Feeling something is wrong
It seems that there are no moral facts or method for finding them. But a lot of people seem to think that feeling something is wrong is an adequate basis for morality.
If you read comments under a video on You Tube you can see this phenomenon where people express outrage about something they think is wrong rather than present an argument.
Some people think that if we just base a society on empathetic feelings this could be morality.
However I think there is a substantial difference between feeling something is wrong and it being wrong. So for example feeling that child molestation is wrong is not proof that someone has broken a moral code or transgressed a natural or religious law.
So in what way is something like genocide wrong and to what extent are people just saying they dislike the event? I think it is worrying that something like genocide may not be wrong at all and that our objection to it is just an expression of emotion but the event is not objectively wrong.
If you read comments under a video on You Tube you can see this phenomenon where people express outrage about something they think is wrong rather than present an argument.
Some people think that if we just base a society on empathetic feelings this could be morality.
However I think there is a substantial difference between feeling something is wrong and it being wrong. So for example feeling that child molestation is wrong is not proof that someone has broken a moral code or transgressed a natural or religious law.
So in what way is something like genocide wrong and to what extent are people just saying they dislike the event? I think it is worrying that something like genocide may not be wrong at all and that our objection to it is just an expression of emotion but the event is not objectively wrong.
Comments (151)
I am not sure whether I think there are moral facts, or not. If we can't have objective moral facts which would be a solid bedrock, we do have other resources at hand. There is belief, and there is thinking. There is acting, and there is observation of consequences. These come into play. David Hume said that "Reason is, and ought only to be the slave of the passions, and can never pretend to any other office than to serve and obey them." Passions -- emotions, wishes, desires, and so on -- are the foundation of behavior (in all animals) but reason is not a powerless slave. It is reasoning that keeps the passions from flying off the rails like a train gone berserk.
Each of us has feelings that are in conflict with the feelings of other people. I like sex with other men. Some people have very strong negative feelings about men having sex with each other. I like meat. Some people feel that eating meat is wrong. I don't like the labor involved in having a perfect covering of grass on my yard. I like a variety of plants -- the 'natural' look. Some people consider the natural look to be downright immoral, and demand that other people maintain their lawn so that it is all grass, cut to 3.25 inches high.
The "moral fact" here is that if we are going to live together we have to find ways of dealing with each others' emotions. So, when the level of hostility is high, gay men have sex in out of the way places, rather than courting each other openly. Carnivores don't force vegetarians to eat meat or go without food (vegetarians don't return that favor, usually). People who like the natural look are at least selective about which weeds they encourage--milk weed, yes -- big thistles, no.
We all follow similar procedures for supporting what we really want to consider right and wrong. Homosexuality can be found just, wholesome, good, and moral, or contemptible, wicked, bad, and immoral. Murder is desirable in some cases (the fire-bombing of Hanover and Dresden) a capital crime in others (the killing of a convenience store clerk during an armed robbery).
How much power the killers have has something to do with its rightness. The powerful can define actions in their own favor. The Nazis considered the Holocaust right and justified as long as they had the power to carry it out. When it was clear they were going to lose the war--total loss--they started finding the death camps and crematoria embarrassing. Pearl Harbor was an atrocity, Hiroshima was beneficial.
The powerful are able to define their passions and actions favorably, and require the less powerful to agree. (The victors write the history of the war.) Only later can the victor's version be challenged. That Europeans conducted a genocide again indigenous North Americans was an unacceptable truth until fairly recently. (The indigenous people, of course, were cognizant of genocide much earlier.)
What about actual harm? For example people have felt repulsed by homosexuality, women and different races etc. But harm is not evident by being one of these things.
I can differentiate between things I don't like and things I think are immoral. The problem is when something is utterly appalling but not wrong. I can absolutely loathe something without thinking it is harmful or immoral. So what differentiates these feelings?
I have not read your whole post yet but I am not saying that it is unreliable to feel something is wrong, but rather that it is not evidence that something is wrong. The same goes for feeling something is right.
The problem for me is that morality is only this feeling and that nothing is of value beyond individual emotion. Collective morality can simply be the emotions shared by a majority which is hence completely fallible.
Evidence is in the eye of the beholder, but the eye of the beholder is conditioned to perceive certain things as right and certain things as wrong. Our feelings of right and wrong are conditioned too. We don't just wake up and start feeling that theft is wrong and giving to the poor is right (unless you think feelings of right and wrong are inherently human and arise from... genes, or something).
Our feelings about things develop in our social context. A toddler will feel good about smacking her younger sister with the plastic stick. An adult will (one hopes) intervene and strongly discourage such behavior. The toddlers will eventually internalize these interventions and after a while they will feel it is wrong to hit each other with sticks.
We learn to feel what is moral, good and right. We learn to avoid actions that resulted in negative feedback--"Naughty girl! Don't hit your little sister." Those are internalized too, and are the basis of guilt feelings.
Children that are not taught how to behave socially, are not taught what is collectively valued as right and wrong, are going to end up in an institutional setting of some kind, sooner or later. We don't tolerate very deviant childhood feelings about right and wrong.
The differentiation is whether is behavior that you don't approve of to an extent that you feel it should be prohibited.
Re "actual harm," I don't know what you'd be referring to. It seems like again it's the problem I specified in the other thread re facts that you're naming "harm" contra assessments, where there's a conflation etc.
I am distinguishing between separate feelings here. The feeling or experience of something as unpleasant but not immoral (like the taste of food you don't like). And the feeling that someone has done something wrong.
I don't think they are on the same spectrum. I don't think people think their morality is just preferences.
I am referring to harm is the basis for a moral judgement as opposed to someones feelings. Something perceived as harmful or shown to be harmful is more likely to arouse morals sentiment.
I also think that the idea that atrocities are not wrong is disturbing. Humans have usually wanted justice and have an ongoing justice narrative.
Is this pragmatism?
This is the difference between those who aren't schooled in rational dialectics and those with philosophical methods of reaching conclusions. It's like "system 1" and "system 2" in psychology. Most people live by "system 1", they rarely make time for "system 2" other than organizing their base knowledge into instinctual behavior.
This is why they cannot grasp the process of deconstructing common knowledge to find out if it's actually wrong or not.
I don't see morality to be anything we cannot find facts around or not having methods of finding them. The truth is that morality as a concept outside of religion or established institutions of power is a totally new thing historically. We've maybe been discussing this the last hundred years or so for real, with actual detachment from any former established "rules".
The problem is that people have a problem of detaching themselves from the established morals in order to find rational answers. I.e people aren't really discussing this with philosophical methods. I see it time and time again on this forum; people are not actually making rational arguments, only talking about their feelings on a subject. Many on this forum, maybe even academic philosophers it seems, abandon rational methods in favor of "system 1" irrationality and emotional outbursts.
Here's a baseline for morality.
1. Do what is positive for the well-being of yourself and others combined.
2. Morality is an evolving process and each situation must be assessed carefully according to point 1.
3. Assessing what is morally good needs to involve current knowledge about human psychology, sociology, and knowledge about human well-being for the individual and larger groups.
Points can be added, but the foundation is still well-being for the individual, the self and everyone else combined, not separated. Any other model is able to be corrupted.
This can invite utilitarianism into the picture, killing few to save more. But that is not something that I find morally good or bad, it's just assessing the moral of the situation. If you are in a situation of saving more by killing a few, there is no real good or bad choice, much like many other situations in life. You do not know if treating someone bad might be good for them down the line or not. But that cannot ever be the factor within moral choices since it's an unknown factor unable to be quantified within the calculation.
Therefore, you can only assess morality according to the things you know, i.e what is good or bad for people in the now. Morality should be about making that calculated choice and even if it turns out bad, the act of the moral choice was still done with good morals in mind. If the calculated choice was done with the points made above in mind, it's hard to make a choice on bad morals.
Now, of course, people can't walk around and always assess situations according to current scientific findings within psychology and sociology, but we can train ourselves to assess better than how we are doing it right now. Because right now, as you mention about youtube-comments, people make moral choices with "system 1" based on moral truths in "system 2" that has been corrupted by a society that is infantile in its moral system; a system past down from religion and political agendas.
People don't know how to act, because they have learned truths and ideals by other people who don't know how to act. This circle of anti-intellectualism is the established foundation when the contemporary methods of finding good morals should be a deconstruction of the morals we have established, erasing the fat and bullshit, scale it back to the basics and evolve it.
It isn't impossible, it's just that people do not do it for real. People do not think, because we act out of comfort, never out of careful thought. This can also be seen on this forum, where we demand careful thought, people write out of "system 1" not "system 2".
Deconstruct your beliefs and convictions, assume that you are wrong and falsify your opinion. If not, you aren't really making rational arguments or think in a way to evolve your ideas and theories. That is how you find answers and evolve things like morality into a more modern point of view.
Sure, lots of people do not think that, but that doesn't make them correct, of course.
Feelings of the one making a moral choice cannot be a foundation for morals, only the concept of what is essentially good for you and others combined can be used. Feelings distort, they're "system 1" in psychology, moral choices should be carefully assessed. If done over a long enough time frame, people can be trained so that "system 1" does these assessments as instincts, connected to our emotions. It's a fine-tuning of empathy that detaches itself from established morals by religion and political agendas into a working model for the well-being of the individual and groups/mankind.
We can feel something to be wrong, but we can train ourselves to understand and deconstruct that feeling to know if that feeling is justified or just a feeling detached from the logic of the moral choice.
Euthanasia is a good example of this. It feels awful making such a decision, but deconstructing our feelings shows us that the feeling is irrational to the logic of the choice. We suffer by the choice, they suffer from their sickness. We will suffer after the choice but we will feel good that we relieved them of their suffering. The conclusion is that you do something out of the well-being of both yourself and the one who is sick combined, even though all current emotions scream otherwise.
Morality is detached from feelings in choices but should generate positive feelings by the result of the choice.
Of course, sometimes our choices have to be made fast and we rely on "system 1", on instinct, but if we live by carefully assessing our morality based on the well-being of others and ourselves combined, we will train ourselves to have a better balance in those "system 1" instincts, just like we have trained our moral instincts to the moral values we have at the moment.
How is a "perception" or assessment that amounts to someone agreeing, "Yeah, that's harmful" divorced from their feelings?
It is not clear on your position what would cause the feeling someone has.
If I dislike the taste of bacon it is eating bacon that caused that sensation. If I dislike seeing someone getting beaten that is what triggered a feeling in me. (some people might call the feeling an intuition)
It's not eating bacon that causes that sensation. It's your brain states relative to eating bacon that causes it. Someone else eating bacon can love the taste. Something has to account for the difference.
Ethical stances are likewise brain states.
It is not clear what brain and mind states are in relation to experience. But the mind has representational qualities so that they can be about something.
So If I think about The Empire State Building I have to represent that in a brain state giving it its "aboutness" or mental content.
I would account for the different response to bacon by referring to differences in peoples sensory receptors. But moral statements have conceptual content as opposed to just immediate sensation.
Now compare mental content about mathematics to mental content about the taste of bacon. We can use our mind to assess mathematical and logical statements for validity.
I don't think brain states are just deterministic uncontrolled reactions.
Any supposed difference seems ultimately to amount to nothing other than a difference in feeling. When someone tries to give an example of, say, someone feeling that something is wrong, but it not being wrong, they seem to just be comparing one feeling with another, but presenting one of them as a "moral fact" or whatever you want to call it.
Quoting Andrew4Handel
I'm not a moral nihilist. I think that things are right and wrong. The question is, given what we know, what sense of right and wrong is a better reflection of reality.
What would class as objectively wrong? What is the value of a morality based on fluctuating feelings with no truth value beyond how one individual feels?
I am concerned with moral nihilism being reality where no one can do anything wrong and all actions have equal status. I think if this is the case we should acknowledge it and decide where to go from their in justifying moral sentiments.
Re mathematics and logic, I'm an antirealist. I buy a combo of social constructivism and subjectivism.
Concepts are brain states, too.
Quoting Andrew4Handel
As I explained in the other thread, you can get facts wrong by failing to match what the external world is like. So you can get right or wrong that Joe premeditatively killed Pete for $10,000, and you can get right or wrong that Pete's family subsequently went on welfare, etc. but you can't get right or wrong whether it was morally right or wrong to kill Pete, or whether it's morally right or wrong for Pete's family to wind up on welfare, etc., because there are no facts regarding whether such things are morally right or wrong.
Quoting Andrew4Handel
Value is subjective, so it depends on the individual we ask, what they value and why.
Quoting Andrew4Handel
Only that's not at all what follows. No one can do anything objectively wrong, but the objective realm is a category error for morality. What makes something right or wrong is how people feel about the actions in question, and people feel particular ways, with everyone on Earth making moral judgments. No one values all actions equally. So they don't all have equal status.
Isn't what someone thinks is good for them based on feelings?
The problem is that moral philosophy has failed to reach a consensus about morality or resolve moral issues. Materialism or the scientific don't appear to leave room for moral or value claims.
So now thinkers are resorting to the idea we should just go with our feelings of what is appropriate or harmful.
I think reason can be a useful tool and moralizing but it does not seem to resolve moral disputes.
What if there was a law giver like a deity or innate moral rules in reality (a la the laws of physics)?
But you said values are brain states. So the actions are the same but the brain states are different.
I think it is problematic if some actions causes intense suffering but someone does not believe it is wrong.
But people have caused intentional immense suffering and believed they were not doing wrong which seems nihilistic to me. I think we should hope for an objective standard by which to have justice and a deterrent and rationale for justice framework.
But someone can base their morality on harm assessment. So they can refer to objective suffering and harm in making a moral claim and their objection to another persons moral intuition can be based on the persons failure to take into consideration harm.
Like I said in another post this is how I differentiate between things I dislike and thinks I morally object to.
I had a long discussion about this in my "quality of life" thread and I think that facts about the world can cause feelings and these feelings can be predicted from facts about the world. So that it is unlikely that feelings completely severed from what actually happened like can happen with a random emotional bout of sentiment.
This correlation between external facts and predictable emotional responses makes certain emotions seem inappropriate or absurd in response to certain scenarios. It is as if the scenarios demand certain responses.
Then again a lion can eat a deer alive without negative emotions. Natural examples of this kind make nature seem quite amoral. :chin:
Right, which is one of the things that results in people not valuing everything equally.
Quoting Andrew4Handel
It's something worth coming to terms with, because the only way to avoid this situation is to do something like engineer brains to only think/feel particular things . . . which we're nowhere near technologically, and which a lot of people would also morally object to (at least until you engineer that moral objection out of them, haha)
Quoting Andrew4Handel
We do have standards, a la views, principles, etc. that a large number of people agree on, or that a smaller number of influential or powerful people agree on, but they can't be made objective. And arguing that the views or principles are correct just because those folks agreed on them is an argumentum ad populum and/or argument from authority fallacy.
Re antinatalism, which I know is one of your primary concerns, you're not going to have anything like an antinatlist standard anytime soon, because far more people disagree with antinatalism than agree with it.
If there were innate moral rules built into reality somehow, then there would be objective morality, although that still wouldn't imply that anyone should conform to it rather than simply go by how they feel.
People could get statements about those innate moral rules wrong, though.
At any rate, there's zero evidence of there being moral rules built into the world somehow.
Do you think it would make sense to say, "I don't dislike this, but I morally object to it"?
I don't want to be too crude but what about rape representation in pornography? Or maybe pornography in general? People can probably have opposing drives especially with the sex drive and the drive to respect other people.
War is something some people enjoy or war games.
So you think it would make sense for someone to say, "I don't dislike rape representations in pornography, but I feel that rape representations in pornography are morally wrong"?
Sure, if that's how they feel about it.
Quoting Andrew4Handel
Moral agents don't make moral claims without a basis in moral feeling. They can refer to an objective whatever the hell they like, talk about harm, etc. That doesn't make any relevant difference. Their ethical objection is founded in moral feeling, or it's not really an ethical objection at all, just empty words.
Quoting Andrew4Handel
Things you dislike aren't relevant unless this leads to a moral judgement. You can pretend that you only like or dislike stuff without ever making any moral judgements, but I wouldn't buy that for a second. You might as well be telling me that you have three heads and live on Mars.
Quoting Andrew4Handel
Well, of course, nonhuman animals aren't moral agents, so their world is amoral. But you're not a lion.
Isn't the challenge to try and find a valid morality and not just to be fed the rules deterministically?
I am agnostic about this. I think that I would behave differently if I knew whether or not there were rights and wrongs.
For example I grew up being told numerous things were wrong like shopping on a Sunday and watching television.
Now I have abandoned some of these beliefs altogether so I am free to act. But there are cases when I don't know what my intuition is. I still struggle with sexually related phobias.
I think people do restrain their actions or act based on moral beliefs and that if there moral beliefs changed they would behave differently so they need some notion of moral truth to justify their attitudes to themselves.
I agree that some people simply follow stuff they were taught, but in those cases, I wouldn't say that they're acting morally (or immorally) at all. They're not acting morally unless they're actually making a judgment about the behavior in question.
So yeah, probably if some people thought about this more they'd do different things than they do when they're just following stuff they're taught. I think we'd all be better off in that case, though, especially since people follow things like "no shopping on Sunday" or "no eating meat on Friday" or whatever.
I think feeling that rape is wrong is adequate to make rape representations problematic. I think it is possible with porn to be aroused by things we would not do ourselves.
People can even become aroused against their wishes when being raped.
People can have a wide range of conflicting emotions. I don't think these are all moral assessments. I like to reach a moral conclusion through reason maybe in a way like Christoffer outlined
I think this is a possible brain state to have. It might just be cognitive dissonance but I feel (heh) that at least the inverse of your statement applies to some of my views.
For example, in the abortion debate, I asked whether being responsible for an injury means one should donate blood or even organs to alleviate it. While I feel that as a matter of personal conscience, I should donate blood in that case, I am at least sceptical whether it can be a moral obligation. And on the topic of abortion itself, I consider abortion a tragedy but do not consider it morally wrong.
My experiences led me to moral nihilism because of the unreliability of guilt feelings and other emotions and the lack of a moral authority.
And this is why I think feeling something is wrong is not adequate for a morality.
Now you yourself have even said "if some people thought about this more" which seems to invoke reason.
I don't quite understand this response. What, exactly, are you saying you don't dislike but feel is morally wrong?
You'd be equivocating here, though. To not be equivocating, you'd need someone saying, "I don't dislike rape, but I think that rape is morally wrong." Or "I don't dislike representations of rape, but I think that representations of rape are morally wrong." It has to be someone saying that they don't dislike x but feel that x is morally wrong in just the same respect, etc.
I'm not saying anything at all against reason. Thinking that I am would be seriously misunderstanding my views.
I am saying that I can dislike things and not consider then morally wrong (e.g. abortion).
And I can certainly like doing things that I consider immoral. But that might not be exactly what you mean.
Ah, sure. But I wouldn't say that that doesn't make sense. Morality is stronger than just any arbitrary dislike of something, and it's also not just any behavior. It has to be about behavior we think is more significant than etiquette, for example.
Quoting Echarmion
It would fit if you're not equivocating. It's a matter of whether it's exactly the same thing, in the same respect, etc.
For example, maybe you enjoy stealing things, but you think it's morally wrong in general for people to steal, It would be an equivocation in that case to say that you don't personally dislike stealing, but you think it's morally wrong for people in general to steal, because maybe you think the economy wouldn't be workable in that case, or whatever. That's an equivocation because you'd not be thinking that exactly the same thing, in the same respect, for the same reasons, etc. is something that both you don't dislike and that you think is morally wrong.
No, you can deduce what is good for you. I can deduce that the death of my father put me in a terrible position mentally, but I have grown as a person to handle life more confidently and with better emotional balance because of it, therefore, it was an event that was good for me personally, even if that sounds bad. (This wasn't an example of moral, but of a deduction of what is good for me and what is attached to feelings.
Quoting Andrew4Handel
This is because of two things; ethics philosophy ignoring science (psychology and sociology) and that you can't quantify specific moral events within that science. What you can do is to use science to create a foundation that can be applied to most if not all moral questions. This means you can create a foundation of morals that are based on a moral method of thinking, not specific acts to do in certain situations that are contextual. Many ethics questions in philosophy concentrate on specific events that get detached from a central moral method and focus on behavior and ideas about those single events.
Another aspect to take into consideration is that the current understanding of the human psyche within psychology and sociology is rather new, only a few decades, if at all decades. You talk about not reaching consensus about morals from philosophical dialectics and ideas from times when we didn't even know enough about how the human psyche and social interaction actually works. While we have a lot of scientific research left on the human mind, we have come a long way even measured within the last ten years. To form a moral philosophy at this time is vastly more rational than trying to pitch ideas that have been outdated for many decades and centuries.
Ideas outside of materialistic nature are unscientific and narcissistic compared to the rational notion that we are not special beings. We can define our perception through idealistic views, but we as beings aren't detached from the universe we are in and nothing points to it in any rational way. Therefore, the more we know of how things work around us, the better we can create methods that work rather than guesses and fantasies.
The result of the scientific progress in psychology and sociology can be witnessed in how we treat mental health issues, in how we can predict behavior and so on. To not be able to utilize this science to find a foundation for a more scientific and objective moral method of living is to ignore the progress we've had the last hundred years and that wasn't clear to those who've done moral philosophy through the centuries.
Quoting Andrew4Handel
If the person who goes by their feelings are suffering from mental health problems, or if they were raised with questionable means and because of it becomes a murderer, I think that is argument enough for "feelings" not being any good measure of moral behavior whatsoever.
As I've described earlier:
Quoting Christoffer
Is a far better baseline for assessing what is a good moral choice in a situation and if it fails it's not because of bad morality but because of a human error in assessing the situation. But the moral assessment will still be good; the intention was good. Moral behavior cannot access knowledge about the future, therefore a person cannot demand morals to be a perfect reflection of the result of behavior, only how to think within the behavior at the moment.
I'd like to hear someone expanding or trying to test my points above, I'd like a dialectic on those points because it's still a vague description, at the moment, of my moral theories in the works.
Sure, but if I need to think exactly the same thing, in the same respect, for the same reasons, the difference between "dislike" and "immoral" disappears. Which of course is your point. But I don't think using the word "dislike" in this manner helps to make the point very clear.
Anyways as to the topic of "objective morality", I think it's just a misnomer. Or perhaps a case of asking the wrong question. The point of morality is, after all, not to provide information on some object. It's to provide practical rules.
Practical rules that are objective in their intention of the well-being of all humans (and maybe beyond).
What does it mean for a rule to be 'objective in it's intention"?
I think you have a point when you say:Quoting Christoffer
Making moral decisions is about using moral reasoning. Trying to find rules which can be applied consistently to all cases, like the scientific theory looks for theories that are consistent with all observations.
In that it follows something that is general for all people regardless of culture or situation. Well-being for someone else and the self, combined, does not have any change between cultures and different lives. What is good for the self and others is another assessment, but the moral intention is good if it is out of the well-being of others and the self. The other points on my list address the risks of when ideas about what is good come from a culture of, for example, "murder" being good for someone.
Quoting Echarmion
And moral reasoning is what I mean when I say moral thinking compared to acting in the context of a specific event.
And I provided such points that can act consistently in all cases. If you like, please test them out or expand, this is a theory in progress not a final solution for me.
You can, but what you're explaining is about your feelings. It wouldn't make any sense to deduce what's good for you where the deduction results in something that you're indifferent towards, that makes you feel bad in the long run, etc.
What you're attracted to re temptation isn't the same thing, in the same respect, etc., that you have a problem with
That's not succinctly summarizable, because it relates to feelings in so many ways, but the important thing is that reason isn't objective. Reason is a mental function.
Point being; can you deduce what creates the most well-being for the self and others in a situation? I argue that you can, based on my list of points. Morality has nothing to do with your emotions since morality is not about you, it's about well-being for you and within your relation to others combined.
But there's no other way. It's either that or nothing, and nothing isn't a real option. You can't just switch off your moral feelings.
The experience you've described in this discussion is of feeling and thinking about the stuff of ethics differently over time. That's not so unusual, and it's no reasonable basis for rejecting a position such as mine. And fallibility is not a sufficient basis for rejecting anything at all.
People seem to like mischaracterising ethical stances such as mine as being reasonless just because of the acknowledgement which myself and others make of the necessary emotional foundation in moral judgement. Perhaps they do so because it's easier to attack such a position. The problem is, I don't know anyone who is actually holds such a position.
Your conclusion of moral nihilism isn't warranted because there are better explanations which you're skipping past to get there.
Would you say that there a way to judge "good" reasoning and "bad" reasoning that is distinct from just determining wether the statement is logically valid?
They're different competing desires. It's simply not possible to simultaneously desire X and not desire X.
For example, you might have temptation to eat a piece of cake. You like the taste, you'd love eating it, but you don't like the calories (maybe you're trying to lose weight), the health issues (maybe you're worried about or you have diabetes), etc.
You don't just have emotions/feelings about yourself.
That's not the point, the point is that there are people in the world that you might not even care about who is affected by your moral choices, therefore morality isn't about emotions and feelings. It can also be corrupted if you are a person who has mental health issues which makes you unable to feel normal emotions and empathy. Morality then, must be applicable to all people, even those with lack of empathy.
If there are people in the world who you don't care about, then your moral views are not going to be about them.
Re "Morality must be applicable to all people," that would only be a credo that you feel. It's nothing like an objective fact.
Definitely people do that all the time, because people judge good and bad reasoning very frequently where they're not even familiar with a concept of logical validity.
So, what is it they, or we, compare statements, or an argument against when we make that judgement? It seems to be more than just the question whether the argument has changed our feelings on the matter.
I'd say it is possible to desire X, and to desire the abolition of X. One can be simultaneously attracted to and repulsed by the same object of desire -- this is because allure and repulsion are separate emotions and gets around the logical possibility of "X ^ ~X"
That is a pretty light form of temptation, I'd say. Plus it's quite rational.
Substance abuse comes closer to what I have in mind, or strong beliefs about sexual mores. These aren't exactly rational attachments, and so desires can compete and be at odds with one another with respect to the very same object.
People compare it to how they reason, what makes sense to them.
I wasn't saying anything about it not being rational. I said that it doesn't make sense to not dislike x but to feel that x is immoral where we're not equivocating. The person likes and dislikes/is worried about different things in the example I gave (the cake example).
With drugs, say, it's the same thing. There are aspects the person likes, but other aspects they dislike. They're not liking and disliking the same exact thing, in the same respect, etc.
Can you give an example?
Do you mean that ideas about moral should not include methods that are general to everyone? Then you are essentially saying that we don't need moral guidelines, we don't need morals. I say that we can have a moral system that includes everyone, even those that lack empathy.
Quoting Terrapin Station
You are ignoring the method I presented. The one that has nothing to do with feelings, but assessing the well-being for all, including the self. That is objective for humans. Are you saying that this method doesn't work, please make an argument against the method so that we can evolve it, otherwise you are just saying an opinion, not doing an ethics-dialectic.
No. What I mean is that if your ideas about morality include methods that are general to everyone, then it's not true that there are people in the world who you don't care about (in that respect).
Quoting Christoffer
You're ignoring that "this fact rather than that is 'well-being'" IS a way that you feel. It's a preference you have. Objectively, there are no preferences for any facts (or counterfactuals) versus any other facts (or counterfactuals)
I'm not sure what you are trying to say here. It doesn't matter if I care or don't care, the moral system is still an objective assessment of what is good for people. If I lacked all empathy I could still deduce that food is good for a person in order for him to survive. Therefore, giving food to this person if he is hungry is a good moral choice, even if I don't feel anything in doing so. I follow the guideline of creating well-being without any feelings whatsoever. Therefore, this moral method is working for everyone, detached from feelings and emotions involved.
Quoting Terrapin Station
Are you saying that giving food to someone who is hungry so that he survives isn't a choice for the well-being of that person? In what way does emotion have anything to do with this? Well-being isn't emotional, it's what is good for a person, it has no emotional value.
I could boil it down even further and talk about dopamine in our brain. If dopamine makes people feel good and well-being as a concept has an essential ingredient with "feeling good". Then a hug, which has been scientifically confirmed to raise dopamine levels in the brain, is a choice I can make for increasing the well-being of that person without even have any emotional value linked to that choice. I deduced the well-being aspect of that person through their dopamine-levels without it having anything to do with my feelings of that choice.
I think you are grasping at nihilistic straws here and I don't think you are actually looking at the method I presented. Can you please do so?
You can deduce that food is necessary to survive. You can't deduce that survival is good or better than not surviving, because that's not a fact. That's a preference that people can have.
Since that's a preference that people have, if you don't care about anyone, then it's not a preference that you'd have. But conversely, if it's a preference you have, then it's not true that you don't care about anyone. You prefer that they survive. (Or you prefer that they attain what they want (where they want survival), or whatever it is that you prefer.)
"Survival is well-being" isn't a fact. It's a preference. It's a way that people feel, where they would rather than one set of facts obtains (survival) than another set (a lack of survival).
Quoting Christoffer
It's not a fact that that is well-being versus letting them starve and die. Both can happen. The extramental world couldn't care less which happens. It's us, as individual persons with brains functioning mentally, who care, who have preferences.
Quoting Christoffer
The emotional value is that you prefer raising their dopamine levels to the alternative.
Why would they do that over the alternative(s)?
You miss that the deduction was about well-being. Are you saying "not surviving" is well-being? Because of this you need to first explain what well-being is and define it as something other than what its actual definition is. If you don't agree with that definition, then we can just give up and just throw language out of the window and stop even having a dialectic. You are making nonsense out of the argument.
You are also making your own interpretation of my argument before counter-arguing, this is a fallacy.
The rest of your argument is out of this misinterpretation of the deduction argument I presented.
Quoting Terrapin Station
What is your definition of well-being for a person? Please provide the definition in order to support your argument. Well-being is what it is, it's not a preference. Well-being has a clear definition and that definition is a fact of what well-being is.
Quoting Terrapin Station
Why are you ignoring the point I'm making? I provided a moral method to use in order to be morally good. The method is detached from feelings and emotions. Using the method you can assess choices through the well-being of people. The choice is to follow the moral method and guideline. You are making an argument that is totally ignoring the entire purpose of ethics philosophy. So your argument becomes a non-argument. If the question is "how can we assess good morals", then your points of emotions becomes invalid. If a person that has zero empathy is told to follow this moral guideline in order to function according to good morals in society, he can do it without having empathy. Then, because of this, the choice of raising dopamine levels has nothing to do with emotions, the choice is to follow the moral guideline, that's the first choice and that choice is made out of the necessity of having good morals in our society. If there is no reason to have good morals in society, then you can throw ethics philosophy out the window since it's irrelevant to you and it's irrelevant to assess morality at all.
So what is your point? That we can't have good morals without emotions? So far I've not seen a solid argument for that. You are intentionally misunderstanding the entire method in order to make your point.
Quoting Terrapin Station
An irrelevant point to the allegory. Invent a reason, like, they need to stay on our planet but will be killed if they start a war with us. So they have to live with us and function in society like if they were people. But since they have no emotion or feelings like us, they need a method to assess good moral values.
What you are doing now is ignoring the actual argument and nitpicking irrelevant things instead of actually focusing on the argument at hand.
I asked you to look into the method and provide a counter argument for why it can't be used without emotion and feelings. So far you have not done that.
I don't think we should summarily dismiss the ''feeling something is wrong''. If we gather data and study it we may be able to discover an underlying rationale to such feelings. What I mean is that ''feelings'' may hide ''reason'' and we could be making a big mistake by rejecting them in our quest for a rational understanding of morality.
As for your question on the disconnect between dislike and immorality, I agree. There are things one dislikes but which may not be immoral and the inverse may be true too. What concerns me is that dislike isn't appropriate to the issue. A more relevant emotion would be pain. I don't say joy because people sometimes take joy in hurting others. Pain, however, is more uniform in nature - even a masochist feels pain. So, I suggest you use pain rather than dislike in the matter of morality. The connection between morality and dislike is too weak. Pain is a better partner.
I'm saying that nothing, objectively is well-being. If you want to focus on the brain chemistry factors re a feeling of well-being, that's fine, but (a) that still isn't objective (because we're talking about a mental state, which makes it subjective by definition), and (b) there's no objective fact that creating the brain states in question are preferential to not creating them.
Re conventional definitions of well-being, those aren't objectively arrived at of course. What's being reported is what the term is commonly used to denote. Those common denotations are strictly subjectively produced (as are all denotations).
It's an objective fact that particular denotations are more common. But that doesn't make the denotation objectively correct.
Quoting Christoffer
My subjective characterization of well-being includes survival, good health, etc. (at least roughly, I wouldn't say at all costs or necessarily as an uncompromised trump card for everyone in every situation).
I don't pretend that those preferences are somehow objective. There's no need to. We should focus on the correct realm/domain for the phenomena in question.
Quoting Christoffer
You're ignoring the point I'm making. Your method is not at all detached from feelings and emotions.
Quoting Christoffer
A hypothetical person who has "zero empathy" can follow someone else's guidelines, sure. And those guidelines will count as "good morals" to people who agree with those preferences. They'll count as "bad morals" to people who disagree with those preferences. The "zero empathy" person won't have any moral view of it one way or the other insofar as they're not engaging with their own preferences, and they won't be doing anything that has anything to do with morality, except in some other persons' assessments (good or bad or whatever depending on the views in question).
Quoting Christoffer
Yes it does. If someone is making a choice to do something, they're making that choice for a reason, for preferences over the alternative. (It may not be simple and direct, but it will still be for preferences over alternatives.)
"Good morals," by the way, are the morals that one agrees with.
Quoting Christoffer
If they have no emotions or feelings whatsoever, then they have no reason to choose not starting a war and being killed or anything else. They have to have preferences to make those sorts of choices.
The significance of pain (for morality, at least) is that people don't like it.
But in order for that to work, they need to have a similar ability to reason. They need to understand at least how the other's reasoning works in order to compare it. Their mind needs to be able to "run" the sequence of reasoning.
That's how we can establish things like logical validity. Doesn't that mean it's possible to also establish other kinds of validity or "truth" between subjects?
When it's more dissimilar or not understood is when you get the "bad reasoning" judgment.
Re validity, there are different species of logic and different definitions of validity. For example, validity is different in relevance logics than in traditional logic. (And quirks with the traditional definition of validity was really the whole initial motivation for relevance logics.)
This is the reason you don't seem to understand the method in the first place. What is and what isn't well-being is what is being assessed by the method and through that assessing the moral choice. Well-being has its definition and I have not said anything about it being objective. I've said an objective method to assess good morals, not objective well-being. That's why I ask you to look at the method I presented, since your whole argument is based on a misunderstanding of the method, therefore, your argument becomes a non-argument against the method.
Quoting Terrapin Station
Your argument is flawed since you have written it out of the notion that well-being has objective parameters on humans when my method is about assessing the well-being. So you have initially ignored the entire method and argument I've made and so there are no points for me to care for when your argument is flawed in the first place. You are arguing about things I haven't even presented. My method is about assessing the well-being not that well-being is objective in itself.
Quoting Terrapin Station
Have you even looked at the points in the guideline? I want you to make an argument for how they are "bad morals" in any rational sense.
Quoting Terrapin Station
You are nitpicking the allegory again. Must I do entire worldbuilding on this in order for you to understand the actual point? I can easily say a reason, they are like plants, they have no emotions but they do choices through survival programming. War equals death to their species, hence to survive they need to adapt. They have no emotion to this, they must simply do it. So the choice is still made without emotion or feelings.
Exactly...why beat around the bush with the unnrcessarily broad category of like/dislike and get to the point - pain, the feeling of it, the sharing of it. The basis of all morality.
This is way too long from post to post. So let's try sorting out one thing at a time. I like to tackle something and move on.
An objective method to assess whose "good morals"?
Well, but dislike is primarily because it's not only pain that's disliked and that factors into moral views.
Presented earlier. I've explained it on earlier pages.
You've been typing a few hundred words per post. Suddenly you can't retype or copy/paste a handful?
Is "not disliking" different from "Liking"? The double negative confuses me. I'd say it's quite possible to like something you believe is immoral. Not sure about "not disliking".
When you divide up a referent into its aspects I'd say that doesn't quite get at the structure of desire very well. Our desires are often in conflict. Saying "I love and hate such and such" makes more sense than to say "I like this part of such and such and hate this part of such and such" -- not because of the logic, but because these two sentences don't say the very same thing and the first sentence references a real phenomena -- a love-hate relationship. It's the sort of relationship where you simultaneously feel conflicting emotions about so and so or such and such, and isn't about dividing up someone or something into various aspects.
Temptation is similar to a love-hate relationship, except that there is a moral dimension whereas that is not necessarily the case with a love-hate relationship. Isn't this why the moralists among us are actually more driven to stamp out the things they find morally disgusting? Because they also feel called by them?
Not always, but certainly some of the time.
@ChrisH -- this is still farily general, but more specific. Does this help?
People have been killed in terrible ways or died in slavery and there has been no justice. It is rather futile moralizing about an event like this when there is no hope of justice. Religious moralities have offered an afterlife justice of some sort or karma. But if you don't believe in this or objective morality then lots have people have suffered with no recompense, recognition or hope.
So just "feeling" X is wrong at some stage after and event or conceptually doesn't really help anyone.
"Not disliking" can include "being indifferent towards" for example.
You'd have to give a plausible account of someone liking and disliking the same thing without equivocation, where what's really going on isn't that they like x (about F) but not y (about F).
How would you provide justice for every person murdered? There's often no good evidence regarding just who perpetrated a murder.
I am not sure what you position is. However It does not follow that if you reject objective morality you have endorse a "feelings" approach.. People have spent a lot of time and effort on and written a huge amount on morality wherein they have not simply been referring to their feelings
The equivalent is the notion of ether in physics. The ether was believed to exist and was a serious postulate that turned out not to exist. People have rigorously examined moral issues and that is what might lead them to moral nihilism. The role of emotion in morality has been one among different postulates
I don't see how feelings can resolve a moral dispute or how you can know which of your feelings is the appropriate one.
I am not attempting to do that I am just pointing out the failures of morality.
Another problem for morality is humans persistent bad behaviour. Humans don't even abide by their own moral codes. We have done slavery, war, racism,sexism etc.
In what respect? You must have picked up something. I'm not a moral objectivist and I'm not a moral nihilist. I'm a moral subjectivist.
Quoting Andrew4Handel
That wasn't my argument.
Quoting Andrew4Handel
So?
Quoting Andrew4Handel
That's a hilarious comparison. That's only appropriate in relation to objective morality. Subjective morality is extremely obvious, as you yourself have noted with your reference to YouTube comments. To conclude moral nihilism, you'd have to reject moral subjectivism, but you haven't provided a strong enough argument for rejecting moral subjectivism. What you have argued against is a caricature of moral subjectivism where morality is mindless and anything goes. Morality is what you make of it. You don't have to share the crass moral judgements of others under moral subjectivism.
Quoting Andrew4Handel
So? These comments are irrelevant or at least incomplete.
Quoting Andrew4Handel
Through appealing to empathy and reason. And again, infallibility is unnecessary. You just go with what you feel and think is right at the time. There's no other option. Well, there's throwing the baby out with the bathwater, but that's unreasonable.
My first post in this thread.
Quoting Christoffer
Adjustments to that list of points:
1. Do what is positive for the assessed well-being of yourself and others combined.
2. What is well-being need to be assessed according to each situation.
3. Assessing what is morally good needs to involve current knowledge about human psychology, sociology and common/advanced definitions about human well-being for the individual and larger groups.
4. If the consequence of the choice isn't within the assessed parameters of well-being even though the choice was carefully defined to the best possible assessment of well-being, the choice is still good (the one assessing the choice cannot see the future).
5. Neither can the assessed choice be considered morally bad if unforeseen consequences occur later on. But the assessed choice need to take everything possible into consideration to the best ability of the one making the choice.
6. The choice is about maximizing the assessed well-being.
If we are to find an objective method to calculate a morally good choice, this is as close as I can get at the moment. If you take into consideration, psychology, sociology, common definitions of well-being but also advanced forms, like a relief of pain by death; take into consideration further consequences, how it affect society, larger groups and yourself at the same time. Then you can end up at a choice that tries to maximize the assessed well-being and in doing so make a morally good choice.
But at the same time, we have common definitions of well-being. We do not harm, kill or inflict pain on people and call that "well-being". So the above is the detailed argument for situations like my allegory about aliens. But we can simplify it to standard definitions of well-being, as it is defined by a dictonary: https://www.dictionary.com/browse/wellbeing
We can argue details about this definition, but in order for the method to be practical we can distill it down to:
1. Do what is positive for the well-being of yourself and the group combined.
2. Assess the well-being according to current knowledge about human psychology, sociology and standard definition of well-being.
3. If the choice is made with careful consideration of point 2 with the intention of point 1, it is considered a morally good choice at the time the choice was made to the best of your ability.
This is a practical method in our society, even if our society shifts. But this simplification is based on the standard and common definition of "well-being". What is and what is not well-being is in this regard academic, not practical. Moral choices based on emotion does not work since emotions can be corrupted. A person might feel good about killing others, but considering that "good morals" based on his emotions is flawed.
Yes, you could argue a nihilistic point of view and say that there are no moral values what so ever. But if good and bad morals should be defined, this method defines it outside of emotion and feelings, focusing on assessing well-being to the best of the choice-makers ability. If good morals are about maximizing well-being in yourself and others combined and bad morals are the opposite, this method can calculate the difference between them without feelings or emotions involved.
Calculate the maximized well-being for yourself and everyone else. The result might not be obvious, but I consider that "good morals". Justice has nothing to do with morals since justice is an invention out of emotional responses to an immoral act, so morals comes first, justice is another question entirely, but what you choose to do with that justice is a moral choice and can be assessed.
That is highly problematic because people feel all manner of things at different stages in their life and different moods. My ethical intuitions lead me to moral nihilism based on the evidence from human behaviour, history and the innate lack of justice. I don't think the fact that I don't like a certain behaviour makes it wrong.
It sounds like you are just selecting some things you like and calling that your morality.
I don't think reason and empathy can resolve moral disputes and they certainly haven't resolved all the on-going moral disputes including meta-ethical disputes. I think you are putting too much faith in peoples moral discernment.
I was badly bullied in school and in my local area until I was in my late teens and I did not realize it was inappropriate at the time. Now that I look back and think how terrible it was it is too late. People can have all sorts of confused emotions and a lack of intuition and cultural or peer group generated emotions.
Look at the method above, isn't that an option? Feelings can be corrupted and therefore, if you base morals on it, you essentially throw all moral values out the window. There's no point to define morals at all. The method above is my attempt to define a moral scale that isn't connected to emotions but still generate what we would consider good morals by the common definition.
I think you can deduce what is good for your physical body but not necessarily what is a good action or purpose. I think physical health can be fairly uncontroversial but as to what we should do with our lives I don't see answers.
Silentio's account of the knight of faith and Abraham comes pretty close to a plausible account that is far better than anything I've cooked up.
I don't think that this is accurate. Not understanding that you are even dealing with an argument is not a judgement of the content of that argument. It's a failure to communicate. There is a difference between "I do not understand this because it is Chinese" and "I do not understand this because the argument confuses me".
Quoting Terrapin Station
But does this impact my argument? If I can reason about logic and try to iron out "quirks" could this not also apply to morality? Do the proponents of relevance logic merely feel that traditional logic has quirks or is this more than just a personal impression? If it is just a personal impression, is their work useless?
I do not think they are saying "I feel it is wrong to harm someone" I people usually mean it is the harm that makes the action wrong.
So the problem is it actually wrong to murder someone or does it just feel wrong?
Look at the method I provided. You mean it's impossible to find out if an action is good or bad with that? Well-being is not only about physical health. If you find the method I wrote isn't working, please point out where the flaws are.
Murder for selfish pleasure or personal gain...
Does it maximize well-being for you and others combined?
By the common standard definition of well-being, no.
Therefore, murder in this situation is morally bad.
---
Murder or rather, killing someone to save others.
Does it maximize well-being for you and others combined?
By the common standard definition of well-being, yes, it maximizes the well-being. Not doing it is to let others die and fill yourself with the guilt of that consequence.
Therefore, killing someone in this situation is morally good.
Can there be dire consequences outside of this, yes, but the assessment of the situation defines the morality of you, not if you can predict the future or not.
It's an irresolvable problem. You have a burden to justify what I don't think you [i]can[/I] justify, namely that it's justified to reject a position just because it is fallible. You need to stop evading this point I've made multiple times and begin to actually address it.
Quoting Andrew4Handel
Please do not send us around in circles. Focus! What did I say before? I said that whatever you like or dislike is not relevant unless it leads to moral judgement. This is what you need to address for our discussion to progress rather than revert back to a previous stage.
I also said something along the lines that it's not realistically possible for you to refrain from moral judgement. You're not a lion, and running around after deer won't make you one. I suspect that your meta-ethics is influenced by your psychology. You want to be a lion, figuratively speaking. Some sort of escapism or coping mechanism.
Quoting Andrew4Handel
It sounds like you're just trying to trivialise my position, and make it seem weaker than it is. I haven't endorsed the caricature of moral subjectivism where it is a simple matter of like and dislike, so you should stop wasting time with this straw man. There are different categories of feelings and different levels of severity. I'm only talking about moral feelings, not feelings of any other kind, like feelings about foodstuffs. That's the wrong category, and it isn't anywhere near the level of severity of my feelings about murder.
Quoting Andrew4Handel
That's an example of fallacious black-and-white thinking. They can and sometimes do resolve moral disputes, whether you recognise that or not. But, once again, it's not an infallible method, and it doesn't need to be. It's unreasonable of you to expect of it what is practically impossible, like infallibility and resolving all disputes.
Quoting Andrew4Handel
You have an annoying tendency to leave out your conclusion. I went by a different standard when I was at school. I wouldn't behave the way I did back then. I changed. It doesn't follow from that that we should throw the baby out with the bathwater, which is what you're effectively doing. You need to understand that you're being unreasonable.
I guess I shouldn't be surprised, as you're also an anti-natalist, aren't you? Even though that seems incompatible with moral nihilism, since it's a moral stance, not an amoral stance. Anti-natalists also throw the baby out with the bathwater. Have you no understanding or appreciation for balance and proportionality? Why do you jump to such extremes?
An option for who? Let's say for you. That depends. How do you feel about it? It would be lose-lose for you, I think. You either concede to the emotional foundation in ethical judgement, in which case yes, it's an option; or you implausibly deny any associated feelings of relevance, and at the same time tacitly admit that it is just an empty formula, which isn't what I consider to even fit the category of morality, meaning that no, it's not an option.
Quoting Christoffer
No, that doesn't follow. That's the same error that Andrew is making. Fallibility isn't sufficient reason for rejection. That argument is untenable. But feel free to try a different argument.
Quoting Christoffer
Again, the problem is twofold: 1) it's not plausible that it's disconnected from emotions, and 2) even if it is disconnected from emotions, then it doesn't come under morality in any way that makes sense.
That only makes sense in the hidden context where they already feel that serious harm is wrong. Whatever you say, you can always go back a step until you can't go back any further, and that's where it ends in the emotional foundation.
I am not sure what position I'm supposed to be rejecting.
My initial argument is that feelings is not a sufficient basis for morality.
The reason is that it is not sufficient to resolve moral disputes or to enforce morality or reflect the gravity of a harm.
For example imagine your family (god forbid) were murdered. Would you put any significance on my feelings in this situation?
You seem to be saying that because my intuitions don't match yours I am misguided and not you, when we are both apparently restricted to the same methodology.
My bullying experience is troubling because I spent years being victimized without defending myself. Now that I have a more robust intuition paradoxically I am not facing that situation. I would like to have recognition of childhood abuse that happened to me but people claim it is unfeasible and to pull your socks up. Now that I judge my whole childhood to be abusive in various ways no one is interested in compensating me for that. What is the point of moral intuition at this stage?
Well then work towards an understanding. It isn't helpful to simply say "I'm not sure what your position is".
Also, I'm going to take this opportunity to say that I really don't like your style of reply where you only quote a tiny part of what I say and then miss out the rest, or when you don't quote me at all. It makes me feel like I'm typing it all up for nothing and wasting my time. It doesn't feel like [I]quid pro quo[/I]. Can you please quote and address all - or at least most - of what I say by breaking it down into key sections, quote by quote? Otherwise I might decide to stop engaging you.
In fact, I was going to continue with the rest of your reply, but I think I'm going to stop right here instead.
For example, no one I know thinks eating bananas is wrong
In order to convince someone this was wrong you would have to provide good evidence or a threat. You might say bananas were poisonous or that God would strike you down if you ate bananas, or that bananas caused cancer. Or just create a threatening environment around bananas.
So I think a lot of basic instinctual morality is based around actual harm or threat and not simply derived from emotional responses to it.
I think a morality divorced from actual real world harm would be absurd
I read it but a long time ago. I'd have to review it.
Quoting Andrew4Handel
Mine, it seemed. It seemed as though you were rejecting it on the basis that it's fallible.
Quoting Andrew4Handel
But no one to my knowledge is advocating that feelings alone are sufficient. It's moral feelings in combination with reason which lead to a moral judgement. Hence that is what we have to work with in trying to convince others. And I don't think that you can rightly generalise about sufficiency in relation to the resolution of moral disputes in the way that you're doing, because there are too many factors which you're leaving out from consideration. In some cases it can be successful, and in others it can fail, and the reasons why one particular outcome occurs instead of a different outcome is actually very complex, and relates to technique and psychology.
Quoting Andrew4Handel
Likely none greater than that of mine, as you'd expect.
Quoting Andrew4Handel
But it's two different perspectives. How can that not be massively relevant? The methodology is the same, but a variation in the results is to be expected if we have different feelings on the matter.
Where is this leading? Is it leading anywhere at all?
Quoting Andrew4Handel
So, just because you can't change your own past, you now see no "point" in moral intuition? Sorry if this sounds abrupt, but how is this anything other than your own personal psychological dilemma? How does this relate back to a reasonable discussion of metaethics? I think that there is probably a "point" for moral intuitions in an evolutionary sense. But this seems like a tangent.
So it's not able to act as a moral guide in order for us to, as close as possible, conclude in what we generally define good morals as objectively as possible? Either we try and define a moral that works for all or we abandon morality as a concept altogether. I don't see any reason to try and define morality without any parameters. The desire to maximize well-being for the self and others combined is as close to a general good moral we can get and that method assesses that for any moral choice. You seem to miss that the assessment of well-being is for the self and others combined. That's the key because otherwise it's either giving up well-being for either yourself or others in any given choice. To maximize it for both pushes you towards a balanced moral choice. The things you bring up are already addressed in that argument. I don't see anything that really breaks the method, only your judgment of it because you are of the opinion it is impossible, but the method itself is still solid.
Quoting S
The point is that you cannot base morals on feelings since there are people who are so corrupted in their emotional life that what you consider good morals, they consider bad and vice versa. So you cannot measure morality based on emotional responses of events. The argument for using emotions to define morality is flawed from the beginning so that needs to be a solid argument first.
Quoting S
These points are not counter arguments since you define morality based on emotions and you assume that conclusion to be true before you present the premises above. In my argument, I argue that emotions are feedback on the choices we make, but assessing what is morally good or bad can only be assessed through a common parameter between all humans. I.e well-being. Emotions are detached from assessing what is well-being, you can deduce those things through that method, make the choice and let emotions enter after that.
Why is emotion necessary in order to make a moral choice? What happens if you have a mental health issue that means you lack empathy. How do you make good moral choices in any given situation? If you can't feel empathy or normal emotions, you can still calculate what is good for others. You could understand that a hug generates higher dopamine and because of this, heightens the feeling of well-being.
I really don't see how your argument is more valid when you assume your conclusion true before making the argument. I don't define morality to be based on emotions since the argument about corrupted emotions makes it impossible to scale morality based on it. Well-being is scalable as a measurement that you can base moral choices on, even for those who have corrupted emotions.
Quoting S
It doesn't have to. You can deduce a conclusion that harm is the opposite of well-being by the very definitions of those words. If you have your own idea that the harm you do is for their well-being and test that idea against common standard definitions, you would come to the conclusion that you are wrong and that the harm you do is morally wrong. You are talking about emotional guesswork, but if you use something like the method I brought up, then you are calculating the choice outside of your emotional spectra and personal definitions. What are the common standard definitions of harm and well-being? Are you saying you are unable to calculate a choice of what is morally good or morally bad when you test the choice against harm and well-being? If you kill someone, is that morally good or bad? What maximizes well-being for both you and others combined? You can't calculate that into an answer about whether killing is good or bad? Doesn't matter what you feel, you cannot argue it isn't harmful to the one you kill, therefore it's morally bad. If you add more parameters to the situation, it gets more complex, but you can still assess where the choice end up between good or bad morality.
That is, if you agree that morality can be assessed outside of emotions, which I argue you can.
I think what people are getting at is that you decide the basis for morality, for you its suffering/harm, for emotional reasons and not objective ones.
I think what you are getting at is an objective standard after the fact. The analogy I use is a ruler, say one that measures inches. An inch isnt objective, a person made up the inch and how long it is, it is man made and not objective. However, once this has been done you have an objective standard, an inch is an inch regardless of peoples feelings about it. Morality is like that, and I think the discussion here is divided by that distinction. The points made against you are talking in terms of the basis for morality, which is subjective or feelings or whatever term you want to use. Your points are being made in terms of already established parameters (objective standard) , which you are refering to in your arguments. You are asking, “ok, see that 12” ruler? How many inches do you think that tree over there is in height?”.
Obviously, morality is a lot more complex than a ruler but I think it makes the point. Does that fit with what you are saying or am I talking out my ass?
No, for me it's a calculated choice about others and my own well-being. I do not define it by suffering/harm without calculation about in what way it is harmful or cause suffering. It's not an emotional value choice for me. I take the common, standard definition of well-being and harm and use it for the calculation of the moral value of a choice. I don't apply my emotions to that calculation, only the common standard definitions of harm and well-being and measuring in what way harm and well-being apply to the situation. I can assess if someone is harmed without any emotional value.
I don't call my morality objective I say the method is a way to calculate objectively, outside of my emotional and subjective experience. There are no objective moral values in the method. You can argue in favor of killing someone being a good moral choice if the deduction of that choice shows it to be the best moral route. Objectiveness, in this method, is about it being detached from our subjective moral opinions and be able to apply the method for all people, even the emotionally corrupted.
Try using the method on any moral situation, can you assess good moral choices with it? If not, we need to adjust its parameters. The method itself doesn't create solid and strict moral rules, it is a calculation for what is the optimal good moral based on our understanding of harm and well-being. How to assess harm and well-being is done out of our knowledge in psychology and sociology, so it's not even about opinion in that assessment.
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The problem with defining moral by emotion and feelings is that the rulebook goes out the window and morality, good and bad morals cease to exist since they can't be defined. If morality is whatever you feel like it to be, then there's no point in even labeling it as moral. My coffee cup is morality because I feel like my morals measure by the amount of coffee in my coffee cup, therefore my coffee cup is my morality. It's an absurd conclusion.
The second is to have strict moral doctrines, like in religion. The problem here is that the only reason to act well is that of divine reward. I'd say that humans should be capable to act well without a false authority invented for that control and it's needed when God and religion go out the window. You cannot tell an atheist to act according to religious doctrines. While some doctrines teach good morals to be killing in the name of God, stoning people and whatever. It's a corrupted way of defining morals since people in power can change the doctrines over time, it's not universal for us as humans.
So we are unable to define morals based on emotions because they are unable to apply to anything but the subjective individual and we cannot define morals based on religious doctrines since they can be corrupted. That leaves morals being undefinable. Still, we value things that act as baseline definers for morality. All people, in any society, can, for the most part, define harm and well-being. So instead of trying to define morality as something fluid and subjective maxim or some strict doctrine, let it be fluid, but based on strict parameters. This way, morality can change according to the situation, but you always calculate the level of harm and well-being, trying to maximize it to both yourself and others.
Is this method flawed? What moral choices can't be calculated with this method? Instead of people saying the method doesn't work I haven't seen any examples of testing it to conclude that it's flawed, only opinions on it being so based on personal definitions of morality.
The basics are this:
- Morality based on emotions can be corrupted and render morality undefined and without any form.
- Morality based on strict set out doctrines can be corrupted and render morality undefined and without any form while being used as a control mechanism for people in power.
- General morality can therefore not be defined by humans, as it then becomes corrupted, it needs to be defined by something else.
- Definitions on "harm" and on "well-being" are generally existing within all societies.
- Morality calculated through a solid method of defining each situations well-being and harm measurements is a way of detaching our emotions and our strict doctrines on morals from morality to assess a more general idea about good and bad morals in each situation.
- The moral choice can change, but the method's parameters cannot and that keeps the calculation from forming corrupted moral values like what happens with religious and emotional morality assessments.
Without defining good and bad morals, why even have the concept of morality? It's a concept without meaning if it isn't able to be defined outside of whatever we feel like it to be.
Now, I don't think we have to be quite as intense as Kierkegaard makes his namesake in our own attachments -- it was just something that came to mind that demonstrates how we can feel seemingly opposing emotions towards the very same thing.
The part you quoted was sloppily put by me, I meant “you” in the general sense not “you” as in Christoffer.
Not sure you bothered reading the rest since that opening sounded like a miscomprehension on my part, but you go on to describe precisely what I went on to describe.
Yeah, wasn't really arguing against, just wanted to try and clarify my point of view on the subject of morality. I don't say my method is tested, done and finished, but I do think there is a way to create a method to calculate good and bad morals in order to guard morality against human corruption.
This is the subjective bit people are taking issue with. This forms the basis of your standard, but it itself is based in subjective/feelings. I don’t think what you are saying is mutually exclusive to that, nor vice versa, but I think this is what people are getting at.
Yes, but earlier I divided the method into one which carefully defines well-being before you calculate how that well-being is being applied to the situation in order to calculate the choice.
The more simple and practical method is one which acts upon the standard definition of well-being and harm that we have. But it doesn't make the final moral choice calculated by the method, simple, it just uses these as parameters so that it's impossible to make moral choices into whatever feels right or whatever you want it to be. Assessing the well-being of someone is done through the other points in the method, by using psychology and sociology as rational and by the facts as possible or within the current knowledge at the moment. That means that the definition of well-being is being calculated by such means, not by an emotional value of what well-being is.
Would you argue that the definition of harm and well-being as they are defined as concepts in our society is wrong? In what other ways can you define these concepts? Do they ever become so differently defined that they cannot be used in my method?
Time to bring Moore back?
Perhaps the mistake is in describing moral sentiment as a feeling. This is most to the fore when what you want is not what you know you ought do.
No, rather I would argue that harm and well being are their own ends and not the basis of morality at all. Part of your argument is that if the term means anything, it must mean that. There are other perfectly legit things morality can mean. You’ve read Sam Harris I take it? You are trying to paint a moral landscape?
That isn't what I proposed though. I said they are parameters within the method that is used to define moral choices.
Quoting DingoJones
I know of Sam Harris and some of his thoughts, but this method is myself trying to deduce a working method out of a moral base that isn't emotional and free from religious doctrine.
Quoting DingoJones
Such as? Outside of religious ones and emotional ones I really want to know what people define it as further. I argue that religious morality and emotional-based morality are flawed and cannot be used to define morality since they become such an undefined mess.
In what more ways do you define morality without it becoming "whatever you want it to be"?
I suppose it depends on what you define as emotion based, but any number of ethical systems that operate from a rational or logical basis are just as legitimate as yours is. Anything you must consistently reference in order to determine what is right and wrong. Any moral system with a system of measuement, like the 12” ruler in my analogy.
Quoting Christoffer
This is what he endeavors to do in “The Moral Landscape”. His argument is very similar, you may find it a good read.
Quoting Christoffer
It forms the basis of your method, if you removed them, what basis would you have left?
Emotionally based is to base your morality on "feeling something is wrong", as the title describes. It's a very corruptible morality definition.
Kant had his categorical imperatives, but they can become so strict that they aren't able to form according to each situation. I still haven't seen anyone stress test my method, so I cannot say it's more or less valid than any other rational method. The difference though, is that the moral choices can change according to the situation. Killing can be good or bad but never corrupted because the parameters of common understanding of well-being and harm steer it in the direction of the common good for both the choice-maker and others.
Quoting DingoJones
I might read it then :smile:
Quoting DingoJones
Yes, and assessing what is well-being is part of the initial "advanced" version of the calculation. But removing aspects of the method in order to invalidate it is like removing anything to define it as not what it is. Remove the trunk and the branches of a tree, what do you have left? If you remove anything at all from morality, what is then, morality? If morality is supposed to be actions of good or bad, then calculating good morals and good actions need to be connected to what we humans perceive as good or bad. Anything else would mean to ignore the very foundation of what morality is supposed to be about and in doing so, it becomes nothing. We can argue what well-being and harm really means, we could deconstruct the words and their meaning to pieces, but their definitions are pretty much straight forward in our language. If you do something to gain well-being in someone else, while you at the same time gain some well-being, that is a foundation for good moral choices. It's fundamental. If you take away the aspect of "good" from morality you don't have any morality left as a concept since there isn't anything "good" that balance against something. It just becomes nothing.
What then is morality? How do you define morality outside of these concepts?
Take Terrapin for example. He believes that morality is about how you feel about things, but (he can correct me if im wrong here) that doesnt mean he holds all morality equally valid. Some are better thought out, more educated or impressive in any number of ways and others are just irrational or invalid. Its the same for other moral methods, it ends up being about the same things anyway: logic, reason etc
Quoting Christoffer
With other, similar axioms.
I think I understand what you're saying but I disagree (I don't think you accurately account for what's going on in a "love-hate" relationship).
The term "love-hate" is fine as a high level, poetic description of a particular relationship but I'm pretty sure that if you were to analyse what's going on you'd find that certain aspects are 'loved' and other, quite different aspects, were 'hated'. I know you don't accept this explanation and believe that the same, indivisible, aspect can be both 'loved' and 'hated'. In my view this is implausible.
Why?
In this sense, absolutely, there needs to be a definition of what morality is about. But how can you even use or discuss a concept that isn't defined? I'm using the definitions of the concept "morality" to be the common definition of the word and concept. That is the baseline, textbook explanation on what morality is. Above that is how we use morality, how it is applied to humanity, to ourselves and as a concept for society as guidelines to good/bad behavior.
This is where I put all other axioms into perspective. Terrapin's point, as I understood it, is as you say, based on how you feel. But the problem I have with this is that feelings and emotions are corruptible, which means you can only create subjective morals. If morality as a concept should have any value whatsoever it has to be outside of the subjective, something applicable to everyone, without demanding corrupted ideas.
Isn't then the only way, to find the common denominators within humanity and have a concept of morality that is applicable to everyone regardless of if our society change? Earlier we had religious doctrines that set out direct moral rules to follow, but it doesn't take much time to put those strict rules into situations where they break down. So what is common between all people? Our biology, psychology and sociology predict there are common denominators between us all. Boiling these down to shorter concepts, we end up with well-being and harm as positive and negative denominators.
Therefore, I fail to see how this idea is subjective? It's a deduction of the common denominators around humans and a method to calculate good and bad choices out of the value these gives. At least I see it as the most objective method we can have, all others are corruptible or breaks down as soon as we externalize them from ourselves as subjective entities.
Strict defined moral rules, emotion-based morality, Kant's categorical imperatives, utilitarianism or even total nihilism, all have problems since they are too strict in their definitions. They are not able to fit the situations you're facing when making moral choices. In order to make room for variables, but still never turn negatives into positives (as a nihilist), we use the common denominators we have between all people and that should be the foundation for calculating a moral choice.
In essence, I can't see how emotional-based morality, that is breaking apart as soon as you have someone with corrupted emotions, is even on the same level to a rational calculation of a moral choice based on common denominators for all humans. The former is so subjective that it's irrelevant to even use it within the concept of morality, the second is applicable to all humans.
The former is like: "would you do A or B?" -"B, because I feel like it".
That's not morality, that's just behavior.
Second is like: "would you do this thing?" -"What is the end result and consequences for my choice? Will I gain a form of well-being or be harmed? Which choice between A and B create well-being for me and the ones affected by my choice? B is only my own gain, A is a small gain for me and other people. But B might give me means to help those who gain from A. Does B equal a consequence that makes them gain more well-being in the long run? Yes, my choice is B."
Of course, it requires much more thought, but it's also much more balanced, there's a rational reason that isn't based on strict rules about the choice, but about how to think about the choice. It's vastly superior since other forms focus on strict rules for the morality itself, not a method of figuring out. It's not corruptible as a system compared to the others, since there's nothing to corrupt.
"x approves of y" = "x likes y"
What you ought to do might be (in the service of) something you don't want?
The argument people have been making is that our moral ideas are just feelings. and that things we thought were objective morals were actually subjective feelings.
I am saying that moral philosophy has been aware of this idea for a long time. It is not the case that moral philosophy has been one long mistake where they failed to realize they were just actually talking about feelings. It is a contested position.
The feelings I am referring to in my open post are not actually those of any theory but the idea that we don't need to theories because we just have our feelings to go on.
What motivated thread was this ending quote to an article
" On morals (....) they are our revisable attempt at a code that will enable us as a community to live happy, productive and fulfilling lives."
This comment comes after the author has explored the problems with various moral positions. And after outlining the apparent failures he just resorts to invoking "happy, productive and fulfilling lives"
But if you can't get a moral agreement how are you going to get an agreement on what a happy, productive, fulfilling life is? It seems he's resorted to emotivism that we can just some how know instinctively what these things are despite the failure of arguments
https://www.thinkingabouthumanism.org/humanism/the-source-of-morality/
If someone says "The Eiffel tower is a tall structure" What they are referring to is something in the external world. The harm of murder and the suffering is real and in the external world.
I am not saying people do not have an emotional feeling that it is wrong but that this feeling is provoked by the event. It is not the feeling that makes the event seem wrong but features of the event itself.
Someones belief that the Eiffel tower is tall is caused by something external.
I am not saying the harm of murder justifies a moral stance but I don't see how it can be completely irrelevant and subservient to how someone feels about it.
Because your usage simply does not reflect how words such as like and dislike are commonly used.
I asked you earlier for an example of an indivisible aspect of an object of evalutaion which resulted in both a 'like' and 'dislike' response. Can you come up with anything?
My own experience of my failure of moral intuition counts against a theory of valid moral intuition/feeling. It is not the only source of evidence. I have also used the example of the history of cruel human behaviour which appears to be a failure of moral intuition.
But the other point I was making is the concerning failure of morality to help people in their time of need and prevent immorality. We only have our own life to lead and the success of moral intervention is someone else's life is not justice for us individually.
Ironically i think when I was child that my religious beliefs such as that people were sinful and fallen and the idea of an afterlife justice made me not concerned with defending myself. I had an optimism founded in the afterlife and was juggling all sorts of religious beliefs including personal unworthiness.
My mind is wandering a bit but I think it shows how complex moral intuitions and scenarios are. I think reason led me to my current moral nihilism and rejecting Christianity.
I feel that dogmatism and psychopathy. a lack of empathy or even fantasy might prop up some other peoples moral confidence and that being reasonable and sensitive is not sufficient to weather life's storms. I mean like being a ruthless business person that tramples on peoples feelings isn't empathetic and flourishes, or being very religious fantastical, esoteric and dogmatic or heavily relying on revelation about morality
Oh? How is that determined?
And supposing it to be the case, then why does it matter?
Quoting ChrisH
https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/252264
https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/252348
Not that this is the only example ever or anything. From my perspective, at least, what I'm talking about is common knowledge -- and to try and make the human heart fit into some kind of rationalist mode is, at least by my lights, just an error born of a desire for rationalism rather than a desire to see how people actually are. Sometimes what you say is the case -- there are certain aspects that we have a different relationship to. But sometimes that's not what we mean or have -- we have different emotions towards the same person or aspect.
From observing common usage.
Quoting MoliereThat we have mixed emotions about a person is not surprising. There are many aspects to a person, some of which give rise to negative emotional responses others positive but never both simultaneously. Do you have a simple counterexample?
Silentio?
I don't see any relevance in that to what I said. Did I say that feelings aren't provoked by events? Did I say that the harm of murder is completely irrelevant? Did I say that suffering isn't real?
Did I say any of that?
If you just want to make irrelevant points or attack a position I don't hold, then please continue. But count me out.
Your position apparently implies a disconnect between moralizing and the activities that provoke moralizing.
If a situation is clearly harmful then that would be sufficient reason to moralize about it without emotions. I am making a general point on the topic that external events are more of a cause of morality than how we feel.
To me the main problem is in enforcing morality. Having moral rules that are (rationally?) compelling and legitimate.
Well, yes, there's definitely a disconnection [i]in those cases where the activities fail to provoke moralising[/I] - and there are plenty examples of that - but not otherwise, and I have not implied otherwise.
Quoting Andrew4Handel
Firstly, if comments like the above are to be of relevance to my position, then you need to specify that you're talking about [i]moral[/I] emotions. I think that I have made that clear before now and on multiple occasions, but you don't seem to pay enough attention to what I say, so you seem to miss things like that as a result.
Or, alternatively, you're choosing to attack a position other than my own, and a weaker position than my own.
This kind of response requires an explanation from you, not another dodge-and-move-on.
Now, with the above qualification, that's just not possible. That would merely be empty words. If there's no moral feeling behind them, then it's not moralising, it would just be an imitation. If I frown and have clenched fists, then is that sufficient grounds to conclude that I'm angry? No. What about if I say that I'm in pain? Is that sufficient grounds for concluding that I'm in pain? No. It's a similar thing going on here.
Quoting Andrew4Handel
Then you have the burden of explaining a whole bunch of counterexamples which seem to make little-to-no sense under your understanding, like why slavery was considered acceptable for hundreds of years. Your account lacks explanatory power in comparison to my account.
Quoting Andrew4Handel
That's a separate issue to the meta-ethical issue that we've been discussing. The meta-ethical issue is about what's the case, not what would be practical or work best or anything of that sort. I don't want to just switch topic like that.
No it doesn't, not to anywhere near the level required to reject the theory. That would be like saying that we should reject the scientific method because of superseded theories like phlogiston theory. You can see that that's a poor argument, right?
I'm not an absolutist. Are you? Because these sort of comments that you keep on making suggest absolutism. If so, then that carries a burden of justification. I've made it crystal clear that I'm a fallibilist, and I'm willing to argue against absolutism and in favour of fallibilism.
I said my experience counts against the theory I didn't say it defeated it.
In science my type of evidence would not defeat the methodology but it would count against the theory that people have adequate moral intuitions. It is like a scientist replacing one tool with another to get better results.
What happened when I became an adult is not that I developed better intuitions but that I had new ones. It is controversial to claim I had better intuitions, because who is to judge and what is that fact?
I have been trying to recover from religious indoctrination since childhood and I find emotions are probably the key thing trapping me. Because I intellectually rejected the religion along time ago. I came across a web site in my early twenties outlining numerous contradictions in the bible and other problems with it.
So I know my emotions are giving me false signals.
This kind of personal account to my mind is more realistic than conceptual theorizing because this is the kind of complex milieu moralizing happens in.
I am currently a moral nihilist so I don't have an ethical position per se. I was arguing against the disconnect between emotions and events.
I think your ideas are much more undermined by slavery than mine. Slavery supports moral nihilism if anything. But on the emotive position people continuously failed to have the appropriate attitude towards gross humans suffering and exploitation.
I didn't say that bad events automatically lead to moralizing but that moralizing was reliant on aspects of events.
However I think emotional manipulation is probably the reason lots of atrocities have happened. For example telling people that other people are inferior, stirring up fear about certain behaviors. Notice how much propaganda the Nazis had to use. The persecution of homosexuals has not been based on reason largely.
The way my family and church enforced a draconian morality was through fear and threats. It was so over the top that it eventually prompted me to leave because of anxiety. Society often just results to emotional manipulation to enforce a moral issue.
I think asking individuals many questions about their morality and life would come up with a rich source of material to explore the issues and from just analyzing myself It is very convoluted, problematic and multi faceted.
I think a moral system is most undermined based on the degree to which it is unenforceable and the level to which it resolves moral disputes. That is one of my key criticism of the feelings method. I feel that the feelings method will only be enforced by brute force as the final way to resolve moral disputes. Whereas a position like utilitarianism could be enforced by calculation and pragmatism.
Deontology could be enforced consistently because you have set of rules like the law to follow.
It doesn't even really count against it. It's a bit like throwing a toothpick at a tank. The theory never presented itself as foolproof, and that's what it would have to have done in order for your experience to count against it. You're fallaciously setting the bar impossibly high in your assessment. Also, unless you can present a realistic alternative which is better, then this is the best we've got.
Quoting Andrew4Handel
No, because adequate is not the same as perfection. You've only shown that it isn't perfect. And nothing is perfect. Moreover, whether or not it is adequate is open to debate, however, what's funny is that there are no other available options, so adequacy becomes meaningless. Adequate in relation to what? What better tool do you think you've got in your toolbox? There is only one, and you're imagining the others.
Quoting Andrew4Handel
Obviously it is people, like you and I, who judge what's better or worse. And you've already suggested that you consider your current outlook to be better than your past outlook. I simply don't believe that you consider them as on par, just like I simply don't believe that you don't make any moral judgements as though you were a lion. What I find more plausible is that you're in denial, and that you're creating your own narrative for psychological reasons.
As for, "What is that fact?", what are you referring to? I've told you that I'm a moral subjectivist, so if you're expecting me to provide you with some sort of objective moral fact, then you're barking up the wrong tree, and facts relating to morality under moral subjectivism are quite agreeable. It's a fact that relative to my judgement x is better than y.
Quoting Andrew4Handel
Where you're going wrong is that you blame your emotions altogether, instead of recognising that you just had the wrong emotions, or the wrong proportions, or maybe even the right emotions but the wrong context or reasoning. You can't rid yourself of emotions, you can only learn to control them to the extent within your power. Your current views are likewise founded in emotion, they're just different from your past views in other respects. In fact, I think that you're coming across as more emotional than me in your discourse about morality. You don't see my dredging up personal stuff from my childhood or comparing myself to a lion.
Yes, I know that you're a moral nihilist. You're fooling yourself if you think that you don't have an ethical position. You're a performative contradiction in denial.
Quoting Andrew4Handel
Then you're not arguing against what I actually said in response to that topic when you raised it the first time around, and you're therefore missing the point [i]yet again[/I]. You don't seem to be taking on board important parts of what I'm saying [I]yet again[/I]. This is a pattern of behaviour.
What I actually said was not as simplistic as that. I suggest you go back and check if you need a reminder. I even put it in italics and underlined it for you, yet you still come back to me with this simplistic take on the matter, as though my response didn't make any difference at all. What is with this black-and-white mindset that you seem to be stuck in?
And to make matters worse, you're just changing the subject by mentioning these things in relation to what you quoted. My point stands: [i]you still have a burden to justify the claim you made, namely that "external events are more of a cause of morality than how we feel"[/I].
Quoting Andrew4Handel
Ha! No, slavery doesn't support moral nihilism at all. Nothing does, because both of us can reject moral objectivism, but moral subjectivism is [i]always[/I] a better explanation than moral nihilism, because moral nihilism does [i]nothing whatsoever[/I] to account for our evident moral judgements. It fails massively in terms of explanatory power.
But yes, people did continuously fail to have the appropriate attitude towards gross human suffering and exploitation. But for a proper explanation, you need to connect the rest of the dots, leading to moral judgement. People don't just stop there, they reach a further conclusion about right and wrong, about morality. And since there is no known objective morality, that leaves subjective morality: which is evident, as you've tacitly acknowledged.
Quoting Andrew4Handel
Here we are again. You've lead me to something that I haven't denied. Why have you done this? What is the point of that? Is it that you just lose focus?
Quoting Andrew4Handel
Can you please try harder to think about what's of relevance and what's not? Preaching to the choir is not productive.
Quoting Andrew4Handel
This has gone way off course. It's hard to remain on track with you. Do you even remember what my position is? Am I advocating pure, unrestrained emotional outbursts, manipulation, fear-mongering, threats, and the like? It feels a bit like I'm talking to a brick wall. Are you interested in a proper debate, or do you just want to run around in a field like a headless chicken attacking men made of straw?
You don't get to choose what's the case, and meta-ethics is about what's the case. You seem to be muddling up meta-ethics and normative ethics. I'm not presenting a normative position. I'm presenting a descriptive position. Utilitarianism and deontology are normative ethical positions. Moral subjectivism is a meta-ethical position. I recommend that you spend some time learning to distinguish between these two branches of philosophy.
You said in your first post.
Quoting S
This In Response to my claim that there was a difference between something being wrong and feeling wrong.
That is why I have pointed out that the feeling wrong is usually connected to harmful events.
Any moral intuition I have now is based on actual harm not on my emotional response to it. I don't see how you can present a moral argument that relies on how you feel.
My moral nihilism does not result from my failure to emotionally respond to harm but the lack of evidence of moral authority and moral facts. Moral nihilism does not entail that you believe all behaviour is acceptable but rather that there are no moral facts.
Quoting S
The problem with my past outlook is that I tolerated harm to myself. I don't need to have developed morally to stop tolerating harm to myself. The reason I see that a lot of people do not leave things like religion is because they haven't experienced the harm. I am gay and grew up in a fundamentalist background so that was obviously going to be more harmful to me than to my heterosexual siblings.
I am certainly not a masochist so I cannot stay indefinitely in a harmful environment. In a very banal way non moralistic way I consider any non harmful environment better than a harmful environment.
The fact you haven't divulged your personal circumstances here does not make your position less emotive than mine it just makes it less grounded in facts. If my position seems more emotive than yours then based on your own position that lends it more credibility.
[B]I've just realised that your claim isn't even compatible with your stance of moral nihilism, if I've understood it correctly. If you're a moral nihilist in the sense of there being no right or wrong, then you can't even say that there's a wrong out there to compare with our moral feelings! You can't have your cake and eat it! What are you: a moral objectivist or a moral nihilist?[/b]
But yes, we [i]usually[/I] feel a certain way about certain events. I was talking about the exceptions, which you implicitly acknowledge: those cases where there's a mismatch, which you claim to be a difference between feeling that something is wrong and it being wrong, whereas in reality it's just a difference between one feeling and another feeling.
And I did also respond as follows: [I]"Well, yes, there's definitely a disconnection in those cases where the activities fail to provoke moralising - and there are plenty examples of that - but not otherwise, and I have not implied otherwise".[/I]
If you want me to provide examples of the above, then just say so, but that shouldn't be necessary.
Quoting Andrew4Handel
That's not possible. You either empathise with the victim of harm and conclude that it's wrong, or you just imitate how a moral agent would react. The latter is possible, but exceptional, and I don't believe that you're an exception. Are you a psychopath?
Quoting Andrew4Handel
Without that premise the argument would be unsound. Moral judgement necessarily has a foundation in moral feeling. You're trying to argue that an empty imitation is the real thing, but it isn't. If you scrap the essence of moral judgement, then it's no longer moral judgement.
Quoting Andrew4Handel
I don't believe that you have a failure to emotionally respond to harm or that you believe that all behaviour is acceptable. I believe that you're like me and most others, as that's most likely. That means that you're a moral agent who makes moral judgements, and moral judgements founded in moral feeling. Since moral objectivism is unwarranted, that leaves moral subjectivism as the best explanation, due to the lack of explanatory power you get with moral nihilism.
Quoting Andrew4Handel
If you admit that it had a problem that you no longer have, then, all else being equal, it follows that your current outlook is better. It's common sense that less problematic is better.
Quoting Andrew4Handel
There's no absolute need. If that's what you mean, then we agree, but I consider that to be trivial. Otherwise, "don't [i]need[/I] to" in order to... [I]what[/I]? Obviously you needed to in order to resolve the problem you were having, yes?
Quoting Andrew4Handel
What you seem to be failing to realise is that experiencing the harm is not enough. You can experience the harm and yet feel indifferent to it. Obviously you need to experience the harm and react with negative moral emotions in order to judge it as morally wrong, and by that I really do mean moral judgement and not an empty imitation of moral judgement.
Quoting Andrew4Handel
The thing is, if it truly is an amoral issue, then it's irrelevant here in the context of ethics, so you shouldn't even be bringing it up here. In this context, why should I care?
Quoting Andrew4Handel
No, because this relates to your confusion of meta-ethics and normative ethics. Again, I'm not making a normative claim about emotion, like saying that the more emotional, the better; or that one should be more emotional. I'm making a fundamental descriptive claim about moral judgements, namely that they have a necessary foundation in moral feeling. Meta-ethics is about what's the case, and appealing to emotion is a fallacy in that context, hence my effort to leave emotion out in that context. But in a normative context, sure, emotions are pretty important. We need moral feelings like repulsion, guilt, and righteousness to guide us, but they're only a guide, not a foolproof method. Your argument against this is very poor, because you only point to things like your own experience of having a change in moral feeling over time, which isn't sufficient grounds to either reject or seriously damage the theory. I can take that on board and my position would still be stronger than whatever supposed alternative you think you've got.