Robert Wrubel wrote:
>
> --- joanna <123hop at comcast.net> wrote:
>
> "I'm saying that I can see how moral quandries that
> present as individual problems are simply
> manifestations of the individual's attempt to work
> through arbitrary social norms."
>
> OK. Divorce is probably an "arbitrary social norm."
> Both partners from the same class background know
> that. Does that tell you whether those partners should
> or shouldnt get divorced (or even separated)?
> Remember Angels in America? How do you know that
> Louis is wrong for leaving Prior? Why does the writer
> forgive Louis in the end but not the Mormon guy?
>
> Iris Murdoch's point is that contemporary thinkers
> (including Marx, Freud, the existentialists and
> structuralists) all in different ways deny the reality
> of Kantian moral imperatives (or any abstract scheme
> of values). Yet we all go on living is if there were
> right and wrong choices.
The Kantian Moral Imperative, quite aside from anything Marx, Freud, or Sartre ever said or thought, is pretty silly. And even if it were true it would have no relevance to the questions you pose -- because it is at the highest level of theoretical abstraction -- and there is no direct link between such high-level abstractions and any particular decision or act. So Kant doesn't help you any more than Marx or Sartre help you. Kant (if accepted) can explain _after_ the event how it fits into the cosmos, but doesn't butter any more parsnips at the concrete level than does Marx or Sartre.
The Kantian Moral Imperative is every bit as abstract and every bit as irrelevant to how we really live our daily lives as is the theory of Surplus Value.
Carrol
>
> OK, 'nuff said on this subject.
>
> BobW
>
> No need to reply. I obviously walked into the wrong
> thread.
>
> BobW
>
> > Miles Jackson wrote:
> >
> > > I'm not sure how to respond other than to say--you
> > cannot
> > >understand the private moral struggles people have
> > without understanding
> > >the sociohistorical context in which those moral
> > struggles emerge.
> > >
> > To put it another way, if you live in a society that
> > accepts slavery,
> > the practice might not offend or distress you. If
> > you live in a
> > polyandrous society, the fact that your wife is
> > sleeping with your best
> > friend might not disturb you. If you live in a
> > society that worships
> > money and "success" the sociopathic actions that
> > lead to these gains
> > might not strike you as being unusual.
> >
> > I'm not saying it's all relative; I'm saying that I
> > can see how moral
> > quandries that present as individual problems are
> > simply manifestations
> > of the individual's attempt to work through
> > arbitrary social norms. Even
> > the need for working through might be socially
> > defined.
> >
> > What is interesting to me is that some feelings --
> > like compassion --
> > are not socially defined and such feelings are able
> > to serve as a
> > universal solvent for other socially defined toxins.
> >
> > Joanna
> >
> >
> >
> > ___________________________________
> >
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> >
>
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