This is from Shari even though it looks like it's from Mari: Very interesting dilemma, Mari. I agreed with you on the first two, but I put David third (although after reading your thoughts I would consider ranking him lower. I had Bob fourth since he just stood by when he might have made a positive difference. And I chose to rank Allan, the opportunist, as most unethical. However, lots to think about after reading your comments.
I loved this piece, but for different reasons that I’m still working through and cannot articulate adequately. But, in summary, through a couple of years of mindfulness practice I’ve ended up as a moral sceptic.
So my reaction to the dilemma is that if everyone focused more on their desired outcomes and less on their feelings about ‘shoulds’ they would all be happier. I know this is a rubbish argument, but it’s intuitive and still founded in a nascent dislike of our (including my own) reflexive judgementalism.
Oh yes! I love this idea! As a pragmatist, I almost always think that we should focus on our goal rather than our own sense of morality. This is one reason I love Dostoevsky's The Idiot so much: Prince Myshkin is so good and innocent that he causes chaos and suffering wherever he goes. It would be far better to be a little less perfect and a little more effective!
Allan - eh, what're you gonna do. Might be the last chance in his life to have sex. But even if not, people get mercanile in extreme situations and he did no great harm that we're told of.
David - horrible POS.
Best of luck to Caroline and Edward. Hey, best of luck to the three guys on the other island, too. Plenty of time to think and perhaps grow.
Oh I posted mine without looking at anyone’s answers either and I said the same about Bob— he didn’t do anything. But I thought Edward acted morally/kindly.
It's interesting you bring up Phillip Larkin's parents, because I just read This Be The Verse for poetry class! Anyway, my ranking:
1. Edward and Caroline, tied. Both of them chose to help other people when they could have abandoned them- Caroline making a sacrifice to see David, and Edward taking on the no doubt difficult task of comforting Caroline after her ordeal. I don't think Caroline's sacrifice makes her more or less moral than Edward.
2. Bob. He just didn't do anything.
3. David. While what he did was awful, you can at least make a vague argument that he had the right to be upset, because Caroline promised to be faithful to him. Unlike
4. Allan. He actively chose to take advantage of a person in a vulnerable position, possibly knowing it would strain her relationship. While he should be thanked for his effort traversing the island, he should also be performing these duties out of the goodness of his heart, not for his own benefit.
I think this shows just how much emphasis I put on care vs harm, over any other moral foundation, lol
Isn't it an excellent poem? And very interesting thoughts, especially your sympathy for David. It is a reasonable point that I haven't been entirely fair to him. Incidentally, our entire family (including Uncle Gene) is unanimous that Allan is the worst!
I found this to be a very interesting ethical question, Mari. My academic training as a psychologist required grad students to reframe our ethical instincts in order to prevent or address ethical dilemmas in professional settings. Without doing so we risk projecting our own needs and desires on others with harmful effects. In my case, this was to prevent harm to psychotherapy patients as much as possible. I share this for insight into the processes I used to prepare for these comments. :)
I understand that Moral Foundations Theory was originally meant to describe innate human ethical decision-making in real life settings all over the world [1]. In addition to reading your article, I read the Wikipedia pages about Moral Foundations Theory (MFT), about your acquaintance, Jonathan Haidt, PhD, and about a few of the organizations in which he's heavily involved, such as Heterodox Academy and RepresentUs. I'm awful at retaining names, so I also looked up my personal history of watching lectures by Dr Haidt on YouTube. I see I've watched two of his short lectures.
Of course Dr Haidt would ask me to make a gut decision versus a logical one, given that's the idea behind MFT. But to answer your questions, Mari, I wanted to see what a logical approach might uncover for me first. Adjacent to what anthropologist Richard Shweder suggested, I looked at the five MFT moral dichotomies via how I would rank the values as I'd hope people would act in a communal setting, and then via how I would rank the values as I'd hope people would act interpersonally in dyads. I used a forced-choice method comparing each pair of values in the two social settings. When I was done, I found slight variations in how I think people can best make moral decisions with multiple strangers versus with known individuals. Generally speaking, my MFT values from most endorsed to least endorsed are: (a) care vs harm, (b) loyalty vs betrayal, (c) fairness vs cheating, (d) sanctity vs degradation, and finally (e) authority vs subversion.[2]
Next, I force-ranked my thoughts about each of the five fictional characters strictly according to my logically derived value hierarchy. Using this logical method, I ranked the ethical choices of each character from most to least ethical, as follows: (a) Bob, (b) Edward, (c) Caroline, (d) David, and finally Allan. Surprising, yes? I'll explain why Bob made my top rank in a minute.
Only at this point in the process did I allow myself to consider what I know my own innate ethical judgment to be. Like Mari, before this process, I know I would judge Edward and Caroline to rank near the top. Given we know nothing at all about Edward's motivations, my innate tendency is to assume the best first. So I'd rank him on at the top of the list given I have no data about mistakes or bad intentions. For the same reasons Mari gave, second would be Caroline, and third would be Bob. I judge sexual opportunists more harshly than I do spouses who perceive themselves as spurned, so I reversed the order of Allan and David compared to Mari's list.
So why did Bob move from third position in my "innate" mindset, to first position when I used the deconstruction process? Once again, this makes a lot of sense if you know about my "do no harm" professional training (and experience as a medical patient). This professional psychologist ethic derives from medical training, and is, I think, a good way to approach interpersonal ethical decisions. This is especially true in professional settings when you don't know other individuals as well as you might know friends and family. The idea is that before you intervene in the life of another individual, you should be as sure as possible that your intended proactive behavior will do no harm. If you aren't sure enough, then it might be better to do nothing (at that moment).
Yes, Bob did nothing to help, but he did no harm either. Even Edward can be argued to have done harm to David: if a rescue crew saved these five, Edward's behavior would further complicate any chance to resolve the marraige/divorce cleanly between David and Caroline. (I hasten to add that there are circumstances during which doing nothing is decidedly unethical. We all know this. I'm not going to elaborate on obvious examples.)
This is an area of personal growth and struggle for me, as it is for many people. Just think of the serenity prayer. It's not easy to know when it's better to accept current circumstances versus having the courage to act, especially if your highest MFT value is are vs harm.
Candy
🦋🧡🦋
[1] Per today's Wikipedia page titled, "Moral Foundations Theory," I learned that "although the initial development of moral foundations theory focused on cultural differences, subsequent work with the theory has largely focused on political ideology. In the "Applications" section of this same page, it says, "The usefulness of moral foundations theory as an explanation for political ideology has been contested on the grounds that moral foundations are less heritable than political ideology". Wikipedia writers go on to summarize a handful of academic articles published from 2017 to 2023 on this subject, showing that political ideology *drives* moral reasoning, and not the opposite, as Dr Haidt apparently suggests. So you might not be surprised at my frustration with Dr Haidt, if Wikipedia writers have accurately protrayed his new theoretical inclusion of a sixth value: "Liberty (opposite of oppression)." He's said to have included this sixth value because "economic conservatives" wish to be "treated fairly based on what they have earned." Ugh. I feel myself wanting to say a lot of things about this. But I will not. Ugh. Ugh. Ugh.
[2] According to the Wikipedia page on MFT, in "The Foundations" section, the more conservative your political orientation, the more you value all five of these MFT value orientations relatively equally. Given I used a forced-choice procedure, I did not find any quantitative results to show how much weight I put on each value relative to the others. But given I ranked "loyalty vs betrayal" second, according to the graphic in "The Foundations" section, I think I must rank somewhere as a political moderate, leaning liberal.
Oh wow, this is fascinating, and you have persuaded me to move Bob higher up in the hierarchy! You are right that “do no harm” is crucial to remember when we are deciding how to act, and that the situation may have nuances we bystanders may not understand. It is better not just just blunder in--we would be wiser to take a moment to assess the situation. And you are right that if the castaways were to be rescued, Edward’s well-meaning kindness would mess things up thoroughly! Thank you so much for sharing your thoughts!
The big difference here is putting Bob above Caroline, and the reason is that Caroline should have taken more initiative to fix the problem herself instead of relying on men for help. Anything you can accuse Bob of not doing, you can also accuse Caroline of not doing.
I had the same rankings as you, Mari, and for the same reasons, except I put Bob outside the rankings. He didn’t do anything moral or immoral. “Do you know how to get off the island?” “No.” And I assume that was true.
I agree with your ranking, but I could be persuaded by the steel-man of Caroline being the most moral. And I love the What about Bob? question. (Baby steps! Baby steps!)
This is from Shari even though it looks like it's from Mari: Very interesting dilemma, Mari. I agreed with you on the first two, but I put David third (although after reading your thoughts I would consider ranking him lower. I had Bob fourth since he just stood by when he might have made a positive difference. And I chose to rank Allan, the opportunist, as most unethical. However, lots to think about after reading your comments.
Very interesting thought to put Bob lower in the ranking! Sometimes remaining neutral is not all that neutral, especially when we could help!
I loved this piece, but for different reasons that I’m still working through and cannot articulate adequately. But, in summary, through a couple of years of mindfulness practice I’ve ended up as a moral sceptic.
So my reaction to the dilemma is that if everyone focused more on their desired outcomes and less on their feelings about ‘shoulds’ they would all be happier. I know this is a rubbish argument, but it’s intuitive and still founded in a nascent dislike of our (including my own) reflexive judgementalism.
Oh yes! I love this idea! As a pragmatist, I almost always think that we should focus on our goal rather than our own sense of morality. This is one reason I love Dostoevsky's The Idiot so much: Prince Myshkin is so good and innocent that he causes chaos and suffering wherever he goes. It would be far better to be a little less perfect and a little more effective!
Ooh, thanks for the recommendation - I really must read The Idiot. It'll be a while, though, because I just started Anna Karenina haha!
I haven’t looked at anyone’s anwers.
I think Bob and Edward are neutral, unrankable. My ranking from best to worst for the others:
Caroline - did nothing wrong. (Hm, maybe she's unrankable too, then.)
Allan - eh, what're you gonna do. Might be the last chance in his life to have sex. But even if not, people get mercanile in extreme situations and he did no great harm that we're told of.
David - horrible POS.
Best of luck to Caroline and Edward. Hey, best of luck to the three guys on the other island, too. Plenty of time to think and perhaps grow.
Yes! Best of luck to everyone!
Oh I posted mine without looking at anyone’s answers either and I said the same about Bob— he didn’t do anything. But I thought Edward acted morally/kindly.
It's interesting you bring up Phillip Larkin's parents, because I just read This Be The Verse for poetry class! Anyway, my ranking:
1. Edward and Caroline, tied. Both of them chose to help other people when they could have abandoned them- Caroline making a sacrifice to see David, and Edward taking on the no doubt difficult task of comforting Caroline after her ordeal. I don't think Caroline's sacrifice makes her more or less moral than Edward.
2. Bob. He just didn't do anything.
3. David. While what he did was awful, you can at least make a vague argument that he had the right to be upset, because Caroline promised to be faithful to him. Unlike
4. Allan. He actively chose to take advantage of a person in a vulnerable position, possibly knowing it would strain her relationship. While he should be thanked for his effort traversing the island, he should also be performing these duties out of the goodness of his heart, not for his own benefit.
I think this shows just how much emphasis I put on care vs harm, over any other moral foundation, lol
Isn't it an excellent poem? And very interesting thoughts, especially your sympathy for David. It is a reasonable point that I haven't been entirely fair to him. Incidentally, our entire family (including Uncle Gene) is unanimous that Allan is the worst!
I found this to be a very interesting ethical question, Mari. My academic training as a psychologist required grad students to reframe our ethical instincts in order to prevent or address ethical dilemmas in professional settings. Without doing so we risk projecting our own needs and desires on others with harmful effects. In my case, this was to prevent harm to psychotherapy patients as much as possible. I share this for insight into the processes I used to prepare for these comments. :)
I understand that Moral Foundations Theory was originally meant to describe innate human ethical decision-making in real life settings all over the world [1]. In addition to reading your article, I read the Wikipedia pages about Moral Foundations Theory (MFT), about your acquaintance, Jonathan Haidt, PhD, and about a few of the organizations in which he's heavily involved, such as Heterodox Academy and RepresentUs. I'm awful at retaining names, so I also looked up my personal history of watching lectures by Dr Haidt on YouTube. I see I've watched two of his short lectures.
Of course Dr Haidt would ask me to make a gut decision versus a logical one, given that's the idea behind MFT. But to answer your questions, Mari, I wanted to see what a logical approach might uncover for me first. Adjacent to what anthropologist Richard Shweder suggested, I looked at the five MFT moral dichotomies via how I would rank the values as I'd hope people would act in a communal setting, and then via how I would rank the values as I'd hope people would act interpersonally in dyads. I used a forced-choice method comparing each pair of values in the two social settings. When I was done, I found slight variations in how I think people can best make moral decisions with multiple strangers versus with known individuals. Generally speaking, my MFT values from most endorsed to least endorsed are: (a) care vs harm, (b) loyalty vs betrayal, (c) fairness vs cheating, (d) sanctity vs degradation, and finally (e) authority vs subversion.[2]
Next, I force-ranked my thoughts about each of the five fictional characters strictly according to my logically derived value hierarchy. Using this logical method, I ranked the ethical choices of each character from most to least ethical, as follows: (a) Bob, (b) Edward, (c) Caroline, (d) David, and finally Allan. Surprising, yes? I'll explain why Bob made my top rank in a minute.
Only at this point in the process did I allow myself to consider what I know my own innate ethical judgment to be. Like Mari, before this process, I know I would judge Edward and Caroline to rank near the top. Given we know nothing at all about Edward's motivations, my innate tendency is to assume the best first. So I'd rank him on at the top of the list given I have no data about mistakes or bad intentions. For the same reasons Mari gave, second would be Caroline, and third would be Bob. I judge sexual opportunists more harshly than I do spouses who perceive themselves as spurned, so I reversed the order of Allan and David compared to Mari's list.
So why did Bob move from third position in my "innate" mindset, to first position when I used the deconstruction process? Once again, this makes a lot of sense if you know about my "do no harm" professional training (and experience as a medical patient). This professional psychologist ethic derives from medical training, and is, I think, a good way to approach interpersonal ethical decisions. This is especially true in professional settings when you don't know other individuals as well as you might know friends and family. The idea is that before you intervene in the life of another individual, you should be as sure as possible that your intended proactive behavior will do no harm. If you aren't sure enough, then it might be better to do nothing (at that moment).
Yes, Bob did nothing to help, but he did no harm either. Even Edward can be argued to have done harm to David: if a rescue crew saved these five, Edward's behavior would further complicate any chance to resolve the marraige/divorce cleanly between David and Caroline. (I hasten to add that there are circumstances during which doing nothing is decidedly unethical. We all know this. I'm not going to elaborate on obvious examples.)
This is an area of personal growth and struggle for me, as it is for many people. Just think of the serenity prayer. It's not easy to know when it's better to accept current circumstances versus having the courage to act, especially if your highest MFT value is are vs harm.
Candy
🦋🧡🦋
[1] Per today's Wikipedia page titled, "Moral Foundations Theory," I learned that "although the initial development of moral foundations theory focused on cultural differences, subsequent work with the theory has largely focused on political ideology. In the "Applications" section of this same page, it says, "The usefulness of moral foundations theory as an explanation for political ideology has been contested on the grounds that moral foundations are less heritable than political ideology". Wikipedia writers go on to summarize a handful of academic articles published from 2017 to 2023 on this subject, showing that political ideology *drives* moral reasoning, and not the opposite, as Dr Haidt apparently suggests. So you might not be surprised at my frustration with Dr Haidt, if Wikipedia writers have accurately protrayed his new theoretical inclusion of a sixth value: "Liberty (opposite of oppression)." He's said to have included this sixth value because "economic conservatives" wish to be "treated fairly based on what they have earned." Ugh. I feel myself wanting to say a lot of things about this. But I will not. Ugh. Ugh. Ugh.
[2] According to the Wikipedia page on MFT, in "The Foundations" section, the more conservative your political orientation, the more you value all five of these MFT value orientations relatively equally. Given I used a forced-choice procedure, I did not find any quantitative results to show how much weight I put on each value relative to the others. But given I ranked "loyalty vs betrayal" second, according to the graphic in "The Foundations" section, I think I must rank somewhere as a political moderate, leaning liberal.
Oh wow, this is fascinating, and you have persuaded me to move Bob higher up in the hierarchy! You are right that “do no harm” is crucial to remember when we are deciding how to act, and that the situation may have nuances we bystanders may not understand. It is better not just just blunder in--we would be wiser to take a moment to assess the situation. And you are right that if the castaways were to be rescued, Edward’s well-meaning kindness would mess things up thoroughly! Thank you so much for sharing your thoughts!
My own ranking was
best
Edward
Bob
Caroline
David
Allan
worst
The big difference here is putting Bob above Caroline, and the reason is that Caroline should have taken more initiative to fix the problem herself instead of relying on men for help. Anything you can accuse Bob of not doing, you can also accuse Caroline of not doing.
Oh excellent point! Show some gumption, Caroline!
I had the same rankings as you, Mari, and for the same reasons, except I put Bob outside the rankings. He didn’t do anything moral or immoral. “Do you know how to get off the island?” “No.” And I assume that was true.
I agree with your ranking, but I could be persuaded by the steel-man of Caroline being the most moral. And I love the What about Bob? question. (Baby steps! Baby steps!)