Ethics of care
I'm a big Nel Noddings fan and like her feminist version of virtue ethics. I rarely see any feminist philosophers mentioned here like Gilligan and others.
It's rather sad that they don't get any mention around here, which seems to say a lot about what people think philosophy is about nowadays.
Anyway, was interested in whether other people have studied feminist philosophies and such. What's your take on feelings such as care or love be the guiding force to moral decisions? Is it overly simplistic or elegantly simplistic?
Thanks.
It's rather sad that they don't get any mention around here, which seems to say a lot about what people think philosophy is about nowadays.
Anyway, was interested in whether other people have studied feminist philosophies and such. What's your take on feelings such as care or love be the guiding force to moral decisions? Is it overly simplistic or elegantly simplistic?
Thanks.
Comments (67)
I think feminist, virtue and care ethics have a valid point that ethics has largely had a gap in recognition of love, care and sympathy, and that the terrain of human moral reasoning cannot be captured in monistic, commanding doctrines. But it's certainly overly simplistic to claim that this new form of ethical reasoning should be the only guiding force in moral philosophy, because there is a component of moral reasoning that is command-like (even if it's not monistic).
If there's one issue I have with "these sorts" of ethical theories (feminist, care, virtue, etc), it's that they tend to be too timid. They don't offer the opportunity to be radically moral. That, and by themselves they fail to provide a complete analysis of morality. Sometimes proponents will suggest we dispense completely with the notion of "duty", which is entirely unreasonable and unpersuasive, if not only because we are sometimes in situations in which we must make a decision that seems to be unaffected by things like virtue, love or care, and we have moral beliefs about what is right and what is wrong that are founded on principles; that is to say, a "virtuous" person believes murder to be wrong because it is wrong (and not that murder is wrong because a virtuous person believes it to be wrong).
In regards to virtue, I think people are generally stuck to their psychological types and it's only through an immense amount of effort that a person can "change" - yet even this possibility is dependent on the person being of a certain psychological type. If this is true, then not everyone can be "virtuous" - yet certainly there are things people should and should not do even if they are incapable of being "virtuous". In that sense, right action is to be sharply distinguished from good natured-ness (i.e. it cannot be a moral requirement to act from a certain intention or motivation).
In regards to love, I think it is entirely unreasonable to demand people love each other, because love is not something that can be voluntarily made. Love is not a foundation of ethics, at least, not in the romantic or deep friend-like way. Love is sometimes said to be the desire to see the good develop in someone else - yet this is a motivation, and I don't think motivations can ever be morally required (since we have no control over them).
So basically, virtue, care, feminist, (etc) ethics offer a different perspective on things and broaden the moral horizon but I hardly think they offer a complete alternative.
The issue with command type ethics is that you're left with a person who doesn't realize what they're doing is good, or why it should be counted as something good over some other action. This greatly stupifies the whole moral framework. There's no point in telling that some action is good unless they can't rationalize it themselves, and if you follow the news, then most of ethics can't be rationalized at all, it's rather a trait that can only be observed but not modeled.
Virtue-care-ethics is elegantly simplistic because it puts the emphasis on the individual to extend their sphere of interest to include others than one's self. I'd rather live in a democratic collectivist ethical society than have a benevolent dictator tell me what is good. Ethics of care is inherently democratic and education is focused on not habituating a person to be good but rather giving them the tools to want to be ethical and moral. What's more, a person who is motivated by care or love or other noble traits will always be a better moral actor than one guided by command type prescriptivist ethical theories. And, that get's neglected in philosophy nowadays. The pursuit of moral absolutes or as you say, monistic tendencies are largely a failure in terms of ethics.
What's more, a philosophy of care appeals to the Rawlsian notion of a veil of ignorance. If you empathize with an individual it requires some degree of putting on a veil of ignorance and trying to view the world in terms of the other and not the self.
Quoting darthbarracuda
Yes, but if doing what is ethical isn't motivated by a sense of care or compassion, then what are we left with? The alternative is worse than having a personal care and go through the process of deliberation about what's best for someone other than one's self to decide what is moral. Like, I said, having a person motivated to be ethical through encouraging kindness, care, and love will in almost all regards be better than even the best Kantian. To put this another way, emotivism and intuitionalism are superior to other ethical theories because they don't really rely on a yet undiscovered rationale as to what actions are the best, they are just intuitively obvious. I seriously doubt a calculus of utility could also be imagined to discern what actions are best or worst in some or any predicament or situation.
Quoting darthbarracuda
No, you're conflating Kantian/prescriptivist ethics with what is talked about, rather a normative ethical theory based on natural and emulatable (emphatic?) emotions. To demand that a person act or behave a certain way is unrealistic and goes against the Hume'ian emotive sense of ethics. People, are not programmable like computers and demanding anything from them to behave ethically completely nullifies the effort to be ethical. In other words, it's just not possible to teach a person to behave morally or ethically. Rather in some Buddhist sense, it's a facet of human nature that ought to be cultivated rather than demanded or required from a person. And, to cultivate this trait from a person, then a person ought to be encouraged to behave with a sense of care or love or something beyond one's sphere of interest other than the self.
That would seem to be the case at least. Implicit or explicit, it's true on face value. As a population representative of what ethical conduct means or stands for, women sure do take the cake.
Generalisations are often invidious. I could say 'But look at this wonderfully ethical man, and look at this despicable woman!' Then someone else chooses contrary examples. Eventually it becomes clear that we are not talking about men and women at all but about virtue, care, law, politics etc as those things are relevant to us all. But by that time we have wasted our energy on an ill-advised battle of the sexes.
Well, then you've answered your own question despite evidence showing that prison populations are predominantly male vs female.
The issue still is that why isn' there more talk about virtue-care-ethics and instead we still get Plato brought up and Aristotle, and the Stoics or Epicureans? Is there still some hefty amount of sexism in the field of philosophy despite ethics as care being a strong argument being proposed by feminist philosophers?
As to sexism in philosophy, yes, I'm sure you're right. There's sexism pretty much everywhere and I would not imagine that philosophy is any exception. But I wonder whether splitting philosophy down the lines of virtue-ethics=feminine and duty-ethics=masculine effectively challenges the issue.
I don't think there was a value judgment made about the ability to care for women more-so than men. If you want me to make a value judgment for the sake of discussion, then I can say that women profess an attitude of care more than men do on average. Does that make them more ethical beings? Not really, it's just that they are more caring than men are in regards to the welfare of others.
However, that doesn't mean that men ought to take care of what they're 'best at' and leave women to do what they're 'best at'.
Yes, they do profess. It is part of the character role. In actual practice .... I have observed no differences between men and women when it comes to caring. Some people do and others don't.
Caring is not an ethic, it is a feeling. Where does this feeling come from, is tough to say? Some people certainly seem to care more than others. In part, caring can be somewhat learned by trial and error in a lifetime, but then again it may take, many, many, many lifetimes.
What "love and care" is, is deep deep bias. We definitely should have love and care for those close to us, but this means favoritism. This means bias. That's been well known for a long, long time. The idea that these should be a wide spread ethical system, is to propose tribalism.
To deflate this a bit, all you're really saying is that helping others in need is moral. What if no one ever needs help. Does morality need to exist? If we know that there will never be a case that needing to help others will go away, why do we keep the whole society thing going where people are in constant need to be helped? Why is this a good thing to persist and continue into the future for more people? This becomes circular reasoning, and rather absurd.
Also, when you reduce someone's problems to victimization and oppression, that compassion is going to make you feel invested, and personally hurt as well, and the blame, or responsibility, rather than being placed with the self causing guilt in the first case, will be placed with the third party causing anger, frustration, and desires for retribution in this case.
You can see that compassion is partial, or indeed individual, taking of sides, and feeling equal compassion for everyone leads to a stalemate, where a super-ordinate value must be the ruling principle in all cases, meaning that "compassion" itself is a nonstarter. Sounds nice and fluffy, and is a feel good word, that signals all kinds of virtue, but it isn't a great ruling principle.
Care is a feeling that may manifest as action or inaction. It all depends.
I'm not entirely sure what you mean here. I understand how this happens in divine command theories (but why?? BECAUSE I SAID SO!!!), but theories like Kantianism, utilitarianism, or similar find grounding in reason, or intuition, or something.
People generally don't disagree about "fundamental" moral principles, like non-maleficence or fidelity. They disagree about empirical, sometimes metaphysical, views on the world. For instance, the debate surrounding abortion is not whether or not it's moral to kill a human being, because obviously most everyone agrees that it's not. The debate is whether or not a human fetus is a being that can be killed, i.e. whether or not it has moral status.
How does a virtue/care ethic approach this sort of topic? (I left feminist ethics out in this example because it's pretty obvious there's going to be strong views on abortion from the feminist crowd).
Quoting Posty McPostface
I don't think an ethical theory would count as an ethical theory if it didn't put emphasis on other people instead of yourself. I'm totally on board with investigating the ethics-before-duty, the phenomenology of the encounter with the Other (Levinas), etc. But I think it's a straw man to say only virtue-care-feminist ethics are ethics concerning other people, because that is certainly false.
Additionally, I think it was Aristotle who said virtue comes with habit. True, you must want to be virtuous, but it's something that needs to be taught as well. I'm not sure if the claim that virtuous people will always be a better moral actor than a prescriptivist person is true - and what are we defining "better moral actor" as apart from a person who does what is right, i.e. what ought to be done, i.e. prescriptions.
Quoting Posty McPostface
I mean, sure, it's better to be a good person who does the right thing than a bad person who does the right thing for bad reasons. But I strongly believe what ought to be done stands independent of motives. Because it's certainly the case that a bad person doing the right thing out of bad motivations is still better than a bad person doing the wrong thing.
What ought to be the case stands independently of motives. Motives enhance the act, make it into something truly remarkable and praiseworthy, but it's not a requirement. It should be enough to say "don't rape" without the additional "don't rape because you don't want to rape," because if someone does want to rape, they wouldn't satisfy this condition. You mentioned previously how someone who doesn't "get" an ethical command will never see the rationale behind it. Yet I believe this is merely a case of someone not seeing the whole picture, or of having an impaired set of reasoning skills.
Quoting Posty McPostface
But the Kantian is supposed to be motivated by duty to a categorical imperative. They are noble, serious and dedicated. The utilitarian is motivated chiefly by a recognition of the importance of pain and pleasure in the human experience, and while their compassion may not be situational-dependent, it's abstracted from everyday encounters and put into a hypothetical counterfactual that expunges context in favor of universality and consistency. Some might even go on and say consequentialist theories are an "enlightened morality", one that can work in situations that previous closer social bonds morality can't. (But can it replace this everyday morality? I think not).
Quoting Posty McPostface
Emotivism and intuitionism are meta-ethical theories, not normative theories. At least, that is how I have learned it and I see it distinguished this way practically everywhere I go.
Quoting Posty McPostface
Well, we have to keep in mind that consequentialists (like utilitarians) don't see their principle of utility as a very good decision theory. Utilitarianism is a theory of what we ought to do, not a theory of how we ought to go about doing what we ought to do. For the most part, utilitarianism (and most consequentialists) argue we ought to not use the principle of maximizing utility in our decisions because that's just not how we think. We aren't very good consequentialists, and consequentialists recognize this.
Yes, but what of the problem I mentioned? What is it that we need to perpetuate the help-cycle to begin with? In other words, why do we keep the whole society thing going where people are in constant need to be helped? Why is this a good thing to persist and continue into the future for more people? This becomes circular reasoning, and rather absurd.
The "help cycle" is complicated. At a community level one can choose to participate depending upon circumstances. At the government level it is automatic with unpredictable results. I chose whether or not to participate based upon my experiences, which are constantly changing. There is no straightforward answer, there are only choices we make in our lives when there are choices to be made.
My question is what are we doing by continuing this whole community thing in the first place? If I am duty-bound to help others (something I nominally agree with), then why are we keeping community going in the first place? Helping others is always instrumental. We help others to..help others to..help others.. to help others. Thus ethics is a means to an ends. But what ends?
Everyone is doing things in order to learn the effects of different actions.
Quoting schopenhauer1
One can care, and not help, which often leads to healthier outcomes. It is all a process of learning and becoming a better navigator in life. Navigation (making choices) is a skill that takes time to learn. Ethical "rules" are if no assistance, as one learns in life. We do things and then judge effects. This is why ones own understanding of the nature of life has a substantial impact on the way over lives a life. So much meaning is lost if we see ourselves as just following rules, or worse yet, programmed robots.
Quoting schopenhauer1
Ethics is a discussion point. It one treats it as hard and fast rules, then it becomes more difficult to learn.
I find it hard to believe this is intended to be a serious statement. Or am I misunderstanding. Are you saying women are more ethical than men? I don't know which it is more insulting to.
Quoting Posty McPostface
Aaargh.
Love and care as a basis for ethics are not nepotism. It's compassion - valuing the interests of others - specific others or humanity in general.
You clearly don't know the meaning of the word "compassion." Compassion doesn't mean guilt or retribution, it means kindness. Being kind doesn't mean giving people what they want, it means caring how what you do affects people. Do you really not understand what it means, feels like, to be kind?
Quoting Wosret
I'll say it again, you have completely misunderstood what compassion is. The way you describe it it sounds like an afterthought. Something you might do if you have the time. Not really that important.
You can't value the interests of "humanity in general" except in empty abstraction, in real life you only deal with a few at a time.
https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/evolution-the-self/201403/the-downside-compassion
https://books.google.ca/books?id=eSyPAgAAQBAJ&pg=PT51&lpg=PT51&dq=compassion+is+the+source+of+guilt&source=bl&ots=ds1C851Q3L&sig=qz4acZHd6_8wS9z2nt3bvAuAnzo&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwi3mr7h2fbWAhVE9GMKHYMvAeQQ6AEITDAI#v=onepage&q=compassion%20is%20the%20source%20of%20guilt&f=false
https://books.google.ca/books?id=vliHyq9cPKcC&pg=PA68&lpg=PA68&dq=compassion+makes+your+enemy+my+enemy&source=bl&ots=r-dOVA6X4K&sig=8CMuhuPKrZmOv-eXP4Uhps196W4&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjf9O7c2vbWAhUK0mMKHfweA84Q6AEITzAH#v=onepage&q=compassion%20makes%20your%20enemy%20my%20enemy&f=false
https://beta.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/the-empathy-trap/article33412535/?ref=http://www.theglobeandmail.com&
There are some sources, your incredulity isn't very persuasive. Also, in insinuating that I'm some unfeeling monster, where was my compassion, friend? When seen as the enemy of things you do have compassion for, it is denied, that's where it went.
Not true.
Quoting Wosret
I don't think you are an unfeeling monster, but I think you may be looking at compassion through the glass of your own cynicism and insecurity. Compassion is generous. I don't see any room for generosity in your understanding of it.
When do you ever actually interact with "humanity in general"? How can what I said not be true?
Why you callin' me names, man? I gave sources, I didn't pull this out of my ass, this is what I've read, put your pyschologizing away, and give real reasons why it is otherwise, explain why I have sources, and you have intuitions...
Compassion isn't an interaction, it's a set of attitudes and feelings. I like people. The first thing I want when I meet a new person is to find out what they know and what's important to them. Good will is my default setting.
Quoting Wosret
I felt a little bad about the psychologizing. On the other hand, you wear your idiosyncrasies on your sleeve and use them for rhetorical effect. To a certain extent it's open season.
Sources? Psychology Today? The Globe and Mail? Please. The sources you linked to are pseudo-psychological clap trap. They use the same incorrect definition for compassion that you do. Compassion - Sympathy and concern for the sufferings or misfortunes of others. Where is there room for guilt in there?
I guess we disagree then, and since it seems to just be that you're right, and I'm flawed and devious, there isn't a whole lot I can say to that.
By your logic, being hungry (the feeling) is the same thing as eating (the action).
I don't believe that one can feel compassion, just as I don't believe that one can feel hunger, and then have no compulsory action or reaction whatsoever as a response, no. Emotions move us, that's what they do. They are not just abstract things un-attached to our actions. Compassion, unless for imaginary suffering, that you're conceiving of in virtual space happens when we encounter the real thing, in individuals, and not "humanity in general".
Buddhism provides a step by step deconstruction of reality using logic and rationality, gives you the plan of action, and then you go do it.
The plan of action, at least what the Dalai Lama famously says, is compassion. Historically, I'd say anatman or non-self.
So we have here the best of both worlds, compassion and reason.
I've read a little feminist philosophy here and there, and I've had philosophical conversations with many people who call themselves feminist.
Cultivating love and compassion is about the best thing one can do to be a moral human being and to promote morality, well-being, and justice in the world. Nonetheless, no matter how much cultivation we engage in, human animals will remain less than perfectly loving and compassionate. Accordingly, I suppose compassion may not be enough, perhaps especially in adjudicating disputes involving one or more selfish, uncaring, or unresponsive agents.
I think of compassion and fairness as two basic and cooperative moral principles that seem to come naturally to human animals and other primates.
So far as I can see, an ethics of compassion and fairness is consistent with the "ethics of care" characterized by Gilligan. I strongly agree that the negative language of rights and tolerance is insufficient to inform a moral worldview. I agree that a moral outlook that involves an "integration of rights and responsibilities" is preferable to one that neglects either rights or responsibilities. I agree that moral responsibility implicates a conception of individuals as interdependent, not independent.
For that matter, I suppose any moral outlook implicates a conception of human agents as interdependent in some sense or other. You don't quite have your rights unless others agree to respect them. I'm inclined to say that a conception of moral responsibility grounded in compassion and fairness is more basic than a conception of "rights".
I'm not sure the language of rights and tolerance was ever meant to serve as a complete moral theory. It seems more like a framework within which people of diverse opinions, attitudes, and lifestyles can agree to disagree while they live together and participate in the same society. I have the impression this framework was one result of an attempt to liberate large segments of society from the oppressive authority of governments, institutions, community leaders, and communal norms.
Arguably a critique like Gilligan's is an extension of the same tendency.
One can make the argument that all of ethics boils down to a sense of feeling, according to emotive theories and intuitive notions of what feels do ethical decisions derive from. I still find it hard to assume that a rationale can be devised to be taught or encouraged to people to care more. Rather, one can encourage certain feelings of care or empathy towards others to maintain some sense of care towards another.
Perhaps, then there's a deficiency in this bias towards others? I don't think we should require us to be caring or emphatic towards others; but, there's rarely something wrong with having people display those traits towards others. I don't really see a problem with encouraging such a bias in general.
Most people, generally, don't view other people as tools that can only be exploited. Although, I know of examples that exploit sympathy and other emotions to further their goals, but, such people typically end up in trouble or most people recognize their falsity and decide not to deal with them. Compassion and other emotions are already moral guidelines that come before rationalization. So, what's wrong with embracing their conclusions than rejecting them on grounds that they can't be rationalized? Not many, I think.
Philosophy has been searching for an ideal rationale for guiding moral theories and ethics for a long time. Even the most universal of ethical postulates, such as the golden rule, rely on people to empathize with others to decide what is the best moral positions to be in regards to others. So, I don't see what's wrong with moral theories if most rely on notions such as 'caring', 'compassion', or relatability in regards to others.
Quoting darthbarracuda
Well, that's not the point I'm making here at least. What I'm saying is that ethical truths are only found upon further examination to be made possible when another person can be related to in some regards based on emotive theories of what 'ethical truths' are.
Quoting darthbarracuda
Well, doesn't wanting to be ethical implicitly rely on emotions, in general? Perhaps there is some selfish element to wanting to be moral; but, I haven't heard of any sort of material gain stemming from wanting to be moral or ethical. Are teachers motivated by an ethic of care and love for others that makes them want to put up with under-developed moral actors? Yeah, I would think so.
Quoting darthbarracuda
Well, yes, none of us have immediate access to a type of rationality that isn't bound by epistemic criteria available at the moment. So, what's wrong with emotions guiding decision making? There's a great deal of prejudice built around emotions nowadays in people. Largely due to the fact that emotions are unpredictable and uncertain. But, if they are what guides moral decision making as best as possible, then I would think there's nothing wrong with having emotions guide what's best for the other than one's seelf. Sure, people have whole sorts of emotions; but, if the right sort of emotions can be cultivated, then, the rest of ethics just falls in place to follow what one thinks is best for another based on a sense of caring and compassion.
I have wrestled with this statement to a large extent, and still think it is generally true. A prime example I ask of is why are males much more representative of prison populations than woman are, around the world? I'm not saying that men are inherently more guided by 'dark forces' or whatever you want to call it.
My life experience does not support this point if view. I have never felt I can count on a person more or less because if their sex. Value systems are individually developed. Cultural issues that you site are quite complicated and can be debated endlessly.
I think you're right. I should have included fairness along with compassion. In a way, fairness is more basic. If responsibilities, benefits, and costs are apportioned fairly, it's in everyone's interest that people get treated kindly.
To me, there is a certain distance in compassion. It's not just sympathy or empathy. There is recognition and depth. I think I'm agreeing with you.
I guess I was thinking of ethical behavior as the way people should behave, not what is practical to transmit. From the Tao Te Ching:
There, when Tao [the way] is lost, there is virtue.
When virtue is lost, there is humanity.
When humanity is lost, there is justice.
When justice is lost, there is etiquette.
Etiquette becomes prevalent when people fail to be sincere and honest.
Hence, chaos begins.
I really agree with that. Compassion doesn't build the house of ethics, but it is the foundation.
I think I said this before on this thread. Maybe it was a different one - that's as disrespectful of women as it is of men.
I'm inclined to say fairness and compassion are more basic than a conception of "rights". I might also say that compassion is more basic than fairness: Arguably, in order to have a genuine sense of what's fair in each case -- apart from abstract rules and laws and customs -- you must have compassionate insight into each party to the case and a feel for human nature. Along those lines, fairness may seem to depend on and be motivated by compassion.
Perhaps fairness is more complicated than compassion. You can be compassionate without taking a stance on right and wrong, on proportionality or equitable distribution; without adjudicating disputes, without assigning rewards and punishments, without predicting or aiming to alter consequences. Arguably full-blown compassion requires that you stand back from such discrimination. One has compassion for the offender as well as the victim.
How can that be? Just the fact that they're women?
Sorry, didn't see this question until now.
In other words, I don't see "feminist" as having any bearing on doing philosophy, at least if you're doing philosophy right (in my view).
It's just like whether you're a gardener or not should be irrelevant to philosophy, and whether you wear a bolo tie or not is irrelevant to it.
Or it's like thinking that it makes sense to section off physics so that we note that a group of people are "Britney Spears-listening physicists," as if that would or should have any impact at all on the physics they're doing.
Yeah, I don't feel as though women get enough credit in society and specifically within the field of philosophy. There's a repugnant feeling of male superiority or downright chauvinism that has dominated philosophy since Aristotle and the likes. Despite getting pummeled with criticism for me saying that women are the fairer sex or more inclined to behave ethically, I see no way around this "fact". Now, before you say that estrogen or gender roles instill this sentiment in practice, I would like to say that men have a lot to learn from women; but, aren't inherently less ethical than women. Not in principle at least, as not to perpetuate stereotypical thinking.
Quoting Terrapin Station
Not quite. We can't dismiss the fact that women are less representative of the proportion of people who have committed crimes against humanity, prison populations, along with racism, bigotry, and hate.
My thought would be "elegantly simple", but I don't know a great deal about it. Sadly I have not studied feminist philosophy, any more than I have studied African philosophy, although I'm sure both have much to offer that other philosophies do not cover. :chin: I look forward to learning more, maybe from this thread? Go for it!
Happy mother's day! :100: :party: :flower:
The concept of duty is necessary, as it helps to persuade us to act co-operatively. We are a social species, and it is as social beings that we are successful. That we are also resistant to society, and its demands on us individuals, acts against this, our primary advantage over other species. As individuals, we achieve little or nothing. As co-operating groups, we achieve ... well, just look around you! :wink:
Yes, but it's not just in philosophy that we can see this. :up:
I don't think it makes sense to talk about beliefs and attitudes in a generalized way like that, unless we've done the empirical research--it would have to amount to surveys in a case like this--that enables us to make statistical statements. I'm skeptical that (a) we have the relevant information for most historical philosophers to know whether they'd endorse anything like "male superiority" or chauvinism, and (b) the philosophers for whom we'd have the relevant info tend (say over 70%) to have those beliefs/attitudes.
I could be wrong about (b) of course (I'm far more confident about (a) due to familiarity with the literature), but I'd be skeptical about it until examining the empirical data.
What's more important though is that this really shouldn't have anything to do with philosophy. It doesn't at all matter if one is a feminist or not when one is discussing whether universals are real, when one is addressing Gettier problems, or even when one is looking at how moral statements work formally.
Ideally, yes. In practice? Not so much...
Well, what could we possibly be doing when we're discussing that stuff that feminism, or gardening, or wearing bolo ties, etc., would have anything to do with it? What would be an example of that?
I'm not trying to imply that women have some moral "authority" over or pertaining to matters concerning ethics and moral conduct. I guess, all I'm saying that we've tried the (stereotypical) male approach to solving ethical problems via rationality, enlightenment, and all that jazz from the renaissance period. Let's give women a shot at deciding what's best for the individual and collectively, society at large.
Philosophy shouldn't be in the business of "solving ethical problems" anyway, as there are no normative facts about ethical stances.
What's "best" for anything is subjective.
Sorry, I didn't know Americans celebrate Mother's Day today. :blush: We all did that months ago! :smile:
So philosophy shouldn't trouble its little head about subjective things? :chin:
Yeah, descriptively there's really no solution to how we ought to go about these problems, as Wittgenstein would point out. But, prescriptively we are inclined to agree with all this talk about rationality instilled through various philosophers since the ancient period to the present day.
Feminine thought is powerful in thwarting ideology. It is more about direct feeling. It is idealized in a mother's relation to her son/daughter. Rather than making the child a numerical unit in some vast conceptual framework, the feminine imposes a unique qualitative importance on every individual.
elegantly simplistic. However you can't expect those in power to just relinquish control of their power with out something in return. Power can only be taken from someone in power with good philosophical arguments or someone more powerful to take those in power out of control.
Good point there, Merkwurdichliebe. Food for thought, I suppose.
I also think of the relation of the masculine to the feminine. Feminine devotion also imposes a unique qualitative importance on the individual. That is in contrast to the masculine fidelity, which is obligatory - a matter of honor. Devotion implies a giving away or unintelligible empathy, while fidelity implies a sort of taking or fulfilling. I believe the feminine to be the greatest power that exists.
Hehe, same here.
There was an episode in Star-Trek The Original Series, where Kirk was divided into two beings, one with effeminate characteristics and the other domineering and masculine. The domineering Kirk then became obsessed with proving to everyone that he was the "real" Captain Kirk and not the imposter. He also took advantage of a woman, given his status. It was a real trip watching that episode.
Here's a video from the episode, where William Shatner takes overacting to new heights. It's pure comedy: