Ethics, morality and other metaphysical statements without theism.

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Debate & Discussion > Ethics, morality and other metaphysical statements without theism.

twodot: Aug 7, 2005; You are objectively correct that this person is dumb and has said dumb things

OwlFancier posted:

You can certainly reject all the fundamental premises and goals of my concept of morality but being as we are both humans living on earth I would suggest that it is likely that we both aspire to things like maximising human wellbeing.

Thus, moral disputes are far more likely to be starting from similar premises than completely alien ones, in which case you can certainly argue that one set of actions better adheres to the goals and premises shared by both parties.

The idea that morality is inevitably restricted to shouting conflicting opinions into a void with no possibility of meaningful debate doesn't really reflect reality.

You're presuming human wellbeing has an objective meaning. I mean you're right that human beings being the same species and having similar experiences often agree on what wellbeing means, but if you are using common definitions as authoritative you're back to here:

Zaradis posted:

I'd say that clinical psychopaths only value their own subjective opinions and claims. So they put no value in the subjective opinions or claims of others. If another person claims that the psychopath ought to value others opinions then there is simply a disagreement, since both claimants' opinions are grounded in subjectivity, and neither is grounded on any stronger ground than the other. And the important point for your argument is that, according to you, for the psychopath to be wrong just requires more subjective opinions in agreement against his own. So if there are 100 psychopaths and 1000 utilitarians, then, following your argument, utilitarianism is correct. You're advocating a tyranny of the moral majority, which I doubt many would agree with, I certainly do not.

The cognitive dissonance still clearly comes into play in even your scenario. The idea that a majority opinion regarding morality is the correct moral opinion is merely a confirmation bias of those who hold the same moral opinion as those in the majority.

Which is a fine approach, but doesn't make it any less subjective, you're just claiming to value majority opinions over whatever you personally would value otherwise.

# ¿ May 25, 2016 18:54

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# ¿ May 16, 2024 05:20

twodot: Aug 7, 2005; You are objectively correct that this person is dumb and has said dumb things

Zaradis posted:

I agree with your first point, but the second is a reply to my post which is in fact agreeing with your response to it. I think you replied to the wrong post.

Sorry, I think your argument is structurally sound, so I was just pointing out that you already addressed where they were going. I also disagree it's an illegitimate way to build a moral system, like here:

Zaradis posted:

Therefore, if morality is subjectively imposed on the world, then to make moral claims necessitates that the person making the claim either actively deny, actively ignore, or be cognitively dissonant about the subjective origin of morality.

I don't have any problem with saying "yes you're right, I have chosen to actively ignore the subjective origin of morality".

Juffo-Wup posted:

You're right, so let's not presume. Let's try to find out!

Okay, since nobody's actually cited an account of moral realism that they think falls short, I'll go ahead and mention that Peter Railton's paper Moral Realism contains a meta-ethical framework that I'd be prepared to endorse and defend.

Here's the general outline:

First, he gives an account of non-moral (read: instrumental) good, where something is (non-morally) good for an individual just in case it satisfies an objective interest of that individual.

An objective interest for an individual is whatever an ideally rational version of that individual would want the actual individual to want.

From there, Railton builds moral value out of the observation that what is distinctive about moral rather than non-moral value is that it is impartial. Since we already have an account of what it is for something to be good for someone, all we need for impartial, moral value is to aggregate all those individual goods into what would be objectively good all-things-considered.

If it's true that it is logically impossible for there to be objective moral values then there has to be a flaw in Railton's argument (though the converse doesn't hold; if there is a flaw in Railton's argument, nothing directly follows about the status of moral realism in general).

I don't see how you define rational without introducing a moral system.

OwlFancier posted:

I am presuming that with sufficient discourse a consensus can be reached whereby either a concurrent definition of human wellbeing can be shared between two or more parties, or that the differences between definitions can be sufficiently articulated as to permit the reduction of the concept to those elements which are shared, and methods of achieving the unshared elements can also be devised.

Where two goals are absolutely contradictory, I dunno, have a big fight and go with whoever is left standing or something. Whatever.

What does a consensus mean? The existence of, for example, crime seems to suggest that at least some people can't reach a consensus. If you mean majority, then that's already been addressed.

# ¿ May 25, 2016 19:18

twodot: Aug 7, 2005; You are objectively correct that this person is dumb and has said dumb things

I think you are talking past each other. Moral systems can contain contradictions. We can say that we don't prefer such systems, but that in itself is also just a preference that can't be logically or empirically backed up. (edit: Clearly we can use logic to demonstrate a contradiction, but since moral systems are subjective the presence of a contradiction isn't objectively bad)

# ¿ May 25, 2016 22:28

twodot: Aug 7, 2005; You are objectively correct that this person is dumb and has said dumb things

Juffo-Wup posted:

A contradiction entails all propositions. Standard formal logic permits one to infer the negation of a proposition that entails a contradiction. Refuting a position by showing that it entails a contradiction is the definition of 'logically backed up.'

Edit: I didn't think I'd have to cite this, of all things.

I understand you don't like contradictions and why you don't, I'm saying you can't use logic to demonstrate to someone that does like contradictions they shouldn't like contradictions.

# ¿ May 25, 2016 22:38

twodot: Aug 7, 2005; You are objectively correct that this person is dumb and has said dumb things

Juffo-Wup posted:

That is not, in point of fact, what you said. You said that a reductio ad absurdum argument cannot be logically backed up. Which is nonsense.

Well it's what I meant to say, and I think both my original post and my edit made that clear.

# ¿ May 25, 2016 22:43

twodot: Aug 7, 2005; You are objectively correct that this person is dumb and has said dumb things

Juffo-Wup posted:

Edit: further, to the extent that you think this is a criticism of moral claims, it generalizes to any truth claim whatsoever. I can't force someone to accept the truth of the universal law of gravitation any more than I can force them to accept that killing is wrong. Of course, you can avoid this implication if you reject that logical inference is truth-preserving per se, but that's not very interesting.

You can demonstrate gravitation by observation and logic, and leave it to people to believe or not believe you. You can't demonstrate that believing in gravitation is good through logic or observation, just have a preference that people believe true things. And don't get me wrong, I think "people should believe true things" is a pretty good preference, but there's plenty of moral system that don't contain that.

# ¿ May 25, 2016 22:57

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# ¿ May 16, 2024 05:20

twodot: Aug 7, 2005; You are objectively correct that this person is dumb and has said dumb things

Hollismason posted:

You're going to have to explain on this one. For example, I went to a barbecue with my family at no point in my interactions with them was their a question of a ethical decisions that needed to be made in this interaction.

I think your notion of "question" is badly defined. I presume you didn't steal from or hurt anyone present, why choose that behavior over another? I agree it's an easy choice, but I don't think relative difficulty removes choice-ness from a decision.

# ¿ May 29, 2016 03:42

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