These forums have been archived and are now read-only.

The new forums are live and can be found at https://forums.eveonline.com/

Intergalactic Summit

 
  • Topic is locked indefinitely.
 

Whose fault is it?

Author
Nicoletta Mithra
Societas Imperialis Sceptri Coronaeque
Khimi Harar
#61 - 2012-07-06 07:47:37 UTC
I'm happy we agree to disagree, Ms. Vitalia.
Rodj Blake
PIE Inc.
Khimi Harar
#62 - 2012-07-06 10:35:51 UTC
Dilaro thagriin wrote:
Rodj Blake wrote:
Ava Starfire wrote:
Hmm.

Perhaps there is some merit in the bloodthirsty attitudes of my brothers and sisters. As days go by, it appears that there is less and less within the Empire worth dealing with as civilized people, and more and more which simply should be burned to fine ash.


And that is the difference between us.

Where we seek to improve the lot of the lesser races, you merely seek to destroy that which is better than you.


In this case Blake, 'better' is entirely subjective.

Personally i cannot see how a culture and civilisation (and i use those terms very loosely) that institutionally infects those it claims to be saving, with a toxin they had no cure for, can be seen by any to be better.

It is barbarism of the worst kind.



If you want to know what barbarism truly is, take a look at the Minmatars exiled, mutilated or killed by their own kind because of they drew the short straw in a pagan lottery.

Dolce et decorum est pro Imperium mori

Ava Starfire
Khushakor Clan
#63 - 2012-07-06 11:22:38 UTC
Rodj Blake wrote:
Dilaro thagriin wrote:
Rodj Blake wrote:
Ava Starfire wrote:
Hmm.

Perhaps there is some merit in the bloodthirsty attitudes of my brothers and sisters. As days go by, it appears that there is less and less within the Empire worth dealing with as civilized people, and more and more which simply should be burned to fine ash.


And that is the difference between us.

Where we seek to improve the lot of the lesser races, you merely seek to destroy that which is better than you.


In this case Blake, 'better' is entirely subjective.

Personally i cannot see how a culture and civilisation (and i use those terms very loosely) that institutionally infects those it claims to be saving, with a toxin they had no cure for, can be seen by any to be better.

It is barbarism of the worst kind.



If you want to know what barbarism truly is, take a look at the Minmatars exiled, mutilated or killed by their own kind because of they drew the short straw in a pagan lottery.


I will think on that as I take my daily Vitoc dose.

"There is no strength in numbers; have no such misconception." -Jayka Vofur, "Warfare in the North"

Halete
Sebiestor Tribe
Minmatar Republic
#64 - 2012-07-06 12:19:19 UTC
Never-mind the fact we poisoned and used similarly questionable indoctrination methods on Minmatar by the drove, look at what the Minmatar do with their sociopaths!

A compelling argument, I would like to subscribe to your faith, now.

"To know the true path, but yet, to never follow it. That is possibly the gravest sin" - The Scriptures, Book of Missions 13:21

Ston Momaki
Disciples of Ston
#65 - 2012-07-06 12:58:36 UTC
[Mithra:
P1: "The essence of freedom is personal responsibility."
P2: Humans can and time and again do reject their personal responsibility.
P1+P2: Humans that reject their responsibility lack the essence of freedom.
P3: If you lack the essence of something you lack that something]

Now let me explain how you have not understood free moral agency.

P1.: The slave who chose to beat up another person dis so because he is a free moral agent in spite of being a slave. This is the point you have missed the whole time. I confronted the idea of a slave holder being punished for the free moral choice of his slave, because it is a further denial of the fact that every human is a free moral agent and responsible both for his right choices and wrong choices. He is free to be 'bad' and free to be 'good.' Moral agency is not always positive, that is part of freedom. You seem to think that a free moral agent can actually abdicate that freedom. Not so. That is why I oppose the master being punished for the free negative moral choice of the slave. Let me repeat what you said earlier " Unfortunately, human beings are fallible and do sometimes push their responsibility away, reject their constitution as moral agents..." This is the principle of culpability. We humans are responsible for our behavior. When we make mistakes or even when we screw up our whole lives, this doesn't negate our freedom and we are still held responsible. A person need not behave responsibly to be held responsible. You seem to think that there is some arbitrary behavior threshold where a person becomes your iconic "slave." No, wherever we are on the moral behavior continuum, we remain "held responsible" for our free choices.

P2: "Humans can and time and again do reject their personal responsibility." This statement is false in the sense that you use it. Since you are using responsibility in the sense of internal motivation rather than judicial culpability, you miss the point. Humans can and time and again engage in irresponsible behavior, yes. But, because they are free moral agents by virtue of their humanity, they are responsible/culpable for that behavior. You cannot arbitrarily reject personal responsibility; you are responsible for what you do or fail to do.

P3.: Your syllogism fails because you misunderstand your major premise and your minor premise is false due to a wrong definition.

In a free society, we hold people responsible for their behavior because we accept that their behavior is the result of their free, moral agency. That is what is meant by, "The essence of freedom is personal responsibility." This is an accepted principle across the board in all societies including your own, Ms. Mithra. You are even arguing against your own faith. If you follow the course of your argument, God might have to stop holding people accountable for their behavior if they have "lost the essence of their freedom." Of course that is ridiculous, but that is the direction or your argument. You are arguing for the ridiculous.

The Disciples of Ston bid you peace

Nicoletta Mithra
Societas Imperialis Sceptri Coronaeque
Khimi Harar
#66 - 2012-07-06 17:37:12 UTC  |  Edited by: Nicoletta Mithra
Cpt. Momaki,

I don't know where to start. First, definitions are never wrong. You might not agree with a definition, but I already noticed your unwillingness to accept definitions that are in contrast to your own as what they are: Different definitions.

As to "responsibility", if you would've read attentively, you'd have noticed that I already responded to your objections. You would also notice that you claimed personal responsibility -not moral agency - to be the essence of freedom. Responsibility is more than culpability and accountability. Of course, even someone who acts irresponsible is accountable. So I'd suggest you scroll up and read what I've written - even without explicitly addressing you.

So, you are keeping to your straw men. Loyalty is an admirable trait, they say.

As it stands, by the way, you will have a hard time to keep your claim up that "The essence of freedom is personal responsibility." if you insist that responsibility means merely culpability and/or accountability here, as you have nothing to point at that constitutes the freedom there. As - as you point out yourself - people have no choice in being culpable and accountable for their action. Thus responsibility needs to mean something more content-rich, then, in your original proposition. Like moral autonomy - the decision to act with ones moral and ethical obligations in mind. This is responsibility in its fullest sense and you need that pointer at autonomy to account for how it constitutes freedom.

For responsibility to be the essence of freedom you need responsibility to be more than "being responsible for" - you need that kind of responsibility that leads to responsible behavior. You need it to be internal rather then external. the freedom you speak of is not constituted by responsibility but the ability to choose - even between responsible and irresponsible behavior. It is according to your definition of true freedom no true freedom at all.

That said, I leave you to contemplate how your reduction of the meaning of "personal responsibility" leads to it being not able to account for any kind of freedom whatsoever. The ball is in your court, I will expect your explanation of how your curbed notion of responsibility can account for freedom.
Kalaratiri
Full Broadside
Deepwater Hooligans
#67 - 2012-07-06 18:31:05 UTC
Apologies for the late reply.

Aldrith Shutaq wrote:
What exactly about the outlook of the Knighthood means that I would agree with someone who is shifting into violent attitudes towards an entire civilization based on the bickering of a few of its members?


As someone who has recently shifted into a more violent attitude, I'm sure you can come up with several answers to this yourself. After all, you seemed to take a certain glee in viewing the recent disputes between LNA and D'K/U'K. Did this spectacle make you think we are worth saving I wonder.

Aldrith Shutaq wrote:

The only people the Knighthood would like to reduce to ash are those who have been proven to be participants in a serious evil. I would be the first one to light the pyre beneath a Holder who has done this, but only once I am convinced he deserves it. The 'brothers and sisters' Ava seems to reference often do not have so much consideration.


In this case, it would be entirely dependent on which part of the Empire we are considering to have partaken in "serious evil". I can easily claim the entire Empire has, and there are plenty who would agree with me. More than half a millennium of slavery is not easily forgotten, as has been said many times before.

You could say traitors, and heretics, and blood raider sympathizers, and plenty would agree with you. Myself included. Believe me, I would take at least as much pleasure in seeing them die as you would.

To me? The Empire's policy of 'Reclaiming' is evil. And for that, and what has been done in it's name, I would burn it all down.

Aldrith Shutaq wrote:
Ava was not specific about what praticular part of this thread made her come to the conclusion she should give sympathy to murders and terrorists who usually end up killing more Amarrian commoners and slaves than unjust Holders with their bombings and shooting-sprees, but I am fairly sure it was unwarranted.


Ava's reasons are not for me to guess at, and I will leave it to her to decide if she should wish to tell you them.

She's mad but she's magic, there's no lie in her fire.

This is possibly one of the worst threads in the history of these forums.  - CCP Falcon

I don't remember when last time you said something that wasn't either dumb or absurd. - Diana Kim

Makkal Hanaya
Revenent Defence Corperation
#68 - 2012-07-06 18:36:48 UTC
In reviewing this discussion, I find I have erred in my reasoning.

I thank all those who took the time to point out my mistake to me.

Render unto Khanid the things which are Khanid's; and unto God the things that are God's.

Unit XS365BT
Unit Commune
#69 - 2012-07-06 20:15:30 UTC
We note that much of the argument in this discussion comes from an inability to understand the difference between a definition and a purpose.

Slave : Definition

1. One bound in servitude as the property of a person or household.
2. One who is abjectly subservient to a specified person or influence: "I was still the slave of education and prejudice"
3. A machine or component controlled by another machine or component.

We note that while this definition is universally accepted, within the Amarrian faith and culture, the purpose of slavery is publicly stated as being one that is not, primarily, the simple aquisition of cheap labour.

However, we also note that in many cases, the activities performed by those enslaved by Amarrian holders are those of an inexpensive and often expendable workforce.

We Return.

Unit XS365BT. Designated Communications Officer. Unit Commune.

Ston Momaki
Disciples of Ston
#70 - 2012-07-06 20:57:35 UTC  |  Edited by: Ston Momaki
My focus on culpability was for your benefit, not an attempt to fully explicate personal responsibility. In a free society, free agents experience a breadth of personal responsibility that is far greater than culpability. I focused on it because it was the original topic of this thread. In a free society your boss commends you and gives you a raise when you are personally responsible for job well done. Accordingly, you receive demerits for a job poorly done. It goes both ways. Of course I believe there is more to it than culpability. I focused on that angle because of the ORIGINAL TOPIC!

I am not attacking a straw man, I am attacking your justification for slavery.

I am attacking this:
Mithra: "It is, then, indeed a great mercy to take up those poor beings and carry their responsibilty for them, as one is responsible for what one's hands are doing, and, as the latter first need to learn to accept the divine gift God has made to all humans, to help them along the harsh way to enable them to do make good use of this gift to their fullest ability, to help them to see their failure to live up to God's plan and thus up to who they are meant to be."

I am attacking this:
Mithra: "What is really preserving slavery is not that others insist that the slave holders own the moral culpability of the slave - they doen't though it is as if he does - but the fact that some humans again and again cast their responsibility, their moral agency, their freedom away and prefer to live as beasts rather than humans."

I am attacking this:
Mithra: "Here you see the mystery contained in the practice of slavery: Just as the slave holder takes the cast-away freedom of the slave up and guards it for the unfree until he is ready to carry it on, God upholds us and keeps our divine sparks safe in our darkest times, in which we are mere shadows of ourselves."

You have the gall to say that you prefer secular explanations. You continue to justify slavery and blame those you enslave for its continuance. This is no staw man. Read your own words. Who are you to say anyone has cast away their freedom? I will no longer play the rhetorical two step with you, Mithra. You are making a slaver argument for the continuance of a wicked and perverted institution called slavery. You are cloaking it in religion, calling it merciful and justifying it by claiming that God upholds you in it. This is slaver tripe from start to finish.

I am attacking the institution of slavery and its justifications, Mithra.

Edit: I was pointing out your failed syllogism. You were not merely providing definitions.

The Disciples of Ston bid you peace

Nicoletta Mithra
Societas Imperialis Sceptri Coronaeque
Khimi Harar
#71 - 2012-07-06 22:48:48 UTC
Cpt. Momaki,

I've stated my argument in secular terms, but you ignore this statement even when I repeated it for you. I explicated my arguments so that it's clear that they are not fallacious - as you claimed them to be - and others here stated that they are sound. You then questioned their validity and I responded to that in one case by stating that you declared a definition to be wrong, which in itself means that you don't understand what a definition is, and in another case by pointing out that the reduced sense of responsibility you put up against my premise leads to the destruction of your own claim that "The essence of freedom is personal responsibility.", which I used as premise.

Now you fail to show how your reduced notion of responsibility can possibly be at the heart of what freedom is. If you accept that there is more to responsibility and that this more is responsible for it constituting freedom, then your attack on my premise failed as it hinged on responsibility being merely culpability and accountability - now that you retract this objection I see my argument out of any danger.

Here's the problems with you: "You are making a slaver argument for the continuance of a wicked and perverted institution called slavery." First framing my argument as a 'slaver argument' and then the dis-qualification of slavery as 'a wicked and perverted institution' speak for the fact that you fail to apply the principle of charity from the start, that quite the contrary is the case and therefore that no one needs to be surprised that you're building up straw men by interpreting what I say in the worst possible light, even to the extent that you ignore parts of what I actually said, as it would contradict your interpretations.

And then you claim something alike to:

P1: All justifications of slavery are fallacious.
P2: Cpt. Mithra's argument is a justification of slavery.
__________________________________________
C: Cpt. Mithra's argument is fallacious.

So far so good, if premise 1 holds. Now to show that P1 holds you'd have to somehow examine all possible justifications of slavery and show that every single justification attempt is, by necessity, fallacious. Now, your argument for this goes like that:

P1: Slavery is wrong.
P2: If something is wrong, it can't be justified.
P1+P2: Every possible justification attempt of slavery must be fallacious.
_________________________________________________________
C: All justifications of slavery are fallacious.

The problem here is, that you're really committing a petitio principii, as "Slavery is wrong" presupposes that "All justifications of slavery are fallacious". This circle isn't a virtuous one, Cpt Momaki.

I'm happy that you "will no longer play the rhetorical two step with [me]", as it's not the game I play anyway. I won't try to engage you in reasoned dialogue any further.

I am sorry that I bothered you to begin with.

Faithfully,
N. Mithra
Ston Momaki
Disciples of Ston
#72 - 2012-07-06 23:09:54 UTC
Mithra: "I've stated my argument in secular terms."
Mithra:"Here you see the mystery contained in the practice of slavery: Just as the slave holder takes the cast-away freedom of the slave up and guards it for the unfree until he is ready to carry it on, God upholds us and keeps our divine sparks safe in our darkest times, in which we are mere shadows of ourselves."

OK, if you say so.

The Disciples of Ston bid you peace

Nicoletta Mithra
Societas Imperialis Sceptri Coronaeque
Khimi Harar
#73 - 2012-07-06 23:55:21 UTC  |  Edited by: Nicoletta Mithra
That, Cpt. Momaki, isn't even part of the argument if one frames it in religious terms. Also, because one does frame something in religious terms, it doesn't follow that one hasn't stated it in other, secular terms elswhere and that even twice.

I'll pray for you.
Ston Momaki
Disciples of Ston
#74 - 2012-07-07 01:12:26 UTC
Nicoletta Mithra wrote:

I'll pray for you.

And I for you.

Obviously you are practiced in argumentation and debate, more so that I am. But, I cannot think any cause more horrible than the continuation of slavery and its justification as the object of those skills. This post is not an argument, but a statement of some of my convictions. It saddens me that you have sealed your own heart in such a wrong cause through the repeated argument for it. It saddens me that you have convinced yourself that God supports slavery when in fact, the creator abhors it. Of all the causes in the universe to argue endlessly to support, slavery is among the very worst.

And for the abolition of slavery and the establishment of every community of mankind as free and self-determined, I will continue to argue with my limited abilities and work with the selfsame until I die or fade into time immemorial. To free those in the bonds of slavery and to abolish that institution forever, is one of the best causes of all for which people labor and fight.

There are those among us who oppose slavery that possess both the acuity of intellect and sharpness of wit to take you on more effectively than I can. What is lacking is the fortitude to do so with verbal force. Slavery is an evil and there are ways to express that fact with language and ways to narrate it with precision if but a willing and skillful practitioner dare to step forward. Don't let these words stroke you as if I am saying that your arguments are that well presented. I still believe that you have changed your stripes since your original post. I do not believe that your arguments are tight. However, I have discovered that I have a very difficult time separating my passions for abolition from my attempts at argumentation. I lose patience quickly in the twists and turns of language and am soon overcome by the more emotive part of my being.

So, is this the end of the debate? No. As long as there is slavery, I will oppose it with words and actions. I will watch your words and comment if I am so moved. I am not even convinced that debate should be that polite in the case of this issue. It should be hard, confrontational and yes, even condemning. Why? Slavery is a scourge that violates the most self-evident of truths that free societies hold, that all people are created equal and have been endowed by their creator with certain inalienable rights, among these life, and liberty.

I also have the ability to pray and that I also will do for you. I will pray that God convicts your soul of the true evil that slavery is and that your skills and aptitudes might be turned to a better cause than they have been thus applied.

Most sincerely,
Ston

The Disciples of Ston bid you peace

Tiber Brucato
Really Great Space Corporation
United Neopian Federation
#75 - 2012-07-07 03:39:22 UTC  |  Edited by: Tiber Brucato
Come see tha' violence inherent in tha' system...
Ssakaa
Animatar Foundation
#76 - 2012-07-07 11:11:56 UTC
Ston Momaki wrote:

...And for the abolition of slavery and the establishment of every community of mankind as free and self-determined, I will continue to argue with my limited abilities and work with the selfsame until I die or fade into time immemorial.


Words to live for.

I don't get the God bit, nor want to, but ... you're alright, Mister Momaki. You're alright.

Fenfalaa

"Modern Life is Rubbish"