What are our students actually studying?

[Guest 6.8 AR]

I went to Sewanee for a year and half before transferring for engineering (still in college.) Can't say I liked that place, nothing but liberals and professors who say you should only support their view. It also had quite the load of philosophy, religion, and ethics you had to take. Actually had one of my professors write on a paper "not my view, minus 10." That didn't make me happy.

That professor shouldn't be there. He's the problem.

[gjohnsoniv]

I had several like that there. I left one, because they didn't have my major, and two, majority of the professors there shared that view. One decided that he was more important that my father being in the hospital. Came up to me in class and said "I don't care if your father is in the hospital, you come to class when I'm here and leave when I'm done. Be here next time." He said that along with some other things that have no bearing on here so I'll spare those details. I'm normally a very calm person but the gloves about came off at that comment. I decided he wanted me to get mad at him so instead I looked him in the eyes and said "understood." But yes, people like that are the problem.

[Guest profgunner]

Link is broken

Edited April 11, 2012 by profgunner

[Guest 6.8 AR]

Which one?

[Guest A10thunderbolt]

I think it all comes down to what you are raised to do, I was raised to never question authority, I was never taught that the way things are supposed to work is, we are the authority as a group and are supposed to make decisions based on the majority as long as it doesn't, violate any of our constitutional rights, this is what I am going to teach my son, always question but be Polite about it. It seems simple but the never question authority set me back a bit as I was one of those who just trusted the Gov, what got my attention was my wifes uncle gave me a book I think it was called How FDR Ruined America, it made me see how corrupt the people in the Gov are I'm not saying I believed all of it, but it made more sense than the history books in high school that said he was a hero for coming up with the new deal.

[Guest 6.8 AR]

I was brought up the same way. It took me years to wake up. I was what Rush refers to as a young skull full

of mush. We grow up.

[Smith]

I was fortunate, I was raised to question everything and that from a Pastor (father). However, cynicism and rebellion do not necessarily go hand in hand. Usually rebellion is the immature, emotionally selfish response to questions one can't find answers they like. Skepticism is usually a healthy distrust of human nature, an understanding it doesn't change easily, and that we are naturally selfish creatures that have to make concentrated efforts to overcome our own condition.

[Guest A10thunderbolt]

I was fortunate, I was raised to question everything and that from a Pastor (father). However, cynicism and rebellion do not necessarily go hand in hand. Usually rebellion is the immature, emotionally selfish response to questions one can't find answers they like. Skepticism is usually a healthy distrust of human nature, an understanding it doesn't change easily, and that we are naturally selfish creatures that have to make concentrated efforts to overcome our own condition.

This is true, but I think that if you are taught to work hard and to take pride in your accomplishments, you have less energy to be rebellious when you are immature its a wast of valuable time. I never really fit in with other teens when I was younger but I always fit in with older people. I have worked and I mean worked since I was 13, just before my 16th birthday I got a job at Wal-Mart it was my first real job. I have filed taxes every year since.

Bottom Line, if you raise you Children the right way, I would say 8 out of 10 will improve America, It may be the only way to save the country.

[Guest bkelm18]

Perhaps I was lucky, or unlucky, to be born with a purely logical brain. I question everything. My mind simply will not allow me to subscribe to any one philosophy or viewpoint, religion or political affiliation. Faith is something that I've simply never been able to fully understand. My mind simply operates on logical facts and makes decisions off of the "presented evidence". It certainly makes me an outcast in a society of absolutes, but I will never say one viewpoint is correct and the other is wrong unless the hard facts simply do not support it. I guess these are the reasons why I thoroughly enjoy school and all the opinions that are offered, but perhaps I enjoy it more so because I know I'm capable of ignoring opinions that I disagree with yet at the same time giving them some amount of understanding. In the end I'm just after a piece of paper with my name on it saying that I completed the requirements for this degree. If some professor wants me to play a game, I will play their game.

[Smith]

Perhaps I was lucky, or unlucky, to be born with a purely logical brain. I question everything. My mind simply will not allow me to subscribe to any one philosophy or viewpoint, religion or political affiliation. Faith is something that I've simply never been able to fully understand. My mind simply operates on logical facts and makes decisions off of the "presented evidence". It certainly makes me an outcast in a society of absolutes, but I will never say one viewpoint is correct and the other is wrong unless the hard facts simply do not support it. I guess these are the reasons why I thoroughly enjoy school and all the opinions that are offered, but perhaps I enjoy it more so because I know I'm capable of ignoring opinions that I disagree with yet at the same time giving them some amount of understanding. In the end I'm just after a piece of paper with my name on it saying that I completed the requirements for this degree. If some professor wants me to play a game, I will play their game.

So you are absolute there is no absolute. Just messing with you.

[Guest Lester Weevils]

Just my thoughts, but moral relativism is based on having an "anything goes" attitude and is the cause of most of our problems in society today, including what our kids are taught.

There are various ways to look at moral relativism.

If it is immoral to eat pork in West Bongostan, should it be immoral to eat pork in TN? Alternately should we go to West Bongostan and force them to allow pork-eating?

If it is against the law for women to show their boobies in public in TN, should it also be against the law in South Pacific Islands?

Remember the "missionary position" where european missionaries really did go among the savages instructing them in the proper way to "do it"? Like the savages didn't already know how?

I don't think stuff like the above is exactly the same as "anything goes".

[Guest 6.8 AR]

Is that really moral relativism, Lester? It sounds like social, cultural and/or religious belief systems, but it doesn't

sound like relativism. I thought relativism had more to do with the lack of a moral structure to the point that various

attitudes and morals were just "okay", not where social structure, based on custom in a geographic region is the

definition. I thought moral relativism is the acceptance of "all of the above" anywhere, not based on local custom.

That's where I am coming from. Maybe I am using a wrong term.

[Guest Lester Weevils]

Is that really moral relativism, Lester? It sounds like social, cultural and/or religious belief systems, but it doesn't

sound like relativism. I thought relativism had more to do with the lack of a moral structure to the point that various

attitudes and morals were just "okay", not where social structure, based on custom in a geographic region is the

definition. I thought moral relativism is the acceptance of "all of the above" anywhere, not based on local custom.

That's where I am coming from. Maybe I am using a wrong term.

Hi 6.8

Its been 44 years since I took the ethics course. I recall enjoying the course more than calculus but don't recall every little thing.

If it is immoral to show boobage in TN and there is absolute morality then public boobage ought to be immoral every place in the world? But if it is immoral to show boobage some localities and not others, then it must be relative? You could further begin to wonder, "If the polynesians get along fine in spite of gratuitous daily public boobage, then maybe it wouldn't be the downfall of society in TN either." That line of reasoning could eventually drift into a certain degree of "anything goes." Heinlein territory.

Sidenote-- Incest is one of the few things that is near-universally taboo across cultures.

A common joke I first heard in ethics class, "nothing makes a man so much of a scoundrel as a prolonged study of ethics". Which is true except for a fella being good-natured before beginning his study. A scoundrel will be a scoundrel regardless whether he studies ethics.

There is disagreement, but to me it is plain that you can't use pure logic to construct an ethical system. You have to start with base assumptions or wild guesses which are impossible to objectively prove. Once you pick some assumptions out of thin air, then you can use logic to construct a more complete structure based on your assumptions. This is the same as with geometry. You can't do geometry until you take a few basic things for granted. Certain low-level aspects of geometry cannot be proved in an "airtight" fashion.

It is like an engineering optimization problem. If you decide you want the most fuel-efficient auto then you can optimize for that but it might not be very fast or powerful. If you decide you want the fastest car then you can optimize for speed, but it probably won't be fuel-efficient. If you optimize for heavy towing then the auto will look more like a truck and most likely neither fuel-efficient nor fast.

So you roll the dice and decide what is "good" and then optimize the ethics to increase the liklihood of "good" results. If you decide that a full belly is good, then after optmization freedom might have a low priority. If you decide that freedom is good, then after optimization a full belly might be low on the totem pole.

Many folks are uncomfortable with the concept that you can't objectively prove what is good. But it am true. You can't prove what is good. You have to either accept what some authority figure tells you is good, or maybe God will whisper it in your ear, or you have to pick something out of the air all by yer lonesome. The mechanics of constructing the ethical system is rather straightforward after you have made a wild-ass guess as to what is good.

However if you were at all rigorous constructing your system, it is doubtful that "anything goes". The sins would change depending on your definition of good and rules derived thereof. But there would typically always be some sins. What is sinful to a commie might not be sinful to a capitalist, and vice-versa, but both of them could in theory construct self-consistent ethical systems.

[Guest A10thunderbolt]

What aggravates me is why they don't have classes teaching History's vicious circle of Gov control= Lack of personal responsibility=Eventual downfall of Country.

[Smith]

Hi 6.8

Its been 44 years since I took the ethics course. I recall enjoying the course more than calculus but don't recall every little thing.

If it is immoral to show boobage in TN and there is absolute morality then public boobage ought to be immoral every place in the world? But if it is immoral to show boobage some localities and not others, then it must be relative? You could further begin to wonder, "If the polynesians get along fine in spite of gratuitous daily public boobage, then maybe it wouldn't be the downfall of society in TN either." That line of reasoning could eventually drift into a certain degree of "anything goes." Heinlein territory.

Sidenote-- Incest is one of the few things that is near-universally taboo across cultures.

A common joke I first heard in ethics class, "nothing makes a man so much of a scoundrel as a prolonged study of ethics". Which is true except for a fella being good-natured before beginning his study. A scoundrel will be a scoundrel regardless whether he studies ethics.

There is disagreement, but to me it is plain that you can't use pure logic to construct an ethical system. You have to start with base assumptions or wild guesses which are impossible to objectively prove. Once you pick some assumptions out of thin air, then you can use logic to construct a more complete structure based on your assumptions. This is the same as with geometry. You can't do geometry until you take a few basic things for granted. Certain low-level aspects of geometry cannot be proved in an "airtight" fashion.

It is like an engineering optimization problem. If you decide you want the most fuel-efficient auto then you can optimize for that but it might not be very fast or powerful. If you decide you want the fastest car then you can optimize for speed, but it probably won't be fuel-efficient. If you optimize for heavy towing then the auto will look more like a truck and most likely neither fuel-efficient nor fast.

So you roll the dice and decide what is "good" and then optimize the ethics to increase the liklihood of "good" results. If you decide that a full belly is good, then after optmization freedom might have a low priority. If you decide that freedom is good, then after optimization a full belly might be low on the totem pole.

Many folks are uncomfortable with the concept that you can't objectively prove what is good. But it am true. You can't prove what is good. You have to either accept what some authority figure tells you is good, or maybe God will whisper it in your ear, or you have to pick something out of the air all by yer lonesome. The mechanics of constructing the ethical system is rather straightforward after you have made a wild-ass guess as to what is good.

However if you were at all rigorous constructing your system, it is doubtful that "anything goes". The sins would change depending on your definition of good and rules derived thereof. But there would typically always be some sins. What is sinful to a commie might not be sinful to a capitalist, and vice-versa, but both of them could in theory construct self-consistent ethical systems.

Yep that's the arguement I've always heard and it's (IMO) a way to over complicate something simple. It all comes down to God vs. Man. If there is a God then there are absolutes and they are absolute in their application regardless of perception, culture, circumstances, etc. Man's application is irrelevant since he is not the holder of the absolute truth. If there is no God and Man is the final authority then things are completley relative to the individual being and his perception is the only reality that matters to him. That is the base for Russell's entire argument in "Perception and Reality". He later denounced it.

Of course I disagree that man is an authority in and of himself, due to one simple fact that there are already universal understandings of right and wrong from cultures who have been truly isolated from any other. Like you mentioned murder, stealing, infidelity, etc are universally considered wrong. There are cultural variances in their application but the main principle is universal. If there is even one universal absolute then relativism is extremely weakened. The fact that there are many is damning to relativism. This is only taking moral issues. Math in and of itself completely denounces relativism as it was not derived from anything but is a simple reflection of absolute right. It can not be changed nor will it evolve into a conflicting stance.

[Guest A10thunderbolt]

Smith

"Math in and of itself completely denounces relativism as it was not derived from anything but is a simple reflection of absolute right. It can not be changed nor will it evolve into a conflicting stance."

I love Math.

[Guest Lester Weevils]

Yep that's the arguement I've always heard and it's (IMO) a way to over complicate something simple. It all comes down to God vs. Man. If there is a God then there are absolutes and they are absolute in their application regardless of perception, culture, circumstances, etc. Man's application is irrelevant since he is not the holder of the absolute truth. If there is no God and Man is the final authority then things are completley relative to the individual being and his perception is the only reality that matters to him. That is the base for Russell's entire argument in "Perception and Reality". He later denounced it.

Of course I disagree that man is an authority in and of himself, due to one simple fact that there are already universal understandings of right and wrong from cultures who have been truly isolated from any other. Like you mentioned murder, stealing, infidelity, etc are universally considered wrong. There are cultural variances in their application but the main principle is universal. If there is even one universal absolute then relativism is extremely weakened. The fact that there are many is damning to relativism. This is only taking moral issues. Math in and of itself completely denounces relativism as it was not derived from anything but is a simple reflection of absolute right. It can not be changed nor will it evolve into a conflicting stance.

I'm easy. Ethics is just one of the many games that have captured folks interest for many generations. I don't know many of the details so if somebody else does then its fine by me. As long as they stay out of my yard.

Euclidean geometry is very useful in the real world and interesting for some to study. It is based on certain unprovable assumptions. There are also non-euclidean geometries which operate on different assumptions, and those maths are also occasionally useful in the real world. And also interesting for some to study. I'd guess that would imply a certain relativism, but perhaps there is a better explanation.

Edited April 12, 2012 by Lester Weevils

[Guest 6.8 AR]

Perhaps I was lucky, or unlucky, to be born with a purely logical brain. I question everything. My mind simply will not allow me to subscribe to any one philosophy or viewpoint, religion or political affiliation. Faith is something that I've simply never been able to fully understand. My mind simply operates on logical facts and makes decisions off of the "presented evidence". It certainly makes me an outcast in a society of absolutes, but I will never say one viewpoint is correct and the other is wrong unless the hard facts simply do not support it. I guess these are the reasons why I thoroughly enjoy school and all the opinions that are offered, but perhaps I enjoy it more so because I know I'm capable of ignoring opinions that I disagree with yet at the same time giving them some amount of understanding. In the end I'm just after a piece of paper with my name on it saying that I completed the requirements for this degree. If some professor wants me to play a game, I will play their game.

You just got a new name, Spock

I have yet to meet a purely logical person, but I question most everything. A lot of the time I fail to achieve the

answer when I question something, too. Sometimes upsetting, so I'll call mine a BS detector

You are a little younger than my youngest son who just graduated from UTK engineering and is on a fellowship

in Germany. He enjoyed school, also, but picked up some liberal ideas while there. He is very open to ideas

if they pass his BS detector, also. I'm not sure if he played the games with his professors or not, but I know

he studied his ass off and it paid off.

It's good that you can separate fact from fiction. Sometimes that's difficult.

[Guest 6.8 AR]

Moral Relativism: is this good enough, Lester?

The philosophized notion that right and wrong are not absolute values, but are personalized according to the individual and his or her circumstances or cultural orientation. It can be used positively to effect change in the law (e.g., promoting tolerance for other customs or lifestyles) or negatively as a means to attempt justification for wrongdoing or lawbreaking. The opposite of moral relativism is moral absolutism, which espouses a fundamental, Natural Law of constant values and rules, and which judges all persons equally, irrespective of individual circumstances or cultural differences.

I don't know that "promoting tolerance for other customs or lifestyles" is necessarily positive, but maybe.

Whatever the customs about "boobage on an island in the Pacific mean to one in America is meaningless

to me, since I'm not a part of the group on that island and should have nothing to do with my relationship

with my community here. If I move there, it's another story. In other words, comparing Figi to America is like

comparing a rock to soup. I think we have, or did have, a more structured system than moral relativism begs.

Are you saying we should adopt someone else's culture as our own? Or are you just explaining what's wrong

with our country now that we seem to be allowing for misinterpretation of Natural laws by other cultures that

may not have caught up to our standards and beliefs? When in Rome...

[Guest Lester Weevils]

Moral Relativism: is this good enough, Lester?

The philosophized notion that right and wrong are not absolute values, but are personalized according to the individual and his or her circumstances or cultural orientation. It can be used positively to effect change in the law (e.g., promoting tolerance for other customs or lifestyles) or negatively as a means to attempt justification for wrongdoing or lawbreaking. The opposite of moral relativism is moral absolutism, which espouses a fundamental, Natural Law of constant values and rules, and which judges all persons equally, irrespective of individual circumstances or cultural differences.

I don't know that "promoting tolerance for other customs or lifestyles" is necessarily positive, but maybe.

Whatever the customs about "boobage on an island in the Pacific mean to one in America is meaningless

to me, since I'm not a part of the group on that island and should have nothing to do with my relationship

with my community here. If I move there, it's another story. In other words, comparing Figi to America is like

comparing a rock to soup. I think we have, or did have, a more structured system than moral relativism begs.

Are you saying we should adopt someone else's culture as our own? Or are you just explaining what's wrong

with our country now that we seem to be allowing for misinterpretation of Natural laws by other cultures that

may not have caught up to our standards and beliefs? When in Rome...

Thanks 6.8

The person who wrote that definition more than likely knows better than me. I was just attempting to give a brief overview based on what little I've retained, which may be far removed and distorted from what is in the books. It is pretty easy to remember things that "make sense" but I can't hardly remember things that don't "make sense". There may be much better ideas I don't recall, having not been smart enough to understand them at the time.

I wasn't advocating that we should do much of anything. Just thinking out loud on the ideas. USA was based on the idea of tolerance, live and let live. Our understanding of tolerance changes over time.

Maybe am wrong, but got the impression that folks around the time of the revolution were rather tolerant and open-minded, though there were plenty of hide-bound folk in the religious-founded colonies. Got the impression that 50 years later the average citizen had got more hide-bound and intolerant. It seems to go in cycles and people become intolerant over different issues. Benjamin Franklin might have got some push-back over his lifestyle in the more prudish times of our history. If Ben were alive today he could never be a politician because the media would run him off over his scandalous personal life, and he would be certain to say stuff to hurt some people's feelings. Both the liberal prudes and the moral majority would be outraged. Ben might be a regular guest on Fox News Red Eye show.

There isn't much especially weird that I want to do, but as long as folk stay out of my face and don't make too much noise late at night then I'd tolerate a wide range of "odd" behaviors as long as it isn't harmful to others.

OS and Smith mentioned "universal" taboos and there are those, though the details vary so drastically. If you have a PhD in cultural anthropology then you are fully qualified to be a shift manager at MacDonalds. Though far from lucrative, the field can be interesting. All the remote peoples who have persisted for thousands of years. Vast differences in rules and customs. All stable. Regardless how crazy-seeming, if the set of rules was not stable then those tribes and nations would have long ago died out or been absorbed by neighboring "more vigorous" cultures.

It could be interpreted a variation of darwinism. It is not that certain morals or customs are good or bad, any more than a long fin on a fish is necessarily better than a short fin on a fish. A tribe with some customs will die off. A tribe with other customs will survive. Mother nature judges what sets of customs are worthy. I'm not saying that is definitely how it works. Merely describing the theory.

Some long-lasting tribes are really uptight miserable people and you would never want to belong. Other long-lasting tribes are generally happy folk. Any of the tribes that haven't died out in their environment (if left to their own devices), proves that their collections of rules was "good enough" to avoid tribal death.

So there is certainly wisdom in tradition. Consider a tribe with a certain set of nutty rules that has been doing "about the same" for thousands of years-- You might change one of the rules and the culture becomes non-functional, causing the tribe to die out. Alternately you might change one rule and the tribe becomes more prosperous and eventually grows into a powerful nation. There is wisdom in SUCCESSFUL tradition, but on the other hand there are many successful traditions. You can't necessarily go tweaking small parts of a culture without hurting it, but on the other hand sometimes tweaking small parts might improve it. Danger on the one hand and possible opportunity on the other.

There is a logic field called Game Theory. Game Theory can be applied to ethics, with the objective of devising rules which optimize the good. But as with other methods, Game Theory cant tell you what is good. You have to decide what is good before you apply the game theory. Some people are happy to get their definition of good from priests, witch doctors, politicians, parents, movies, whatever. Some people are ornery enough to try to figure it out for themselves. Ya pays yer money and takes yer chances.

The phrase Social Darwinism is controversial. There is the cultural darwinism as described above, but Social Darwinism usually references a pseudo-scientific belief system from the Victorian age. Them folk were uptight authoritarian church-going people who were happy to use the name of science for their own justification. Darwinism, being a LAW OF NATURE, demanded that rich and powerful people had the OBLIGATION to exploit, use and abuse their underlings. It was natural law, and so if you became rich and powerful and you didn't rule your corporate underlings with an iron fist and totally exploit them, you would be unworthy and defying the laws of science.

That was a kinda nutty interpretation. Just because there are strong people and weak people, makes no requirement that strong people have a duty to be total a-holes in the name of science.

[Guest 6.8 AR]

Well, like I stated, I don't necessarily agree completely with that definition. It came from a free dictionary online, but

it was close to my understanding without getting too deep in it, which is something else I can't do without a lot of

preparation.

Of course, some of the things written about our historical figures like Franklin and Jefferson have been distorted to

fit in with a certain agenda, from time to time, haven't they? The open-mindedness you refer to around the founding

of our country I thought was referring to the rebelliousness against the King and his rules and taxation, and a desire

for a much more freedom based society over here. I never got much more than that. Religion played a role in that,

too, by giving a structure in the ideas that made us a free society. Not taking sides with Puritans or pagans, but those

things played a role certainly in good and sometimes bad ways alike.

Freedom requires all the elements found in the Constitution. Societies will change their standards occasionally, but

will always rely on some baseline ideas for survival. For the longest time we have been trying to redefine what morals

are still necessary through theories like you mentioned(not talking about Darwinism, but game theory and Social

Darwinism), or outright change them, although they are still necessary.

Right and wrong will always exist. Otherwise we will base our society on non-absolutes. I hate to see that happen.

Absolutes are only authoritarianism to the effect they are understood properly and society has a good understanding

of right and wrong, good and evil. I don't know how I could ever water them down except through relativism, and I

reject that.

It's the nature of the beast that humans will always try to re-invent the wheel, without much success.

I'm trying to hang in there.

[Guest profgunner]

I'm not a philosopher, but I find this discussion of "moral relativism" to be fascinating. Is there such a thing as "absolute" morality? Consider the following. Imagine that somewhere, someplace you encounter an innocent child with a bomb strapped to her back. She is fleeing her terrorist captors and is now running furiously toward a very crowded bus terminal. You, a sniper, have 10 seconds to decide whether you shoot the child in an attempt to save the lives of a large number of people who will be blown to hell and back should she reach her target. Assuming that you can only shoot to kill, would you pull that trigger? What would be the moral thing to do?

[Smith]

I'm not a philosopher, but I find this discussion of "moral relativism" to be fascinating. Is there such a thing as "absolute" morality? Consider the following. Imagine that somewhere, someplace you encounter an innocent child with a bomb strapped to her back. She is fleeing her terrorist captors and is now running furiously toward a very crowded bus terminal. You, a sniper, have 10 seconds to decide whether you shoot the child in an attempt to save the lives of a large number of people who will be blown to hell and back should she reach her target. Assuming that you can only shoot to kill, would you pull that trigger? What would be the moral thing to do?

Premise is wrong. The circumstances are irrelevant to the absolute, regardless of what one chooses. However, information or lack therof, is essential to ones personal decision but again it will not change the truth of the scenario.

[Guest 6.8 AR]

If I knew for a fact, she was carrying a bomb on her back and I had that choice to make, I guess I would shoot her

because it means just one life will be wasted. I couldn't let her age get in the way of that. It would tear me up to have

to do that, but I would.

Moral relativism is, to me anyway, an allowance to let all groups of morals dilute what we live by. I am not criticizing

other moral groups, just don't want to be forced into a category that I disagree with because another group is

trying to enter our group and forcing change on our set of standards for moral behaviour. I understand the people

of Figi and that they may have a different set of standards, but I don't live there. They may not like our standards,

either.

I don't have anything against gays, for example, but I do object to their diluting the value I place of marriage

to include them. Really, I think it is part of a political agenda to break down the institute of marriage and I object to

that.

[Guest Lester Weevils]

I'm not a philosopher, but I find this discussion of "moral relativism" to be fascinating. Is there such a thing as "absolute" morality? Consider the following. Imagine that somewhere, someplace you encounter an innocent child with a bomb strapped to her back. She is fleeing her terrorist captors and is now running furiously toward a very crowded bus terminal. You, a sniper, have 10 seconds to decide whether you shoot the child in an attempt to save the lives of a large number of people who will be blown to hell and back should she reach her target. Assuming that you can only shoot to kill, would you pull that trigger? What would be the moral thing to do?

As is plain to see, I'm not an authority. I don't think that scenario would necessarily have anything to do with moral relativism. It would be a specific problem to work out in context of whatever ethical system one has adopted (or alternately, the ethical system by which you will be judged later on). If a fella doesn't want to get in trouble for the rest of his life then he might do something against his own ethics in order to comply with his tribe's ethics. He might rationalize breaking his own personal ethics, that it would be bad to go to jail or be executed, and leave his family with no father. Better to sin and stay free to take care of the family.

In your above case, if the fella's ethics match the tribe's ethics, he would try to use the ethical system to decide which is "least evil", shooting the child or letting the group blow up. If the personal and tribal ethics conflict, then the decision would be multi-part.

A-- Solve the "least evil" problem above, in context of the tribe's ethical system.

B-- Solve the "least evil" problem above in context of the personal ethical system

C-- If evaluations A and B conflict, solve whether it would be "least evil" to follow one's personal ethics and go to jail, versus follow the tribal ethics and stay free to take care of the family.

In your given scenario, however, it might not be so complicated. If there is good reason to believe the bomb is armed and will go off, then the child will die regardless whether you shoot the child. So in that case shooting the child makes no difference to the ultimate outcome. The child would have died either way.

====

Dunno if this was fact or in a work of fiction-- I recall something about special forces behind enemy lines in one of our recent middle-east conflicts. A young innocent sheepherder accidentally discovers the soldiers. They can't take him captive and carry him along. If they let him go then he might rat on them and get the soldiers killed. So the only alternative to getting the mission exposed and possibly being killed, would be to kill the young innocent sheepherder.

====

There is a famous classic science fiction short story about a similar situation. There was much discussion in subsequent years, and the ending of the story was re-written at least once by other folk, to provide "less evil but still evil" better solutions.

http://en.wikipedia...._Cold_Equations

Legit online text by a licensed publisher--

http://baencd.thefif...3498747__19.htm

Edited April 13, 2012 by Lester Weevils