The role of ethics, philosophy in real life...

Maybe I have a little too much time on my hands but my last post had me thinking about this whole idea of presenting a proposition and then in order to evaluate whether it is true or false, we go through rigorous testing in an attempt to falsify or verify the proposition.  I mentioned my reference to the 'It only takes one' idea that a counter-example is all it takes to refute a proposition.

I always find it interesting discussing ethics and philosophy with others and they unknowingly change the rules mid-argument.

I once had a debate with a coworker on whether it is "right" to never lie to your children.  I said it's never right to lie to anyone which would include children.  You may have reasons to lie to your children but you still have to accept that what you are doing is a conscious action of doing something that is wrong.  Then, predictably, he employed the 'It only takes one' stance to say something like "Well, what do you do if your children's lives are in danger and the only way to get them to comply and listen to you is to lie?"  My answer to that is, "Why would your children's lives be in danger and why would lying be the only option to save them?"  Of course, he's like "Forget about why they're in the situation in the first place.... blah blah blah."

So, since he thinks he has found a counter-example to my "rule" and therefore concludes that the rule is not valid.  However, the statement "It is wrong to lie or to pass off something that is false as true" is a moral statement.  Therefore, the scope of morality only applies when choice and free will is involved.  To present a situation where all choices have been removed and then claim victory over a person who presents a moral rule is simply someone who is fooling themselves.  This is the same tactic the  subjective-relativistic camp bullshit you hear from most people today.  They don't want to accept any "black and white" rules because "You don't know my situation" or "Walk a mile in my shoes before you judge someone."  People don't like to be judged and I understand that but what these defense mechanisms do is keep people from conducting self-reflection on why they got into their situation in the first place or where they got their "shoes" from.  Things happen for a reason.

So then the question becomes does your debating partner believe in free will?  See, the whole point of ethics is predicated on the fact that there is free will.  If one doesn't believe in free will, then the whole conversation of ethics goes out the window since determinism is how they see the world and every cause is an effect of another cause.  But of course any true determinist would be a very stoic, robotic-type person since there is no reason to get emotionally upset about events, good or bad, since they're incapable of accepting conscious choices as variables.  So this "emergency ethics" isn't really ethics at all.  All the choices have been taken off the table except for "immoral" one.  It's all about managing the situation and discussing things as good or bad shouldn't exist.

Most likely though, most determinists aren't like that.  And consistency is really the only true test if a person really believes in what they say.  And that circles back to why I titled this posting the way I did. Philosophy is not about the abstract or a basis for utopia.  It's about real life.  It's about understanding why you do the things you do.  The only way to start that journey is to accept that you have choices in life and then you take ownership of those choices.  This goes back to my definition of property rights.  It all integrates quite nicely.