Order implies organized grouping, progression and causality, since one thing or element depends upon another and is preceded and followed by yet another. Order is a non-random grouping according to a repeatable pattern, while its opposite is no-pattern, no progression, no causality. If there is to be an order, then it is bound by rules/laws, limits, a pattern or blueprint of some sort, and it likely needs to be maintained (by means of some cosmic energy or force?), else it ceases to be.
Vera,
If you throw a couple of dice a few million times (or whatever equivalent random situation matches your taste) you'll get a very predictable distribution of results, but you would have a tough time arguing that (given suitable experimental conditions) a given throw constitutes part of a progression or that it has a causal relation to the preceding or following throws. In other words, this set of events exhibits "order" and is a "repeatable pattern", but is generated by a "grouping" of "things or elements" that was generated in such a way that no element "depends upon another". In fact the way a system is determined to be random is by showing that it produces an expected distribution of results. Also, in order to deal with the complexity and messiness of the concrete universe, the human brain has become organized to look for patterns. We're so good at it that humans, given enough time, will find patterns in pretty much any finite data set (and the observable universe is a finite data set). The place of the word "order" in your discussion strikes me as taking the place occupied in many mystical or quasi-mystical discourses by "meaning" (with the usual opposite, of course, being "meaninglessness").
... it is a given that we do not know if there is an order or there is not.
The possibilities are:
A) If there is no order, it makes little difference what we do in the long run, only in the short run (our observable personal lifespan).
B) If there *is* an order then it is a valid possibility that it *does* make a difference what we do, and there is a resulting set of consequences that stretch from the past into the future like a line of dominoes.
Given such a dilemma, I said, the *responsible* choice is to assume scenario B.
Why? Because there are 50/50 odds of it being true ...
As we do not only not know whether or not an "order" exists, but also do not know what the chances are that said "order" exists, assigning 50/50 chances to the outcome is misleading at best and a logical fallacy at worst. But I doubt this affects the argument much , as, given the set of assumptions, any chance of the existence of this "order" could be sufficient for the argument. (I.e. this point addresses only the form, not the content of this argument.)
The argument as presented also strikes me as eliding at least one layer of reasoning. We may have choices
A)the universe has no order, and
B)the universe has order,
but if we assume B, we then have choices
B1)actions by inhabitants of the universe do not affect the order, and
B2)actions by inhabitants of the universe affect the order.
Looking to the wider context of the argument, we can add
B2a)destruction is not an action that affects the order, and
B2b)destruction is an action that affects the order,
followed by
B2b1)destruction may affect the universal order non-adversely,
B2b2)all destruction affects the universal order adversely.
(This also begs the question of whether the "destruction" requires an agent to be ethically problematic, e.g. are colliding neutron stars a problem?)
Defining an ordered universe as one in which killing affects the universe adversely would seem (to me anyway), at this point in the discussion, either post hoc or really misleading. The argument also requires sufficiently concrete definitions of (at least) "order", "inhabitants", "killing", and "adverse" in order to function. Some things about your definitions of these terms can be inferred from your posts, but I see no reason why your definitions are better than mine or any one else's.
To take up the complexities of "destruction" in the form of "killing": Is harvesting vegetables and grains ok, or only fruits and leaves? If it's ok to eat leaves, what is the ethical status of a plant using chemicals to ward off fungus or beetles? And what about parasites? A single mosquito or tick isn't going to kill a good sized mammal, but might be (unknowingly) carrying an agent that could. Is a malarial mosquito ethically different from a non-malarial one? And are non-malarial mosquitos agents of virtue in the universe since they don't kill to survive? Should bees only sting humans who won't die of anaphylactic shock? Or do they need to produce hypo-allergenic venom in order to be virtuous? What about species (digger wasps, say, or that fungus that infects ant nervous systems) whose reproductive cycle is entirely predicated on destroying another organism? Is your argument supposed to imply that humans not eating cows will somehow cause lions to evolve such that they don't eat antelope, and digger wasps such that they don't paralyze another creature to lay their eggs on? You can say these questions are ridiculous, but your argument invites them; on some level, they seem to be the sort of questions your statements are trying to answer. (And, yes, "virtuous" is a term I chose, I am using it in this context to mean "tending to promote order", in whatever way you're defining order.)
I would be curious as to exactly what this philosophy hinges on. What statements, being refuted (whether logically or observationally), would change your mind? Or does the philosophy require an argument from faith or emotion? (Nothing wrong with such arguments per se, but its more or less impossible to make them using the methods and terminology of science and logic.) And if there is no circumstance under which you would change your mind, why should I not dismiss you as a fanatic?
My intention here is not to be hostile. I do, however, find your argument as it stands logically unconvincing. I also find it "imaginatively" unconvincing, as it does not seem to address many of the complexities (and perplexities) I see in the universe, especially those dealing with the complexity of observed interactions between living beings. On the other hand, I can respect the impulse behind your search. Good luck in your struggles.
Those polar bear pollinated flowers can be a real pain to clear out of the back yard... (though watching yellow-headed polar bears wander dazedly through the neighborhood is fun...)
For a recent clinical summary of results on animal suffering, detailing both pain- and fear-related suffering, see this paper by Temple Grandin. One neurological perspective has it that an organism requires a limbic system (i.e. the parts of the brain which integrate stimuli into emotional responses including the amygdala, the hippocampus, and some other structures - more detail than you probably want here) in order to have the feelings humans identify as suffering. I assume the argument runs something like: since the human experience of suffering can be located in these structures, animals who do not have a limbic system do not suffer in a way that is a meaningful analogue of what humans experience. Extrapolating this idea to a world view would seem to mean that human empathy is only meaningful when applied to certain groups of mammals. (An extreme version of this view limits meaningful suffering to "humans, higher apes, and possibly dolphins" - see the Grandin paper.) Grandin's view (from a skim through the above paper) seems to be that the limbic system is only one layer in a neural processing hierarchy governing pain, fear, etc., and that the other levels of this hierarchy are structurally similar enough to the limbic system that the various fear reactions and learned aversions exhibited by all vertebrates can be treated meaningfully as forms of suffering (and that this reasoning could possibly be extended to neurologically sophisticated invertebrates such as octopus).
In a more speculative vein, suppose you are a newt that can regenerate a leg or a lizard that can shed its tail. What would be appropriate neurological responses (from an evolutionary point of view) to losing the aforementioned limbs? Our lizard would certainly be justified in fearing the circumstances that lead to the loss of a tail (That hawk is going to EAT me!), but would the lizard have an actual fear of losing its tail? And would the experience of losing a tail be particularly "traumatic"? I suspect that it would be better for the lizard if the actual tail-loss were a relatively neutral event, perhaps entailing a change in foraging strategy to avoid situations requiring tricky balancing, but hardly a matter to bewail at great length to all the lizardy gods, or to get all neurotic about. ("And whatever you do don't mention 'the tail incident'...")
I suppose my point here is just that choosing the grounds for empathy is tricky, especially when applied to entities with different life cycles and physiological tricks than humans (jellyfish? ferns?).
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