[photo-3d] Re: Grant's RBT

[Bruce Springsteen <bsspringsteen@xxxxxxxxx>]

[I apologize for what follows if it is deemed inappropriate to this list,
but we've touched on something that goes to my core, and I can't be quiet.
 The moderators will have to censor me, if necessary, but I do promise
that this is my last moralistic posting in this thread.]

You may notice this is really two related threads - one about the
practical options for getting the camera back into it's true owner's hands
- the other about general questions of ethical judgment and legal
judgment.  Both questions interest me a great deal - the first because I
care about Grant, the second because I care about our collective health as
a society.

While Grant and Dan, for example, are motivated to consider "morality" in
large part due to their religious convictions, I have no such convictions.
 How then, as a non-believer, do I suggest that there are moral and
ethical imperatives - a kind of values reasoning that bears on all of us? 
Well, the law is in fact an expression of such a secular universe of right
and wrong, continually modified and refined by consensus, meant to apply
to everyone regardless of philosophical or religious perspective.  I
personally happen to think that there are innate "ethical" rules in human
social and psychological evolution, relating especially to the phenomenon
we call "empathy," that are elaborated through culture, but which have
some fundamental nature, like the ability to acquire language or learn
gymnastics or perceive color.  Some are perhaps born with a better
"talent" for moral reasoning than others, some with a definite impairment,
but training and cultural influences are also relevant.  I see a decline
in the capacity for healthy ethical judgment in many of the interactions I
have with people in our current cultural climate - which those with
religious agendas often attribute to a "falling away from God."  I
attribute it to a faux-intellectual movement in recent decades towards a
kind of social Darwinism that reduces human interactions to a sort of
reptilian scampering for advantage.  This grade-school "finders keepers,
losers weepers" world view was most clearly expressed perhaps in Ayn
Rand's "The Virtue of Selfishness."  Far from virtuous, I consider this
"philosophy" to be the essence of evil.

Yes, evil.  A word that makes people queasy.  How does an atheist talk of
evil?  I would suggest something like the following:  "A philosophy which
seeks chiefly to rationalize shallow self-interest, and which tends to
cast others as either resources (AKA "losers") to be exploited, or as
obstacles to self-gratification to be out-maneuvered or eliminated."

Nobody thinks of themselves as an evil agent.  They are merely ingenious
at casting whatever they want as virtuous - their intellect is entirely in
the service of rationalizing selfishness and minimizing concern for
others' pain.  Evil is done by everyday people whose ability to detect
their own self-serving bull**** has been atrophied.

So, consistent with my view, I withdraw my offer of $20 to buy Grant's RBT
at the full market value.

I will donate $20 to pay back the $50 that this "entrepreneur" spent for
his camera.

Or I will donate $20 toward a legal fund to force him to behave ethically.

Or I will donate $20 toward a full-page ad in the local paper describing
only the verifiable facts of the situation, without leading opinions.  Let
people judge the facts for themselves and act as they will.

Or if the camera cannot be retrieved, I will donate $20 to allow Grant to
order another RBT.  I'm sure he will never lose that one.

I agree with John that triumphalism about getting dirt-cheap cameras from
unsuspecting widows is creepy, and should not be encouraged here.  I also
agree that there is a fine line between letting people speak their minds
to a scoundrel and becoming a harrasing mob.  So let's watch that.

Fondly,
Bruce 

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