Difference between revisions of "Tem"

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==APR 1 ==
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==SEP 30==
  
===Haidt Chapter 9: Divinity with or without God===
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[[Topic preferences]]
  
Elevation as a vertical axis in relationship.
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Click on the link below to add notes from your browsing exercise to the page:
  
:*Flatland
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[[Fall 2015 Proseminar Browsing Exercise]]
:*Major speculative hypothesis:  183: In addition to relationship and status, we perceive/experience "divinity" as a kind of "moral purity".
 
  
:*But this is puzzling, given that we are also ANIMALS
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===Singer, Ch. 1, "A Changing World"===
:*Research on disgust.   Why do we experience disgust?  186.  Purity opposite impulse from disgust.  Disgust brings us "down".
 
  
:*Psychological anthropologist Richard Shweder, U Chicago: Haidt worked with him on research in morality in India: "Shweder's research on morality in Bhubaneswar and elsewhere shows that when people think about morality, their moral concepts cluster into three groups, which he calls the ethic of autonomy, the ethic of community, and the ethic of divinity." 188  -- evidence on diff. distribution of these ethics by classNote observations on research in India. Link bt. purity/divine.
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:*Globalization: Terrorism, climate change, (added: human migration)
 +
:*US interests: political consensus (dems/repubs) on Bush remark.
 +
:*Should political leaders adopt an internationalist stance (beyond interests of their nation-state)?
 +
::*competing models of leadership
 +
:*Historical parable: reaction to 1914 assasination of Crown Prince Ferdinand (and wife) by Bosnian Serb nationalists, starting WW1. Objections to Autro-Hungarian ultimatum to Serbia. Compare to international reaction to US demands of Taliban to hand over Osama bin Ladenprinciple p. 7, new today vs. WW1.
 +
:*Rawls "old school" scope for theory of justice
 +
:*Is the Nation-state on the decline?
 +
:*Should we be internationalists?  Why is multilaterism no longer a political topic in the US?
  
:*Cites approvingly: Eliade, The Sacred and Profane -- perceiving sacredness universal among humans. 189:  Interesting examples: handedness, space in houses.
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===Singer, Ch. 5, "One Community"===
  
Elevation and Agape
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:*Considers aid given after 9/11 to other international aid needs.  again with partiality.
 +
:*Sidgwick and Himmler on partiality.  Godwin on saving Fenelon vs. the chambermaid.
 +
:*Singer's famous example of saving the small child drowning in the university fountain.  distance doesn't matter.
 +
:*Biblical reference to Paul and ethics of partiality.
 +
:*Examination of different forms of partiality: family and kin, gratitude 160ff. 
 +
:*Compatriots 167ff. prefering our own might be justified by obligation of reciprocity. 
 +
:*Choice between "imagined" community of nation-state and "imagined" global community.
 +
:*Justice between vs. within states: Wellman's arguments
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:*Rawls and The Law of Peoples: Rawls example of the two societies: no obligation to redistribute to improve the worst off between the two societies.
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:*2nd criticism: Why allow difference between countries to circumvent redistribution and not allow differences within a country to do so?  178
 +
:*Millenium Development Goals (MDGs); US shortfalls; public perceptions of giving (15% rather than actual 1%)
 +
:*Comparative Value Exercise: Unger's thought experiment: Bob's bugatti.  amputation scenarios. yuck.
  
:*Looking for a name for the emotions that we experience when we observe morally outstanding deeds. "Elevation"
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===Sachs, Jeffrey, "Can the Rich Afford to Help the Poor?" (2006)===
:*Jefferson: Experience of aesthetic value triggers physical changes in the body and recognizable feeling of elevated sentiments.
 
  
:*196: wants to see if elevation is a kind of happinessresearch with student Sara Algoe, (three conditions: doing something good for someone, saw someone tell a joke, saw extraordinary non-moral performance) results seem to separate out different responses: moral elevation vs. response to non-moral excellence like basketball player.
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:*(One of the architects of the UN Millennium Development Goals. Opposed by some noted development economists.)
 +
:*Optimist about relief:  .7 GNP level of giving adequateAbsolute poverty down from 1/3 to 1/5 (interesting to compare US discussion in 1960 at the start of the domestic "war on poverty" of the Johnson administration)
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::*Increase in wealth of the rich world is dramatic (note Rawlsian difference principle from yesterday)
 +
::*(Digression on actual giving: [http://www.globalissues.org/article/35/foreign-aid-development-assistance]
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::*Note analysis on pages 294 of amounts that developing countries can supply to meet their own poverty needs.  Middle-income countries like Brazil, Chile, and Mexico have enough.
  
:*initial research documents elevation as responseUnclear how moral/non-moral triggers work.
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:*Can the US afford to meet a .7 GNP target?
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::*Sachs considers this obviousTo dramatize his point, on pages 304-308, he points out that the wealthiest 400 US citizens earned more than the total populations of Botswana, Nigeria, Senegal, and Uganda. More to the point, the tax cuts this group received during the Bush administration in 2001, 2002, and 2003 totaled about 50 billion a year, enough to meet the US giving goal of .7% of GNP.
  
:*Vagus Nerve theory -- operation of vagus nerve, relationship to oxytocin.  Since oxcytocin causes bonding rather than action, this theory might explain the lack of evidence in an earlier study that elevation leads to action.
 
  
:*Puzzle about moral elevation and lack of action -- in two studies no sig increase in "signing up" to volunteer after elevation.
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===Singer, "Rich and Poor"===
  
:*Lactating moms study 198 -- (answers puzzle: oxcytocin is about bonding, not actingwe've managed to make moral conduct a trigger for oxcytocin.)
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:*facts about absolute poverty
 +
:*difference between grain consumption accounted for in terms of meat consumption. problem of distribution rather than production.
 +
:*absolute affluence = affluent by any reasonable defintion of human needsGo through paragraph on 221.
  
:*Letter from religious person distinguishing two kinds of tears in churchcompassion/celebration
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:*figures on giving by country: OPEC countries most generous. U.S. and Japan least.
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The Moral equivalent of murder?
 +
five purported differences:
 +
::*1. allowing to die not eq. to killing.  no intention to kill. 
 +
::*2. impossible to ask us to be obligated to keep everyone alive.
 +
::*3. uncertainty of outcome in not aiding vs. pointing a gun.  less direct responsibility, less like 1st deg. murder.
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::*4. no direct and identifiable causal connection between consumerist action and death of individuals in other countries.
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::*5. People would be starving with or without meI am not a necessary condition for there to be starving people.
  
:*Latter like agape objectless love
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:*Singer's point: these differences are extrinsic to the moral problem.  there would be cases with these features in which we would still hold the person responsible.  
  
Awe and Transcendence
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:*Showing the extrinsic character of the differences: Singer's argument strategies at this point is to show that the differences are smaller and more contingent that one might think.  Point by point:
  
:*cites Darwin / Emerson, idea of elevation from exp of nature.
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::*1.  example of salesman selling tainted food.  doesn't matter if no identifiable victim in advance.
 +
::*2.  lack of certainty about the value of donations does reduce the wrongness of not giving (concession), but doesn't mean that its ok not to give.
 +
::*3.  responsibility for acts but not omissions is incoherent way to think about responsibility.  consequences of our actions are our responsibility.  irrelevant that the person would have died if I had never existed.
 +
Considers non-consequentialist justifications for not aiding (166)
 +
:::*idea of independent individual in Locke and Nozick doesn't make sense. Note appeal to social conception of humans based on ancestry!
 +
::*absence of malice also doesn't excuse inaction.  involuntary manslaughter (in the case say of a speedin motorist) is still blameworthy.
 +
::*grants that we may not be as blameworthy for not saving many lives if saving those live requires heroic action.
  
:*Drugs - -entheogens. reports old experiment with mushrooms and religion.
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:*The obligation to assist: Main Principle: '''If it is in our power to prevent something vey bad happening, without thereby sacrificing anything of comparable moral significance, we ought to do it.'''
 +
::*goes on to claim that it is within the power of dev. countries to aid the poor without sacrificing . . . etc.
 +
considers major objections:
  
:*Emerson's "transparent eyeball" experience.  Awe and transcendence of the ego. (also in flow)
+
:*taking care of your own
 +
:*property rights [at most weakens the argument for mandatory giving (but note that governmental means might be the most effective, esp. where problems have a political dimension)
  
:*Awe:  "As we traced the word "awe" back in history, we discovered that it has always had a link to fear and submission in the presence of something much greater than the self." 202
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:*population and the ethics of triage:
 
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:*questions whether the world is really like a life boat
:*Emotion of awe:  "Keltner and I concluded that the emotion of awe happens when two conditions are met: a person perceives something vast (usually physically vast, but sometimes conceptually vast, such as a grand theory, or socially vast, such as great fame or power); and the vast thing cannot be accommodated by the person's existing mental structures."  203
 
 
 
:*Story of Arjuna Pandava from Gita.  Gets a cosmic eye.  Extreme case, but Haidt implies this is a model for how we describe spiritual transformation.
 
 
 
:*Maslow's work on peak experiences.  Side note on clash about the nature of science in psychology.  Maslow is considered a founder of humanistic psych.
 
 
 
:*Mark Leary, Curse of the Self:  Self as obstacle to -- mental chatter -- self as obstacle to vertical development .  Read p. 207.
 
 
 
===Hall, Ch 9, Altruism, Social Justice, Fairness, and the Wisdom of Punishment===
 
 
 
:*Hall's point about the wisdom of Solomon (from beginning and end of chapter) -- implication for theory.
 
 
 
:*Problem of altruism
 
::*from Darwin, then from Hamilton and Trivers "reciprocal altruism" and "kin selection"
 
::*Research by Ernst Fehr -- behavioral studies of subjects in Prisoner's Dilemma situations (digress on Prisoner's Dilemma), bias toward cooperation.
 
::*2002 finding by Rilling -- mutual cooperation stimulates learning and pleasure responses.  (Later, on p. 161, same is true for punishment.)
 
 
 
:*Ultimatum Game
 
::*Interpretation of Ultimatum Game regularity (25% or less gets rejection).  Example of NFL revenue sharing.
 
::*Alan Sanfey's work on neural response in ultimatum game -- areas for emotion and disgust "light up" on low offers.
 
::*Fehr research using TMS --- respondents accepted unfair offers. p. 161
 
 
 
:*Public Goods games and punishment / Wisdom and punishment
 
 
 
===Prisoner's Dilemma Intro===
 
 
 
:*for more depth, see Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy article on game theory.
 
 
 
{| class="wikitable"
 
|-
 
! !! Prisoner B: Smith stays silent(''cooperates'') !! Prisoner B: Smith betrays (''defects'')
 
|-
 
! Prisoner A (you) stays silent (''cooperates'')
 
| Each serves 1 year|| Prisoner A (you): 3 years<br/>Prisoner B: Smith: goes free
 
|-
 
! Prisoner A (you) betrays (''defects'')
 
| Prisoner A (you): goes free<br/>Prisoner B: Smith: 3 years || Each serves 2 years
 
|}
 
 
 
:*Pay off matrix for any outcome:
 
::*Smith stays silent (cooperate), you betray (defects): 3, 0 (Smith's a sucker)
 
::*Smith betrays (defects), you stay silent (cooperate): 0,3 (You're a sucker)
 
::*Both betray (defect): 2 years each (Game theoretic outcome)
 
::*Both (cooperate): 1 year each (Optimal outcome for combined interests/utility - allegedly only achievable with an enforceable social contract - even one enforced by bad guys!)
 
 
 
:*Why should you defect in the the face of uncertainty about Smith's cooperation?
 
::*Analyze both possibilities for Smith
 
::*He stays silent (cooperates)
 
::*He betrays you (defects)
 
 
 
:*Note on iterated prisoner's dilemma
 
 
 
===Edgarton, Sick Societies, Chapters 1 and 2===
 
 
 
:*Ch 1
 
::*myth of primitive harmony in 20th c anthr and pop culture.
 
::*Rousseau and history of European exp. of non-Euro cultures.
 
::*leads us to believe too much in the adaptiveness of cultural beliefs. 
 
 
 
:*Ch 2
 
::*recognition of adaptive/maladaptive in our own culture. 
 
::*Oneida Community 1848-1879  John Noyes
 
::*sexual practices
 
::*changing the rules
 
::*Duddie's Branch, 1960, Eastern Kentucky  238 ind.
 
::*gov't support, deterioration of hygiene, basic values
 
::*non standard tracking of patrimony.
 
::*fierce loyalty to community, showed "pride, dignity, courage, and generosity"
 
::*23-45: Review of the issue of relativism in anthropology, especially in mid-late 20th century.
 

Revision as of 00:51, 1 October 2015

SEP 30

Topic preferences

Click on the link below to add notes from your browsing exercise to the page:

Fall 2015 Proseminar Browsing Exercise

Singer, Ch. 1, "A Changing World"

  • Globalization: Terrorism, climate change, (added: human migration)
  • US interests: political consensus (dems/repubs) on Bush remark.
  • Should political leaders adopt an internationalist stance (beyond interests of their nation-state)?
  • competing models of leadership
  • Historical parable: reaction to 1914 assasination of Crown Prince Ferdinand (and wife) by Bosnian Serb nationalists, starting WW1. Objections to Autro-Hungarian ultimatum to Serbia. Compare to international reaction to US demands of Taliban to hand over Osama bin Laden. principle p. 7, new today vs. WW1.
  • Rawls "old school" scope for theory of justice
  • Is the Nation-state on the decline?
  • Should we be internationalists? Why is multilaterism no longer a political topic in the US?

Singer, Ch. 5, "One Community"

  • Considers aid given after 9/11 to other international aid needs. again with partiality.
  • Sidgwick and Himmler on partiality. Godwin on saving Fenelon vs. the chambermaid.
  • Singer's famous example of saving the small child drowning in the university fountain. distance doesn't matter.
  • Biblical reference to Paul and ethics of partiality.
  • Examination of different forms of partiality: family and kin, gratitude 160ff.
  • Compatriots 167ff. prefering our own might be justified by obligation of reciprocity.
  • Choice between "imagined" community of nation-state and "imagined" global community.
  • Justice between vs. within states: Wellman's arguments
  • Rawls and The Law of Peoples: Rawls example of the two societies: no obligation to redistribute to improve the worst off between the two societies.
  • 2nd criticism: Why allow difference between countries to circumvent redistribution and not allow differences within a country to do so? 178
  • Millenium Development Goals (MDGs); US shortfalls; public perceptions of giving (15% rather than actual 1%)
  • Comparative Value Exercise: Unger's thought experiment: Bob's bugatti. amputation scenarios. yuck.

Sachs, Jeffrey, "Can the Rich Afford to Help the Poor?" (2006)

  • (One of the architects of the UN Millennium Development Goals. Opposed by some noted development economists.)
  • Optimist about relief: .7 GNP level of giving adequate. Absolute poverty down from 1/3 to 1/5 (interesting to compare US discussion in 1960 at the start of the domestic "war on poverty" of the Johnson administration)
  • Increase in wealth of the rich world is dramatic (note Rawlsian difference principle from yesterday)
  • (Digression on actual giving: [1]
  • Note analysis on pages 294 of amounts that developing countries can supply to meet their own poverty needs. Middle-income countries like Brazil, Chile, and Mexico have enough.
  • Can the US afford to meet a .7 GNP target?
  • Sachs considers this obvious. To dramatize his point, on pages 304-308, he points out that the wealthiest 400 US citizens earned more than the total populations of Botswana, Nigeria, Senegal, and Uganda. More to the point, the tax cuts this group received during the Bush administration in 2001, 2002, and 2003 totaled about 50 billion a year, enough to meet the US giving goal of .7% of GNP.


Singer, "Rich and Poor"

  • facts about absolute poverty
  • difference between grain consumption accounted for in terms of meat consumption. problem of distribution rather than production.
  • absolute affluence = affluent by any reasonable defintion of human needs. Go through paragraph on 221.
  • figures on giving by country: OPEC countries most generous. U.S. and Japan least.

The Moral equivalent of murder? five purported differences:

  • 1. allowing to die not eq. to killing. no intention to kill.
  • 2. impossible to ask us to be obligated to keep everyone alive.
  • 3. uncertainty of outcome in not aiding vs. pointing a gun. less direct responsibility, less like 1st deg. murder.
  • 4. no direct and identifiable causal connection between consumerist action and death of individuals in other countries.
  • 5. People would be starving with or without me. I am not a necessary condition for there to be starving people.
  • Singer's point: these differences are extrinsic to the moral problem. there would be cases with these features in which we would still hold the person responsible.
  • Showing the extrinsic character of the differences: Singer's argument strategies at this point is to show that the differences are smaller and more contingent that one might think. Point by point:
  • 1. example of salesman selling tainted food. doesn't matter if no identifiable victim in advance.
  • 2. lack of certainty about the value of donations does reduce the wrongness of not giving (concession), but doesn't mean that its ok not to give.
  • 3. responsibility for acts but not omissions is incoherent way to think about responsibility. consequences of our actions are our responsibility. irrelevant that the person would have died if I had never existed.

Considers non-consequentialist justifications for not aiding (166)

  • idea of independent individual in Locke and Nozick doesn't make sense. Note appeal to social conception of humans based on ancestry!
  • absence of malice also doesn't excuse inaction. involuntary manslaughter (in the case say of a speedin motorist) is still blameworthy.
  • grants that we may not be as blameworthy for not saving many lives if saving those live requires heroic action.
  • The obligation to assist: Main Principle: If it is in our power to prevent something vey bad happening, without thereby sacrificing anything of comparable moral significance, we ought to do it.
  • goes on to claim that it is within the power of dev. countries to aid the poor without sacrificing . . . etc.

considers major objections:

  • taking care of your own
  • property rights [at most weakens the argument for mandatory giving (but note that governmental means might be the most effective, esp. where problems have a political dimension)
  • population and the ethics of triage:
  • questions whether the world is really like a life boat