DISQUS

In this video you struggle with the "temptation" to pass a pure moral judgment on someone who's preferences contradict yours, to say of them that they are not merely contrary or malevolent, but morally EVIL

The premise behind this temptation seems to be that your preferences are weak justifiers, and "no better" than someone else's. You seek out stronger justifiers that operate beyond the realm of clashes among preferences. (This I call the "moral urge".)

I understand the urge. I experience it myself. But I can't really follow through because I'm a non-moralist (meta-ethical agnostic, more precisely). Morality still makes no sense to me. So instead, I accept that my preferences are the best I have. No. More than that. My preferences are are sufficiently strong justifications. I overturn the moral urge by reminding myself that I'm completely comfortable with my preferences as justifiers.

I suspect I can do this so well because I've become acutely aware that my preferences are dominated by benevolence. Since my preferences are in fact benevolent, I don't worry that justifying by way of my preferences will harm others.

To me, benevolence is a sufficiently strong justifier. I don't need morality telling me to help others.

You might enjoy reading my essay about this topic in which I try to overturn the notion that benevolence must be a weak justifier. I discuss morality in it as well. I call it "Benevolence as a Weak Justifier" and this is the URL for it:

http://forum.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=m...