I took a bullet, but only because the system is defining all justifications equally.
Specifically, I agreed that "it is justifiable to base one's beliefs about the external world on a firm, inner conviction, regardless of the external evidence, or lack of it, for the truth or falsity of this conviction."
But, I disagreed that a rapist who believes god told him to rape was justified. It claims this is a contradiction, but only if we assume that all beliefs can be justified this way, and I don't think they can. Some beliefs are justifiable without external evidence. Some are not. For example, beliefs about socially constructed models can only be justified by inner conviction for that is their place of origin.
But things of material origin, on the other hand, don't depend upon what you believe.
The test even makes this explicit claim, "The example of the rapist has exposed that you do not in fact agree that any belief is justified just because one is convinced of its truth," but it doesn't understand the issue is centered on the term "any."
Not "any" belief, but there is at least one.
Ah, but morality is a socially constructed model! So why does the rapist get punished? Because the rapist doesn't really believe rape is a good thing. He's only doing it because he thinks god told him to. That's coercion. And since it was established (in a previous question) that god does not necessarily have the good of the world at heart, "god told me to" is not necessarily justification.
Because there is a difference between things that affect only yourself and things that affect others. F'rinstance, if I want to take my car to the junkyard and have it crushed into a cube, that's my business. But if you do it without my permission, even though I was going to do it anyway, that's theft. That's because it is conceivable that I would have changed my mind at the last moment or wanted the experience of doing it myself etc.
Rape involves more than one person and we have to take that other person's opinion into account.
Rrhain
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