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Koveras
Joined: 09 Oct 2008
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 Posted: Sun Sep 20, 2009 12:23 am Post subject: |
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| Kuros wrote: |
| Koveras wrote: |
| Kuros wrote: |
| Koveras wrote: |
| The justification or condemnation of slavery depends not in any way on the feelings of the slaves. In other words, happy slaves don't justify slavery, and unhappy slaves don't condemn it. |
I do think unhappy slaves, in the sense that slavery made them feel unhappy, is a point against slavery, yes. |
1) Then 'the slaves whom slavery made to feel happier' (a rather nebulous cause and effect, like yours) are 'a point for slavery'.
2) If the justification is based on feelings, there's nothing absolutely immoral about slavery, and it becomes an calculation between specific masters and slaves. Perhaps you agree with that, after all. |
Point 1 is not necessarily true, but even if it were, I'm not entirely uncomfortable with it. If slaves are made happier, yes, its a point for slavery. I don't think slavery would win down the whole score list, however. |
You will never bother even to try to make this list. If you did, you would either abandon it as a hopeless project, or push it through using a very simplified, and therefore flawed method.
For example, you can't simply tally the feelings of slaves and have done with it; you have to tally the feelings relative to how they felt before, and relative to what their other options are at the time of enslavement (perhaps imprisonment or death); you have to pay respect to the feelings of masters, of slaveless freemen and serfs (who were probably pleased at seeing people lower on the social scale than they); etc. etc.
There's a reason no one ever does these utilitarian calculations: they're impossible. But carry on using a hypothetical list, whose results you've somehow already determined, as a part of your argument.
For what it's worth, I agree with you that slavery would probably lose. I just find it irrelevant.
| Quote: |
| Point 2 is just wrong. I'm not basing the justification entirely on feelings, but yes, the feelings of slaves are relevant to the discussion. Its not true that if we consider feelings, it supplants the objective morality of the discussion. |
Okay, point granted, my response was too linear. Just so you know where I'm coming from, I take Aristotle's discussion of slavery in Politics - from the points of view of Natural and Positive law - as definitive. |
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Kuros
Joined: 27 Apr 2004
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| Posted: Sun Sep 20, 2009 1:27 am Post subject: |
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| Koveras wrote: |
| Kuros wrote: |
| Koveras wrote: |
| Kuros wrote: |
| Koveras wrote: |
| The justification or condemnation of slavery depends not in any way on the feelings of the slaves. In other words, happy slaves don't justify slavery, and unhappy slaves don't condemn it. |
I do think unhappy slaves, in the sense that slavery made them feel unhappy, is a point against slavery, yes. |
1) Then 'the slaves whom slavery made to feel happier' (a rather nebulous cause and effect, like yours) are 'a point for slavery'.
2) If the justification is based on feelings, there's nothing absolutely immoral about slavery, and it becomes an calculation between specific masters and slaves. Perhaps you agree with that, after all. |
Point 1 is not necessarily true, but even if it were, I'm not entirely uncomfortable with it. If slaves are made happier, yes, its a point for slavery. I don't think slavery would win down the whole score list, however. |
You will never bother even to try to make this list. If you did, you would either abandon it as a hopeless project, or push it through using a very simplified, and therefore flawed method.
For example, you can't simply tally the feelings of slaves and have done with it; you have to tally the feelings relative to how they felt before, and relative to what their other options are at the time of enslavement (perhaps imprisonment or death); you have to pay respect to the feelings of masters, of slaveless freemen and serfs (who were probably pleased at seeing people lower on the social scale than they); etc. etc.
There's a reason no one ever does these utilitarian calculations: they're impossible. But carry on using a hypothetical list, whose results you've somehow already determined, as a part of your argument.
For what it's worth, I agree with you that slavery would probably lose. I just find it irrelevant.
| Quote: |
| Point 2 is just wrong. I'm not basing the justification entirely on feelings, but yes, the feelings of slaves are relevant to the discussion. Its not true that if we consider feelings, it supplants the objective morality of the discussion. |
Okay, point granted, my response was too linear. Just so you know where I'm coming from, I take Aristotle's discussion of slavery in Politics - from the points of view of Natural and Positive law - as definitive. |
Yeah, I recognized the ancients in your thinking. You're right, I think you can reject slavery without considering the feeling of slaves, and I don't think you can justify slavery by appealing to the feeling of slaves. But we're not talking about run-of-the-mill suffering here: being separated from your family is in another league from the daily toil in, say, cotton fields. |
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young_clinton
Joined: 09 Sep 2009
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| Posted: Sat Oct 03, 2009 3:38 pm Post subject: |
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I prefer Lincolns line of reasoning when it comes to slavery. ' I would not want to be a slave, therefore I would not wish slavery on anyone else.'
As far as the ancients goes, they did not have Darwin or Nietsche yet. People make decisions, do things and form lines of reasoning based on things that they value. What a person values is ultimately what is best for himself. There is no line of logic that can be separate from human experience. one way or another, slave holders wanted slaves because they felt that it made them part of a better existence. An existence that gave them something that they needed.
Besides if the slaves were so happy and content, then why not just remain on the plantations and continue to work for nothing? Particularly bad work at that. |
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