Welcome to #GeekSpeak. Before we begin, I'd like to remind you that all channel logs are the copyright of the channel owners: Pankaj Saxena and Tom Wright. Logs may not be redistributed in any form without the prior consent of the channel owners. Tonight's discussion is on "Why Success in Life Requires Strict Adherence to Principles" and will be moderated by Andrew Schwartz. As usual, the discussion will be conducted in keyword-protected mode. If you see someone off-channel whom you think would like to join the discussion and would not be disruptive, please message me or Wright. Go ahead, Gilles. OK. Let's start by getting it clear in our minds what our subject is. Our topic is specifically moral principles, but first, what is a principle in the broadest sense of the word? Examples? A principle is a statement of fact that presents a general truth. A principle is a guide to action, like: To have food taste good, use butter in the pan. A principle is broad generalization a principle is inthe sense used here a (normative) abstraction. A generalization about a causal relationship. It has to omit the particulars of any specific actions. "A fundamental, primary or general truth on which other truths depend" Joe: I'm asking about the broad usage of the term. Tom, isn't a principle more broad than that? Not just normative. Other types of principles exist. hi gilles! yes but in some sense isn't there a normative aspect to principles? How are these principles arrived at, and why are they valid? By inducting from reality. Well I thought I'd start off with an easy one ;) Principles are arrived at through the process of reasoning by the human mind. We know they're valid by relating them to the perceptual. I liked Sube's definition. Hey, can the talk unrelated to the topic clear out of here? Okay, he's gone. Gilles: By abstracting causal connections. Can anyone give some examples of principles (in the broad sense as defined by Subetai) and how they were arrived at? I want some examples. Gilles: Honesty is the best policy. Betsy: I'd rather get a non-moral principle for now. Principles require two things: 1) a body of evidence; and 2) an understanding of the causal relations involved. Since principles are a guide to action, then causality is involved in two senses: 1) What you are and what you can do; 2) what the identity of the thing of interest, what is it and what cn it do? Reason as an absolute....based on its relevance to live ones life Things, when dropped, fall towards the earth. Gilles: One must eat in order to survive. Brad: Can you give an example of a principle? Thank you Subetai. I want some examples of things I can *see*. You want a broader one? If you want your food to taste good, learn how to cook. ;) I want simple perceptual examples like Subetai's. You cannot win a battle by aceding your enemy's premises. Is one perceptual example the best you can do? It hurts to run into a stone wall. Gilles: when one billiard ball hits another, it tends to make the other move also. Two things cannot occupy the same place at the same time. so how does the concept "knowledge" differ from "principle(s)". why is subetai's gravity example a principle, and not just knowledge? Pascal: That is a statement of a specific fact. Can you find the more fundamental fact underlying it? There are some good examples. Principles *are* knowledge. I would say that principles are guides to action. If it is merely a truth, it is not necessarily a principles. Like Betsy's statement, right? Two things cannot occupy same space, same time. that is why we have the separate term 'principle'. sube: so the two words are synonymous? Joe: No, a principle is a subset of knowledge. A principle is a statement of a general, fundamental truth. You can have statements of fundamental facts, like the law of gravity, and you can have specifically moral principles. That's what we're going to discuss now. This apple is red," is a statement of truth, but not a principle. joe: A principle identifies a causal connection. Knowledge isn't always about causal connections. Also, principles are abstract. Not all knowledge is in the form of principles, though valid principles are knowledge. How are these principles arrived at, and why are they valid? A principle has broad applicability to a wide variety of concretes. Now, what are specifically moral principles? Examples? subetai: ok, good. thanks. If you're talking gravity, "things fall" is a pretty general fundamental truth. Same for other branches of knowledge. Oral hygein is maintained with consistant brushing of one's teeth. Principles are formed by observing the behavior of things, and coming to an understanding about why certain conditions always obtain. Subetai: i think that is a truth, not a principle. If at first you don't succeed, try, try again. TomM: no, "a truth" is synonymous with knowledge. No man should be forced to live for the sake of another. For a moral example: one must hold self-esteem as a value of life Moral principles are general statements that identify a fundamental truth about actions (whether or not it's moral, etc.) A man's home is his castle. Principles are derived from knowledge, basic truths. PascalM: Principles *are* basic truths. Joe: Saying "things fall" is knowledge, but not yet in the form of a principle. Morality is about how to live one's life: a guide to proper action. So moral principles are statements that make broad generalizations about actions. So where do they derive from? Knowledge? of perceptions of the world? Right, Subetai. How are moral principles arrived at? Imagine you find yourself on a desert island. You have no knowledge of Objectivism, your parents were hippies, and now you must figure out how to survive. Can anyone explain how you might arrive at some valid moral principles over time? I disagree, Tom, but we'll discuss it later. We need to move along. Gilles: Aren't there many intermediate, not so all encompassing, ideasd often referred to as "working principles" or "rules of thumb?" Pascal: objectivism recognizes no form of knowledge that does not come from perception (or is based on it). Thanks Tom. The topic is far more complex: how following them is efficacious and necessary. Gilles: You might feel hungry and look for things you can eat. Betsy: You mean like "wear a hat when it's cold"? Gilles: One of the basic moral principles they'd arrive at very quickly is that you can't fake reality. A moral principle would be a broad statement about some aspect of human existence, such as to accomplish X do Y. Betsy: Peikoff indicates that in one of his lectures. He says something to the effect of "to catch the train, one must get their a half hour early" isn't a principle, since it is too concrete. Pretending that something is a particular way doesn't make it so. Okay - you can't fake reality. How would you come to arrive at such a principle? Is it an innate idea? Gilles: no innate ideas. Tabula Rasa. :) Moral principles would be abstractions from those concrete rules of thumb betsy mentioned. Assume you can't read Atlas Shrugged on this island. Gilles: No. Probably by observing that wishes don't change things, actions do. If Im on the island and I need food and must realize that I must catch fish to eat, they arent going to jump out of the water on to my plate ready to eat. Cant fkae realtiy. Can someone give me a scenario for a short movie in which someone discovers that you can't fake reality? Another principle might be that everything you need to survive must be obtained by human thought and effort. Betsy: I agree. How do you arrive at that principle? Gilles: Is morality applicable to a single person alone on an island, or does morality only apply in social situations (dealings between people)? Man sitting on the island wishing hard it would stop raining so he could build a fire. Doing many calisthenic rain-stopping dances. Finally, a light bulb flashes and moves into a cave or very close to a large shady tree. Shain: It's applicable to a single person. We'll see why a bit later. Gilles: By the fact that you discover that YOU have to actually thing and work to get the things you need to survive and nobody else is around to do it for you. thing=think and moves = and he moves good subetai The train example is too concrete because it is just about trains...now if you said something like: To arrive at a destination with spare time for the unexpected, get there early. Furthermore ... once you act you discover you have to act _properly_. Competently. Not just any action, despite wishes, will achieve a desired end. Do you arrive at these moral principles by induction or deduction? By induction. There are deductions involved in isolating the facts that'll go into defining the principle. There is also deduction in applyging principles to new situations. Yes. Right subetai, but because life is the standard and death is not deductied from living, its a prcoess of induction Gilles: you can deduce principles from broader principles. But all knowledge is primarily inductive. Right. But the essential in this context is the induction. You see from experience that you only succeed by conforming to reality. This is the best way to form the principle. Induction is the process of generalization. A principle is a general truth. Now we want to find out whether acting on these principles is always necessary. You are still on the desert island: let's say you have discovered that it is very beneficial to be honest with oneself about the facts; you know that it might rain tomorrow nd you should do something about getting shelter, but you really don't feel like it. Given your hippy upbringing, you think it's reasonable to act on the feeling since it's so strong. Envision such a situation; what would be the consequences of this on decision? One general moral truth that Gingrich broke recently is don't convort with the enemy. You'd get wet. oops covort. Okay, you might get wet. But say it doesn't rain after all. Would there be any negative consequences? Gilles: You are more likely to slack off in the future. Yeah, you're wasting time on building the shelter you need for the tropical storm when it does hit Gilles: yes it will, in the long run. Gilles: If you had a principle that said: When it rains, find shelter, that would con=ver it not raining ;) Yeah. You didn't act on your knowledge, you acted on your feelings. That would erode the consistency of your mind. Not physically. You might not be ready for the next rain though. yes, youd continue to think its not necessary to find shelter the next time you think itll rain You'd have to wait till later to find out that you shouldn't rely on feelings as a means of knowing reality. (sorry, I'm not used to this keyboard) It would be that much harder to act on your knowledge in the future. I have to go. Goodnite. Gardner; thanks. With his concrete-bound thinking, he's forming an association between "not feel like acting" and "nothing bad happens". An implicit principle of sorts whether he recognizes it as a principle or not Or covert, depending on the side you are on ;) Gilles: Though it ended up not raining, you were not prepared if it did rain, which was likely. The point is that it is too late to start building shelter when you are being rained on. Principles allow you to prepare in advance, when you have the time. Okay, you have given all the right answers. Now let's state them as principles. phil: so, one could form a principle: Don't wait until the last minute to do something, you may not have time to do it correctly. Being consistently rational takes effort. It's a situation imposed on the mind by the will, not the default. I can think of three reasons one must act on principle -- one existential, one psychological, and one psycho-epistemological. Anybody care to give me the simple existential reason? What is the simple function of principles? to live To act as guidelines for action. And why do humans need this function? To live? Animals live too, but they don't have principles. gilles: man has no instincts, so he needs to reason everything out. Humans have the ability to reason; i.e., think LONG-TERM. Because it saves them from analyzing every new situation from the ground up. Gilles: The simple function of principles is to allow you to think long-term. Gilles: The crow epistemology makes principles necessary. Subetai - we'll get to that in a moment. Okay. Gilles: The existential reason is that reality is consistent and causal. Principles make it possible for one to decide what to do before one *has* to decide what to do. Like Betsy said, we can't remember an enormous number of facts. Nor can we stop to analyze simple situations we've dealt with hundreds of times in the past, over and over again. THe two important facts here are: humans have no instincts - they don't act automatically; and so they must act *long term*. HOw do principles make long term action possible? Another way of looking at the existential reason -- without principles, civilized life is totally impossible. Life lived as a rational man Betsy: yes, existence exists, and wishing otherwise won't make it so. Psychological reason: A rational man's mind requires consistency; otherwise life is insane, random, whimsical? In situations where there is less evidence of something than you might wish, you can use principles to get the rest. The psychological reason is that actions tend to become generalized and automatized by our subconscious minds. Living long-term means knowing in advance what actions will lead to which consequences. Wait wait! Tom just gave the answer I was looking for. Gilles: By providing an alternative to a range-of-the-moment action and pointing out that it's probably to one's disadvantage long term if it contradicts a principle? A principle is always going to give the same results in the same situation in the future. Toddm too! Yes - principles tell you about *the future*. They tell you the future, and you need to know about it since you don't have instincts and must act long-range. Everyone get that? Okay, that's what I classify as the existential reason. Now what about the psycho-epistemological reason? It's already been mentioned. Gilles: Principles allow us to live long-range because they identify the types of causes that must be planned if one is to be able to live. Gilles: The P-E reason is the crow. Jim_N: That doesn't really get at the necessity of principles in particular - just acting in accordance with knowledge. Psycho-epistemology is the automatized aspects of man's mind. The P-E reason for principles is to automatize the correct mode of thinking/action. Tom: That's a good point. I hadn't thought of that. priciples are units and our minds are able to make units of those principles for later use Okay, Betsy and Todd are right. It's the *crow*. But, as Betsy pointed out, it is also a means of cobatting the crow. a principle can be held in one's mind as one unit. +m Because it saves them from analyzing every new situation from the ground up. That's what Subetai said. Or remembering what they did before, as Betsy said. If you had to analyze every new situation from the ground up, you'd die of starvation before you would ever get to act. Can someone think of an example of that? (In my words) Is everyone clear on what is meant by the crow? Gilles: Trying to act in a dictatorship where the laws change every day? :\ gilles: Most horror movies where someone freezes in terror instead of deciding what to do to save themselves. Trombone: irc.hypermall.com trombone: irc.hypermall.com Oh, right - sorry about that. Does everyone know what the crow is? That means the limited perceptual capacity of the human mind. You can only focus on so many things at the same time. You can't be aware of everything in one frame of consciousness. Nor remember a large number of units except by condensing them in some way. Principles permit us to deal with a morass of concretely different situations using a small number of units Gilles: Attempting to understand Kant's *Critique of Pure Reason* is paralyzing :) Tom: Or rather, some murderer comes into your house and you start thinking: "Okay. Existence exists. Hmm...my grasp of that fact implies that I am conscious...hmm...okay...I use concepts - how do I form those again? hmm..." (man is killed by mu A baby is the ideal example. It has _no_ principles and _would_ starve without mom murderer) It would be impossible to have a discussion if one had to analyze back to a single existent the meanings of every concept spoken especially if higher level abstractions are being used ToddM: That sounds like humanities.philosophy.objectivism ;-) Gilles: Right. he didn't have the principle that self-defense is moral. Mentally disabled people are similar to babies in that regard. They need relatively isolated situations to live in, highly regular, because they cannot deal with the new lol Okay. So you see why you can't do that? Once you have validated a principle, you know it will always hold and you can act on it without validating it all over again. Folks sustaining brain damage, needing to learn all over again (like babies). lol, betsy That's funny, Betsy hi right, Tom. If he had that principle, he could simply apply the principle and run away or call the police or get his gun or whatever. Gilles: yep. Gilles: There's an important proviso there, however. One can accept a "principle" such as the 10 commandants which omit important context and are blindly followed deductively. Okay. What about the psychological reason some of you alluded to? Why do you need to be principled? Why can't you breach a principle with impunity? phil: However, those are not principles. Phil: I'm assuming rationally formed principles. TomM: Sure they are ... bad ones phil: No, they are not codes of conduct, they are mearly rules. But it's an important point ... even fully rational people are capable of error and must always check their premises _if_ the facts seem to suggest that a principle is failing to cover a situation Some of you said that the mind would become chaos, and that acting on the principle would be harder the next time. Why? Gilles: that's only a psychological problem secondarily. TomM: Very true. Most moral codes are lists of rules. Objectivism is a system of principles. Gilles: Well, first of all, you *know* better. To break your moral code is to set yourself against yourself. Phil03: Also, a similar point: one must remember the context in which a principle was formed. If the context changes, the principle may mislead you. Jim and Phil: We'll get to context in a moment. If you don't act on principles for a few days, what's going to happen to your psychology? Anyone? Breaking a principle that you yourself have formed violates integrity, which means you are not acting as one with yourself and your knowledge og existnce. Because a principle is a general guide to action. Failing to use it in applicable cases leads to another principle: Pragmatism, or, the decision to use feelings rather than principled conclusions for action You'll erode your self-esteem. Subetai: Yes. Gilles: What had happened to your psychology to make you go without principles for a few days? The psychological condition would've been already existing. Pragmatism is not a principle. An anti-principle, really Gilles: you would have given up reason as a guide to action--you'd be operating on whim. Phil: That's true too. That's the answer to my next question. Gilles: If you don't act on principle all the time it establishes a pattern of not acting on principles all the time -- and you never know when it is OK to do that and when it is not. A pyschological SPLIT. wonderwal: You're not determined by your psychology. You need will to act on principles. You can't hide from yourself. If you break your code, you will punish yourself for it -- i.e. loose self-esteem as someone mentioned. psychology is subbordinate to philosophy because philosophy is explicit, psychology is not (and therefore not open to direct correction). Right. Okay, there are 2 issues here. I want to concentrate on the self-esteem issue. Think of the positive reason. What do you get psychologically when you use principles? And Why? Positive feedback and confidence, because of predictability, control, etc. It takes strength of will and determination to act on principles. It's not always the easy way. If there's an emotional reward involved (like gaining or keeping one's self-respect) it's easier. Gilles: if your principles are in accordence with existence and what you are, then following principles will give you positive results, and you will experience happiness. Gilles: You gain confidence when you act on principle, since you know you are taking the actions to succeed. Gilles: to be principled is to act in accordance with reality. Gilles: You get intellectual certainty and a sense that you are in control of your life. self-esteem, because principles show you that you can exist and are worthy of existing let me see something oops All very good answers. I like Shain's and Betsy's the best for my present purpose. You become confident that you will act this way *in the future*. You get a sense of control. Okay, now the other thing that came up. Now can anyone name the psycho-epistemological fact which makes it necessary to *always* act on principle? I'm specifically concerned with the *always*. I think it's already been stated: to keep in contact with existence and your own sense of self-worthiness. Gilles: Is it somehow related to the ABSOLUTISM OF REALITY as opposed to relativism? Gilles: Guilt. If you ever act against your principles it feel real, real bad. +s Gilles: that's where "conscience" comes in. Is it that integrity (oneness between thought and action) is an absolute, and anything less is well ... less? The converse of unbreached rationality is being irrational. There's no middle ground. Betsy: That's true, but that doesn't get at what I'm after. I'm specifically concerned with the *always*, and I'm looking for a relavent psycho-epistemological fact. (not the crow, which doesn't deal specifically with the always.) Gilles: Living with an active consciousness. Think of it this way: Is it possible for your consciousness to accept *no* principles? not always acting on a principle undermines the fact that it *is* a principle, i.e. that it always applies. Gilles: it may be that pragmatism is the default. joe: Yes, that's true. I think joe just said it Tom: Very good. To compromise certain principles ends up giving you no principles, and that is only a path to destruction It's the same error as misidentification only applied to action. If you failed to ever admit that a triangle was a triangle -- or that it was a circle -- it would be the same mistake Gilles: If you don't make principles consciously, the process of subconscious generalization will create "principles" for you. What's the fact of human consciousness that's relevant here? Tom and Joe are onto it. Gilles: One must "always" act on principle to acnowledge reality. To do otherwise would deny reality to the most important person in the world...yourself. However, you really can't live with no principles, but pragmatism comes close. It is so short-range that it is dangerous. Betsy is very very correct! Conceptual conscioussness is by definition principles oriented? It's the job of consciousness to integrate. If you don't do it consciously (with principles) then who knows what will be pinned to what? And the subconscious generalization will be pragmatism -- it is ok to operate by violating principle, which is a generalization even if not a principle Every choice you make is based on at least a subconscious principle about what it is *good* to do. If you don't *always* act on principles, you've subordinated your principles to whim and that will corrupt your mind. How is that? Heck, you might "think" it's ok to let Jesse jackson sit next to you in the house of representatives ;) Excellent exercise Gilles :) Gilles: I've already mentioned it will set you against yourself. It's 11:00, but we're going to continue this another 15 minutes. And you will become paralized by indecisiveness. Phil: Yes, yes, yes! You become a pragmatist. Why does this corrupt your reasoning ability? I wish I could stay, but I have to go. Great topic! later Betsy Bye Betsy bye Betsy. It corrupts yo reasoning ability because fear takes over your mind. Gilles: also, a logical positivist, correct? Gilles: I see it as what I said before. A principle is to action as a concept is to identification Rex: yes, that too. RexMundi: I don't know. Gilles: because being unprincipled is arbitrary. If you fail to admit that a triangle is a triangle you're committing a grave error that assaults your conceptual faculty You have to become anti-conceptual and evasive Because it lessens the importance of reason by allowing one to escape it time and again. Being unprincipled says you have no identity, and if you accept that, you soon will have no identity. Failing to act on principle promotes evasion I understand logical positivism to be one who must examine the latest "empirical" data in order to see if everything is still as it was in the past. Similar to Hume's "No Necessary Connection." Gilles: because you tend to lose your focus on the future, you act more range of the moment Okay, right. You're basically unconcerned with reasoning if you are a pragmatist. Because you're a pragmatist *in principle*. Yes You might even decide Kelley is a good Objectivist. Gilles: "unprincipled on principle" Basically you don't take ideas seriously. They are a game. Ideas are not your guide to action -- feelings are Gilles: Isn't it impossible to be a pragmatist in principle? Pragmatism is a negation of principles, and therefore being pragmatist on principle would be a contradiction. wonderwal: what I said. wonderwal: Altruism is certainly a moral system albeit in reason it is anti-any-morality wonderwal: good point. To summarize, you want to use principles because: 1.You don't act automatically and you need to know the future; 2.The crow; 3. Self-confidence and a sense of control; 4.The only alternative is pragmatism or emotionalism. wonderwal: that's what I was getting at earlier. Pragmatism is not a principle, and accepts no principles. Gilles: How do you reconcile the principle that "stealing is wrong" with "a mob is after me and in order to survive I need to steal somebody's weapon, car, etc.? What do we mean when we say moral principles are "contextual" absolutes, as opposed to dogmatic commandments? Shain: That's what we're getting to right now. ok. footnotes to everybody that said what I said before me. Gilles: man's life is the standard, not a set of rules. Gilles: You just answered my question! Thanks. Okay, we're onto the next topic: context. What's the context of a principle? What does it mean to say they're "contextual"? To give an example, it's okay to hit the burgler first. Because all principles are inductively formed from a certain set of facts. If your generalizations do not cover similar facts then they need to be generalized further Since a principle is created according to a set of facts, if that set changes, the principle no longer applies. Right. That's the existential context: a set of facts. Is there something else? An intellectual or conceptual context? I would say _some_ principles are so broad that they are always true -- philosophical principles. Such as: Act according to your moral system -- do not evade -- etc. "context" means the set of facts under consideration. for instance to lie is not necessrily being dishonest about reality, like the kidnapping example used in Oist texts Contextual means "in the context of your knowledge of reality" - meaning, there are the facts as such which are immutable, and there's your knowledge of them. Both contexts must be upheld. "Be moral" is a broader principle than "do not lie." There are hierarchies involved here. Going higher up the hierarchy supplies greater context Do you just form a principle after looking at some facts? Or do you have prior knowledge that is important? Gilles: Well, your identity is also a fact, so yes, thee is an epistemological factor involved: What you know about existence. true Yes. There's a hierarchy. When you have a moral principle, there's already prior knowledge you have conceptualized. What's the context of, say, the virtue of honesty? I mean the philosophic context. Anybody? Existenc exists and can not be faked. Gilles: The need for principles. Rationality as one's means of survival. Tom and Jim: Right. I would add after Tom's "reason as the only means of survival." Oops, you said that Jim. The knowledge that one must benefit from one's own actions and not be a parasite on others. Which is based on the knowledge of man's mind and it's relationship to the physical world. The context is: You are dealing with _honest_ people If you are dealing with immoral people, you are under no obligation to be honest with them, necessarily Phil: That's part of the context you are looking at - but I'm asking about what you already know. Because the broader context is: Be honest _in order to promote your own life_. If doing so violates your life, rationally -- then the higher principle/context applies i.e. The killer knocks on the door and asks where everyone is. Another important idea you already have is life as the standard of value. Right? Response: "everybody has gone, OJ" right Wright: Exactly Right: Life is the standard of value. This is a higher level concept that supplies the context for other virtues Okay, so we have, basically: Reality, Reason as means of knowledge, Life as the standard of value, rationality as means of survival and therefore the primary virtue. The question one should ask is "Am I taking the unearned?" Am I destroying a value? What is the existential context? Instead of answering right away, consider the case of lying to the theif who asks you whether you have precious jewels and where they are hidden. How is this a different context than the one in which you formed the prin iple of honesty (in its social variant)? Phil: This is what you were saying before. Yeah You form the idea of the virtue of honesty based on certain contexts: That you need to live long range and that dealing with people without faking reality is in your self interest long range. If however you are not dealing with honest people yourself, or people attacking you, then the context has changed Gilles: The principle of honesty (in it's social variant) is formed in the context where one is free of coercion. As Rand pointed out, morality ends at the point of a gun. Thanks Gilles, its been a great topic and discussion.....later all:) The existential context is that it's reality that's fundamentally important, not the principle. You mustn't negate or ignore reality for the sake of the principle. In this context, reality = sustaining your life Good point Sube. Right. When you form the principle of honesty to others, you are considering others as rational human beings who perceive reality and think like you. But the thief is like an animal, so the principle doesn't apply. How is this different from pragmatism? Why isn't this pragmatism? Are you being unprincipled? Are you not acting on principle in this case? Gilles: Beacuse the principle is that your life is worth defending. You are adhering to a principle that hierarchically supersedes the principle of honesty: The principle of rational self-preservation Gilles: because yr delimiting principles to context, not abandoning them. Your life is the standard, not the rule: Never Lie to anyone. Gilles: Considering that one forms the principle of honesty by recognizing that by being dishonest you cut yourself off from reasoning with others, that you lose the benefits of their rationality, it would be wrong to uphold this principle with someone who is attempting the very thing the principle was trying to avoid. Right. You're all right. That's very good. Jim: and one of these days you will learn that applied to Kelley. gilles you are not lying to gain an unearned value Pragmatism negates principles. This is simply recognizing that the principle is a summary of some aspects off reality, a generalization which was formed to deal with certain circumstances, not an exhaustive replacement of all that can conceivably be. off = of Right, everybody. You *are* being principled. That's easy given what we just discussed. I just wanted to make the distinction. So, to conclude: I hope you can now answer the questions "Why not steal an apple?" or "Why didn't Roark just do one building he didn't like?" or "Why not just slouch off when you get tired?" and I hope you feel more strongly than before the crucial neces ity of being moral. That's all, folks. Subetai: right. And that ties back with the primacy of induction. Thanks, Gilles. That was a great discussion. :) Thanks for participating. Thanks Gilles! Bye all ... quit Gilles: it would be unprincipled to say, in effect, OK, you hold the gun and therefore command existence. Thanks Subetai. :) Thanks Gilles. You achieved many important points in your discussion. I must go as well...need to play with my new radio... Jim: I hope so! Thanks for a good discussion. Bye. good luck, Tom a principle by definition contextual, i.e. it applies only to a certain context, i.e. it is an abstraction of a certain set of facts. +is Gilles: We'd certainly like to see you moderate discussions in the future Wright: Thanks. I'd be interested in doing a couple more before the summer.