Moralty is Objective [ by Magnus ]

[Walker]

Objective morality is the morality that pertains to all, i.e., primordial morality.

AI, what is primordial morality?

[popeye1945]

Objective morality is the morality that pertains to all, i.e., primordial morality.

AI, what is primordial morality?

Morality is a distinction of groups, societies, and communities of organisms. Morality for an organism in isolation is nonsense; there is nothing to relate to in isolation. You are a subjective consciousness, and that means there is really nothing objective, for all meaning is the creation of a subjective life form which has a projected reality of sensing and understanding processed through its own being. Your apparent reality is a biological readout; your senses and understandings are projected onto a meaningless world. This does not mean there is nothing out there, but you do not experience what is out there. You experience how what is out there changes, alters, or affects your biology; you are experiencing your biology as apparent reality.

[Walker]

Primordial morality is inherent morality, therefore biological morality, therefore objective morality.

[popeye1945]

Primordial morality is inherent morality, therefore biological morality, therefore objective morality.

You live in a subjective world, a subjective reality. You are subjectivity. There is nothing in your world that is objective; your apparent reality is the experiences of your body. Objective morality is simply nonsense. One can create systems, institutions, and philosophies in the outside world, but these are biological extensions, projections of the nature of humanity; these are subjective creations applied to a meaningless world. There has never been an objective reality that we can known. Apparent reality is a biological readout of that which changes its biology from without, and this without is the fuel of consciousness. You do not experience what is out there; you experience how what is out there alters, changes, or affects your biology. Reality is a biological experience. Morality is particular to groups, packs, and societies; to an organism in isolation, morality is meaningless. Morality is relational; no relations, no morality.

[Eodnhoj7]

I made this post in another thread, in response to something a member of this forum has said, but since it turned out to be pretty long, and far more than just a strict reply; and since the thread I posted it in is pretty noisy, I decided to give it its own topic.

So here we go.

In the ontological sense, the word "objective" means "existing independently of minds". To say that a thing exists independently of minds is to say that it would exist even if minds ceased to exist. The question of this thread, then, is "Would morality continue to exist if all minds ceased to exist?"

The first thing that needs to be done in order to answer that question is to understand what the word "morality" means.

The term "morality" means "the set of all laws that someone [ an individual, a group of people or everyone ] ought to obey in order to maximize their chances of attaining their highest goal".

If it actually meant something like "a set of beliefs about what is right and what is wrong held by someone", then morality would clearly be subjective, since beliefs exist within minds, and if something exists within a mind, removing all minds from existence would also remove that thing from existence. But is that what the word actually means?

Of course, you can use the word "morality" that way, and a lot of people already do, but in that case, you'd no longer have a word for what moral beliefs are attempting to represent. ( Every belief, if it is a proper belief, is attempting to represent a portion of reality. Moral beliefs are no exception. If there is no portion of reality that moral beliefs are describing, they are not beliefs, but something else. A belief is a proposition held to be true by someone, and every proposition, in order to be a proposition, must consist of two parts: the described and the description. Remove one of these parts and you no longer have a proposition. )

Morality isn't a set of beliefs. It is a set of laws. And it isn't a set of any kind of laws. Societal laws ( i.e. how societies behave, e.g. "When a resident of a modern day country kills someone, he goes to jail" ) and personal laws ( i.e. how individual people behave, e.g. "Peter never eats meat" ) are not moral laws. Moral laws are laws of the form "Under circusmtances C, the best decision for person P or group of people G is D."

Given that morality is a set of laws, we need to ask the following questions:

1) What is a law?

2) Do laws exist?

3) Are laws ontologically objective? Is their existence independent of minds? If minds ceased to exist, would laws continue to exist?

Let's answer these questions one by one.

WHAT IS A LAW?

A law is a limit on what is possible. It is that which forces a portion of reality to be certain way in some or all situations. If there are no laws, i.e. if no laws exist, it means that everything is possible in every situation. If there are laws, i.e. if some of them exist, it means that certain things aren't possible in certain situations.

The simplest example of a law is the law of identity, "A = A". That statement is saying that every thing is identical to itself in all situations. It's saying that there is a law that prohibits all things in all situations from not being identical to themselves.

Another example is the mathematical law captured by the statement "2 + 2 = 4". That statement is saying that every set consisting of two sets of two elements is a set consisting of four elements. It's saying that there is a law that prohibits all sets consisting of two sets of two elements from being sets of one element, sets of two elements, sets of three elements, sets of five elements, etc.

Another example of a law is the causal law that is "If you press the light switch at point in time t, the light bulb will turn on in less than a second". That statement is saying that there is a law that prohibits the light bulb from not turning on when you press the light switch at point in time t.

Finally, there are moral laws. Moral laws are laws of the form "Under circumstances C, the best decision for person P or group of people G is D". An example of a moral law is "The best decision for a man, every man, in every situation is to choose to do only what his mind unanimously agrees it's the best thing to do". ( I understand that most people don't define the term "morality" this broadly. Most use it narrowly, to refer to social morality, i.e. to what's the right way to treat other living beings. Keep in mind that I define it a bit differently, to mean what's the right thing to do in general. )

DO LAWS EXIST?

Given that a law is a limit on what's possible, it follows that, if there are things that aren't possible in some or all situations, then there are laws. And if there are laws, then they exist.

To say that laws do not exist is to say that there are no laws, i.e. that there are no limits on what is possible. That, in turn, means that everything is possible in every situation.

I can assure you that literally everyone believes that we live in a world in which at least some of the things aren't possible. And if there are people who argue otherwise, which I'm sure there are, I can assure you that they are contradicting themselves.

The idea that laws exist is difficult to accept by some people. These tend to be people who think in terms of "If you can't touch something, it does not exist". They affirm the existence of nothing but physical objects. They have a tendency to bastardize highly abstract concepts by reducing them to the most similar concept they are familiar with. Pragmatists, for example, have done that with the concept of truth by reducing it to the concept of useful belief ( or to the concept of the limit of inquiry, as C. S. Peirce did. ) A number of physicists have done the same with the concept of past by reducing it to memories in the present. Others have done it by reducing the concept of time to "what clocks show". And so on. There are many examples. If you ask these people, laws either do not really exist, since they aren't physical objects, or they do, but they are not want we think they are, they are merely concepts inside our minds ( e.g. mental tools that we use to predict what's going to happen in the future. )

The fact of the matter is that the universe is not merely the sum of everything that was, everything that is and everything that will be. The universe does not merely refer to what is actual. It also refers to what is possible. And what is possible is determined by laws.

ARE LAWS ONTOLOGICALLY OBJECTIVE?

If minds ceased to exist, would laws continue to exist?

To answer that question, it's important to understand the difference between mutable and immutable things.

A mutable thing is a thing that can change. A thing that can change is a thing that can go through multiple stages of existence. The number of stages a mutable thing goes through is called its lifespan. A mutable thing, if it has a beginning, starts existing at one point in time, and if it has an end, it stops existing at another. Typically, a mutable thing occupies a portion of space at a single point in time at every stage of its existence. However, this is not a definitional requirement -- a mutable thing can occupy any number of moments at any stage of its existence. A mutable thing can exist in the same exact state at every stage of its existence, meaning, it does not have to change at all. But it has the capacity to do so. The state of a mutable thing at any stage of its existence, as well as its lifespan, can be determined, partially or completely, by other things. Physical objects, for example, are mutable things.

An immutable thing, on the other hand, is a thing that has no capacity for change at all. An immutable thing can exist at one or more points in time but it cannot go through more than one stage of its existence. The set of everything that was, that is and that will be is an example. That's the state of the universe at every single point in time. It's a thing that exists at more than one moment -- actually, at every single moment of existence -- but that goes through no more than one stage of its existence. The state of a physical object at a single point in time is another example. It's a thing that exists at a single point in time and a thing that goes through exactly one stage of its existence. The truth value of a proposition is yet another example. If a proposition is true on one day, it is true on all days. None of these things can change. As such, nothing can change them. If they exist, nothing can make them disappear from existence. They are, in a sense, permanent.

That said, if a law is an immutable law, it cannot cease to exist.

Are all laws immutable?

Absolutely not. There are mutable and immutable laws. Let me illustrate that with a very simple example.

Consider a universe that consists of exactly 3 points in time. At each point in time, nothing exists except for a light switch and a light bulb. At each point in time, the light switch can only be in one of the following two states: it can be "up" or it can be "down". Similarly, at each point in time, the light bulb can only be in one of the following two states: it can be "on" or it can be "off".

Let us say that the following laws apply:

1) Whenever the light switch is "up" at point in time 1, the light bulb is "on" at point in time 2.

2) Whenever the light switch is "down" at point in time 1, the light bulb is "off" at point in time 2.

3) Whenever the light switch is "up" at point in time 2, the light bulb is "off" at point in time 3,

4) Whenever the light switch is "down" at point in time 2, the light bulb is "on" at point in time 3.

The 4 laws that I just mentioned are immutable laws. They go through exactly one stage of their existence. They have no capacity to change. They are what they are.

However, if we said that 1) and 3) are two different stages of one and the same law, that law would be a mutable law. And in this particular case, it would be a law that changed ( since it went from "If up, then on" to "If up, then off". )

Are moral laws immutable laws?

A morality is a set of immutable laws, i.e. laws that cannot change. They either exist or they do not. If they exist, nothing can make them disappear from existence. Thus, if minds ceased to exist, moral laws would continue to exist.

Objectivity is shared subjective states, evidence of thus is consensus of facts within a scientific community..anything outside of the mind, experience to be precise, is a limit of the mind by what the mind is not. You cannot speak of things outside experience because you cannot experience them for they are not experienced.

[Magnus Anderson]

If you "magnus anderson", really, still, after all of these back and forth posts, can not yet comprehend, and understand, these three claims, of mine, then you are more blind, closed, and stupid, than I first noticed.

It's pointless to argue against the meaning that I assign to the word "objective". Any word can be assigned any meaning. It's an arbitrary thing guided only by use value. And in the case of words, the use value mostly revolves around being easily and correctly understood. There are no true and false meanings. The word "objective", like all other words, has no true meaning.

You're expecting me to assign the same meaning to the word that you assign yourself. You use the word "objective" to mean "that which can be accepted by everyone". That's your own prerogative. Personally, I would never use it that way myself because noone other than you does so. The probability of being misunderstood would be unnecessarily high.

The same exact mistake was made by Skepdick earlier in this thread. He used the word "objective" to mean "ontologically existent" which basically means "existent". In that sense of the word, anything that exists in the world is objective. As such, given that morality exists, morality is objective too. But that's not what's being discussed here in this thread. Pretty much everyone agrees that morality exists. The question is how. Specifically, the question is: does it exist independently from minds? He tried to force his idiosyncratic meaning onto me the same way you're trying to force yours. Again, I would never use the word "objective" his way because noone other than him [ Skepdick ] does so. The probability of being misunderstood would be unnecessarily high.

You're now tasked with the impossible which is to prove that it's necessary for me to assign the same meaning to the word "objective" that you're assigning yourself. I am pretty sure you're not even going to attempt that, let alone succeed at it. It's a futile effort. All you're going to do is just repeat yourself, which is more or less all you did ever since you joined this thread.

I understand that you argue that minds do not exist. Peter Holmes argued the same earlier in the thread. You're not the first to do so. And although I can very easily define the word "mind", as I already did earlier in this thread, and show that minds do exist, whether or not minds exist has no impact on the meaning that I am attaching, nor on the meaning that I should be attaching, to the word "objective".

[Magnus Anderson]

Objectivity is shared subjective states, evidence of thus is consensus of facts within a scientific community

That's intersubjectivity, "The shared perception of reality between two or more individuals."

It's also popular opinion, "An opinion that is held by the majority of the people within a given group."

This thread has nothing to do with that.

You have to distinguish between morality qua beliefs and morality qua laws. Intersubjectivity pertains to the former.

The thesis of this thread isn't, "A set of moral beliefs S is the most popular set of moral beliefs within some group of people G."

The thesis is, "Moral laws are mind-independent".

[Walker]

Objective morality is the morality that pertains to all, i.e., primordial morality.

AI, what is primordial morality?

Morality is a distinction of groups, societies, and communities of organisms. Morality for an organism in isolation is nonsense; there is nothing to relate to in isolation. You are a subjective consciousness, and that means there is really nothing objective, for all meaning is the creation of a subjective life form which has a projected reality of sensing and understanding processed through its own being. Your apparent reality is a biological readout; your senses and understandings are projected onto a meaningless world. This does not mean there is nothing out there, but you do not experience what is out there. You experience how what is out there changes, alters, or affects your biology; you are experiencing your biology as apparent reality.

Biologically, unadorned inherent morality is survival oriented. It is objectively immoral to wrong your neighbor because that could create a survival challenge. This applies to everyone, therefore it is objective. The method of wronging the neighbor can vary according to the culture.

[Magnus Anderson]

Imagine a drawer with 4 balls in it. Imagine that two of those are black and two are white. What's the truth value of the statement "All balls in that drawer are black"? It's "false" in binary language and "50% true" in non-binary centenary language. It's not either / or. Both descriptions are accurate.

There are many options to claim what is reality [true or false] of a proposition, it depends the human-based FSK one is adopting.

In your 4 balls example, each statement is true or false depending on its specific human based FSK i.e. [binary or non-binary] and the stipulated or implied conditions.

Because it is human-based, it follows, the resultant conclusion of the reality cannot be mind-independent.

1.

The truth value of that statement ( "All balls in the drawer are black" ) is the same regardless of what language we use to express it.

"False" and "50% true" have the same meaning. They are synonymous terms, two different ways of expressing one and the same truth value.

It simply isn't the case that the statement is either true or false depending on the FSK that one is using ( whatever FSK actually is. )

The truth value of a statement has absolutely nothing to do with the method we're using to determine or express its truth value.

You're confusing what's true with what people think it's true.

2.

If something is mind-independent, it means it can exist without minds. That is to say, if we remove all minds from existence, it will still be there.

Jsut because something is based on humans, it does not follow it's mind-dependent.

There are paintings that are based on humans, for example. You are not telling us that they would cease to exist in the case all minds ceased to exist?

But most importantly, the number of balls in a drawer is not even based on humans. The perception of it is created by humans by employing human methods of reasoning. Still, the number of balls ( the territory ) is not the same as the perception of that number ( the map. ) And that's what you're confusing.

3.

I am not sure you even realize what you're saying by denying philosophical realism. You're basically saying that the entire galaxies would cease to exist in the case all minds ceased to exist.

[Immanuel Can]

Objective morality is the morality that pertains to all, i.e., primordial morality.

AI, what is primordial morality?

Morality is a distinction of groups, societies, and communities of organisms. Morality for an organism in isolation is nonsense; there is nothing to relate to in isolation. You are a subjective consciousness, and that means there is really nothing objective, for all meaning is the creation of a subjective life form which has a projected reality of sensing and understanding processed through its own being. Your apparent reality is a biological readout; your senses and understandings are projected onto a meaningless world. This does not mean there is nothing out there, but you do not experience what is out there. You experience how what is out there changes, alters, or affects your biology; you are experiencing your biology as apparent reality.

Biologically, unadorned inherent morality is survival oriented.

But you would need to prove that "survival" is a moral imperative. And clearly, it's not imperative -- nature allows species to go extinct all the time. It's also in need of proof that that is a moral issue. A different person might only recognize in it survival of the fittest and natural extinction, and see no moral value attached to either.

It is objectively immoral to wrong your neighbor because that could create a survival challenge.

This cannot be right. As we have seen, "survival" isn't moral or imperative -- either for you, nor for your neighbour. But you're weakening the claim even beyond this, for you say it "could create" a surivival "challenge," which implies it might not. And from a conditional premise, no categorical conclusion ever follows. That's a basic rule of logic.

This applies to everyone, therefore it is objective.

I don't see how you are showing this. A conditional "could" claim, doesn't apply to everyone, or even every case of anyone. It might not happen at all. So it's not capable of being objective...it might not even be real.

The method of wronging the neighbor can vary according to the culture.

Cultural relativism? Then it cannot be objective for that reason, too.

It is commanded in the Koran to beat one's wife (in "The Chapter of Women," which see), and yet in Western society we are told that beating one's wife is abuse, show, using cultural relativism, which is objectively right.

Can you do it?

[Eodnhoj7]

Objectivity is shared subjective states, evidence of thus is consensus of facts within a scientific community

That's intersubjectivity, "The shared perception of reality between two or more individuals."

It's also popular opinion, "An opinion that is held by the majority of the people within a given group."

This thread has nothing to do with that.

You have to distinguish between morality qua beliefs and morality qua laws. Intersubjectivity pertains to the former.

The thesis of this thread isn't, "A set of moral beliefs S is the most popular set of moral beliefs within some group of people G."

The thesis is, "Moral laws are mind-independent".

Frankly I don't have to distinguish anything. And on what grounds would I make such a distinguishment and at what point is the necessitated ending? The act of perception is the act of distinguishing and the nature of objectivity is but shared subjectivity for an objective truth is that which exists across all subjective states.

There is a fault within language, specifically English, in the the synonymous nature of words effectively leads to conceptual clutter. Intersubjectivity is synonymous, in many contexts, to objectivity for what we know of objective truths are but truths that resonate across subjective states.

You can speak of objective truths outside of perception but would have little rational ground for you cannot be aware of what is beyond awareness and if you claim such things exist beyond awareness you are making a distinction of said things within your awareness thus you harbor an inherent self contradiction within your reasoning...and I assume you claim contradiction as an avoidable state.

You want to talk about objective morality, and that is fine, but an investigation of "objective" and "morality" as conceptual experiences is warranted for you are synthesizing such distinct concepts into a new concept "objective morality". By the foundations of a thing is a thing known and thus by degree we are relegated to observing the branches of epistemology and metaphysics so to gain a clearer awareness of ethics itself.

So with that in mind make an assertion as to what objectivity is and is not and under these terms where do you choose to limit the chain of distinctions that come from said thing?

[Magnus Anderson]

Intersubjectivity is synonymous, in many contexts, to objectivity for what we know of objective truths are but truths that resonate across subjective states.

The word "intersubjective" is an adjective that can only be used to describe beliefs that are shared between two or more individuals.

The word "objective" has multiple meanings. The one used in this thread, as explained in the OP and subsequent posts, is that of mind independence. A thing is said to be objective if and only if its existence is independent from minds, i.e. if it can exist without minds existing.

That's all you need to know in order to tell that they are not synonymous.

Trees, for example, are objective. Their existence is independent from the existence of minds. If minds ceased to exist, trees would still be there.

But trees themselves can't be said to be intersubjective because they are not beliefs. A tree, by definition, is not a belief. It is a three dimensional object occupying a portion of space at a point in time located outside of brains and minds. Only beliefs can be intersubjective. An example would be a belief that a tree is this or that way.

[Eodnhoj7]

Intersubjectivity is synonymous, in many contexts, to objectivity for what we know of objective truths are but truths that resonate across subjective states.

The word "intersubjective" is an adjective that can only be used to describe beliefs that are shared between two or more individuals.

The word "objective" has multiple meanings. The one used in this thread, as explained in the OP and subsequent posts, is that of mind independence. A thing is said to be objective if and only if its existence is independent from minds, i.e. if it can exist without minds existing.

That's all you need to know in order to tell that they are not synonymous.

Trees, for example, are objective. Their existence is independent from the existence of minds. If minds ceased to exist, trees would still be there.

But trees themselves can't be said to be intersubjective because they are not beliefs. A tree, by definition, is not a belief. It is a three dimensional object occupying a portion of space at a point in time located outside of brains and minds. Only beliefs can be intersubjective. An example would be a belief that a tree is this or that way.

Not synonymous by your degree, but there are many degrees.

You claim a mind independent morality and such a morality would be that of hive minded drones where choice is not evident and morality is inevitably futile thus your objective morality is but rhetorical redundancy as you abdicate consciousness to that of nothing of meaning nor value.

We only know morality by degree of choice for without choice morality is neither necessary nor anything other than concept synonymous to a determinism by which morality is further synonymous to cause and effect. Objective morality is but a term for cause and effect under these terms....and yet you cannot speak of such an objective state for cause and effect is but a concept to defined distinctions made evident only by the attentive mind.

Objective morality, mind independent reality? Of what can you argue for such a thing without the awareness by which thing becomes distinctly an act of consciousness.

Your mind independent reality is but a shadow of the fear of your own mind and the minds of others for the mindlessness you argue is but an forfeighting of the reason for things to be.

How can such distinctions of a mind independent reality occur where a mind independent reality is but a self contradictive distinction made by the mind itself?

Objective morality defeats itself under its own terms. Morality is but the process by which values are made manifest and value is both subjective and intersubjective.

[Magnus Anderson]

You can speak of objective truths outside of perception but would have little rational ground for you cannot be aware of what is beyond awareness

You forget that perception is almost entirely about things that are outside of perception. As an example, by definition, humans are outside of perception. A human is a 3D physical object occupying a portion of space at a point in time. It is something that exists outside of brains ( too large to fit inside ) as well as minds ( excluded by definition. ) Yet, you perceive humans all the time. Or are you saying you're not seeing humans anywhere? Merely colors? That would be a very serious case of epistemic nihilism.

Everything that is outside of what affects us in the present moment, such as light that immediately surrounds us, is understood in terms of how it would affect us under different conditions. Even the light that immediately surrounds us is understood in terms of how it would affect us. We have no direct access to it. A thing does not have to affect us in order for us to know it's there. We can use reasoning to indirectly figure out it's out there. You never see the entire apple at a single point in time. You can only see a side of it. Yet, you can safely deduce it's an actual apple rather than a fake apple made out of cardboard.

[Eodnhoj7]

You can speak of objective truths outside of perception but would have little rational ground for you cannot be aware of what is beyond awareness

You forget that perception is almost entirely about things that are outside of perception. As an example, by definition, humans are outside of perception. Yet, you perceive humans all the time. Or are you saying you're not seeing humans anywhere? Merely colors?

Everything that is outside of what affects us in the present moment, e.g. light that immediately surrounds us, is understood in terms of how it would affect us under different conditions. It does not have to affect us in order to know it's there. We can use reasoning to indirectly figure out it's out there.

Things outside perception are but a distinction of perception that gives evidence to the nature that perception is a continual process by degree of its potential for to claim what exists outside of perception is merely to claim perception as but a process of transforming the unknown into the distinction of the known. To see the limits of perception is to see the distinction that is perception itself thus relegating it to the only thing we know for we know only by distinction.

By the limits of perception we know it as existing. A purely objective, mindless morality, would cease to be anything.