Moore, Open Questions and ...is good.
"...is good" is simple and unanalysable, according to Moore.
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/moore-moral/
Moral judgements, like all judgements, are true, or they are false. This follows from their predicate-subject form.
Moral propositions imply an action. That is, one ought act in accord with true moral propositions.
Consider a particular naturalist claim, such as that “x is good” is equivalent to “x is pleasure.” If this claim were true, Moore argued, the judgement “Pleasure is good” would be equivalent to “Pleasure is pleasure,” yet surely someone who asserts the former means to express more than that uninformative tautology. The same argument can be mounted against any other naturalist proposal: even if we have determined that something is what we desire to desire or is more evolved, the question whether it is good remains “open,” in the sense that it is not settled by the meaning of the word “good.”
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/moore-moral/
Moral judgements, like all judgements, are true, or they are false. This follows from their predicate-subject form.
Moral propositions imply an action. That is, one ought act in accord with true moral propositions.
Comments (1174)
Okay, but how would that work. We can point to someone helping a little old lady across the street. We can point to someone giving food to someone who is hungry. We can point to someone groping someone else in the subway. We can point to someone shooting someone else, etc. It's a fact that all of those behaviors occur as we point to them. Where is "murder is bad" etc. in those actions?
Quoting Baden
I'd not call them moral/immoral. Morality is judgments we make about (usually) interpersonal behavior that we consider to be more significant than etiquette.
I'm not sure I understand what you're getting at there. A theory or a law that morality only occurs in a particular location?
:100:
:lol:
Quoting VagabondSpectre
Just a thought: maybe it would be helpful if you scrapped the figurative lingo? Is it necessary? Is it a hindrance to understanding?
Nahhh... the easy stuff is done; morality is subjective, mentally located, if that is how one thinks of it. Philosophy, never one to leave well enough alone, still wants to ask, how is it that it is (However it is thought) and why should it be that way.
Otherwise, we talk about what we accept without sufficient explanation as to why we accept it the way we do.
I made that same point about the requirement of an additional principle as well, and that its application is a subjective matter.
The objectivity I referred to acknowledging would boil down to something like: (the fact that) I feel this way about it. Or, like I said, something along the lines that acting contrary to your goals is detrimental to achieving those goals. These are not relevant for moral subjectivism in the context that matters.
That I feel this way about it is only objective in the sense of being a fact which doesn't depend on the subjective whatevers of anyone else, or even some if not all of my own subjective whatevers, like what I think. All that would matter is how I feel, which is both subjective and objective in different senses.
Quoting Terrapin Station
Quoting Baden
Quoting Terrapin Station
So, the brain state is morality but there is no moral / immoral to brain states? Where can you find the moral / immoral then?
Just trying to clarify here.
Ah--yeah, that makes sense, but I'd say it's another topic from what I've been focusing on.
I like to do one small step at a time . . . especially because, as we've seen, it can be like pulling teeth even to get that done. :razz:
In other words, "It is morally wrong to murder," ontologically, is a brain state.
"It is morally wrong to have the brain state that it's wrong to murder" is not what I'd call a moral stance, since morality is about interpersonal behavior and having a brain state isn't interpersonal behavior. While someone could feel some way about brain states qua brain states re whether they're moral or not, I wouldn't call that morality, and it would be very unusual. We don't usually make moral judgments about brain states. We usually make moral judgments about interpersonal behavior.
Quoting Baden
I use subjective to refer to mental phenomena. Mental phenomena are a subset of brain states. There are brain states that don't amount to mental phenomena. An obvious example is the brain of a dead person. But there are states of living persons that don't amount to mental phenomena, too.
Like New York? That's a state of living persons, and I know where it's located. It's in Russia. You know, the other Russia. Not the Russia with a balding dictator, the Russia with a balding would-be dictator who is orange.
Nice diagram.
Cheers, I thought we might have some visual learners among the critics here, but...
I'm with @S here, because I can't see any sense in the idea that the objective/ subjective distinction "fails". As I see it, in the moral context the distinction is merely between what pertains to subjects; i.e. intentionality, self-awareness, a sense of personal responsibility, and so on, in other words, thoughts and feelings, and what does not, in other words what is just the general objective (physical) conditions and constraints on events.
Also, I think too much is often made of the social-constructedness of subjects; I prefer to think of subjects as socially mediated, as well as biologically mediated and physically constrained. So, yes, of course subjects are more or less subject to objective constraints and conditions, but it is the subjective dimension of thinking and feeling which is the one defining attribute of a moral subject. It is thinking in terms of this subjective dimension that allows us to make sense of moral behavior. If all you want to say is that there is no hermetic separation between the subjective and objective then I would agree with that; but that would be to agree to something which seems trivially obvious.
Wait, I think I get it. Morality is a badly drawn cone?
I couldn’t help myself. First thing I thought was, time-like and space-like morality? Whaaaa???
Sorry. I’m all better now.
It's at least amusing that the two criticisms of the idea of problematizing the subject(ive)/object(ive) distinction re morality are:
1) That's ridiculous!
2) That's trivially obvious!
You are hopelessly befuddled*. Morality is not reducible to biology any more than concepts like 'marriage', 'money' etc, or more to the point, "beauty", "virtue", "the good" and so on. (Speaking of the trivially obvious... )
*Exhibit A in subject(ive)/object(ive) befuddlement:
Quoting Terrapin Station
The complement nonmental phenomena to subjective experiences are brain states, which are physical configurations of a biological brain. i.e. We can observe/measure brain states with instruments. They are in that sense part of the 'objective' realm.
But:
Quoting Baden
Quoting Terrapin Station
And:
Quoting Terrapin Station
Not to mention:
Quoting Terrapin Station
(!)
Ah, I see what you're doing. This is "payback". I made fun of your diagram by purposefully acting as though I had grossly misunderstood it, and you're now doing the same thing with my criticism of your criticism of the subjective-objective distinction.
Do you genuinely disagree with me, though? And if so, what's the significance of our disagreement? Earlier, you said that we were talking past each other. And I said that you were missing the point. Are you sure that we can't come to a reasonable agreement about the subjective-objective distinction?
Do you accept that some "things" are subjective and some "things" are objective? Like, say, judgement and rocks?
The evidence of those implicit values is that a model assuming them makes successful predictions (and, in addition, is explanatory). Suppose that Bob has a bottle of water and a bottle of poison on the bench and that he is thirsty. The bottles are clearly identified. I predict that Bob will drink from the bottle of water, not the bottle of poison. I would predict this, even without knowing Bob or asking him what his preferences are.
As the above attests to, Kant carved up the world very differently to Aristotle. For Aristotle, eudaimonia is a state of well-being only achieved by practicing virtue.
Consider the example I used earlier of the coin counterfeiter. He may appear to be doing well for himself and might eventually die at a ripe old age without ever being found out. But he did not achieve eudaimonia since that requires one to practice virtue.
Conversely someone may practice virtue but thus far failed to have achieved eudaimonia due to injustice or misfortune and not through any fault of their own.
Consider the analogy to a running event. One has to both follow the rules of the event and cross the finish line to successfully complete it. Neither someone who cheats nor someone that pulls out injured meets that criteria (though obviously for very different reasons).
Morality is an abstraction (or pattern or form), not a concrete particular like the above things. However it is an abstraction over particulars and natural processes and so is similarly natural. As a familiar example of a natural abstraction, consider the center of mass in physics.
The particulars in the case of morality are actions like murdering people and kicking puppies. These actions occur in the natural world.
So the issue, I think, is not one of natural versus artificial, but of whether there is a natural moral standard that is well-motivated (and useful) versus standards that are artificial (or subjective).
Which is where Schelling points come in. But I'll leave it there for now in case you disagree with any of the above.
The full argument may not be there yet. But I think we should be able to say that the good has something to do with (sentient) life and well-being. A kicked puppy is not a happy puppy.
Just as knowledge has something to do with belief, reasons and truth, even if it is not straightforwardly reducible to those things (as Gettier showed).
Yes. And even if they do not naturally feel that value (such as with sociopaths and psychopaths) we still expect them to learn and act on that value. Just as we expect a colorblind person to stop at red traffic lights.
Quoting Janus
That's fine. But I understand the Will to Power as a wholesale rejection of morality, not a tinkering at the edges. Do I have that wrong?
That's not evidence in support of your claims where there is disagreement. We know that most people value their lives, so Bob will probably choose the water over the poison. That's implicit, sure. As in, Bob hasn't made this explicit, and he doesn't need to for us to accurately predict his behaviour. But I don't think that anyone will disagree with you about that.
Here's the disagreement. What Bob values is just what Bob values. You haven't shown that this is evidence of a value independent of what it is [i]behind[/I] the human valuing, namely preference and feeling. Bob probably gets enjoyment out of his life and is not suicidal. Otherwise, he might well choose the poison.
Things in nature have a centre of mass, and that's objective. It doesn't even seem to make sense to say that things in nature have a morality. Objectively? Whereabouts on a rock is a rock's morality? And a natural moral standard seems completely unsubstantiated and a leap in logic, assuming that even makes sense and is not a category error.
I accept that there is a sense in which everything is natural, but not if you make a mutually exclusive distinction between natural and artificial, which is a useful distinction. Suggesting that everything is natural, on the other hand, is not very useful at all. When you brought up monetary value earlier, that's an example of something artificial. Morality, at the very least, definitely has an artificial aspect. We came up with "good" and "bad", moral language, moral rules, moral principles, etc. We came up with moral concepts. If you point to behaviour, and to acts, like, say, kicking a puppy, then that's all you're pointing to: behaviour, actions, a puppy, a person. Where's the morality to be found there, independently, as though it has a place in nature? That strikes me as absurd. If we dissect the kicked puppy, will we discover wrongness inside of it? How could we even test your theory? If I objectively examine kicking puppies, I do not find morality there. I would only find things that you can find in things like physics and biology, like the physics of movement and the biology of canines. I would necessarily have to take into my account subjectivity to find morality stuff. You just seem to be projecting, to be anthropomorphising.
The issue is not whether there is a natural moral standard that is well-motivated and useful versus standards that are artificial or subjective. That's getting ahead of yourself. Well-motivated and useful is irrelevant at this stage where the very suggestion that there's a natural moral standard is in question. How many angels can dance on the head of a pin?
An approach that might work is looking at capabilities. Martha Nausbaum. Usable stuff.
That's all pretty obvious. It's additional claims and where you take this which could be problematic. Phrases like "has to do with", "looking at", and "usable" would need to be drawn out.
That's how i understand it. Stepping beyond good and evil, to bring about what it is that one wills.
"x is not reducible to biology" . . . that's a claim. What's the support of it?
Concepts are reducible to biology. They're mental phenomena.
Quoting Baden
I'm a physicalist, an identity theorist. Some brain states are mental states. Some brain states are not mental states. "Subjective" refers to mental states. So it refers to those brain states that are mental states. "Objective" is the complement--everything that exists that's not a mental state--so nonmental brain states, ocean states, office desk states, etc.
I wouldn't say that subjective things are necessarily brain states, by the way, just because mental phenomena might be able to obtain in other substances/structures. We don't know if that's going to turn out to be possible or not, but it very well could be.
Re the series of quotes you reposted, you didn't say anything about them. Maybe be a little more verbose why you're reposting that stuff?
Why couldn't it be that you're predicting what his preferences will probably be, based on knowledge of most persons' preferences?
Yeah, the counterfeiter made the Kantian “better calculation”, and if never found out, there is reason to suspect he was quite thoroughly pleased with himself, and only immoral upon reflection by another.
Nevertheless, the major names in moral/ethical philosophy are usually left with either assuming a naturally innate human quality in order to alleviate rational infinite regress, or, posit an innate human rational faculty with the specific job of alleviating rational infinite regress. For Aristotle, virtue, for Descartes, the evil demon, for Hume sentiment, for Kant the good of the will, Schopenhauer compassion....and so on.
Good.
Quoting S
I was getting at the question of method.
Some conceptions are of that which exist in their entirety prior to being conceived. That holds for goodness. Thus, we find ourselves asking the question, or a similar one...
If goodness were nothing more than our own personal like/dislikes or something similar that arises from metacognitive endeavors, then it would be existentially dependent upon language, as would our knowledge of it. There would be no difference.
There is.
I think Nietzsche was concerned with a "revaluation of all values" not a rejection of all values. I read Nietzsche as rejecting what he called "slave morality", which he saw as being based on "ressentiment", and I think his ethics is aestheticised, in rejecting any moral formulae. So, certainly his work is a "wholesale rejection" of moral rules, but I would not say it is a rejection of morality tout court.
It's a mystery to me what that might be saying/what it might amount to.
Quoting creativesoul
Likes/dislikes arise from metacognitive endeavors? No idea there, either.
Quoting creativesoul
Likes/dislikes are existentially dependent on language, as is knowledge of likes/dislikes? Again a mystery.
Now I’m not sure that that is an ethical system.
I don't think Nietzsche accepted the validity of systems; where systems are understood to be universal, overarching. It doesn't follow from that that his thinking was not systematic.
I also think there's a significant difference between saying that morality consists in rules and saying that it consists in judgements. Even if it is thought in terms of rules, though, one could have rules that one consistently follows in relation to one's own moral feeling and judgement that determine one's moral behavior, without expecting anyone else to follow those rules; one's rules are for oneself alone; and to each their own.
And one might change one's feelings and then change one's judgements and the rules that proceed from them, and that might from the outside appear as an inconsistency, whereas it is actually a matter of remaining consistent with one's moral feeling. It would be like changing one's aesthetic tastes. The key to understanding Nietzsche is that for him everything is a matter of aesthetics.
Maybe a later day...
You mentioned concepts. I suggest that you be a bit better prepared to defend the notion next time.
In short... we discover some things. Moreover, that which is discovered exists in it's entirety upon it's discovery. That is not to say that no thing discovered evolves afterwards. All things do and morality 'grows' solely by virtue of it's constitution(thought/belief). Morality existed, in a much less 'refined' way(compared to historical and current moral discourse), prior to our naming and talking about it.
There's much to be learned along such lines of thought.
Never mind the rest, it was poorly put.
Indeed. It consists in part of both. It consists entirely of thought/belief about acceptable/unacceptable thought, belief, and(mostly) behaviour including but most certainly not limited to statements thereof.
Well it is in layman's terms, not typically in philosophical circles though, I would venture to guess...
Typically, as I understand it, the difference between morality and ethics, is that ethics involves what to do when we're faced with conflicting moralities(conflicting belief about acceptable/unacceptable behaviour).
Perhaps it might boil down to someone, somewhere, offering a better - more adequate - definition(delineation). That would need to include how it emerges unbeknownst to us at the time(because it does), and be capable of explaining how it evolves over time(because it does).
There needs to be a universally relevant, rightfully applicable account of that which underwrites all of the subjective particulars 'across the board'. That which is most important to us all. I've always held that that was to be gleaned through careful examination of language acquisition itself, including how all of us adopt our first worldview, replete with our first moral belief system.
We can even dig a bit deeper than that, and be justified in doing so.
As a term of judgment, it is equivalent to what the user finds good/acceptable. It indicates an approval according to their own moral belief system. I most often use it to refer to a particular class or kind of thought, belief, and/or statement. This is commonly done by everyone using the phrase "moral discourse" to indicate the subject matter. I also just classified a kind of belief(moral belief system) earlier in this very paragraph.
We come up with all sorts of names for all sorts of things. It quite simply does not follow from that that all of those things are artificial.
Trees come to mind as an obvious example, or rocks, if you prefer. These are obviously not equivalent to our notions/conceptions of them, obviously not artificial. They are physical things. Only a moron would think that they are existentially dependent upon our names for them, or that they were artificial.
However, there are other things that are not physical objects that we've named, talked about, conceived, and misconceived even. Human thought and belief is one such thing. Morality consists entirely thereof. Thus, if one does not understand the former, there can be little hope of understanding the latter.
Our moral concepts, ideas, rules, and principles can be mistaken/false.
Yep.
We will disagree on rules, since private rules are not rules or not private. That's another discussion.
What's interesting here, at least for me, is not the exegesis so much as the notion of someone who has no interest in right and wrong. What might that look like?
From my meta-ethical position morality only exists to service existing human values, which is why when given conduct is detrimental to the relevant values in question, it makes some sense to refer to it as "immoral". A more technical way of putting it would be that some actions are more moral than others (or, some actions are more immoral than others) because they serve or damage existing moral values to lesser and greater degrees. If an action leads to worse outcomes than abstaining from that action, it's not hard to conceive of it as a morally inferior action. However, I think this is largely a semantic difference rather than a meaningful meta-ethical one.
Quoting S
You're right, but once we have agreed on a basic moral framework (i.e: it's meant to be a cooperative strategy which serves our moral values), there's still quite a bit of room left for strong moral suasion; the subjectivity/relativity of our moral values is only as harmful to moral practice as there is range and variability between them. Keeping in mind that morality is a strategy in service to human moral values, moral agreements, acts, or principles which more effectively serve those values which are more common (and more highly valued in our various value-hierarchies), are statistically more useful as moral heuristics, and objectively more useful in specific situations where the relevant values are in-fact shared. Where our primary moral values do in fact differ (but don't compete) we're left with a similar task of finding moral strategies which accommodate a diversity of human values more effectively.
Where we have mutually exclusive primary moral values (e.g: puppy kicking vs no puppy kicking), the best we can do is challenge and attempt to influence each other's values. It might seem like a craps-shoot, but since most people do share higher order values (e.g: the desire to go on living), it is often possible to manipulate (with reason) lower order values by appealing to higher order ones. In reality (I think) our value-hierarchies are rapidly fluctuating and poorly considered, making them lucrative targets for persuasion and elucidation, be it rational or manipulative.
Playing that game of moral suasion is sometimes an exercise in objective truth (e.g: should I vaccinate my child?), but it is very often an exercise in objective inductive reasoning (eg: How do we know our moral values are internally consistent? How do we know our moral conduct comports with our desired moral outcomes? How do we negotiate an environment filled with agents with sometimes disparate and competing values (i.e: what is the extent of the mutually beneficial cooperative strategies that we can undertake?). If we tried to answer the question "what should we do?" scientifically (given starting values as brute facts), then these are broad questions we would seek to answer.
Ultimately, if a difference in conflicting moral values cannot be negotiated with reason, then appeal to emotion. If it cannot be negotiated with emotion, then the remaining options seem to be forfeit, compromise, stalemate, or attack. Yes, people do sometimes go down fighting for their moral values, but in how many of these cases did emotion or the absence of reason play the major role? Values disparity might be a problem for the universality of our answers to specific moral situations, but it is not a significant problem for the practical utility of moral systems themselves given how infrequently sound moral reasoning from well ordered values actually necessitates violent conflict or even mutually exclusive values.
Quoting S
I'm defining what normative ethics is from my meta-ethical standpoint. I'm also rebuking the "it's all just preference" line. In truth our preferences are mostly aligned, and the majority of moral dilemmas we're faced with pertain to figuring out how or committing to maximizing our nearly universally shared values in the first place. Our best moral theories are merely inductive and approximate models (of ideal strategies) but so are our best scientific theories (inductive and approximate models of observable phenomenon). It might seem trivial to you to persuasively show that normative ethics matters (and that it requires objective reasoning), but in the midst of strong relativism bordering on nihilism I don't think it's that trivial (not pointing fingers). One of the major sentiments that fuels moral absolutism is the knee-jerk fear people encounter when they consider that right and wrong might be in some way conditional, relative, or subjective (and therefore truthless/meaningless).
Quoting S
Any specific normative content I put forward was really only meant as a demonstration of objectively reasoning moral conduct from starting values.
Quoting S
I took him to mean "we" as in "we the interested parties" (as opposed to everyone who ever lived). Meta-ethically, morality isn't just about what's best for the individual, it's what's best for the individual in an environment filled with other individuals. Without at some point, in some way, considering the "we", the game of morality cannot begin; otherwise it's just competition.
The only way you'd guess that is by not being very familiar with academic philosophy. "Ethics" is conventionally the name used for the field of philosophy. What do we study in that field? Everything that anyone calls "ethics" or "morals/morality/moral philosophy."
So you believe that concepts somehow exist prior to people constructing them?
I sort of wonder at the thought of someone who has no interest in right and wrong. To put it bluntly anyone who has an articulated opinion such that they are beyond good and evil or that they are nihilists sort of betrays in that act that they are more interested in right and wrong than most people are.
So I wonder if you mean someone who has reflected upon these issues and come to such a conclusion, or if you mean a sort of person who simply is the ubermensch?
One interesting thought Nietzsche put forward in criticizing himself, -- which he often does -- was that Jesus was such a man because he broke the tablet of values before him and reforged the image of goodness for everyone.
Firstly, I don't see why an individual could not have a private set of rules that governs their moral behavior. Although of course there are common rules governing moral behavior many people who think for themselves probably have their own unique sets of such rules. There is no need for, or perhaps any possibility of, any of the rules that make up such individually unique sets of rules to be absolutely original, either. Is that just the point you wanted to make?
Secondly, I don't think Nietzsche can rightly be characterized as someone who had no interest in right and wrong: he could be said to have no interest in general rules of right and wrong, though, that would fit I think.
Quoting Janus
On the face of it, I don't see that anything but a general rule could be properly called a rule. The general form of a rule is perhaps a conditional: If X do Y; and the "if X" bit is general.
Further, if what is proposed is to be a moral rule, it perhaps has an additional clause such that anyone who finds themselves in situation X ought do Y.
Hence I think there is good reason to take Nietzsche as doing ethics, but not playing the game of morality.
note that I'm adopting the usual terminology such that ethics is the study of what we ought do, while morality is a set of rules about what we ought do.
So an empirical model (in my view) should not only be predictive, but also explanatory. If Bob drinks the water then, on the model's premise that life and well-being are valuable for human beings, there is nothing that needs explaining. Whereas if Bob drinks the poison, then that does need an explanation. Perhaps Bob drank the poison simply because Bob wanted to drink the poison. But that's an a priori answer one could give for any behavior that someone exhibits, however strange, and so doesn't really give us any insight into what is going on.
Whereas the above model demands a deeper (causal) explanation that is consistent with its assumptions. For example, did Bob misread the labels, or did he have a mental illness, or an incurable disease that caused him great suffering? If a satisfactory explanation can be discovered, then we have potentially learned something new (about the accidental conditions that change its predictions) and the model has been useful. If no satisfactory explanation can be found, then we have a puzzle. Perhaps we just haven't figured out the explanation yet, or perhaps there is a problem with the model. If so, is there a better model?
Quoting S
Yes, I'm pointing to human actions. If Joe murders Bill then Joe's action is wrong. That's a perfectly ordinary example using a moral predicate.
What makes a specific action moral (or not) is a function of what is universally valuable for human beings (namely, life and well-being).
To make a parallel with your paragraph above, suppose Alice claims that it is raining outside. If you point to behaviour, and to acts, like, say, claiming it is raining, then that's all you're pointing to: behaviour, speech acts, rain. Where's the truth to be found there, independently, as though it has a place in nature?
Yet we do say that Alice's claim is true (or not) independent of her preferences or opinions on the matter.
Quoting Terrapin Station
If one simply prefers whatever one does, then the model will predict preferences as well. But the purpose of that model is to predict (and explain) behavior.
I notice that she incorporates Aristotle and eudaimonism in her work. So it seems we are in the same ball park.
Quoting Mww
And similarly for a runner who cheats to win a race.
What I'm getting at here is that contrary to the counterfeiter's self-serving calculation, a moral calculation factors in the life and well-being of all relevant agents. The counterfeiter could have done that, but chose to reject it. For everyday purposes, most of us can correctly figure out what actions are moral most of the time. For Aristotle, moral action becomes habitual through practicing virtue.
Quoting Janus
The problem as I see it is that it is easy for people to be self-serving about what they feel. If Joe feels that he must kill Bill then, as far as Nietzsche is concerned, he should go for it, rules be damned. Aesthetics would seem to replace morality (and reason).
I can't see why someone could not have a moral rule for themselves that takes the general form of 'if X do Y'. I mean it would more accurately be expressed as 'If x then I do Y'.
So, I can't see why that could not be proposed as a rule that applies only to myself, and it could, but need not, have the additional clause you are suggesting. If it did have that additional clause then it would be intended as a general rule, but not otherwise.
I think Nietzsche would say that Joe should have a very good reason to kill Bill, and not act compulsively as a slave to passion, because such a disposition is not beautiful; it lacks aesthetic quality. Have you actually read much Nietzsche?
Not for a long time, but I'm happy to be convinced to take another look.
Do you think the crime of the century (a robbery, say) would count as having aesthetic quality? Well thought out and perfectly executed.
What I'm trying to understand is whether Nietzsche ends up endorsing a defensible morality or whether his aesthetics take him some place else.
I don't think Nietzsche can be read as endorsing any general set of moral rules. He certainly does have an aesthetic notion of something like "greatness of spirit" so I think that he would assess any act that he understood to be lacking greatness of spirit as being morally bankrupt; perhaps he might see it as a petty act driven instead by ressentiment, jealousy or envy, for example.
I think Nietzsche is definitely concerned with ethics, with how to live, and his general answer would be something like: 'live a rich, beautiful and noble life'. He perhaps would have admired a "great" robbery.
As an aside: I think Hegel also rejects the notion of "moral rules". I seem to recall reading a passage in one of his works to the effect that where there are rules, there is no morality; the idea being that morality depends on conscience and conscience in turn depends on moral intuition.
Of course Hegel's reasoning is very different to Nietzsche's, since the former was no supporter of individualist thinking. Hegel assumes that a properly rational subject will be motivated by moral intuition and conscience; and perhaps there are affinities here with Aristotle's "phronesis" or practical wisdom. I think this idea of practical wisdom can also be tied in with Heidegger's notion of "authenticity", and the general existentialist idea of owning one's personal responsibility.
Rather, our conventional notions/conceptions of morality are constructs of language. All conceptions of morality involve in some way or other what counts as acceptable/unacceptable behaviour. I would argue that we already have some crude sense of acceptable/unacceptable behaviour prior to language acquisition.
No. All concepts are language constructs. I hold that not everything conceived of is. Some concepts have referents that exist in their entirety prior to our naming and describing them. Morality is one such thing. Truth(as correspondence) another. Meaning yet another. Thought/belief as well.
Like a performative contradiction, yeah?
The Great Moustache was most certainly more obsessed with the God of Abraham than many believers.
Nuh. I'm on the cricket pitch. :razz:
Fundamentally just a moral feeling then, upon which explicit moral injunctions are based and elaborated?
I'm more comfortable not calling it a "moral" feeling. More like rudimentary thought/belief about acceptable/unacceptable behaviour. These would include 'feelings', simple emotions. 'Feelings' are necessary but insufficient for thought/belief, moral thought/belief notwithstanding.
Moral injunctions seem a bit too complex for a pre-linguistic human. Although, I am attempting to provide a basis from which such complexities 'grow'...
The way I see it a moral feeling at simplest would just be an un-selfconscious disposition to behave towards others in ways motivated by empathy or compassion
Nothing there that I would balk at... I just avoid the 'feeling' talk. I think it is no where near as nuanced as it need be. But yeah, I agree that compassion/empathy matters.
I don't know why you would want to avoid talk about feeling. Compassion and empathy are fundamentally feelings no matter how conceptually elaborated they might be.
I agree that without emotion there is neither compassion nor empathy. Emotion is necessary but insufficient for both. It takes thought/belief about another's situation/circumstance... understanding unspoken cues(facial expressions like wincing in pain, etc). Thought/belief like that includes emotion, as does thought/belief about acceptable/unacceptable behaviour.
Most talk about 'feelings' I find very unhelpful.
Say wha?
In other words, the reason he picks one over the other is because of his preferences. You don't have to personally query his preferences to make a prediction about which he'll choose with a great chance of success, because that's such a common preference. But that doesn't imply that it's not about a preference he has.
We don't agree re concepts being language constructs, but what I'm interested in is what you're taking to be evidence of morality existing outside of/prior to the concept of it.
That's simply terminological whims. The different terms aren't picking out different phenomena. They're simply different terms.
Unless we want to know what we're referring to ontologically re something being valuable. That is, we want to know what's going on ontologically to make that the case if it is.
You can proceed where you don't care about it so you're just not going to bother figuring out what's going on ontologically there, but we can be interested in it. That's what I've been focusing on.
Observing that pre-linguistic humans find certain behaviours unacceptable.
No. You're mistaken. If the terms picked out the same things, I wouldn't have an issue. They don't, so I do.
Ah, so not agreeing that concepts are (necessarily) linguistic becomes important here.
Are you referring to infants, by the way?
Quoting creativesoul
When I talk about feelings in a moral context the above is what I'm referring to. So it's simply using different terms to refer to the same thing.
Even more important is what counts as being necessary.
The above is a textbook example of a situation where an author's ground is purely imaginary. That's not totally unacceptable, unless it is ground for positive assertions that mistakenly presuppose understanding another's language use. You've done exactly that.
The irony here is thick.
You've no idea what the use of "thought/belief" entails on my view. Since you cannot know that, you cannot know that your talk about feelings in a moral context points to and/or further describes the same referent(s) as my notion of thought/belief about acceptable/unacceptable behaviour.
I can assure you that it does not.
You denied shared meaning in a debate with me on another forum(hence - the source of irony), maybe a year ago? Unless you've changed positions since that debate, our respective positions are irreconcilable. If that still holds good - if you still deny shared meaning - there is no possible way to reconcile your view with mine, for I am committed to a notion of thought and belief that quite simply is incommensurate with such a denial.
You may be lucky and guess what "thought/belief" entails on my view, but you cannot possibly know that - as of right now - either.
In short...
The above is false.
One cannot even suppose that another is lying unless s/he already has a worldview. During initial language acquisition, one does not. There is no ability for such a student to be able to doubt much of anything that they're being taught, including social mores, customs, value systems, etc.
All of these things are true of each and every one of us, regardless of that which is subject to familial, historical, social, cultural, and/or other particulars.
Is this relevant to moral discourse?
It certainly serves as ground to reject contradictory claims/positions.
It certainly places a more appropriate amount of value upon sincerity. Every worldview is existentially dependent upon all these things. These things are all necessary elemental constituents of all world-views.
Sincerity matters to everyone.
Meaning matters to everyone.
When one promises to plant rose garden, there ought be a rose garden planted, not because one ought keep one's word(which they ought), but rather because that is precisely what the promise means when spoken sincerely. That is not a vote of approval/disapproval coming from me. Rather, it is quite simply stating the way promises work in common language. That's what making a promise means.
The reason Bob would drink the water and not the poison is because he has a physiological need for water. It would not normally even cross one's mind to drink poison, one would instinctively drink the water. He's not deciding between ice cream flavors.
At any rate, the model explicitly predicts what Bob will do, whatever is the case regarding his preferences. And what one does occurs in the world, not in one's mind.
Quoting Terrapin Station
I think you misunderstood my comment. Human beings have physiological needs including the need for food and water, therefore food and water is valuable for humans.
So there's nothing that needs explaining if Bob drinks the water. That's just the expected outcome. Bob drinks the water because that satisfies his physiological need for water.
Just as a horse needs water in order to survive. It doesn't have to prefer it or value it (if horses can do such things), it just has to drink it.
In other words when I talk about "feelings" re what we're doing when we make utterances about morality, I'm talking about "thought/belief about acceptable/unacceptable behaviour." If you think that my usage of "feelings" is saying something different than what I'd be saying with "thought/belief about acceptable/unacceptable behavior," then you're not understanding how I'm using the terms.
This has nothing to do with shared/not-shared meaning. Meaning is something different than usage and definitions.
Ok. so we both know that we work from different linguistic frameworks. The words "thought/belief about acceptable/unacceptable behaviour" has a different referent on your view than mine. That may not cause issue. We are aware of it.
Concepts then...
I claim that they are all existentially dependent upon language. The concept of morality is no different. All concepts are. You say otherwise.
Let's flesh it out keeping it relevant to morality.
I don't know if that's the case, though, unless you're using belief to necessarily refer to (beliefs) about externals.
You should know, because I'm telling you. What I'm telling you is true. It is about my understanding of thought/belief compared to what you've written here regarding thought/belief. Thus, if you believe me, then you'll know.
Quoting Terrapin Station
Feelings are not thought/belief.
I would be willing to bet that what you claim here cannot pass the test of salva veritate. That is, if what you say here is true, then one ought be able to replace all your use of the term "feelings" with "thought/belief about acceptable/unacceptable behaviour" in all the situations where you are making utterances about morality, and the transformation not suffer any loss of meaning. I seriously doubt that that would be the case...
That's irrelevant really.
Do you want to get into concepts? I would argue that all concepts are existentially dependent upon language. All concepts are linguistic constructs, whereas not everything conceived of is.
Morality, as it is conventionally understood is the rules of acceptable/unacceptable behaviour. That's the basic conventional conception. Here I would argue that we already have some crude unrefined thought/belief about acceptable/unacceptable behaviour long prior to learning how to talk about it. It would only follow that thought/belief about acceptable/unacceptable behaviour is prior to our conception(s) called "morality". We form and hold such thought/belief prior to our ability to describe our thought/belief.
Here's what I'm getting at--I probably wasn't being verbose enough about this:
Say that your referent of "thoughts/beliefs about acceptable/unacceptable behavior" is ?.
Well, your referent of "feelings" in a context of talking about what we're basing morality on wouldn't be ? then, it would be ?, since the two terms in quotation marks refer to something different in your view.
So, I was asking how you'd know that my referent of "thoughts/beliefs about acceptable/unacceptable behavior" isn't ?.
You can't know based on me saying that that's what I'm referring to with "feelings" in a moral context, because my referent for that could be ?, too. Which would imply that we differ on the referent for "feelings" in this context instead. (Or, you were taking me to be talking about something with "feelings" other than what I was talking about.)
Quoting creativesoul
Are you saying so that grammatically it would work just the same? Or are you allowing that I'd have to change grammatical structures at times, perhaps, to make it grammatically conventional? And the "meaning doesn't change" in whose opinion?
When I'm talking about this sort of stuff--same for when I'm talking about time being identical to change/motion, I'm never making a claim about conventional language usage. I'm doing ontology. I'm not arguing about common language usage.
Quoting creativesoul
If you want to. I already said that I don't agree with that.
Here's an easy example. I have a concept of "building houses" when musicians are playing together, especially in a jazz context. My concept of that isn't at all dependent on language. It's an abstract concept about ways of playing together/interacting with other musicians (again especially in a jazz context). I could very roughly attempt to put it into words, but that would be rather ad hoc and sloppy. It's not a linguistic concept.
Quoting creativesoul
I don't agree with that either. I'm not necessarily asserting the negation. The problem is that we don't have the survey data we'd need to really be able to assert this. It's just as plausible that morality is conventionally understood as judgments about interpersonal behavior a la acceptable/unacceptable, etc., where those judgments include the idea of rules per se, but where rules do not exhaust it--it includes many things that aren't rules, too. Under this, it would be a moral issue if someone feels that it's acceptable or not for a particular person to act in a particular unique way towards another particular person, even if no one is formulating a rule about that. My suspicion is that that's a far more common way of thinking about what morality is.
There's also the issue of what's going on functionally with respect to how people use terms (like morality/ethics), where that can be different than persons' beliefs and conceptions about something a la how they'd define morality, what they'd state is going on in their opinion, etc.
The above is prima facie evidence of misunderstanding being hard at work.
All thought/belief(my referent) consists of the same basic set of necessary elemental constituents. Necessity is determined by existential dependency. Thought/belief cannot be properly accounted for and/or reported upon by a single variable. A single variable cannot properly account for a plurality of things.
You should know because I am telling you. I am offering a report based upon true statements about my thought/belief system... my worldview.
Look it up at SEP. Definition of morality.
Your agreement isn't necessary. The conventional understanding exists regardless. I'm granting it for the sake of accepting current convention somewhere.
Why not start there? I mean, it seems as good a place as any. If you would rather not make our discussion about a position that neither of us hold, then that's fine by me too.
:wink:
If you would like to have me go over another conception of morality, say yours?... I would be more than glad to. I've been reporting upon lots of different aspects of my own thought/belief about the subject matter. You could always ask an interesting question about that as well. So, there are all sorts of good options at our disposal.
Here's something we disagree upon...
Not all utterances of ought are equivalent to voicing one's approval/disapproval of the act/behaviour in question. Some utterances of ought lend a voice to expectation. Verification is existentially dependent upon knowing what we ought or ought not see in and under certain conditions if a certain claim(statement of thought/belief) is true.
Given that you argue for emotivism. Here's a direct question.
How do you make sense of and/or reconcile everyday events when a speaker's utterance of ought is not indicative of approval?
It is often the case that when someone says "X ought happen", they are making a prediction based upon pre-existing thought/belief. They are using their own thought/belief as a means to predict the future, even if it is only in some small way. They are doing it nonetheless.
The first solar eclipse that happened after Einstein's second paper was used to make and verify a prediction about the well documented position of a particular celestial body. That is a report of the facts. Those people who were planning upon verifying knew...
They knew what they ought see if Einstein was right. They also knew what they ought not see if Einstein was right. They ought not see the same body in the same place in the sky from the earth's vantage point.
I've already argued for most all of this without subsequent attention from you.
It makes no sense whatsoever, on my view, to talk or to think/believe that 'we base morality' upon something.
Rather...
What we base our conceptions of "morality" upon... sure.
The variable was simply a way of saying "refers to whatever it refers to for you" but giving that a symbol, so that we could differentiate it from another "refers to whatever it refers to for you"
It's not as if I'm going to agree that morality is conventionally thought of as rules of conduct just because the SEP article says that if it does. What determines how something is conventionally thought of is how each individual thinks about it. However most individuals who think about x think about x (at least in population p) determines how it is conventionally thought of (at least in population p).
What the SEP entry author thinks isn't sufficient to establish how most individuals think about x.
Quoting creativesoulThat was in the post you quoted. Maybe we should avoid longer posts until we can get anything running smoothly?
Quoting creativesoul
What you're describing there is "if x is correct, then y should obtain"--what in the world does your example have to do with morality?
Rubbish.
You claimed that your use of "feelings" had the same referent as my use of "thought/belief about acceptable/unacceptable behaviour"...
It doesn't. If it does then we can remove all your use of "feelings" and replace them with "thought/belief about acceptable/unacceptable behaviour" and not lose/change the meaning of the claim.
According to whom?
That's an ill-conceived question.
If the referent of your use of "feelings" is the same as the referent of my use of "thought/belief about acceptable/unacceptable behaviour", then the meaning does not change... cannot change.
Fido ate his food.
My dog ate his food.
Your dog ate his food.
"Fido", "my dog", and "your dog" all have the same referent.
In all contexts, when I write "thought/belief about acceptable/unacceptable behaviour", thought/belief is never equivalent to feelings. That is because feelings are but one of the necessary elemental constituents of thought/belief. Feelings are never equivalent to thought/belief.
If we substitute one for the other the meaning drastically changes, because the referent and the truth conditions of the claim drastically change. All of that is point of view invariant. That's how it works. None of this is the case when the referent is the same.
Thought/belief are not equivalent to feelings.
If you cannot even accept this, there's nothing I see compelling about continuing.
Yes, which, grammatical conventions aside, we could do in a context of talking about morality.
Is an apple equivalent to an apple fritter?
Not in my usage.
That's not a good translation. A prediction need not take if/then form. Most do not... most average people's talk. Rather, these kinds of utterances of ought are the ones that place conventional understanding of morality in question.
She promised to do X. X ought be done.
That is not an indication of moral approval. Thus, not all utterances of "ought" are equivalent to voicing one's moral approval and/or feelings.
Good.
Feelings, like apples to apple pies, are necessary but insufficient for thought/belief. Both apples and feelings are an elemental constituent of a more complex constitution.
I agree with that (that a prediction need not take if/then form). However, what you described was an if/then relation, and one that had nothing to do with morality.
Quoting creativesoul
That's a preference that someone has about behavior in relation to promises. It's a way they feel. If it's moral to them, they approve of following through with promises and do not approve of not following through.
When we're talking about thought/belief in a moral context, we're talking about ways that people feel about behavior. This has nothing to do with apples/apple fritters.
No, it's not.
Not all use of "ought" is a voice of one's approval. This is particularly the case when one is giving their word, such as in promising.
I'll use Moliere's earlier example..
Say we have a gambler who owes a lot of money to a loan shark. The loan shark tells the gambler "Since you owe me and cannot pay, I promise you that your family will suffer"...
Anyone who knows what the meaning of that is knows that it ought be the case that the family will suffer.
That is not a voice of moral approval. Rather it is a voice of understanding what the words mean.
Thus, not all utterances of ought are voices of approval, or are equivalent to someone's feelings of approval about the behaviour in question.
Your position cannot account for these cases.
When we're talking about thought/belief in any context, it is never equivalent to feelings. That was the point with the analogy. I thought you bright enough to understand that.
How much would you wager on this:
We take 1,000 random people and tell them the first paragraph. They can't have knowledge of the test we're doing prior to this.
We then ask them, "Agree or disagree: it ought to be the case that the family will suffer"?
There's more to this, but what would you wager on the the majority of respondents saying "agree"? We can talk about why after you answer that.
It is re the way I'm using "feelings" in this context. That's the whole point I've been making.
Better to ask them what ought happen if the speaker keeps his promise.
How about answering what I asked you now?
Which is why I've been at pains to explain to you how your use of "feelings" is not equivalent to my use of "thought/belief about acceptable/unacceptable behaviour". Those two uses do not have the same referent.
What's an example where you'd use "thought/belief about acceptable/unacceptable behavior" where I wouldn't use "feelings" (in this moral context)?
Your question does not bear upon the argument I'm giving. Mine does.
I don't care at the moment if it does or not. I asked you a question. If you're to not be a rude a-hole, you'll answer.
What difference does that make?
None.
You conflate thought/belief and feelings.
I don't.
The apple question had everything to do with how feelings are not equivalent to thought/belief.
If there's no example of you using "thought/belief about acceptable/unacceptable behavior" where I wouldn't use "feelings" then there's no reason to believe that you're using "thought/belief about acceptable/unacceptable behavior" differently than I'm using "feelings"
Not in my view. But I answered it anyway. So how about not being a rude jerk?
If "feelings" are thought/belief about acceptable/unacceptable behaviour on your view, then you're working from a conception of thought/belief that is in stark contrast to my own. There is no better reason to believe that you're using the same terms differently.
You use y however you use it. Let's say there's no example where I'd use y in any different way.
Then, I say, "I use x so that it's identical to y." You don't at all use x that way.
That doesn't give you any grounds to say that we use y in any different way. You only know that you don't at all use x in the same way.
My argument shows that not all utterances of "ought" are equivalent to a voice of approval/disapproval.
The appropriate question to ask is the one I suggested.
I mean, it does seem quite odd to me when someone else(you in this case) insists that their use of the term feelings has the same referent as my use of thought/belief about acceptable/unacceptable behaviour even when it does not. The oddity arises not from the mistake, but rather from the insistence of telling me that I'm wrong about my own terminological use. This oddity is further perpetuated/compounded when this person remains adamant while openly voicing no interest whatsoever in understanding my position.
Without knowing both frameworks, one cannot possibly know which terms - if any - in the respective accounts share the same referent. There can be no comparison between without knowledge of both.
:sad:
Glad it wasn't just me. Good luck to anyone trying to make sense of it. I tried.
That's a misunderstanding. I wasn't talking about things, at least not things as in trees and rocks and whatnot. These are obviously things, and obviously natural things. I was talking about language and abstractions.
These are just the same bad arguments, only made by different people, or put in a different way. So now I'm expected to believe that your "wrong" is like rain? It's really easy to make a false analogy which looks the same, but has important differences which render it false or misleading.
I'm not presenting an isolated form of reasoning consisting of variables that you can simply replace with whatever you want without effecting the soundness of the reasoning. The content matters, the context matters, the differences matter.
And for the umpteenth time, you can't just take for granted what you're supposed to be trying to prove. What universal values? You haven't demonstrated any. That's the whole point.
On the second comment I would like to interject my own opinion that the word ‘good’ is a flexible term in real life where line soften blur and there are more than a few factors for every action rather than one singular desire to ‘do good’ or to desire to desire the ‘good’.
Here it is easy to repeat Meno’s error against Plato that virtue is subjective, like a child’s, a policeman’s and a retired person each ought to follow different and sometimes conflicting policies to be virtuous. It must be remembered that: different virtues like kindness, courage and even the modern meaning of virtue viz skill or talent, and such individual qualities are subjective. But virtue itself, by very definition, is objective.
Doesn't follow, unless perhaps you're using "valuable" to mean something else.
Humans are individuals. Physiological needs aren't necessarily valuable for an individual. And they aren't in certain cases. If I'm on hunger strike, and that's the most valuable thing to me in the world right now, then the "need" for food isn't valuable for me. It's actually the antithesis of value for me.
No, I'm saying "right/wrong" is like "true/false". The former relates to actions generally, the latter to speech acts. Joe murdering Bill is wrong. And that statement is true.
Quoting S
I didn't say I'd proven it. I said that by assuming that life and well-being are valuable for human beings, one can explain their observed behavior. It's an empirical model.
Quoting S
The empirical issue is whether the reason for hunger strike behavior is consistent with the above model's assumptions. I would suggest that the most valuable thing for the hunger-striker is not that they suffer and die, but that an injustice be overturned (which adversely affects people's lives and well-being). Their hunger strike behavior is a means to an end, not an end in itself.
Except that the way in which we judge whether the statement about rain is true differs in important respects from the way in which we judge Joe murdering Bill is wrong, so your analogy is false or misleading at best, and not for the first time.
I can look outside to see whether it's raining. I can't look outside to see whether it's wronging. I reach a moral judgement through my moral feelings. I don't judge the weather that way - my feelings are irrelevant.
These differences have been pointed out time and again, yet still the false equivalencies keep on coming.
Quoting Andrew M
No, you said that they're universal values. Can you, for once, not move the goalposts? That's an informal fallacy, you know? It's a bad model as you originally described it when I made this criticism in my last reply before you moved the goalposts. It fails Ockham's razor. I don't need to make the additional posit of universal values in order to explain their observed behaviour, and if it is truly universal, then there can be no exceptions, but there can be, so your claim about universal values is false.
Quoting Andrew M
It's obviously not consistent with the model. It's an example of a situation where food isn't valuable to a human: it's the opposite of being valuable to them. It doesn't matter what you think is valuable. You don't get to decide. I'm [i]telling you[/I] that food isn't valuable to them.
I also gave the earlier counterexample of poison being more valuable to a human than water.
I don't think that you're going to be reasonable here. You'll just explain away whatever counterexamples I raise rather than concede. If I say that the sky is blue, you'll say no, it's red. If I say that it's Monday, you'll say no, it's Friday.
Quoting creativesoul
Quoting S
Clear it up then. You invoked the notions of "artificial" and "conception"...
I thought we were talking about morality. Particularly I was making the point that just because we 'come up' with a conception of "morality", it does not follow that morality is artificial.
So it does. Nonetheless morality is an abstraction over actions just as truth is an abstraction over speech acts.
Quoting S
Whereas I consider the consequences of the person's actions in relation to people's life and well-being.
Quoting S
Those assumed values are universal in scope, yes.
Quoting S
Have you ever put up with short-term pain for some reason, say, getting immunization shots or training for a marathon? Does it follow that life and well-being are therefore not valuable when you choose to endure the pain?
The hunger-striker is forgoing food - a value - but not because they regard starving and dying as an end in itself.
Quoting S
I think the dispute is semantic. You define value in terms of opinion or preference, I define it in functional terms.
It was already clear enough. It's your fault if you missed it in spite of that. I didn't even mention trees or rocks. You plucked that out of thin air.
Quoting creativesoul
That's an irrelevant conclusion. I only said that morality definitely has an artificial aspect. Pay closer attention in future and you'll reduce the chance of making these same mistakes again.
It's not some sort of pure intellectual thing, though. You don't just consider, you feel a certain way about it, and that's very relevant, perhaps more than you realise.
Quoting Andrew M
No, and that hasn't been reasonably demonstrated. It's no different, in principle, then if I were to say that God exists or we live on Mars.
Quoting Andrew M
You haven't demonstrated that it's necessarily a value to begin with, so saying that it's a value which they forgo does nothing. That's like saying that God exists as an Unmoved Mover, or that we live on Mars on Tuesdays.
I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that you can't reasonably demonstrate a universal value. Begging the question doesn't count, and you've had plenty of opportunities.
Your point that it works as an explanation is refuted by my point about Ockham's razor.
Quoting Andrew M
Yeah, that's a bit of a problem. You're not even talking about value, not like the rest of us. You should call that something else to avoid confusion. You're talking about food and water, which are just necessities for survival which most people happen to value, and life itself, which again, most people just happen to value. Nothing universal there when you're talking like the rest of us, as you should be. Setting up your own language barrier is not a good thing.
I know what you said. I quoted it verbatim. Your argument for your conclusion does not hold good. It does not follow from the fact that we've named something - anything - that that which is named is artificial.
Clearly, you're invoking notions like "conception" and "artificial" in an attempt to bolster your view on morality. The attempt fails. The arguments are fallacious. The viewpoint is based upon rhetoric. You do not even seem to have a coherent notion of either "conception" or "artificial".
You're not very good at accurately representing other people's arguments in your own words. Maybe stick to quoting them, and making requests for clarification if need be.
I doubt it.
Surprise me.
I threw you a bone already. Or rather, you snatched it out of my hand and ran off with it. (Bad dog!)
Artificial: made or produced by human beings rather than occurring naturally.
Moral language, moral rules, moral principles, moral concepts, moral theories, etc. comprise an aspect of morality.
Moral language, moral rules, moral principles, moral concepts, moral theories, etc. are artificial.
Therefore, an aspect of morality is artificial.
Surprise! :party:
Artificial: made or produced by human beings rather than occurring naturally.
Scientific language, scientific rules, scientific principles, scientific concepts, scientific theories, etc. comprise an aspect of science.
Scientific language, scientific rules, scientific principles, scientific concepts, scientific theories, etc. are artificial.
Therefore, an aspect of science is artificial.
Nah. I'm in agreement thus far. It doesn't add anything helpful though, does it?
Seriously? I don't even properly remember the original context in which I was making that point now, and I can't be bothered to go back and check. You just unhelpfully butted in to an exchange I was having with someone else, misrepresented my argument a few times, I then set you straight, and now you have the nerve to tell me that I'm not adding anything helpful? :brow:
It's actually prone to a reductio...
Naturalism has artificial aspects in the same way.
Now about "concepts"...
:wink:
How do you draw and maintain the distinction between a concept and what is being conceived of?
Conception of "morality" as compared/contrasted to morality?
The same with a rock. Conceptions of "rock" with the rock?
"Rock" is a conception. You earlier charged morality with being 'just a concept'. What were you attempting to argue?
That's a recurring problem.
It's only really a problem for me for as long as I remember that it's a problem, which isn't very long at all. And other people's problems don't matter. So... wait, what were we talking about again?
I take it that you cannot distinguish between concepts and that which is being conceived of...
That's a perfect example of what I mean! :rofl:
I didn't say anything like that. I don't even believe that word usage can be wrong.
Concepts are abstractions. They don't exist externally. There are external particulars that serve as influences or bases for concepts, but concepts are "of abstractions," they're not "of particulars."
Of course it is relevant. Without feeling a certain way, some humans might no longer care for their children. But it is the caring for their children that morality refers to, not the feeling.
Quoting S
It's a hypothetico-deductive model and I've defined my terms. So you need to provide a counterexample that contradicts the model. All you've said is that you don't define value that way.
Quoting S
You can't explain moral behavior without appeal to values. But simply defining value as whatever their behavior is makes any explanation useless and devoid of content. Why did Bob drink poison? Because he valued drinking poison. Why did he value drinking poison? Because it was his preference. Why did he prefer drinking poison? ...
If you are interested in getting out of that subjective loop and gaining further insight, then you'll need to look for an explanation for his action in the natural world.
Quoting S
You just need to pay attention to the context to avoid equivocation. Undervaluing something and perceived value versus actual value are conventional usages. (But perhaps you think that to undervalue something is a semantic contradiction.) As I'm using the term here, what is valuable (or of actual value) is that which satisfies the functional needs of human beings. Such as food and water.
Do it.
Quoting Terrapin Station
Which is the concept, and which is that which is being conceived of?
If concepts are abstractions, and they are of abstractions, then they are of themselves?
:yikes:
If I am pointing at a tree and say "look at the dog", that is wrong word usage, no?
What you did say was that your use of "feelings" has the same referent as my use of "thought/belief about acceptable/unacceptable behaviour". That is quite mistaken. For whatever reason, you've focused upon that and left out any of the important bits regarding morality.
Let's move on to the concept notion disagreement.
I say all concepts are existentially dependent upon language. You disagree.
Can we set out our reasoning behind our positions? It is relevant to conceptions of morality.
Yes, but if humans didn't care about how they and others behaved then there wouldn't be morality in the first place. Morality is thus dependent on care, or in other words, on feeling.
I meant care in the sense of, "The provision of what is necessary for the health, welfare, maintenance, and protection of someone or something." (OED)
So if humans didn't provide for and protect their children, there would presumably be no humans, let alone morality. So the feelings bootstrap that behavior. Yet a person can still act morally (e.g., provide for and protect their children) without the attendant feeling.
That's true, they can. But it is arguable that parents who didn't have any feelings of care for their children would only care for them (in the sense of "provide for and protect") on account of their caring about what others will think, or what actions of others they might be subject to, if they failed to provide such care.
And others would only care to condemn someone who didn't care for their children on account of their own caring about the moral principles that prescribe caring for children, or some other feeling. The point is that moral principles have no "bite' if no one cares about them; so they cannot be merely exercises of reason.
And that's the big, reoccurring problem whenever you engage him in a discussion. He comes with preprepared straw men that he desperately wants you to adopt.
If I don't believe that word usage can be wrong, then obviously I'd not say that that is wrong. Word usage can be unusual, unconventional, etc., but it can't be wrong. It's not wrong in general to be unusual or unconventional.
Yes, concepts are "of themselves." They're tools we create, out of necessity, really, because it's too difficult to deal with the world as a set of unique particulars.
As with morality, it makes more sense to say that it's wrong relative to a particular standard. Why aren't more people here going with the solution which makes the most sense?
Well, it doesn't follow a particular standard, but why is it wrong to not follow that standard? A lot of people are going to read "wrong" with connotations that I'd want to avoid. If they would read "wrong" so that it just amounts to "is different from x" that would be fine, but people read "wrong" so that it implies something negative, suggests something normative, etc.
I wouldn't simply say that it's wrong, because then it seems like a generalisation, and I'm not making a generalisation. Creativesoul made that mistake about a hundred million times. He kept taking what I was saying out of a relative context, and treating it as a generalisation.
I would say that it's wrong relative to a particular standard, because it's implicit within a particular standard that one is expected to act accordingly. So if you don't act accordingly, then you're wrong relative to that particular standard. That's just what it means to be wrong.
Quoting Terrapin Station
What's wrong with that, so long as it's suitably qualified in accordance with relativism? Isn't not admitting a right or wrong a sort of nihilism? Are you a nihilist of a sort?
I think that's ridiculous though. Just because some people want to do things whatever way, have whatever preferences, why the hell am I expected to act that way or I'm "wrong"? That's basically demanding that I conform to what they want to do or what they like. On what grounds?
Re the question you asked, I'm a nihilist in the sense that I don't believe there is any objective value, meaning, etc.
Maybe this is your extreme liberalism getting in the way of good sense. You don't "have" to conform. You are at liberty not to. But by my standard you should do, because by my standard that's what's right. I don't believe that you don't make judgements like this. It's practically impossible not to.
By your standard it's what's right in what sense?
If you're just saying that it's what you prefer, then why should I do what you prefer?
In the moral sense, if we're talking about morality. And simply because it's what I judge you should do. Of course, you might judge it differently, but I'm not going by your judgement, am I? That wouldn't make any sense.
First, we were talking about word usage. But we could talk about morality instead. The moral sense of "it's right" is that it's how you feel about interpersonal behavior, the behavior that you'd prefer.
Moral shoulds (rather than, say, conditional shoulds--conditional shoulds being that "if S wants y, S should do x, because that will give S y") are just a way of saying that you'd prefer if everyone behaved how you prefer . . . which of course makes sense, given what preferences are. There's nothing more to moral "shoulds" than that.
That's okay, the reasoning I used there is basically the same in either context.
Quoting Terrapin Station
I don't think it has to be [I]everyone[/I]. I'm not a moral universalist. But otherwise, sure. I don't really disagree on the preference thing. I just call it moral judgement, which is based on moral feelings. But we seem to be pretty much talking about the same thing here. Calling them "preferences" invites those stupid comparisons to ice cream and the like. At least combine it with "moral" each time, so you get the term "moral preferences".
I have a paragraph about Moore. I have trouble understanding it. I think it is wrong and in conflict with Moore's opinion. Please correct me if I'm wrong. And I'm not good at english.
Here is the paragraph:
Actually, the term “naturalistic fallacy” originates with British philosopher G. E. Moore in his 1903 book Principia Ethica. His point that qualities associated with goodness are themselves good was a bit narrower
than Hume’s. In other words, if good things tend to be visually attractive, then visual attractiveness must also be good. (This is not strictly true, as attractiveness may be incidental to moral goodness.)