Dear Pedro,
I find your statement, that Robinson Crusoe did not need
any ethics in his solitary island, very intellectually stimulating.
I actually take the opposite view of ethics. I believe that
the ethical individual is one who has INTEGRITY.
Integrity means completeness. An individual's completeness
is tested most by their capacity to be alone.
If an individual can be alone, indeed prefers to be alone,
then they are complete. This will mean that they have
no need to use another person, steal from them, exploit them,
and generally have an existence that is parasitic on
another person.
A complete individual, one with integrity, can enter society
without the need to use others, exploit them, etc.
I argue therefore that, paradoxically, ethics towards others
actually begins with the capacity for aloneness.
The unethical individual is empty - and strives always to
maintain that emptiness, by avoiding internal growth,
inward examination and self-understanding.
This constant flight from self sends them continually
in search for others upon whom they are entirely dependent.
They have no identity other than what they can steal from others.
It is the relation that an individual has to themselves,
when alone, that determines their relation to others.
By the way, Pedro, thank you so much for creating
such an interesting debate on ethics.
best
Michael
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Received on Tue Apr 25 10:30:37 2006
