One reason this knowledge is mundane, not as surreal as it seems, certainly not as nihilistic as it has seemed in the past, is that we do triangulate on approximations which are functionally like judgements in themselves.

In my reply to Specter I use the example of judging someone good or bad in themselves.

If someone has many bad relationships with what surrounds them, say, as slave owner, as rapist, as thief, as murderer, we triangulate on the person and conclude they are bad in themselves. That is an approximation like all truth-statements, and works because compared to the risk of trusting that person, its uncertainty is negligible within a frame of reference where our self-preservation is held as of value.

On the other hand, any single relationship might be more difficult. I like to use Thomas Jefferson as an example, he was a slave owner, that was wrong, that relationship of his with certain others was wrong, and his side of it is culpable for its role in the relationship.  But Jefferson also has a relationship to many of the rest of us in which he increased our freedom, and in fact one can argue those freedoms set in motion an idea of freedom in which slavery itself was doomed... it's not as easy to judge Jefferson in toto because he was a slave owner.

As a relativist the problem of analysing Jefferson is not solved automatically, but there is less confusion about the fact that the relationship of slave and master is separate from Jefferson's other relationships. It is not surprising from a relativistic point of view that we can more easily judge Jefferson's relationship to his slaves than we can Jefferson entirely, because in the end we are never judging a man-in-himself or a thing-in-itself, we are judging it's web of relationships with all around it, one by one, more or less.  Often summary approximations which claim a person generally had bad, evil, or selfish relationships works good enough for survival purposes, but sometimes it is not so simple.

Are you having fun talking to yourself......:=)  >>>>>>kidding!

  You are clearly much more schooled up and tuned into this philosophical construction than I. This is interesting to me...... seeing as I am an abstract person, so I will take a stab here. Forgive me if I seem off the mark, as I have no expertise in these matters.

I agree there is no black and white when it comes to "morals". Relativisim applies. One has to start with as your illustration shows the moral value of what is black and what is white. In describing what is good and what is evil, one starts from a value point that is by definition relative.

My feeling is that morals should not be a part of the equation, in discussing what is good or bad in relative terms. We see people executed for committing the crime of murder, yet when called up to defend our nation from threats murder is defined in relativistic terms as good.

If you take morals out of the equation, since different relationships and cultures have differing moral standards, the context for judging actions in my opinion is what is fair, ethical and for the common good.

  Ridding the definition of what is good or bad out of moral values which can be subjective and vary in different cultures. What is moral in Islam, suicidal martyrdom used as a weapon of war, is inconceivably immoral in a western christian context. What is punishment for a crime in Sharia law, beheading which results in death, is considered barbaric in Christian lands, that punish with more polite execution, yet both have the same result...... death as punishment for a crime. Moral relativism.

If a young man and his sister are orphaned, and the young boy takes a check out of a mail box and cashes it to feed his sister who is sick, one can use Ender's black and white moral equation to say that stealing is bad and should be punished as a crime. The punishment involves a federal criminal prosecution for tampering with the mail. The boy goes to federal prison for stealing, yet he was only trying to feed his sister.

IN the context of what is fair, ethical and good for the society, the same young man could be seen as doing the right thing. He took care of his ailing sister by the only means he saw available. His action is justified as being for the greater good, and as an orphan with no means, it was ethical and fair for him to take care of his sister. The said crime falls into the gray area and therefore does not deserve punishment. What at first seems criminal then becomes an act of nurturing another human being and not a crime, if you take the moral value out of the equation, or apply relativism.

wish your perfect society on the muslim terrorists... Some things are worse than hell.

For the explanation on why a safety net of social services is so important. For want of a food bank and health care a government building and all of its workers were bombed.

I find I am a reasonably good person for me to talk to, :p

I follow what you say, and morally, my take is compatible, but the part that I see as relativistic is not so much finding the single good reply.

That boy might have stolen a check that was to buy my family medication... I believe understanding relative ethics is not about assuring there is a good outcome, a compromise, but it helps us find them.

In this case we have another issue, which is that metaphors like black is bad and white is good are merely metaphors. They cannot be literally true, and it's not only relativism that indicates that.  These are simple metaphors that break down, Ayn Rand's folk widom styled reasoning (you have to have black and white before you make gray) is false because it assume the metaphor is literal, and even misses the fact that white to me is someone elses grey.

are with self. (and perhaps some of the worst)

There was a movie with Kevin Bacon, called Murder in the First, which is where I got my example...... although my memory is a little fuzzy.

Relativism always assumes that there is compromise to reach the best outcome?

I can relate to that. I am married....... sigh, and I hate to compromise but it is of course a necessity in a healthy relationship...... grrrrrrr.

I read Ayn Rand years ago. My main recollection of her is it is all about the "I" or a very me oreinted form or rationalizing selfishness.

I like your posts. They always bend my brain...... and stretch that gray matter up their a bit. Ha Ha.

do you see my point about shades of grey, black and white as a metaphor, and the actual facts of visual perception upon which that metaphor is based?

There is no black and white, not even in visual matters, there are only relative shades of grey.  And two identical shades can seem different, two different shades can seem identical, and it truly is relative.

?

I think the actual relative position is that something can be right from the boy's point of view, and still wrong from the mother's point of view.

The question becomes, what should society's point of view be, the judges point of view?

I don't think it's confusing and relativity doesn't have a final answer, it has a methodological answer... it should be that which makes the most sense from the frame of reference the judge represents, that of a functioning nation.

The relativistic answer is likely to be that we should ensure that people don't have to steal to feed their sister, if it comes to that, some other way to get food can be established.

Given the robbery, then you pay the price, and there is nothing non-relativistic about that if the culture decided that through a collaborative process as opposed to dictatorial law.

Relativism does not say there is always a good compromise.

Sometimes people's points of view really are in opposition.

However, relativism, as a philosophy that inspires us to be open minded and circumspect helps us to see things through other people's points of view. Often, even a real conflict can be avoided when one has a chance to see something from another's point of view.

We can understand WHY that boy is so desperate to steal and perhaps think a social safety net will help him, his potential victims, and us all. It may help us to realize that he can be "rehabilitate" or needs opportunity, even if we have a culture that doesn't believe in safety nets.  In short, we get access to many more possible solutions, and I believe we find more acceptable solutions that way.

But the underlying reality of nature is that sometimes one will have a real conflict, for example over limited resources, and such conflict happens in an area where moral arguments hold little sway.

In my case, I actually find in relativism a bit of release. With a relativistic approach one should be in a better position to know when one has exhausted all reasonable attempts at working things out... e.g. murder. I don't have to be confused about "crimes of passion" because yes, I understand the point of view of the passionate murderer that kills their lover when they are caught cheating... but I don't have to forgive it.  We have made our rules from a common frame of reference wanting a civil society... and me getting your point of view doesn't mean you walk free... but it may mean I don't believe in torturing you in prison... that is, it yields some understanding, but not freedom from responsibility.

fair, ethical and for the common good of a civil society.

in my case study the boy was orphaned and went to Alcatraz because the taking involved a mail box making it a federal crime.

Another case study in relativism might be Katrina victims looting for food and water since there was no other source of life sustaining goods was available.

Did our founding fathers view the right to life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness as relative rights, even if granted by our Creator?

I'll give you an example and I'd like you to let me know what you think about it.

In a society based on the principle of common good there exists a group of stubborn individualists. They are guilty of not sharing the resources they've accumulated over the many years of labor and are not interested in sharing it with the starving majority. Majority tells them that according to the laws of the land they have to share to provide for the common good of the people. They refuse. Majority tries to take the goods by force but the people fire with their weapons to scare them off. Knowing the only way to solve this situation the law enforcement of the land moves in and has to kill everyone in the group for they would not willingly surrender.

Who is right and who is wrong? Is anyone right or anyone wrong? Remember this society viewed what that small group did as wrong.

As someone who believes in Right and Wrong I have my own answer. I am just curious how you would address this particular example.

... relativism, as a philosophy that inspires us to be open minded and circumspect helps us to see things through other people's points of view. Often, even a real conflict can be avoided when one has a chance to see something from another's point of view.

As a tool to avoid unnecessary conflict, relativism has value.  Conflicts often arise out not out of malice but out of misunderstanding or stupidity. Thinking before reacting is good strategy.  Discerning your opponent's motivation and intention is critical not only to see if a true conflict exists, but also to determine the best way to meet that conflict if you are required to do so. 

But relativism by itself is not adequate for a society.  To use the example: The boy who stole had a reason. That reason may make us more lenient in assigning punishment and may help us determine if we have structural problems in our society that must be addressed. Yet stealing is wrong and we cannot allow him to believe otherwise.  To let him think that is to blind him to the other (legal, moral) actions he should have taken. He could have begged a neighbor, his pastor, or his councilman for help.  He could have bartered with someone who had food.  He could have rummaged for leftovers discarded by others.  He could have stood with a placard and shamed his neighbors.  He had choices other than stealing. 

Jesse James or the Plantation Owners.

hypothetical situation so I am not sure why you are trying to compare it to some event. It's a group of people within a nation. Fine, they did not pay their taxes. The only thing known is that they accumulated their goods via lawful means of business/invention/science/etc. They decided to disobey the law and stop paying the ever increasing taxes that were carrying the rest of the starving nation that kept democratically increasing those taxes to pay for the majority's living. This is the hypothetical situation and you have to address the act of murder that was done for the greater good since they wouldn't share to address the common good value of need.

and while the core of my point may be hidden below other stuff... let me point out... I've said that, the justice's point of view is that of the shared national frame of reference, and what is practical from it's point of view.

stealing can't be tolerated, but social services can help, in a case like this where the crime is motivated only through serious hunger.

we cannot allow him to believe we will TOLERATE stealing.

It doesn't matter if he thinks it's not wrong in comparison to realizing that.

Would that be a fair way to put it according to you?

Your explanations take some difficult concepts and succintly make them accessible.  I can see the passion you bring to the topic.  It is almost as if this subject is porno for pyrrho:) (sorry, but I've been waiting for that one for months).  I can see you put much thought and time into this discussion, so I will try to add only a few minor points.

Since you do such a remarkable job discussing this theory, I will stick to some peripheral concerns.  This mostly deals with some competing ethical theories that some people have brought up (without directly using their correct names), absolutism and consequentialism.

Moral absolutism, of course, is a theory that argues acts are just or unjust (good or evil if you prefer) in every case, in every place, throughout time, whatever the consequences.  While depending on such principles may seem admirable, it is not a very rational belief since it does not take into consideration the after-effects of the action.  For example, Ender often argues (here is such a thread ) that innocents are sometimes expendable in accomplishing a military goal (such as shooting a missile at a terrorist in a crowd).  This goes against a moral absolutism of 'it is evil to kill innocents.'  If it is unjust to kill innocents, then this must be the case no matter what other consequences are involved.  If it is just in some situations because the end is just, then it breaks the rules of absolutism.  So while he may loathe to admit it, he is not an absolutist.

What Ender may call himself is a consequentialist (which is directly related to moral relativism).  This theory stipulates that an action is just or unjust depending on its end.  In other words, the ends justify the means.  In this case, shooting a missile into a crowd to kill a terrorist but also will probably kill innocents is evaluated depending on whether the end brings more justice than injustice.  Utilitarianism is the most common form of consequentialism (the greatest good for the greatest number).  An argument against consequentialism (as Ender probably knows by now) is that we are not God, so we don't know what the future consequence of every action wil be.  For example, shooting a missile into a crowd filled with innocents to kill a terrorist may kill that terrorist, but it may also create five more.  Therefore, it did not create the consequence intended.  There are other problems of agency that do not pertain to a general discussion such as this.  It is important to notice that the actor is judging whether the consequences are just or unjust and not that this act is always just or unjust.  Therefore, it is closer to relativism than absolutism as Ender would like to claim.

Overall, I would say that relativism is the only honest moral approch.  We must always evaluate context, perspective, and frame of reference. 

I hope to see more discussions like this in the future (especially in the Philosophical Thread).

Is it murder for the police to defend themselves while trying to engage in a lawful arrest? Not sure where the murder occured. Murder is, pretty much by definition, an unlawful killing.

What you are describing is not hypothetical as we experienced it twice in this country, once via the revolutionary war and again during the Civil War. You have one group attempting to end the social contract with another when it finds it no longer in its interest, i.e. secession. In both cases, at a simplisitic level, you have a group (colonists or plantation owners) who did not want to give up what they considered to be their legal rights to another (the Crown or the Federal Government) that was attempting to change the law in a manner that they found disadvantageous.

  Interestingly, we have determined that it was 'good' in the first case (Freedom!) and bad in the second case (Slavery!) How relatiivistic. ;-)

If Bush walked up to a couple of kids and shot them point-blank, I don't think anyone would defend it, least of all Ender.  The argument he's making - and for the record, I disagree with it - is that a greater number of lives are protected by certain military strikes, and though innocent people may be killed in the meantime, a far greater number will be saved in the long run.

The vehemence of our disagreements stems less from that belief (I think we'd all carry it to a certain degree, depending on the circumstances) and more from a combination of perceived alternatives (could these military engagements have been smarter and more targeted?), plus the cavalier and dismissive attitude towards that loss of innocent life. 

You know, language operates a lot like moral relativism.  There are 'rules' to language, but not really - they only come about due to common agreement, and there's nothing to prevent you from breaking them other than a risk of lack-of-communication.  If you do something 'wrong', people will call you out on it, but many people have forgotten that those rules are flexible (i.e., not absolutes) and do change over time.  You can speak your own made-up language all day long, but you're likely to be shunned from society because of it. 

On dkos, we had the following exchange, which I think highlights the difficulty of defending grammatical absolutes.  Someone called out the diarist on a language point:

The grammar police called. The plural of RFC (RFCs) should not have an apostrophe. You are making it plural, not showing possession.

I responded:

Not using an apostrophe is more common, but that's a fairly recent development.  Since single letters do take an apostrophe to show plurality (as in, "mind your p's and q's"), originally it was common to do the same with acronyms.  That's changed a bit recently, but methinks the grammar police should only issue a warning this time, not a ticket.  :)

The point of this digression is that there are two perfectly defensible usage rules that contradict each other - they can't "both" be right in the sense that they are mutually exclusive (that is, you either have an apostrophe or you don't).  But neither takes precedence because both have precedents.

So as writers, what do we do?  Well, we have to make a decision, and part of that decision depends on what the people around us do.  But even there, we run into problems - most grammar guides nowadays vote for no apostrophe, but some editorial guides demand it (most prominently, the New York Times). 

Quo vadis?  In language, there are no easy answers.  :)

both you and knocienz miss the obvious evil of the system under which this tragedy is occurring. The law of the land is not always good and in this case it is moral to resist as I described a society of thieves that democratically votes themselves the livelihood of others.

The police know from the original encounter that these people will not go down without a fight and so to take away their posessions according to the "law" would involve a lot of death. There can be no "bloodless" arrest from the scenario.

It is murder because the governmental action is enforcing an immoral law. Thus it is not a suicide on the part of this group, because there can be no suicide along with murder. Is the murder provoked? Sure.

Their use of national infrastructure is irrelevant as I pointed out that most of national anything is due to their own taxes as they are the only producing group in the whole country. The rest of the people are living off the government which means living off this group's taxes.

note that I said "many on the far left". So I did not mean liberals unless you consider liberalism on the far left.

Are the children born to muslems in the South of Lebanon, then by definition evil by birthright? That to me is what you are saying. And these children therefore deserve to die because they are born to the "enemy".

If they are not born evil, then when does the genisis occur when the are no longer innocent to that of the evil enemy. You moral decrees of absolutism do a disserve to these children by calling them evil fascists. Your world of absolutisim does not allow for moderates.

That the people follow their leaders, says to me we should be going after leaders like Hitler who held the absolutist belief that his world was being polluted by liberal pacificst Jews who were the appeasers and the defeatists and therefore the enemy of German superiority.

To me your way of thinking is very dangerous.

The action is more important than the word chosen to describe it, so one could call it illegal or intolerable or immoral or wrong.

But I think it is important that he knows it is wrong, because that knowledge provides a reason for him to seek more tolerable solutions. 

that all muslims or their children were the evil enemy or islamofascists, there is nothing here for me to reply to.

As for going after leaders like Hitler, sometimes you need to go through their followers. That is showcased in WW2 where we had to kill millions of his military and civilians before we actually defeated him. It's never that simple. And even if we wanted to go after those leaders, liberals like you would still prevent us by saying that assassinations of heads of state are wrong. Your position translates to inaction and appeasement which is the worst possible position to have.

relative standards to a  tax code, and then using  relativism to justify breaking a law that you have equivocated to be morally wrong.

Your logic is filled with contradictions and celebrates anarachy and tribalism and lives outsides the bounds of social order.

to parents that belonged to Hezbollah. and unfortunately the IDF was not able to complete the mission. They are islamofascists by birth that call for the destruction of Israel, if you follow the logic of your absolutist way of thinking. They must be exterminated before they grow into adult  evil and dangerous Hezzbollah Islamofascists.

You mischaracterize my position  with broad sweeping statements, but I am used to that by now.

I can't imagine why we ever negotiated with the Soviet Union since that was appeasement. It must have been the NYT that made us do it.

some culture's frames of reference does not hold all human beings as equal (women in this case) does not mean it should be excused by that. Frames of reference are meant to be altered when either better example is available or when it can be rationalized that these frames are illogical or irrational.

I understand what you are saying. I know you are talking about understanding other cultures and why they hold the views that they do. I have no problem with that part.

Correct me if I misunderstand but you are also saying that all that separates us is the societal norms that we somewhat arbitrarily establish where each culture determines what is right and wrong by consensus? The way I see it, it is not enough for a well functioning and "moral" society. By the way to me morality has nothing to do with religion, but with what we rationally determine to be good and evil based on how it affects ourselves and other human beings.

Societal norms at times held that slavery and discrimination based on external characteristics were normal. It is the minority of people who put their foot down and said that no, slavery is unacceptable and immoral, who changed our society and moved it towards the more moral state. Societies are often far from infallible or rational and agree on standards far from moral. It's the courage of those who are able to see beyond the consensus and beyond the current frames of reference that changes our world for the better.

that we live in, but to a hypothetical society that is well beyond what we currently have.

The answer to your question is that resistance could be justified in any society, regardless of the government, that has a serious and extreme moral flaw in it. In my example the flaw was so extreme that the existing order became worthless and immoral to participate in. Armed resistance was the only option.

when guerilla resistance is a viabable solution!!

as if your absolutes are becoming a little slippery and used to suit the occassion (sounds a bit like relativism). 

So is Iraq wrong in the insurgency?  After all, many of them believe they are protecting their society by attacking the enemy by the best means [they] have at [their] disposal.  (I'm not morally justifying the insurgency here, necessarily.  I am using your own argument against you though.)  I have to rummage through part of your argument, because some of it sounds like formulaic Hoplite stuff --America is the most moral nation: agree or disagree; discuss.

I think you are putting your toe in the muddy waters (relativism) when you say, "There are moral choices to be made within the context of that defense but our morality and potential absolutes diverge even there."

leaving aside the existence of an outside moral authority (eg God or whatever independent being you may choose), if the human race were somehow 100% behind a certain moral code that you consider evil, how would anyone know it was evil, much less have the ability to conceptualize of it as evil?

So we're back to epistemology again. 

I'll use a silly hypothetical to illustrate this: let's say for a minute that there is a Higher Being, and one of that HB's irreducible moral codes is that walking upright on one's hind legs is evil.  That means the entire human race is guilty of committing an evil action it doesn't even realize can be discussed on moral terms.  Now, take the HB out of the equation - is the action still evil?  Is the term 'evil' even adequate anymore in terms of describing the action? 

Like I said, this is a silly hypothetical, but it applies to the way we think about the way we think - it's possible to imagine a world in which the Nazis had won WWII, eliminated all opposition, and established their own hellish (to us) utopia.  But with none of us left, and no HB who intervenes in any significant way, is it possible to describe that world as evil if there's no one to conceptualize of that world as evil? 

Now, before you try to twist this around into something it isn't - no, I'm not advocating Nazi victory.  For one thing, it would require elimination of me, and I'm not terribly fond of that idea.  But I am going to throw this question back at you: if you're going to call something evil regardless of the population involved, what independent ground do you stand on in order to so? 

nevermind.  I meant that more as a joke, but I guess the previous discussion was fairly serious, so the joke might have been hard to interpret.

It is purely consequentialism:

That means attacking the enemy by the best means we have at our disposal. At the same time I do not hold that indirect death of the innocents as a result of our defense as morally wrong.

Remember, absolutes depend on unwavering principles.  Consequentialism is the means justify the ends and, specifically, the end result.

You are describing two wholly seperate societies. One, an aristocracy which also happens to perform all labor AND all invention and the nearby barbarian horde that happen to live nearby and demand, in return for peace, that the producers pay tribute (not too uncommon, it usually results in the producers creating their own defense force and actually employing the hungry horde into performing labor)

Strangely, you are putting the police and the military (also part of this non-producing group) and weapon manufacturers and all those others which somehow managed to stage a massive assault against these amazing producers and doers of everything as part of the non-producers.

Apparently, in this increasingly hypothetical situation, these increadibly wealthy folk wielded no influence with the politicians or the media and did nothing to maintain their security.

You describe the very society we live in today.

So, in your universe, Bush is culpable for the murder of how many Iraqis then?  Maybe he had reasons to break the law in invading their country, but the law is the law, right?  We started a war of aggression, which surely you see as a moral evil, right?  You wouldn't suggest that the greater good of overthrowing Saddam should be used to justify the fact that laws were broken and innocents killed, would you?

No, Bush, like those you describe above, also feels justified in breaking a few eggs to make an omlette.  As you state, "anyone trying to justify their actions as working for the common good is absoloutely wrong".  I agree; just because he used the common good as a justification for invading Iraq doesn't mean he's not guilty (as we all are) of an act of evil.

Certainly a case could be made for the simple assasination of Saddam, but that wasn't on the table; invasion, war, and the inevitible deaths of tens of thousands of completely innocent civilians (not to mention the rapes, pillages, etc.) was chosen instead, justified by said travesties being all part of a greater good.  And now under the occupation it continues under a different equation: these people are being instead sacrificed for "democratization", with no irony intended.

The truth is that Bush chose a grey area which you so despise, and we all do the same every day.  Any cop will laugh in your face if you suggest law is a matter of black and white; forget the courts, the true face of justice is seen on the street every time an officer makes a moral-relativist decision as to who to bust, who to warn, who to let go, etc.  I mean, how many mafia soldiers were designated as such but allowed to roam free (so's to trace and spy upon) all in the name of the greater good, e.g., busting the mafia boss? 

There is more to good and evil than simply good and evil.  In fact, I would go so far as to say these childish terms should be abondonded in favor of ethical vs. unethical, which is something that can be objectively arrived at, not arbitrarily determined (usually in as self-serving a way possible).

So it sounds like national defense casts aside any other moral value, if I am reading you correctly.  How you cannot see this as profoundly immoral is beyond me.

Your absolutes need to be applied to all actors.  Thus, if it is moral to defend one's country by any means necessary, how can you say the insurgents in Iraq are not justified in ridding themselves of an occupier (which we unquestionably are).  I have no doubt that if you were born an Iraqi you'd be defending your country against the foreigners, because, as you imply, national defense trumps all other moral values.

That you suggest the moral superiority of the US as the deciding factor in which side to support belies a grave misunderstanding of the relativistic nature of the world.  You think any Iraqi believes the US is culturally superior to themselves?  Not many.  And I'm pretty sure if you ask most other people around the planet they will tell you, in a dead earnestness similar to your own, that in fact THEY live in the most moral country in the world.  After all, if it's immoral to let women parade around the street without head-scarves, how could these uncouth, barbaric Americans say otherwise?

YOU might see your country as more moral than the rest, but the ground you stand on is just as shaky as everyone else who claims the same thing.  Aside from being a very self-serving attitude to take, it also happens to be deluded.  Nations are neither moral nor immoral, only the actions performed by individuals from that country; thus, you can say Saddam was bad while Iraq was not (necessarily).  Similarly, while we have had American leaders who performed acts of good or evil, it is illogical to say America itself is similarly good or evil, because any good you may choose to quote (say, winning WWII) can be countered by an evil commited by other Americans in a different place and time (Vietnam, anyone?).  A wise person would see the difference; Iraqis, for example, would be wise to recognize the invasion and occupation of their country as an act of George W. Bush and his supporters (a vocal minority), and not America as a whole (who disapproves of the war).

Of course, your argument falls apart much more quickly once it is acknowledged that attacking Iraq was only defensive in rhetoric.  It was a war of agression just like the rest.  Defending one's country means being attacked, then responding; "pre-emptive defense" is just a legalistic way of saying "offense".  So, what does your moral absolutism have to say about non-defensive wars conducted by the world's firstmost moral authority?

assuming that since an Evil side exists, it MUST exist. It just so happens that at this period in time multiple Evil sides exist.

Are they absolutely evil? Well hard to say, but pretty damn close. At least one so close that only a military confrontation will prevent a horrible tragedy.

As for your first paragraph, yes that is absolutely true.

So it sounds like national defense casts aside any other moral value, if I am reading you correctly.  How you cannot see this as profoundly immoral is beyond me.

I am not sure where I suggested that. I only suggested that national defense in the face of existential threats is an absolute moral good. There are many other important moral values that we should be upholding but it would be kinda moot if we surrender to a wholly evil side intent on destroying everything we (or I) value.

Your absolutes need to be applied to all actors.  Thus, if it is moral to defend one's country by any means necessary, how can you say the insurgents in Iraq are not justified in ridding themselves of an occupier (which we unquestionably are).  I have no doubt that if you were born an Iraqi you'd be defending your country against the foreigners, because, as you imply, national defense trumps all other moral values.

I specifically addressed that. Since I belive US to be morally superior, I do not consider the views of the evil side we are battling as being in contention with my morals or equally valid. They could certainly consider their opposition moral, but I am not a relativist so it is of no consequence to me.

So to further expound on that, I do not care how some Islamic jihadist views our country or our war on him. The primary concern should be for the survival of our country, our morality, our liberties, our way of life. Other country's views on all those matters should be of absolutely no relevance. If we proceed logically from that, I believe in a fully unilateral posture when it comes to most of our foreign policy decisions including most most importantly who to wage war against. No one else should be in a position to decide how we defend ourselves.

You accuse me of a very self-serving attitude, but that is what I am.

Nations are neither moral nor immoral, only the actions performed by individuals from that country; thus, you can say Saddam was bad while Iraq was not (necessarily).  Similarly, while we have had American leaders who performed acts of good or evil, it is illogical to say America itself is similarly good or evil, because any good you may choose to quote (say, winning WWII) can be countered by an evil commited by other Americans in a different place and time (Vietnam, anyone?).  A wise person would see the difference; Iraqis, for example, would be wise to recognize the invasion and occupation of their country as an act of George W. Bush and his supporters (a vocal minority), and not America as a whole (who disapproves of the war).

Technically you are right. It is not "nations" that are moral or immoral but only those who direct the actions of the nations. In some nations there is more to it. In case of America you have to take into consideration the unique circumstances of her founding, the brilliant foundation layed down by our forefathers, the awesome creative, adventurous, and enterpreneurial spirit of those who made this country into the awesome power it is now. It is the combination of all those things including our willingness to fight for what is right and oppose tyranny whether it was in Nazi Germany, Imperial Japan, or Soviet Union, and now Islamic Nazis.

Our government, our freedoms, our individuality, our actions, our way of life, our opportunities, our unique foundation, our capitalism, our wealth, our power, our great forefathers in business, invention, and government, and our uniquely independent culture all make for our overwhelming superiority to any other current country or anything that had ever existed.

Of course, your argument falls apart much more quickly once it is acknowledged that attacking Iraq was only defensive in rhetoric.  It was a war of agression just like the rest.  Defending one's country means being attacked, then responding; "pre-emptive defense" is just a legalistic way of saying "offense".  So, what does your moral absolutism have to say about non-defensive wars conducted by the world's firstmost moral authority?

1. I never acknowledged any such thing.

2. Preemptive war is just as moral as a defensive war, but only a lot smarter. I like good offense. The only question becomes whether we attacked the right country and there lies some mild disagreement.

Again, preemptive war is a wonderful thing. Only weakling morons wait until they are attacked when the intent of the enemy is well known.

I isolated both squares--they are not same shade of gray.

I pulled them into Paint, and they are the same shade here.

I don't think anything can be darker than a black hole, since light can't escape it.  But I guess this would only be a refutation of your argument if general relativity were absolutely correct, or at least the laws pertaining to the existance of a black hole.  And then I quess it would still depend on your point of view, since inside the black hole you can see stuff you couldn't see on the outside.

But this brings up a greater point.  Do you believe, like I understand Feynman to beleive, in an absolute equation that explains everything? I always thought this was arrogant on his part but then I'm nowhere near as smart as Feynman, so who am I to judge?