What does, "moral," mean?

[KLewchuk]

I guess you consider science superstitious?

You do, really? [Unfortunately, some of it is, today.]

If you have something against the Buddha ...

How could anyone have anything against a guy like that.

I prefer the 100 acre wood version

https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&url=htt ... AdAAAAABAT

[Belinda]

I have no idea how that is supposed to answer my question, but appreciate the response.

My answer is like , there is no difference between efficiently right and morally right. Both efficiently right and morally right depend on criteria.

The criterion for efficiently right is usually a scientific or technological explanation or what your respected medic,or lawyer or the manufacturer said . The criterion for what is morally right may be what some important politician such as Muhammad , The Pope, or Moses said or is sometimes a sociological or biological explanation.

The distinction then is just a matter of which kind of authority or expert specifies the objective or end or purpose of the value. Is that right? (I mean, as you see it.)

Not exactly.There is no distinction between moral good and efficient good, apart from social reality. Social reality is sometimes influenced greatly by an individual such as Moses, the Pope, Muhammad, St Paul, Martin Luther, Trump, Murdoch, Mandela, Florence Nightingale, Mao T'se Tung, and Genghis Khan. However mostly social reality is influenced by necessities of life.

If any of us small people wants to influence social reality, and social reality needs change in many areas, then we have to work very hard on behalf of our principles and sometimes man the barricades at risk of our lives.

[Immanuel Can]

Their verbal descriptions, however, were a bit surprising: "isn't that incision beautiful," and "look how lovely those sutures are." I'm not sure if you've ever seen sutures inside an open chest cavity, but surgeons definitely have a unique sense of aesthetics.

Yes, that's a good example.

I've noted the same thing about, say, proponents of modern art. They can stand before a canvas that ordinary people may find rather off-putting and pointless, and discuss endlessly how beautiful the compositional elements, techniques and implications of that piece of art are, much to the utter bafflement of the listener.

But of course, they aren't necessarily faking it. They are looking at the piece differently from the way the ordinary viewer is, and perhaps they find those aspects of the painting genuinely elegant, genuinely beautiful and genuinely ingenious. For example, the art-admirers are likely to understand the philosophy behind the piece, the history of art leading up to it, the difficulties of acquiring or manipulating the materials, and the originality of the thought involved in the artist having brought that particular piece into the context of the gallery; but such things are unknown and obscure to most ordinary viewers, who might just say, "It's a bunch of blotches on canvas: what's the point? My kid sister could paint better," because they only look at art as ordinary representation, and they only think of what it looks like.

[RCSaunders]

My answer is like , there is no difference between efficiently right and morally right. Both efficiently right and morally right depend on criteria.

The criterion for efficiently right is usually a scientific or technological explanation or what your respected medic,or lawyer or the manufacturer said . The criterion for what is morally right may be what some important politician such as Muhammad , The Pope, or Moses said or is sometimes a sociological or biological explanation.

The distinction then is just a matter of which kind of authority or expert specifies the objective or end or purpose of the value. Is that right? (I mean, as you see it.)

Not exactly.There is no distinction between moral good and efficient good, apart from social reality. Social reality is sometimes influenced greatly by an individual such as Moses, the Pope, Muhammad, St Paul, Martin Luther, Trump, Murdoch, Mandela, Florence Nightingale, Mao T'se Tung, and Genghis Khan. However mostly social reality is influenced by necessities of life.

If any of us small people wants to influence social reality, and social reality needs change in many areas, then we have to work very hard on behalf of our principles and sometimes man the barricades at risk of our lives.

I'm sorry, Belinda, but have no idea what you mean by, "social reality."

[Scott Mayers]

In all the discussion on morality I have not seen a single clear explanation of what is meant by the word moral. I've seen the words, "right," and, "wrong," "good," and, "bad," used, but those words are used for things all the time that are not described as, "moral." The meat has gone,"bad," that singer is really, "good," the package was delivered to the, "wrong," house, or, "that girl is the, "right," one for the part, do not mean the bad meat or wrong house are immoral, or that the good singer or right girl are morally good or right, do they?

So what kind of thing makes something, "morally," good, as opposed to just good because one likes it or, "morally," right as opposed to just right because it achieves some objective or purpose, and what makes something, "morally," bad, as opposed to just bad because one doesn't want or like it or, "morally," wrong as opposed to something that is just wrong because it fails to achieve some objective or purpose?

Whenever I see the word, "moral," used it always infers, implicitly, if not explicitly, a kind of judgement that doing what is morally bad or wrong makes one guilty of something while doing something morally good or right confers a kind of virtue. I do not know if everyone who uses the word moral includes that censorious or judgmental aspect of the word, but it is very commone.

I think any discussion of morality must make it perfectly clear what is meant by the word, "moral," and what differentiates, "moral," issues from all others, and the question answered, does one's behavior, from a moral perspective, determine one's guilt or virtue?

"Moral" probably derives from "that which moors/anchors all people". So its use meant to imply a universal foundation of conduct assumed to be intrinsically valued the same by everyone.

I prefer thinking of it as any assigned value that defines something's tendency to move toward or away from something and is only relative to one's initial assignments from the environment during windows of development. Those that people share become what many think are 'universal' and 'absolute'. But this is just a misleading assumption about the whole because people just eliminate those who disagree as relatively defective in their morality.

[RCSaunders]

In all the discussion on morality I have not seen a single clear explanation of what is meant by the word moral. I've seen the words, "right," and, "wrong," "good," and, "bad," used, but those words are used for things all the time that are not described as, "moral." The meat has gone,"bad," that singer is really, "good," the package was delivered to the, "wrong," house, or, "that girl is the, "right," one for the part, do not mean the bad meat or wrong house are immoral, or that the good singer or right girl are morally good or right, do they?

So what kind of thing makes something, "morally," good, as opposed to just good because one likes it or, "morally," right as opposed to just right because it achieves some objective or purpose, and what makes something, "morally," bad, as opposed to just bad because one doesn't want or like it or, "morally," wrong as opposed to something that is just wrong because it fails to achieve some objective or purpose?

Whenever I see the word, "moral," used it always infers, implicitly, if not explicitly, a kind of judgement that doing what is morally bad or wrong makes one guilty of something while doing something morally good or right confers a kind of virtue. I do not know if everyone who uses the word moral includes that censorious or judgmental aspect of the word, but it is very commone.

I think any discussion of morality must make it perfectly clear what is meant by the word, "moral," and what differentiates, "moral," issues from all others, and the question answered, does one's behavior, from a moral perspective, determine one's guilt or virtue?

"Moral" probably derives from "that which moors/anchors all people". So its use meant to imply a universal foundation of conduct assumed to be intrinsically valued the same by everyone.

I prefer thinking of it as any assigned value that defines something's tendency to move toward or away from something and is only relative to one's initial assignments from the environment during windows of development. Those that people share become what many think are 'universal' and 'absolute'. But this is just a misleading assumption about the whole because people just eliminate those who disagree as relatively defective in their morality.

I don't think anyone who believes in morality would agree with you, but I do. If morality can be correctly defined, I think you have defined it perfectly:

A universal foundation of conduct assumed to be intrinsically valued the same by everyone.

The important words being, "assumed," and, "intrinsically valued." Since there are no intrinsic values (nothing is just good or bad, only good or bad for something to someone) such values have to be assumed, because they cannot be deduced rationally.

Excellent!

[Skepdick]

The important words being, "assumed," and, "intrinsically valued." Since there are no intrinsic values (nothing is just good or bad, only good or bad for something to someone) such values have to be assumed, because they cannot be deduced rationally.

Rationality is about induction, not deduction.

Winning strategies in game theory despite imperfect information/fallible knowledge.

Rules are intrinsically valuable. That's why we use them to delineate fair play. Laws.

[RCSaunders]

The important words being, "assumed," and, "intrinsically valued." Since there are no intrinsic values (nothing is just good or bad, only good or bad for something to someone) such values have to be assumed, because they cannot be deduced rationally.

Rationality is about induction, not deduction.

Winning strategies in game theory despite imperfect information/fallible knowledge.

Rules are intrinsically valuable. That's why we use them to delineate fair play. Laws.

Those who view life as nothing more than a game are losers by default.

[Skepdick]

Those who view life as nothing more than a game are losers by default.

Then start with game semantics and expand your view?

[Belinda]

The distinction then is just a matter of which kind of authority or expert specifies the objective or end or purpose of the value. Is that right? (I mean, as you see it.)

Not exactly.There is no distinction between moral good and efficient good, apart from social reality. Social reality is sometimes influenced greatly by an individual such as Moses, the Pope, Muhammad, St Paul, Martin Luther, Trump, Murdoch, Mandela, Florence Nightingale, Mao T'se Tung, and Genghis Khan. However mostly social reality is influenced by necessities of life.

If any of us small people wants to influence social reality, and social reality needs change in many areas, then we have to work very hard on behalf of our principles and sometimes man the barricades at risk of our lives.

I'm sorry, Belinda, but have no idea what you mean by, "social reality."

You can easily look it up.

[RCSaunders]

Not exactly.There is no distinction between moral good and efficient good, apart from social reality. Social reality is sometimes influenced greatly by an individual such as Moses, the Pope, Muhammad, St Paul, Martin Luther, Trump, Murdoch, Mandela, Florence Nightingale, Mao T'se Tung, and Genghis Khan. However mostly social reality is influenced by necessities of life.

If any of us small people wants to influence social reality, and social reality needs change in many areas, then we have to work very hard on behalf of our principles and sometimes man the barricades at risk of our lives.

I'm sorry, Belinda, but have no idea what you mean by, "social reality."

You can easily look it up.

Why would I? Anything described as, "social ...," means it is some collective view of things that ignores or minimizes individual human beings. You used the term so I thought you might know what it means. I certainly don't care or have any interest in anything, "social." All my relationships with all other human beings is with each as an individual, not as a submerged non-entity as a member of some collective called society.

[Belinda]

I'm sorry, Belinda, but have no idea what you mean by, "social reality."

You can easily look it up.

Why would I? Anything described as, "social ...," means it is some collective view of things that ignores or minimizes individual human beings. You used the term so I thought you might know what it means. I certainly don't care or have any interest in anything, "social." All my relationships with all other human beings is with each as an individual, not as a submerged non-entity as a member of some collective called society.

Do you pay taxes that pay for national defence?