Channel
Ted Talks
Date
Apr 28, 2023 9:52 AM
Done?
Guest
Sam Harris
Platform
YouTube
[2023]
Topics
Philosophy
★☆★
★★★★★
Questions of good and evil, right and wrong are commonly thought unanswerable by science. But Sam Harris argues that science can -- and should -- be an authority on moral issues, shaping human values and setting out what constitutes a good life.
- Ethical Obligations
- We care about animals more than rocks because we believe that the former is exposed to a greater range of happiness and suffering.
- We could be either right or wrong. (biological complexities vs. possibilities of experience)
- Human morality & values
- The end point (main concern) is: our conscious experience and its possible changes
- i.e. religion, life after death, etc.
- The continuum of life facts
- 一个因/行为/condition将推动下一个果/事件/state
- Truths = Facts; Morality = Values
- Morality relates to truths (we know how to feel right)
- Values can be reduced to facts
- consicous experience of conscious beings
- Morality relates to the domain of facts - where science can interfere
- Brain - well being
- personality is the product of the brain
- culture can change our brain
- Moral Landscape
- personal and collective beliefs that associate with our conscious experience and personal well-being
- there are states of human well-being that we rarely access (few people do) because of how our minds are structured according to the above point
- mystical & spiritual
- How science can play the role?
- to admit that there are right and wrong answers to the question of how humans flourish
- How to define “human well being” and “physical health”?
- the concept of certain standard is open - the beauty and health standard
- universal morality vs. objective morality
- they don’t conflict
- people can have different preferences of taste, but can have a mutual understanding of the nutrition (what’s food and what’s poison)
- discuss the better balance on the spectrum between two extremes (woman images)
- Domain of expertise
- “Does the Taliban have a point of view on physics that is worth considering?”
- when talking about facts, certain opinions must be excluded
It seems to me, therefore, patently obvious that we can no more respect and tolerate vast differences in notions of human well-being than we can respect or tolerate vast differences in the notions about how disease spreads, or in the safety standards of buildings and airplanes. We simply must converge on the answers we give to the most important questions in human life. And to do that, we have to admit that these questions have answers.