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Thread: Anwar al-Awlaki killed
Originally Posted by a completely inoffensive name:
I don't understand the mentality of only caring about the result and not the method.
But that's not there case. There are ends and there are means. Here is merely a matter of certain means being acceptable to some and reprehensible to others. You all can go ahead and work out which means should and which means shouldn't be in the policymaker's toolkit based upon your arbitrary standards and morals. I don't understand the mentality of only caring about the result and not the method.
Originally Posted by Montmorency:
But that's not there case. There are ends and there are means. Here is merely a matter of certain means being acceptable to some and reprehensible to others. You all can go ahead and work out which means should and which means shouldn't be in the policymaker's toolkit based upon your arbitrary standards and morals.
My understanding is that the president ordered for him to be killed, and so he was killed. This isn't really a good precedent to establish even if the man was a genuine terrorist.But that's not there case. There are ends and there are means. Here is merely a matter of certain means being acceptable to some and reprehensible to others. You all can go ahead and work out which means should and which means shouldn't be in the policymaker's toolkit based upon your arbitrary standards and morals.
Arbitrary standards and morals = If we all said rape was ok, it would now be ok. lol
Originally Posted by a completely inoffensive name:
My understanding is that the president ordered for him to be killed, and so he was killed. This isn't really a good precedent to establish even if the man was a genuine terrorist.
It's not a particularly new precedent. In fact, Obama was following a precedent established years ago.My understanding is that the president ordered for him to be killed, and so he was killed. This isn't really a good precedent to establish even if the man was a genuine terrorist.
If you all believed rape were acceptable, it would be acceptable to you.
Do you dislike the word arbitary? Fair enough. Arbitrariness is, of course, subjective. You believe as you do for many reasons, some of them biological and sociological.
This perspective offers you no solutions. It gives you no pleasure, and so it wearies you to read it. Perhaps you are even angered.
Do you get it?
Do you dislike the word arbitary? Fair enough. Arbitrariness is, of course, subjective. You believe as you do for many reasons, some of them biological and sociological.
This perspective offers you no solutions. It gives you no pleasure, and so it wearies you to read it. Perhaps you are even angered.
Do you get it?
Originally Posted by PanzerJaeger:
It's not a particularly new precedent. In fact, Obama was following a precedent established years ago.
Its newish. <10 years old. Point is that it shouldn't be something to be tolerated.It's not a particularly new precedent. In fact, Obama was following a precedent established years ago.
Originally Posted by Montmorency:
If you all believed rape were acceptable, it would be acceptable to you.
Not what I said. If we all said it was ok to rape, does that make the make the act of rape in and of itself ok? Do you think it is perfectly fine to say that rape is bad in the US because we say it is bad, but it is ok in some tribal land where they think differently?If you all believed rape were acceptable, it would be acceptable to you.
Originally Posted by :
Do you dislike the word arbitary? Fair enough. Arbitrariness is, of course, subjective. You believe as you do for many reasons, some of them biological and sociological.
I believe what I believe because they are (or at least I try to have them be) logical conclusions stemming from undeniable axioms. Of course, you would probably deny them, but I doubt you would have a solid reason to refute them.Do you dislike the word arbitary? Fair enough. Arbitrariness is, of course, subjective. You believe as you do for many reasons, some of them biological and sociological.
Originally Posted by :
This perspective offers you no solutions. It gives you no pleasure, and so it wearies you to read it. Perhaps you are even angered.
Not angered, not weary. Linear algebra wearies me when I have to do 5x5 matrixes all night long. This perspective intrigues me because it seems self defeating. If we all believed x was acceptable than it would be acceptable to us. So if we all believe that our standards and morals were not arbitrary, then our standards and morals are not arbitrary. This perspective offers you no solutions. It gives you no pleasure, and so it wearies you to read it. Perhaps you are even angered.
Originally Posted by :
Do you get it?
Kinda, sorta, not really. Not a philosophy major so of course I am completely vulnerable for someone with actual knowledge to wipe the floor with me.Do you get it?
Originally Posted by a completely inoffensive name:
Its newish. <10 years old. Point is that it shouldn't be something to be tolerated.
Not what I said. If we all said it was ok to rape, does that make the make the act of rape in and of itself ok? Do you think it is perfectly fine to say that rape is bad in the US because we say it is bad, but it is ok in some tribal land where they think differently?
Why is it either bad or good in and of itself? How do we know? Why should we care?Its newish. <10 years old. Point is that it shouldn't be something to be tolerated.
Not what I said. If we all said it was ok to rape, does that make the make the act of rape in and of itself ok? Do you think it is perfectly fine to say that rape is bad in the US because we say it is bad, but it is ok in some tribal land where they think differently?
Originally Posted by :
I believe what I believe because they are (or at least I try to have them be) logical conclusions stemming from undeniable axioms. Of course, you would probably deny them, but I doubt you would have a solid reason to refute them.
Undeniable? How so? "Logical" and "undeniable" are excuses. I believe what I believe because they are (or at least I try to have them be) logical conclusions stemming from undeniable axioms. Of course, you would probably deny them, but I doubt you would have a solid reason to refute them.
Originally Posted by :
Not angered, not weary. Linear algebra wearies me when I have to do 5x5 matrixes all night long. This perspective intrigues me because it seems self defeating. If we all believed x was acceptable than it would be acceptable to us. So if we all believe that our standards and morals were not arbitrary, then our standards and morals are not arbitrary.
They would not be arbitrary - to us. Correct. What I said was tautological: if you believe something, you believe it.Not angered, not weary. Linear algebra wearies me when I have to do 5x5 matrixes all night long. This perspective intrigues me because it seems self defeating. If we all believed x was acceptable than it would be acceptable to us. So if we all believe that our standards and morals were not arbitrary, then our standards and morals are not arbitrary.
I also said that arbitrariness is subjective - like your moral axioms.
Supposedly the Justice Dept issued a confidential ruling on this guy, stating that he was fair game. Not the same as a trial, but at least this was done within some sort of legal framework.
If we're going to get upset about the treatment of American citizens in the GWOT, I'd much rather get worked up about Jose Padilla, who appears to have been tortured until he went utterly insane. Sigh.
-edit-
Ah, here it is:
If we're going to get upset about the treatment of American citizens in the GWOT, I'd much rather get worked up about Jose Padilla, who appears to have been tortured until he went utterly insane. Sigh.
-edit-
Ah, here it is:
The Justice Department wrote a secret memorandum authorizing the lethal targeting of Anwar al-Aulaqi, the American-born radical cleric who was killed by a U.S. drone strike Friday, according to administration officials.
The document was produced following a review of the legal issues raised by striking a U.S. citizen and involved senior lawyers from across the administration. There was no dissent about the legality of killing Aulaqi, the officials said. [...]
A Justice Department spokeswoman declined to comment. The administration officials refused to disclose the exact legal analysis used to authorize targeting Aulaqi, or how they considered any Fifth Amendment right to due process.
So everyone agrees that this is ok. Just dont squeal like pickets when Russia next radiates someone or China nominates an ethnic minority leader as a terrorist. And do not cry about backpackers in Iran.
Don't complain in a generation when India and China knock off disidents internal and external.
At the top of your game you changed the rules for the worse. Perfect for the next superpower to play on.
Don't complain in a generation when India and China knock off disidents internal and external.
At the top of your game you changed the rules for the worse. Perfect for the next superpower to play on.
Originally Posted by Lemur:
Supposedly the Justice Dept issued a confidential ruling on this guy, stating that he was fair game. Not the same as a trial, but at least this was done within some sort of legal framework.
The Justice Department is the executive branch. The same guys who brought us enhanced interrogation techniques. This is essentially the prosecutors determining guilt and passing sentence.Supposedly the Justice Dept issued a confidential ruling on this guy, stating that he was fair game. Not the same as a trial, but at least this was done within some sort of legal framework.
Originally Posted by Montmorency:
Why is it either bad or good in and of itself? How do we know? Why should we care?
Ahhh, I love the landscape where this is heading. Why is it either bad or good in and of itself? How do we know? Why should we care?
The human biology is on average probably well approximated by a constant. Human biology appears to have built-in concepts of innocence and justice, and so basing moral on moral feelings (and a bit of logic), we can deduce it objectively to be wrong when the victim is innocent. The subjective part is here the definition of moral. However, the definition used here is not abitrary, regardless of subjectivity. Arbitrary morals would let being e.g. the current weather decide whether the act you are currently thinking of is either moral or immoral.
As for rape as a bad thing in itself, that's a more complicated topic. In an eye for an eye-moral, rapists could get raped as punishment, just as murderers could get murdered (executed).
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