Tales from the Dawn

[EaraGrace]

Interesting argumentation, given you've just assumed a position that justifies everything the Ancients were doing on Elpis and their entire plan to sacrifice lives, something you've been so critical of in the past.

No? I never argued the first sacrifice was wrong, only that what follows is wrong. The third sacrifice is the core of the issue, as there isn’t a justifiable reasons beyond grief to justify it. It’s harvesting an organ from an innocent to try to save someone you personally care about.

But really, "we have to pragmatically violate our supposed ideals for the greater good"? You must know how completely faulty and self-defeating that is, it's logic that renders the original view and intent morally destitute and worthless.

Where have I “violated” my beliefs.

If they were actually acting in accordance with their ideals, yes that is precisely what they would do. But remember, we're talking about a level of values import where someone actually does believe that the bear's life is worth more than a human life and should be protected over a human life, not a case where it's just some half-hearted idea. That itself would still be hypocrisy, but we're talking about an absolutist position where one is willing to weigh the lives of other people and trade them in reality, not just some layman notion. And to be clear, I'm not saying it's morally wrong for that person to defend their own life. I'd just like some honesty about it.

It’s not honestly, it’s stripping away context and complexity and trying to ground this in a categorical duty you find aesthetically pleasing. It all comes down to why we value life, which we’ll get into in the next response.

You also sidestepped my first point in that response. Why exactly is an individual life of less uniqueness and import than the idea of all life?

Without life one does not have virtue (good) and thus lacking any sort of life we lack any sort of good. That is why life is important. Others will disagree of course, but that’s my moral position. Notice how I can hold that life is precious and that sometimes people who use their lives to harm others shouldn’t not be suffered to do so. Because I’m not solely concerned with some vague moral duty, I’m worried about why a person kills another.

A society where a conscripted soldier is forced to die for a child but a parent can leave their child to die doesn't sound very just at all to me, even if we just table the pregnancy part of it. It sounds to me like the ideals you're talking about are the exact foundations of an unjust society, a system where nebulous concepts are given priority over individuals, where the lives of people are treated as things to be traded for promises and ideas of a better future. In other words, something Endwalker, and XIV as a whole, has been criticizing for years. These are the foundations of dysfunction, hypocrisy, and tyranny, the constant excuse for brutality and murder, not justice.

Justice is an abstract principle, as is equality, kindness, mercy, or courage. They’re all “ideals” and “nebulous concepts” that we place as the foundations of our society, and oftentimes enforce over wellbeing. As we should. You’re equivocating all ideals as equally bad, when in actuality the only good world is one that values these sorts of things. If I asked whether you would live in a society that values justice and equality and one that does not, you would of course choose the latter despite the fact that these are just abstract concepts. Which comes down to either hypocrisy or you just didn’t think it through.

And yknow, the reason why I wanted to avoid the abortion comparison is perfectly illustrated here. Comparing abortion to leaving a child to die ignores the complexity of the issue when it comes to how we consider personhood and bodily autonomy, aspects that clearly impact how we apply any moral principles we glean from the topic.

It seems to me the distinction is imagined. You're controlling someone's life to sacrifice them for the sake of another life. It's the same thing, no matter the labels you put on it.

You’ve yet to explain how the distinction is imagined when I gave several examples of how valuing one leads to harming the other. By all means explain how I can believe in some “greater good” by harming life if there’s supposedly no distinction between the two?

Again, these are just falsehoods and titles, used to rationalize something which is not morally justifiable. "A person forced to die for a defensible cause can be just and defensible"? No, absolutely not, I'm not going to invoke godwin's law but you must know exactly what follows that logic.

Ok then we have moral disagreement going back to our core principles. That’s fine. I think you’re undercutting you’re own argument with that line however. After all, simply acting in self defense is in fact me forcing someone to die because the cause is just.

Yes, forced conscription is wrong, no matter the enemy. For someone who proposes to be a moral absolutist, you really do seem intent on taking positions which completely erode concepts such as "good and evil" and render them nothing but empty moralization. Again, this logic your using is the exact line of thought that leads to atrocity. This is what I'm talking about when I'm asking people to use some critical thinking about the ideas they're raising.

You’ve never actually taken the time to explore my positions or consider what I’m saying beyond the strawman so of course you feel that way. I’m not a Kantian or Utilitarian. I don’t hold duties or maximizing happiness to be the ultimate good, others do and good for them but that’s not me. I’m a virtue ethicist. I’m more interested in the why than the what. What motivates actions than what the consequences are. What you claim is me obfuscating good is really just you never bothering to consider that what I consider to be good doesn’t follow your preconception.