Do rights exist?

[Fortinbras Armstrong]

38. OK, I shall introduce myself to you.

First, I direct you to http://www.democraticunderground.com/1221658 in which I talk about my specifically religious education and touch on my experience of the Vietnam War. Then, as I said in a couple of my previous posts in this thread, I have Asperger's Syndrome -- see http://www.democraticunderground.com/1018637313#post37 for some of my comments on that.

I would remind you that you did not answer my question about what exactly you mean by reasoning to morality does not make one moral. Please do so.

One thing we have not gone into the question: What is morality? I mean morality as it is contrasted with the non-moral, not as it is opposed to the immoral. I do not ask, say, whether lying to a friend in a certain situation is moral or immoral, but asks what makes something, for instance lying to a friend, a moral problem. Allied to the same question is: What counts as a moral consideration? What makes a motivation moral as opposed to prudential. Basically, it about the boundaries of morality. I am just throwing this out and hope you will respond.

One quick comment on honor, and then I have to run. In Lois McMaster Bujold's novel, A Civil Campaign, Count Vorkosigan speaks of the difference between honor and reputation. "Reputation is what other people know about you. Honor is what you know about yourself. ... There is no more hollow feeling than to stand with your honor shattered at your feet while soaring public reputation wraps you in rewards. That's soul-destroying. The other way round is merely very, very irritating. ... Guard your honor. Let your reputation fall where it will. And outlive the bastards."