Is morality objective or subjective?

[Immanuel Can]

Does it matter as long as it works? Not perfectly, but what does work perfectly?

It doesn't "work." Nobody even HAS a "social contract." There's no such thing.

I would say there is an implicit social contract.

And I have the "implicit" ownership papers for your house.

Well I do use logic and rationality, in addition to my own experience, to assess if what I'm being told makes sense.

That's what we're talking about.

[Atla]

I'm so amused when anti-Christians tell me what they think Christianity is all about. It's always entertaining...but never informative.

I wasn't really telling you, to you those are just words without meaning no?

No, but don't let me stop you...

Please do tell, what is love?

[Immanuel Can]

I wasn't really telling you, to you those are just words without meaning no?

No, but don't let me stop you...

Please do tell, what is love?

You'd better start a new thread. That's a huge question, by any account.

[Harbal]

It doesn't "work." Nobody even HAS a "social contract." There's no such thing.

I would say there is an implicit social contract.

And I have the "implicit" ownership papers for your house.

Implicit ownership papers are no good without my implicit agreement that they are valid, which I'm afraid is absent. An implicit agreement between people to behave decently towards each other is similarly not actually binding, but as those involved in the agreement are mostly willing participants, it functions nonetheless. And don't forget; this thread is asking what morality is, not what IC thinks it should be.

Well I do use logic and rationality, in addition to my own experience, to assess if what I'm being told makes sense.

That's what we're talking about.

As I've already said, what you are talking about doesn't make sense. It runs completely counter to my experience.

[Immanuel Can]

I would say there is an implicit social contract.

And I have the "implicit" ownership papers for your house.

Implicit ownership papers are no good without my implicit agreement that they are valid, which I'm afraid is absent.

So is the social contract. What language is it supposed to be written in, by the way?

Well I do use logic and rationality, in addition to my own experience, to assess if what I'm being told makes sense.

That's what we're talking about.

As I've already said, what you are talking about doesn't make sense.
[/quote]How would you know, except by depending on the above methods, which you also say are mechanistic and robotic, not human?

[popeye1945]

There's no duty within an Evolutionary worldview to prefer "the wellbeing and security of a given population" when your own is at stake, or even when you just suppose it is. Your interest in others is purely instrumental...if they serve you, good; if they don't, then the Devil can take them all. That's the logic of survival.

Google the social contract.

I don't need to. I know all about it. But answer my question: when did you sign your "social contract"? Answer: never. "Social contract" is just an heuristic device, an imaginary "tool" for thinking about human relations. It does not refer to anything anybody "owes."

Nature is red in tooth and claw, it is a jungle, and life lives upon life, these things Darwin knew better than most, they are the opposite values of society, this too Darwin knew only too well.

"Red in tooth and claw" is Tennyson, not Darwin. Darwin was not an ethicist. He was an anthropologist and biologist of a rudimentary sort. That's all he really knew about that.

You need not focus just on human societies; our animal cousins also find them most helpful in the struggle for survival.

You have "animal cousins"? I'll stay away from your family gatherings.

But hey, you can prove me wrong: fill out that syllogism I gave you in my last message. Put in your "boos" in any terms you think are appropriate. Let's see if we get anything that looks "moral" -- or even plausible -- at all.

If we do, you've got me.

What specifically are you resisting here, not sure.

I know what you're resisting: having to answer the Frege-Geach problem. And why? Because,I suspect, you don't have any plausible account of a moral prohibition (or endorsement) that you can offer. Your paradigm just doesn't work.

You can only know the world through the worlds altering your biology, that goes for everything, thus it has to be the fulcrum of all knowledge including what is good, bad or indifferent. You are the center of your own universe, as the self -- I. There simply is no other means of building a foundation for a rational morality other than the common biology of the species. As to the social contract, the law and the judicial systems are in place to remind you of the rules of behavior and their consequences. It is that which you are born into, and in which you have your well-being and security more or less guaranteed. There simply is no a rational moral paradigm other than one's common biology. Do you think it is rational to base a system of morality on the supernatural or the antiquated ignorance of our ancestors? Biology is the measure and meaning of all things, ponder it for a time, it is an unavoidable conclusion. Life is consciousness, consciousness is life, and as Carl Sagan used to say, "We are cousins to the trees, made of the same stuff, arranged into a different order."

[Immanuel Can]

I know what you're resisting: having to answer the Frege-Geach problem. And why? Because,I suspect, you don't have any plausible account of a moral prohibition (or endorsement) that you can offer. Your paradigm just doesn't work.

You can only know the world through the worlds altering your biology,

I'm sorry...I must have missed the bit where you put your own version of the Frege-Geach problem. Would you like another chance?

Here you go. The floor is yours. Show what your version of the prohibition would look like. Use "biology" if you would like.

[popeye1945]

I know what you're resisting: having to answer the Frege-Geach problem. And why? Because, I suspect, you don't have any plausible account of a moral prohibition (or endorsement) that you can offer. Your paradigm just doesn't work.

You can only know the world through the worlds altering your biology,

I'm sorry...I must have missed the bit where you put your own version of the Frege-Geach problem. Would you like another chance?

Here you go. The floor is yours. Show what your version of the prohibition would look like. Use "biology" if you would like.

I am not familiar with the Frege-Geach problem, in what way does it contradict myself, and Spinoza, please expand.

[Immanuel Can]

You can only know the world through the worlds altering your biology,

I'm sorry...I must have missed the bit where you put your own version of the Frege-Geach problem. Would you like another chance?

Here you go. The floor is yours. Show what your version of the prohibition would look like. Use "biology" if you would like.

I am not familiar with the Frege-Geach problem, in what way does it contradict myself, and Spinoza, please expand.

I guess you skipped all the earlier discussion. We'd invested quite a bit of debate in it. Somebody had even springboarded a second thread off it.

It's very easy. All you have to do is show that your view can effectively prohibit/endorse one moral axiom. It can be anything: no killing, no rape, no murder, yes to charity, yes to giving ice cream to orphans, whatever you like to choose.

But what you need to do is create a syllogism of the kind below, to show your idea about what morality is "works" in some way.

So here's the Frege-Geach model:

P1: Killing is wrong.
P2: If Killing is wrong, then getting your brother to kill is wrong.
C: Therefore, getting your brother to kill is wrong.

And here's the form you need:

P1: X is ____________
P2: If X is _________, then getting your brother to X is _________.
C: Therefore, getting your brother to X is _________.

The blank is whatever you think amounts to the legitimate basis of morality. The X can be any act at all, depending on what you choose to endorse or prohibit.

Let's see what you've got, then.

[Harbal]

I am not familiar with the Frege-Geach problem

Unless you enjoy having your time wasted, I suggest you keep it that way. It's one of those problems that wasn't a problem before you allowed someone to convince you it is a problem. And even then it would only be a problem if you are the type of person who falls to pieces at the sight of a rogue syllogism.

[popeye1945]

I am not familiar with the Frege-Geach problem

Unless you enjoy having your time wasted, I suggest you keep it that way. It's one of those problems that wasn't a problem before you allowed someone to convince you it is a problem. And even then, it would only be a problem if you are the type of person who falls to pieces at the sight of a rogue syllogism.

Thanks for the heads up!

[FlashDangerpants]

You can only know the world through the worlds altering your biology,

I'm sorry...I must have missed the bit where you put your own version of the Frege-Geach problem. Would you like another chance?

Here you go. The floor is yours. Show what your version of the prohibition would look like. Use "biology" if you would like.

I am not familiar with the Frege-Geach problem, in what way does it contradict myself, and Spinoza, please expand.

The Frege-Geach problem is nothing like IC's description of it and is most likely nothing to do with your theory. Here's the basics though...

Frege - who died in 1925 and Geach - who was born in 1916, did not work together to craft a special problem just for one purpose. Instead, Geach used some famous aspects of Frege's theories to construct a specifically Fregean argument against something specifically vulnerable to that Fregean move.

The Fregean principle in question is called the Principle of Identity Substitution.

If a certain name (n) appears in a true sentence S, and the identity sentence n = m is true, then the Principle of Identity Substitution tells us that the substitution of the name m for the name n in S does not affect the truth of S

What this means is that if you hold that Tully and Cicero are the same person (which they are) and that any sentence that references Tully also references Cicero is simultaneously saying the exact same thing about Cicero (which we can grant today for the sake of argument but is technically bullshit if you didn't know Tully and Cicero were the same man), then all the truth conditions for Tully is fat are identical for the phrase Cicero is fat, and thus you have a truth preserving direct substitution between those two names,symbols,concepts or whichever entity you are defining.

The Frege-Geach problem takes advantage of that truth preservation via identity of intension and extension for the circumstance of moral conceptualising. However, you can only use the Frege bit of Frege-Geach if there is a direct truth preserving identity relation between two concepts such that they are really just different names for exactly the same thing.

In one moral theory, which we call non-cognitivism, there is such an identity relationship. The main objects of moral language (universals such as good and bad right and wrong, as well as all the activities in which we make use of them) are linked to some underlying emotion or compulsion or opinion directly in exactly the same way as Tully is Cicero.

For non-cognitivism the judgement expressed in moral language "it was wrong of you to steal that money" isn't very much like saying "you stole that money" and wriggling your eyebrows in a display of either needing the toilet or being quitre angry.... it is exactly the same.

The Frege-Geach problem takes that instant translatability feature of Fregean Identity Substitution, and the fact that non-cognitivist theories tend to assert such a substitutabler identity, and puts in an extra step to make the sentence being expressed seem bizarre and unnatural.

That little syllogism IC is playing around with doesn't do what he thinks it does.

[Immanuel Can]

I'm sorry...I must have missed the bit where you put your own version of the Frege-Geach problem. Would you like another chance?

Here you go. The floor is yours. Show what your version of the prohibition would look like. Use "biology" if you would like.

I am not familiar with the Frege-Geach problem, in what way does it contradict myself, and Spinoza, please expand.

The Frege-Geach problem is nothing like IC's description of it...

Go back and read the article in PN, and then my earlier question based on it, and you'll know the argument. Otherwise, you don't.

[Veritas Aequitas]

There's no duty within an Evolutionary worldview to prefer "the wellbeing and security of a given population" when your own is at stake, or even when you just suppose it is. Your interest in others is purely instrumental...if they serve you, good; if they don't, then the Devil can take them all. That's the logic of survival.

You are very ignorant of human nature and your own psychological nature.

You're very off-topic and illogical. It doesn't matter what "human nature" might be, if that "nature" is just a product of "nature." It would be contingent and irrelevant because "nature," as you conceive of it, does not care about right and wrong.

It is an imperative ought of human nature that ALL humans must breathe.
This imperative ought to breathe is contingent and irrelevant.
Morality is part of human nature is similar to the above imperative ought to breathe.

Morality-proper is not about rightness or wrongness which is highly subjective, thus impossible to be objective.

I argued;
Morality = Rightness or Wrongness is WRONG
viewtopic.php?t=40331

We need Morality-proper to be objective with a fixed goal post to facilitate progress.

[FlashDangerpants]

I am not familiar with the Frege-Geach problem, in what way does it contradict myself, and Spinoza, please expand.

The Frege-Geach problem is nothing like IC's description of it...

Go back and read the article in PN, and then my earlier question based on it, and you'll know the argument. Otherwise, you don't.

The reason I know this better than you is that I didn't learn about Frege-Geach a few days ago from a 500 word essay in PN. Even VA knew it already, did you not notice that when you boasted "Somebody had even springboarded a second thread off it" that VA's Fege-Geach thread was 3 years old and he just revived it for you?