GT WT
1000+ posts
06/04/11 02:02 PM
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Has our species so profoundly altered our planet that we are now in a new geological epoch - the anthropocene? Some geologists think so -
The Link
In reply to:
Now our effect on the climate and our fellow species is having a global impact. "The fossil record will reveal a massive loss of plant and animal species, and also the scale of invasive species – how we've distributed animals and plants across the globe," Zalasiewicz says.
Of course, recognition of the new epoch is just a plot by evil, liberal scientists to push their agenda of environmental activism
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"Faith must trample under foot all reason, sense, and understanding. "
Martin Luther
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Perham1
5000+ posts
06/06/11 06:41 AM
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Could be. Man wipes out a lot of species, even genera.
We're not very good caretakers of the planet.
I have the simplest tastes. I am always satisfied with the best. Oscar Wilde
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general35
10,000+ posts
06/06/11 07:58 AM
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I'd like to quote Navin R. Johnson: "Nothing? Are you kidding? Page 73 - Johnson, Navin R.! I'm somebody now!
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OrngNugz
250+ posts
06/06/11 09:24 AM
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Yep, unless we see some serious change fairly soon we are pretty much ensuring our collapse. We are probably gonna take a lot of other species with us.
Personally I don't see humanity coming together for our collective good. We might as well have fun and go out in style.
The good news is the Earth will be just fine a few hundred years after we are gone.
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Perham1
5000+ posts
06/06/11 09:48 AM
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Yeah, the earth will recover after our demise.
And if things get really, really bad, then in a billion years or so most (all?) of the earth will have been recycled anyways.
I have the simplest tastes. I am always satisfied with the best. Oscar Wilde
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Dionysus
2500+ posts
06/06/11 01:03 PM
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Mother Nature will only put up with our [censored] for so long.
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Coelacanth
2500+ posts
06/06/11 04:22 PM
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Let's just assume, for the sake of the argument, that man is poisoning the Earth to the point that it is killing off various species and also that, in time, this poisoning will threaten to eliminate the material basis for human civilization as well.
In such a case, what empirical evidence leads you to the conclusion that all this is a bad thing?
Perhaps someone might say: well, it is deserved, since man is greedy, and as for the animals and lesser species, they deserve it as well, since they haven't adapted to the changing environmental conditions, and so Darwin mandates their extinction as well.
By what science can you say that they are wrong?
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GT WT
1000+ posts
06/07/11 05:41 AM
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In reply to:
what empirical evidence leads you to the conclusion that all this is a bad thing?
It's a value judgement, Coelacanth. Some of us value intact ecosystems and biodiversity.
"Faith must trample under foot all reason, sense, and understanding. "
Martin Luther
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Perham1
5000+ posts
06/07/11 06:51 AM
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Let's just assume, for the sake of the argument, that man is poisoning the Earth to the point that it is killing off various species ....
Anybody who has looked at this knows that it need not be, and often is not, "poison" which kills off species. Man has killed many large animals to extinction. It also isn't just "various species", but many species.
As far as it being a bad thing, it depends. Sometimes it may be bad, sometimes not. If some extinct animal would have helped us in some manner (new antibiotics, some beneficial genetic makeup) we will probably never know the full value of that lost animal.
But since your question is about why "all this is a bad thing", noting your use of the word "all", one need only look at the severely depleted fishing stocks (not quite extinct, but getting close). The "empirical" evidence why this is bad is quite clear: a reduction in food sources for humans.
Perhaps someone might say: well, it is deserved, since man is greedy, and as for the animals and lesser species, they deserve it as well, since they haven't adapted to the changing environmental conditions, and so Darwin mandates their extinction as well.
I really don't think that is what Darwin mandates.
I don't think the poster is aware of the extent to which man causes extinctions.
I have the simplest tastes. I am always satisfied with the best. Oscar Wilde
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Perham1
5000+ posts
06/07/11 07:02 AM
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what empirical evidence leads you to the conclusion that all this is a bad thing?
Think about that question given the following statement.
(from Bryson's "A Short History ...."
"According to the University of Chicago palaentologist David Raup, the background rate of extinction on Earth throughout biological history has been one species lost every four years on average. According to Richard Leakey and Roger Lewin in The Sixth Extinction, human-caused extinction now may be running at as much as 120,000 times that level. (...)
This certainly isn't a good thing.
I have the simplest tastes. I am always satisfied with the best. Oscar Wilde
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general35
10,000+ posts
06/07/11 07:30 AM
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this planet has been through a lot worse.
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Perham1
5000+ posts
06/07/11 07:31 AM
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this planet has been through a lot worse.
Yes, and most livings things didn't make it.
Are you talking about Noah's flood?
I have the simplest tastes. I am always satisfied with the best. Oscar Wilde
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Coelacanth
2500+ posts
06/07/11 10:49 AM
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Perham1,
In reply to:
I don't think the poster is aware of the extent to which man causes extinctions.
For the purposes of this thread, I am not concerned with validity of the claim that anthropogenic climate change will have disastrous implications. I’m even willing to stipulate, for the sake of the argument, that it will have apocalyptic implications. Nor do I mean to disagree with the secondary claim—the assertion that such an apocalyptic mass extinction is a bad thing.
My interest is in trying to determine the basis for GT’s value judgment. He says that “some of us value intact ecosystems and biodiversity”. I think it is safe to assume that many of us share that judgment. And I am willing to go further: even if some stranger made the argument that since man is greedy, and since other species have failed to adapt, they all deserve their fate, I am willing to tell the stranger that he is wrong. And I think GT and many others would join me in saying so—so long as they weren’t asked to dwell too deeply upon the implications of what it means to say that the stranger is wrong.
In saying the stranger is wrong, aren’t we claiming access to some higher sense of what is right and what is wrong?—Some higher sense than an arbitrary value judgment, which of course any person is free to disagree with? To say a stranger’s argument is wrong is a fundamentally different thing than to say that his argument is disagreeable.
And this is why the question about the basis of GT’s value judgment is so important to the argument. If it is based on that higher sense of right and wrong, then it can aspire to bind others to its world view; it is a transcendent vision of moral judgment to which all moral beings are subject. On the other hand, if his value judgment is a mere personal preference for one thing over another—if it is mere disagreement about what one person or group chooses to value vis a vis what some other person or group chooses to value—then there is no moral basis on which we can say that the stranger is in fact wrong.
In the latter case, the stranger could well make the following argument: that he acquired his value judgment from his culture, a culture that would have included his parents, his teachers, and even, say, the writings of Darwin. And he could say, further, that his adherence to that morality is measured by the response of people he loved and admired, who reflected their approval or disapproval of his moral choices. Or, as an alternative, he might go the route of limited existentialism and say that his sense of morality is not constrained by the opinion of others, especially those such as GT or Perham, who clearly hold a different moral framework than he does.
Well, that was precisely the argument that GT made on a neighboring thread about the basis of his moral judgments. But if GT behaves in a moral fashion when he absorbs the moral outlook of his culture and rejects the moral outlook of those outside his culture, then on what basis can we say that the stranger in our example is behaving any less morally when he invokes those same arguments? The answer, of course, is that we are left with no moral basis for saying that the stranger is wrong to believe as he does, or to act according to those beliefs. And as a consequence, whatever judgments or pronouncements or laws that follow can only be arbitrary value judgments.
If, on the other hand, the value judgment is based on some higher sense of right and wrong—some transcendent justice—then it must be that we have reached beyond the empirical certainties of the lab to reference a vision of truth whose completed form lays beyond our scientific grasp. GT has told us that “Truth is a construct”, but this sort of truth—based on transcendent justice—is no construct, but rather it is either an inborn or revealed sense that impresses itself in our minds in a far different way than material experience, which can be measured empirically.
It is only by means of transcendent justice that we can say that the stranger who claims we all deserve our Darwinian fate can be said to be wrong. And it is only by transcendent justice that the actions of Hitler, or Stalin, or any other oppressive regime can be said to be wrong. It will not do to say that such people are in fact refuted by force of arms by those who hold different arbitrary value judgments, since by that logic we simply appeal to what is rather than what ought to be. And an appeal to is ultimately is an appeal to the status quo, whether it agrees or disagrees with our value judgments; it provides no moral basis for opposing the stranger who sanctions murder in the name of Darwin, nor our neighbor who murders in the name of national socialism or Marxism.
It seems to me that GT, in his own mysterious way, has brought us back to the issue of “necessary versus willing faith” that he brought up on the other thread. The original claim was that even scientists must have faith in certain fundamental things, such as the chair being real, or the hand in front of my face being real—“those mundane little assumptions we all must make every moment of our lives”. Pressed further, GT conceded that “the scientist, being human, tends to slip into the mode of simply accepting things, even important things such as moral decisions, on faith.”
But now we’re at the critical moment, whereby we need to determine if indeed it is “necessary” for both scientists and strangers to believe in the sort of transcendent moral truth that GT has explicitly rejected. Without such a moral truth, it becomes impossible to arrange the world in morally comprehensible ways. It becomes impossible to advocate for any cause, or to denounce any crime, on moral grounds.
It will be immediately noted that many who agree with GT that morality is a construct live their lives in a moral fashion and that they continually denounce immoral activity. This is no doubt true. But we are left to wonder whether this implies that they have silently, even unconsciously consented to the sort of faithful vision of transcendent truth that is indeed necessary to live in such a way.
None of which is a proof for God. But the argument that “necessary faith is the only legitimate faith” puts us one step away from God, since God would, of course, be the most obvious source of that transcendent truth, if it did exist.
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Perham1
5000+ posts
06/07/11 11:00 AM
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For the purposes of this thread, I am not concerned with validity of the claim that anthropogenic climate change will have disastrous implications.
My point goes beyond just the global climate change effects wrought by man.
A mass extinction is certainly bad for man, perhaps not bad for the planet. And when defining "wrong" here we usually do so on how it affects humans.
I have the simplest tastes. I am always satisfied with the best. Oscar Wilde
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GT WT
1000+ posts
06/07/11 11:04 AM
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To place Coelacanth's comments more firmly in the domain of the present topic, let me ask if he believes the religious are better stewards of the natural world than the non-religious?
p.s., you referred to me by name 9 times in a single post? Jeez, I am humbled....
"Faith must trample under foot all reason, sense, and understanding. "
Martin Luther
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Perham1
5000+ posts
06/07/11 11:04 AM
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And it is only by transcendent justice that the actions of Hitler, or Stalin, or any other oppressive regime can be said to be wrong.
Not at all. What does "transcendent justice" even mean? But no matter, TJ is not required to call those actions wrong. Simple justice, ala Hillel, will do quite nicely.
I have the simplest tastes. I am always satisfied with the best. Oscar Wilde
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Perham1
5000+ posts
06/07/11 11:06 AM
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But we are left to wonder whether this implies that they have silently, even unconsciously consented to the sort of faithful vision of transcendent truth that is indeed necessary to live in such a way.
Talk about begging the question.
I have the simplest tastes. I am always satisfied with the best. Oscar Wilde
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Perham1
5000+ posts
06/07/11 11:13 AM
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To place Coelacanth's comments more firmly in the domain of the present topic, let me ask if he believes the religious are better stewards of the natural world than the non-religious?
Depends on the time, depends on the religion, depends on the person. There are those who wish to protect nature and there are those who think the earth was given to us by their god to basically exploit, and that this god will provide no matter what. Sort of the "sparrow hypothesis". We seem to be seeing more of that view today.
I have the simplest tastes. I am always satisfied with the best. Oscar Wilde
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Coelacanth
2500+ posts
06/07/11 11:43 AM
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GT_WT,
In reply to:
To place Coelacanth's comments more firmly in the domain of the present topic...
The present topic cannot divorce itself from the domain of your point of view regarding morality and how people ought to act if they are to act in a moral fashion.
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Coelacanth
2500+ posts
06/07/11 11:55 AM
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Perham1,
In reply to:
Simple justice, ala Hillel, will do quite nicely.
Hillel's framework for moral behavior is very much a vision of transcendent justice, and also one whose foundation was belief in God.
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