tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-207940809631227645.post6888796697471901981..comments2021-02-03T22:47:48.381-08:00Comments on Angra Mainyu's blog: The Perverted Faculty Argument: A reply to Edward Feser. Angra Mainyuhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16342860692268708455noreply@blogger.comBlogger23125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-207940809631227645.post-12031338894369598062021-02-03T22:47:48.381-08:002021-02-03T22:47:48.381-08:00Dear ABC123,
I'm afraid I am no longer blogg...Dear ABC123, <br /><br />I'm afraid I am no longer blogging. I don't know whether someday I will do so again, but for the foreseeable future, I'm not planning to, because I no longer have enough time to write thorough posts that address the arguments carefully. <br /><br />If I ever decide to blog again, I will consider addressing the arguments you mention. Angra Mainyuhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16342860692268708455noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-207940809631227645.post-22740415414090095002021-01-23T12:49:56.714-08:002021-01-23T12:49:56.714-08:00Dear. Mainyu can you write a pdf for critique argu...Dear. Mainyu can you write a pdf for critique argument from religious experience, argument from consciousness or Fine tuning argument? ABC123https://www.blogger.com/profile/07965494718443307392noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-207940809631227645.post-59455471444605711602021-01-10T11:16:24.191-08:002021-01-10T11:16:24.191-08:00Can you write a reply to collins's Fine tuning...Can you write a reply to collins's Fine tuning argument and/or argument from religious experience(especially kai-Man kwan's defence)?ABC123https://www.blogger.com/profile/07965494718443307392noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-207940809631227645.post-30830422152394918922020-03-12T04:13:54.665-07:002020-03-12T04:13:54.665-07:00Hello, thanks for the link, and sorry I did not pu...Hello, thanks for the link, and sorry I did not publish this before (I'm retired from these discussions, at least for the foreseeable future, and I missed this comment). Angra Mainyuhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16342860692268708455noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-207940809631227645.post-45646579989666352752019-08-18T05:08:00.450-07:002019-08-18T05:08:00.450-07:00Hello, if you are interested, I have improved my c...Hello, if you are interested, I have improved my criticism considerably in my own blog. Here you can find it: <br /><br />https://spirit-salamander.blogspot.com/2019/08/all-round-critique-of-thomistic-natural.htmllotanahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07962084195419187271noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-207940809631227645.post-21085494755480741262019-03-20T16:27:42.552-07:002019-03-20T16:27:42.552-07:00Walter,
The word "good" is not meant t...Walter, <br /><br />The word "good" is not meant to be a technical term on Thomism, but have the ordinary meaning. Moreover, Feser defends his premises appealing to common sense, and I'm pointing out that his premises are actually a radical departure from common sense, and making a proper counter argument. <br /><br />But in any case, I do not intend to persuade Thomists, but a person who is assessing the matter and being epistemically rational. If some (or all) Thomists who comment on my argument say that in my examples, the behaviors in question are indeed immoral as implied by the perverted faculty argument, readers not committed to Thomism (even people who might not yet take a stance about the argument) will take that as another piece of evidence that I got those implications of the argument right, and that the perverted faculty argument really has those absurd consequences. <br /><br />Other than that, defenders of the argument will need more than just biting bullets against moral common sense (which, again, is fine with me, as long as they keep making clear to potential readers how absurd their position is) if they intend to defend Feser's response to Grisez's <a href="https://angramainyusblog.blogspot.com/2019/01/the-perverted-faculty-argument-reply-to.html?showComment=1553037428180#c3066145260647991018" rel="nofollow">"stomach-pumping" analogy</a>. Saying the behavior is immoral (i.e., biting the bullet) will not cut it, because Feser is saying that the perverted faculty argument does not apply to the example, but I point out that - by the same standards by which it applies to an analogous contraception case -, it does, so Feser got that part of his reply to Grisez wrong (or else, concede that it would not apply to the analogous contraception case, either, which contradicts the claim that all contraception is immoral, or else come up with yet another absurd distinction, etc.)<br /><br />Regarding requiring something that is "in no way contrary to what is good for us, not even in a minor respect.", I argued against the premise under different potential interpretations of Feser's claims.Angra Mainyuhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16342860692268708455noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-207940809631227645.post-54263816746178980442019-03-20T07:45:47.849-07:002019-03-20T07:45:47.849-07:00Angra
I've just managed to read through your ...Angra<br /><br />I've just managed to read through your argument against premise (6). While I personally think it is a good objection, I don't think it's goung to impress the calssical theist or the natural law proponent. <br />"Good" is the Thomistic sense has a very specific meaning and, at least according to some of the more radical Thomists, has no direct relationship with human flourishing. I know that some Thomists will defend the view that lying, e.g. can never be permissible, not even if it were the only way to save the lives of thousands of people. To be fair, I don't know if Feser would claim this. <br />But someone who believes that lying is never permissible, will not agree that any of the things you use in your analogies is actually morally permissible.<br /><br />I have also read the first part of your criticism of the first premise and there is something in Feser's words that strikes me as odd<br />"A genuine counterexample to the perverted faculty argument’s key premise would have to involve an action that both involved the active frustration of the natural end of a faculty and yet which was in no way contrary to what is good for us, not even in a minor respect. I submit that there are no such counterexamples, and that there could not be any given an Aristotelian-Thomistic metaphysics of the good."<br /><br />I am not sure why anybody would be required to come up with such a counter example. I really do not know of anything that is "in no way contrary to what is good for us, not even in a minor respect." If I had to come up with an argument I would say that masturbation is in no way contrary to what is good for us, not even in a minor respect. Of course excessive masturbation could be contrary to what is good for us, but that's another matter.Walter Van den Ackerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16101735542155226072noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-207940809631227645.post-79073142694130509242019-03-19T16:38:59.825-07:002019-03-19T16:38:59.825-07:00Billy,
To be crystal clear (because of your prev...Billy, <br /><br />To be crystal clear (because of your previous "Also, from other run ins with you online, how can you of all people be building arguments from common sense? "), when I said: <br /><br /><b><br />Of course he can say what he wants. But which would those "objective rational grounds be"? Premises that are in conflict with common sense? And how would one determine that those premises are true, when one's own epistemic sense say that they are <i>improbable to the level of absurdity</i>? And precisely, one way to assume that they are so, is to use one's own sense of right and wrong to assess them. If that is not allowed, then why not, and how? </b><br /><br />I did not mean at all to suggest that there are no objective rational grounds. What I meant is that if Feser replied as you suggested, he would be getting the moral facts wrong due to epistemically improper assessments, just as the supporter of YEC gets the geological and biological facts wrong due to epistemically improper assessments (and almost certainly many historical facts involving humans as well), and the supporter of MLCT gets the historical facts wrong due to epistemically improper assessments. <br /><br />I do believe that there is an objective fact of the matter as to whether the behaviors described in my examples (and others, generally) are immoral. Again, I'm saying Feser is getting the assessments wrong, not that there is no objective fact of the matter. <br /><br />As for making arguments from common sense, I do that all the time. Your " how can you of all people be building arguments from common sense? " clearly indicates that in our previous interactions, there has clearly been a very big misunderstanding. Briefly, and in the matters that concern us here, I believe we humans have a sense of right and wrong and an epistemic sense by which we make probabilistic assessments. Those senses are generally reliable, even if fallible. In particular, we can consider cases in which the sense of right and wrong yields clear verdicts as a proper means of testing moral theories. In fact, I would say that that is the most common and probably more useful proper way of testing moral theories, assuming they have internal consistency.Angra Mainyuhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16342860692268708455noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-207940809631227645.post-30661452606479910182019-03-19T16:17:08.180-07:002019-03-19T16:17:08.180-07:00Billy,
I would also like to mention one of the c...Billy, <br /><br />I would also like to mention one of the counterexamples given in the comments (see my reply to lotana's post here). It's about an analogy (Grisez's example) involving a person eating food for pleasure even though his stomach is being pumped because he can't safely keep the food in it (and he knows it). My analogy: <br /><br />Alice and Bob agree to have sex. They know that allowing the reproductive process to continue would be dangerous for medical reasons and plan to stop it by taking a contraceptive pill after sex (or removing the semen and killing any remaining sperm cells before there is any fertilization, or another such method), and then they do as planned. <br /><br />Note that both are cases of "an individual deliberate act of using a bodily faculty" rather than "an ongoing and involuntary physiological process", and the natural end is frustrated (I would call it the main function, but that aside). Well, sort of: if the natural end of the sexual act involved is to place semen in a vagina, it is not frustrated. Rather, the physiological process that begins after that is frustrated. But for that matter, the same happens in the food case. <br /><br />Yet, the Perverted Faculty Argument would condemn Alice's and Bob's actions in this case, so analogously it would condemn the actions of the pleasure eater. Else, what is the relevant difference? In both cases there is medical reasons. In both cases, the action is for pleasure. In both cases, the purpose of act carried out deliberately is frustrated (well, maybe not, but Feser insists all acts of contraception involve frustration, so let us say it does, else Feser is wrong about whether oral contraception, or at least emergency oral contraception, frustrates the purpose of "the" sexual act). <br /><br />Personally, I think the example I give in the essay is better because it shows that even if there is no medical reason, the behavior is not immoral under certain circumstances (leaving aside any problems of limited information), but <i>if</i> a supporter of Feser's argument is going to reject all of the examples I gave in my argument (which is what, in my assessment, very probably all supporters of Feser's argument who consider my argument will do, rather than stop supporting Feser's argument), then I think the additional point that Feser's reply to Grisez is mistaken (in re: the stomach example, not necessarily the rest) is an interesting contribution.Angra Mainyuhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16342860692268708455noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-207940809631227645.post-20647407859566429662019-03-19T15:33:57.913-07:002019-03-19T15:33:57.913-07:00Billy,
Of course Feser did not say that common s...Billy, <br /><br />Of course Feser did not say that common sense could not be wrong. That is not the point. The point is that common sense <i>is a rational way to test a moral theory</i>. Indeed, there are infinitely many possible moral theories that are mutually incompatible and internally consistent, and many actually proposed theories that are so. A way of testing a theory is precisely to use our sense of right and wrong in cases in which it delivers clear verdicts, in order to ascertain whether the theory's predictions are true. That is exactly what I am doing. <br /><br />Sure, the person defending the theory can consistently bite the bullet and deny common sense assessments. For that matter, a defender of Young Earth Creationism (YEC), or a Moon Landing Conspiracy Theory (MLCT) can consistently do the same, and interpret the observations in a way that is - while, again, consistent - clearly extremely improbable - <i>where probability is assessed by our own faculty to make probabilistic assessments, which is the only way we have</i>.<br /><br />And no, I am not working on the "the assumption that Feser thinks that if common sense tells you its wrong, then it really must be wrong." Not at all. Just as I need to make no assumptions about the beliefs of the YEC or the MLCT with regard to our epistemic sense and how to use it to test theories, I do not need to make assumptions about Feser's belief on the use of our common sense, or conscience, or moral sense, or however one calls it, in order to use it to test his theory. A supporter of his theory can consistently bite the bullet, of course, just as the YEC supporter and the MLCT supporter can. That much is clear. <br /><br />I will point out, however, that Feser intends to use <i>common sense</i> in support of the premises of his argument, and in particular, in support of Aristotelian-Thomism, but common sense clearly says that his sixth premise is false, and so is his conclusion. Sure, Feser or another defender of the argument might say that common sense is a good source of evidence in support of the theory but not against it in the particular cases I chose, for some reason they might or might not state. But - again - my point is not that they would be inconsistent, but that they are mistaken, on the basis of a proper testing of his theory - which I do in the essay. <br /><br />Granted, defenders of Feser's argument will (in nearly all if not all cases) not be persuaded and insist on it, some or many of them consistently. But again, for that matter, so will the defenders of YEC or MLCT. This is not about consistency. <br /><br />You say: ' "Feser can simply say, "Even if Jorge's family is likely in danger, or 200 people are likely to die, you can determine on objective rational grounds that this cannot justify frustrating the realisation of a good, no matter how much it aligns with common sense". You place way too much weight on common sense."'<br /><br />Of course he can say what he wants. But which would those "objective rational grounds be"? Premises that are in conflict with common sense? And how would one determine that those premises are true, when one's own epistemic sense say that they are <i>improbable to the level of absurdity</i>? And precisely, one way to assume that they are so, is to use one's own sense of right and wrong to assess them. If that is not allowed, then why not, and how? <br /><br />You say: "Don't you think all meaning is purely semantic? "<br />I do not understand that question. Words have meaning, and that is a semantic matter. If you are talking about another sense of "meaning", like whether something is morally relevant, then I do believe many things are morally relevant. If you mean something else, what do you mean?Angra Mainyuhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16342860692268708455noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-207940809631227645.post-85715690620791698502019-03-19T15:14:53.356-07:002019-03-19T15:14:53.356-07:00Billy,
As I said in my essay, Feser says earlier...Billy, <br /><br />As I said in my essay, Feser says <i>earlier</i> that "<i>a rational and correctly informed</i> person", etc., but he <b>does not seem to make exceptions, and neither does this premise</b>, and then I continue my argumentation. Moreover, before I present the cases of Jill and Jack, I say "In any event, and for the sake of thoroughness, I will give examples in which human beings behave rationally even when what they do is in no way good for them, due to limited or false information." <br />So, of course they are not correctly informed. I said that before I posted the examples. My point there is that the premise does not make an exception for correctly informed people, so <i>if</i> Feser meant to exclude them (which he does not say), that is on its own a signficant limitation on the application of the premise, even if it were true, whereas <i>if</i> Feser did not meant to make an exception, then those counterexamples work. <br /><br />In other words, assuming that Premise 6 has an unwritten exception and only applies to cases of correctly informed persons, then the conclusion also only applies to correctly informed people (on pain of invalidity), so even the conclusion of the argument were true, it would be possible for plenty of people to engage in acts of masturbation, homosexuality, contraception or bestiality under conditions in which the conclusion simply would not apply to them. <br /><br />Still, as I said, I give those examples for the sake of thorougness, but rest of the argument stands on its own, without them. <br /><br />Regarding full information, I did not say that it required it. In fact, I considered different options, one of which was that one. My paragraph says "So, let us assume that cases of limited information like the ones above do not count, so they cannot falsify the premise – that would be too easy. But then, a relevant question is: What are the information requirements in this premise? Is it full information? We may interpret full information not in an absolute sense, but in the sense of all of the information required to decide whether an action is good or bad for A, to what degree, etc. Yet, even then, it is not the case that there is full information in all real life cases. In fact, at least there isn’t full information in plenty of real life cases, including many of those involving the frustration of the functions or ends of human faculties. Maybe the correct interpretation of Feser’s words is something else? But what might it be? "<br /><br />In short, I'm saying Feser is at best very unclear, failing to explain the amount of information that is required. Sure, Jill would have acted differently if she had known about the bomb. Now consider people who - like nearly all of humanity - masturbate without having information about Feser's perverted faculty argument. Now I believe of course that that is not correct information, assuming <i>for the sake of the argument</i> that Feser's argument is sound and rationally persuasive, would a person who hasn't been told about it be "correctly informed"? <br /><br />I will address the rest of your points below, <i>assuming for the sake of the argument that Feser's argument has a good way out of the limited information objection.</i>Angra Mainyuhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16342860692268708455noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-207940809631227645.post-47352950902441778582019-03-19T14:56:09.416-07:002019-03-19T14:56:09.416-07:00Hi, Walter,
Thanks.
I have to say after the way...Hi, Walter,<br /><br />Thanks. <br /><br />I have to say after the way I was treated by Brandon the previous time, I decided not to read comments or post to Feser's blog anymore. However, in any case, I'm sort of retired from posting. As I mentioned in a previous reply to lotana, the post above is meant to be the last one at least for the foreseeable future, barring perhaps improbable short comments on different matters - and I would say maybe the last one. My meatspace commitments would be negatively affected if I kept getting involved in these matters.Angra Mainyuhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16342860692268708455noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-207940809631227645.post-42135754585379760982019-03-19T11:58:40.021-07:002019-03-19T11:58:40.021-07:00Angra
At first glance: great essay. I'll give...Angra<br /><br />At first glance: great essay. I'll give it a more thorough look when I have time.<br />Meanwhile, there is some discussion about your essay going on over at Edward Feser's blog.<br />You should take a look over there if you haven't already.Walter Van den Ackerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16101735542155226072noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-207940809631227645.post-13487581008876216512019-03-19T01:12:18.396-07:002019-03-19T01:12:18.396-07:00Hi Angra,
The Sixth premise:
You start by quotin...Hi Angra,<br /><br />The Sixth premise:<br /><br />You start by quoting Feser saying "a rational and correctly informed person" but then you only target the "rational" part of this in your examples.<br /><br />For instance, in your cancer example you say, "Unfortunately, a very improbable mix-up happened, and the results belonged to another patient". Clearly Jack wasn't correctly informed then.<br /><br />Regarding your bomb example, you conclude, "Surely, turning the ignition key was very bad and in no way good for Jill, but she was rational in doing so." But, just like Jack, Jill wasn't correctly informed.<br /><br />You try to get past this when you say, "Yet, even then, it is not the case that there is full information in all real life cases"<br /><br />There doesn't have to be. You only have to be correctly informed, as Feser says. If Jill knew the bomb was in her car, it would be wrong for her to start the ignition. If Jack knew there was a mix up, it would be wrong for him to get the radiation therapy. <br /><br />This brings me to the smoking examples. You say, "Surely, Jorge did nothing irrational, even though smoking like that frustrates the end of breathing. The conclusion that he was even slightly irrational in his acts of smoking would fly on the face of common sense."<br /><br />Feser never said that common sense couldn't be wrong, even incredibly wrong. His only point here is that there are situations where "common sense clearly tracks the “old” natural law theory’s insistence that there is a connection between what is good for us and what is consistent with the realization of the ends nature has set for us." Your examples do nothing to disprove his point at all. You seem to be working from the assumption that Feser thinks that if common sense tells you its wrong, then it really must be wrong. But that isn't what he said. Common sense can possibly be incredibly wrong, but that doesn't mean common sense is just random. In a blogpost, Feser states:<br /><br />'That is not to say that intuitions in the sense in question have no place at all in philosophy, but their role should be at most heuristic, a pointer to something objective, which alone can serve as a legitimate premise in a philosophical argument and after the discovery of which the “intuitions” can be put to one side. “But as an A-T philosopher, don’t you think metaphysics and ethics should be in harmony with common sense?” Yes I do, but that does not mean that saying “It just seems commonsensical to me” is how an A-T philosopher thinks metaphysical or ethical claims should be defended. That gets the significance of common sense and intuition all wrong. The A-T philosopher doesn’t say “Such-and-such metaphysical and ethical claims seem intuitive and commonsensical; therefore they must be correct.” Rather, he says: “Such-and-such metaphysical and ethical claims are correct, and can be shown to be so on entirely objective rational grounds; and it is because they are correct that nature has made us in such a way that we tend to regard them as intuitive and commonsensical.”'<br /><br />Feser can simply say, "Even if Jorge's family is likely in danger, or 200 people are likely to die, you can determine on objective rational grounds that this cannot justify frustrating the realisation of a good, no matter how much it aligns with common sense". You place way too much weight on common sense.<br /><br />"So, it is clearly metaphysically possible for human beings to smoke to excess...and behave rationally in doing so"<br /><br />Your argument seems to be that because common sense tells you X is possible, therefore X is metaphysically possible. That's a bad argument, and, as I said, places way too much weight on common sense. Also, from other run ins with you online, how can you of all people be building arguments from common sense? Don't you think all meaning is purely semantic? Your position wouldn't even be able to build any relationship between truth and common sense.<br /><br />For now, I'll leave it there. It's getting late.Billyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14579200479132033014noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-207940809631227645.post-36410234507828038632019-02-25T08:38:43.479-08:002019-02-25T08:38:43.479-08:00It's fine; in fact, Feser uses "other tha...It's fine; in fact, Feser uses "other than" in his article, so that was correct (I thought you were quoting him). Angra Mainyuhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16342860692268708455noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-207940809631227645.post-45919460963276375632019-02-25T02:01:26.530-08:002019-02-25T02:01:26.530-08:00in my post i mean of course "different from&q...in my post i mean of course "different from" instead of "other than". i'm not an english native speaker and sometimes i work with a translation program as help, so small mistakes can occur which could cause confusion.<br /><br /><br />lotanahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07962084195419187271noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-207940809631227645.post-90493289366641897392019-02-24T14:07:53.000-08:002019-02-24T14:07:53.000-08:00I think you're right. The beard thing could go...I think you're right. The beard thing could go both ways. And a discussion would only provoke (literally) hairsplitting. I had originally thought so about this topic: <br /><br />The beard hair grows teleologically and the beard itself has a (teleological) function, whatever that function may contain. But it must have a function, because why should the hair grow at all (understood in an Aristotelian sense)? Then shaving the beard is a violation against natural law. Because shaving prevents the hair from exercising its continuous function as a beard. I have thus deliberately brought a faculty (beard) into a process (shaving), at the end of which the goal of the faculty is undermined. This may not be a great sin in the eyes of the natural lawyers, but it is nevertheless a violation.<br /><br />I only suspect that the defenders of the pervert faculty argument secretly consider that the sexual and generative faculties of humans are absolutely exclusive and incomparable to anything else. Grisez also seems to see it this way as well. Thus, each objection is pushed aside by the defenders of the perverted faculty argument. That's my estimation. But then one could accuse them of dogmatism. Sometimes I also have the feeling that in some controversial cases the natural law advocates tacitly resort to an ethical particularism (which they do not actually desire, they certainly want to have general principles), but I cannot prove this yet. <br /><br />"Other than", in my opinion, can only have three meanings. Either it refers to another function of a faculty that has not been mentioned before. Or it refers to another way (other means) and not to the conventional and natural one to achieve the goal of the function. Or one understands by it the inappropriate and perverted activation of a function of a faculty, which leaves however no damage to the function, the faculty or the whole human organism, what would then be a matter of interpretation. In the latter case, the function does not achieve its goal because it has been perverted. In any case, these proposed meanings must be related to a deliberately activated ability/function, otherwise "other than" would be a meaningless concept. If I consciously activate a function, then there is only one either-or: Either I try to achieve the goal in the best possible knowledge and conscience, or I do not allow the goal to be achieved. If I do not know of any function, of any faculty, of any corresponding goals, then I do nothing that can somehow be understood as "other than". <br /><br />"Contrary to" can only mean perverting the function of an ability, that is, deliberately preventing it from reaching its goal. This would imply overall harm if the third definition of "other than" came into effect. <br /><br />One could perhaps classify the "contrary to" possibilities in this way. Serious transgressions: I deliberately pervert a natural process into which I have deliberately entered that takes place only voluntarily and willfully. <br />Minor offences: I deliberately pervert a natural process that takes place on an ongoing and involuntary basis. However, this distinction would not make any sense, as an artificial stopping of the heartbeat would only be a minor matter. In the end, there is no getting around evaluating each human function individually and classifying it according to importance, provided that one wants to establish an ethical hierarchy of offenses. In some or many cases this will lead to arbitrary decisions. <br /><br />Well, you're right again. These aspects are basically irrelevant if there are enough clear counter examples. I'll read your analysis again and come back to you sometime.lotanahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07962084195419187271noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-207940809631227645.post-15075663279228785942019-02-24T10:20:57.109-08:002019-02-24T10:20:57.109-08:00Thanks again.
Regarding beards, I think a defend...Thanks again. <br /><br />Regarding beards, I think a defender of the perverted faculty argument (PFA) might say that there is no faculty that is perverted - allegedly, no faculty that somehow malfunctions if the beard does not grow. Of course, one can counter that the faculty in question is precisely the growth of beards, but I think they might say that is not a faculty. In any case, that would seem to fall in Feser's distinction between "an individual deliberate act of using a bodily faculty" and "an ongoing and involuntary physiological process"; the growth of beards falls into the latter category, and according to Feser, those cases would escape the PFA. I agree there is some obscurity in his distinctions but I think that is not a problem because there are readily available counterexamples in which there is no such ambiguity, like the vomit case. <br /><br />In the milk case, I do not know for sure, but I guess he might say it is slightly immoral - a distinction he uses in the cases of smoking and breastfeeding I address above in my post. I think that that would be obviously mistaken, but then, it is also obvious to me that masturbation (in a private setting) is generally not wrong, but that unfortunately is not what many people believe. Still, one can construct cases where the PFA leads to even greater absurdity and rejection of moral common sense, by having a setup in which a woman does not spill her milk for fun, but rather, to prevent some horrific evil (and, by the way, one can do the same with the example of masturbation, as I did with smoking "to excess", or a complete lack of breastfeeding in the examples; I used those cases precisely because Feser says that they would involve perverted faculties). <br /><br />In re: the distinction between "contrary to" and "different from", I think the latter involves cases in which there isn't a specific act for a specific "natural purpose" (I do not believe in those, though I do think there are main functions) that is disrupted, whereas the former do. But I agree that Feser is imprecise when describing it. Still, I think one can grant (even if just for the sake of the argument) that the distinction makes sense, given the availability of counterexamples to some of Feser's key claims in which one can use his own arguments to classify the acts as "contrary to".Angra Mainyuhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16342860692268708455noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-207940809631227645.post-14451028564423255412019-02-24T03:53:16.994-08:002019-02-24T03:53:16.994-08:00Thanks for the clarification. I still have to read...Thanks for the clarification. I still have to read Feser's paper at some time. I know his argumentation so far only from his book about the last superstition and I criticize more the general basic idea of Thomistic natural law theory, for which I also read original passages from Aquinas. Grisez instead goes, I believe, more into the theological realm in his argumentation, which is not so interesting for me. Therefore one can ignore him. Nevertheless, it is worth reading this one critical chapter from him.<br />I agree with you on your objection to Feser. As long as the stomach can still digest and as long as the eaten substance is digestible and somewhat nutritious, artificial pumping out or induced vomiting of the eaten substance always leads to a perversion of the relevant faculty, no matter in which context and for what reason. Grisez just adds that a mere dark feeling of having eaten something bad (though partly digestible and nutritious) is enough to cause an artificial vomiting, which does not offend the moral feeling. And this shows, according to Grisez, that it is not the perversion itself that we morally reject. But the perverted faculty argument presupposes that a perversion of a faculty is morally (intrinsically) wrong and must be felt as immoral, otherwise the name of the argument no longer makes sense.<br />I also completely agree with you that your example of the lovers is analogous to the artificial removal of food from the stomach. <br />When Feser speaks of a diseased organ, the question naturally arises as to what is meant by it. The following is conceivable. First, the organ suddenly starts working against the whole body. Secondly, there are bacteria, parasites, viruses or cancer cells that have infected the organ and want to spread to other parts of the body, but let the organ function more or less. Only in the first case, if there is no medical alternative (which has to be valid for both cases), removal would not be perversion, but only because the organ itself has become something perverting. <br />I'd like to know what Feser would say about the following. First example: A woman who produces milk because she recently conceived squirts some of that milk on the floor simply for fun. This, for one part. Then the cynical philosopher Diogenes of Sinope, who masturbates in a full marketplace and ejaculates on the floor to convey a philosophical statement provocatively (a real anecdote). In both cases, it is a substance that potentially has to do with the preservation of humanity and is therefore to be regarded as equivalent. However, no one would be as deeply morally offended by the woman (and Grisez argues in this direction, but with a more solid example) as by Diogenes, although perversion takes place in both cases. This shows that our evaluation is prejudiced. Shaving beards could therefore also be considered morally problematic or make other cases less problematic: https://www.patheos.com/blogs/tippling/2017/07/22/beards-perverted-faculty-argument/<br />It seems to me that much of Feser's argument depends on his distinction between "contrary to" and "different from", which I haven't yet found quite clear. This distinction is missing in Grisez, and if it is not tenable, then we have to agree with Grisez in many ways. In Feser's Last Superstition, the distinction, in my opinion, was kept vague. In order to make the distinction more understandable, one would need to describe it better and more clearly using other words and also compare two faculties with each other, and say in advance which definitive functions they have (regardless of whether one can argue about these).<br />I don't want to keep you from your work any longer, but I think it's good that you go into this topic in detail. For in the academic world of philosophy (outside theology), natural law in every form has already been put ad acta. There is hardly any discussion about it, and so I had to painstakingly gather many information for my criticism. Your thoughts are thus an enrichment for the discussion.lotanahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07962084195419187271noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-207940809631227645.post-76007686268833657172019-02-23T23:18:08.170-08:002019-02-23T23:18:08.170-08:00Thanks.
In the article I reply to above, Feser r...Thanks. <br /><br />In the article I reply to above, Feser responds to Grisez's objections, and argues that the perverted faculty argument escapes them. <br /><br />Briefly, I think that Feser's reply works against most of the objections involving counterexamples (only alleged in most cases), but not against all of them. In particular, the case in which the stomach is pumped for medical reasons works. Feser replies that "Eating food that one will for <i>medical reasons</i> out of one’s control not be able safely to keep down is also not a plausible candidate for something that is contrary to the natural end of eating any more than removing a diseased organ is.". Feser gets that wrong. In Grisez's example, the person eats the food only for pleasure, knowing that it will be removed for medical reasons, and agrees to that removal. The fact that keeping the food in the stomach would be dangerous for him does not help the person escape condemnation by the perverted faculty argument. Here, a relevant analogy would be as follows: <br /><br />Alice and Bob agree to have sex. They know that allowing the reproductive process to continue would be dangerous for medical reasons and plan to stop it by taking a contraceptive pill after sex (or removing the semen and killing any remaining sperm cells before there can be any fertilization, or another such method), and then they do as planned. There is no difference in terms of risk. Also, they are both cases of "an individual deliberate act of using a bodily faculty" rather than "an ongoing and involuntary physiological process", and the natural end is frustrated (I would call it the main function, but that aside). There is no relevant difference here, so the perverted faculty argument would condemn would condemn the person eating food in that context, just as it would condemn the actions of Alice and Bob. <br /><br />Still, in the post above, there is a similar example but in which <i>no medical reasons are involved</i>. I posted that example in part to deal with Feser's reply in another way - though it should be clear that Grisez's example also works-, and in part to describe the parallel in considerable detail, given that Feser complains of a lack of specifics in Grisez's examples. <br /><br />That aside, in general I disagree with Grisez's views on the morality of a number of sexual activities, but I'm afraid writing a reply to Grisez would require me to dedicate a lot of time, and I have commitments in meatspace that would be affected negatively if I did so (the post above is meant to be the last one at least for the foreseeable future, barring perhaps short comments on different matters, but even that is not very likely).Angra Mainyuhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16342860692268708455noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-207940809631227645.post-13768903089965589622019-02-23T10:38:55.549-08:002019-02-23T10:38:55.549-08:00I highly recommend reading the second chapter of a...I highly recommend reading the second chapter of a book by a man named Grisez. Grisez is an expert in Thomism and a Catholic theologian who however thinks little of the perverted faculty argument.<br /><br />Here you can find his book: https://catholicebooks.wordpress.com/2014/07/25/online-text-contraception-and-the-natural-law-by-germain-grisez/lotanahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07962084195419187271noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-207940809631227645.post-77389438291562882792019-02-22T16:36:25.691-08:002019-02-22T16:36:25.691-08:00Hello,
Thanks, and thanks for the links. I'm...Hello, <br /><br />Thanks, and thanks for the links. I'm a bit busy with meatspace stuff at the moment, but I will try to take a closer look later. Angra Mainyuhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16342860692268708455noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-207940809631227645.post-55035841366013030932019-02-22T13:36:25.450-08:002019-02-22T13:36:25.450-08:00Hello, what I have read so far from your analysis ...Hello, what I have read so far from your analysis was very elaborate and I liked it very much. I have also dealt critically with this subject. You can find it, if you are interested, as a guest blog entry: https://gunlord500.wordpress.com/2018/12/29/guest-post-from-tru-several-critiques-of-edward-feser-and-aristotelian-philosophy/<br /><br />I have also greatly expanded my essay in the comments section. Also the blog owner wrote a very good analysis on the same topic. That can also be found on his site.lotanahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07962084195419187271noreply@blogger.com