Four more months! Four more months!

I got to watch some of the RNC last night.
I can never think about politics without considering philosophy, which makes it difficult to talk about politics. I firmly believe that we need more philosophy in the world. Not more philosophers, I'm not advocating a Platonic Republic of philosopher kings, but better thought; better processes.

For example, what percentage of people (let's say Americans) do you think believe as a matter of principle that taking the life of another human being is morally wrong?

I suspect that most people would view their own personal ethical systems as being absolute--either Deontologically or Divinity based. They would say that they know the difference between right and wrong. They would say that right is always right, wrong is always wrong and there is a clear difference between the two. That's what they think they believe. But in fact, most people are Egoists or at best Utilitarians, whose view of right and wrong is pliable depending on cirumstance or individual interests.

Really, I don't even think most people would engage in the kind of intellectual rigor that Utilitarianism requires, so most people are essentially moral hypocrites.

Now, it doesn't concern me too much what people do, that is, how they behave. What I'm concerned with is how they think. But, if you're a Utilitarian or a willful Egoist and that's your normative approach to the world, that's fine.

I'm opposed to the death penalty. If someone asks me why, I don't respond with a moral argument. I don't say "because it is wrong to take the life of a human being," because people don't really believe that--it won't make a convincing argument. If you believe it is morally wrong to commit murder and morally acceptable to execute the murderer, you are operating under a different set of moral principles than I am. You're probably operating under a different ethical system, which is fine.

What troubles me are the people who behave like Egoists, think like Utilitarians and talk like Divine Commandists.
That is what I find so disheartening about our political discourse. There are so many people who hold political beliefs that do not seem to be deduced from the moral principles they would claim to espouse.