“You say the holocaust was immoral because it was injust?  How can you objectively prove it was unjust?

You say the holocaust was “disharmonious,” because not only did it lack purpose, it lacked backing.  This is an entirely abstract truth…what do you mean it lacked purpose and backing?  What is an abstract truth?  And…how do you objectively categorize what are moral and immoral purposes.  The Nazis did have a purpose.  They said their race was superior.”

Let me try to answer all of this to the best of my ability.

Firstly, I cannot prove it is objectively unjust, because my argument is not one from experience.  OBjective means that I can take a reality and assign a non-relative value to it, but the problem is that most objective things in argument are relative.  My argument is purely abstract, or outside of experience and not part of concrete existence.

Now here is my argument:

Justice, according to Plato, is the harmony of something and its parts.  Justice in a person is the harmony of his soul, justice in the state is the harmony of its moderation, appetite, and courage.  I use this definition, because other definitions just reiterate the word “just” and are meaningless.

Now, a just state is in harmony, as it is as efficient in its statecraft as possible.  Being just is merely being as good of a state as it can be.  Just like being a just person requires being as good as a person one can be.  This requires one to be moderate and ordered, harmonious if you will.

A state must have an appetite like a person.  Without the desire to go on, it cannot exist.  A state, like a person, requires courage, or it one not stand against enemies or anything that hinders it.  Above all, a state, like a person, needs moderation.  One must be moderate, otherwise they run away with their war fervor (courage) or they seek immediate gratification.  Therefore, if a state has this harmony between its parts, it is operating perfectly.  It is fully just.

Now, the holocaust served no practicle purpose to the state, because the premises for any argument of its justification is flawed.  There is no evidence there is a master race, there is no evidence there was a Jewish conspiracy, and there is no evidence that the holocaust in any way shape or form did anything from the opposite of hinder the state.  Basically, it wasted resources and manpower.  Nazi Germany lacked moderation, because it ran away with its appetite and courage, and without moderation, it committed a hinderance on itself.

Furthermore, I would like to assert something additional to this.  Killing anyone without cause is unjust, because at its most basic level it is a waste of effort.  When one looks more deeply in this matter, it is rather obvious that someone who kills without cause lacks a personal moderation, thus they are unjust.  Let me extend this further and say doing onto others as one does not want done to them is unjust if one commits bad deeds to those others, because one lacks the essential moderation for inner harmony.  One just runs away with one’s appetite, and in the end, if all were to act like this, like the state, it would be ultimately unjust, because the individual makes it okay for all individuals to act in a matter that in its totality is inefficient to the whole.

Killing one child to save the world from diseases seems to be jsut merely from the sake of efficiency.  Having a society that does not consider murdering unjust is inherently unjust, because it does not wish its entirity to be moderated.  The individual is unjust, because the individual does an action that in the end makes one’s own life less efficient and therefore exhibits a lack of personal moderation.

I believe, abstractly and totally outside the realm of anything relative, have shown that the holocaust is inherently unjust.  Of course, most people (and I am sure you too) do not think of the issue that in depth to realize that it in the end is unjust.  However, it is necessary for people to realize that it is not a matter of moral relativism, but a matter of universal morality that inefficiency is inherently bad.  Therefore, anything that breeds inefficiency lacks moderation and is therefore unjust.

You can disagree with Plato’s definition, but using my common sense, I find it hard to debunk that acting in a moderate and efficient matter is anything but just.

“I agree there are objective truths…such as the truth of our limited knowledge of god.

You say killing people w/out a basis is inherently immoral…again, what is the criteria.  And…since the Nazis clearly felt their criteria for killing was moral, how do you prove that your morals are objectively true?  When can you kill, and when can’t you kill…and what makes your criteria the objective truth, rather than just your opinion?”

I would prove the nazis wrong by saying they are inherently being inefficient.  If their argument is morally relative and mine is totally abstract, unless they make an abstract argument that disproves mine, my argument prevails, because it lacks doubt until it can be abstractly disproven.  Therefore, it is not a matter of opinion, I see their inefficiency as being immoral as a matter of absolute truth.

“You say at the least it was immoral because it was wasteful.  Do you imply that morality involves only doing non-wasteful things, and if so, how do you define non-wasteful/useful things?”

I do not wish to particularly get into libertarian philosophy, because then deciding how government best exhibits efficiency is a matter of moral relativism.  Is moderation best served by some state that is libertarian, communist, or is it a matter of the society?  Who knows, I think I know the answer, so I debate for libertarianism, but I cannot say that libertarianism being the best is an absolute truth.  Plato would argue that freedom is immoral!  Therefore, it is a matter of who is right in the end.  Unless you wish to take the side of Plato (which can be fun), I have nothing more to say of the matter.  If you wish me to elaborate, that is not a problem.

However, to better answer your question, wasteful (inefficient) things are anything that is the result of disharmony, the lack of moderation in the whole.

“to ultimately…your morality stems from the idea of efficiency. murder is inefficient and thus immoral, you’ve also said many times that taxation is immoral because it does not result in the most efficiency. immorality comes from being out of harmony, whether as an individual or as a state.”

Morally, I think it is more than that, but purely abstractly yes, it is a matter of inefficiency. But yes, you do understand what I am saying.

“so…define moderation. Is it immoral for me to eat when I am full? Isn’t moderation a subjective matter? Since our morality does not come from god…we’re simply saying that moderation is efficiency and harmony, then what/who is the judge of those things?”

Yes, eating when you are full is a lack of moderation. You do not satisfy yourself more, or any more than how bad you feel if you gain weight! So moderation is simply one being reasonable and rational.

“Also…acting in a moderate and efficient manner, how does that take into account positive actions such as giving charity? For example…if someone is in a bad situation, is it unjust to not do something to help that person? This applies for both people and a state. If people w/in a state are living in hunger, is it just for the state to do nothing?”

Let me borrow from aristotle. If someone is in a bad situation, they must donate accoridng to the means that apply to them, or to directly quote him, “the mean relative to us.” Don’t overstep your logical bounds. The state is an artificial entity. So, in order to prove the state must donate to the mean relative to it, you have to totally deny the right of individuals to be just and charitable! Unless you want to live in Plato’s inherently unfree aristocracy (rule by the best),asumming average guys cannot be just because they cannot see the good and know what justice is, you cannot support what you are saying.

“Your definition of morality says the Holocaust was immoral because it wasted manpower. Essentially, any inefficiency is immoral, and they only vary in the degree in which they are inefficient. So…why is stealing immoral? What about gossip? What about racism?”

Stealing is immoral, because if everyone robs from each other, their lives are hindered, and then people have to work less hardf at work and work to protect what they have. Gossip hurts people emotionally, and they do their work not as well, and you hinder their lives, and they are less eficient. Furthermore, you hinder their own happiness, making the happiness outcome less efficient. Racism is the same as gossip when it comes to emotional damage. Slavery is inherently immoral, because free labor produces more goods and if all of society though might made right, and as long as you are capable of enslaving someone you should, allo of society would be less efficient and therefore it is immoral.

“Also…you argue that there are abstract truths that go beyond moral relativism. It seems these would be truths that are universal, and would stand up against a religious argument that their can be no morality w/out god.”

Yes, I would totally agree.

“But…I still believe that any idea of morals that is created by man, is subject to the subjectivity of man. So…I wish to debunk that there must be truth in your definition of justice.”

Then you must disagree with absolute truth. For example, because a man came up with the pythagreon therom (the triangle is an abstract concept), then it cannot be true? If the premises of the argument are correct and it is logical, it is truth. I am not omniscient, so my premises and logic might be faulty, but i do not think so.

“For starters…you argue Plato’s point that justice is harmony. You then say being a just person involves being as good a person as one can be, which, according to your definition, means being in harmony. All I’m getting is that justice = harmony, justice = good/moral, moral = efficiency. “

Yeah, in short terms that is pretty much it if one thinks totally abstractly. For example, freedom I cannot defend abstractly, or at the very least, I am yet to. That is a moral of mine own.

“How do you define this harmony/balance w/out moving beyond the abstract? Since your definitions only exist abstractly…how do you apply them to the material world?”

They apply by being true. We take truths and then apply them to concrete things. We take geometry and build towers. We take abstract morality, and live our life by it. That’s why the argument “morality is inherently religious” is not true, because most of morality is based off some sort of conceived abstract definition. However, for it to be a good definition, it must not be morally relative.