Hi Everyone,
Here are a couple of links to an academic scandal that has emerged in the last few days:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2010/apr/23/historian-orlando-figes-amazon-reviews-rivals
http://www.cambridge-news.co.uk/Home/The-historian-the-savage-reviews-and-the-literary-whodunnit.htm
A hitherto well-respected and prominent historian admits to writing anonymous bad reviews of the work of other historians on the Amazon site, and nice ones about his own work! When suspicion is aroused, he first of all says it was his wife that wrote them, then eventually admits that he did.
What might this tell us about the world in which historians work? Before the WWW age, it would be very difficult to broadcast views so easily and so anonymously - do you think this raises any ethical issues and, if so, how should they be addressed?
I think the ethical issues are quite clear here. It is clearly unacceptable that Orlando Figes should rubbish the work of other historians and praise his just to improve his perceived skill as a historian. Of course, there is no problem if his comments are his honest opininons. However, if they were, why would he seek anonymity?
ReplyDeleteSecondly, he lied about the comments and shamefully put the blame on his wife. Disgraceful!
I think the fact that people have so much freedom to comment and comment anonymously on the web or other sources is a good thing. More forums for ordinary people to debate the work of academics is a good thing.
To keep such opportunities from being abused ala Orlando Figes, I think very tough punishments should be instituted for such actions. This will serve as a deterrent for other academics who would want to behave in such manner. Orlando Figes reputation should be dimiinshed for a long period of time and must be made to work hard to re-establish his integrity.
Hehehe….Kojo you sound like the solution is simple and easy…You say: Figes was “wrong”, his lying was “unethical”, and he should be punished “severely” to deter other people from following suit, in such “disgraceful” actions. But seriously, let’s take an objective stand as IB TOK students. What really are the implications of Orlando Figes’ reviews on both history as a way of knowing, and our growing use of technology to transfer knowledge, more specifically the world-wide web???
ReplyDeleteFor a “historian” to lie blatantly on the world stage and commit such an act of deceit, makes us wonder the extent to which these actions are “transferrable” into his work ethics as well! Then again, what will spur such rivalry in the world of history? Could this mean that historians report more than just the facts, and in fact may have an obligation to interpret events in a way that is appealing to their audience?(Why then will he be under so much pressure to compare his books to others’ as “beautiful and necessary”?) Also, his lie about his wife proves the “anthropocentric” theory stated by philosophers – “Man’s first instinct will always be his own survival. I guess this explains why his first instinct was to play the “blame-game” on his wife. Again, it brings to light the question of the extent to which human behaviour may actually have some underlying “commonalities” justifying behaviourist’s attempt to deduce a “pattern’ for human behaviour! Unfortunately, I see no solution to people broadcasting their views anonymously on the world-wide web. With the globalization of this era, came certain consequences man was bound to lose control over – technology in this respect, is one of them!
I approached commenting to this post with much reluctance for two reasons the presence of the words history and ethics. I dislike both words, because the former was a very confusing subject for me and the latter is just a topic that I cannot possibly be objective in. However, I am commenting on this post simply because I find Fige’s callow conduct funny…
ReplyDeleteThe WWW age has really morphed the world we live in, into one of much more liberty than the world of the past. And this creates a problem, because like all things. Orlando Fige comes with cons and pros, and his conduct was a perfect example of a con. Anonymity really has its disadvantages.
Was what Orlando Fige did right or wrong? Was it not his right as a human? This is why ethics troubles me so much because what is right and what is wrong has been set in stone for cultures, countries, religious groups and there are so many contradictions, for instance; what is right in my culture may not be right for your religious group and the examples are never-ending.
But I want to pose a question: Who are we to even comment on Fige’s actions? By we I do not mean us hgic student but us humans. I do not think what he did conduct was wrong in any way. For me to think that and assert in a post would be dogmatic would it not? All I am going to say is that hhe simply lacked tact . We live in an age where speech and opinion are our rights no matter how unwarranted. However, to be bold enough to slander somebody anonymously then pin it on your wife and then finally take the blame does not strike me as well thought out.
The world in which historians interests me. Right now I wish I had taken my history lessons a little more seriously, because I have no clue. History can be biased, distorted, lost and most certainly commented on. That much I am certain of but the credibility of sources and all those other factors historians have to take into consideration I am not. However, I am sure that all these things allow for historians to have contradictory opinions. The fact that Robert Service felt affronted by Fige’s comments shocks me though. Everyone is entitled to an opinion about history so shouldn’t historians be ready for disagreements? But then again ...Fige’s reviews were quite rude.(Now Fige apologize to to service! oh..and your wife.)
And in agreement with Metty, Fige’s conduct most certainly bolsters the anthropocentric theory and really does beg the question: What kind of world do historians live in that such rivalry between historians should exist? However, I believe that there are so many ways to detect authenticity and that his work ethics are not necessarily questionable.
For example, by following these links
> http://goliath.ecnext.com/coms2/gi_0199-6935156/What-makes-a-good-historian.html
> http://educationforum.ipbhost.com/index.php?showtopic=2777
one can see that the better the historian, the greater the reliance on the best available evidence and that all good historians are willing to adapt their theory when the evidence suggests that the original one was incorrect. This means that like the good angler you have to use different baits and try different places on the river bank.
So can competition really affect a historian’s work ethic? I do not believe that is the world in which they live in because I think they live in one that is purely dependent on the interpretation of facts. That is why they may differ in my opinion. Am I implying that historians cannot be liars though? No I am not. I am simply implying that the world of historians is one of integrity. In such a world, work ethic is rarely questionable when everything one does is based on facts and even interpretations of facts can be followed logically...
Merci
nicely put Erudit...
ReplyDeleteSurprising, this Historian had to bring himself such negative publicity, gain the world's anger and even lie about his wife. The world gets even suspicious of his works: Can such a person ever be trusted to write something true? Is History reliable at all? These are the questions that one might ask. Looking at this man's profile, I came to realize that perhaps this man did the right thing by commenting on the Amazon website, as far as I am concerned this man, did what most people would have done (I am not saying what he did was anything near right) he did something that anyone in his position would had been tempted to do. With his family facing serious threats and having so many rivals on the same ground of study, he decided to do what he thought was the only option. Figo should not only be painted with the 'guilty and unreliable' paint but should be seen as someone courageous enough to accept his wrong. Many might say that his comments have revealed his true nature and the fact that he lied about his wife shows how untrusting he is but are we to look at the bad side of a man who has already given us his bad side? What we have to do is to learn from him.
ReplyDeleteHistory is already being said to be biased, having this man lying about his wife does not make it less or more biased. You have said what I would have said erudite.
I believe Figes had the right to express his thoughts about the books because Critics are a very important for judging books and they present us with many views. What he did wasn’t wrong but the way in which he did it and the fact that he didn’t accept the blame is what is wrong. Writing comments under anonymous identities is a shameful act and also writing under anonymous names means you are not certain about what you are writing or you are lying about it. In fact, Figes crime was being anonymous. For instance a lot of historians may have criticized some books but because they acknowledged the fact that they have problems with the book and were open to reasons for their dislike did not make it wrong. Blaming his wife even worsened his crime!!!! Is not that Historians shouldn’t be subjected to critics is just that it should be done in an open way giving reasons for your remarks.
ReplyDeleteWith respect to the world in which historians work, we may choose to call this "world" pretty unreliable. I say this because, after Figes had done the dubious deed, some of the work of the other historians were removed from Amazon!!!!
ReplyDeleteI find this quite worrying. Ignoring the fact that, most of the time, these comments which are made are "supposed" to be genuine and probably objective, more often than not, these comments reflect the critic's own personal feelings towards either the writer or his work. However, this is not supposed to be the case. The comments which are made are supposed to reflect facts and hence, devoid of any emotion whatsoever. Indeed, the world in which historians work is quite disturbing. In their analysis, there could be disagreements but in presenting facts, obviously, no disagreements must arise.
Maybe we should return to the age when we couldn't broadcast our views publicly?? (Just saying)
Better still, the process of commenting should be made a bit rigorous to ensure that, such things don’t happen.
I agree with you Ewurabena D when you say “The comments which are made are supposed to reflect facts and hence, devoid of any emotion whatsoever" but this is a man who was facing so many challenges. Do you think his actions can be justified to a certain extent?
ReplyDeletePlacing other peoples’ lives at risk for one’s own benefit cannot be considered as nothing more than a selfish, ruthless and unjust act against society. Therefore Cynthia, I believe that a man, when faced with challenges should learn to act ethically and this should be no different for prominent figures in society like Orlando Figes. The scandal committed by Figes brings out the fact that History as a way of knowing can be biased. This is due to the fact that sometimes Historians try to fabricate information and thus bring a lot of complications and distortion.
ReplyDeleteAdditionally, as indicated by Kojo, why would one identify himself as anonymous if really his “piece of work” is honest true? One might say that, so very often people tend to publish their stories or comments as anonymous and therefore, there is nothing wrong with what Orlando Figes did. Well, as already seen from the Guardian article, Figes’ main reason behind his identification as an anonymous personality was to critic other Historians and bring suspicion and to probably trash their professions as Historians. As Rival historian Robert Service said, “I am pleased and mightily relieved that this contaminant slime has been exposed to the light and begun to be scrubbed clean.”
Basically, the ability of people to freely post their comments and opinions on websites brings about a lot of complications as many at times people tend to pass bad comments about other peoples’ work. Maybe their comments are just honest opinions, but frankly we realize that the more humans are given the freedom of speech the more we tend to abuse it. Therefore, I believe that Figes case should be addressed in a way that will enable other culprits to realize the consequences of placing false accusations or insults on other people.
I have a problem with this blog, please stop putting extremely long comments on the blog, its quite annoying to have to read ESSAYS before you can write your own comment...
ReplyDeleteAnyway, this story of the historian gives fully supports my previous stance that of all the areas of knowledge, history can be the most unreliable. because of the basic human tendency to twist facts to fit our situations. nuff said.
After an interesting read I would like to contribute by saying that Historians are a valuable source at the disposal of society.However, what is extremely worrying here is that the people we trust and are highly respected in society are those that lack moral values.This article, raises various issues on how dependent we can be on people in the academic sector.This is precisely why it is vital to create transparency within society and global networking and academic sites to ensure that such problems do not become a constant problem.
ReplyDeleteWhat I found extremely worrying is how quickly Orlando Figes , came up with the idea to blame his wife.As readers, we must question his morals.How do you blame a person that supports you and comforts you of such a fowl crime that you have committed yourself ?
hmmm....Why don't you just try to follow, it is like that with everything if you let work pile you have to study more at a time Safo. Some people have lots to say :S
ReplyDeleteI disagree fully with the negative stance people are taking against Fige.
like really...like I said before who are we to criticize?
I am about to delve into a very awkward subject for everyone but here is another example of why i dislike ethics:
in the bible murder is a sin
however we see that god killed all the firstborns of those Egyptians
Was god sinning? :S
sure there is the argument of old testament and new testament...but my dad went further to open a new dimension to my thinking when he answered, " who are we to say what god does is sinning? didn't he make the rules?"
still confusing me now..different times..different covenant..but still confusing
but You see fige has not necessarily done anything wrong..
and I actually agree with Safo when he says that it can be the most unreliable area of knowledge but for a different reason.
Not because of the human tendency to twist facts to fit our situations but simply because of our different interpretations of those facts.
I mean you can't really say that a historian is twisting facts when all they use are facts and they follow logic to arrive at different conclusions.
What was the last history book you read that did not have its sources cited? Just check the facts yourself and check what has been twisted.
:)
Surprisingly when I read the article I didn’t feel as disgusted or angry as everyone else seems to be. Sure what he did was wrong but I don’t think this is anything new. I admit that before WWII it would not be as easy to share opinions so easily and anonymously however I still think that before WWII this was possible and this still happened.
ReplyDeleteI am a firm believer in the cliché; ‘History is written by the victors.’ There is evidence of this everywhere! Countless times after a war, history books have been rewritten in to favor the winners i.e. what was written by historians was not the whole truth but just what the a certain somebody would like to be told. In the works of Shakespeare, upon close inspection you will find that he always portrayed the ruling house as virtuous and righteous and the defeated one as evil, vile, despicable and repugnant. A clear example of this is in Richard III which we all studied in IG, Shakespeare’s historical drama portrays Richard as the Tudors (who were in charge at the time) would have liked him to be portrayed: a contemptible bastard.
And more recently (in the 20th century), Chinese have protested against new Japanese textbooks which dumb down Japan’s occupation of China in the 30s and 40s and refer to the killing of over 250, 000 Chinese as an ‘incident’ rather than a ‘massacre’ as the Chinese prefer to call it. Yet again, the account of an event has been altered slightly based on the interest of the person writing it. Is this any different from what Figres did? Not really!
Finally, I would like to give another personal example; one that hopefully we can all relate to. Last semester I went on an exchange program to Togo and studied history in French. Previously I had always been taught (in IG and early IB) that after WWI France was badly defeated and Great Britain had to take up majority of the responsibility for maintaining international peace. You can imagine myself shock then, to hear the Francophones say that after WWI, France was the main power of the world because Great Britain was weakened by the war and busy with internal problems!
To me the only difference is that whereas before history was written by the powerful, nowadays due to the advent of technology which makes communication around the world faster and easier, any Tom Dick and Harry can write ‘history’ to suit himself.
SO back to the question…‘What does this tell us about the world in which historians work?’
It tells us that whereas facts are objective the way they are expressed in history is subject to the personal preferences of the historian. As such, as a history student, one of the things that I look at when analyzing information is the source of the source; who wrote this info, where did he come from and during which time period was this made. I also try to compare the opinions of one historian with one of another (preferably of a different background) to get a more holistic view.
Although this moves the discussion a long way from Figes and his "indiscretion", I can't resist following up on érudit's musing above. This is an old argument, but no weaker for it, and it goes roughly like this:
ReplyDeleteIf God told you to torture a baby, would you do it?
If you say NO, then you have implicitly made a distinction between what God says and your own sense of morality, so God cannot be the original source of goodness. You have made your own judgement about what is morally correct, so you have undermined the idea that God is inherently good?
If you say YES, it is good because it is God's will, then God could instruct you to do anything and you would just do it; therefore you have forsaken any independent yardstick with which to judge matters of morality.
If you say this is ridiculous because God would never tell you to torture a baby, I am permitted to ask why not? Either you measure moral goodness by your own yardstick or you rely on God to do it for you, in which case you have given up any say in the matter.
Any thoughts?
Nnenna, your connection with between Figes and history being written by the victors is not too strong at Here, Figes tries to disqualify the works of other historians by making his seem better and theirs worse; he gives them bad reviews. This is completely different from the example about the Togo class because the fact that you learnt that "after WWI France was badly defeated and Great Britain had to take up majority of the responsibility for maintaining international peace" and the Francophones say that "after WWI, France was the main power of the world because Great Britain was weakened by the war and busy with internal problems," doesnt mean that either story is FALSE. As Erudit said, it really has to do with interpretation and what some people think happened. Figes here outrightly condemned the historical pieces of other historians... If your example had the French saying that British were lying and had terrible evidence, then fine maybe the connection would have been stronger.
ReplyDeleteFor those in support of Figes action saying that "he was simply being a critic," must know that the works of these historians are greatly valued and immense research and data collection have probably gone into them. To objectively criticise work is fine, but the fact that he lied later on, and changed what he said shows that he probably had ulterior motives. Also, in praising his own work, Figes exposes himself to be very subjective. Asking "who are we to judge?" and saying that he was entitled to "free speech" is very dangerous. Figes comments, which first of all seem very flimsy,( the sort of book that makes you wonder why it was ever published), unecessarily negative( an awful book”)are too directedly attacking. It is necessary for historical work to be critically and objectively analized so in this case, I beg to differ with all people who say that Figes cannot be condemned.
To Erudit and Mr. Kitching, I agree that ethics can be confusing and with the “God” examples, I concede that the question “who are we to judge” or “who are we to say what is good/bad” can be asked. I will just throw some light on the issue. In the Bible when God told Abraham to kill Isaac, Abraham was willing to. When God told Samuel to anoint David (a mere shepherd boy) as King, he did it. I could cite many examples but the simple fact is that these people did what God told them to do because there is the assumption that since He is God, He does things for “the greater good.” Or that He “knows what he is doing.” So the answer to this question, (for those who “listen” to God at all costs) will be that as He knows what is “best”, He will make the best ethical decision, although they may not understand. This is debatable, but I am just showing how certain people think. This makes me conclude that your analogy about God in relation to Figes is NOT alike...or is not completely correct. Because it excludes the people I have described above. Figes is human. Comparing him to God is not possible because he is human. Those people will believe that God knows best, unlike Figes. I however understand what you were trying to say.
Thanks for your response, Deborah.
ReplyDelete1) Some would say that the argument I presented means that, for a person to accept God's stature as the arbiter of good and evil, s/he cannot appeal to reason as a justification. We are left with faith. Isn't this a problem for religion (or for us as a species) - that people have different gods, or interpret the same ones in different ways, and then act on these imperatives and interpretations without further independent thought?
2) The second point is a question. If we believe that "God knows best", what are the implications for the ways we go about making moral judgements?
I do not recall this whole “God” discussion/example/musing/analogy being related to Fige in anyway. In fact made sure I did not do that. I was talking about ethics…and trying to open a new dimension to the conversation.
ReplyDeleteTo answer Mr.Kitching’s question, I would like to say that God would never ask me to torture a baby. So now I have won the bonus question: Why not?
Hmmm… why not? Because my creed dictates that God would not. In fact, just hearing God’s voice is always supposed to be constructive and positive according to my creed. But this is where the problem I mentioned in my first comment comes in, different religious groups have different beliefs. Growing up in the United Arab Emirates, I learned that in Islam , I think during the Prophet Mohammed’s time, when God made a rule it would directly replace an older one if they referred to the same thing. So if god had said torture a baby? Then even if he had previously said that it was illegal, it would become allowed. I am not sure about what happens right now… that is all I can say given my limited knowledge in that area.
But back to mr Kitching’s topic. Either you measure moral goodness by your own yardstick or you rely on God to do it for you. And that is that. I rely on god to do it for me, simply because the situation of God asking me torture a baby would never occur.
But I disagree with the assertion that to accept God’s stature as the arbiter of good and evil, a person cannot appeal to reason as a justification. My belief is that accepting God’s stature as the arbiter of good and evil is a form of reasoning in itself. All reasoning requires truths and whenever it is reasoning mixed with ethics it not only requires truths but also beliefs. For instance, in some countries, there is a federal criminal law that prohibits mailing any materials that refer to or instruct a person how to procure an abortion. In fact is illegal to have an abortion in some.
In this we see that religion plays a large part in the government.
• Why can we not have an abortion in those countries?
Because it is illegal
• Why is it illegal?
Because there is a law that states that we can not…
• Why is there a law that states that we can not?
Because abortion is murder, you are killing a baby
• But its not even crawling yet? What is wrong with that anyway? Its my baby?
Well its just not Christian/muslim or jewish…
This is my argument Mr. Kitching. What is the difference? Using our own yardsticks implies our own reasoning and reasoning mixed with ethics spells beliefs and beliefs come hand in hand with God or, like you said, our own sense of morality. But I rule our own sense of morality out of the question because like I said : the situation of God asking me torture a baby would never occur. So there is no distinction. Unless we believe that we would torture the baby…but that’s a different argument.
If we believe god knows best… we wind up in the world we live in today. With wars, disagreements and a plethora of other dangerous words and we go about making moral judgements the way we always do…according to our creed. To Deborah, erm.. 1) I believe Mr. Kitching said that his comment would “ move the discussion a long way from Figes and his indiscretion.” So the analogy about god in relation to figes never existed 2) if it did (or I do not see the analogy) Mr.Kitching said it would move the discussion a long way from Figes And 3) It was simply referring to our sense of morality…ethics if anything
Finally I think we should depart from this “Greater Good” idea when referring to God. I think it is a human concept. He does things the way he does things or like Deborah put it “he knows what he is doing” and that is what is best for us as my belief dictates. I would not have to add to my list of truths when using logic by simply trusting god and shortening the process.
Wow…now the world in which historians live… >.>
merci
Erudit, you said: I disagree fully with the negative stance people are taking against Fige.
ReplyDeletelike really...like I said before who are we to criticize?I am about to delve into a very awkward subject for everyone but here is another example of why i dislike ethics:
in the bible murder is a sin
however we see that god killed all the firstborns of those Egyptians
Was god sinning? :S" And you went on to say:"...when he answered, " who are we to say what god does is sinning? didn't he make the rules?"
still confusing me now..different times..different covenant..but still confusing
but You see fige has not necessarily done anything wrong..." Is this not a link between Figes and God? Who can say Figes was wrong because who can even say GOD is wrong. I know it is a question of ethics..but you tried to draw parallels between Figes and God..either unknowingly or not.
Can Orlando's actions be justified? Considering his situation?
ReplyDeleteInteresting idea, érudit: "...accepting God’s stature as the arbiter of good and evil is a form of reasoning in itself". Is this a conclusion drawn from some premises? If so, I wonder what they might be.
ReplyDeleteAs for your vignette on abortion and the law, if I have understood you properly, I tend to agree. The law, if it is a just one, presumably embodies a good moral judgement, but in this case it originates from god(s). If we are saying that the law is derived directly from what God proclaims, then haven't we once again absolved ourselves from the troublesome matter of deciding ethical matters for ourselves? I suppose you could say that we have reasoned out the law from the supernatural directive, so the process is a reasoned one, but that was not really my point, although I think I can see that it was yours. But you are right if what you are saying is that here we are reasoning within a "system" that has already accepted God's authority.
My central point was that if you believe that God is the sole arbiter of goodness then you have left yourself with no other independent method of determining (ie reasoning out) what is good; you simply have to accept, to submit (here I am saying that there is no way of reasoning around God's authority - ie bypassing it). Isn't this what people call faith? At this point I am not seeking to make any judgements about reason and faith; merely trying to establish the basis upon which religious people might navigate in the moral area.
But this has profound implications for the study of ethics because it seems to imply that all the other ways that we have devised for calculating moral goodness and badness, such as weighing up the costs and the benefits of a particular action, are redundant or superfluous. Claims of this sort seem rather close to what might be called religious fundamentalism, and they don't seem to me to accord with the way we make moral decisions on a day-to-day basis.
This is a big topic, and we haven't yet spent time discussing ethics as an area of knowledege, but there is no harm in exchanging ideas now. Feel free to correct me if you think I have misunderstood you above, or indeed if you think I am wrong!
Wow - I didn't mean to go on so long...
morality is a highly subjective matter to me, and i strongly believe that when it comes to such matters we ought to divorce morality from religion. However, in answer to one of Mr. Kitching's questions, by saying no, one would not have necessarily undermined the idea of God's inherent goodness, given the tactful multifaceted character of God as portrayed by the bible .i'm not saying that they (God's various biblical character traits) do not contradict, or undermine each other when we place all these points on a single sheet of paper. then again who's to say that these traits contradict when morality and principles are ultimately a subjective matter? to a large extent society skews the subjectiveness of our moral compasses such that they all point in the same direction. but i side with erudit on this one, who's to say what's right and what's wrong?
ReplyDeletemost commenters see Figes' actions as deplorable, depraved even...maybe even draconian. but let's disect it a bit more. Why is Figes' wrong to voice an opinion, especially when the writers have opened themselves up to all matter of comments? they must have understood that by allowing comments on their work on Amazon, there was the possibility that they would receive "rude" remarks. so why then is this an 'Academic issue' if an anonymous person expresses his 'rude' opinion on a person's work? i have a theory, that blows taken in the place where a person is strongest hurt the most. perhaps not physically. we build our confidence on things we are 'good' at. say i was good at basketball, and on a day where i felt on top of my game i played like an utter novice, it would be a huge blow to my ego, my perception of myself, my strength as a person. here is a classic case of Mr. Figes trying to protect his ego, at the expense of those of others. here arises the problem. what should it matter to the greater world if Orlando Figes has some sort of a complex? what should it matter whose work is better, "necessary"? how many of us are going to bother to read their books? is there anything like misinformation in history, where the fact are mostly consensus, and we cannot with absolute certainty know the past, deu to the factors of subjectivity, and the unreliability of memory as an area of knowledge? it has been made to matter because the egos he has come into contention were just as big as his, if not bigger. his 'mistake' was that he hit these people where it hurts the most. when the entire situation expands, into this man's inclusion of his wife, the retraction and re-issuing of statements, and how he has marred the credibility of his lawyer. i would say Figes' was a desperate man in a struggle to maintain an image and nourish an ego. society would deem these actions inacceptable, perhaps they were ill-calculated... but without all the values society and religion and society have inevitably shoved down our throats that we have swallowed as our own, would Orlando Figes' be such a 'bad' person for attempting, albeit badly to 'protect' his image of self.
(i like to link eveything back to greater inherent human struggles, i believe they are the root cause of many 'good' and 'awful' actions, and statements. if you notice such a trend in my blog posts, there's the reason why)
Interesting,can Fige's actions be justified?
ReplyDeletethis is a situation of ethics. in my opinion i think that this man should be publicly disgraced or even imprisoned for what he has done. with this he has tried to change the perception of those who are reading his works and so the value of his works are uncertain. his works should be able to affect people in positive ways if it is good enough but him criticizing other peoples works shows that he himself does not believe his work is good enough he will rather make others look bad in order to raise peoples perceptions of the work he has done. in relation to the www. i think it is quite unavoidable right now because it is just that the man is unlucky he has been caught i am sure other people may have done the same thing and gotten a way with it. in tok we learnt about authorship that forgeries once discovered, become suddenly worthless even when the craftsmanship is of a superior quality. this is just what the man has done to the value of his work.
ReplyDeletebut still the internet is too important to let these crimes to make the internet end. security has to be increased, i do not know how but it as to be done. also a good historian should not have done such his morals are not on the right path. i do not even think his integrity can be re-established in my view he is done for! history is based on facts.
ok then.. morality is a subjective matter? From when we were young we knew right from wrong once we were taught. Tori asks "who are we to criticize". We are the future generation and leaders of the world, we have a right to criticize this is clearly wrong! In IB alone simple plagiarism is seen as a sin to IB so what Fige has done how can one say we have no right to criticize? i do not think morality can be divorced from religion. as for christianity morals are important.
ReplyDeleteAha! Now I see where you are coming from. Sorry about that Deborah! I was linking my example to where the post had progressed. By that I mean the phrase: “ Who are we to criticize?”
ReplyDeletewho are we to state what is wrong and what is right we did not make the rules did we?
In the " who are we to say what god does is sinning? didn't he make the rules?" part, I indirectly asked who are we to criticize Figes , but not because he is similar to GOD or that his actions are similar to God’s but because we did not make the rules. So who are we? That is what I mean… no intentional parallels are being drawn between Figes and God, (Apotheosis ain’t my thing :D) but rather our views on Figes’ actions and God’s actions. If that’s what you meant then I guess you are right about that and yes I did do that unknowingly… hehe…but like I said, it was only meant to go as far as ethics and not really into the whole Figes situation. I was just thinking about ethical side of the situation...hmmm
Mr.Kitching, I do believe we have absolved ourselves from deciding ethical matters for ourselves and that that happened the second laws were made. Since my last post, I have been trying to figure out a law which doesn’t boil down to some religious decree and I have not found one yet.
ReplyDeleteIf I have understood you correctly, You contend that decisions based on the fact that God is the sole arbiter of right and wrong don’t seem to accord with the way we make moral decisions on a day-to-day basis. I only assert that they are the same thing.
As can be seen, I do believe that religious people navigate in the moral area with faith in the laws which are of their religion. However, counter-intuitively, I believe that non-religious people do the exact same thing. The only difference being that it is not according to a specific religion they are aware of but according to the law and simply ,as I said in my introduction, I have not found a law which does not boil down to some religious decree.
I say accepting God’s stature as the arbiter of good and evil is a form of reasoning in itself because it does the job for us. In this form of logic, we do not need to go through premises and arrive at conclusions because through the acceptance of God as the arbiter of good and evil, all these are reasoned out already and accepted as either right or wrong. This as you have mentioned is faith. Faith that the reasons for God decreeing deeming certain things wrong and others right are correct. For that reason, we do not have to reason them out ourselves.
I noticed a flaw in my argument earlier, one slight problem: what about law-breakers? I would like to introduce the term NRRBI’s (Non-religious-rule-breaking individuals.) and ask a few questions. Are they ethical? Do they know right from wrong? If so, what do they base their moral judgments on?
Mr. Kitching, on a day-to-day basis we make moral judgments based upon the principled complexes we ourselves have formed uniquely for ourselves. These complexes, however; always have one thing in common: they feature what we call “rights and wrongs”. These complexes have been established, as Temitope said, from when we were young. But these “rights” and “wrong” are based on our religions and laws. if we were never taught, if we have no religion, if one is a NRRBI. We have nothing to guide us but ourselves. Only NRRBI’s use their own yardsticks to form moral judgments.
Hmmm… Other methods devised for calculating moral goodness and badness…I do not really understand how moral goodness and badness can be determined from the weighing of costs and benefits of a particular action.
Remember that I picked that God would not ask me to torture a child and I am only arguing from that point of view. Sure I would have no say in the matter if he did, but it would never happen. This implies that if God asked me to torture a baby I would say yes simply because that is my belief (faith in his instruction) butI already know that that would never happen simply because God himself says he would not do that. I rely on God to make my judgments and therefore I have “given up any say in the matter”. From my point of view, other methods are, as you stated, “redundant”. But redundant because in most cases they arrive at the same decisions as some religious group somewhere hehe.
I am not sure if I am making sense, but I hope I have answered you.
Merci
There are two disparate strands in this discussion and i shall try to bring them together eventually if I can find a way, but not yet! In the mean time, just a few comments.
ReplyDeleteErudit wrote: "Since my last post, I have been trying to figure out a law which doesn’t boil down to some religious decree and I have not found one yet."
This is an interesting point. It may well be that there is a great deal of overlap between what many religious decrees say and laws that exist in the world. Assuming the justness of law, we could perhaps assert that there is a great deal in common between religious imperatives and secular values (I am willing to entertain counterclaims here too, but let's go on for now!). For example, could we not point to values such as integrity, honesty, compassion, loyalty, etc.?
Now Temitope J wrote: "i do not think morality can be divorced from religion. as for christianity morals are important"
I do not see how this needs to be the case (your sentence isn't actually logically valid, if you think about it!). A convergence between religious and secular values or imperatives does not necessarily imply that one is derived from the other. It is a source of great irritation for atheists and agnostics to be told that morality stems exclusively from religion, not least because it implies that people with no religion are necessarily amoral (this is surely impossible - to be a person with NO moral dimension) or prone to immoral thinking and action.
Some might even go further. About Time wrote: "when it comes to such matters we ought to divorce morality from religion". There is a whole new question here as to WHY it might be better to do this. Any thoughts?
But About Time also said: "i side with erudit on this one, who's to say what's right and what's wrong?". As I understand it, Erudit is saying that GOD is the one to say! This would rule out any relativism in the field of morality, wouldn't it? You can't claim the God is the source of moral goodness and then assert that morality is relative. I make this point here only to forestall what some may write in their essays, etc.!
And finally, I quote from Erudit again: "Other methods devised for calculating moral goodness and badness…I do not really understand how moral goodness and badness can be determined from the weighing of costs and benefits of a particular action."
I am referring to a practical utilitarian approach to moral decision-making. Let's take one example. After the recent earthquake in Haiti, there were scenes on television of people looting from broken shop buildings. Was this a morally correct action? Should we go with the ancient commandment about theft? Or is it more appropriate to evaluate this behaviour in terms of cost and benefit. There was no emergency food aid available at the time. People were injured and desperately hungry. The food would have spoiled anyway. Should we even call these actions "looting" at all, given the connotations of crime that are evinced? Don't the benefits of this "stealing" outweigh the costs?
I'd like to add a clarification on a possible source of misunderstanding.
ReplyDeleteI understand Temitope J's comment about it not being possible to separate morality from religion if we are talking about everyone - some people are Christians and for them morality is intimately connected to religion. Agreed. What I was challenging was the idea that it is impossible for anyone at all to separate morality from religion. Many people have and do.
A related point occurs to me with the "who's to say?" idea. Taking a step back and looking at humanity as a whole, we might claim that morality is relative because different people base their morals on different foundations and we might come to the conclusion that it is impossible to find a benchmark against which all these beliefs can be judged. But if YOU personally subscribe to a religious view of morality then surely your position is likely to be incompatible with someone who holds a non-religious view. So there can be a tension between one's personal moral commitments and one's research findings about the world.
Don't know if I'm making anything clearer, but I think particularly in this area of discussion one must try hard to avoid minunderstanding.
With respect to the historian's rather guileful actions, an issue that lends itself to discussion is the apparently subjective nature of the viewpoints of different people. This can be said because it is very plausible that the historian's actions stem from this subjectivity as he tries to promote his viewpoints over those of other historians. Also, considering that this historian preyed on the credulity of the unsuspecting public and asserted the veracity of historical claims at the expense of the feelings of other historians, the issue of ethics also surfaces as his hypocritical criticism of other historians' works demonstrate his callous disregard for the feelings of others.
ReplyDeleteOkay, after reading the article about Figes the only impression I formed was that he acted immaturely; and for him to say that his comments weren't intended to cause any harm is something I find either false or (sorry to say) quite foolish, because he obviously wanted to extol himself while criticizing others, one of whom we should note gave Figes a critical review of his book "Natasha's Dance" sometime in the past. Nowadays I think people in prominent positions are taking for granted the influence they have on other people in the world. This may be slightly unrelated but you can take the examples of certain famous personalities lying about their infidelity in recent times. And these are people who are supposed to be role models for our society. That isn't to say they should be perfect, but they make matters worse when they point fingers at other people and/or put their reputation above the trust and honesty they are associated with.
ReplyDeleteAnd basically I think what this tells us about the world in which historians work is that emotions, subjectivity, and humans' fallibility do find their way into this world, perhaps inevitably.
Andrea