If someone were to ask the above-mentioned question, I'd point out that we value our ability to reason (broadly understood) abilities that seem more basic and which may make reason possible. In this way we are a microcosm of the universe So just as we value one aspect of ourselves over others, so too do we regard some parts of the universe over others. The highest part can do whatever the lower does... plus more.
Here is a summary and comments on the essay Freedom and Resentment by PF Strawson. He makes some great points, and when he is wrong, it is in such a way as to clarify things a great deal. My non-deterministic position is much better thanks to having read this. I’ll summarize it in this post and respond in a later one. In a nutshell: PFS first argues that personal resentment that we may feel toward another for having failed to show goodwill toward us would have no problem coexisting with the conviction that determinism is true. Moral disapprobation, as an analog to resentment, is likewise capable of coexisting with deterministic convictions. In fact, it would seem nearly impossible for a normally-constituted person (i.e., a non-sociopath) to leave behind the web of moral convictions, even if that person is a determinist. In this way, by arguing that moral and determinist convictions can coexist in the same person, PFS undermines the libertarian argument ...
Comments
My argument is only a sketch, but I think adding the ability to name names, as it were, is still not enough to make the argument seem cogent. For one can still ask why we prefer being able to name over other skills had by animals but not by humans. The objector would demand a more convincing reason.
The answer I have in mind is, to put it briefly, that there is something infinite about human beings in comparison with the subhuman. That "something" has to do with our ability to think of the meaning of the cosmos. Whereas one might say"He's got the whole world in His hands" of God; one might also say, "He's got the whole world in his mind." So there's a sense that in order for "my world" to make sense, so does yours: yours has to make sense too, because we all live in the same world (the "we" being all rational creatures).
Oh well, that's just a sketch, but here's some background.
As I composed this argument, I had in the back of my mind something a French Catholic philosopher named Jacques Maritain pointed out in The Person and the Common Good: that there is a kind of infinity to the human person. It's as if we take the whole cosmos w/n our thought. Add to that what some Rennaissance dude said about man as microcosm, and its almost as if we model, in our governance of our bodily movements, the divine governance.
Naming is part of this god-like way we imitate divine providence. For naming is disinguising forms of being in terms of their purpose, which purpose is related to the purpose of the whole, which whole can be thematized by us humans and not by chimps.
Oh well, that's my story an' I'm stickin' to it :)
My argument is only a sketch, but I think adding the ability to name names, as it were, is still not enough to make the argument seem cogent. For one can still ask why we prefer being able to name over other skills had by animals but not by humans. The objector would demand a more convincing reason.
The answer I have in mind is, to put it briefly, that there is something infinite about human beings in comparison with the subhuman. That "something" has to do with our ability to think of the meaning of the cosmos. Whereas one might say"He's got the whole world in His hands" of God; one might also say, "He's got the whole world in his mind." So there's a sense that in order for "my world" to make sense, so does yours: yours has to make sense too, because we all live in the same world (the "we" being all rational creatures).
Oh well, that's just a sketch, but here's some background.
As I composed this argument, I had in the back of my mind something a French Catholic philosopher named Jacques Maritain pointed out in The Person and the Common Good: that there is a kind of infinity to the human person. It's as if we take the whole cosmos w/n our thought. Add to that what some Rennaissance dude said about man as microcosm, and its almost as if we model, in our governance of our bodily movements, the divine governance.
Naming is part of this god-like way we imitate divine providence. For naming is disinguising forms of being in terms of their purpose, which purpose is related to the purpose of the whole, which whole can be thematized by us humans and not by chimps.
Oh well, that's my story an' I'm stickin' to it :)
My argument is only a sketch, but I think adding the ability to name names, as it were, is still not enough to make the argument seem cogent. For one can still ask why we prefer being able to name over other skills had by animals but not by humans. The objector would demand a more convincing reason.
I tried to post more in the comments, but google wouldn't let me, so I'm creating a new link...