Naked Ethics

[thinkdr]

Trump is a very divisive President - half of America loves him and half of them hate him
...

But its not only about Trump - he is just the acceptable / unacceptable face of something very deep going on over there

The battle is between traditional American values of God and Family and Patriotism against the newer ones of identity politics and social
justice and civil disobedience - but it runs so deep that its wrong to categorise it as merely tribalistic - that explanation is far too simple

That's an interesting categorization you put forth. Some of us favor the traditional American value, along with social justice and civil disobedience. I count myself among them.

The topic of this thread is Applied Ethics, and what are the bare facts.

Yes, 30% ti 40% so far love him; and 60% are 'turned off' by him. He is indeed "the face of something deep": namely, the attempt by multi-millionaires and billionaires to introduce fascism to the USA. I mean by "fascism" the merger of government and corporate administration run by oligarchs and favoring corporations. Often it results - as we have with Trump (and with Putin) today - in a kleptocracy.

[Prismatic567]

The fact is DNA wise all humans are programmed with certain generic features to optimize for the whole of humanity
while leaving room for individual freedom within the requirements of the whole

This does not explain why tribalism has always existed in our species and still does no matter how advanced we become
So were we all programmed to think of humanity as merely a single entity then there would never be any divisions at all

Tribalism emerged out of necessity and is adaptive, i.e. has survival values.
It is noted humans in the early stages started with the realization of the advantage of being in small groups but they also realized the greater advantage of larger groups, thus larger and larger groups [tribes] are form as evident in modern times.
Naturally there are the cons of larger groups, thus the need for rules to manage whatever is immoral.

While the progress is towards larger group into one single entity, the thrust here is to develop common shared goals on critical issues, e.g. survival of the species.
Even with the drive for one single entity in terms of shared visions and goals, divisions are still needed re the necessity of specialization and its advantages.
E.g. an ant colony will act as one entity when the nest is under threat, but there are nevertheless different divisions and groups of ants doing their specialized task.

Thus the target is to strive for humanity to act as a single entity especially toward threats against the human species as a whole, e.g. climate change, limited resources, WMDs, rogue meteor/asteroid.

For example if there appear a rogue asteroid heading Earth's path and is large enough to destroy Earth to smithereens, it is imperative that everyone on Earth think and act as one to deal with the threat rather than on their own group or tribe.
The same attitude need to be developed to deal with the other critical threats against the human species.

[thinkdr]

THE JOY OF LIVING ETHICALLY

Here is something to think about.

I will define three emotions in the order of how valuable they are. I’ll remind us of a key imperative of Ethics, the violation of which impedes the experiencing of the most valuable emotion. And will then draw an important conclusion from these deliberations.

The Unified Theory of Ethics is that new paradigm everyone has read about here: https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/viewtop ... 1&t=195234 as well as in the References listed below which provide more details and clarification.
The following are three definitions derived from this Unified Theory of Ethics, using the three major Dimensions of Value to do the derivation. Those Dimensions are Systemic (“S”) value; Extrinsic (“E”) value; and Intrinsic (“I”) value.
Satisfaction is a Systemic emotion. Pleasure is an Extrinsic emotion. And Joy is an Intrinsic emotion. So here is an analysis of certain select emotions, arranging them from least (at the top) to most value.

S: Satisfaction
E: Pleasure
I: Joy

[Recall that one of the early theorems of Ethics (when phrased as an imperative) is Do no harm! To do harm is to conduct oneself immorally.]

Joy is the result of love (I-valuation.) Those who act immorally are not behaving lovingly toward those to whom they have done harm. Therefore to act immorally is to miss out on joy, to lack joy in their life.
Since a major benefit of complying with, and practicing, Ethics is to gain joy …as a result we feel sorry for those who don’t live their ethics. In an important sense, they are losers

[Ecmandu]

You speak a lot but say nothing. You don’t know heaven and hell and beyond. It’s not your fault.

Again, you speak a lot and say nothing.