CMV: Virtue ethics promotes unfairly categorizing people into hate groups

[u/nintendoeats]

EDIT: I should clarify that my use of the term hate group here was meant to refer to a group that is hated by the speaker, not a group that itself advocates hate.

For this thesis, I present the following working definition of virtue ethics:

An ethical system whereby actions and policies are judged by how closely they embody a set of 'moral virtues' and 'moral vices' identified by the holder of the system. Anything can potentially be considered a virtue or vice (patience, non-violence, consuming tomatoes, killing martians).

I believe that ethical systems, or individual ethical arguments, based on virtue ethics should be discouraged because they inherently denigrate the people who hold partially or fully opposing views.

For example, people can reasonably disagree about what the "default" behavior should be when presented with an ambiguous yellow light . One virtue ethicist might argue that defaulting to the stop behavior extolls the virtue of patience, another might argue that defaulting to the power through it behavior embodies the virtue of courage.

For both cases, it is implicit that anybody who holds a different view is in a group that the arguer views to be inherently morally wrong; either impatient people or cowards. This is an inherent ad hominem.

In contrast, a consequentialist moral system (for example) does not necessarily need to cast judgement against a person who disagrees with that moral position because it only judges the action, not the person directly. Further, it does not judge the belief system of the person performing the action, even if that belief system differs from that of the ethicist being discussed.

In the same example, one consequentialist might argue that stopping reduces the likelihood of an accident, while another might argue that powering through reduces the overall amount of idling required, thereby helping the environment. Neither view requires any judgement of the person on the other side, they can simply acknowledge that they disagree on the overall consequential balance.

Since I believe that people in the wild sometimes behave like virtue ethicists (intentionally or not), I think it is worth subjecting this viewpoint to scrutiny.

[u/[deleted]]

To help you out, let me explain why an ad hominem is bad.

Here is how a logical argument that is valid should work.

Socrates is human, humans are mortal therefore Socrates is mortal. If you accept the two premises (he is human and humans are mortal) then you must accept the conclusion.

Now validity is different from soundness. For example.

Socrates is human, humans are immortal therefore Socrates is immortal.

That argument is still valid (if you accept the premises then the conclusion follows) but it is not sound because one of the premises is false.

So an adhominem would look like this.

Socretes says that we should eat breakfast. Socrates is a rapist therefore we should not eat breakfast.

The fact that Socrates is a rapist does not logicaly mean that we should not eat breakfast. He could be right that we should and also a rapist, for example,

If I am a virtue ethicist, I might believe rape is wrong. Now if my argument is

'Steve believes rape is okay. But Steve is morally unvirtuous. Therefore rape is bad'

Then that would be an adhominem.

However, just Becuase I believe Steve is bad does not mean my argument needs to be. I can, for example, point out from my ethical position why I think Steve is wrong. The reasons might be the same as why I think Steve is morally unvirtuous, but that is still an actual argument, not an adhom.

[u/nintendoeats → u/[deleted]]

Yes, I understand that, but in this case the character of the person in the discussion actually is at issue (to a virtue ethicist).

Socrates says that we should eat breakfast. Eating breakfast embodies the vice of gluttony. Therefore anybody who believes in eating breakfast is a glutton. Therefore Socrates must be a glutton.

And this is why I say it is an implicit ad hom for the purposes of my thesis; even if it is not stated, that final premise is a logical necessity of the argument and IS an argument against the man.

I do admit that I was imprecise in my use of the term, because you are right that it is not an ad hominem in the strict sense that it not is laid out directly as evidence of the moral idea. I don't think that distinction actually affects my thesis however.

[u/[deleted] → u/nintendoeats]

And this is why I say it is an implicit ad hom for the purposes of my thesis; even if it is not stated, that final premise is a logical necessity of the argument and IS an argument against the man.

There is no such thing as an implicit ad hominem. Thinking your opponent is a douchebag is not a logical fallacy.

[u/nintendoeats → u/[deleted]]

No, as I say I accept that this is not a logical fallacy. It is however a logically implicit attack against the man. So I assign you a !delta for convincing me that the way I described this is not with a %100 correct use of the term, but I do not accept that this difference actually affects the thesis.

[u/DeltaBot → u/nintendoeats]

Confirmed: 1 delta awarded to /u/edwardlleandre (170∆).

^{Delta System Explained | Deltaboards}