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Politics : Sharks in the Septic Tank -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Lane3 who wrote (61143)	10/4/2002 5:33:01 PM
From: TimF	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 82486

I don't think this is as much of a twist. Too take advantage of the Christian models idea of forgiveness you have to be really repentant or you have to be ignoring the actual model and instead applying a model that vaguely resembles the Christian model. But as far as I can tell Rand's model is that your self interest is morally right. All that is left is to argue about what is really in one's self interest. If you think taking the money is in your self interest then you are not really manipulating the model just coming to a conclusion based on it. The arguments for it not being in one's self interest seem to be 1 - You will feel better about yourself if you earn the money honestly through your own work Well not everyone would agree with this. Also what about inherited money, or money one at from a charity raffle, do you just toss them away? 2 - Guilt - It is likely that many people would feel guilty about steeling or embelizing money or getting rich based on causing some one else's death. But if you truly believe that it is not wrong doing anything that is in you self interest then guilt should not be a factor if you view getting money as being in your self interest. If you have a personal moral code that goes beyond self interest and says some things are wrong even if they are in your self interest then I can see why you could feel guilty and because you feel guilty the act might not have been in your self interest, but if you start only with the self interest measure I don't see any reason to feel guilty. I will present one possible argument against the ideas I have presented, that attacks them from a very different direction. Both of my examples are somewhat fanciful esp. the second one. You can not really be 100% sure that you will get away with theft, and I at least do not have the power to cause someone on the other side of the world to fall instantly painlessly dead, and even if I did I don't see how doing so would make me rich. Do you think that fanciful arguments are useful in moral questions because they can isolate particular issues from real world complications and confusions or do you think that since they do not reflect our real experience they should not be given much weight? Tim