this post was submitted on 31 Mar 2024
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People need to understand that it's possible to vote against genocide.
Donald Trump is Genocide at home and abroad.
Joe Biden is "only" Genocide abroad, and probably less of it.
Therefore, a vote for Joe Biden is a Vote against genocide.
No, it doesn't matter that he's an active participant in the apparatus that's creating the genocide, because if he's in office there's less genocide. Which is the important part, and pretending otherwise is sophistry. If you abstain from voting, you are increasing the likelihood of more genocide and if you discourage others from voting, you are an active participant in the overall social apparatus that is probabilistically increasing the amount of genocide.
The utility calculation is dead simple: more votes for Biden in key states makes more genocide less likely, and discouraging people from voting for Biden makes more genocide more likely. Therefore, discouraging people from voting for Biden is a pro-genocide strategy and voting for Biden in battleground states is an anti-genocide strategy. You should vote for Biden unless you live in a solid blue state, and even then it's not a bad idea.
No, it's a vote for genocide, but less. Still the right thing to do of course, but I'm sure you can see how that is still a vote for genocide. No need to twist yourself in knots to justify this, it's a vote for genocide AND the only sensible thing you can do in the current American political system.
Personally I can understand how this doesn't sell people on the idea so well. Maybe Biden just shouldn't do that
The parameters we set forth for what it means precisely to vote "for" something or "against" something is a choice that we make. While that's true for every social construct, I think these phrases are particularly subject to opinion.
Sounds like a lot of semantic twisting and turning so it's easier to feel ok with voting for someone currently aiding a genocide. That's fine but let's not pretend it reflects the reality of the situation
E.g. candidate A wants to give the death penalty to all crimes.
Candidate B wants to give the death penalty to murderers
Is voting for candidate B an anti death penalty vote? I think that is absurd
voting for a little smidge of genocide isn't voting against genocide. it's still voting for genocide
and israel-palestine is more than a smidge
Ah yes the "I'm not Trump so I can be relatively better but still shitty so y'all better fall in line by November" strat. Classic.
The absolutely mind boggling privilege of this comment.
Oh I'm sorry, is this not the lefty sub where we're allowed to point out dissatisfaction in the democratic party, and how they can do whatever the hell they want because the right will always be worse and nothing is being done to eliminate first-past-the-post?
That will also probably mean the end of the USA (for good). and may be that'll mean less of "it's fine when we fund or kill people abroad"
And now start your deflection about how you're keeping the peace in the world and savior of the world. Forget everything about afghanistan, iraq, vietnam and countless other regime changes. I hope the bubble bursts and you get to see how people in war zones feel.
I value honesty and reason far too deeply to do something that blatantly stupid. The United States' foreign policy is a net negative for the rest of the world taken as a whole.
Instead I'll comment thus:
I'm going to assume this statement is made in ignorance, because the alternative is that you're a fool. This strategy is called "accelerationism". Its results are well-documented, and while I could very well be missing something, I'm unaware of any time it's worked in leftists' favor.
Isn't it great, living in a country where our two choices are "genocide" or "less genocide"
voting for bad people is bad. utilitarianism literally says the ends justify the means and most people don't believe that. i'm one of "most people".
Alright, what ethics system are you using to reduce questions of morality to questions of fact? Kantian deontology? The principles of Nicomachean Ethics? The Bible?
Why do you say this? Is there a study that says that? What were it's methods? Was it a single question, or were people subjected to a series of moral dilemmas?
In my experience, most people when faced with the trolly problem will conclude you should pull the lever, so I'm very curious as to the basis of your reasoning.
The PhilPapers survey shows the professional philosophers prefer deontological ethics. many people are not professional philosophers, but they do have religion. religion is almost universally divine command theory. that, too, is deontological.
I'm not really concerned with what professional philosophers prefer, I'm concerned with having self-consistent ethical axioms that are largely agreeable. I find deontology to be a generally poor approach to this problem, and so I don't use it. As for most people identifying with a religion, I believe it is a false inference to then claim that this means most people prefer deontology, and it would especially be false to say that most people prefer a specific deontological code (as I suspect you're already aware). Simply put: what people say they believe, and the beliefs we can infir from people's actions and opinions often contradict each other. People largely behave and argue as if they are naive utilitarians, and so I don't think it's reasonable to say that most people disagree with it.
of course it doesn't actually matter whether I'm right about most people being abhorred by claims like "the ends justify the means", though I am. what matters is whether you can actually prove the utility value of your proposed course of action BEFORE the consequences have come to fruition. and since you can't, since you can't have proof about the future, utilitarianism boils down to overwrought hedonism.
I'm beginning to suspect that you've educated yourself about utilitarianism only insofar as you need to in order to make coherent (though not necessarily accurate) complaints about it. I'm also beginning to suspect that you don't really have a firm understanding of philosophy in general. Apologies if that's inaccurate.
Alright so first of all: neither of us can prove to the other that our respective selves exist. That is a fact; it's impossible to prove that our senses represent reality, and so it is a fundamental fact that nothing about reality can truly be proven. However, retreating to this fact in the face of an argument about whether something is true or not is obvious sophistry. I am aware that you did not make this argument, but I want to make sure that you understand because it's an important part of epistemology. If you want to know more, look up "solipsism".
With that in mind, it's easy to see that I don't actually need to prove anything about the future; I just need to have a good justification for believing that my predictions are probable, and have a rough idea of how certain actions increases or decrease the probabilities of the ranges of utility values. I already stated my justification in the above comment.
Now, could I use my knowledge of statistics and probability to estimate the odds of a Biden victory, his future actions, etc. using available data? Yeah, probably. But frankly that's too much work because the differences in outcomes are stark enough that getting a more precise estimate won't change anything. It's like giving me a gun and politely asking me to shoot myself. I could figure out how likely I am to survive, but I don't need to do that before deciding to not comply for obvious reasons.
WTF is wrong with hedonism that transfers over to utilitarianism?
solipsism gets us nowhere
Yes, that's the point; if we can't tolerate any uncertainty, then in essence nothing is provable and there's nothing to do. It's inconsistent to assert that I must have perfect knowledge about something while acting as though I exist when you have no way of verifying that.
When you say that you have a degree, you mean specifically in philosophy, correct?
there are ethical systems that can exist even if we don't. kantian ethics require only that you decide what should be universal law and act accordingly. that doesn't require that you know anything outside of yourself. by contrast, utilitarianism is fraught with epistemic problems.
Every set of axioms is independent of reality by definition. Deontology isn't special in that way; consequentialist systems are also axiom sets. Furthermore, every ethical system has the same problem when putting it into practice; if you don't know anything about the world, your ethics system might as well be empty.
i suppose so, but if your axioms depend on the future, which by definition is unknowable, then it is empty.
Consequentialist axioms impose an ordering on world-states, almost all of which will never exist. I don't understand how you can think the axioms themselves depend on future events; by definition they wouldn't be axioms.
if you must do what will cause the most pleasure (or least displeasure), then your axiom depends on knowing the future.
No, acting upon the axiom requires "knowing the future" as you put it.
even knowing how to act requires knowledge of the future in such a paradigm.
Every ethical system requires knowledge of the world.
Knowledge of the world includes knowledge of the probability of future world states.
Future world states are subject to doubt.
Present world states are also subject to doubt.
There is no fundamental difference between the degrees of uncertainty about present and future events.
We can know with a high degree of certainty that without intervention, the sun will be destroyed. I can know with a high degree of certainty that your arguments come from a mind that is not part of a mind that I am part of. I can know with a high degree of certainty that the place I am currently located will not be subject to an event that will destroy me.
Privileging the certainty of nearer-term events is fallacious. It is true that any particular chosen event becomes more probable as its proximity to us increases, because there are fewer ways to avert it, but that does not mean all further-future events are less probable than all nearer-future events.
probability is never 100%, but the categorical imperative is always 100% certain.
Are you claiming that in a particular physically real situation, the categorical imperative can can tell you the correct course of action with 100% certainty? If so, please explain how that's possible when your personal certainty of the situation is (necessarily) less than 100%.
if you've decided that a certain course of action should be universal law, then complying with that law is moral. The categorical imperative is incredibly simple to apply
Look, I'm not even getting into the fundamental problems with the insane, subjective, and ad-hoc way the moral imperative is supposed to work; I'm pointing out that you're performing apologetics. I don't need to get into the weeds of how it works, because your argument is fallacious.
If you decide that it's wrong to allow an infant to starve, but that poisoning a child is wrong, how can you be 100% certain that what you are about to feed it isn't poison? You can't know that it's moral to feed the child what you are about to feed it. The absolute certainty you claim is either a useless technicality or an outright fiction.
this is handwaving. i believe the kids today call it "cope"
it doesn't matter. if i don't believe it's poison, then feeding it to the child is the right thing to do. done-and-dusted.
my focus was logic and scientific reasoning but the undergrad requirements covered ethics
nothing. I am quite partial to it myself. but pretending you know what will create the most pleasure for everyone (or least displeasure) is just that: pretending. you might as well do what you want and make up a story about why it's going to benefits everyone because that's all that utilitarianism really is.
no, I'm degreed
Thank you for this. Too many high-horse genocide-enablers in this country.
The irony of this while voting for genocide.
Troll or unfamiliar with cause and effect?
I also agree that it would be better if Biden actually did something to lessen the genocide
You do recognize where this was posted, yeah?
I can't believe you're justifying it as "only genocide abroad." Like wtaf?
Tell the DNC to take their head out of their ass or you're getting the fucking orange you dork.
Bidens done so many speeches that have been interrupted by anti genocide protesters, one 17 times.
All he has to do to secure this vote is be anti genocide. And we still get people saying 'he's better than the other guy'
4 years ago it was vote Biden because he could be pushed left. Turns out that was a lie.
This whole discourse is designed to prop up a system that's fundamentally broken. Americans should be having some very uncomfortable discussions with each other.
Ah damn good point forgot leftists had actually lost their minds and forgot that abstaining from voting is basically endorsing whoever wins
3rd party isn't abstaining but keep voting for genocide, be my guest
I think at this point I'm supposed to simply reply "ratio".