Why is coercion bad?

Jackson LaRose:

You set up a straw man.  My question is, why?

Is there a reason for the mocking tone? Did I mock you somehow?

That aside, how exactly did I set up a straw man?

Autolykos:

Did I mock you somehow?

No, but you are being a weenie.

Autolykos:

That aside, how exactly did I set up a straw man?

By typing words out on a computer.  In all seriousness, by morphing this,

Jackson LaRose:

If I want some of your stuff, I have to be able to "outcompete" you for that stuff.  Otherwise, you just wouldn't listen to me.  If I have the ability to outcompete you (power), than I can successfully appropriate your claimed items.

into this,

Autolykos:

How does a certain amount of money or other wealth necessarily constitute the ability to "outcompete" anyone?

That is definitely a non-sequitur which you seem eager to fight with, hence, the straw man.

Jackson LaRose:

No, but you are being a weenie.

Really now? How so? And even assuming arguendo that I am being a "weenie", how does that justify mockery on your part?

Jackson LaRose:

Autolykos:

That aside, how exactly did I set up a straw man?

By typing words out on a computer.  In all seriousness, by morphing this,

Jackson LaRose:

If I want some of your stuff, I have to be able to "outcompete" you for that stuff.  Otherwise, you just wouldn't listen to me.  If I have the ability to outcompete you (power), than I can successfully appropriate your claimed items.

into this,

Autolykos:

How does a certain amount of money or other wealth necessarily constitute the ability to "outcompete" anyone?

That is definitely a non-sequitur which you seem eager to fight with, hence, the straw man.

So you weren't claiming that holding a certain amount of money or other wealth necessarily constitutes the ability to "outcompete" someone over his stuff? Then what were you claiming, exactly?

There are other types of power besides economic power.  I'm claiming that in a world of scarcity, competition for resources takes place, and that "power" equates to competitive advantage, or rather, the means to achieve a competitive advantage. 

 

"I'm saying that is how the current system operates.  Of course, I can't envision an alternative, but that may be my limitation."

How is it that in any system might can make right happen when right is a subjective phenomenon? Might can make right happen, but it cannot make right as such. The value judgements surrounding a murder remain the same regardless of whether or not the murderer is actually able to go through with his plan or not. This is one area where I believe that Stirner was very mistaken.

Neodoxy,

I am treating "might makes right" as a descriptive, rather than a prescriptive statement.  It's akin to staing,

"History is written by the victors."

I'm not sure this is ever mentioned by Stirner, although you could gleen this position from his philosophy in general.

I'll restate the question, even though it shouldn't need to be asked, to get the thread back track, because whatever it's on now is going nowhere.

So, as the original question, why is coercion bad?

Well, is coercion good?

I think I'd lead more to a utilitarian choice than a moral one, does coercion produce anything of substance?

Jackson LaRose:

There are other types of power besides economic power.  I'm claiming that in a world of scarcity, competition for resources takes place, and that "power" equates to competitive advantage, or rather, the means to achieve a competitive advantage.

My point was to challenge the very notion of "economic power". That's why I focused on it. In retrospect, I understand now why you took that as a straw man - I should've been explicit that I was singling out just one kind of what you call "power". Hope this helps.

I'll just pop in here to quickly reply to the criticism levelled at my natural law position.

Boniek, your reply mostly consisted of restatements of your own position, e.g. "I do think that right and wrong objectively exist - as our subjective feelings", "I believe that 'all ethics are subjective'". Assuming what you need to prove is hardly a rebuttal.

boniek:

"I can at any time say and do contrary to the public consensus (or even my own) thus breaking objectivity of such goal."

How does the fact that you can do contrary to "consensus" prove ethical subjectivism? It would only do so if you presupposed that morality was determined by consensus, which was not my position.

Perhaps I was unclear when I wrote that "all values are equal." Clearly, if no value judgement are objectively better than any others, then they are equally without value. You also completely dodged my argument for ultimate goals.

Jackson LaRose's reply caricatured me. boniek failed to account for the Aristotelian possibility of a natural end for man. He didn't address a very old and well-known philosophical position, meaning his argumentation was lacking. Clearly, this inadequacy can be answered, namely by addressing it.

It's not me who misuses the term "law", but rather you who misues the term "ethical law". The point of natural law inquiry is to discover those rules that ought to govern mankind. By the same token, "ethical laws" are those virtues which we should cultivate if we want to achieve "the art of living", in Aristotelian terms. I repeat, ethical law does not stipulate that you can do no wrong (what would be the point of morality in that case?) and there is no analogue between it and the laws of physics. Asserting that it does is a complete caricature.

Jackson LaRose:

Morality is inherently a social construct, just as Crusoe has no need for property (rightful possession), he has no need for morals (rightful conduct), unless he fears some sort of otherworldly reprocussion.

Depends on how you define "morals". I use the word the way it was used by Ayn Rand, namely the way in which you should conduct yourself if you want to survive in the long run. Clearly, on that definition, even Crusoe has a use for morality.

I don't really get the relevance of existentialism and yoga, which you go on to mention. Again, I will repeat my challenge, which I don't think any of the ethical subjectivists on this board has addressed.

The ethical relativist denies that any values are superior to others. But by engaging in argumentation, surely the relativist has made a value judgement — that it would be preferable to argue than not. How could he have accomplished this if all values are equal?

The obvious reply to this is that ethical relativism does not maintain that value judgements are impossible — for that would indeed be a self-refuting and hopeless position — but rather that whatever standard of value is employed in making such judgements is necessarily subjective and relative to the individual. That is to say, nothing has value without someone to place a value on it. True enough, but by what standard of value were those values adopted? By virtue of what goal are our goals pursued? And how could any standard of value in the long run be adopted at all if none possess any apparent superiorities?

Of course, they have subjective superiorities in the eyes of human beings, but this begs the question. By what standard of value was the standard of value "I will do that which seems to me superior" adopted?

As Aristotle notes in the Nichomachean Ethics, all human ends are typically justified only by reference to other ends. As a result, like the incessant inquiring of a child, one can pose the question "Why?' in the face of every human endeavour and after a while seemingly tear away the basis for all motivation. Replying "because I want to" or invoking Humean "passions" is no answer, for the decision to obey one's passions and urges is itself a choice that demands higher-order justification.

To cease the infinite regress of ends, there must be some self-justifying end-in-itself that makes it possible to evaluate that acting to gain and/or keep any value, any goal, is preferable to not, and which allows the rise of a chain of means and ends in the first place. This ultimate goal cannot be subjectively chosen (for that would beg the question) but is objectively determined by the facts of reality and necessarily beyond one's choice.

Objectivist Ethics:

An ultimate value is that final goal or end to which all lesser goals are the means—and it sets the standard by which all lesser goals are evaluated. [...] Without an ultimate goal or end, there can be no lesser goals or means: a series of means going off into an infinite progression toward a non-existent end is a metaphysical and epistemological impossibility. It is only an ultimate goal, an end in itself, that makes the existence of values possible.

"Why?" --> To avoid pain and experience pleasure.

No infinite regress there; if you don't want to avoid pain nor experience pleasure, we can simply avoid discussing this further.

What if you find pleasure in struggling through and/or experiencing pain?

That just means you get more pleasure out of it than pain, so it's pursuing pleasure. In fact I can scarcely think of any way of pursuing pleasure that is not similarly roundabout.

@AJ - someone brought up this objection in another thread I was in. Human beings aim at satisfaction and avoid dissatisfaction, according to this position, which is a common one with those trained in economics and I understand why people hold it.

The problem is that "satisfaction" or "pleasure" are not in themselves goals, but rather only states of affairs in which one's goals are achieved. The specific contents of "satisfaction" are determined in advance by the valuations of the agent. So saying human beings aim at pleasure is essentially saying, "I aim to achieve the achievement of my aims", perhaps useful for economic analysis but a pointless tautology in ethics, which sets out to prescribe exactly what it is that should satisfy you in the first place.

Well now you've changed the goal entirely, and we are back to asking what you mean by "should"? Most pointedly, should for what purpose?

It seems to me, unless you define ethics otherwise, that ethics would be about how to maximize long-term pleasure (and minimize long-term pain). 

Are you asking me what I think the ultimate goal of human beings is? I take the Randian position, that man is by nature an acting being involved in a struggle for survival that in itself makes it necessary to act and pursue goals. So man's life qua survival is his ultimate end.

So if you were to ask, by "what standard of value did you decide to pursue life", I would say that in order to pursue any standards of value at all, I must pursue life, and in order to pursue life, I must have standards of value. (Life's basic requirement is goal-directed action.) Life is the ultimate end because the ultimate means. This is why it is a self-justifying goal.

(And self-affirming: the only alternative to pursuing life is pursuing death, which cannot be an ultimate goal and give rise to values because death is merely the absence of all values and all action. So for someone who commits suicide, their immediate goal is a positive existential state where they have a knife in their chest or are breathing carbon monoxide fumes, but their ultimate goal is still necessarily life, otherwise they couldn't have acted to attain their death. Of course, human beings can err -- as well as be ignorant of their natural end -- which is what has happened in the case of the person who kills themself. He is a hypocrite who is basically saying, "I want my natural end, but I won't do what is necessary to attain it." If you don't want to train for the race, why bother running it?)

This isn't merely "survival" in the short-run sense though, because that would also run into the means-end regression problem. Namely, supposing your natural death is at time t, by what standard of value did you decide that you would prefer to die at time t-1? Rather, life as a goal is, in Irfan Khawaja's words, the pursuit of optimal conditions for the operation of your essence. This goal cannot be boxed into a time frame, since it includes trying to extend your lifespan (perhaps through hobbies, fruitful relationships, diet & exercise, etc.), and so involves long-run as well as short-run calculations.

ethics would be about how to maximize long-term pleasure (and minimize long-term pain)

That's part of it. Of course, the other part is determining what should constitute pleasure to begin with. Should you be satisfied by torturing animals? Or, if you are, should you take action to change that?

tunk:

Are you asking me what I think the ultimate goal of human beings is?

I'm asking for your definition of "should."

tunk:

Should you be satisfied by torturing animals?

Why invoke a more complicated word than necessary? I would not like to be satisfied by torturing animals, and if I were, I would would probably not like the fact that I got satisfaction from such an activity. In other words, such a preference would likely reduce my long-term happiness (Long version: I'd be less happy due to nagging guilt, and if I could eliminate the guilt I would have a harder time socializing, and if I could satisfy myself with being an animal-torturing hermit I would probably by then be so far removed from what we have evolved to enjoy that there seems very little chance I would get more net satisfaction out of life living that way no matter what else I did).

Why do you want me to define "should"? "Should" means whatever you ought to do. If you are asking me what it is that I think human beings ought to do, I would direct you to my previous answer.

such a preference would likely reduce my long-term happiness (Long version: due to guilt, etc.,

Ah, but human beings will only feel guilty if they are already convinced some injustice has taken place. You are already convinced you shouldn't torture animals, so you feel guilty and it hampers the satisfaction you get out of life. But what about someone who is totally okay with it? Is there any rational justification for going up to him and saying, "You are doing something immoral and you should stop", or would we just be blowing smoke?

My answer would be that deriving pleasure from torturing animals is usually a sign of severe psychological problems, and so engaging in it is nurturing a mental state of ill-health that will hamper your ability to survive in the long run (as well as distract from more worthwhile pursuits). So torturing animals is "wrong" (although I am not yet convinced of the existence of such a thing as "animal rights"). And if you asked me why you should care about surviving, I would point out that you already do, or else you would not exist as a living, acting being.

tunk:

Is there any rational justification for going up to him and saying, "You are doing something immoral and you should stop", or would we just be blowing smoke?

From this additional context, I further infer that your definition of "I shouldn't do X" or "It is immoral to do X" is one of the following:

1. "I would feel guilty if I did X, or if I let you do X" 
2. "I would feel guilty if I did X, and you would feel guilty if you did X"
3. Something else

If you clarified that you meant 1, he'd probably not care, or maybe he'd stop because he feels sad that he's making you feel guilty. If 2, your claim would be contradictory, because you just finished saying he does not feel guilty about it. If 3, what is your definition?

tunk:

My answer would be that deriving pleasure from torturing animals is usually a sign of severe psychological problems, and so engaging in it is nurturing a mental state of ill-health that will hamper your ability to survive in the long run (as well as distract from more worthwhile pursuits). So torturing animals is "wrong"

Now there's a definition I can agree with, except I would remove the part about survival and change it to "it is nurturing a mental state of ill-health that will distract from more worthwhile (read: long-term pleasurable) pursuits." Long-term pleasure already includes survival as a prerequisite, and mere survival is sufficient to ensure happiness, so I don't understand the Randian focus on survival in particular. 

Note, though, that this is just life advice, self-help, or whatever, so I don't see any need to call it "ethics."

"It seems to me, unless you define ethics otherwise, that ethics would be about how to maximize long-term pleasure (and minimize long-term pain)."

Only if you have some pretty opportunistic definitions of pain and pleasure. It's not at all impossible to conceive of something that is subjectively right and painful. If we tack on that the pleasure the person derives is the same thing as knowing they did the right thing, then you're right. But knowing you did the right thing or feeling like you acted morally does not necessarly imply that it's pleasurable.

AJ, your reply honestly baffles me. You and I are basically in agreement, it's only semantics that separates us.

I'm only aware of variants of the following "definition" of the word "should":

should/SHo͝od/

Verb:    
   1. Used to indicate obligation, duty, or correctness, typically when criticizing someone's actions: "he should have been careful".
   2. Indicating a desirable or expected state: "by now students should be able to read".

Synonyms:    
shall - must - ought

What I think you, if I've understood you correctly, are referring to is not the "definition" of "should", but rather what it is that human beings "should" do. And yes, there are innumerable opinions on this (certainly more than 20!). That is indeed the point of moral philosophy.

My point had nothing to do with "defining" should. Rather, what I was saying was, arguing that you shouldn't torture animals because it will make you feel guilty and diminish your happiness presupposes that the person who tortures animals is convinced it is wrong to torture animals, otherwise no feelings of guilt will follow and the person will proceed unhampered in the enjoyment of his life.

Again, saying that human beings should pursue pleasure amounts to saying nothing, because pleasure is not a goal in itself, but rather a state of affairs in which man's goals are achieved. What determines "pleasure" other than what the acting agent regards as pleasurable? The point is to be able to say that human beings ought to find X pleasurable, and if they don't, take steps to do more of X so that becomes pleasurable. (X might be diet & exercise, for example.)

Note, though, that this is just life advice, self-help, or whatever, so I don't see any need to call it "ethics."

That depends on what your conception of ethics is. I share with Aristotle the belief that ethics is the study of practical wisdom that will help man achieve the art of living well. That is, ethics is indeed life advice. It shouldn't be confined to the ivory tower.

Birthday Pony,

I bolded "long-term" for a reason. But besides that, this is pretty out of context. I was talking about ethics as if it was something different from morality because Tunk seemed to be defining it that way, and I was working with his definition.

That just means you get more pleasure out of it than pain, so it's pursuing pleasure. In fact I can scarcely think of any way of pursuing pleasure that is not similarly roundabout.

 

Touche.  But now we're just muddying the lines between pleasure and pain.

tunk:

You and I are basically in agreement, it's only semantics that separates us.

Of course, that is always the case in philosophy, and this is why I harp on definitions.

Should:  Used to indicate obligation, duty, or correctness, typically when criticizing someone's actions: "he should have been careful". 2. Indicating a desirable or expected state: "by now students should be able to read".

That's already five definitions, plus the guilt one and the long-term happiness one makes seven, and then all the definitions that encompass two or more of those seven. 7C2 + 7C3 + 7C4 ... = a whole lot of definitions. Not to belabor the point.

tunk:

Rather, what I was saying was, arguing that you shouldn't torture animals because it will make you feel guilty and diminish your happiness

This is simply clarifying which definition you are communicating with. In this case, "A shouldn't do X" = "A would feel guilty if he did X."

tunk:

What determines "pleasure" other than what the acting agent regards as pleasurable?

It is indeed entirely subjective. 

tunk:

saying that human beings should pursue pleasure amounts to saying nothing

That is exactly why I don't use the word "should" in philosophical or other rigorous contexts, but only in everyday talk. That humans pursue pleasure is obvious. Or, to reword it, that human beings have goals is obvious. The only reason to ever point out the obvious is if something is entertaining an idea that does not make sense, i.e., forgetting the obvious. Then they may reply that I am not saying anything (other than the obvious), which is indeed the case, but if someone is missing the obvious then the statement was not in vain.

That's already five definitions, plus the guilt one and the long-term happiness one makes seven, and then all the definitions that encompass two or more of those seven. 7C2 + 7C3 + 7C4 ... = a whole lot of definitions.

No it's not. They're all variants of one definition, "that which ought to be".

Also, "the art of living well" is to me more clearly put as "maximizing your long-term pleasure" or, if you prefer this wording, "maximizing your long-term goal achievement."

It's kind of funny how you keep repeating this. You cannot answer the question, "How can I maximize my pursuit of pleasure", until you answer the question, "What ought I to regard as pleasurable?" The one precedes the other. It is the latter question that is the important one, with which I'm concerned. The former question reveals nothing of interest, is true by definition as you wrote yourself, and furthermore would be positively monstrous to regard as a starting point for ethics. We don't want to inform a Nazi as to how to maximize his pursuit of pleasure.

Laotzu del Zinn:

That just means you get more pleasure out of it than pain, so it's pursuing pleasure. In fact I can scarcely think of any way of pursuing pleasure that is not similarly roundabout.

Touche.  But now we're just muddying the lines between pleasure and pain.

Actually it's clarifying that the lines between pain and pleasure in this example are time-based:

Pain-pain-pain-PLEASURE-pain-pain-PLEASURE-pain-pain-pain-pain-pain-pain-PLEASURE-PLEASURE-...

At any one instant we may only experience one or the other, but we find that for a worthwhile but grueling activity the net pleasure over time outweighs the net pain. The length of the time interval one considers is called one's "time preference."

tunk:

That's already five definitions, plus the guilt one and the long-term happiness one makes seven, and then all the definitions that encompass two or more of those seven. 7C2 + 7C3 + 7C4 ... = a whole lot of definitions.

No it's not. They're all variants of one definition, "that which ought to be".

Uh...

tunk:

Also, "the art of living well" is to me more clearly put as "maximizing your long-term pleasure" or, if you prefer this wording, "maximizing your long-term goal achievement."

It's kind of funny how you keep repeating this. You cannot answer the question, "How can I maximize my pursuit of pleasure", until you answer the question, "What ought I to regard as pleasurable?"

That's an interesting question in its own right, but the same could be said of questions like, "What should I invest in?" It's simply one of a long list of useful self-help-related questions that one needs to answer in order to know how to act in a way that maximizes long-term pleasure. Your question here is, in practical terms, "What types of self-modification to my emotional response are most effective at maximizing my long-term pleasure?" 

Again, an important and interesting question, but I doubt everyone else is referring to the same question when they talk of morality, ethics, etc. Though I'm not saying they shouldn't adopt your definition. In any case, we finally have definitional clarity, do we not?

 

Well put. This is true in many fields: economics, philosophy, sociology, physics, and perhaps even all of the ones I'm not familiar with.

i always kind of wonderd how much physics and math were BS.  I can't really comment on them, and I'll take whatever the mainstream tells me, as it just isn't my game - but I wouldn't be surprised if there was a lot of mystic  BS going on at some level.

Definitely. What I've found is that almost all the parts of science that don't face any kind of direct "market test" (like being used in engineering) devolve into total spookiness pretty quickly. You don't have to know anything about physics to know that "curved nothingness (space)" is an incoherent notion or that a wave isn't what something is, but rather what something does. Physics is absolutely fraught with communication/semantics issues that have completely deadlocked the field to the point where they're claiming that the end of physics is coming. Physics and economics probably suffer worst because they are both "kingmaker" or celebrity fields (Keynes, Krugman, Einstein, Hawking, Feynman, etc.) and of course states have a direct interest in economics.

Last time on this, because it is a bit off topic -

Do you have any layman links to  "end of physics" stuff? 

thanks in advance if you do

Not sure which side you're looking for, but this is a nice layman article that hints at the problems in physics. (PM me for more.)

http://discovermagazine.com/2008/may/02-three-words-that-could-overthrow-physics

http://mises.org/daily/2197/The-Death-Wish-of-the-AnarchoCommunists

It is no crime to be ignorant of economics, which is, after all, a specialized discipline and one that most people consider to be a "dismal science." But it is totally irresponsible to have a loud and vociferous opinion on economic subjects while remaining in this state of ignorance.

-Murray Rothbard

Replace "economics" with "math", "physics", etc.

Replace "economics" with "philosophy" and see how that sounds. Besides, as much as I appreciate Rothbard's quote, it is not even strictly true of economics. Even a layman can tell that Keynesians equivocate, reify, etc. But that is less "loud and vociferous" than quiet and limited, yet still fatal. 

Anyway, I wasn't saying that a layman should have a loud and vociferous "opinion." By all means, do the research before you take on the established theories.

"Just let the semantic oddities pique your interest," is my point.

Yes, but that is hardly "the end of physics" since the same mysteries - how to explain the mechanism of action for magnetism and gravitation in terms of things we can observe - were pondered and judged mostly inscrutable by Newton and later Einstein. The fact that we still cannot do it, despite having many fantastic tools that utilze these phenomena only makes the mystery more alluring.

This is why Feynman emphasized learning and using the math of physics even though the fundemental physical mechanisms weren't understood. Otherwise we would never have developed the technology we have now.

The whole "end of physics" is actually something the mainstream physicists are talking about that I disagree with. By the way, what technology did Feynman pave the way for?

Anyone talking about "the end of physics" while Dark Matter and Dark Energy are being bandied about by leading physicists as serious ideas has their head firmly planted in their nether-regions. We are on the verge of a fundamental re-think of physics. The greatest dogmatism always precedes the biggest shifts (a bit like that Biblical maxim... "pride comes before a fall.")

Clayton -

tunk:

I use the word the way it was used by Ayn Rand, namely the way in which you should conduct yourself if you want to survive in the long run. Clearly, on that definition, even Crusoe has a use for morality.

Well, that is a definition that doesn't do much for my argument!  Then, are you saying morality is subjective?  Behavior necessary for long term survival may change from individual to individual, depending on their respective circumstances.

tunk:

I don't really get the relevance of existentialism and yoga, which you go on to mention.

Well, they aren't really relevant anymore, since I was attempting to show how one simply needs to act how they would like others to act, and they will have inched society ever so so slightly to a preferrable state, rather than issue some blanket edicts on preferrable conduct.

tunk:

The ethical relativist denies that any values are superior to others. But by engaging in argumentation, surely the relativist has made a value judgement — that it would be preferable to argue than not. How could he have accomplished this if all values are equal?

I would consider this a hyperbolic mischaracterization.  So do you, apperently,

tunk:

The obvious reply to this is that ethical relativism does not maintain that value judgements are impossible — for that would indeed be a self-refuting and hopeless position — but rather that whatever standard of value is employed in making such judgements is necessarily subjective and relative to the individual. That is to say, nothing has value without someone to place a value on it.

So let's just forget that part.

tunk:

but by what standard of value were those values adopted? By virtue of what goal are our goals pursued? And how could any standard of value in the long run be adopted at all if none possess any apparent superiorities?

Habit, faith, and ignorance.

tunk:

As a result, like the incessant inquiring of a child, one can pose the question "Why?' in the face of every human endeavour and after a while seemingly tear away the basis for all motivation.

This is called an Existential Crisis.  That is why I brought it up.  You real question seems to be,

"What is the cure for an existential crisis?"

Which you answer,

tunk:

To cease the infinite regress of ends, there must be some self-justifying end-in-itself that makes it possible to evaluate that acting to gain and/or keep any value, any goal, is preferable to not, and which allows the rise of a chain of means and ends in the first place. This ultimate goal cannot be subjectively chosen (for that would beg the question) but is objectively determined by the facts of reality and necessarily beyond one's choice.

Which is an unprovable position.  You could just as easily say,

"To cease the infinite regress of ends, submit your will to Allah."

Just because you have chosen to place your faith in Logic, doesn't necessarily mean that you have chosen the "truth".  Rather than accept the unknown, you have chosen to ignore it.

Objectivist Ethics:

It is only an ultimate goal, an end in itself, that makes the existence of values possible.

It is the individual which chooses, as a matter of faith, their ultimate goal.  There is no way to "know" which is the "right" or "true" goal for which to struggle.

 

To the rest,

Oy, semantics.  Language is such a shoddy facsimile of concepts!   I find physics a great field for demonstrating how little humans know about our own physical beings.  Also, this clip just became a bit more "deep" to me,

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RQWksKNrJm0

 

@ AJ - You completely missed the point. I repeat, maximizing "pleasure" is not and cannot be the goal of a moral code, because the concept of pleasure presupposes an agent that already finds certain things pleasurable. If you asked me, "How can I maximize my pleasure", you would essentially be saying, "How can I acheive the acheivment of my aims?" Well, I would first need to know what your aims are. Ethics is the study, not of how to acheive your ends, but of what your ends should be. As Henry Veatch wrote in his classic Rational Man, the job of morality is not to make you happy but to make you unhappy, to rouse you from your complacency and awaken the thirst for self improvement.

@ Jackson LaRose -

You know, the trouble with point-by-point replies is that, while the make the author seem authoritative and comprehensive, they are more often than not a string of fallacies written by someone who was lazy and thoroughly misunderstood the original post. (No offense.)

"Morality", in the traditional Greek rational-egoist sense in which I use the term, has meant those virtues one should cultivate in order to achieve one's ultimate goal or "natural end". So if your natural end is life, then a rational egoist would tell you that it would be moral to, say, diet & exercise. That is the way I use the term. Just putting this out there so it's clear, since I hate the stupid arguments about semantics which debates on forums often descend into. Either accept my definition or introduce your own.

Now, of course it's true that "behavior necessary for long term survival may change from individual to individual", but by analyzing man in an isolated state we can derive some fundamental moral principles he ought to abide by assuming life as his goal, just like we can derive some necessary economic truths about action. For example, were you stranded on a deserted island, you would need to consistently practise the virtue of "rationality", i.e. you could not survive by dozing off and hallucinating, but rather you would need to be awake and alert, to orient yourself to the facts of reality, so you could gather the material resources required for survival.

And you completely misunderstood my argument for ultimate goals, like everyone else in this thread. If you had understood my point, you would have realized that simply repeating slogans like "habit, faith, and ignorance" is not a coherent answer. The problem is ultimate justification for human ends. And if you asked me why I did what I did, and I responded, "because of habit, faith, and ignorance", you would run into the same problem because you could simply ask me, "Why?"

You call this an existential crisis, when it was Aristotle who first identified it:

Nichomachean Ethics:

Every art and every inquiry, and similarly every action and pursuit, is thought to aim at some good; and for this reason the good has rightly been declared to be that at which all things aim. [...] If [...] there is some end of the things we do, which we desire for its own sake (everything else being desired for the sake of this), and if we do not choose everything for the sake of something else (for at that rate the process would go on to infinity, so that our desire would be empty and vain), clearly this must be the good and the chief good.

I'll quote Ayn Rand again as well, since she makes the point with her usual clarity:

The Objectivist Ethics:

An ultimate value is that final goal or end to which all lesser goals are the means—and it sets the standard by which all lesser goals are evaluated. [...] Without an ultimate goal or end, there can be no lesser goals or means: a series of means going off into an infinite progression toward a non-existent end is a metaphysical and epistemological impossibility. It is only an ultimate goal, an end in itself, that makes the existence of values possible.

The problem of ethics, at least in the natural law tradition, has been to identify the self-justifying end-in-itself that makes all ends possible. (And I repeat, the ultimate goal cannot be the object of a choice, since it would run right back into the regress problem.) Responding with trite cliches will not cut it as answer to this.

According to you, this is an "unprovable position". Why? Because I "have chosen to place [my] faith in Logic". You say I cannot prove my position, and then you deny the possibility of any proof anyway. Well, can you blame me for failing to meet your exacting standards? But this is interesting. Do you deny the existence of such a thing as logic, a valid argument and an invalid one, a necessary truth and a sufficient truth, an identity and a contradiction, etc.? Because if you do, there is no point in arguing any further. You cannot even participate in an argument unless there is something objective to disagree about and a common frame of reference to facilitate communication. You cannot argue with me, for example, unless you accept the Law of Non-Contradiction, otherwise you would be wantonly uttering meaningless speech and no one could grasp you. I rather like logic, as a matter of fact, since it makes argumentation possible.

Your final point is merely that "it is the individual which chooses, as a matter of faith, their ultimate goal." This is what we experts call "begging the question", assuming what one needs to prove. But since you don't place your faith in logic, but rather in existentialist slogans, you probably don't mind!