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This does pretty heartily violate Kant's categorical imperative.

• patio11 16y ago
  That depends on how you look at it. In my philosophy, it is close to axiomatic that free exchanges leave both parties better off. Therefore, any commitment strategy which increases the number of exchanges is a win. If everybody simultaneously implemented it, it would just be a bigger win. The most obvious way to disagree would be to say that the psychic transactional cost involved in rejecting an exchange swamps the value of increased trade, which is almost exactly the pathology the therapy seeks to go after. The world is an eighth grade dance writ large, where he's too shy and she's too afraid of being forward, and both parties are a wee bit worse off for having been alone in the corner when they could have been dancing.
  • randallsquared 16y ago
    In my philosophy, it is close to axiomatic that free exchanges leave both parties better off. In externally quantifiable terms, that's something I think, too. However, there are so many personal examples where it's not really true that I'm beginning to wonder about it. For example, when a pretty girl comes up to me (as in the linked blog) and asks me for something I would be reluctant to provide her with, the very act of asking me has already made me worse off. At this point, it's true, I can make myself better off than I now am by doing whichever I would really prefer, but I would be better off still had she not asked.
    • jodrellblank 16y ago
      In what way has the very act of asking made you worse off?
      • randallsquared 16y ago
        Because the outcomes available to me have reduced from the three: "continue as before", "disappoint [person] in front me", or "feel upset about giving someone X when I would have preferred not to", to only the last two. The first option, which could well have been the best outcome in my opinion, has been removed by the act of asking. Edit: changed the other individual to "person" to be clearer.
        • defen 16y ago
          Well the pretty girl wasn't going to sleep with you anyway...perhaps you just need more practice talking to pretty girls until you realize they're mostly just regular people, too. I say this as someone who used to have the same problem.
          • randallsquared 16y ago
            The "pretty girl" is just the example we're using from the post. I've changed this to make it clearer for you. Thanks.
        • jodrellblank 16y ago
          What about politely refuse and still feel good (or, feel as before) and let person take care of their own disappointment or not?
          • randallsquared 16y ago
            Because I do not want to become a person who doesn't care about his effect on others.
            • jodrellblank 16y ago
              If you think your refusal makes them sad, do you think you have a kind of telepathy? Isn't believing you control the outside world with your mind an indication of schizophrenia?
              • randallsquared 16y ago
                Is this really the path you want to go down?
                • jodrellblank 16y ago
                  It's an illustration by absurdity that your thoughts are limiting you and making you unhappy, and that there are other ways to think which are still compatible with being a good person and a moral person. For as long as you hold in your head the belief that your refusal is what hurts people then you are going to be unhappy about being asked questions. If instead you held the belief that their expectations and demands in their head is what hurts them, then you would be free to accept or refuse politely and in good conscience, and still be able to be a person who "considers how he affects others". The fact that you cannot consider saying no is what makes a joke out of your comment "I don't want to be a person who doesn't care about his effect on others". At the moment you are forced to accept regardless of whether you care or not. Caring doesn't come into it, they ask and you force yourself to accept, you don't get to choose or consider. If you didn't force yourself to accept because you were no longer afraid that it was you hurting them, then you would be free to consider their request unpressured and respond however you felt like at the time, but still respond based on your morals and so on. At the moment you say you are someone who cares, but you act in a way that you ignore your consideration and decisions and marginalise your caring making it subservient to a fixed instruction. You say you don't want to be someone who doesn't care, but changing that part of you would free you up to be someone who can care and isn't forced to act one way or the other.
  • deleted 16y ago
    [deleted]
  • po 16y ago
    You seem to be implying that there is no such thing as a bad attempt at a trade. This would probably be true if all trades were rational but I am saying that the very act of asking for a trade biases it to going through, even if it is a bad trade for the person being asked. This is because there is a social pressure to comply. My point is that you shouldn't be afraid to ask for something, but you should be aware of the line when you're taking advantage of a person. That line is gray and usually culturally defined.
• tomjen3 16y ago
  Kants imperative was never very useful in the first place - there is nothing wrong with lying to prevent a murder.