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What the Word "Respect" Means



There are at least two kinds of respect: Unearned and earned.

Unearned respect is the kind of respect one gives other people simply because they are persons. One recognizes that other people have mental lives, too; that other people have feelings, too; that other people have awareness and self-awareness, too; that other people are members of society, too. Unearned respect is a recognition of reciprocity: One wants to be treated civilly and kindly and with a recognition of the importance of his own mental life, and one reciprocally treats other people civilly and kindly and with a recognition of the importance of their mental lives. One wants his own feelings to be treated as having importance, and one reciprocally recognizes the importance of the feelings of others. One knows that his beliefs and thoughts and feelings matter to him, and one reciprocally treats other people as though their beliefs and thoughts and feelings mattered to them, too. One wants to be treated as intrinsically valuable, and one reciprocally recognizes other people as intrinsically valuable, too--not because they're smart or talented or skilled or accomplished, but simply because they are one's fellow persons, and persons are intrinsically valuable.

On the other hand, there is earned respect. A person may be respected for his prowess in some field of endeavor, or for his moral virtue, or for his penetrating perspicacity; but earned respect generally has something to do with having proven oneself to be a good person--with being of good character. One gets to know a person and discovers, over time, that he is truthful, and one then respects him for his honesty. Or one sees that another person has a principled moral code and observes that he consistently does what he thinks is right according to that code of ethics, and even though one might not always agree with that person's assessment of what the right thing to do is, one nevertheless respects him for doing what he thinks is right instead of what is merely expedient. In any event, one sees another person as admirable in some way, and one respects him for being admirable--one sees him as having earned respect.

We all treat other people, even complete strangers, with unearned respect. (Or we should, anyway, if we're to be civil individuals.) Earned respect, though--well, at the risk of seeming tautologous, earned respect must be earned.

Now, we might not only speak of respect for persons; we might also speak of respect for ideas or arguments or beliefs. But in this case, it is always earned respect. One might listen to another person's ideas or arguments out of politeness--simply out of an unearned respect for the other person's humanity and his desire to be heard; one might recognize that different people hold different beliefs and recognize other people's right to believe whatever they want to believe and recognize the sincerity of their believing, just as one would want to have recognized his own right to believe whatever he wanted to believe and just as one would want to have his own sincerity in holding his beliefs recognized, without regard to what his particular beliefs were. But an idea itself, or an argument itself, or a belief itself, is not respected unless it has merit. A good idea gets our respect; a bad idea doesn't. A well-reasoned argument gets our respect; a poorly-reasoned argument doesn't. And a well-justified belief gets our respect, while a poorly-justified belief doesn't. (Or shouldn't, anyway.)

So, the idea of using a few musclemen to throw a spaceship to the moon doesn't get anyone's respect. The argument form known as "affirming the consequent" doesn't get the respect of anyone who knows that it's a logical fallacy. The belief that the next time I make toast, the bread I put into the toaster will come out as broccoli, doesn't get our respect, as it is not only completely unjustified but runs contrary to our observations of how the world works. It could turn out to be true, of course--a magician could come along and set up a trick, so that just as he can make it appear that he has sawed a woman in half, he will make it appear that I've put bread in the toaster and wound up with broccoli; or the way the world works could change, so that suddenly bread put into toasters started coming out as broccoli instead of as toast; but it would be an epistemic mistake for me to hold a belief so prima facie absurd with no justification. Respect is not freely given, unearned, to ideas, arguments, or beliefs, even though unearned respect is freely given to thinkers, speakers, and believers; ideas, arguments, and beliefs must merit our respect.

See also Here.

(©2007 by Keith Brian Johnson)

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