"Right" and "Wrong."

The last post was entitled "Post Human Ethics." Yet it seems to not deal with the traditional subjects of ethics, which is, roughly, the ideas of "Right" and "Wrong." Instead, it seems to focus upon the problem of resentment and violence against artists who conspire to become the dominant life form on Earth so that they can more effectively continue to trick humans into not committing senseless mass slaughter on battlefields. What has this got to do with ethics?

Well. We have already established that this series of speculations arises from the celebration of the centennial of Dada, the movement that declared that art had failed in its task of civilizing Humans, as evidenced by the senseless mass slaughter on the battlefields of France in WWI. And this movement introduced the idea that artists actually have a task beyond simply getting famous and therefore rich by selling paintings and such. And that this task was to civilize humans into not committing senseless mass slaughter on battlefields. I would like to introduce the perhaps radical idea that "Right" and "Wrong" cannot be separated from "Survival." And "Survival" cannot be separated from "Death." And "Death" cannot be separated from "Senseless Mass Slaughter on Battlefields." So artists who define themselves as the civilizers of humans, by means of preventing mass slaughter on battlefields, and then find them selves in danger of being killed by from those same humans who resent being manipulated into not committing senseless mass slaughter on battlefields or off of battlefields , when asked, "Is senseless mass slaughter 'wrong?'" are very likely to answer 'You bet your ass'. I am not sure what I just said.

Let us now consider the idea that "Right" and "Wrong" cannot be separated from "Survival."
Imagine, if you will, the statement "Abortion is wrong." Change the previous period to an exclamation mark , if you wish. Let us try to separate this idea from the idea of "Survival." I speak here only of survival of entire societies. The reason is that people who tend to say "Abortion is Wrong" tend to be the sort of people who claim that they "believe in traditional values." And the only way a value can become traditional is that it is passed on for so many generations that no one can remember when it first appeared, and the society that passes it on has managed to survive to pass it on. So it is not possible to separate "traditional values" from the survival of a society long enough for the particular value to become "traditional."

So. Back to the separation of "Abortion is Wrong" from "Survival." Time marches on. "We" witness significant numbers of societies come and go and notice that societies that hold to the traditional value "Abortion is Wrong" have a seriously tendency to disintegrate and disappear. And societies that hold to the traditional value "Abortion is Right" have a serious tendency to survive for thousands of years. What does it mean, in this context, to say "Abortion is Wrong?" It means, in part, that we are willing for our society to disintegrate and disappear. Yeah, yeah, I know, "Post hoc, ergo propter hoc" is a fallacy. But I still ask the question. Get over it.

So: I am tired. I don't feel like going on with this any more.