Fire Arrow on 18/1/2024 at 15:13
Quote Posted by Sulphur
I find that curious. The Good Place uses its afterlife as a sort of scaffolding to examine moral frameworks, and while it ultimately collapses them down to something that the creators feel is 'right' to the detriment of its overall point, I think it serves at the very least as an introduction of the spectrum of moral philosophy to people who would otherwise not be aware of/interrogating their own mix-and-match styles of ethical decision making in the real world, and it does so while being a pretty good comedy. So... care to elaborate?
This is embarrassing, I haven't actually seen it!:p I shouldn't pass judgment on something I haven't seen. It's really just guilt by association (it's probably not as bad as I expect it to be; I really should know better than to judge a book by it's cover). I'll watch it this evening, and give an actually worthwhile opinion.
I think maybe because it's linked in my mind with Redditor-type consequentialism; I don't want to be a snob, I want to engage in good faith, but I feel like I've seen too many people try to cut ethical considerations to fit the trolley problem, which I think is begging the question.
I think you have to already have an idea of the good, in order for utilitarianism to work. It doesn't help saying you should choose more good over less good, if you don't already have an idea of what the good is. So utilitarianism seems to miss what's actually important in ethics.
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Regarding your last statement, I almost feel like you're adjacent to the Kantian stance on morality as contingent on free will existing, or maybe not. If I've got the wrong idea, I'm open to figuring stuff out because I'm just picking up strands here and there. I also haven't studied philosophy in any great detail (having been somewhat allergic to most if it in the past as a follower of the empirical method), so don't mind me too much.
You're correct that I consider myself adjacent to Kant, but with regards free will I have something slightly different in mind. Although I'm not a huge fan of existentialism, I think Jean-Paul Sartre's concept of (
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bad_faith_(existentialism)) 'bad faith' is very useful for understanding what people get wrong in practice.
I'm OK with taking free will seriously; initially I was a compatibilist (something along the lines of Bergson's (
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creative_Evolution_(book)) Creative Evolution) and then now as a functionalist (I think causes are pretty obscure, which is why I'm moving away from Spinoza and towards Leibniz, but I digress). I think usually the kind of intractable social and moral problems we have today are the result of a false choice between two inadequate options. And this is where I will lose most people, I expect, because my view is that of a Christian humanist, meaning I often take deeply unpopular opinions of both conservative and left-wing perspectives (e.g. from a 'conservative' perspective I think abortion is unethical, I think revolutions are bad, and separation of powers is a good thing; from a left-wing perspective I think homophobia needs to be challenged, there needs to be a redistribution of wealth, there needs to be freedom of conscience for non-religious people, and the dehumanisation of immigrants should be challenged). Now I'm fully aware I'm at odds with virtually everyone, so I don't really mind that this will throw into question everything I say. All I will say before this inevitably provokes some people is that I come from a very politically diverse background (in my family there are religious conservatives, socialists, eurosceptics, environmentalists, and anarchists), so I try to be respectful of people I disagree with (in other words you're not going to get a heated debate about this topics from me, as I prefer to slowly and carefully examine the roots of the disagreements I have with people).
With regards to philosophy, I was a similar way growing up. Since science is virtually indispensable to almost any question. I think the only reasons I'm able to engage with philosophy on the level that I do, is because 1) I read about Thomistic theology growing up, 2) I was interested in mysticism, 3) I'm a lot more interested in history than most people, and 4) I grew up around a lot of Germans, so I got a sense of the "rhythm" of German thought which other might not have.
Lastly, I think because science is so useful, the onus is on philosophers to prove that philosophy is able to answer questions that science cannot, or points to a subject matter distinct from science.
Sulphur on 19/1/2024 at 10:22
Quote Posted by Fire Arrow
This is embarrassing, I haven't actually seen it!:p I shouldn't pass judgment on something I haven't seen. It's really just guilt by association (it's probably not as bad as I expect it to be; I really should know better than to judge a book by it's cover). I'll watch it this evening, and give an actually worthwhile opinion.
Fair do. I won't colour your imagination about it, as I do like it a fair bit, but I'd be interested in your opinion on it regardless if you feel it's something you can stick with.
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I think you have to already have an idea of the good, in order for utilitarianism to work. It doesn't help saying you should choose more good over less good, if you don't already have an idea of what the good is. So utilitarianism seems to miss what's actually important in ethics.
Well, I don't know if it's as fundamentally broken as that. 'Good' generally is defined as the overall amount of positive benefit or well-being for the party(ies) in question. What that is of course will be situational to a degree. This actually reminds me of The Good Place poking fun at The Trolley Problem, because Schur finds the original paper that introduced it a fair bit hilarious.
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You're correct that I consider myself adjacent to Kant, but with regards free will I have something slightly different in mind. Although I'm not a huge fan of existentialism, I think Jean-Paul Sartre's concept of (
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bad_faith_(existentialism)) 'bad faith' is very useful for understanding what people get wrong in practice.
I'm OK with taking free will seriously; initially I was a compatibilist (something along the lines of Bergson's (
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creative_Evolution_(book)) Creative Evolution) and then now as a functionalist (I think causes are pretty obscure, which is why I'm moving away from Spinoza and towards Leibniz, but I digress). I think usually the kind of intractable social and moral problems we have today are the result of a false choice between two inadequate options. And this is where I will lose most people, I expect, because my view is that of a Christian humanist, meaning I often take deeply unpopular opinions of both conservative and left-wing perspectives (e.g. from a 'conservative' perspective I think abortion is unethical, I think revolutions are bad, and separation of powers is a good thing; from a left-wing perspective I think homophobia needs to be challenged, there needs to be a redistribution of wealth, there needs to be freedom of conscience for non-religious people, and the dehumanisation of immigrants should be challenged). Now I'm fully aware I'm at odds with virtually everyone, so I don't really mind that this will throw into question everything I say. All I will say before this inevitably provokes some people is that I come from a very politically diverse background (in my family there are religious conservatives, socialists, eurosceptics, environmentalists, and anarchists), so I try to be respectful of people I disagree with (in other words you're not going to get a heated debate about this topics from me, as I prefer to slowly and carefully examine the roots of the disagreements I have with people).
With regards to philosophy, I was a similar way growing up. Since science is virtually indispensable to almost any question. I think the only reasons I'm able to engage with philosophy on the level that I do, is because 1) I read about Thomistic theology growing up, 2) I was interested in mysticism, 3) I'm a lot more interested in history than most people, and 4) I grew up around a lot of Germans, so I got a sense of the "rhythm" of German thought which other might not have.
Lastly, I think because science is so useful, the onus is on philosophers to prove that philosophy is able to answer questions that science cannot, or points to a subject matter distinct from science.
I think that places you in a position of being something of a centrist politically, which isn't controversial so much as it paints you as a target for either side, and so the work of explaining yourself is that much harder, and can devolve into defending yourself more than having something in the way of a dialogue. I can relate, though my reasoning isn't so much grounded in one firmly defined ethical school of thought.
I've had at least one other person tell me the same thing about philosophy and science, and I'd like to believe it's true, which is why I have an interest in sifting through the issues philosophy brings up (though the same person also has an issue with agents having free will inasmuch as we can't even define what it is, which is a decently big problem). The other problem, of course, is having enough time and motivation to go through all the competing models and schools of thought and working out which ones have more apparent validity than the other. It's a slow process, but I see Sartre is as good a place to start as any.
Fire Arrow on 19/1/2024 at 11:58
Quote Posted by Sulphur
Fair do. I won't colour your imagination about it, as I do like it a fair bit, but I'd be interested in your opinion on it regardless if you feel it's something you can stick with.
It's already surpassed my expectations. 2 episodes in so far. I'll wait until I've finished the first series before giving a more fleshed out opinion, but suffice it to say it looks promising.
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Well, I don't know if it's as fundamentally broken as that. 'Good' generally is defined as the overall amount of positive benefit or well-being for the party(ies) in question. What that is of course will be situational to a degree. This actually reminds me of The Good Place poking fun at The Trolley Problem, because Schur finds the original paper that introduced it a fair bit hilarious.
I suppose it would be useful to know how it's framed, as I imagine a lot of the context people have today for ethics comes from The Good Place.
So for you, is 'good' indefinable?
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I've had at least one other person tell me the same thing about philosophy and science, and I'd like to believe it's true, which is why I have an interest in sifting through the issues philosophy brings up (though the same person also has an issue with agents having free will inasmuch as we can't even define what it is, which is a decently big problem). The other problem, of course, is having enough time and motivation to go through all the competing models and schools of thought and working out which ones have more apparent validity than the other. It's a slow process, but I see Sartre is as good a place to start as any.
It's a cliché, but I agree with Whitehead's famous quote: "the safest general characterization of the European philosophical tradition is that it consists of a series of footnotes to Plato." In particular, Plato's dialogue the Meno is better place to start than the Republic in my opinion, and I keep meaning to read the Timaeus (I've heard it contains the earliest expression of what would become Cartesian dualism).
If I was giving an idea of the core of philosophy as distinct from science it would roughly go along these lines: Parmenides -> Plato -> Aristotle -> Anselm of Canterbury -> Descartes -> Leibniz -> Kant -> Frege -> Heidegger -> Kripke. (This list is only chronological, there isn't necessarily any linear development.) Bear in mind I'm biased in favour of metaphysics and ontology. If you're interested, I could PM you a more detailed summary, but no hard feelings if you're not interested, I know I swamp people with info/opinions.
Anarchic Fox on 20/1/2024 at 15:50
Quote Posted by Fire Arrow
Well, not to be too argumentative, but I don't really think Christianity is distinct from Aristotle. The bible is full of references to Greek philosophy.
How reductive. Philosophers make terrible historians.
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I know this isn't much of a response. I'll write more details later.
I still want those details.
Quote Posted by Fire Arrow
Ok, so I actually played a bit of Ultima IV, so I can actually contribute something now.
I see how virtue ethics and hedonism fits together for Garriott.
They don't fit together. Garriott's later hedonism is also a disavowal of Ultima's system; note how he talks about Lord British, his avatar, as a separate entity. Garriott, sadly, is quite fickle.
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The questions in the tarot seem very geared towards a consequentialist approach to virtue ethics that I hadn't imagined. I was pleasantly surprised by how nuanced the questions were. (After all my first interaction with games that contained ethical questions was Black & White; which isn't that deep.) I understand what Anarchic Fox means by a 'combinatorial' virtue ethics now (I had difficulty imagining it before).
Thanks for giving it a try. Perhaps you can see why it would deeply influence a twelve-year-old Fox. :D
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...stories about pleasure seekers don't really allow for much deep conflict.
Disco Elysium is one such story. Its main character is such a pleasure seeker that he's just experienced a near-fatal bender.
Quote Posted by Fire Arrow
It may be unfair to expect game developers to answer questions about ethics that even professional philosophers are unable to reach a consensus on. I appreciate the effort when there isn't too much self-aggrandisement/moral-grand standing (e.g. Fallout New Vegas has a certain amount of restraint, in contrast to Black & White).
Similar difficulties apply as in written fiction. In such fiction, mouthpiece characters are a bad idea, partly because then your story becomes half essay, and partly because such characters have a favored status. I do prefer stories with a strong moral core, like The Lord of the Rings, but the best such stories demonstrate their positions via the events of the story, without pontification.
Similarly, a game can have a strong moral core (like Undertale or Roadwarden), but in order to still be a good
game this core must be expressed by the game mechanics, rather than something which subordinates those mechanics.
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In my view, humility is the most important thing when approaching ethical questions; know-it-alls make boring stories.
And humility is one of the Virtues! :angel:
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The key thing I was unclear on (now that I've actually seen how the ethics system in Ultima IV works), was how virtue ethics and consequentialism would be compatible because to my mind virtue ethics is 'teleological'. 'Virtue' in the original Greek context (ἀρετή; aretḗ) means 'excellence', which I take to be something 'holistic' as opposed to consequentialism which I see as 'reductionist' (I'd be interested if there were counter-examples).
That looks like a false dichotomy to me. Why, exactly, can a system not be both consequentialist and teleological? The two are helpful for different kinds of dilemmas.
Quote Posted by Fire Arrow
It's a cliché, but I agree with Whitehead's famous quote: "the safest general characterization of the European philosophical tradition is that it consists of a series of footnotes to Plato."
Disdain for philosophy is a common trait among English-speaking philosophers.
Fire Arrow on 20/1/2024 at 17:05
Quote Posted by Anarchic Fox
How reductive. Philosophers make terrible historians.
I know, I was into history long before I ever went near philosophy. Still it's the case that Christianity can't be separated from the context of Greek philosophy, otherwise there would be no difference between Judaic messianism and Christianity.
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I still want those details.
Virtue ethics is still guided by an overarching concept of the good. Aristotle, for better or worse, is the origin of virtue ethics in the Western tradition; and Aristotle is still partially a Platonist.
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They don't fit together. Garriott's later hedonism is also a disavowal of Ultima's system; note how he talks about Lord British, his avatar, as a separate entity. Garriott, sadly, is quite fickle.
Ah, I wasn't aware.
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Thanks for giving it a try. Perhaps you can see why it would deeply influence a twelve-year-old Fox.
Yes, I think it possibly even blows every other ethical system in video games (that I'm aware of) out of the water.
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Disco Elysium is one such story. Its main character is such a pleasure seeker that he's just experienced a near-fatal bender.
I kind of thought the point was the inadequacy of pleasure seeking. Maybe it's just me projecting my own experience, but when I'd go on those kind of benders myself, it was usually because of feeling deeply lonely/lost.
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Similar difficulties apply as in written fiction. In such fiction, mouthpiece characters are a bad idea, partly because then your story becomes half essay, and partly because such characters have a favored status. I do prefer stories with a strong moral core, like The Lord of the Rings, but the best such stories demonstrate their positions via the events of the story, without pontification.
One of the mildest criticisms you could make of Ayn Rand!:cheeky:
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Similarly, a game can have a strong moral core (like Undertale or Roadwarden), but in order to still be a good
game this core must be expressed by the game mechanics, rather than something which subordinates those mechanics.
I expect you're already aware of Lisa the Painful. A game that had a big emotional impact on me.
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And humility is one of the Virtues! :angel:
Fair do's.
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That looks like a false dichotomy to me. Why, exactly, can a system not be both consequentialist and teleological? The two are helpful for different kinds of dilemmas.
Much the same way no one has 2.3 children. If you were building a car, the number of seats needed is exact. But that might be my weird aversion to irrational numbers speaking. I'll concede an ethical system can be both consequentialist and teleological, but I'm generally opposed to consequentialism (I think of it as everything wrong with the world).
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Disdain for philosophy is a common trait among English-speaking philosophers.
I wouldn't read that as a mark by Whitehead against philosophy, but rather as praise of Plato. To be fair I find Whitehead impenetrable though. I'd spent over a decade learning all this terminology, only to read a page of Whitehead and barely understand a word he said.
Anarchic Fox on 20/1/2024 at 17:52
Quote Posted by Fire Arrow
I know, I was into history long before I ever went near philosophy. Still it's the case that Christianity can't be separated from the context of Greek philosophy, otherwise there would be no difference between Judaic messianism and Christianity.
Okay, that much I agree with.
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Virtue ethics is still guided by an overarching concept of the good. Aristotle, for better or worse, is the origin of virtue ethics in the Western tradition; and Aristotle is still partially a Platonist.
That's all? I'm disappointed. I wanted your response to
my ideas. Anyway. Socrates, via Plato, had quite a bit to say about virtue, so Aristotle is not the origin. And the familiarity of Socrates' interlocutors with the concept of virtue indicates the concept well predates Socrates.
It sounds to me like you've fallen prey to the Great Man theory of history, when it comes to the history of thought.
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Yes, I think it possibly even blows every other ethical system in video games (that I'm aware of) out of the water.
As far as presenting an ethics that the game also endorses, I agree, but there are a good number of games with better ethical systems. They just don't endorse a single position within them. Disco Elysium, which tracks its character's political and professional ethics, again provides a great example.
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I kind of thought the point was the inadequacy of pleasure seeking. Maybe it's just me projecting my own experience, but when I'd go on those kind of benders myself, it was usually because of feeling deeply lonely/lost.
I was using DE to refute the point you made: "Stories about pleasure seekers don't really allow for much deep conflict." Now, it might be true that stories
endorsing hedonism don't have deep conflict, but you were making a stronger point.
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One of the mildest criticisms you could make of Ayn Rand!:cheeky:
Actually... I read Atlas Shrugged completely unspoiled, and found it effective as a novel. Its foreshadowing and plot twists worked, even as I disagreed with everything its main character was pontificating.
Nowadays it's all but impossible to read the novel unspoiled.
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I expect you're already aware of Lisa the Painful. A game that had a big emotional impact on me.
Yes. I didn't get far. It was too harsh. Do you recommend I give it another try?
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Much the same way no one has 2.3 children. If you were building a car, the number of seats needed is exact. But that might be my weird aversion to irrational numbers speaking.
Speaking as a graduate student in mathematics, that's a terrible analogy.
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I'll concede an ethical system can be both consequentialist and teleological, but I'm generally opposed to consequentialism (I think of it as everything wrong with the world).
I'm glad you conceded the point, because it's an important one.
How would you criticize consequentialism? I have a number of criticisms against purely consequentialist systems, myself. For one, you must seek out power in order to maximize the impact of your actions, and I cannot endorse a system that entails the pursuit of power. Along those lines, consequentialism is of little use to disempowered people, which is to say most people.
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I wouldn't read that as a mark by Whitehead against philosophy, but rather as praise of Plato.
It is very clearly a remark against philosophy. Such contempt is distressingly common.
Fire Arrow on 20/1/2024 at 18:27
Quote Posted by Anarchic Fox
That's all? I'm disappointed. I wanted your response to
my ideas. Anyway. Socrates, via Plato, had quite a bit to say about virtue, so Aristotle is not the origin. And the familiarity of Socrates' interlocutors with the concept of virtue indicates the concept well predates Socrates.
What it comes down to is Plato has an absolute concept of the good (because universals are transcendent), while Aristotle thinks universals only exist in the concrete. So for example, justice is an either/or state for Plato, where as for Aristotle courage is immanent. I wouldn't say Aristotle is original. I think it's more that he found philosophical justifications for traditional Greek life after Socrates uprooted it (e.g. in his criticism of religion and of poetry); in contrast Aristotle wrote about rhetoric and theatre. Thus it transforms from custom to theory.
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It sounds to me like you've fallen prey to the Great Man theory of history, when it comes to the history of thought.
I am aware of it, I just think it's OK in certain contexts. Not everything is a bottom-up process. For example, scientific discoveries are disseminated usually from central sources (universities).
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As far as presenting an ethics that the game also endorses, I agree, but there are a good number of games with better ethical systems. They just don't endorse a single position within them. Disco Elysium, which tracks its character's political and professional ethics, again provides a great example.
Fair enough, care to add any more examples?
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I was using DE to refute the point you made: "Stories about pleasure seekers don't really allow for much deep conflict." Now, it might be true that stories
endorsing hedonism don't have deep conflict, but you were making a stronger point.
My fault for using weasel words. "don't really allow", I meant the more boring point about endorsing hedonism.
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Actually... I read Atlas Shrugged completely unspoiled, and found it effective as a novel. Its foreshadowing and plot twists worked, even as I disagreed with everything its main character was pontificating.
Fair Enough.
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Yes. I didn't get far. It was too harsh. Do you recommend I give it another try?
Nope. :cheeky: It's great, but it will make you miserable. Too much staring into the void to be honest.
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Speaking as a graduate student in mathematics, that's a terrible analogy.
Meh, not really invested in it. It was more to do with reading a Pythagorean influence into Platonism. If you'll forgive my reductionism, I kind of think of most of Western philosophy as being either mutations of Platonism (e.g. Aristotle, Augustine, Descartes, Kant) or variations on atomism/materialism (e.g. Epicureanism, Francis Bacon, Hume, Bentham, Comte). In my view, utilitarianism is rooted in a rejection of metaphysics.
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How would you criticize consequentialism? I have a number of criticisms against purely consequentialist systems, myself. For one, you must seek out power in order to maximize the impact of your actions, and I cannot endorse a system that entails the pursuit of power. Along those lines, consequentialism is of little use to disempowered people, which is to say most people.
I think it has to do with two points, one from the kind of Platonic/German idealist view of 'right', and second practical.
In the German idealist tradition, 'right' is treated abstractly from a metaphysical point of; so there is a universal concept of dessert/entitlement. This has a few different legacies, e.g. the more radical view of Hegelian-Anarchists, arguing from an idea of universal legitimacy that no state can have absolute moral legitimacy; the one I find less appealing is praxeology (there is a direct line from Kant to it).
From the practical perspective, it is because of my own sympathy towards Kantianism. I believe that you have to treat everyone as ends-in-themselves, and not as means to an end.
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It is very clearly a remark against philosophy. Such contempt is distressingly common.
OK, in which case my usage is against the intention of the speaker.
Anarchic Fox on 20/1/2024 at 18:57
Quote Posted by Fire Arrow
I wouldn't say Aristotle is original.
You said, "Aristotle, for better or worse, is the origin of virtue ethics in the Western tradition."
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I am aware of it, I just think it's OK in certain contexts. Not everything is a bottom-up process. For example, scientific discoveries are disseminated usually from central sources (universities).
The Great Man theory is such a curse on our understanding of history that I would rather err by opposing it too strongly. Even in physics, where there are certainly great physicists, it has too much sway.
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Fair enough, care to add any more examples?
, of course, though it doesn't tell you what it's tracking.
The
Geneforge series tracks your opinion of its world's politics along three axes. You can take a revolutionary, conservative or conciliatory position. The last game also allows you to take a primitivist or nihilist stance.
On a much more humble scale,
Hero-U: Rogue to Redemption tracks your attitude toward school and your classmates. I also recall
Shadowrun: Dragonfall and
Hong Kong tracking your ethics in a non-binary way.
Hopefully others will weigh in with more good examples, because I feel like my recall is letting me down at the moment.
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My fault for using weasel words. "don't really allow", I meant the more boring point about endorsing hedonism.
Oh, okay.
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Nope. :cheeky: It's great, but it will make you miserable. Too much staring into the void to be honest.
Heh. I've learned enough about it that I may still give it a try someday. Perhaps when I'm feeling nostalgic for the good old days before the abyss gazed back.
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Meh, not really invested in it. It was more to do with reading a Pythagorean influence into Platonism. If you'll forgive my reductionism, I kind of think of most of Western philosophy as being either mutations of Platonism (e.g. Aristotle, Augustine, Descartes, Kant) or variations on atomism/materialism (e.g. Epicureanism, Francis Bacon, Hume, Bentham, Comte).
I am rarely willing to pardon reductionism. Variations on "there are only two kinds of philosophy" are kin to the contempt I mentioned earlier. If you sort philosophy into two categories, that is a bad intellectual habit on your part, not a stance worth defending.
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In my view, utilitarianism is rooted in a rejection of metaphysics.
Like with most of these philosophers, it's been a long time since I read him, but I recall Mill being indifferent to metaphysics, not rejecting it.
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OK, in which case my usage is against the intention of the speaker.
Oh, okay. We'll have to wait and see how helpful Sulphur found that recommendation.
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I think it has to do with two points, one from the kind of Platonic/German idealist view of 'right', and second practical.
In the German idealist tradition, 'right' is treated abstractly from a metaphysical point of; so there is a universal concept of dessert/entitlement. This has a few different legacies, e.g. the more radical view of Hegelian-Anarchists, arguing from an idea of universal legitimacy that no state can have absolute moral legitimacy; the one I find less appealing is praxeology (there is a direct line from Kant to it).
From the practical perspective, it is because of my own sympathy towards Kantianism. I believe that you have to treat everyone as ends-in-themselves, and not as means to an end.
That doesn't answer my question.
Understand that the people here who participate in these threads are interested in
your positions and arguments. The fact that they came from Hegel is but a footnote.
Fire Arrow on 20/1/2024 at 19:23
Quote Posted by Anarchic Fox
You said, "Aristotle, for better or worse, is the origin of virtue ethics in the Western tradition."
I stand by it. Plato isn't a virtue ethicist. He believes there is right and there is wrong categorically speaking.
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The Great Man theory is such a curse on our understanding of history that I would rather err by opposing it too strongly. Even in physics, where there are certainly great physicists, it has too much sway.
Ironically, I think trying to get get rid of it leads to people reading summaries instead of original sources.
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Heh. I've learned enough about it that I may still give it a try someday. Perhaps when I'm feeling nostalgic for the good old days before the abyss gazed back.
Yes, it was good when it was the exception rather than the rule.
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I am rarely willing to pardon reductionism. Variations on "there are only two kinds of philosophy" are kin to the contempt I mentioned earlier. If you sort philosophy into two categories, that is a bad intellectual habit on your part, not a stance worth defending.
It's literally what I believe. If you don't want to talk to me, because I'm too shallow, I'll understand. Platonism = Kantianism with different language. Everything that isn't Platonism is wrong.
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That doesn't answer my question.
Understand that the people here who participate in these threads are interested in
your positions and arguments. The fact that they came from Hegel is but a footnote.
Well, 'right' is the reason I'm opposed to consequentialism. I think ethics can't avoid Kant/German idealism. Right is about what people deserve. The question of better or worse is preceded by whether you can make meaningful normative statements. I expect the problem is that you find German Idealism repulsive, so you want me to express my perspective without any reference to it. It would be dishonest of me to do that.
Edit: I've tried to be civil, but you are incredibly condescending. If I keep talking I will get angry, so I'm going to call it quits. They can delete this thread if they like, or leave it, I don't care.
Pyrian on 20/1/2024 at 21:15
Quote Posted by Fire Arrow
Yes, I think it possibly even blows every other ethical system in video games (that I'm aware of) out of the water.
Only in that it's a low bar, lol. So many games that engage with morality at all do so in a binary or at best linear (good/neutral/evil) fashion. There's not a lot of meaning to mine out of good and evil when you've defined one side as good and the other evil, lol. So, getting back to U4, having different and potentially
competing virtues is more interesting.
But sadly, after the prologue, U4 does very little to pit its virtues against each other. There's
one plot-critical conversation where someone tells you something you need to know, but before they'll tell you, they'll ask you straight-up "Are you The Avatar?", and they'll only tell you if you say you are. If you
aren't The Avatar, you lose Honesty if you claim you are but gain Humility if you admit you aren't (a decent source of a hard-to-get virtue). But if you
have gained Avatar status, you'll lose it either way! If you claim you're not The Avatar, you lose Honesty, but if you say you are, you lose Humility. Ironically, this means he can never actually tell his information to The Avatar, because he steals your status away by asking the question, lol.
