I think the mistake here is equivocating between accidental misses and deliberate choices. For example, I've been playing piano for years. I can easily imagine myself playing a wrong note at a piano recital despite practicing the piece 1000 times. I can't imagine myself asking a kid to suck my tongue. Those two acts are in completely different categories so criticizing the Dalai Lama for this makes more sense than criticizing Slash for messing up a guitar solo (or whatever).
Exactly this. If a highly morally exemplary person is taken by surprise and slaps someone in the face by reflex, in a way that's totally out of character with their usual poise, wisdom and kindness, then it would perhaps make sense to think less of it rather than more for the fact that they're unusually virtuous. But if such a person is insulted at a party, thinks over what happened and sets up a plot to hurt their offender 10-fold in vengeance, of course it would make sense to see this as a betrayal of their supposed high ethical standards. As the video says, it would be good evidence that they were actually never as moral as they appeared.
Pragmatically, it makes sense to draw a distinction between accidental misses and deliberate choices because the latter reveals more about a person's state of mind and how he or she is likely to act in the future. Premeditated murder is punished more harshly than negligent homicide for a good reason: someone who kills by accident isn't as dangerous and likely regrets what they did because they didn't intend it in the first place. On another level of analysis, however, we can categorize an immoral action without regard for the intention of the perpetrator. Having had the intention to do something bad can be considered a failed attempt at being moral, similar to missing a putt. In the case of an intentional action, the failure is already embedded in having had the intention, which becomes evident in the action. In the case of a missed putt, the intention is successful, but not the outcome.
@@entertainingideas Having the intention to do wrong can't be considered a failed attempt to do good because there was never such an attempt. If I cheat on my wife, that's not a failed attempt for me to be a faithful spouse. I think part of the issue here is that we're so used to euphemisms like "I made a mistake" or "I messed up" when caught red-handed in our deliberate misdeeds that we're starting to actually believe that there's no difference between missing a put and asking a child to suck your tongue. Or accidentally playing a wrong note and cheating on your spouse, etc. I stand by my point that accidental misses in actions that require skill are completely different from deliberate choices.
I think that your and Sam's analogy is, as josephkrohi explained in another comment, an equivocation between accident and deliberate choice. However, what Sam Harris was originally trying to get at was never dependent upon the poor choice of analogy it was accompanied by. If all human behavior is causally determined by prior events, then responsibility only makes sense to the extent that it can positively influence the future. It makes sense to admonish someone in so far as you can potentially improve their future behavior, and it also makes sense to trust someone less in so far as you discover evidence that they are less honest. But it is empty and a waste of vitriol, of emotion in general, to be angry or act betrayed beyond these kinds of considerations. If some person manages to be unusually virtuous, improving the lives of those around them to an awe inspiring degree throughout the various circumstances that are relatively normal to their own experience, then this is a pure good. And if in less usual circumstances they act in a substantially morally worse way, it should be treated as it is. An unusual event, that may perhaps reveal just as much or more about the limitations of humanity in general or the specific features of certain environments, than it does about them as a person. But distinguishing between what I've just described and someone who merely acts in such a way as to receive much praise, and then acts hypocritically when they think they can get away with it in another context, is no trivial thing. Perhaps it is so difficult as to be what our thoughtful narrator described: solely theoretical.
But why 'hold someone responsible' in the first place? Ur describing why we attach feelings of responsibility to situations where we make certain moral choices, not explaining why people with aspect X should be held more responsible. Isn't it resultant of a more 'generally preferable' society if people are held responsible according to the influence of the actions they are being held responsible for in such a manner that it actually functions as a feedback mechanism curbing undesirable influence and promoting desirable influence?
Considering that a quick Google clarified that the Dali Lama's "moral failing" in this case is actually a mixture of cultural differences and an old man's incomplete grasp of his second language, I'm not even sure this is a valid example for this argument. Unless you're such a chauvinist that you are firmly asserting that Liberal Western morality is the pinnacle of all existing moralities in all cases, then I find it hard to conclude that the Dali Lama didn't actually do anything wrong. Because the modern Liberal Western interpretation of this as a s-xual act with a child is not what was actually happening.
His bad english doesn’t excuse him trying to get his tongue sucked. You can see his intentions, even if you don’t understand what is being said. And there is nothing in tibetan culture that mandates this either. You’re wrong
@@entertainingideas - "Suck" was the wrong word, and that mistranslation heightens the perception of a sexual intent to a Western audience. And you can literally Google "Dali Lama tongue explanation" yourself, just like I did, if you don't believe that it's a Tibetan cultural practice with no sexual connotation whatsoever... No one said anything about a "mandate", BTW. That's a sloppy response in line with your sloppy (or non-existent) research.
I think the mistake here is equivocating between accidental misses and deliberate choices. For example, I've been playing piano for years. I can easily imagine myself playing a wrong note at a piano recital despite practicing the piece 1000 times.
I can't imagine myself asking a kid to suck my tongue.
Those two acts are in completely different categories so criticizing the Dalai Lama for this makes more sense than criticizing Slash for messing up a guitar solo (or whatever).
Exactly this. If a highly morally exemplary person is taken by surprise and slaps someone in the face by reflex, in a way that's totally out of character with their usual poise, wisdom and kindness, then it would perhaps make sense to think less of it rather than more for the fact that they're unusually virtuous. But if such a person is insulted at a party, thinks over what happened and sets up a plot to hurt their offender 10-fold in vengeance, of course it would make sense to see this as a betrayal of their supposed high ethical standards.
As the video says, it would be good evidence that they were actually never as moral as they appeared.
Asking the kid to suck his lounge is more in line with Sam Harris example than OPs. To me, its a display of his mental deterioration in old age
Pragmatically, it makes sense to draw a distinction between accidental misses and deliberate choices because the latter reveals more about a person's state of mind and how he or she is likely to act in the future. Premeditated murder is punished more harshly than negligent homicide for a good reason: someone who kills by accident isn't as dangerous and likely regrets what they did because they didn't intend it in the first place.
On another level of analysis, however, we can categorize an immoral action without regard for the intention of the perpetrator. Having had the intention to do something bad can be considered a failed attempt at being moral, similar to missing a putt. In the case of an intentional action, the failure is already embedded in having had the intention, which becomes evident in the action. In the case of a missed putt, the intention is successful, but not the outcome.
@@entertainingideas Having the intention to do wrong can't be considered a failed attempt to do good because there was never such an attempt. If I cheat on my wife, that's not a failed attempt for me to be a faithful spouse. I think part of the issue here is that we're so used to euphemisms like "I made a mistake" or "I messed up" when caught red-handed in our deliberate misdeeds that we're starting to actually believe that there's no difference between missing a put and asking a child to suck your tongue. Or accidentally playing a wrong note and cheating on your spouse, etc.
I stand by my point that accidental misses in actions that require skill are completely different from deliberate choices.
I think that your and Sam's analogy is, as josephkrohi explained in another comment, an equivocation between accident and deliberate choice. However, what Sam Harris was originally trying to get at was never dependent upon the poor choice of analogy it was accompanied by.
If all human behavior is causally determined by prior events, then responsibility only makes sense to the extent that it can positively influence the future. It makes sense to admonish someone in so far as you can potentially improve their future behavior, and it also makes sense to trust someone less in so far as you discover evidence that they are less honest. But it is empty and a waste of vitriol, of emotion in general, to be angry or act betrayed beyond these kinds of considerations.
If some person manages to be unusually virtuous, improving the lives of those around them to an awe inspiring degree throughout the various circumstances that are relatively normal to their own experience, then this is a pure good. And if in less usual circumstances they act in a substantially morally worse way, it should be treated as it is. An unusual event, that may perhaps reveal just as much or more about the limitations of humanity in general or the specific features of certain environments, than it does about them as a person.
But distinguishing between what I've just described and someone who merely acts in such a way as to receive much praise, and then acts hypocritically when they think they can get away with it in another context, is no trivial thing. Perhaps it is so difficult as to be what our thoughtful narrator described: solely theoretical.
But why 'hold someone responsible' in the first place? Ur describing why we attach feelings of responsibility to situations where we make certain moral choices, not explaining why people with aspect X should be held more responsible. Isn't it resultant of a more 'generally preferable' society if people are held responsible according to the influence of the actions they are being held responsible for in such a manner that it actually functions as a feedback mechanism curbing undesirable influence and promoting desirable influence?
Considering that a quick Google clarified that the Dali Lama's "moral failing" in this case is actually a mixture of cultural differences and an old man's incomplete grasp of his second language, I'm not even sure this is a valid example for this argument. Unless you're such a chauvinist that you are firmly asserting that Liberal Western morality is the pinnacle of all existing moralities in all cases, then I find it hard to conclude that the Dali Lama didn't actually do anything wrong. Because the modern Liberal Western interpretation of this as a s-xual act with a child is not what was actually happening.
His bad english doesn’t excuse him trying to get his tongue sucked. You can see his intentions, even if you don’t understand what is being said. And there is nothing in tibetan culture that mandates this either. You’re wrong
@@entertainingideas - "Suck" was the wrong word, and that mistranslation heightens the perception of a sexual intent to a Western audience.
And you can literally Google "Dali Lama tongue explanation" yourself, just like I did, if you don't believe that it's a Tibetan cultural practice with no sexual connotation whatsoever... No one said anything about a "mandate", BTW. That's a sloppy response in line with your sloppy (or non-existent) research.