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Oct. 4, 2012 - Freedomain Radio - Stefan Molyneux
02:52
2225 Ethics Unsucked! A Rational Proof of Secular Ethics

Stefan Molyneux, host of Freedomain Radio, reviews Universally Preferable Behavior: A Rational Proof of Secular Ethics, using audience participation at the Capitalism and Morality seminar in Vancouver, summer 2012.

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Mr. Morini.
All right.
Hi, everybody.
You have good lunch?
Are you all carved up?
Ready for some good philosophy?
All right.
Sorry, some people over there said they couldn't hear me.
Is that better?
Kind of got a deep throat this thing now.
Okay.
Well, thanks, of course.
I just wanted to mention it's really been great to meet all the listeners to Freedom Aid Radio who say it's kind of weird to see you in the flesh.
I'm buffering for you just so it feels a little bit more like a true internet experience.
Now pixelate.
Now pixelate.
Oh, you know what?
That gives me such a migraine.
I get all Picasso and then, no, that's no good.
So, if you remember from this morning, ethics sucketh.
I think that's where we left off this morning.
Ethics suck, but they don't have to.
So that's what we're going to try and work on a little bit this afternoon.
So, this is Philosophy 101, real quick.
I'm sure a lot of you are aware of this.
This is how philosophy, I think, should be taught.
So, this is audience participation afternoon, so feel free to jump in.
Okay, so, let's say I say I do not exist.
Still here?
Yeah, okay.
So, I do not exist.
What's wrong with that?
Performative contradiction.
Yeah, it's performative contradiction.
If I say you do not exist, you're not going to believe me, right?
Okay, who here has never donated to Freedom in Radio?
Okay, good, because I don't want to smoke any donators if I'm wrong.
If I say you do not exist, does that make any sense?
I guess if I haven't donated, maybe.
Yeah, if you don't exist, I'll get my PayPal account, and that's to me the same thing!
But no, so, if I say, you do not exist, that clearly makes no sense.
Right?
Because I'm pointing at you and saying, identifying you as a discrete entity, saying, you do not exist.
So, I do not exist, you do not exist, makes no sense.
How about, language has no meaning.
We're going to be all tricky now.
Language has no meaning.
Does that make any sense?
Why not?
I have to pick specific words that have meaning in order to communicate that language has no meaning.
Sound does not exist.
Yeah, but you can, but then I'm just contradicting myself, right?
I mean, I can make up whatever nonsense I want, and I've certainly been accused of that in the past, but sound does not exist.
It's like mailing someone a letter saying, letters never get delivered.
Okay, so this is to me the essence of philosophy.
Everybody knows this old Hume thing.
You can't get an ought from an is.
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