I may have overgeneralized from my own mentality. My own outlook is very different from yours or joshua’s; I am of Jewish extraction, but after a couple of years attending Brandeis university, I found the in-group dynamic sufficiently oppressive that I now refuse to self identify as Jewish, and become offended when people refuse to accept my distinction between being Ashkenazic on my mother’s side and being Jewish. That sort of cultural affiliation, absent any particular beliefs or ideals to associate it with, is something I’ve only observed from the outside.
I think it’s worth asking though, whether, once you winnow out all the absurd and unjustified beliefs in these various cultural packages, there are any sane beliefs that justify taking offense at actions such as drawing pictures of Mohammad, keeping a transubstantiated wafer rather than eating it, or urinating on the Torah. I think that the first two are only comparable to the last one if they are performed as deliberate attacks on a cultural icon, and if they’re not, then I’m not sure what sane reason that could leave to object to them.
I’m not quite sure what a sane reason for offense is. More generally, I’m not sure what a sane reason for any emotional reaction is.
But I guess I can see saying that since fear evolved “in order to” encourage us to avoid danger, it’s sane to feel fear with regards to genuinely dangerous situations, and insane to feel it with regards to situations that aren’t dangerous. On that account, being scared while standing on the edge of a cliff in high wind is sane, but continuing to feel scared after someone someone clips a safety cable to my belt is insane.
And adopting the same stance with respect to offense, I would say that offense evolved “in order to” encourage us to defend our status, and is therefore sane when our status is genuinely at stake and not when it isn’t. Using that standard, it seems entirely sane to be offended at the actions you list: they all have the effect of lowering the status of various symbols of my tribe, which in turn lowers my status.
That said, you seem to be using some other standard for a sane emotional reaction, one I don’t entirely understand. Can you clarify it further?
But I guess I can see saying that since fear evolved “in order to” encourage us to avoid danger, it’s sane to feel fear with regards to genuinely dangerous situations, and insane to feel it with regards to situations that aren’t dangerous.
Careful, if you judge the validity of your emotions by whether they’re serving their evolutionary role, you’ll end up arguing that the purpose of life is to maximize your inclusive genetic fitness.
I agree, sort of, modulo your introduction of the rather ill-defined term “purpose of life”.
Which is why I started out saying I don’t know what a sane reason for offense is.
I suppose one could say, instead, that X is a sane reason for offense if feeling offense in the presence of X achieves useful results in that environment.
On that account, if taking offense at actions such as drawing pictures of Mohammad increases my status within my community, and if increased status is useful, then drawing pictures of Mohammad is a sane reason for offense within my community.
I was pretty sure that wasn’t what desrtopa was looking for either, though.
My first thought was to characterize a sane belief that justifies an emotional reaction reaction as one that creates a connection to one’s terminal values without being clearly counterfactual, but I’m not sure whether this is adequately transparent; I’m biased by having my own meaning in mind.
Using that standard, it seems entirely sane to be offended at the actions you list: they all have the effect of lowering the status of various symbols of my tribe, which in turn lowers my status.
I’m not sure this is true. For instance, in the case of urinating on the Torah, it’s an act that would be widely agreed to represent contempt for a symbol. It would be reasonable to interpret it as a deliberate assault on a representation of the group with which you affiliate.
In the case of drawing Mohammad, it’s not an act which generally denotes contempt; drawing symbols of various other cultural groups doesn’t constitute an attack. So for it to be a sane source of offense, you would need some justified belief which could complete the connection between the drawing and an attack on your group’s status. If you had reason to belief that the artist had drawn it to make a mockery of your traditions, that would be a sane belief which could complete the connection, but if you know the act was not done in ill spirits, what might you believe which could complete the connection?
(EDIT: You edited the parent after I replied; I take no responsibility for whether my reply has any relationship to the new parent. I really wish people would stop doing that. I may come back to this later and reconcile.)
Not quite transparent.
I more or less understand what it means for a belief B to not be clearly counterfactual, and what you mean by my terminal values V.
I don’t understand what it means for B to “justify an emotional reaction” E, and I understand what it means for B to “have a connection to” V, and I’m not sure what the relationship between B and V has to do with E.
(EDIT: You edited the parent after I replied; I take no responsibility for whether my reply has any relationship to the new parent. I really wish people would stop doing that. I may come back to this later and reconcile.)
For what it’s worth, your response wasn’t there when I started making the edit, and I didn’t see it until after I had changed my comment. I frequently find a few seconds after leaving a comment that I had more to say, and revise my comment to reflect it.
Yes, I understand that people do this. One consequence of doing it is that other people’s replies are retroactively disconnected from the thing they appear to reply to.
I just don’t like my replies being treated that way, is all.
Of course, I can’t do anything to prevent it, and nobody else is obligated to respect my preferences. The best I can do is edit my replies to note that any disconnections might be retroactive, which is what I did.
I may have overgeneralized from my own mentality. My own outlook is very different from yours or joshua’s; I am of Jewish extraction, but after a couple of years attending Brandeis university, I found the in-group dynamic sufficiently oppressive that I now refuse to self identify as Jewish, and become offended when people refuse to accept my distinction between being Ashkenazic on my mother’s side and being Jewish. That sort of cultural affiliation, absent any particular beliefs or ideals to associate it with, is something I’ve only observed from the outside.
I think it’s worth asking though, whether, once you winnow out all the absurd and unjustified beliefs in these various cultural packages, there are any sane beliefs that justify taking offense at actions such as drawing pictures of Mohammad, keeping a transubstantiated wafer rather than eating it, or urinating on the Torah. I think that the first two are only comparable to the last one if they are performed as deliberate attacks on a cultural icon, and if they’re not, then I’m not sure what sane reason that could leave to object to them.
I’m not quite sure what a sane reason for offense is. More generally, I’m not sure what a sane reason for any emotional reaction is.
But I guess I can see saying that since fear evolved “in order to” encourage us to avoid danger, it’s sane to feel fear with regards to genuinely dangerous situations, and insane to feel it with regards to situations that aren’t dangerous. On that account, being scared while standing on the edge of a cliff in high wind is sane, but continuing to feel scared after someone someone clips a safety cable to my belt is insane.
And adopting the same stance with respect to offense, I would say that offense evolved “in order to” encourage us to defend our status, and is therefore sane when our status is genuinely at stake and not when it isn’t. Using that standard, it seems entirely sane to be offended at the actions you list: they all have the effect of lowering the status of various symbols of my tribe, which in turn lowers my status.
That said, you seem to be using some other standard for a sane emotional reaction, one I don’t entirely understand. Can you clarify it further?
Careful, if you judge the validity of your emotions by whether they’re serving their evolutionary role, you’ll end up arguing that the purpose of life is to maximize your inclusive genetic fitness.
I agree, sort of, modulo your introduction of the rather ill-defined term “purpose of life”.
Which is why I started out saying I don’t know what a sane reason for offense is.
I suppose one could say, instead, that X is a sane reason for offense if feeling offense in the presence of X achieves useful results in that environment.
On that account, if taking offense at actions such as drawing pictures of Mohammad increases my status within my community, and if increased status is useful, then drawing pictures of Mohammad is a sane reason for offense within my community.
I was pretty sure that wasn’t what desrtopa was looking for either, though.
My first thought was to characterize a sane belief that justifies an emotional reaction reaction as one that creates a connection to one’s terminal values without being clearly counterfactual, but I’m not sure whether this is adequately transparent; I’m biased by having my own meaning in mind.
I’m not sure this is true. For instance, in the case of urinating on the Torah, it’s an act that would be widely agreed to represent contempt for a symbol. It would be reasonable to interpret it as a deliberate assault on a representation of the group with which you affiliate.
In the case of drawing Mohammad, it’s not an act which generally denotes contempt; drawing symbols of various other cultural groups doesn’t constitute an attack. So for it to be a sane source of offense, you would need some justified belief which could complete the connection between the drawing and an attack on your group’s status. If you had reason to belief that the artist had drawn it to make a mockery of your traditions, that would be a sane belief which could complete the connection, but if you know the act was not done in ill spirits, what might you believe which could complete the connection?
I might believe that the existence of the drawing lowers my group’s status, regardless of the artist’s intent.
(EDIT: You edited the parent after I replied; I take no responsibility for whether my reply has any relationship to the new parent. I really wish people would stop doing that. I may come back to this later and reconcile.)
Not quite transparent.
I more or less understand what it means for a belief B to not be clearly counterfactual, and what you mean by my terminal values V.
I don’t understand what it means for B to “justify an emotional reaction” E, and I understand what it means for B to “have a connection to” V, and I’m not sure what the relationship between B and V has to do with E.
For what it’s worth, your response wasn’t there when I started making the edit, and I didn’t see it until after I had changed my comment. I frequently find a few seconds after leaving a comment that I had more to say, and revise my comment to reflect it.
Yes, I understand that people do this. One consequence of doing it is that other people’s replies are retroactively disconnected from the thing they appear to reply to.
I just don’t like my replies being treated that way, is all.
Of course, I can’t do anything to prevent it, and nobody else is obligated to respect my preferences. The best I can do is edit my replies to note that any disconnections might be retroactive, which is what I did.