Indeed, I was talking about people feeling that certain aspects are right or wrong though rather than people knowing that they are.
Yes, I got that.
But the way I see it, emotional responses can often be very unfortunate when trying to determine the objective truth - assuming there is one. We can have very strong emotions based on very wrong information, for instance.
The emotional power can be extremely hard to overcome, and it's been my experience that human beings are very hard to reason with if they let their emotions guide them.
This is often the case for myself when dealing with people I love, for instance, and I find myself behaving in a way that I'm not proud of - which is why I always try my best to separate my emotions when discussing whatever topic.
I think we disagree on the semantics here then, I don't think of laws and rules as things that guide my conduct, I think of them as things that stipulate the scope of my conduct if I am to obey the laws.
Well, the difference between principles and laws in this case would be that the upholding of principles isn't enforced by any external power. But other than that, yes, I think we disagree on what they mean to people. Whether that's a semantic issue or not, I can't say.
I think that's less an issue with having a set of principles and more an issue with people believing that their principles are a set of moral absolutes handed down by a power greater than themselves. A more frequent issue when people adopt principles from others rather than developing them themselves.
Now I'm starting to see how we might disagree on semantics. For something to be a principle in the first place, it IS an absolute. I don't think people necessarily see them as being handed down by a power greater than themselves, and in fact I'm sceptical that's even the norm.
But it's for sure that many adopt their principles from others - and if you view, say, parents as a "power greater than oneself" then I guess we can agree there. It's just a term I would apply in a religious context more than anything else.
I do, I just find it odd that your reaction to some people being dogmatic in adherence to inflexible principles is to view having principles at all as a negative.
I've never stated having principles is negative. I've just said that I try to avoid having them, or too many of them. It's because I find it a very human tendency to adhere strictly to what I consider fundamental self-induced laws. That's what principles are to me - and I think it's pretty close to the official definition as well.
So, I've been guilty of this myself.
People who can have these laws for themselves, and ignore them at will, probably shouldn't worry about it. But in that case, I think it's a semantic issue and in reality it's not the kind of principles I'm talking about.
Where did I say I was neutral about piracy? And why does a lack of neutrality mean a lack of objectivity, presumably you're not neutral about e.g. rape but could still be perfectly objective in that non-neutral stance?
I'm not talking about intellectual objectivity or neutrality. I'm talking about emotional objectivity. Now, you haven't said that you're emotionally neutral - nor would I ever expect that of you.
I'm simply sensing that your emotional investment is too strong for us to have a fruitful debate. Maybe that's unfair of me, but when people constantly add "shit" and "bullshit" when referring to the opinions of others - then my interest in pursuing a serious debate wanes. Sorry about that.
It probably is going nowhere and we should move on, but before we do - please can you make some arguments as to why I shouldn't be very negative about the vast majority of piracy? I promise to really try and be objective, even if that doesn't mean I agree with your arguments.
I would never impose on your opinions like that. It's none of my business how you feel about it.
I'm simply saying that if you want to have this debate with me, you're going to have to appear reasonably emotionally neutral. Not necessarily a fair request, but there it is.