Sapere Aude!

Slipper Slope and the Same-Sex Marriage Debate

Won’t legitimizing same-sex marriage lead to legitimizing polyamorous relationships too? If two men can marry one another, why not one man and two women?  This argument is a favorite of former U.S. Sen. Rick Santorum, the so-called Christian right and the right-wing blogosphere.

Responding to these arguments is a challenge. On the one hand, I reject the tactic of distinguishing the good gays from the “bad” poly people. Further marginalizing the marginalized is just the wrong trajectory for any liberation movement to take. And it reminds me of the way that some mainstream gay activists have sold out transgender and gender-nonconforming groups. We’re the married gays who make neighborhoods stable and herald the arrival of cool coffeehouses; we’re not those awful drag queens. This is all trash, it sells out members of our own community who deserve more than that, and it’s a punt, really, not an argument.

On the other hand, I don’t want to fail to draw any distinction, either. I don’t know what polyamory’s approval ratings are, but I bet they aren’t high — Newt Gingrich notwithstanding. At the very least, it would be bad politics to agree and argue that there really is no difference.

How about this response, instead: to question whether the “slippery slope” is the right way to argue at all.  Philosophically speaking, it certainly isn’t. You don’t decide the ethical value of a decision based on other decisions; you decide based on the decision at hand. Is euthanasia of a brain-dead human being morally permissible? Maybe or maybe not, but the answer does not depend upon the slippery slope of whether it’s permissible in other cases, say, of chronic pain, or mere dislike of aging. The slippery slope is a dangerous fallacy.

Of course, policy is not the same as philosophy, and in policy discussions, the slippery slope is commonplace. We draw bright-line rules to prevent slippery slopes all the time, even if the lines may be a little over- or under-inclusive. Driving a car while texting may be safe if you’re an excellent driver or if you’re on an empty road. But we as a society can’t get into those details, and if we allow even some texting, we might allow too much. So, bright line: no texting while driving.

Some value choices, though, are just too important for bright-line, prevent-slippery-slope decision making.  Marriage is one of them. It affects too many people, and asks too many important questions on its own.

via www.salon.com

Philosophy — What's the Use? - NYTimes.com

The perennial objection to any appeal to philosophy is that philosophers themselves disagree among themselves about everything, so that there is no body of philosophical knowledge on which non-philosophers can rely.  It’s true that philosophers do not agree on answers to the “big questions” like God’s existence, free will, the nature of moral obligation and so on.  But they do agree about many logical interconnections and conceptual distinctions that are essential for thinking clearly about the big questions.   Some examples: thinking about God and evil requires the key distinction between evil that is gratuitous (not necessary for some greater good) and evil that is not gratuitous; thinking about free will requires the distinction between a choice’s being caused and its being compelled; and thinking about morality requires the distinction between an action that is intrinsically wrong (regardless of its consequences) and one that is wrong simply because of its consequences.  Such distinctions arise from philosophical thinking, and philosophers know a great deal about how to understand and employ them.  In this important sense, there is body of philosophical knowledge on which non-philosophers can and should rely.

via opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com

Locked in the Ivory Tower: Why JSTOR Imprisons Academic Research - Atlantic Mobile

This morning, I searched for an article about autism on JSTOR, the online database of academic journals. I have a child on the autistic spectrum, and I like to be aware of the latest research on the topic. I could not access any of the first 200 articles that contained the word "autism." That's because, for the most part, only individuals with a college ID card can read academic journal articles.  Everyone else, including journalists, non-affiliated scholars, think tanks and curious individuals, must pay a substantial fee per article, if the articles are available at all.

I later found one article that was available for $38. I'm not sure why one twelve page article costs $38. It takes me about eight minutes to scan a twelve page article. The researcher receives no royalties. Why does it cost so much to read one article? 

The answer lies in the antiquated system of academic publishing.

via m.theatlantic.com

Louis C.K. on Personal Responsibility for Social Problems

 

(Hat tip Andrew Sullivan.)

Struggling with the question of belief? Homer Simpson's got the answer | Julian Baggini | Comment is free | guardian.co.uk

Having argued last week that prayer provides benefits for believers that are not available for atheists, I was interested to come across an academic paper by Tim Mawson that argued atheists have an obligation to pray to God that he stop them being atheists.

Mawson says his argument only works for atheists "who assign anything greater than a negligible probability to God's existence". In that respect, his is just the latest in a long line of arguments that use the mere possibility that God exists as a reason to be religious, or at least give it a go.

The most famous of these is Pascal's Wager, which, in a nutshell, says that you have more to lose by not believing and being wrong than you do by believing and being wrong, and more to gain by believing and being right than not believing and being right. Critics protest that this is only true if all outcomes were equally likely, but if there is only a minuscule chance that God exists, the odds aren't worth taking. To which the reply is: the stakes here are so high, even an incredibly long shot is worth a go.

I think there is a fairly decisive response to this, which also takes care of Mawson. But it also has a more interesting positive corollary: it shows why belief in God doesn't matter. Even if we think it is more likely God exists than not, we should not bother to believe in him. (Apologies for the masculine pronoun, but I defer to the conventions of those who believe.) I won't call it Baggini's Wager, in part because I'm sure I'm not the first to think of it. So let's call it Homer's Wager, for reasons that will soon become clear.

Here's how it works. Let's start with the very generous assumption that we think it more likely than not that God exists. To put a number on such things is ridiculous of course, but for the sake of argument, we'll use the figure of 67% which was the one a risk assessor came up with a few years ago. You might think that, if this is true, you should believe in God. But here's the problem: does it matter which God you believe in?

Maybe it doesn't matter, but it does matter if it matters. If it doesn't matter which God you believe in, it's because there are no important rewards or penalties for believing in the right or wrong God. But if that's the case, then it would not seem to matter if you didn't believe at all. A God who didn't care if you got belief right would hardly come down hard on those who didn't believe at all. I think we can safely conclude that the probability of a liberal God fascist – one who doesn't mind which version of him you believe in, but if you don't believe in him at all, he'll let you rot in hell – is negligible. As Homer Simpson put it when arguing that he shouldn't go to church: "Don't you think the almighty has better things to worry about than where one little guy spends one measly hour of his week?"

So if it doesn't matter whether you believe in such a vague God or not, you have no compelling reason to bother. The atheist bus slogan could just as easily be "There's probably a God. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life".

If, on the other hand, it matters which God you believe in, it's because there are certain important rewards of belief that you will not receive if you don't believe in the right one, or punishmen

via www.guardian.co.uk