What could make morality objective?

[Peter Holmes]

VA.

Factual assertions (statements) - which is what premises are - are NOT valid or invalid. They are just true or false - or not shown to be true or false. It's arguments that are valid or invalid, and that refers to their logical structure - whether the conclusion follows from the premise(s).

So we're arguing about the truth-value (true/false) of your P1. And I've shown you why it's false.

[Skepdick]

VA.

Factual assertions (statements) - which is what premises are - are NOT valid or invalid. They are just true or false - or not shown to be true or false. It's arguments that are valid or invalid, and that refers to their logical structure - whether the conclusion follows from the premise(s).

So we're arguing about the truth-value (true/false) of your P1. And I've shown you why it's false.

Insisting that there's a difference between True and False is just moral smuggling.

In a subjective moral universe there's no such thing as True/False dichotomy.

There's just your version of the truth and my version of the truth.

[Peter Holmes]

VA.

We have to perceive, know and describe the facts of the reality - of which we're a part - in human ways. And that's all that your blather about emergence, realisation and fsrs-fsks amounts to.

But our perceiving, knowing and describing water as H2O is not what makes it a fact of reality that water is H2O. Water just is what we happen to call H2O. And ALL the empirical evidence from natural science confirms this. And that's what objectivity means - confining ourselves to facts of reality.

Your P1, stripped of its irrelevancies, doesn't establish what you want it to establish - that moral evil and goodness are facts of reality which morality can describe in the way that chemistry describes water. There's no such thing as a morality-proper fsk which is in any way like the chemistry fsk.

You claim that 'oughtness-not-to-kill-humans' is a fact of human neurological programming. And you call this a moral fact - as 'conditioned upon a credible morality fsk'. But there is no morality fsk, credible or otherwise, so such conditioning doesn't exist.

Your moral theory amounts to saying some actions are evil, and others are good. And you define evil as 'to the net detriment of the individual and society', and good as 'to the net benefit of the individual and society'. But you don't explain why one is preferable to the other. You just assume it is - and that assumption is subjective - a matter of opinion.

The expression 'moral fact' is incoherent. And that's why morality isn't and can't be objective.

[Skepdick]

The expression 'moral fact' is incoherent. And that's why morality isn't and can't be objective.

What makes the expression "Paris is the capital of France" coherent and factual?

Which feature of reality is being correctly described?

(Prediction: this question will be ignored. Possibly because its inconvenient to the realist conception of facts. )

[Harbal]

Well, you don't find it "rationally impossible." That would require some sort of evidence, or some sort of rational argument. And for sure, you've offered no reasons or evidence for anybody to believe that morality (assuming such exists at all) is "subjective."

According to that reasoning you must then have to accept the existence of Zeus and Apollo.

Of course not. You don't have to believe in unicorns just because you believe in horses.

Exactly, and objective morality is certainly a unicorn.

Everyone knows there is such a thing as subjective morality,

"Everyone knows"? That's obviously untrue.

No, it obviously is true, because everyone has moral opinions of some sort, and they know they have them.

What everybody knows is that people have different opinions about all kinds of things. But nothing makes those opinions especially worthy of being called "moral." That's quite a different question.

I think I see where you are going wrong. When I talk about moral opinions, I mean opinions about moral issues, not morally worthy opinions, although what is morally worthy is also a matter of opinion.

"Morality" can never be solely private, because it governs relations between the individual and the external world, and most particularly, the relations with other "counters," or people. Whether or not I share your values, your choices affect how you treat me; and likewise, how I make my choices governs how I treat you. So morality is an expression of a kind of agreement as to what is appropriate between people; and whether or not that is superintended by God, or merely idiosyncratic, imaginary and arbitrary, is the remaining question.

I'm more or less with you here until you get to the God bit, and what comes after it.

To recognise one's moral opinions as subjective feelings is not a figment, because those feelings do exist.

If I have the feeling that there's a bogeyman in my room, it's certainly subjective: and it's true that "the feelings do exist." But it's an illusion, just a figment of my imagination, nonetheless. So you can't prove subjective morality exists by merely saying, "Well, people have the opinions." Opinions can be good or bad, right or wrong, true or false. And the fact of having an opinion has nothing to do with whether or not one has a justified opinion.

Having a justified opinion has nothing to do with it. A moral opinion (an opinion about a moral issue), simply relates to how you feel about something. If I disapprove of cruelty towards animals, no sensible person would describe it as a figment. They might say my feelings about animal cruelty are misplaced, and that I am making a fuss over nothing, but they wouldn't call it a figment, because a figment is something else altogether.

If the thing appeals to them, they are likely to accept it,

But they'll need grounds for it to appeal.

Yes, I suppose so, but I would say that, with moral issues, an emotional appeal stands more chance of success than a pseudo rational one, like most of yours are.

What I am saying is that the wide range of moral views on any given moral issue suggests that morality is not fixed, but is relative to personal perspective.

That's not logical. There can be a "wide range of views" about anything. It never suggests that the answer is "relative."

There is a "wide range of views" about the universe. That doesn't even remotely suggest there's not an objective universe or an objective truth about the universe. All it tells us is that lots of people are bound to be wrong about the universe...and that will be true of all views but one.

The universe has a physical existence, but morality does not. You are comparing two completely different things. Morality is to do with how human beings judge the behaviour of other human beings. Morality is entirely abstract, you can't measure it for accuracy.

My comments about your conduct on the forum were my opinion, and you, or anyone else, should take them as such.

Then they were false opinions. For I was not "being dishonest," and was not "deceiving." Your opinion was one of the many errant ones in the universe.

My opinion that you are arguing dishonestly may be wrong, because there is the possibility that I am mistaken, which would be the case if it turns out that you are not being dishonest. But if you are behaving dishonestly, my opinion that it is morally reprehensible cannot be right or wrong in any absolute sense; it can only be right or wrong in relation to my (or anyone else's) personal attitude towards dishonesty.

Moreover, even if you genuinely held that opinion, and even if subjectivism were true, then your own insistence was that it meant no more than "Harbal feels like..."

And now that we know that, why should I feel shame or even moral hesitancy on the basis of it? It's unbacked by objective facts, by your own testimony on the subject.

Just so. I think you are beginning to get it.

It doesn't matter how objectively true any moral principle or precept seems to be, there is nothing out in the universe to which you can point and say, "here is the fact that shows X is morally wrong".

God. And consequently, objective reality as He created it to be.

When you are able to produce God for inspection, and we have heard from the horse's mouth why we should observe his moral code, I may well reconsider my position, but till then, I am sticking with my above statement.

If something seems morally wrong to you, you just tend to respond to it as though it is morally wrong. I don't think many of us will then go on to wonder, "ah, but is it subjectively or objectively wrong"?

Well, you certainly seem to be wondering that. For otherwise, why would you be at such pains to argue that morality is subjective?

Because this is a forum where people come specifically to argue about such things. When I want to behave in an ordinary, every day kind of way, I go somewhere else.

A subjective view of morality would also automatically make every person in the universe "moral," and morally equivalent to every other one.

If morality were subjective, we would have millions of people all with their own moral opinions, and guess what: that is exactly what we do have.

But then, "moral" would mean absolutely nothing at all. If all things are "moral," then "morality" itself fails to describe any distinctive or special phenomenon, and disappears into moral nihilism of the most complete sort. We could not even use the word in a meaningful way: there would be no difference at all between "having a bare opinion" on the one hand, and "having a moral/good/fair/true/functional/etc. opinion," on the other.

So what do you mean when you say, "X is moral/immoral?" By subjectivism's lights, you can't mean anything at all. You can only be saying, "This is the opinion I happen to have." And you could be Ghandi or Hitler. You'd still be a person with a subjective opinion. But then, so what? All it would show is that the speaker does not even know what "moral" could possibly mean. He/she has nothing specific in mind, except perhaps that old incentive to gratuitious self-approval.

I will leave all this nonsense for someone else with more patience than me to deal with.

[Skepdick]

No, it obviously is true, because everyone has moral opinions of some sort, and they know they have them.

Everyone sure has opinions; alright.

But what makes you think your opinions are "moral"? How do you know they aren't "immoral" opinions?

How do you know you aren't getting mixed up?

If morality were subjective, we would have millions of people all with their own moral opinions, and guess what: that is exactly what we do have.

So then how do all of those millions of people with moral opinions distinguish themselves from all the people with immoral opinions?

Are you saying that there is no difference between moral and immoral opinions?!?
Are you saying that morality and immorality are the same?!?

[Harbal]

No, it obviously is true, because everyone has moral opinions of some sort, and they know they have them.

Everyone sure has opinions; alright.

But what makes you think your opinions are "moral"?

When I have an opinion about a moral issue, I count it as a moral opinion. I do that because the opinion is related to the subject of morality.

Are you saying that there is no difference between moral and immoral opinions?!?
Are you saying that morality and immorality are the same?!?

I am not saying anything about morality at the moment, but if you want to know what I have already said, just read it for yourself.

[FlashDangerpants]

everyone has moral opinions of some sort, and they know they have them.

Immanuel Can doesn't. Haven't you noticed that all his moral thoughts coincide perfectly with those of God?

[Harbal]

everyone has moral opinions of some sort, and they know they have them.

Immanuel Can doesn't. Haven't you noticed that all his moral thoughts coincide perfectly with those of God?

I think the truth is that IC is the source of objective morality, and God looks to him for guidance. IC is just too modest to admit it.

[Immanuel Can]

I think the key area of controversy they're expressing is not so much the true/false distinction itself, which all but the most radical and crazy Pomo-types would still nominally affirm, but rather whether the kind of ontology that applies to true/false can also apply to moral/immoral.

Well, sure. This follows directly from the True/False distinction - it has an inherent and implicit moral component.

They (and Hume) insist it doesn't. They insist that true/false is real, but moral/immoral is merely subjective and refers to nothing real. So they argue that moral/immoral is an illegitimate and propagandized insertion into true/false.

I agree with you, though: this is assumptive, not demonstrated, on their part. And it leaves dangling the question of why human beings universally have a faculty of belief in something that is unreal...and how such allegedly-necessary but fictive beliefs get generated by a reality that has no such thing in it objectively. They never really explain that.

It's generally accepted that telling the truth is right/preferable as a social norm over telling falsehoods.

Well, "preferable" isn't a moral quality. We don't have some proven axiom that says, "Thou shalt do what people prefer." Which is probably why most people excuse the so-called "little white lie" on a very regular basis.

In fact, if we try to discipline ourselves to tell nothing but the absolute truth, we find it's very hard for us to do. We all seem very inclined to lie, at least in small ways, on such a regular basis that it takes a Herculean mental effort on our part to get through a single day -- or even a single conversation -- while remaining unrelentingly honest.

It seems that we human beings resort to deception very, very quickly. It's more natural to us than the alternative, for sure.

Hume thought it couldn't. But Hume only thought so because he'd already decided to be an Atheist, and that's what Atheists have to think, logically speaking. Since they have already presumptively (and presumptuously) ruled out the grounds of morality, so they are kind of committed already to believing that morality has no grounds (i.e. is subjective).

Which necessarily requires them to erase the True/False dichotomy, in fact the notion of Falsehood simply disappears in a subjective moral system.

Hume thought it didn't. He thought we could have true/false without right/wrong. But that depends on whether or not the Creation itself is infused with moral teleological values. If murder is not merely an act of intentional and unjustified killing, but is also a sin, then the fact that one has murdered implicates one also in the moral value of wrongness.

But Atheists are committed to arguing there was no Creator, so they also have to conclude that there can be no moral teleological value associated with any action. Facts and values are forever severed.

There's only your truth and my truth. Everybody is just so deeply misunderstood.

Yes: that's the Oprah Winfrey attempt at morality.

Of course, she would have to say that slave owners, rapists and pederasts are "deeply misunderstood," too. I doubt she's thought that far.

It would be awfully hard for them to argue that morality was ontologically grounded in reality, and at the same time, that reality itself has no particular meaning or values inherent to it, but is the mere accidental product of time, chance and a lucky explosion in space.

Well, that would be a coherent story. Truth is all there is. Chance. Luck. Giant space explosion.

But then suddenly - a second truth-value appears. Falsehood. Where from?

Right. And what makes falsehood morally "wrong"? If there are no objective values...

[Skepdick]

When I have an opinion about a moral issue, I count it as a moral opinion. I do that because the opinion is related to the subject of morality.

Why do you keep telling only half the story? Morality goes hand in hand with Immorality.

You can't talk about the one without the other.

I am not saying anything about morality at the moment, but if you want to know what I have already said, just read it for yourself.

I can't read what has not been written. You've only written about your morality. You've said nothing about your immorality.

Tell us about a time in your history when you realized one of your "moral" opinions turned out to be an immoral opinion. Tell us about a time in your history when you learned to be more moral.

Otherwise tell us that you've never ever had such a realization. Tell us that you've never ever been on the wrong side of morality.

[Harbal]

When I have an opinion about a moral issue, I count it as a moral opinion. I do that because the opinion is related to the subject of morality.

Why do you keep telling only half the story?

Because I don't know how it ends yet.

[Skepdick]

When I have an opinion about a moral issue, I count it as a moral opinion. I do that because the opinion is related to the subject of morality.

Why do you keep telling only half the story?

Because I don't know how it ends yet.

But I am not asking you about the future? I am asking you about your past.

Tell us about a time in your history when you realized one of your "moral" opinions turned out to be an immoral opinion. Tell us about a time in your history when you learned to be more moral.

Otherwise tell us that you've never ever had such a realization. Tell us that you've never ever been on the wrong side of morality.

[Immanuel Can]

According to that reasoning you must then have to accept the existence of Zeus and Apollo.

Of course not. You don't have to believe in unicorns just because you believe in horses.

Exactly, and objective morality is certainly a unicorn.

I knew you'd throw that out there. But if you say "certainly," then how come you can't say what makes you "certain" of it?

Everyone knows there is such a thing as subjective morality,

"Everyone knows"? That's obviously untrue.

No, it obviously is true, because everyone has moral opinions of some sort, and they know they have them.

You're missing the point. Nobody denies that people have "opinions." But nothing about the mere having of an "opinion" makes it "moral." It may be "subjective," alright; but it's not evidence how that's "moral."

So the argument for "moral subjectivism" can't be made that way.

What everybody knows is that people have different opinions about all kinds of things. But nothing makes those opinions especially worthy of being called "moral." That's quite a different question.

I think I see where you are going wrong. When I talk about moral opinions, I mean opinions about moral issues, not morally worthy opinions, although what is morally worthy is also a matter of opinion.

Ah, good...you're starting to see the actual problem.

"People have opinions" is obviously true. "People have opinions about moral matters" is true. But that those opinions are right is not only not shown by these things, but cannot possibly be true. Because, as Aristotle pointed out, a basic rule of logic is that genuinely mutually-contradictory statements cannot be simultaneously true.

So all the observation "People have opinions about moral matters" actually tells us is that a lot of the people are wrong. In fact, it's even possible to argue, as per moral nihilism, that ALL such answers are wrong. But by the basic rules of logic, it's utterly impossible to argue that they're all "right."

So the fact that people have opinions is simply not telling of anything, for our purposes.

"Morality" can never be solely private, because it governs relations between the individual and the external world, and most particularly, the relations with other "counters," or people. Whether or not I share your values, your choices affect how you treat me; and likewise, how I make my choices governs how I treat you. So morality is an expression of a kind of agreement as to what is appropriate between people; and whether or not that is superintended by God, or merely idiosyncratic, imaginary and arbitrary, is the remaining question.

I'm more or less with you here until you get to the God bit, and what comes after it.

Well, then, let's set that aside for a minute.

Morality governs relations between us and the external world, especially the social world of other people. Thus, other people not only have a consequence from what we decide with our moral "opinions," but also cannot avoid passing judgment on those "opinions." If you and I are having lunch, and I'm a narcissistic psychopath, there is good reason for you to decide to cut our lunch engagement short and flee. Never mind that my "opinion" is subjective and my own: you're in danger. And if you are wise, you want nothing to do with me.

Moreover, if I sneak arsenic into your sandwich, society also has a say about me, regardless of my "opinion." They have a stake in locking me up for murder. And they cannot safely let me roam, and say, "Well, his morality is subjective, so we have to let him do as he pleases."

Thus, morality is not subjective. It's at least intersubjective, meaning that it involves other plausibly subjectively-operating people. But if it's merely intersubjective, then by what right do these people lock me up for murdering you? Where is it written that the moral opinions of other people are higher than my narcissistic, psychopathic opinions? Why should they have jurisdiction over me? Are they just employing power, and not right? If so, then they are merely oppressors, who have no actual right to lock me up for poisoning your sandwich. But if they have justification and right to lock me up, then from where does such justification come?

To recognise one's moral opinions as subjective feelings is not a figment, because those feelings do exist.

If I have the feeling that there's a bogeyman in my room, it's certainly subjective: and it's true that "the feelings do exist." But it's an illusion, just a figment of my imagination, nonetheless. So you can't prove subjective morality exists by merely saying, "Well, people have the opinions." Opinions can be good or bad, right or wrong, true or false. And the fact of having an opinion has nothing to do with whether or not one has a justified opinion.

Having a justified opinion has nothing to do with it.

It's absolutely essential.

For there's no way we can call a thing "moral" at all, if it's not justifiable.

A moral opinion (an opinion about a moral issue), simply relates to how you feel about something. If I disapprove of cruelty towards animals, no sensible person would describe it as a figment.

Sure, they would. Have you heard of PETA? They have very strong opinions about cruelty toward animals; but most people do not share their opinions, which is why they keep campaigning.

If the thing appeals to them, they are likely to accept it,

But they'll need grounds for it to appeal.

Yes, I suppose so, but I would say that, with moral issues, an emotional appeal stands more chance of success than a pseudo rational one, like most of yours are.

But even what we call an "emotional" appeal, cannot be effective without incentives or grounds. For people are not merely creatures of blind instinct, driven by nothing but emotion. In order to feel the requisite emotions, they find they need facts to back them up.

If I don't believe that the chicken on my plate suffered, and that suffering of that sort is wrong, then PETA can never convince me to give up my chicken parm dinner. So my dismay at finding an animal on my plate is entirely dependent on my acceptance of objective values, such as that the causing of animals to suffer is evil. Otherwise, I will not feel the requisite emotions at all.

What I am saying is that the wide range of moral views on any given moral issue suggests that morality is not fixed, but is relative to personal perspective.

That's not logical. There can be a "wide range of views" about anything. It never suggests that the answer is "relative."

There is a "wide range of views" about the universe. That doesn't even remotely suggest there's not an objective universe or an objective truth about the universe. All it tells us is that lots of people are bound to be wrong about the universe...and that will be true of all views but one.

The universe has a physical existence, but morality does not.

We don't know that. You've not showed that's the case...you've just demanded it, and hoped readers will agree.

Moreover, even if you genuinely held that opinion, and even if subjectivism were true, then your own insistence was that it meant no more than "Harbal feels like..."

And now that we know that, why should I feel shame or even moral hesitancy on the basis of it? It's unbacked by objective facts, by your own testimony on the subject.

Just so. I think you are beginning to get it.

Then your allegation makes no sense. You alleged I was "dishonest" and "deceptive." Bu now you say that your own allegation was merely subjective; so you can't have been expecting me, or anybody else, to think it was objectively true, or objectively worthy of an allegation...far less of me feeling shame, or changing my behaviour, or of other people having any reason to discredit me or my views. You were just saying, "Harbal feels..."

And if so, it's not clear you had anything in mind at all.

It doesn't matter how objectively true any moral principle or precept seems to be, there is nothing out in the universe to which you can point and say, "here is the fact that shows X is morally wrong".

God. And consequently, objective reality as He created it to be.

When you are able to produce God for inspection, and we have heard from the horse's mouth why we should observe his moral code, I may well reconsider my position, but till then, I am sticking with my above statement.

I can absolutely promise you that if I can produce anything on demand for inspection, then whatever I produce is not God. But if God has given you evidences of HIs existence, by his own grace rather than my demands, then why don't you consider them?

A subjective view of morality would also automatically make every person in the universe "moral," and morally equivalent to every other one.

If morality were subjective, we would have millions of people all with their own moral opinions, and guess what: that is exactly what we do have.

Non-sequitur again.

It's interesting...you're really stuck on that, aren't you? You are still convinced that the reference to the fact of a multiplicity of opinions represents an argument against truth. But it doesn't. And a little careful thought will reveal to you that it doesn't.

When 100% of the world's population held the opinion that the world is flat, then 100% of the opinions were wrong. When it was only a few who knew the world was round, then only a few were right. And when everybody except flat-earthers believed the earth is round, everybody but flat-earthers were right. But at no point, regardless of opinion, was the earth not flat.

And I know what you'll say: you'll say, "Yeah, but the earth is a real thing, and morality is not." But that, again, is only to jump to assuming the conclusion you want, not to having proved it. The point holds: a multitude of opinions does not argue against the existence of an objective truth, in any realm at all.

But then, "moral" would mean absolutely nothing at all. If all things are "moral," then "morality" itself fails to describe any distinctive or special phenomenon, and disappears into moral nihilism of the most complete sort. We could not even use the word in a meaningful way: there would be no difference at all between "having a bare opinion" on the one hand, and "having a moral/good/fair/true/functional/etc. opinion," on the other.

So what do you mean when you say, "X is moral/immoral?" By subjectivism's lights, you can't mean anything at all. You can only be saying, "This is the opinion I happen to have." And you could be Ghandi or Hitler. You'd still be a person with a subjective opinion. But then, so what? All it would show is that the speaker does not even know what "moral" could possibly mean. He/she has nothing specific in mind, except perhaps that old incentive to gratuitious self-approval.

I will leave all this nonsense for someone else with more patience than me to deal with.

I'll be interested to see if they can.

[Peter Holmes]

I'm sick of moral objectivist bullshit. Let's have honest objectivist responses to these assertions.

It's a fact that humans killing humans is morally wrong/evil- because...

It's a fact that unlawful killing is morally wrong/evil because...

It's a fact that homosexuality is morally wrong/evil because...

It's a fact that homosexuality is not morally wrong/evil because...

Or insert the moral issue of your choice, and whether it's morally wrong/evil or not. Your choice. Go for your pet moral fact.

You could try '...because my team's god says it is' or '...because everyone thinks it is', or '...because there's an intersubjective consensus that it is' or '...because humans are programmed with such-and such ' or '...because it's a fact that such-and-such is morally wrong/evil'.

But hey. Maybe there's a new bullshit answer we haven't seen yet. Oh, I forgot - '...because a person owns her own body and possessions'.