i can't even guess as to why they went quiet. not one guess at all. we will never know.
edit: well they're not quiet now once they get called out
this post was submitted on 17 Nov 2024
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Ummm....yes! Of course I would make that compromise! If I have a choice between they both die or one dies, of course I'm taking the choice where one lives!
What wouldn't I be willing to compromise on? Nothing. If I have a choice between bad and worse, I'm taking bad, what kind of lunatic would intentionally choose worse?
The vast majority of people would choose worse, at least in some situations.
Philosopher Bernard Williams proposed this thought experiment: suppose someone has rounded up a group of 20 innocent people, and says that he will kill all of them, unless you agree to kill one, in which case he'll let the rest go. Act Utilitarianism would suggest that it is not only morally permissible, but morally obligatory to comply, which Williams saw as absurd. As an addendum, suppose the person then orders you to round up another 20 people so he can repeat the experiment with someone else, and if you don't, he'll have his men kill 40 instead. Congratulations, your "lesser-evilist" ideology now has you working for a psychopath and recruiting more people to work for him too.
Even the trolley problem, which liberals love to trot out to justify their positions, is not nearly as clear cut as they try to pretend it is. A follow up to the trolley problem is, is it ethical to kill an innocent person in order to harvest their organs in order to give five people lifesaving transplants? The overwhelming majority of people say no.
Act Utilitarianism is something that seems intuitive at first glance, but is very difficult to actually defend under scrutiny, and there are many, many alternative moral frameworks that reject its assumptions and conclusions. Liberals don't seem to realize that this framework they treat as absolute and objective - that you would have to be a "lunatic" to reject - is actually a specific ideology, and one that's not particularly popular or robust.
The trolley problem is clearly not clear cut at all, that's what makes it interesting. This, of course, is lost on the Dunning-Kruger crowd.
Contrived explanations couched in self indulgent and imperious insults, just like the Biden/Harris campaign. And you lot wonder why so many voters didnt bother to get off the couch.
You've learned less than nothing and are even worse now than before. I see a lot of calls to move the party rightward, cloaked in a very vague rejection of "wokeness". And you expect to win any election like this? Out-republicanning the republicans has been tried so many times by the liberals and its never worked. And yet you lot keep running the same play every time.
I guess I should be happy you make the case for a progressive party easier, but damn, its disappointing that we even need to do it.
I think you're replying to the wrong comment.
Where this analogy falls apart is in the implicit assumption that this is just a one-off situation. (I mean, most people only have two parents.)
What happens when it's an iterative phenomenon? (Politics is an ongoing thing.) Then, the situation in the analogy turns into the classic "negotiating with terrorists" scenario. The received wisdom is that one should never negotiate with terrorists, because once they learn that terrorism works they'll do it again.
Maybe make it cousins. Do you choose the option whereby two cousins die, or just one. What if choosing just one now increases the danger of more dying later?
Yep, thats one of the classic criticism of utilitarian philosophy: it doesnt take into consideration if the actions being evaluated are evil or not. From a certain point of view I'm sure killing anyone can be made to be a good trade compared to some other greater evil, but you're supposed to just line up behind defeating evil and be done with it. Utilitarianism is taught almost solely to be mocked in philosophy class, same as solopsism.
Ironically it was only the college educated who are likely tro be exposed to these ideas, and they are primarily on the utilitarian side of the argument this time.
Makes no sense. I think they just werent paying attention in philo 101. They missed out on ethics 301 as well.
Well, add another layer of complexity. The lesser of two evil guy wants to be picked. But instead of offering anything, he really wants to kill one of your parents and banks on your choice. He could of guaranteed getting picked by saying he'd kill none of your parents. But he does wanna kill one of them and gambled on you picking the lesser evil.
Didn't happen, and you think it's somehow the person making the impossible choice wrongly than the ones making the choices.
Thank you for your time.
There's no need for extra complexity, both of your parents are getting killed now.
And heres the thing. In the moment, I can wish we could make that "lesser evil" choice. It sucks, but i voted kamela myself. But now that it has failed, you would rather blame the people who couldn't bring themselves to make that difficult decision instead of the campaign for not being fucking evil, even if lesser. Like, do you get where my frustration comes from? I'm on here arguing with a liberal about how its actually the fault of random leftists and people unable to make that impossible decision when we both acknowledge the campaign actively ran on "I'm still gonna do a genocide, cant stop me" and you think thats just cool?
Once again, mid vote I can get your stance. But it didnt work! What are you doing now? What are you hoping to gain by swinging on people like me who are just BEGGING YOU to support a democratic party that'll say "no evil" next time instead of "Wittle bit of evil". Seriously? Are you just pissed beyond any actual care for the people who are about to be targeted by this regime? You wouldn't rather talk with people like me on ways to resist and damage the ability for this regime to do the evil we both hate?
Once again. I can get your frustration, but from my perspective you are still trying to juice a campaign strategy that failed. It didnt work. Lesser evil DID NOT WORK. WHY DO YOU KEEP WANTING TO DEFEND SOMETHING THAT DIDNT DO THE ONE THING IT WAS SUPPOSED TO. WHY DONT YOU WANNA TRY SOMETHING NEW?!?!
Are you saying that Biden is more progressive then Harris? Because he won that campaign virtually the same way.
Covid. Do you want me to elaborate?
However you cut it it's one parent or two. One parent is always better than two.
Except it didn't work. Polled the entire American population and was found that it don't work. Would you like to try that again next election or do something different this time? Cause right now you seem like you reeeeeeally wanna try the same thing again next time. Hell, throw some extra bacon on the grill. You gonna sacrifice trans people next? Gay marriage? Cmon bubby. What's the next sacrifice and I am curious when you pick one that includes you
You guys have sacrificed trans people and probably gay marriage by electing Trump. Its a stupid argument when those things are literally already under attack by the guy you let win.
You guys already have picked one that includes all of you. An anti vaccer in charge of your health.
Things are 100% going to be worse for Gaza under Trump. You didn't win anything by electing him.
You guys fucked it so bad it's literally unbelievable. You got tricked by the don't vote against trump propaganda campaign and can't even see it.
Assuming things is bad for conversation like this so let me be clear that I voted Kamala
So take all your insults and pack it back up and try again. My argument is that it is ultimately kamalas fault for not giving the left anything to vote for. I wish we could have lesser eviled here but ultimately it's the Dems fault for choosing to be a little evil when they could of easily of chosen no evil and won.
I blame the organization and organizers of the campaign for thinking they could gamble on this by remaining pro genocide and failing.
I blame the organization who was told clearer than any election that people will not vote for them on this one issue, concede or lose, and they as the decision makers chose lose
please consider editing the personal attacks out of this comment so the mods don’t remove it. :) your perspective is important and i don’t want it silenced for breaking rule 1
I felt against it when writing it and I appreciate you being the voice to back me off the angry ledge. I will remove it.
I don't disagree with that. And they were absolute shit. But blame who you want the world now has 4 years of trump to deal with.
My argument is if the left didn't want her electing Trump is an absolutely ridiculous response.
You vote now and protest later.
I thought you were joking but from the pattern of your other comments I see you actually beleive this. How about a third option, when someone threatens to kill your parents, you kill them instead of making a deal with them on who they murder? Did you even think about that possibility?
Seems like you choose to put yourself in a trolley problem, rather than life actually putting you in one.
There was no third option. If you missed it this was an analogy for the election.
You are correct that it was an analogy for the election, but the point the analogy is trying to illustrate is precisely that if you actually and for real were faced with this situation and decision (assuming you love your parents, if not please substitute for the 2 living beings you love the most), that you would reject the decision and take any number of alternative actions that are available to you before allowing a loved one to be killed. Hell, a bunch of people would fight to the death in a situation like this.
The previous realization would then illustrate the hypocrisy behind expecting people to behave in a strictly utilitarian sense when you yourself would not when it involves your loved ones.
Except there were literally only two outcomes in the election. There were literally no alternative outcomes.
This was completely bound and a gun to your head. Absolutely no other possible outcome. Choose one option or both die anyway.
America chose both dying anyway.
I know you see it as saving a parent, because for whatever contrived reason you cant save both, but letting one of your parents die instead of fighting for whats right is actually a pretty decent metaphor for voting for Harris.
Where your metaphor falls apart though is that Harris could have chosen to break with bad policies and forge her own way forward on the genocide and the economy, and she just didnt bother. No one ever had to die, and she didnt need to lose. All she had to do was try to do the right thing and be worthy of the office, and she didnt do that. So here we all are.
It's literally the analogy put forward by someone else that I was responding to.
Moving the goal posts and changing the question to invalidate my answer is pointless.
However you look at it she was better than trump. You've cut off your nose to spite your face and indeed here we all are.
Except its not a game of winning the popular vote is it. And I'm in a bright blue state, so my vote basically didnt matter at all. It was a contest of winning the swing states.
And was it the voters who owned the campaign choices or was it harris? There should be accountability for making campaign choices. Are you claiming Harris had no choices in how she ran her campaign?
Seems to me your are using abuser logic.