h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I think one of the problems we're experiencing here is that Andrew is personally tied into the doctrine of redemption and forgiveness. Thus discussion of morals etc. can become clouded by this.

The natural human response upon meeting Rudolf Höss and seeing what he had done would be to shoot him, preferably in the lower abdomen so he took hours to die in screaming agony.

No show trial, no attempt to characterize what he did as evil, or to make an example of him. Nor any attempt to rationalize his acts as those of someone insane or against the moral codes of a bunch of ancient genocidal hebrews. And definitely no attempt at redeeming the bastard.

Gun. Shoot. Abdomen. Let the bastard die alone, no witnesses. Simple.

There are unredeemable people. A few whose acts go beyond what any human can understand. They should be expunged and forgotten.

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Well, it'd be somewhere along the human response Bell Curve, yeah. I think the point Andrew is trying to make is that that Bell Curve is something external, and we're saying it's just part of being human for the reasons already given.

The human response 'bell curve' is very internal and subjective. Most attempts to externalise it have been disasters.

As an aside what would have been your human response to Rudolf Hoss?

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Yep, that seems to be what Andrew's arguing against.



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Well, first I'd probably check photos of Rudolf Hess to see if it was the same guy.

Seriously though, I don't know. If I'd known anyone he'd murdered I'd probably want to kill him, although quickly I think.

If I was more considered, then probably life in prison, probably in solitary. Which doesn't mean either is right.

The natural response to someone like Herr Rudolph the Red Handed Reichdeer is to give him what he deserves but I think, in the long run, a more practical response is in order.

There will always be people like him. They will always do their work until we can educate our kids to identify them.

Vengeance is natural. It's cyclical. We need to break the cycle.

"Vengeance is natural"... hmmm. I was thinking more of Justice than vengeance.

Given the nature of his crimes what right would Rudolf Hoss have had to forgiveness - the Christian response.

Even in a society that usually refuses to consider capital punishment exceptional justice is necessary for such men.

You're confusing vengeance and justice. The terms are often used interchangeably but thy are not the same thing.

In a christan context, when god says 'vengeance is mine' it sounds unnatural and it is. What god is asking for are acts of unnatural love.

It has a practical benefit though. It stops the cycle of vengeance that prevents society from moving forward. Even the most primitive village has a headman who settles disputes. The modern state has a monopoly on justice just so the mob doesn't go looking for the vengeance that they call justice. A lynching is entertaining and emotionally satisfying, but that's true whether or not you've got the right guy.

We have to sacrifice our need to punish monsters in order to avoid the worse crime of punishing innocent people.

Also, since there is no afterlife where divine vengeance awaits, killing a monster now just lets him off easy. I'm still angry that Timothy McVeigh murdered 168 people, many of them small children, and then got off with only three years in jail.

There is no hell, a federal prison is the next best thing. They should have kept McVeigh alive for as long as they could.

'afternoon all!

I can't think of a way to test Pedro's hypothesis about *really* sentient lions, with a rational nature. But even so, with lions or intelligent aliens, if they developed moral codes at all, even if the individual precepts were to vary somewhat, the underlying concept of moral obligation would still be there.

Nurture is easier to test because we see it. It accounts for differences in how people see certain moral values, but it doesn't account for the existence of the imperative that you 'ought' to behave in a certain way.

My question would be, do you think that this sense of moral duty is simply based on what our parents told us we 'ought' to do (i.e. nurture)? It seems to me that this does not explain the 'ought' itself; it really explains it away instead, as a simple feeling that something is right or wrong. Isn't objective reason involved as well as emotion? (I agree that emotion is involved, but not just that.)

It also - it seems to me - fails to explain how we can fairly censure the acts of people who behave badly in a society where the consensus is on their side. Isn't reason - again - needed for that?

To sum up, the precepts themselves might vary in different circumstances, but the thing underlying them is constant. The fact that we can criticize different moral codes presupposes that it is possible to fall short, which implies that there is an objective moral standard.

The 'bell curve' is not just internal, unless you mean that it is innate to rational creatures - but it's rational creatures that we are talking about.

Hi blicky badger!

I have blind spots, it's true...

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Everything I have written should be kept in the context of human acts, whether good or bad. Someone's acts can't change their human nature into an non-human one (or vice versa). You can, however, say that someone's acts - in the case of a concentration camp guard again - were inhuman. That was all I meant to convey, but I was probably imprecise with terminology.

As usual, I think Noggin has hit the nail on the head. The moral law exists outside of any one individual. This is what makes it possible to compare and criticise people's behaviour. I would settle for the term quasi-objective to describe it, if objectivity is to be reserved for the laws of physics.

Hello Math!

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It's true, I am tied into that. But I think this discussion stands on its own without it - I hope...

Hi Tumsup,

"There is no hell, a federal prison is the next best thing."

So what you are saying is that prison is hell and a death penalty "just lets him off easy"? From this I could infer that sending a monster to prison then is an act of vengeance, and thus the death penalty is justice .

Why does a supposedly civilised state think that making a person spend their entire lives in captivity is more merciful than killing them?

Matholwch .

Hi Andrew

"It's true, I am tied into that. But I think this discussion stands on its own without it - I hope...".

Ah, but it does influence the position from which you stand does it not?

As an Abrahamic monotheist you are in the position of having a very well documented moral code by which you are supposed to live, and which you are expected to apply in your daily life and in your dealings with others.

As a Brythonic Tribal Polytheist I also have standards of behaviour to which I aspire, based upon my dealings with my gods and ancestors.

I do wonder where the atheists get theirs...?

Matholwch .

I got mine from Buddhism!

Buddhism Astro? Really?

I'm so proud when my little atheists get all growed up and admit to a little theist influence

Well if there is no God, then surely there is no Satan, no heaven and no hell - unless of course, depending on your circumstances, your life is hell on earth - but one person's idea of heaven is another's idea of hell and visa versa.

Imagine if you believed in God, led a good life in the hopes of avoiding hell and getting through the Pearly Gates instead, only to find that Heaven was not your idea of heaven at all, but was actually your idea of hell?

Hi Kellzone,

Have you come here from the original posting? As you can see we've been around the block a bit since then .

The quandary of the abrahamic monotheist amuses many and appalls some. They pray to a God who is happy to see most of them burn for eternity unless they slavishly adore him. If he chooses them for salvation they get to carry on slavishly adoring him for ever.

Nice choice.

Matholwch the Apostate .

>>They pray to a God who is happy to see most of them burn for eternity unless they slavishly adore him.<<
That's a misnomer! Would you be happy to see your son burn for eternity? Of course not! Do you adore/respect your parents?

"The natural human response upon meeting Rudolf Höss and seeing what he had done would be to shoot him, preferably in the lower abdomen so he took hours to die in screaming agony."

Well, that's certainly not what I would do. I would not feel any inclination to do it. Nor would I feel that it should be done. Justice matters.

http://books-by-isbn.com/0099581914

TRiG.

Hi Warnr,

"That's a misnomer! Would you be happy to see your son burn for eternity? Of course not!"

Yet this God still intends to make the majority of humanity burn for eternity for the disobedience of a distant ancestor.

"Do you adore/respect your parents?"

Yes, but then they do not demand that I worship them on pain of eternal torment.