For the discussion of all things philosophical.
https://canzookia.com/
There is nobody else reading what I wrote about myth other than people on this forum. You advised using the word 'myth' in its popular sense of a fable a fiction because that is what people understood by the word. I will not be talking down to people on this forum.If people don't know the more interesting meaning of 'myth' then they can Google it if they so please.I didn't say anything about the people in this forum. Sorry.
Annoy isn't the right word. It caused no more than a tut.
It is.Belinda wrote: ↑Tue Jul 26, 2022 7:29 pm Immanuel Can wrote:There is nobody else reading what I wrote about myth other than people on this forum. You advised using the word 'myth' in its popular sense of a fable a fiction because that is what people understood by the word.I didn't say anything about the people in this forum. Sorry.
But we here are not strangers on the street. We are engaged in a not very popular way of thinking about stuff.Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Tue Jul 26, 2022 7:48 pmIt is.Belinda wrote: ↑Tue Jul 26, 2022 7:29 pm Immanuel Can wrote:There is nobody else reading what I wrote about myth other than people on this forum. You advised using the word 'myth' in its popular sense of a fable a fiction because that is what people understood by the word.I didn't say anything about the people in this forum. Sorry.
Try to float that word to any number of strangers on the street, and I'll bet you bucks to bagels they won't say, "Well, it's a religious studies term denoting things that are potentially either true or false but still capable of meaning."
So stop whining and pretending I've insulted people I haven't.
Not that I care, mind you. If I have something strong to say, I guarantee I'll say it. You know that much. But your mendacity here irks me, and it rubs me the wrong way to think you don't realize I would even be smart enough to see through something so transparent.
Let's not play silly games.
And?Belinda wrote: ↑Tue Jul 26, 2022 7:52 pmBut we here are not strangers on the street. We are engaged in a not very popular way of thinking about stuff.Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Tue Jul 26, 2022 7:48 pmIt is.
Try to float that word to any number of strangers on the street, and I'll bet you bucks to bagels they won't say, "Well, it's a religious studies term denoting things that are potentially either true or false but still capable of meaning."
So stop whining and pretending I've insulted people I haven't.
Not that I care, mind you. If I have something strong to say, I guarantee I'll say it. You know that much. But your mendacity here irks me, and it rubs me the wrong way to think you don't realize I would even be smart enough to see through something so transparent.
Let's not play silly games.
I think due to a hard doxastic voluntarism being false, though, that this "drift" you hypothesize is low or inscrutable. There are many atheists in this world, and we don't seem to notice any trend where the older an atheist is, the more likely they are to commit crime. In fact, consider the US, where ~1 in 100 people identify as atheists; yet data from the Bureau of Prisons shows that only 1 in 1,000 violent criminals identify as atheists.Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Tue Jul 26, 2022 7:03 pmWell, Cat, we have to separate two kinds of claims here:Astro Cat wrote: ↑Tue Jul 26, 2022 6:27 pm The main thing that I wanted to dispute here is the "if you decided not to do that..." bit. I don't think that goes down the way that you somewhat portray it. It seems to me that some hard form of doxastic voluntarism is false: people do not get to just consciously will themselves to hold certain values or to cease holding certain values.
People do go through belief revision processes that can affect their values (e.g., anecdotally, when I deconverted from Christianity, a few of my values did change over time: consider the easiest one, "I ought to go to Church on Sundays"). They don't seem to consciously do this though. This is because you don't really control what convinces you or what doesn't convince you. If I told you there is an invisible dragon in my garage right now, I imagine that no matter how hard you tried, you couldn't force yourself to truly believe me. Likewise, if you encounter some very powerful argument or proof, you might find yourself unable to deny that you're persuaded.
1. Rational consistency,
versus
2. Psychological probability
You are quite rightly pointing out that the probability is that psychologically, people will believe or unbelieve things in particular ways. You point out that they're unlikely to do so by pure will, and more likely to be psychologically "drifted" into a new position, so to speak. Some element of one's changing psychological position is "unconscious," as you say, and can't be done by some exercise of force. Fair enough.
However, I was speaking of #1. That is, the question of what Atheism rationally permits. And as I said, in regards to psychological probability, I think most people will continue to "drift" along, just believing in moral schemes for which Atheism provides no legitimative grounds. But my point is that if they decide to do otherwise, then they will find no resources in Atheism that resist such a move. And that's fairly easy to show.
Now, will people continue indefinitely to believe in morality, a morality their Atheism tells them is irrational? Perhaps: but only to the extent they don't take their Atheism seriously, and don't reason through what it implies, or the extent to which they happen not to see that they have any interest in amorality.
But will that last? I think not. You can't forever convince people never to follow through on the logic of their basic ontological assumptions. If they think the world is essentially amoral, a place in which moral judgments have no objective, rational integrity, then how long can it be until that starts eroding their conviction that they should not always act in their own perceived interests? Not all that long, I think.
Yes, I wasn't saying anything otherwise. Someone could indeed form those hypothetical imperatives if that is what their values lead to. Correct.Immanuel Can wrote:Here's the problem with that theory: "hypothetical imperatives" are only instrumentally useful. They tell me, as you say, what I "should" do, if I want X to happen. But it's not hard to come up with totally immoral imperatives from an instrumental basis.Astro Cat wrote:So I think that "oughts" are only sensible in the form of hypothetical imperatives (if I value x, then I ought to do/not to do y). When we make moral statements, we're building hypothetical imperatives based off of our values: "If I value altruism, then I ought to consider signing up for that charity run." We don't choose the values we build moral beliefs from, they exist as some combination of nature and nurture. They get revised over time as we are exposed to new information, new perspectives, etc.; but when they do change, it's not because we're deciding them to.
For example, "If I want my race to dominate, I ought to exterminate the Jews." Or "If I want to control the political landscape, I should have all my opponents shot." Or "If I want to own Cat's television set, I should break in and steal it on a day when I know she's at work." Or, "If a woman refuses my advances, and there's nobody around, and I'm stronger..."
An alternative explanation is that evolutionary history accounts for some common human traits (altruism is a fantastic survival trait, for instance), so we find some commonalities in moral structures around the world. Some of it could also be the cultural circumstances surrounding the dawn of civilization that have carried throughout.Immanuel Can wrote:Harbal and I were talking about that.Astro Cat wrote: So why did I lose the value leading to "I ought to go to Church on Sundays" but kept values leading to "I ought to care about other people?" I think because I held these values for different reasons: I only valued church contingently on my belief that specifically Christian theism was true, whereas my valuing other people is more primal, more core to my being. It was possible for the the first set of values to change because it was contingent on something being true which was possible to become convinced otherwise. I don't think it's possible for the second set of values to change (barring brain damage or something) because it's a set of values based solely on feeling a certain way: it's not contingent on something else being true*.
From a Christian perspective, we would say that human beings were "created in the image of God," and thus have an innate awareness of objective morality. This is called "conscience," of course. And everybody has one. Even people in whom it functions less well have one. Perhaps only outright psychopaths don't -- but we can't say for sure, in their case. We just know they don't respond to it; but maybe they still have a conscience.
By contrast, church on Sundays is merely a cultural form. There's no reason it would be embedded in the innate conscience, though it might well be embedded in habits acquired through socialization.
But this describes the world that we see. Yes, our moral beliefs are similar to preferences, and I don't see how the realist can get around this in a cognitive way. That's the point.Immanuel Can wrote:Now you're at the core question. But it's a very serious one. If "ought" does not correspond to anything in reality, then what is its force? Why should you or I be concerned about it at all?Astro Cat wrote:If "oughts" have some correspondence to reality outside of hypothetical imperatives as per the moral realists, it seems as though the onus is on them to explain how that is even cognitive, because to me it looks like such statements are a reference without a referent. What is an "ought" and where does it correspond to reality?
But that is the very world that Atheism posits as the real world.
Per Atheism, there is no fact in reality that can be tied to an "ought," as Hume said -- at least, not to an "ought" that is more than instrumental or mechanical, as in "If you don't want to burn, you ought to get out of the sun now," or "Once we've hit the air filter three times with a wrench, this car ought to start." Those "oughts" however, have no hint of moral content in them. They don't pass a value judgment on the rightness of tanning, or say that a car is immoral if it does not start on cue.
But let's take one that does. "People ought to be able to love whom they want."
That is presented as a moral claim, is it not? It's clearly not merely mechanical (as in, if the parts fit), or instrumental (as in, if we want to avoid marches and demonstrations that are inconvenient). The force that such an axiom wants is objective and moral (as in, if you don't allow this, you people are tyrants and haters, and those are bad things to be).
But what validity can a claim made on objective moral basis be, if we live in a world with no objective morality? Then the claim thins out considerably, amounting to no more than an "I want."
And who needs to care what you and I might want?
Would you like to comment further on this, or is this just the way you interact with people? I mean, I'm willing to make the effort to talk to you if that's what you're here for; but if you're just here for this then I can just move along.
Having read the lyrics, I’m morbidly curious why you relate me to Dinah-Moe?promethean75 wrote: ↑Tue Jul 26, 2022 8:12 pm that 'ought' statement is still without qualification unless it's a hypothetical imperative. that's what Dinah Moe (astro cat) is tryna tell you bruh.
the problem evolves around what the action is for, and that if the action one ought to take is for the purposes of and toward some end. the action best suited to get those desired results is the action one ought to take. the rightness of that action is therefore qualified by it's usefulness for that purpose. but if that action is for the sake of itself and not to attain some end, it's categorically imperative... which is what all prescriptive moral statements reduce to through a regression; it's good to be charitable. why. because being charitable is an act of good will, and acts of good will are good. why. because acts of good will express love and compassion for people, and love and compassion for people is good. why. because love and compassion for people is conducive to social co-operation, and social co-operation is good. why. because social etc., etc.
there are really only hypothetical imperatives and emotive statements in moral language. as dinah moe explained, there is no cognitive content in such utterances.
