Ethical help please

[RedneckNoob]

I do Philisophical and Moral debate and I need a little help and I thought some of you might be able to help me.

Resolved: The actions of corporations ought to be held to the same moral standards as the actions of individuals

That is the resolution we are debating for January and February.  For the Affirmative side, we have to say that the resolution is true.  I finally figured out what exactly this resolution was implying.

A kid goes out a buys a gun and kills someone.  Someone sues the company for supplying the gun.

That is what this resolution is talking about.  The affirmative resolution would be saying that corporations are at fault when someone buys a weapon and goes out and kills someone with it.  In this type of debate, we need to take a philisophical value, such as the common good, and argue that it's better than our opponents value using a criterion and evidence.  An example of a previous combination I did was Life as my value with Maslow's hierarchy as my criterion.  Maslow's hierarchy says that basic needs have to be met before anything else can be done, saying that life was the most important.  Something I could do for affirmative is argue common good for value and deliberative democracy as criterion.  But that seems too easy and I feel like everyone will do it.

For the negative.  I was thinking of using Nihlism and say that moral standards don't exist so the resolution is negated because it is impossible to people to something that doesn't exist.  I'd feel lazy by running with this.  But with that Nihlism would only be the criterion.  What would I do for the value?  Also, I could try saying that all fault is the individual's and use Objectivism, which I already have tons of research for.  That again is only criterion.  What value would I uphold?

In a nutshell, for negative I need to focus on individual choice and for affirmative I need to focus on the idea that suppliers are at fault.  I just need help on how to do this and I was thinking at least SOME of you would be able to give me some useful help.

BTW I have to take a neutral standpoint while writing these cases.  In no way am I to think about which side I personally support while writing these.  I am not saying I support one or the other so this will not become an argument.

[Particle]

more of your homework?

[Celtic16]

exactly what i was thinking!

[RedneckNoob]

Not really homework.  It's the debate club.  I was just stuck and couldn't figure out where to go next and was wondering if someone could help.

[Celtic16]

then tell everyone that, don't try and pass it off as a normal thread!

[Xenos]

then tell everyone that, don't try and pass it off as a normal thread!

I do Philisophical and Moral debate and I need a little help and I thought some of you might be able to help me.

wtf do you think this means? It's certainly written in english.  There was no passing it off as a normal thread.

Redneck after reading what you wrote I think it's good. Sorry I can't help.

[Particle]

I think that a business should be held responsible for its own direct actions.  If it's making suicide vest packs and marketing them to terrorists then sure, they're responsible.  If it's making a shady business deal then sure.  If they make a legitimate product like firearms, however, and aren't marketing directly to attract felons then they aren't responsible what people do with their product.  After all, a Hallmark greeting card could be used to give somebody paper cuts to the point of their death.  It does not mean they are responsible for that usage of their product.

[RedneckNoob]

Luckily enough I haven't encountered anyone yet who even realizes the words "actions" in the resolution.  Mostly I've lost because of an idiot judge who doesn't even realize the attacks I've made.  The deffinition of Nihilism is the belief in nothing.  The (latin I believe) root of nihil is nothing.  It comes from the word annihilate, which means to turn to nothing.  I pointed that out and the judge decided to take my opponents comment of "Nihilism is determined using pure logic" over mine when I used citations to prove it, and not just my own word.  Next I lost to someone hailing to Absolutism.  He used something called Categorical Imperative developed by Immanuel Kant that says when you take a hypothetical situation considering a moral value and see if it comes true or false.  Whichever the answer, then from that point on any situation considering the same act becomes absolute with no subjectivity.  I pointed out that the morals society at large holds to value most changes over time because the minds of human beings are constantly evolving.  I gave an example of the intellectual prowess of someone from the midevil era and then someone from the 21st century.

For the negative I'm running a Core Value of Rational Self-Interest, which I describe with support thoroughly in the debate, with the Value Criterion of Ayn Rand's Objectivist philosophy.  Rand's Objectivist philosophy holds Rational Self-Interest as the highest ethical value, so I found it a perfect fit.  I focus mainly on choice, and the word "held" in the resolution saying that "held to" means not just judgement, but punishment or reward and that it'd be illogical to reward a corporation for following moral standards, but it would not be illogical to reward the people who run the corporation.  I define the corporation as an independent object, like a machine, that is controlled by people (the workers if you need more clarification).

For the Affirmative, I just bullshat the whole thing right then and there trying to do pure analytics using some research I had memorized without realizing it.  I think when I finally put it together I will be focusing on the word "action", hopefully catching my opponents off-guard extremely from the performances I saw on 1-13-2007.  If I didn't feel dirty using it I probably could pull off Categorical Imperative, but the logic of it would just make me feel dirty if I used it.

[DeinGesicht]

For the negative I'm running a Core Value of Rational Self-Interest, which I describe with support thoroughly in the debate, with the Value Criterion of Ayn Rand's Objectivist philosophy.  Rand's Objectivist philosophy holds Rational Self-Interest as the highest ethical value, so I found it a perfect fit.  I focus mainly on choice, and the word "held" in the resolution saying that "held to" means not just judgement, but punishment or reward and that it'd be illogical to reward a corporation for following moral standards, but it would not be illogical to reward the people who run the corporation.  I define the corporation as an independent object, like a machine, that is controlled by people (the workers if you need more clarification).

I would suggest that you not use anything from Rand. Her so-called "philosophy" is just a bunch of sloppily-done rationalizations for her own prior beliefs. What she said was in a person's "rational self interest" was more or less what she wanted people to do, without any sort of quality justification. Her cult popularity is mainly due to her writings' attraction to the naive minds of older teens and young adults, and because of the fact that she simplifies things so much that the true issues get pared off and certainty is proclaimed. Randists think themselves high, mighty, and specialized, but all they are is high on Ayn's delusions.

I don't know your affinity for Rand or her writing, but I was a Randist last year, and boy do they piss people off with their absolutism and certainty. Doesn't get you any non-Randist friends, either. Despite stating the contrary, Randists act and speak as if they were inerrant. Heh, but they are as inerrant as the sun is black.

I'm quite a bit ticked at Randists from my own experience of being in their ranks, and from thereafter learning how wrong and simple-minded they are. I'm not going to justify any of my statements here, as I'm not as interested in philosophy as I was just a while ago. Plus, it would waste my time, when instead I can give you links to some good reading.

This was not an attack on you, by the way. T'was just a warning that even something as simple-sounding as "rational self-interest" is a facade. In Rand's inconsistent philosophy, "rational self-interest" can be used to justify anything. And I do mean ANYTHING. You'd best use someone actually recognized as a philosopher outside of some delusional cult following.

And if you happen to be a Randist, well... it'll be hard to change your mind, so I won't try further.

If you'd like those links I was talking about for reading, tell me.

[Lidge Farkley]

Hmm...

I would not use Nihilism as a support arguement at all because current and past Nihilists often argue about what they believe which is in opposition to the alleged purpose of Nihilism.

I think using Nihilism could open up a whole new can of worms that would just cause you some serious difficulty if there was anyone willing to challenge the seeming fact of Nihilism being at odds with itself.  Nihilism would probably not hold up in a political debate, especially a debate in the seubto-christian police-state we are trying to live with.


A strategy I might use to speak about the "negative" side of the debate would be the very one that is probably (unfortunately) predictable.  That is, "People are responsible for their personal lives and control of their personal belongings."  Of course, you should also address (in the case of gun example you cite) the issue of stolen "belongings" being used to commit crimes in terms of weather or not the original owner (before theif used weapon or sold weapon to the killer) should be held liable for the crime.  In this case I would point out that it would be the ultimate responsibility of the one using the device in question and they should be held responsible unless it can be shown, in a court of alleged law, that the orriginal owner gave it to them or let them have it to aide in the crime commited with the object.  If addressing all of this, you should also be mindful of the "car example" by which people may say "if some one kills some one with a car, intentionally or not, does that mean the car manufacture should be responsible?  Certainly the vehicle has the ability to kill some one, but that was not the intended use."  Undoubtedly this will bring up the "guns are designed to kill people" idea, but one could argue that most guns owned by people in domestic situations are not used to kill people and that their intended use would depend on home owner to home owner (self defense, target shooting for fun, game hunting, etc.)

There are many ways this could go.

For my own personal speaking with other open-minded and solution oriented individuals I can say that the strategy of "intents of owners" and "intents of the implement in question" has been most successful.  Often times, the weapons used in crime are stolen and used with out the permission of the owner.  Nearly all weapons, vehicles, toasters, etc.. are all sod with warnings as to the safety hazard they present and how to best avoid injury through their use.  This would also be a good thing to cite, as it is law (if I remember right) unless the trade is a private trade (in California, USA.)

Goodluck.

[RedneckNoob]

I am not a "Randist" persay, but I took her core writings and turned it into something that I believe.  For a while I was one, but not anymore.  I am an Objectivist though because I used the Objectivist philosophy to develop my own beliefs.  While I do disagree with the actions of many Objectivists, I still classify myself as one.  I do not believe myself "high and mighty", unless I'm suffering from some of the dellusions of granduer I am affected by so much.

I understand the "intent" that lidge was talking about, except that the word of the resolution is action, and not intent.  So if I followed that I would easily be destroyed.

My Affirmative strategy, now that I have done better research on the Categorical Imperative, is the Core Value of Duty (Kantian Duty), with the Value Criterion being the Categorical Imperative.  The person who used CI against me was very ignorant of it's real meaning and if I had been better prepared I would have won that debate.  So, now I won't feel as dirty if I use it.

Also, politics have no place in the type of debate I do.  It's purely ethics and philosophy.

My negative strategy is still pretty much the same, except with some important deffinitions thrown in.  I am mainly saying that morality is a code of values accepted by rational choice and that the resolution violates several parts of that.  Also, that moral standards in itself are wrong because they are not discovered by the individual.

Also, yes I really would love those links.  It will help me build my research file that I've been putting together.  So far it's 550 pages, all gathered from the Standford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.