intelligent" "creator" you say? So atheists are "wrong" if our universe was created in some trial and error test by aliens working in a shampoo company's R&D company, and our universe is nothing more than the "error" in search for something that adds to a the Sleek and Shine series? According to any practical definition of "god" (and thus "atheist" and "theist"), no atheist should feel as though they flubbed it if they didn't pray to or model our ethical system after something that doesn't know about us / care what we believe / care what we do and offers no useful advice on any of those things.
Anything simpler than the above parameters in the beginning of this sidetrack, and we're talking about something that comes so short of any practical application of this knowledge of god, that it's irrelevant to me whether it exists or not. It may be of great physical or metaphysical importance, but it's like adding an element to the periodic table: to anyone outside of the field, we're only interested in its practical effects are. Until I'm told that it cures cancer or can hold conversations with me about why I'm here and what the meaning of all this is, this god element is water under the bridge (or whatever). [/Sidetrack]**
My point in saying that everything has ethical value is that we can evaluate all actions and their expected effects on its subjects, and it's apodeictically better to do things that have high value than it is to do things that have not-as-high value than it is to do things that have no value than it is to do things that have negative value. As such, we're better off learning how to optimize our actions (whether this means studying philosophy or, if you're a money-loving egoist, reading a book on how to swindle people or what have you). If it's not possible to influence the activities of an object or being (either through lack of Will in those objects or lack of communication between us or whatever), then it doesn't much matter how much we study up on how good or bad it is for those objects to do this or that.
This may or may not be OVERLY simplistic, but it's a fair summary of the practical limits that I'm discussing here. I don't think it's meaningful to say that getting an abortion is "amoral" just because there exists at least one part of the universal spacetime that remains indifferent to the action. GETTING AN ABORTION IS OF EXTREME VALUE (positive or negative) AND IT IS INSANELY IMPORTANT TO HAVE AN UNDERSTANDING OF THIS VALUE, as a pregnant individual or as a society or as a species. This is a pretty simple, practical definition of ethics. Making it more complicated than that--applying all these sociological, evolutionary, theological, objectivist, etc criteria--is obfuscating and decreasingly practical.
So I agree, over-expansion of a term can make it lose its meaning. In this case, it's the over-refinement of the term that makes it importless.
sweet aborted baby jesusQuote:
Originally Posted by surviva316
You mean what if you and I had the power to make it so that--for example--entropy decreased in isolated systems? Of course enacting that would have moral considerations. I haven't the cuntiest idea what the implications of such a reversal would be, but surely the effect would hold a certain value to the sentient inhabitants of our universe (both living and not-yet extant), and it would be terribly important to evaluate this.Quote:
Originally Posted by wufwugy
:kissy face:Quote:
Originally Posted by d0zer
It certainly would, but that doesn't make it non-amoralQuote:
Originally Posted by surviva316
From the perspective of humans, a machine that increases or decreases entropy has as many moral implications as anything else. But when you go beneath human perspective (or other consciously adequate beings), the universe couldn't give a flying fuck. What moral purpose for the universe is served by a decrease or increase in entropy? The moral purpose of this is relevant for humans, but that is irrelevant for the topic of morality beneath or beyond human experience
The sun was here long before us and will be here long after us. It could shoot flares that wipe us out tomorrow and that changes nothing for the sun, its sun-like plane of existence, or any anthropomorphized moral care it could have.
Yes, it does. We're talking in circles now. We've already covered all this stuff about "beneath human perspective."Quote:
Originally Posted by wufwugy
I've already conceded that it's possible that morality doesn't exist without sentient beings. Here's the trick, though: sentient beings do exist. Our actions have effects because they (at the very very very very very very least) affect the subjects of the action. I can't prove that our actions have values beyond their effect on other humans and "consciously adequate beings", but I can prove that they affect other humans and consciously adequate beings, and I can prove that those entities exist in this universe. Beyond that, you're making it more complicated than it needs to be.
Your argument either relies on sequestering us from the universe (which doesn't make sense), or it suffers from the all or nothing that I covered earlier: if we're not Gods-by-Extension enacting some universal and eternal law, then we might as well be rearranging the sands on Mars. All you are demonstrating is that there exist some parts of the universe's spacetime that go unaffected by our choices; all I mean to demonstrate is that our actions affect things in this universe (even if not necessarily everyfuckingthing).
And I don't really know what your endgame is with all this anyway. You seem to be talking to boost about a practical rhetoric to take up with Christian pro-lifers, and I'm not terribly interested in that. If setting up some dummy argument about how morality doesn't really exist helps you blow a Christian's worldview, then sure, whatever, I don't care.
If we're actually trying to have a discussion about what choices people should make in their life, I am adamantly against classing most of our actions and inactions as amoral and align their moral compass to avoiding the few immoralities that are out there. The reason this is so important is that people routinely refer to abortion as though it doesn't matter whether you do or don't get one (lolwut?) or reason that it's amoral to leave a train on-course to kill 20 people and immoral to switch it to a track where it would only kill one person (HOLY SHIT WHAT?!?!) or rate a "flawless" but mediocre artist higher than a sporadically great one (okay, now I'm getting into aesthetics, but again I put less of a divide between these than some do) and so on.
This is why I argue so adamantly against moral systems that talk a lot about "amorality" and "moral responsibility" and "culpability" and the like. There are actions that can be reasonably expected to have positive effects, there are actions that can be reasonably expected to have negative effects, and there are (rare) actions where those effects coincidentally come to almost cancel each other out. You don't HAVE TO do anything, but obviously it's better to do better things.
This started because you said amorality doesn't exist. I questioned you on it. If you said amorality doesn't exist within how humans decide to interact with each other, I probably wouldn't have questioned.
My original point about amorality -- which is what prompted you to say it doesn't exist -- was that people who live in the mind-space of universal ideals and abstractions with little reason to consider their veracity other than mere belief are doing a disservice and I normally like to point out that if they were to exit that mind-space, the universe would say "fuck off with that noise". I was trying to point out that when somebody says "abortion is wrong because god says so", they're really just wringing their hands at an amoral existence of no such thing. I wouldn't consider this a problem -- I do similar dumb shit all the time -- except that it causes people problems. It could be said that I'm making a moral argument for why I'm pointing out this amorality
I never intended to suggest the kind of "amoral" thing with what you referenced with the train. I don't think people who claim amorality in that sort of situation understand the concept. The train example is an exercise in morality. Amorality is not relevant within morality contexts. Maybe people confuse an absence of morality existence with an absence of good moral behavior. That certainly sounds like how some people may call a decision in the train example amoral, when what they really mean is immoral and perhaps they simply don't want to admit it or don't understand the concepts that well in the first place
It doesn't pay anything. The lead escort who is there all day gets some hourly rate. All other escorts are purely volunteer. It's just service to the community for me.Quote:
Originally Posted by flomo
I don't ask anything of the women coming to the clinic. As I understand it there is a consultation that every woman is giving that attempts to educate them on effective birth control options but I don't do anything like that. That is all handled by paid experts that work in the clinic.
Yes, I'm in the US and I do it purely for the last bit. I'm one of the most privileged person on the planet (the only thing I lack is significant discressionary funds) and I hate that people (e.g. gays, women in general but specifically those that seek an abortion, those experiencing homelessness, etc.) are made to feel less than by others (and society etc).Quote:
Originally Posted by OngBonga
I can do something about it. I can stand up and say "I'll help." Sure, there is some risk. I also wear a rainbow colored pride bracelet, and have everyday for the past 3+ years (when I haven't lost the fucking thing) because I want people to be confused and I want them to ask questions not because I want praise for what I'm doing but because I want things to get better and I want more people to help and I want people to realize they can help by doing simple things.
And do I get some blowback? Absolutely. I get asked by protestors why I'm there, why I don't care about the babies, and all sorts of shit. It's very minor in comparison to what women feel but I hope it helps a little bit. Because of my pride bracelet some people think I'm gay! This, I'm embarrassed to say, actually used to bug me but I got over it. What the fuck do I care? Im very happy that I can actively and visibly stand in solidarity with those that are being mistreated and bullied.
I almost seek out to be the target of bullying because I have all the privilege a human could ever want to have, and because of my position in society I can take harassment.
I should clarify that I don't think LGBTIQ folk or women aren't tough enough to put up with bullying. But they get harassed and attacked for who they are and I just don't think that anyone should be subject to that bullshit.
Unless you're a ginger. Sorry Chelle, but you people are an abomination and your seed should be wiped from the earth.
@bold, I just now caught this. I think it's hilarious the perception that some people have of guns in the United States.Quote:
Originally Posted by OngBonga