Hi, Nick here from Pods with Nick and James. Just a quick one before we get into this podcast.
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Anyway, back to the podcast.
Welcome to Pods with Nick and James, a podcast where two blokes talk about some deeper subjects,
which are the sorts of conversations you'd have at a pub and wished you remembered more of the night after.
Sorry, the morning after. I know that's how I feel a lot about these things.
So far, we've covered some interesting topics like ancient authority and myself remembering that one of the first recorded kings in history was King Sargon.
I still love that name. Not going to get over that anytime soon.
Looking a little bit at political systems and remembering that out of all of the political systems, oligarchy seemed to be quite possibly the worst next to tyranny,
along with the education system and now with, yeah, how not everything we've taught is quite there to enable us.
I also learned about Jonestown, something which I've seen mentioned but assumed wasn't real.
Sometimes ignorance is bliss, but I don't know. The truth will set you free.
All right. How are you doing today, Nick? I am good, sir. I am very good.
Yeah, been a short break since the last time we recorded. Obviously you went on holiday, but. Absolutely.
Absolutely. It was a great time. I went to West Wales and it's a beautiful country is all I can say.
It is. I've been to South Wales. It is very, very beautiful. As Lee Evans says,
the thing about Wales is every time you go out, you go to the shop, you go up a hill, you go home from the shop, you go up a hill.
That's one thing I remember from Wales. That is absolutely true.
Like what did I also love how I'm, you know what? Right. Sorry. I'm going to go very slightly off topic. Please bear with me listeners.
This will just be a minute. All right. So I went to Wales and I love it because five minutes from the holiday camp,
there was a castle whose name I'm not going to even try and pronounce. But I went there and it was a really impressive affair.
Like it was at least the height of a four story building. There were some parts of it which were nearly intact and other bits were in ruin.
You know, it's the sort of thing where if you scaled it down, you would see nerds in a hobby shop placing miniatures on it.
Absolutely amazing. Like and I say that because I am one of those nerds and it's the sort of shit I make in the spare time.
But it was just so it was incredibly impressive. And what it had was a sign outside of it, a couple of safety rails, very few warning signs.
But the safety rails were there and it just seemed to be common sense. You know, you can climb all over the castle.
You can go all over the castle, but there's no one here to check on you. Yeah.
Tell you what, there's a place where I grew up, which is called Hadley Castle, which is down in Essex, down near South End.
And it's not much of a castle. Like it's a castle wall more than anything in the upright of a roundel.
But there's a sign as you walk in that says don't climb on the castle. But like if you do,
there's no no barriers to stop you from climbing the castle. And to be fair, I've climbed on top of one of the roundels.
But sense and sensibility says you don't go too high and you don't climb the big one.
And I don't think many people do. I think that it's just kind of implied, isn't it?
Well, that's it. But like, I guess the thing that weirded me out was that you have this random castle at the end of a country road
with nothing more than one house and an old person's home next to it.
And then to contrast that with I went to a wedding the other weekend and there's a massive hill outside of Salisbury.
And it turns out that like one of the largest castles in England at one point was there.
And there's absolutely very little left of it. There's a cathedral that was constructed on top of the hill and then struck by lightning five days after its consecration.
It's just plain ironic. But anyway, there's that there and it's all it's just the foundations and that's all that's there.
And there's less of this castle up on this hill in Salisbury than there is this random one in Wales.
And what really weirded me out was this massive manmade hill in Salisbury with less castle on it.
They want the there's a ticket office. There's a cafe and they want eight pound fifty to take a look around the almost non-existent ruins.
As opposed to the three intact to it and multi-level ruins that there were in Wales.
Yes, it's silly, isn't it?
It just kind of made me go, go, but anyway, right. Sorry. OK, right.
Moving on. Today's topic is about ethics.
My although I use the Internet for some of this stuff, the main source of this talk where I've got my questions from comes from Eva, The Good Place,
which is a series of Netflix, which a lot of people can enjoy.
Chidi being quite possibly the best character in that.
But also just need to put this out there. Simon Blackburn's book for the Oxford Press, ethics, a very short introduction.
So I'll start with just one of the basic questions.
What's the difference between ethics and morality, Nick? Do you know what?
I think the way that I always remembered it was morals equals me.
Ethics is socially imposed. Morals is your own imposition.
That's like I'm going to be honest with you, mate, like 10 out of 10, you've hit the nail on the head there.
What I found from ethics is it's both broader and more specific.
Ethics is kind of like the study of morals from what I can tell.
So morality, every person has a morality, just as everybody has a fee, their morality being part of it.
But ethics seems to be the study of that morality.
And if you want, if you like the the judgment of that morality and the good and bad that that morality produces.
Yeah, it's. Yeah, it's like.
Yeah, don't agree with everything Simon wrote, but he definitely did a good job.
OK, so I guess I guess I'll start with a basic one.
Do you reckon ethics has increased or decreased in the last 10, 20 years?
And can you give me an example? Ethical behavior as a whole.
I think all the need of ethics. So.
All right. So I guess Simon. All right.
So Simon defines it as an ethical environment is is a surrounding climate of ideas of how to live.
It determines what we find acceptable or contemptible.
Sorry, acceptable or unacceptable, admirable or contemptible.
It determines our view of when things are going well or badly.
It determines what we expect from ourselves and from others.
It determines what can be forgiven and what cannot.
In the eyes of some, some thinkers, it shapes our very identity.
That's one definition he gave. But I was just wondering it from a personal view.
Do you think the do you think that the society in which we live has become more ethical in the last 10 or 20 years?
And if so, like, what would you what can can you think of an example where things have gotten better or like how it has changed?
So I realize that's a big, broad question, but I just kind of wanted you to know that there's not really a wrong answer here.
I just want to get. No, no, I think I think it's if you look at it like if you try to look at it like whether ethics has whether there's more ethics in modern day.
And I think you look I think potentially you look you you you start the conversation wrong, if you will.
I don't mean that in an assault way. I mean that my grandparents had a completely different level of ethics to what I have today.
For example, their ethics brought about more chivalry in some aspects.
Their ethics brought out a bit more community.
I can remember my Nan telling me stories about how it was completely normal for her to sit out in her front garden, a table and chair and talk to everybody that went by.
I actually remember one New Year's Eve party.
We walked out and did the can can all the way down my Nan's road and everybody on the street came out and joined the can can.
And so we went all the way down the road and all the way back up again.
Everybody doing the can can. Something that wouldn't happen nowadays.
As a matter of fact, if somebody tried to do that, everybody would be looking out the window.
I say everybody. I mean proverbially everybody would be looking out the window judging those people for trying to do that.
Like they were strange. So I think ethics has changed over the last 50 years at least.
Absolutely. I guess we live in times of great change at the moment.
In the last couple of hundred years, this country has changed massively.
Sorry to go back to this, but cities like Salisbury, cities like Coventry, which once dominated the landscape and like were powerhouses or cities like Ely even,
which were political powers in and of themselves are now, I hate to say it, backdrops.
Like they're not. Yeah, they're not. They're not centers of like they still exist and they've still got historical importance.
But I don't know. I can't think of the last political movement that came out of Salisbury Coventry or Ely, you know, not that I mean to pick on these places.
If you're from those places, fair play to you. Your house is probably worth a lot more than what I'm going to be able to afford.
Right. Okay. Well, something that Simon brought up and you've scraped upon it because your point is more about community and about the fact that there were times when you could just let your guard down in a community.
There were times when people could talk to each other and it was perfectly acceptable to talk to each other.
Like, for example, I know one of my neighbors is a guy called Tango and he's a really nice bloke.
But the only reason I speak to him is because he fixes up cards on the road and ends up using up a lot of parking spaces.
However, he redeems himself because he talks. He talks to you and he's always very happy because he knows he's using up more than his fair share, if you will.
He's always willing to move and that and he's always willing to have a chat.
So that kind of actually possibly makes him my best neighbor, even though it does frustrate me when I'm having people over and all of the spaces are taken up on the road.
But that's we all going to make a living, you know?
Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely.
I think, as you said, the redeeming feature, the redeeming factor is that he, despite the fact that he's using up a lot of space, he isn't unapproachable.
And he hasn't put a wall up, almost like this is my entitlement and I'm going to have it.
Instead, being quite open and approachable, it's almost like I respect the fact that I'm overstepping the mark and I'm more than happy to move.
But if it's no bother, I'm going to use it, which is completely acceptable, I think.
Yeah, yeah, there was a time when it used to frustrate me simply because my housemate and landlord is in many, many ways very chill.
But I myself am very territorial as a person.
Like if I'm working on a desk and someone puts some of their stuff on my desk, I'll let it slide for 15 minutes, but I will bring it up with them at a later point if they haven't moved it, which is somewhat hypocritical because I myself make mistakes and often cross people's boundaries.
But anyway, okay, so it's interesting here that you spoke about your grandparents sense of chivalry as well.
Yeah, and that is something that Simon talks about in his book.
How today's society is obsessed with rights.
Yeah.
Rather than good, or it's obsessed with rights, rather than duty, it's always, what do I deserve, rather than what is expected of me.
Yeah, now I don't mean to be a boomer here, or I don't think I'd even technically am one, but I don't mean to put all of the buck on people for their own happiness and for their own well being I know there's a lot of complicated issues out there that we're now aware of.
But I don't see
in advertisements, it's always about your rights and creating a sense in you of lack of contentment.
In a way, adverts are out there to rob you of your peace but I feel that what's happened in society is as we've all kind of watched these things over the years. We've all started feeling like we are entitled to lots of stuff that perhaps we're not, and none of us want to, none of us want to step out, step up to the plate and do good, but we want to have good done to us.
Yeah, yeah I completely agree with that. Now I spent a lot of my, as I said when we were talking about education, I spent a lot of my time in school being bullied.
And one of the worst things that I will remember, and I'll remember it to the day I die, I was encircled by a group of people that I went to school with, whilst two people kicked live in hell at me.
All I can remember is this circle of people that were not doing anything about it. I could not have been one of those people on the outside watching what was going on without getting involved, without stopping what was happening, even if I didn't even like the person on the floor.
Even if they'd done something terribly wrong, that was wrong. And I couldn't stand by and watch that. And that kind of comes into that duty thing. I would feel like I had a duty to humanity, not just to that person, but to humanity to be responsible.
And to say, no, that's not how this is going to go.
Unfortunately, in my respect, they didn't. Nobody, nobody was looking on thought it prudent that they or nobody felt the duty, should we say, to stop that.
And I just had to wait until these guys kind of had their fun. But there's been times in the past where I've, I've stopped a bully from starting on somebody less able than myself or even more able but just less able to stand up for themselves.
And there's been a couple of times where a couple of a couple of really tough looking kids being picked on and I'm like, No, you're not going to do that. I don't care. I'm a complete weed, but I don't care. You know, you're not doing that.
No matter what the threat to my own safety it was. And that comes under morals, doesn't it? I think I've always been a very strongly moral person. I know discussions with certain religious door to door.
Should we say religious door to door salespeople have had numerous long hour long conversations with me about how their, their religion could benefit me.
And I politely remind them or inform them that my morals are more than adequate for me to be assured of my positive input to humanity.
And that's good enough for me.
Okay. I think that's also touched upon another point there that we all.
We all look to our own safety. Okay, several points here. I can't remember exactly what it was called. I'll maybe I should start Googling this but I don't want to waste our listeners time by Googling this.
I know there was a case in New York, where 37 people witness, a man being kicked to death in a back alleyway and 37 different people saw it from their various apartments.
Not a single one of them called the police.
Everyone assumed.
That someone else would do it.
And unfortunately that kind of takes the whole spectator sport of drama, if you will, kind of really puts that on the head, I'm going to need to look up the exact numbers and find the exact example and it's probably, it may not have been 37 it's probably.
I'm hoping for the sake of humanity it's less than that but I will look it up and find out about that later. See I don't have the faith in humanity that you do so I'm quite, it probably is 37 if I'm honest.
Yeah, I just, you know what I've got a load of endorphins kicking around my things I've just started doing some aerobics and that so I've got endorphins in me at the moment now I'm really glad we don't record this immediately after work or there would be all sorts of shit pouring out of my mouth.
Quick disclaimer also sorry for swearing there.
The other time I was talking about democracy, and I thought that the ancient society had a good system. What I was saying there is that the idea of people having a vote as whether to go to war or not.
I thought was a good system, not the idea of only landowners being able to vote. Just to be super clear on that to everybody. I realized it's very easy for that to be misconstrued.
So anyway, apologies for that. Right back to this topic though and back to your own behavior there Nick. I actually really respect the fact that you speak to door to door people, as a lot of people won't do that the moment you are approached by someone.
It's annoying because you only seem to be approached by, I myself have been scammed by loads of people who have approached me on the street, either selling me something, offering me something. I'm not even going to go into it.
It does annoy me though the number of times that I've done that rather than just telling them to do one. Because they could be, you know, each time you interact with a person they could be genuine.
But I really like the fact that you do speak to door to door people because I've also spoken with them. I've done some of the studies with them and that and although I don't necessarily agree with everything those guys say, the whole reason why we're doing this podcast is because you should be able to talk about morality.
You should be able to talk about politics, you should be able to talk about religion, you know, and you should be able to talk about sexuality and although sexuality is the one that's being pushed in schools. I'm not against that.
But I just think you should be able to talk about the other stuff as well. I think that that's you hit the nail on the head there I was going to say the same thing like the whole reason we've started doing this podcast.
I wanted to do this podcast myself for personal reasons is because I want people to feel like it's okay to challenge not other not just definitely not other people's perspectives but definitely their own perspectives, I actively seek to challenge my own perspective by having these conversations
with people Jehovah's Witnesses Mormons whoever come to the door. I say to them, essentially, convert me.
I am very strongly opinionated as I'm sure you're aware.
But I'm also educated to a level.
But I don't profess to know everything. What I do know is that these religions have entranced and enlightened for lack of a better term, millions of people.
There's obviously a reason for that. So don't, I'm not going to act like I know what that reason is and it's not good enough for me.
If it's good enough for millions of people, why wouldn't it be good enough for me.
Why is it so good.
And if it still doesn't resonate with me then I know then I know why it doesn't resonate with me I know why it doesn't make sense to me, and I actually have more faith in my own beliefs than I had before I started.
And that's actually something which in the early days of communism, started as a movement, what they would do was they would take a new recruit, put them with an older person who would be quiet, just for the sake of safety, and they would send that pair out onto a street corner for that
communist convert to try and convert other people. And the reason they would do that would be to mature them, like quickly, and mature them through conflict.
Because on the street, not everyone's going to have the same opinion as you. And if you're the one who's part of a movement, you will often find yourself up against resistance.
So I love the fact that what you're doing there is, yeah sorry, what the point you've made is that your, your views may have become more entrenched, but they've become better informed and refined through conflict.
Yeah, and I, I hate how scared I am of conflict, how annoyed I get at challenge when I'm feeling insecure. And I think that's what's happening a lot nowadays with people generally is we lose that ability to communicate through that lack of challenge.
I also was massively challenged by Simon's book, like and there were some parts where he took a view I had, and he absolutely smashed it apart. And there are other times when he seems to think he was smashing it apart, and he'd missed the point.
Yeah, like we'll go into some of those later but I think
it's weird that me and you are having this conversation, the sort of conversation that people used to have down the pub every single day, yet we're having it maybe once every week once every two weeks in a contained environment because these sorts of conversations make people
nervous. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. I think there's been numerous times where I've started to express my, I mean I've come to learn that I choose to discuss my beliefs, very selectively.
And there's good reason for that and that's because my beliefs are so niche that people feel almost insulted by them sometimes.
And, yeah, I've come to these conclusions or not conclusions because I don't think belief is something you have to have a little bit of faith in there's no real concrete, no concretized evidence, necessarily.
So, I think I've come to these, these, for lack of a better term, assumptions based through research like hours and hours and hours of research and logical deduction. So, to me, it absolutely makes sense but there's so many people that it genuinely shakes their foundations
that they insult you to kind of validate themselves. And it's, it's a very immature way to deal with that kind of attack but like you said it comes from fear isn't it comes to comes from that fear of challenge that fear of, of change, or, or, yeah, lack of security in your own foundation.
And I think we've all done that, and I've been. I've been massively disappointed by some people I've been speaking to and they've reacted that way because up until they did that.
They may not have even been aware that they were winning the argument they were winning me over.
They may not make a single point, which makes sense. And their immediate response is to literally.
Yeah, you know what, not going to relive that will keep going with ethics though.
So one thing that Simon put through in his book is the idea about us being focused more on right, rather than duties, however, later in the book he also talks about how freedom from a particular type of suffering is a really good way to start a movement
which I completely agree with but I do think it sometimes gives a sense of entitlement but we'll touch about that again.
Some of the ways that I feel that society has made huge steps forwards.
The tolerance of other sexualities other than just the traditional straight one has, I feel has come forward, like massively I remember, like in secondary school, gay jokes were normal.
Like nowadays, just, you just don't get people talking that kind of shit anymore. No, no, but I worked in elderly care homes for 14 years.
And you wouldn't believe how normal it is for, and I'm quoting here I'm paraphrasing here I'm using words that other people have used to as example but like the, like the words blackie and stuff like that completely normal to come up in conversation.
And yet, for me, when the first time I heard somebody refer in that way to somebody I was working with, I, my jaw hit the floor and my heart sank. And I was like, wow, like this is the 21st century and people still think it's okay to use that terminology man, come on.
But it's just the time they came from and that's no excuse against it please don't think that I'm excusing these people. Quite often these people that I was looking after had dementia, and didn't, they were they were regressing back to when that was okay they weren't thinking
that was okay to do now they were genuinely back in the 1930s. And they were living it was okay.
So if you're surrounded by people who agree, or just if you're surrounded by people of that same generation.
Easily done. Yeah.
Yeah, I mean, you learn what you live and you live what you learn and some of the kids that we are see in the playground when I pick up my kids from school.
They, some of the conversations that they are having are so adult some of the comments that are coming out their mouth so many insults they're throwing are so adult that you know it's not their words.
It's their parents and they've heard their parents say that their aunts and uncles say that and they've, they're regurgitating that because they think it's cool because their parents said it so why wouldn't it be cool, you know.
So what are they calling each other immature, or toxic, or no no just just jaded.
It's like the terminology they're using isn't something that you would expect like a seven or eight year old kid to start using, but they're using it because they're their parents, you can almost hear their parents telling them that that's what that kid that that kid.
That kid behaves that way because, because his mom's a diss that and the other you know or something like that. You know, wow. Okay, so they're still going for the jugular and they're still being mean it's just a different place.
Absolutely. Oh, dear.
Right, well, I feel that in the last 20 years.
There's a lot more understanding out there.
I feel that's a, that's a good thing.
I feel that there is that I'm glad that, like, less of, not less.
Other than the model perfect people. There seems to be a celebration in women of different body types which I think is good.
There's I think society has made a lot of progress in the last 20 years, but I will admit that there have been things that have lost things like community things like, I hate to say it chivalry things, things like just letting your guard down and joining in.
Because of, you know, security people value their rights and people value their, their safety.
And I feel to a point,
safety is somewhat of an illusion so it's actually better to get involved like I love things like live music events or Kaylee's because you, sorry, a Kaylee is like English barn dance listeners who haven't done it they don't happen all that often but like you know they're out there.
And I love these things because of the breakdown of social barriers that happen when everyone in the room is learning a dance for the first time.
And although you've got a partner you've got the people around you and you'll have to look at each other and figure out what you're doing and what you're doing right and it's just kind of like because of the movement and because you're dancing the music and you're giving it a go, you end up smiling at each other
and that creates, although it's a false sense of community, it's still pleasant.
I wouldn't say false I'd say temporary.
Yes, yeah no you're right, you're right.
Okay, so I think it's gotten.
I think things have gotten better in a lot of ways, but worse than some others.
I'm glad that people are aware of their own rights, but I wish that we would all fight and do a little more for the rights of others.
You can't see me right now but I am nodding.
Yeah, I don't know.
Yeah, definitely just take responsibility, take ownership. You know if you don't, nobody else will. And that's where my morality comes into it, where I've been left and nobody else has for so long, for the large majority of my life.
I'm not trying to play the violin and make people feel sorry for me but I've experienced what it's like to not have people step up so rather than allow that wheel to keep turning.
It's on me to stop that wheel turning isn't it it's on me to stop that cycle from continuing to happen. And maybe, maybe by people seeing that I can be a bit courageous and I can stand up for other people.
And they can go, you know what that wasn't that difficult, and he didn't get challenged that much like he was right for doing that, therefore I'm going to do that too.
I think, I think it was Mahatma Gandhi that said be the change you want to see in the world. And there's never been a proverb that I've lived by more.
That's fantastic and that's something we all aspire to. I'm glad that you're, you're living it I'm not sure I am at the moment but I'm working on it.
All right, well, I'll cover a couple of things.
I'm sorry I keep on calling him Simon as if I know him in the book, it covers seven threats to ethics. Unfortunately, this book.
I'm not the best reader. I am dyslexic.
So I listened to an audio book, so out of the seven, I can remember five.
The third, the, so these are five threats to ethics, although I'll admit, even the last three to me.
Start to kind of meld into one another.
Because of
Just because of my own lack of understanding in them. And I will admit this, like this book has both insulted and challenge me on a number of ways, but it's also made me aware of my ignorance, and I feel that I actually
owe the author.
Something there because he has made me aware of this. Anyway, five threats to ethics in the modern world in today's zeitgeist if you will.
The threat of the death of God.
The threat of relativism.
The threat of egoism.
The threat of evolutionary
biological understanding, and the threat of determinism.
So I'll cover some of those.
He was covering the threat of the death of God, as in the move away from religion in today's Western society.
Morals, morals, objectivity used to, in some part in many thinking cultures, rely on fears and as a way of providing object value to these subjective ideas.
He covers this quite well, although I will admit, he was obviously raised in a Christian household and fell away from it because he just shits over my own religion and the thing I love quite a lot, and does it quite well in some parts and not so well in others, but what he basically
comes to say is that
not religion, even without religion.
Morality and ethics still have a place because human beings are ethical and moral agents, regardless of where they are, even more so in communities.
So no matter, so wherever you go, every culture will have different ethics, but every single culture will have ethics, simply because it's a byproduct of human nature, and that in itself, in his mind is enough.
In my mind it's not enough.
But,
I will admit at least,
he sees some substance in it, you know, but then again, it's very difficult to be an ethical professor, if you don't believe in ethics.
What do you believe?
I think, I think you're both bang on the money.
I think the reason why you,
you felt challenged by that is because it's almost an ambivalent topic, isn't it?
It's almost an ambivalent opinion,
where I can personally see both sides of the argument.
You know, I can see that religion,
even though, even though I'm not personally religious,
I think that the basis of each of the core beliefs,
each of the core religions,
has value, has a lot of value, and has strong principles,
which enable for a rich society.
And if you step outside of that and you expect community
to develop into its own rich,
pro-humanistic ethics, like you've got to also
gauge for selfishness,
and those natural animalistic traits that humans have.
Religion quite firmly gives us rules, regulations,
that are taught time and time again, whereas outside of religion,
there's no stone tablet with Ten Commandments written on it
to tell you that this is how things are supposed to be,
or to give you the guidelines in which a good life is lived.
So you base that on what you see around you,
and you run the risk of getting blurred lines,
and you run the risk of your ethics being manipulated or warped over time.
One thing that I think humans are all very guilty of as a whole
is allowing community to lead the way,
and not challenging it when something's wrong.
I think back to the conversation I had earlier about
the entire group of kids that were stood around me.
I thought one of those wanted to stop that,
yet all of them would have known it was wrong.
But because there was a sense of community
in them watching what was going on, they all thought it was fine.
They thought, he thinks it's fine, so I think it's fine.
Unless anybody's going to challenge that,
I'm not going to change that,
because I don't want to be the one to change that.
The two kids beating on you, were they fearsome opponents,
or were they just regular kids?
They were just regular kids in the school,
but that was quite frequently the case back then.
Then you end up with the strong leading the weak,
and that's how manipulation happens,
and that's how personal views become imposed rules,
and you end up in dictatorships and other things.
So yeah, I think religion gives a good structure to ethics,
and a good basic...
For example, the Ten Commandments are a very good, strong base
for ethical behaviour.
And like I said, having that rule book there,
especially for an autistic person,
nobody ever gave me the ethical guidebook when I was growing up.
I had to learn all of these unwritten rules,
and there's me taking mental notes every time somebody points out another one.
But everybody else just seems to get it,
and I'm like, but nobody told me that was a thing,
so how was I supposed to know, man?
It doesn't make sense.
But at least with religion, it's very clear and says,
don't do that, do this, don't do that.
And sometimes that's good, but sometimes it's not.
Sometimes when you get wrapped up in the history of religion and everything else,
then it becomes a grey area of...
Absolutely, it can be used for both great good and great evil.
Yeah.
What I find interesting is that Simon's view was very much that
the death of God isn't just a...
It's not only not a hindrance to ethics,
but it is a requirement that we move away from that.
And I guess that was one of the key things that I disagreed with him on.
But I can understand, because a number of the points that he made were valid.
The Bible does include rules for how you should treat a household slave,
where slavery is now known to be detestable and wrong.
It does include a number of...
Everybody, if you're listening to this, go out and buy Ethics,
a very short introduction by Simon Blackburn.
You know what, you might not agree with it,
but if you're anything like me, you will learn something.
Just to be clear, I don't have a book deal.
Use code.
Yeah.
I disagreed with him.
He also pointed out a load of problems with Jesus.
One of his things that he had a go at him over was
Jesus is made out as meek and mild,
and he was at times.
But there were a load of times when he wasn't.
But it's the perception that religious people say that he's meek and mild,
is the falsehood, not the fact that he was.
He was harsh with the people he needed to be harsh with.
He was...
As I understand it, and once again, not religious,
but as I understand it, he was exactly what he needed to be
for whatever situation he was in.
Well, that's it.
If somebody was a puffed up asshole,
he spoke to them like a puffed up asshole.
I'm not going to pretend to understand the cultural dynamics
between Jew and Gentile 2,000 years ago,
but there was a massive cultural divide,
and there were times when his interactions with Gentiles
weren't great by modern day standards.
I did really struggle with the one where Simon says that
Jesus obviously didn't care about prophecy, right,
because of the story that I think it's in two of the gospels,
so it's repeated.
The more something's repeated in the Bible in different places,
the more credible it's seen as going,
just as news from multiple sources,
as the Bible's made up of 52 books.
Sorry, I'm not going to talk all about this all the way.
But he talks at one point where one of the famous stories is
there was a bloke who had not just one demon in him,
not just one mental health problem, but loads,
and he used to scavenge around a burial ground,
like one side of the Sea of Galilee.
At one point he meets Jesus,
and Jesus casts...
I won't go through the whole interaction,
but the demons call themselves legion
because there is a lot of them in this bloke.
I'm not going to pretend to understand what's going on here,
but Jesus casts them out into a bunch of pigs.
The pigs all run down into the lake and die.
Now, I realize it sounds like a load of bollocks,
and although I believe it happened,
I don't necessarily have proof,
and I don't have the farmer's market records from 2000 years ago.
But Simon was saying because Jesus did that,
he didn't care about property rights of the people who owned the pigs.
And I'm like, you've missed the point.
The point is that God cares about that one individual complete waster of a man
than he does about the additional welfare of a load of rich folk.
Even now, I'm saying the story wrong,
and if I get struck by lightning later tonight, you'll know why.
But still, it's just like...
Simon took that out of context,
and I just felt that that was badly researched compared with the sheer quality.
There's a chance that this Simon is basing it on his own experience.
He may very well have had a negative experience. I certainly did.
Maybe he comes from a wealthy background,
and actually wealth looks after wealth.
So what he would see out of his own experience there is that that was damage to property,
and that in itself is a crime.
Whereas my own morals come in from no money,
I look exactly at the humanity of the situation where God banished the demons out of the human
to give him a better chance at being a normal human.
But it swings around about it.
As we said earlier, it's what you live and what you learn, isn't it?
Absolutely.
We're nearly out of time, but I can't believe this.
I've actually done a better job than I thought I'd done.
I've got loads of stuff still here to cover.
What you mean is...
We managed to talk the ears off of the topics that you'd researched.
Yeah.
Well, I've got a load of other... Okay, so we'll move on from the threat of the death of God.
And the next one is the threat of relativism to the idea of ethics being worthwhile and valuable.
One of the main things that is covered here is when...
Well, that's just your opinion.
How often have you had that said to you?
Like, I know it's thrown around in media a fair amount of times.
It's seen as a polite refusal.
I find it's thrown at me when I prove my point beyond point of argument.
And they don't have a counter-argument, so then they make out that it's my opinion.
Yes, because that's the only way to undermine your victory is to say that the victory doesn't matter.
Yeah, exactly.
So I quite often...
I will research a topic that I believe in quite firmly to the point where I back it up with quite a lot of fact.
And I'm very careful about what I say so that I am clear in what is hypothetical or logical deduction
and what is based on factual research.
So when I am arguing the point with someone and I manage to get my point across,
because it is so strongly backed up, if I do actually argue, bear in mind I don't argue,
so if I do end up arguing it's because I firmly believe in what I'm saying and I firmly know what I'm talking about.
So I give everything over and then they go, oh crap, I've got nothing to come back with.
So well, you're entitled to that because that's your opinion.
No, I am entitled to that because it's not just opinion, that is fact.
And if it wasn't fact, I wouldn't have wasted half of my day trying to prove to you that that was fact.
If it was my opinion, I would have kept it to myself.
Or they'll call you insecure or petty for putting the effort in to engage them in conversation.
And this is the annoying thing, although everyone likes to be right, no one likes to be wrong,
that's why I struggled reading this book because there are several points in which I'm wrong.
This is why I struggle with arguments as I'm bad at putting my points across and I get muddled in my speech.
But when I'm defeated, I'm not having read this, I'm definitely going to try and be far more positive about the situation than, well, that's just your opinion.
Like, well, that's just your opinion.
It doesn't give the person it's not providing an answer.
It's not providing an opportunity to continue discussing or to even change the subject of conversation.
It's not an admission of being wrong.
It's just literally saying that everything that we've talked about doesn't matter because it's all subjective.
And if you're going to look at things like ethics, you can't just say that's just your opinion
because then what you're basically saying is the entire conversation is a waste of time.
And this is a point I did really agree with Diamond about.
It's not, well, that's just your opinion is it's a terrible phrase.
And it's something, yeah, it's something which people will say to stuff they disagree with as a way of allowing themselves to continue believing what they believe unchallenged.
You know? Yeah.
Like, I don't know how you feel, but sometimes I actually use that I actually use the phrase in the return.
In the return sense. So instead of saying, oh, that's just your opinion in order to save somebody the need to argue with me, which is never going to go well.
And I quite often say, but it's OK, because that's just my opinion and then leave it there and walk away.
Oh, bugger.
You use it as a mic drop.
Exactly that. Exactly that.
So what I've learned over the years is quite often people will go to say it as a means to get out of an argument.
But if you take that away from them, they kind of sit there going, oh, yeah.
So, and I like doing that.
So, you know, I will quite often give across my opinion, quite give across my opinion or based on the research that I've done.
And then I'll go. But it's OK. That's only my opinion.
And then leave them to chew on it. OK.
Well, that's yeah, that's fair enough.
But I find it interesting that when talking about.
Now, this is the thing I'm really worried about when when anyone talks about like subjectivity and objectivity, subjectivity is used as a way of softening things.
And you get, you know, like French philosophers who were saying that reality is the biggest illusion here simply because I can't actually prove anything to do with anything.
Whereas every every person who's properly tried to think about things seems to come to the conclusion that objective reality, although they can't prove it, seems to be real through its shared and consistent nature, even though it's a chaotic and changing nature.
So what I find interesting is that the idea that everything subjective and nothing really matters seems to be held by.
Well, I know I was one of these people.
And it's OK. So, you know what? I'll describe myself as I was when I was younger or when I was first dipping my toe into philosophy subjectivity seemed to be incredibly attractive because it had the glamour of being very liquid.
It should almost justify anything, say anything, interact with anything on a light level and on your terms when it's subjective.
And because it's subjective in that way, it's a very attractive view for the young and for those who haven't necessarily invested or researched a topic yet.
You come at it from a light hearted subjective point of view, and that allows you to or facilitates you to learn more about it.
And I see that as fair enough. But just because that's your view of it, it shouldn't mean that you can assume that everyone else should hold that same view.
You know, yeah.
It's it. I do find it weird, though, although I disagree with.
Absolute relativism.
The amount it gets shit on by every single serious philosophy professor I've read is is baffling.
It's something they obviously find themselves hitting their head against a brick wall about, like literally it gets shot on more than religion.
Like, and I'm wondering,
is
OK, it's something that seems to be on the rise in in society on the whole. Optimists optimistic nihilism.
And I'm going to be honest with you.
Maybe it's just my autism. Maybe it's my own stupidity here.
I can't get my head around it.
Yeah, to be fair, when you said that, my brain kind of went, where?
Right. OK, so nihilism is obviously the belief.
I hate I hate when people say basically, obviously all of this lot, because unfortunately, a work colleague.
Yeah, he shall remain nameless because I doubt he'll be very happy with me using his name on this podcast pointed out to me how often I said basically in conversations.
And annoyingly, I've now picked up on that and I've picked up on how often my brother says it.
And everyone says it all the time.
And it now annoys me. And it wasn't a pet peeve.
And now it is. So thank you very much. That particular work colleague who pointed that out to me.
Right. Just you know, mate, it wasn't yourself.
It with with optimistic nihilism, I can understand it's incredibly freeing, but it's only incredibly freeing when you have food on the table, reliable systems of support and governance and a long and happy life ahead of you.
Optimistic nihilism simply simply gives you freedom in that context. And I can see it working for a lot of young people.
I can't see it working for anyone else.
Yes, I just read a little bit on optimism, optimistic nihilism, just to verse myself. No, I didn't. I wasn't fully versed on nihilism myself. But obviously nihilism is life has no meaning.
Is that right? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Well, it's not it's not just that life has no meaning. It's that everything has no meaning. Like you can you can be an atheist, but not a nihilist if you still believe that certain things are important.
Nihilism seems to be the complete shutdown almost depression of all thought. Yeah. Yeah. And like, and this is the weird thing because you've got a lot of smart kids who are now going for this.
Yeah. So optimistic nihilism is like nothing has any meaning. So nothing has any meaning other than what you give it.
And so therefore it's like seen as this ultimate freedom. But if nothing has any meaning, then it means that when people hurt you or when you've hurt them, it no longer matters.
And although it's good not to dwell too much on the past and not to beat yourself too much up, there are times when you should attempt to make amends.
There are. Although I believe people should forgive things, they shouldn't just say it doesn't matter. And I guess this is something that kind of annoys me because even in things like anime like Attack on Titan, can't even remember one of the characters name, but they have the most intelligent character in the series.
And I would basically point out the subjective nature of morality.
And part of me was so disappointed in the writers of that series at that point because if because the character was so intelligent and had done so much. It was disappointing to see them.
And their their raw substance would have given them a greater insight than to simply pander to the masses.
But anyway, that's that's right. Sorry, I've gone off on one again. Apologies. Okay, so subjectivity and relativism, death and then finally nihilism. All of those things kind of.
They all take a stab at ethics, but I don't feel they defeat it.
And that might just be because of my own immature moral emotional thinking, but that's that's that's just myself.
All right. What we've got here.
What we've got next is the threat of egoism. I'm going to just group these all together, even though they are separate.
The threat of egoism, evolutionary doctrine and determinism. Egoism being that everybody does everything out of self interest all the time.
I would argue that even if somebody does something kind to make themselves feel better, it doesn't make it makes it not altruistic, but it doesn't mean that it's not kind.
It undermines it, but it doesn't destroy it. What do you think?
No, I agree. I agree.
Okay. When it comes to the evolutionary principles again, Simon takes a massive stab. I didn't see this coming. He takes a massive stab at Dawkins.
And points out that even if we are.
The way that he put it was really good and I wish I had written this down.
He was looking at like different ethical kind of papers and stuff.
And one of them was explaining about motherly love.
And it was saying that motherly love exists.
Here are the examples and here's why it exists.
Therefore, motherly love doesn't exist.
And that's the way he pointed out that it's flawed.
It's a flawed investigation.
Because if you're saying that motherly love is only made up of all of these things, splitting it up into different pieces doesn't mean the collective whole of those pieces does not exist.
Which I found interesting.
If nothing else, the final one he used was, and he only touched upon this briefly as he said there was whole other books to be written about this.
Determinism, the fact that everything is already determined, the fact that your choices are not real choices.
They're just the form of the calculations that you make in your brain.
I've got a mate of mine who's a chemistry and biology teacher.
And he's a smart man, but he only believes in determinism.
And I will admit, if determinism is true, then I understand why it kind of somewhat destroys ethics.
Unfortunately, I wasn't.
This is the annoying thing.
So all of our listeners, you may have guessed by now, I'm not a very smart man.
I was not able to understand Simon's arguments against determinism.
However, the very fact that he was able to make any kind of argument against it still gave me somewhat hope.
I realize this is a bit of a weird word, and I didn't know that determinism referred to this. I just knew that it was a view that my mate had that we are just chemicals.
There is no choice.
Things will happen in response to.
We are just the response of our genetic disposition and external stimuli.
So essentially, biological fate.
Yes. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly.
Not spiritual fate.
Everything's pre written and and God's had a hand in everything, but your your sociological and biological history outlines your future.
It determines it completely. That's why it's called determinism.
Sorry. And again, that sound that came out wrong.
Sorry about that.
Sorry. Yes, you've hit the nail on the head, but it's like literally you have no choice. Everything that will happen to you will happen to you.
You are not a moral agent.
You are just the result.
And you continue to be the result.
See, I don't I don't.
And this is where I think determinism is going to be massively not for me because like I've had experience with a number of different people, should we say, who have experienced a number of different things.
Myself, I've had a should we say a colorful past.
I personally have not been a very nice person at times, and I have had not very nice things done to me.
My choice now is to have learned from those experiences and to act against any kind of negative inhibitions I may have.
Whereas I have also got I've also I also know of people that I grew up around who had similar I won't say the same because they weren't in my shoes directly, but similar backgrounds that choose not to act on experience, not to grow from negative experiences and not to more to dwell on those negative experiences and to continue those cycles turning.
And you tend you tend to find that they choose.
And it is an active choice because I know I can almost put my finger on exactly when I made the choice not to be this person.
So for me, it was very clear when I chose to be a good person. And so when I see people having had the same experiences, the same richness of history, shall we say, and they choose not to learn, then like determinism is completely thrown out the window because biologically
near on exactly the same people hereditary hereditary, should we say even to the point where some of my cousins may fall into the same bracket.
And like one of my cousins is even got his dad is my dad's brother and his mom is my mom's sister. So, like, it couldn't be any more cousins if we tried you know the genetics are very much there.
And yet, wait, so you both got the same set of grandparents.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, it was off. It's awfully bizarre but welcome to my world.
Okay, I can't.
My family's from Somerset.
I'll leave it at that.
Okay, you know what, maybe if that requires further stuff.
I think every you know what no I'm not I'm not gonna I'm not gonna I'm not gonna go I'm not gonna go I'm not gonna go on record everywhere has got that that that.
Like, I'm currently living in Sussex and they tell me that the people from this place or that place or inbred or that place and this place or inbred or that place and, you know, everywhere's got that you, you know, I was brought up in South End and we used to say that
people from Pitsy were inbred you know I mean, but I think that's possibly scary maybe everyone is inbred I just.
Well, my own my own my own family history. If you remember back to our first podcast where I brought up royalty and then I mentioned about Charlemagne and our, the seven, the extension of seven yes everybody is inbred at some point.
So yeah, let's not let's not go there but yeah the terminus determinism I think is completely.
On the outside but it's one of those things that I think this is what I kind of do I kind of go well that doesn't resonate with me. Let me find out why, let me find out why that doesn't resonate with me let me really know why that doesn't make sense.
I'll tell you why this doesn't resonate with me, but I will admit fully.
I have considered, like, we're all making choices, all the time.
I, I, I don't know I almost see
reality is like either a pinch point like this. I believe in the power I believe that choices is real, that free will is real.
And I believe in possibilities and I know that I've there have been loads of times when I could have made a stupid choice, and I didn't, or I could have made a good choice.
And I haven't.
Yeah.
My ability to choose is.
If everything is pre if if determinism is real, then slavery doesn't matter.
Because choice is an illusion.
You know, and I feel that.
No choice.
It's just not. Yeah, but at the same time, I realized that that is incredibly scientifically flawed and incredibly naive.
I think on a cellular level, absolutely. If you go down to the, if you go below self awareness, then determinism is a very strong factor.
You know, absolutely, but when you become self aware, then determinism, you have to, you have the ability to almost break your programming, for lack of a better term.
And yes, I'm aware that I'm almost quoting AI. When you make something self aware, then it has the opportunity to learn and when you have the opportunity to learn, then you have the opportunity to choose to do different than you were determined to do.
Absolutely.
That's, that's true.
So I think I've covered.
I'm going to call it there, but like, there were several things that were gone into in the book, where they started talking about
abortion and euthanasia. Again, I was like someone, or the weird thing is, I was somewhat challenging some things but there were some bits where me and
the author were entirely in the right, it's just in the idea that things are not as black and white as anybody likes to think they are, but I think maybe things like euthanasia things like abortion should be topics for things in in and of themselves, rather than
just something that we skip over now.
I guess the final question that I have here because I've just found a whole bunch of questions I was supposed to ask you but we have actually covered them.
Do you have a favorite moral philosopher.
I think I have favorite proverbs, and I've already said my favorite, which is be the change you want to be in the world and that was Mahatma Gandhi. But I am a man of many proverbs. And I think a lot of my rule book.
Should we say is these proverbs that I've heard or I've come up with my own way. And over the ways over the over the years. And you can ask any one of the people that have spent a lot of time with me quite often I will annoyingly come out with a random metaphor or, or make like that will explain a situation
almost perfectly.
That's fair enough. All right, I'll tell you. Well, from what I've learned recently, I'm liking can't and disliking niche.
Just generally, although I wouldn't.
I wouldn't. I haven't read enough of their stuff so we'll be covering them at a later point. Who was I can you got a little bit of robot.
No worries. So I'm. I enjoyed can't.
Emmanuel can't.
And I'm.
The annoying thing is, Albert Einstein was massively inspired by Frederick niche.
But niches a lot of niches philosophy seems to be incredibly reductive.
But maybe that's just trying to use science within psychology, as it was still in its infantile state and I do love the, the quote from Frederick each nationalism is an infantile disease.
As it really kind of sums up the stupidity of war over lines drawn on a map or authority for, you know, if a leader truly values that people, then they will think twice before going to war rather than just can I get away with this can it be
get but anyway sorry that's another thing. I tell you what Neil. That's right. I'll tell you what Nick sorry.
Yeah, right.
I.
One of my favorite Proverbs is taken from the Bible but I learned even during this that it's wasn't originally spoken there.
I love the golden rule of ethics. And that is, do unto others, as they would do to you.
I love it. It's one of my favorite quotes from the Bible because it's then followed by, because in this is summed up the law and the prophets.
See, I would, I would probably change that little bit based on personal experience to do unto others as you would have done unto yourself.
Okay, yeah, well I probably I've probably said it wrong.
That that's my favorite moral quote although I had to do have several others. Since you've said that you have a whole system of Proverbs, what, which one would you say is your favorite.
Oh god give me a scenario like this.
Okay, so they are applied to individual scenarios. Absolutely. Which, which one do you think is the most important overarching
Proverb or thought, or are they all practical in nature. I think they're all just they're all practical so I will quite often come up with Proverbs because Proverbs are my way of understanding
each individual scenario, because although every scenario in itself is unique and
being autistic, it becomes very difficult to like try to look at each individual scenario and understand it entirely.
If I make it into something that I know, then I understand it better. So,
yeah, I'm trying to think of an example but like I said without having the scenario there, then it becomes difficult for me to think up something.
That's fair enough.
Well, listeners, well, I'm going to call it a day there.
If you have gotten through all of this, thank you once again for your time.
I can't pay you back.
On that, I wish you good night.
Thanks very much for listening guys. Take care.
Bye bye.