Morality and the Good Life

Mike Austin's Blog

2009-05-26T12:25:00.001-04:00

Morality and the Good Life is moving here. To find out why, go here. To see my new blog, which will include a discussion of the same kind of issues, go here. In sum, go here.

A-Rod, Steroids, and Naturalness

2009-05-22T10:59:00.002-04:00

Readers of this blog might be interested in a discussion over at the Philosophy of Sport blog.

Should we become cyborgs?

2009-04-29T15:25:00.004-04:00

I'm finishing up teaching a course on technology and values this semester, and the final book for the course is The Impact of the Internet on our Moral Lives. James Moor writes a chapter that asks whether or not we should let computers get under our skin. First, we can define a cyborg as someone who is part human, part computer. Moor points out that it is inevitable, i.e. that we will become cyborgs. The question we should be asking is, rather, what sort of cyborgs should we become? There is much more in this chapter worthy of discussion, but Moor's overall approach is a fairly standard one--we should be free, and responsible. What this means is that we should be free to do whatever we want in terms of computer implants, as long as we don't harm others. I used to think this was the best way to approach such issues, but now I have a sense that this approach is inadequate. That's a topic for another post (or book), however.

One ethical consideration in this realm has to do with control. Computer implants have the potential to enhance human agency as well as undermine it. They can enhance it by eliminating symptoms of Parkinson's disease, actions that result from obsessive-compulsive disorder, and other medical and psychiatric conditions. However, there is also the potential for our agency, or our control over our lives, to be undermined. Researchers have been able to control the behavior of rats by stimulating pleasure centers in rat brains. Perhaps something along these lines could be used to help people stop smoking or lose weight. These sorts of patients and people could regain control over their lives. The problem arises when we consider that there is also potential for giving up control over at least some aspects of our lives, if we are connected to the agency of others via wireless-enabled computer implants.

This all sounds very science-fictiony, but we should be thinking about these issues know and constructing an ethical approach for dealing with such potentialities, rather than merely reacting to the ones that ultimately do come to pass.

Immigration Ethics

2009-04-19T14:42:00.003-04:00

When in all of the debates and discussion of immigration, possible amnesty, and a border fence have the following words come up?

"Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"

Capitalist Assault on Kids

2009-04-09T12:19:00.000-04:00

This post over at Leiter Reports is worth reading and thinking about, especially for parents.

Act Now for Darfur

2009-03-23T14:04:00.000-04:00

Anger, AIG, and Darfur

2009-03-20T14:04:00.003-04:00

Activist Jim Wallis makes the following point with reference to the ongoing atrocities in Darfur:

Thursday morning, a small group gathered in the Rules Committee meeting room of the Capitol building. Congressmen and women, activists, faith leaders, and celebrities spoke to express our outrage at the flagrant disregard for human life [in Darfur], but press was sparse at the event. AIG bonuses were the headlines of the day. Certainly, that is a revelation worthy of our anger, but in the midst of our financial concerns, we must remember the lives of the millions killed over the past 20 years and the hundreds of thousands of deaths that will come with the support of the Khartoum government.

Both of these situations merit anger, but we simply must overcome that part of human psychology that tends to be more concerned with issues of lesser moral importance in our immediate surroundings than with issues of greater moral importance on the other side of the planet.

Philosophy for Everyone on Facebook

2009-03-18T15:53:00.003-04:00

If you're on Facebook, you might want to check out this Facebook group:

http://www.facebook.com/home.php?ref=home#/group.php?gid=154569165360&ref=mf

So far, the series includes Wine and Philosophy, Food and Philosophy, Beer and Philosophy, and Running and Philosophy, with many other titles one the way.

Plagiarism and Essay Mills

2009-03-16T15:42:00.002-04:00

A recent article in the Chronicle of Higher Education is discussed here.

One of my "favorite" parts comes from the justification given by a philosophy and religion major at James Madison University. He paid a service to research and write a paper on the parables of Jesus Christ for a New Testament class. Here's the alleged justification for this action:

[He] defends the idea of paying someone else to do your academic work, comparing it to companies that outsource labor. "Like most people in college, you don't have time to do research on some of these things," he says. "I was hoping to find a guy to do some good quality writing."

There are important moral disanalogies between corporate outsourcing and plagiarism, but I'll leave it to the reader to come up with them (perhaps in the comments). However, my view is that this is a consequence of the commodification of education and that many have forgotten that study and thought about important ideas can be part of becoming a morally and intellectually virtuous person. A college degree ought be be more than a mere credential. Of course, it fails to be even that if those who receive it are not qualified because they've plagiarized and cheated rather than actually learning something.

The Key to a Good Marriage

2009-03-15T10:24:00.003-04:00

Apparently, it involves treating your spouse as you would a child. A writer for Parenting magazine used the following parenting techniques on her husband, with some success:

1. Reward good behavior.
2. Keep it brief (when reminding them to do something).
3. The time-out.
4. Give quality time to get quality time.
5. Creative discipline.

To me, a lot of this just seems wrong. In the ideal marriage (what we pursue, not what we actually have) we don't use childrearing techniques to manipulate our spouse into doing what we want him or her to do. Rather, lofty traits such as intimacy, trust, and some unconditional love foster an environment where each partner puts the interests of the other ahead of their own. This parenting approach to marriage is just another example of manipulation (at worst) or a misguided way to deal with marital conflict and stress (at best).

The Point of Moral Philosophy

2009-03-06T12:12:00.001-05:00

Our present inquiry does not aim, as our others do, at study; for the purpose of our examination is not to know what virtue is, but to become good, since otherwise the inquiry would be of no benefit to us.
(Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 1103b 28-30)

Nanomedicine and the Value of Individual Liberty

2009-03-02T14:54:00.005-05:00

The above is an artistic rendering of a potential application of nanotechnology in the medical field. Here, the nanobots are cleaning the lungs of the patient. There are many interesting and difficult issues surrounding nanotechnology in general, and nanomedicine in particular. In the future, it may be possible not only to treat and prevent disease using nanobots, but we may also be able to select from a variety of elective procedures. For example, in Nanoethics (Wiley-Blackwell, 2007), the selection from Robert Freitas (ch. 12) offers a volitional normative model for disease. On this model, disease is defined in part by the failure of optimal functioning of biological systems, which involves the operation of biologically programmed processes. I'll grant this, just for the sake of argument, to get to the more provocative and seemingly problematic part: on this model, the patient's desires are a crucial element in the definition of health for that patient. For example, imagine that I go to my nanophysician in the future, because I have the disease of "small biceps." I'd like to have bigger biceps so I can participate more successfully in a particular recreational sport. On the volitional normative model of disease, this is a disease given my desires and given that informed consent and informed desire obtains in my particular case. This, as the author notes, is a very permissive concept of disease and naturally leads to a fully permissive medicine.

This understanding of disease and its implications will be counterintuitive to many, and I think rightly so. But part of what motivates this view is the weight placed on the value of individual liberty. If you want some trait x, and x will help you satisfy desires that you find important and will not constitute (a serious) harm to others, then nanomedical help in acquiring x is permissible. This is in part because you will have the disease of not-possessing-x.

It seems to me that "disease" should be a less flexible concept than this, as one's desires are not as relevant as this model takes them to be. However, I am sympathetic to the notion that a condition might be a disease for some people, and not for others, given their desires. And yet this doesn't seem quite right. Perhaps the proper way to put it is that in any case a disease is present, but in some cases the presence of the disease is not a harm to the individual in question. For example, a person might accept her deafness rather than seek a nanocure because she prefers her life within deaf culture and the lack of an ability to hear is not a harm to her, all things considered.

Save Darfur

2009-03-01T11:25:00.004-05:00

I am hopeful, but not as much as I'd like to be, that the Obama administration will engage in concrete actions to end the genocide in Darfur. There are now over 300,000 dead, more than 4,000 villages burned, and more than 4 million people displaced from their homes. We become accustomed to statistics, but the real stories stick with us, and hopefully move us to do something.

A Darfuri farmer tells of the janjaweed raid on his village:
"They took everything from us. They beat me and left me for dead. And they kill everybody in the village if you are not running. If you are children, elder, woman, man. Everyone, when they find us, they just kill us. My brother was my best friend, like a father to me. They shot five bullets in his back."

The following is a description of an attack on an all-girls school in Darfur:
"Five, five different men, they attacked me. They raped me, and they cut me in different parts of my body with a knife, and they burned cigarettes in my body."
She continues to tell of the rapes of 40 girls and teachers.

One survivor of a janjaweed raid is now risking his life by being a translator for foreign journalists. He says "I believe if people know what is happening, they will do something to stop the genocide."

Perhaps his faith in the rest of us is grounded, and perhaps not. If you'd like to do something, go to Save Darfur, and get involved.

Followers

2009-02-27T12:22:00.000-05:00

I've just added the followers widget to the right, in case any readers would like to make us of it.

Whether or not it is deserved...

2009-02-16T14:04:00.002-05:00

this blog made a top 50 philosophy blog list. See here for the list, with links to 49 other philosophy blogs. I'm wondering if there are more than 50 philosophy blogs out there?

Why study the virtues?

2009-02-04T11:08:00.003-05:00

Lately I've become interested in particular virtues in my teaching and research. In the book Radical Virtues, Richard White discusses several reasons that support studying individual virtues, such as courage, compassion, and temperance. First, doing so can help make one a better person. This seems right to me, as attending to a virtue can help with its formation and development. Of course, this assumes many things about one's character, intentions, desires, and so on. Second, studying the virtues is connected to our common life. Examples of this include the connections between a virtue such as temperance and environmental ethics, and the connections between justice as a personal virtue and issues of social justice. Third, a virtuous person is a morally sensitive person, which is good. She attends to rules, consequences, and the needs of other people as warranted. Such a person is not self-absorbed. Finally, White points out that a study of the virtues can lead to moral progress, in the individual and in society as well. The above overlap, but I think that White makes some important points, especially in a culture in which virtue and the moral issues deserve more attention in our daily lives.

100-0 and Being a Good Sport

2009-01-27T14:29:00.002-05:00

Readers of this blog might be interested in my post over at Philosophy of Sport:

100-0, with Honor?

Barack Obama, Moral Realist and Virtue Ethicist

2009-01-23T14:35:00.003-05:00

Well, the title of the post may be overstating a bit, but consider this portion of his speech:

Our challenges may be new. The instruments with which we meet them may be new. But those values upon which our success depends — honesty and hard work, courage and fair play, tolerance and curiosity, loyalty and patriotism — these things are old. These things are true. They have been the quiet force of progress throughout our history. What is demanded then is a return to these truths. What is required of us now is a new era of responsibility — a recognition, on the part of every American, that we have duties to ourselves, our nation, and the world, duties that we do not grudgingly accept but rather seize gladly, firm in the knowledge that there is nothing so satisfying to the spirit, so defining of our character, than giving our all to a difficult task.

As a moral realist and someone who is thinking that some form of virtue ethics is a very important part of normative ethical theory, Obama's words ring true. Moreover, there is a lesson about true happiness. We are most fulfilled when giving ourselves to a difficult task for the sake of the common good.

Facebook Ethics

2009-01-17T14:48:00.003-05:00

There's a group on Facebook that I just came across, called "Faculty Ethics on Facebook." It includes 12 suggested guidelines for faculty who use this social network, and a forum for discussion of these issues. Proposed guideline number 3 states "Not friending students unless they request the connection. Not poking students. Never pressuring students to friend the professor (such as repeated mention of a faculty profile in class)."

These seem like good ideas to me. A couple of years ago I started a Facebook account and within the first several weeks of the fall semester had a large number of Facebook friends who were also students. For a variety of reasons, I closed my account. I wanted to meet students where they are at, so to speak, and open up opportunities for dialogue outside of the classroom. Part of my goal as a professor is to help my students develop as they prepare to graduate and go out into the world. There were some weird things happening, and I decided the trade-off wasn't worth it. Now I'm back on, but have privacy settings set at a level that precludes students from seeing my account. I use it now to keep in touch with friends from the past who live far away from Richmond, KY.

I think there are some interesting ethical questions about faculty-student relationships via Facebook. While in some seminars on campus I've been encouraged to have a Facebook and Myspace page, it just doesn't seem worth it. I'd prefer that my students talk to me face to face anyway, even though this is becoming increasingly difficult for some. It seems a large amount of their social lives are mediated through Facebook. And to me, as an old guy who liked to hang out with friends in college at the coffee shop and Fast Eddie's Pool Hall, it seems like they are missing out on a great part of the college experience.

College Football Playoff Again

2009-01-08T13:15:00.004-05:00

Since I've written on this topic in Football and Philosophy and commented on the issue in prior posts, I'll inform readers who are interested in yet more on the issue of a playoff in American college football: cnn.com

Check the video link as well, and enjoy the game tonight! Go Sooners!

Best Books of 2008

2008-12-30T12:09:00.005-05:00

These are the books I've read and particularly enjoyed this past year:

A Theory of Virtue: Excellence in Being for the Good, Robert Adams
This book is an excellent (!) treatment of many of the current debates surrounding virtue ethics and the various challenges it faces as a normative theory. Of particular interest to people working in the field is the discussion of the situationist challenge to virtue ethics and Adams' responses.

Racing the Sunset: An Athlete's Quest for Life After Sport, Scott Tinley
This book is relevant not just to athletes who are facing the tough transition to retirement, but for anyone facing a change in life which bears significantly on their self-concept. Many of the insights were helpful for me, as back surgery forced me to "retire" from 28 years of distance running.

A Dog in a Hat: An American Bike Racer's Story of Mud, Drugs, Blood, Betrayal, and Beauty in Belgium, Joe Parkin
The end of my running days moved me onto the saddle of a road bike, and Parkin's account of his life as a professional bike racer in Belgium gives genuine insight into the sport.

Coaching for Character: Reclaiming the Principles of Sportsmanship, by Craig Clifford and Randolph Feezell
A great resource that makes philosophy practical. I highly recommend it to coaches and parents who want take advantage of the opportunities sport provides for building character. I used some of the ideas in the book with my U10 soccer team, with some success.

How to Be Evangelical without Being Conservative, Roger Olson
The title was enough to get me to buy and read this book, and Olson makes a good case that evangelical need not be equivalent with the ideals of the religious right.

And here are a few of the books I'm looking forward to reading in 2009:
Tour de Life: From Coma to Competition
Major: A Black Athlete, a White Era, and the Fight to Be the World's Fastest Human Being
Understanding Virtue Ethics
Ethical Intuitionism
Kant and the Ethics of Humility
Why Sports Morally Matter
and some of Thomas Reid's work.

War and Liberation

2008-12-05T08:35:00.002-05:00

The war against hunger is truly mankind's war of liberation.
-John F. Kennedy

Social Justice, Health Care, & Human Rights

2008-12-03T14:21:00.004-05:00

In one of the U.S. presidential debates, the moderator asked the candidates whether they believed that health care is a right or a responsibility. In class today, we considered this question from the perspective of social justice. My own view is that basic health care is a right and a responsibility. It is a right because such care is required for our basic needs as human beings to be met. Medical care for illness, preventive care, and treatment of injuries seem to be fundamentally necessary for human well-being.

Social justice is relevant insofar as it has at least 3 elements: liberty, equality, and fraternity. Each member of a just society should be free to pursue his or her own goals in life. This will include things like freedom of speech and religion, but more generally it is a right to govern one's own life, or a right of self-determination. Untreated illness and injury can seriously hinder one's liberty, and so a just society ensures access to health care as a human right. It is the responsibility of the individual to care for themselves, and to take advantage of access to health care, however. In a just society, there is equality, and there are no unjustifiable inequalities. This means in part that the needs and interests of all people matter the same. If this is the case, one should have access to basic health care irregardless of ability to pay. The needs of the poor matter just as much as the needs of the rich. Having cancer shouldn't entail battling insurance companies, nor should it mean one loses everything. Finally, in a just society, there will be fraternity, defined as a sense of community and commitment to the common good. Public health is an important aspect of the common good, and so a just society will provide basic health care for all, or at least access to such care.

How to accomplish this is a separate and of course very controversial issue, but in my view all should have access to basic health care.

Courage for Peace

2008-11-24T12:44:00.003-05:00

In my introductory ethics courses, we have just begun reading and discussing Richard White's book Radical Virtues.
The first chapter deals with the virtue of courage, and offers the following as a typical way of thinking of courage: "an awareness of personal risk and danger and the willingness to proceed in spite of everything (p.15)." Later in the chapter, White proceeds to discuss 5 paradigms of courage, including soldier, martyr, everyday courage, "female" courage, and courage for peace. It is this last one that I've been thinking about more today. Some obvious examples of this type of courage include MLK and Gandhi. I also found a couple of YouTube clips that illustrate what I believe White has in mind.

Arrests_At_Beit_Romano
Uploaded by heathlander

From Bono to Barack

2008-11-18T10:34:00.002-05:00

Here.