The Knowledge of Good and Evil

Here's another one of my philosophical theories which, as far as I know, hasn't been duplicated by anyone else. There's a great debate in philosophy about whether or not man has an inherent (pre-installed, or innate) knowledge of what is moral, or whether we just made it up or learned it from an outside source such as nature or God. Until recently, I sided with the philosopher John Locke, who said that although we don't have any inherent knowledge, God has told us and given us the tools to discover what is right and wrong. Locke asserts that we are blank slates when we enter the world, and that the only way we can have knowledge and ideas is by reasoning, using our five senses, and reflection (observing how our own minds work).
The reason I no longer completely agree with Locke is because I thought of an idea that I think is inherent to everyone, even if someone were raised completely separate from other humans. Let me take that example and show you what I mean. Let's assume there's a child who was born in the jungle, we'll call him Bob, and for some reason his mother died and he was raised by animals. Now let's say that you wandered into this jungle and got lost and started to starve. Bob sees you and realizes that you're starving. Due to social instinct, Bob goes to the trouble of finding and preparing some food for you. However, when he brings you the food, let's say that for no reason at all you take it, throw it on the ground and grind it into the dirt. Now what do you suppose that Bob, who has never heard of morality, justice, or right and wrong, would do? He would probably be ticked.
I think that everyone, no matter where they come from, starts out thinking that kindness should be returned with kindness. Even if people say they don't believe it, if they say that we should take what we can get and not bother about where it comes from, I think their actions show otherwise. If we do something nice, we expect people to appreciate it; or, at the very least, not to show contempt for it.
This discovery may seem insignificant, but the desire to have kindness reciprocated is actually the basis for most of our social and moral laws. After all, it is only a small step from there to the famous command, "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you." And from there, all sorts of theories can be deduced. Kant's Retributivism, and Bentham's Utilitarianism are both different interpretations of that command, when you think about it. So perhaps there is something to be said for inherent ideas after all, or at least for one. Maybe when Adam and Eve decided to chow down on the forbidden fruit, the human race was introduced to the concept of "Do as you would be done by." Maybe our ability to understand that is, in fact, the knowledge of good and evil.
S.D.G.

Ethical Beatings

In my ethics class, we've been doing presentations on different areas of ethics, such as religion, prostitution, animal cruelty, and the like. I was assigned the topic of how ethics applies to punishment, hence my odd but intriguing title. Contrary to what my title suggests, I didn't talk about parent to child discipline. I aimed at the much broader category of criminal punishment. It's really an interesting topic, so I decided I'd post the one page paper I wrote about it. It's a bit more formal and wordier than my usual stuff because I wrote it for an Honors class, but I hope you'll like it anyway:

This presentation will evaluate the justification for punishing criminals and present three different philosophies concerning how and why criminals should be punished.

1.      Why punish criminals?

Here are two of the most common arguments made against legal punishment. First, inflicting hardship on someone does not benefit anyone, increase happiness, or undo the crime. While it is true that the crime is not retractable, punishing criminals usually does bring peace of mind, security, and a sense of justice to the victim and most of society. Second, our aim should be to restore what was damaged, not punish the damager. This idea is known as restitution. It sounds nice, but it is usually inapplicable and sometimes leads to absurdities. For instance, how should a murderer atone for his crime? Our ideas of restitution are usually subjective, making them difficult to apply to an entire society. There is also the problem of premeditated crime. If you knew that a murder was being planned, you could do nothing about it. Because no crime has been committed, the would-be criminal can’t be arrested.

2.      Utilitarian Justice.

Jeremy Bentham, a proponent of Utilitarianism, proposed the correctional theory of punishment. Since Utilitarianism wants the greatest good for the greatest number of people, Bentham believed that criminals should be separated from society, since this would secure the benefits of security and peace of mind for citizens, but he also advocated reforming prisoners through job training, education, and counseling. Bentham believed that if criminals had the opportunity to make money honestly, then they would.

3.      Retribution.

Directly opposed to Bentham is Immanuel Kant and his Retributionist theory. Simply put, Kant believed that criminals deserve to be punished in proportion to the severity of their crime. He reasoned that if someone saw fit to harm other people for selfish gain, then we should return their behavior in kind. Kant believed that this was actually a form of respect for the criminal’s human dignity.

4.      Divine Command Theory.

The Christian theory is a complicated one. In Matthew 18:23, Jesus begins to tell a parable about a man who owed a huge debt, but was forgiven by the man he owed. The forgiven man then proceeded to find someone who owed him a small sum and relentlessly demanded to be repaid, ordering him to be thrown into prison until he could pay. When the man who had forgiven him heard about it, he ordered the unforgiving man to be thrown into prison until he could pay the original huge debt. The story illustrates that since God has forgiven our sins, we have a duty to forgive other people as well. However, although we may forgive, there are still earthly consequences criminals must suffer. A life of adultery may lead to STD’s or a sex addiction, for instance. Paul also encourages submission to the law and its punishment by saying in Romans 13:4 that government “does not bear the sword in vain.”

In conclusion, we have looked at different philosophies regarding punishment. Although their motives and methods differ, I have shown that criminal punishment is necessary in a just and secure society.


S.D.G.

My Obituary

One of my classes this semester is an online course which teaches more in-depth journalism techniques than the regular newspaper. In newspaper, the focus is more on experience, and the business of making a paper sometimes pushes back the actual "learning the trade" part of the class. The online course is designed to pick up the slack and is much more focused on techniques and tricks of the trade. Anyway, our first real writing assignment was to write our own obituary. That may sound a little morbid, but our teacher explained that most universities will assign it to us anyway.

Do you know how intensely boring most obituaries are? Usually it's the same words used over and over with different names. Sure, occasionally you might find one that really portrays a person's life, but they're rare. Writing a 200-300 word self death notice was none too interesting to me. So I did what anyone with an artistic license and an imagination would do. I had fun with it. I may have had a little too much fun, in fact. By the time I was finished with it, I decided that I would put it up here for you guys to see as well. Please bear in mind that I have no intention for my actual obituary to look like this. This is just the product of someone desperate to add interest to a potentially dreary project:

The church bell is greeted with jubilant cheers. So ends the funeral for Seth Houston, journalist and respected member of society.

Seth Houston was born and raised in the small town of Laurel, Mississippi. After graduating from Jones County Junior College, Houston moved out of the state for legal reasons. He soon began travelling the country on a journey to gain experience in his chosen profession, journalism. “He moved around a lot to hide from the law,” Sheriff Ted E. Bear said. “It’s a good thing he died when he did, because he was running out of places to go.” The entire police force attended the funeral to pay their respects. “I had to make sure he was really dead,” said Bear after respectfully spitting on the coffin.

Houston was preceded in death by his mother and father, who died of natural causes after reading a newspaper article celebrating their son’s community-centered activities.

Houston leaves behind two brothers and four sisters, as well as a loving wife, Caroline. “The scoundrel left after the first month,” she said, the tender emotion evident in her voice. “Nobody could find him, so I couldn’t even get a proper divorce.”

Houston was found in a warehouse, the victim of a tragic gang shooting. He was 35. “It just goes to show that even common thugs have a sense of decency,” said Bear. 

Houston’s grieving wife also had words to affirm his strong character. “He’s lucky the gang got to him before I did,” she said.

Many friends of the deceased from across the country turned out for Houston’s funeral, escorted by their local prison guards. Other than a small cheering section, it was evident that Houston will be missed by many.
S.D.G.

My Fifth Dimension Theory

     College is useful for all kinds of things, like knowing how to categorize the theories you have come up with over the years. I recently learned about metaphysics in philosophy, and realized, "Hey, one of my theories is about metaphysics!"
     The theory itself is about the structure of reality, and occurred to me when I learned about the different dimensions. It isn't original by any means, I just sort of re-invented the wheel. C.S. Lewis wrote about it in his book, Mere Christianity (one of my favorites), long before it ever entered my head. It goes something like this: There are four dimensions of reality. The first dimension is a straight line which can only go in one direction, right to left. The second is made of straight lines which can go in several directions; right to left, forward and backward, and all the degrees in between. A square is possible in this dimension, and wasn't in the first. The third dimension is made of lines which can go in all the directions of the second, as well as up and down and all the degrees in between. The concepts of depth and volume are introduced in this dimension. A cube is also possible here, which is made of six squares. I'm a little fuzzy on the fourth dimension. I'm no physicist, but I think that space and time are what makes it unique. Anyway, the theory asks the question: What if there were a dimension beyond ours? What if there was a higher level of reality that our reality was a part of, just like the squares from the second dimension were a part of the cube of the third dimension? If this were true, there are two things we can deduce from it.
     1. We could not know anything about this dimension other than that it might exist. Imagine that someone was born and lived in the second dimension and somehow was able to visit the third dimension and learn about it. If he went back to the second, how would he explain to his friends the concepts which make the third dimension unique? He could draw a representation of a cube, but to someone who had never seen depth or volume for himself, it would have absolutely no meaning. In the same way, if it were possible to somehow experience the fifth dimension, no one would be able to explain it to us because it involves concepts which we have never seen or felt for ourselves. This leads us to the second point.
     2. We cannot imagine anything that does not already exist in our dimension. All of our "original" ideas are just things which already exist, rearranged in a new way. Take the idea of dragons, for example. A dragon is just a compilation of ideas which already exist, such as scales, wings, feet, teeth, animals, and certain shapes. Even the fire-breathing thing is a combination of the existing things breathing and fire put together. All we mean by original ideas is to combine existing things in ways that don't occur naturally.
     Another point, but this is purely speculation, is that the fifth dimension could be what we refer to as the spiritual world. In that sense, spirituality would be more real than the material things around us. The possibilities for this theory are limitless. What if, instead of just one other dimension, there were an infinite string of them? Of course, the obvious drawback to this theory is that even if it were true, it could never be proven.
     In all probability, someone else has already written in a lot more depth about this than I have. In any case, I thought it was a neat idea, and I hope it keeps your minds busy until my next post.

Pirates: Old and New

     I decided to take a break from all the heavy philosophy and write about pirates. Pirates have been around for a long time, I'm not sure how long, maybe ever since there were ships. They're famous for stealing things from ships using swords, pistols, brute force, or anything else at their disposal. Legends revolve around their skill in battle and the huge amounts of treasure that they supposedly accumulated throughout their plundering years. Blackbeard was one of the fiercest and toughest pirates ever to sail the seas. One story says that he once tested his men's mettle by literally creating an artificial hell below decks, complete with burning brimstone, and holding a contest to see who could endure the intense heat and blinding smoke the longest. The story says that before long, every one of his crew members had given up and fled the torturous prison, while Blackbeard's maniacal laughter reverberated from the smoke and ebbing red glow. Those were the pirates of old.

    
     Pirates are still around today, but they've changed drastically. The most common pirates today don't sail the seven seas, but instead surf the World Wide Web. They wouldn't know what to do with a sword or a pistol, and as far as fighting ability goes, they usually rank around the "zilch" level. Instead of stealing priceless gems or gold and silver, they pillage movies, music, and video games. The closest they come to obtaining riches is to download an illegal copy of the Gold and Silver versions of Pokemon games. Compared to their predecessors, these sorry excuses for pirates are nothing more than an ill-told joke. They would probably faint at the mere mention of enduring fire and brimstone. Blackbeard would hang his head in shame.

    Needless to say, piracy has lost a lot of the appeal it used to have to adventurous souls. Perhaps this is a good thing. Maybe the way to fight piracy isn't to go after the pirates themselves, but to make internet plundering seem so uncool that people can't stand to be associated with it.
     Those are my thoughts, anyway. Next week it's back to serious stuff. I've had an entire week off of school, so my brain is kind of lazy right now. Until next time.

Deafening Silence

The "Day of Silence" happened October 19. People walked around wearing red tape over their mouths with the word "Life" on it. That takes a lot of courage, especially considering how easy it would be to make fun of someone with tape over their mouths, regardless of what was written on it. I'm sure there are a lot of pro-life people here on campus, this being the bible belt and all. There was, however, a sort of retaliation by a few people. One student walked around with a poster-board vest that listed all of the monsters throughout history who weren't aborted. This is where I get on my soapbox. I know I said that I wouldn't talk about politics much, but to me this isn't really a political issue. It falls into the category of right and wrong, which is my area of interest. First of all, the potential of the babies being aborted doesn't really factor into whether it's right or wrong. Sure, there's potential for great good and great evil, just like with the rest of the human race. I've heard supporters of both sides make that kind of argument, but it doesn't really touch on the moral side of the issue.
If abortion were nothing more than a women's rights thing, it wouldn't be controversial. My beef is that you're affecting someone else, not just yourself, so there's more to be considered than just what's convenient or what makes the mother happy. Really, the whole issue depends on whether or not the unborn can be considered human. If they're not, then it really doesn't matter what we do to them, but if they are, then abortion is murder, and there is absolutely no way to justify it. If you were to ask a pro-choicer, they would probably say that a fetus isn't human because it's attached to the mother, therefore making it her property. That's bogus. If merely being attached brings ownership rights, then what does that mean for siamese twins (twins joined together at birth)? Does one have ownership over the other? Of course not. I think what pro-choicers really mean when they say that is that the baby is totally dependent on the mother, and therefore doesn't meet the criteria for being human. Here's somthing to ponder: What about the baby as a newborn, or an infant, or a toddler? They are totally dependent on others for their survival. Should they have rights? Another argument against the unborn's humanity is that they lack the ability to think and act like other humans do; essentially, they're not as developed and capable as the rest of us. If that's the case, what does that mean for the mentally ill and those with birth defects or disabilities? Do they qualify for the right to live?
Abortion is nothing short of murder. I think that one day, people are going to wake up and realize the truth. Just like the other injustices over the past, such as slavery. Abortion can be likened to racism. You have a group of people denying the humanity of another group, for the purpose of convenience or because they actually believe it. I think that when people come around, they'll say "abortionist" a lot like people say "racist" today.
Okay, I'm through ranting, so I'll get on to regular life. I met with my new advisor yesterday, and it turns out I have to take 12 hours of Spanish to be a journalist. Short of Mexico taking over America, I can't see how this will help me deliver the news. Oh well. College Algebra is really the only class giving me trouble. I'll be glad when it's over and I won't have to take any more math classes. I might be writing a series of dental articles for the ReView soon. Yeah. My dentist, who happens to be a family friend, is going to give me his ideas today while he works on my teeth. I guess you could say he's going to "fill me in." I'll let you know how that goes. See ya.