As I said in response to Lumifer’s post, the problem is this still leaves it up to chance. We may come to the same conclusions on one thing or another, but that is purely by accident, and if we should begin to come up with different moral axioms, I have no reason to respect his viewpoint if a.) I have no guarantee that he’ll respect mine, or b.) I have no axiom which states that I should respect other moral frameworks even if they’re different from mine. Certainly, there are many instances in which both parties to a discussion discover an idea they agree upon, but the debate continues because of how the agreement was come upon, when it shouldn’t matter.
We may come to the same conclusions on one thing or another, but that is purely by accident,
You may want to look at the ZFC example again. Is the shared commonality of Peano Arithmetic there purely by accident?
In general, humans occupy a pretty small piece of mindspace, and the ethical and moral attitudes of people influenced by Western thought occupies a small piece of that.
a.) I have no guarantee that he’ll respect mine, or b.) I have no axiom which states that I should respect other moral frameworks even if they’re different from mine.
I’m confused by a how a guarantee why personal respect is necessary. It doesn’t impact whether or not one of his arguments should be at all persuasive. As to the second, given your emphasis on equality and egalitarianism, I’m surprised that some form of respect for other moral frameworks would fall out from that.
As I said in response to Lumifer’s post, the problem is this still leaves it up to chance. We may come to the same conclusions on one thing or another, but that is purely by accident, and if we should begin to come up with different moral axioms, I have no reason to respect his viewpoint if a.) I have no guarantee that he’ll respect mine, or b.) I have no axiom which states that I should respect other moral frameworks even if they’re different from mine. Certainly, there are many instances in which both parties to a discussion discover an idea they agree upon, but the debate continues because of how the agreement was come upon, when it shouldn’t matter.
You may want to look at the ZFC example again. Is the shared commonality of Peano Arithmetic there purely by accident?
In general, humans occupy a pretty small piece of mindspace, and the ethical and moral attitudes of people influenced by Western thought occupies a small piece of that.
I’m confused by a how a guarantee why personal respect is necessary. It doesn’t impact whether or not one of his arguments should be at all persuasive. As to the second, given your emphasis on equality and egalitarianism, I’m surprised that some form of respect for other moral frameworks would fall out from that.