Is morality objective or subjective?

[Immanuel Can]

As this book comes to an end, I worry that I have given the impression that I’m against Empathy.
Well, I am—but only in the Moral domain

"...but only in the moral domain."

Get it? Only when empathy is given rule over common sense, and then allowed to dictated "the moral"...which it too often is.

Have your empathy. Feel anything you want to feel. But don't turn it into the idiot dictator of your judgment. That's the thesis Bloom is promoting.

[Immanuel Can]

I suppose that's true, theoretically, but your commitment to God could also disappear in five minutes, theoretically.

Highly unlikely. Calculations based on the present evidence and historical experience suggest that would be a substantially improbable outcome.

However, a subjectivist changing his mind...that can happen on a whim.

Calculations based on the present evidence and historical experience suggest that such whims are highly unlikely.

Whims have nothing to do with objective truth. Objective truth remains stable. Whims come and go.

Whims are a feature of subjectivism. When one follows one's feelings and impressions, one finds one's feelings change.

If I tell you the definition of, or the answer to something, like a moral question, but then I say, "Of course, by the time I've finished telling you this, the answer may have changed," then I really haven't told you anything. There's nothing you can act on, trust to remain, or find reliable. So I haven't helped you at all.

You don't need to worry about that; I'm never going to be coming to you for moral advice.

Or being able to give it to anyone, apparently, since whatever you offer to somebody could change immediately.

It's an unstable view -- not you, of course, but the view you're presently holding. In principle, it can change anytime. It does not, therefore, offer the observer even a single trustable moral axiom.

That seems too little work for a view supposed to be about "morality" to be able to do. I think most sensible people will see that, and realize they have to look elsewhere for information about morality than to subjectivism.

[Immanuel Can]

And let's not forget that IC thinks he's not a subjectivist.

Of course I'm not. I've been quite frank about that.

So a person could still say, "He's an objectivist, but he's wrong about that." (Everybody has a right to think what they want, and I'll say the same of him: he's a subjectivist, and I think he's wrong to be one.)

But nobody sensible's going to say, "He's not an objectivist." I've been clear about that.

[Peter Holmes]

If you think moral rightness and wrongness depend on some agent's opinion, then you're not a moral objectivist.

[Immanuel Can]

If your faith in God were based on the same hope, then it would be the same "regular faith, the kind needed in ordinary relationships."

Yes, that's right. And it is.

But relating to the Eternal God is somewhat different, at least for the present, from relating to other human beings, since we do not visibly see God at the moment. It does require an additional use of faith and hope, for sure.

Right. So the "regular faith, the kind needed in ordinary relationships" is not enough to sustain your belief in God; the difference, it seems to me, being the extra dollop of hope included in every 'probabilistic calculation' you perform. You hope the Bible is the inspired word of God, unlike the thousands of beliefs and religions you insist are human creations. I won't labour the point, but you hope the various arguments presented in favour of God are sound, and you hope your feeling of a relationship with God is based on some interaction between you and him.

Well, again, there's a debased version of "hope," just as there is a debased interpretation of "faith." In both cases, the debased version assumes that there's no evidence or warrant for either -- that one has "hope" in things that are improbable, and "faith" in things that are unrealistic. But neither word, in a full-blooded way implies either.

Just as "faith" is a probability calculation premised on estimating the evidence for the truth of something to be strong, hope is simply belief that what God has said He will do. It's a vote of confidence in the character of the One whom one has come to know.

So, you might say, you "hope" that your wife will be faithful to you. And she will, if she is a person of good character and morals. You know her to be a person of good character and morals, the type to keep her vows to you, so you have every reason to trust that she will also prove faithful. And your confidence in her good character will empower your relationship to grow stronger and more trusting.

But it's not from nothing you believe this. You have a history that confirms her faithfulness and trustworthiness to you...and hopefully, the evidence from it is good. So you dare to hope in her fidelity.

That's how relationships work, of course. And it is no different in regard to one's confidence in God's character. The strength of the hope you have is the evidence that's available to support that confidence.

The empirical evidence is available to theists and atheists alike and different interpretations are available. The difference is that you hope it is true.

That's not a "difference." It's a similarity.

The scientist ventures his hypotheses on faith. Even when he's run a hundred tests, he knows he has never run the complete set of possible tests. If he's run 5, he knows he didn't run the 6th: and what if the anomaly appeared in the 6th? He's not absolutely sure it wouldn't. But it looks to him as if that's improbable, if he's run 5 really good tests, so he invests his hope and faith in the integrity of his hypothesis...and often, more evidence follows.

But here's the thing: if he had run 100 or a 1,000 tests, he still would know he hadn't run 101 or 1,001. Doing the complete set of tests for anything is simply impossible, because it's infinite. So whenever we assert a scientific conclusion -- and even when we decide to dignify that phenomenon with the term "scientific law," we're still speaking only probabilistically. We don't know with absolute certainty that such a "law" can never be contravened; we only know that, so far as we know, it never has...and so we say, "It probably never will, and I can safely call it a 'law.'"

That's not unreasonable. It's good science. And a faith or hope premised on good evidence is likewise eminently rational...and unavoidable, since we live in an empirical world, among empirical phenomena, and are ourselves finite, limited creatures. Upon what then can we operate but faith and hope? There is nothing else, for us.

It gets nasty when you accuse people who don't share your conclusions of being cynical, which itself is cynical.

You'll have to show me where you think I did that. To my memory, I have only ever called something "cynical" when it was manifestly a case of being cynical rather than thoughtful.

But I'm sure you wouldn't allege that if you didn't think it was true, so feel free to supply the case and context.

[Iwannaplato]

If you think moral rightness and wrongness depend on some agent's opinion, then you're not a moral objectivist.

And if you need the threat of hell and orders from a master to do the right thing, you're not moral: you're pragmatic and obedient. Especially if you are arguing elsewhere that human nature cannot be trusted and you're, well....human.

[Peter Holmes]

If you think moral rightness and wrongness depend on some agent's opinion, then you're not a moral objectivist.

And if you need the threat of hell and orders from a master to do the right thing, you're not moral: you're pragmatic and obedient. Especially if you are arguing elsewhere that human nature cannot be trusted and you're, well....human.

Agreed. Is there such a thing as moral cognitive dissonance? If so, IC could be an interesting case study. Banging on about the uselessness of moral subjectivism, while being the willing moral 'subject' of a god - and a nasty one at that.

That was a joke.

[Iwannaplato]

If you think moral rightness and wrongness depend on some agent's opinion, then you're not a moral objectivist.

And if you need the threat of hell and orders from a master to do the right thing, you're not moral: you're pragmatic and obedient. Especially if you are arguing elsewhere that human nature cannot be trusted and you're, well....human.

Agreed. Is there such a thing as moral cognitive dissonance? If so, IC could be an interesting case study. Banging on about the uselessness of moral subjectivism, while being the willing moral 'subject' of a god.

That was a joke.

I probably would have realized, but in forums like this one jokes elsewhere are often asserted straight.

I find it amazing what moral is often considered to be. Not the specific morality, but how the morality is supposed to function in the person. Yeah, my nature is saturated with evil and really I want to [fill in the commandment breaking urge] but there's Hell and God's orders, so I don't.

Heaven must filled with passive-aggressive, self-hating God-fearers roiling with unfulfilled, unintegrated urges.

[Immanuel Can]

Banging on about the uselessness of moral subjectivism...

Well, what's interesting is that so far, subjectivism has not provided us with even one moral axiom. Not even one. That seems far too little for a view claiming to tell us about "morality" to be able to do.

So that suggests that, whatever we may think is true about any form of objectivism, subjectivism is immeasurably more troubled as a thesis.

[Harbal]

Whims have nothing to do with objective truth. Objective truth remains stable. Whims come and go.

Whims are a feature of subjectivism. When one follows one's feelings and impressions, one finds one's feelings change.

Neither does morality have anything to do with objective truth. And subjective moral values aren't whims, they don't just come and go like a sudden desire for ice cream.

You don't need to worry about that; I'm never going to be coming to you for moral advice.

Or being able to give it to anyone, apparently,

I don't tend to give moral advice, as morality is about following your own moral sense, not that of someone else.

whatever you offer to somebody could change immediately.

Some of my moral opinions have changed over time, but I can't remember any that underwent a sudden, there and then, change.

It's an unstable view-- not you, of course, but the view you're presently holding.

No, you are wrong. My moral views are very stable, and I am not aware of any reason to think most people's aren't stable.

In principle, it can change anytime. It does not, therefore, offer the observer even a single trustable moral axiom.

As I said before, in principle, whatever you believe about God now could change at sometime. You can't offer anyone a trustable moral axiom any more than I can. Unless someone has exactly the same beliefs about God as you have, which I imagine will be relatively few folks, why should they trust what you have to say?

That seems too little work for a view supposed to be about "morality" to be able to do. I think most sensible people will see that, and realize they have to look elsewhere for information about morality than to subjectivism.

I don't know about sensible people, but most decent people will know to look to themselves.

[Peter Holmes]

And if you need the threat of hell and orders from a master to do the right thing, you're not moral: you're pragmatic and obedient. Especially if you are arguing elsewhere that human nature cannot be trusted and you're, well....human.

Agreed. Is there such a thing as moral cognitive dissonance? If so, IC could be an interesting case study. Banging on about the uselessness of moral subjectivism, while being the willing moral 'subject' of a god.

That was a joke.

I probably would have realized, but in forums like this one jokes elsewhere are often asserted straight.

I find it amazing what moral is often considered to be. Not the specific morality, but how the morality is supposed to function in the person. Yeah, my nature is saturated with evil and really I want to [fill in the commandment breaking urge] but there's Hell and God's orders, so I don't.

Heaven must filled with passive-aggressive, self-hating God-fearers roiling with unfulfilled, unintegrated urges.

It's been said that the best thing about philosophy is the jokes. Not mine, I realise.

And I'm sure I read about a Christian theologian - may have been one of the Fathers - who said that part of the quiet satisfaction experienced by the blessed in heaven is seeing former loved ones ripped to bits in hell. What a fucking horrible religion.

[Iwannaplato]

Agreed. Is there such a thing as moral cognitive dissonance? If so, IC could be an interesting case study. Banging on about the uselessness of moral subjectivism, while being the willing moral 'subject' of a god.

That was a joke.

I probably would have realized, but in forums like this one jokes elsewhere are often asserted straight.

I find it amazing what moral is often considered to be. Not the specific morality, but how the morality is supposed to function in the person. Yeah, my nature is saturated with evil and really I want to [fill in the commandment breaking urge] but there's Hell and God's orders, so I don't.

Heaven must filled with passive-aggressive, self-hating God-fearers roiling with unfulfilled, unintegrated urges.

It's been said that the best thing about philosophy is the jokes. Not mine, I realise.

And I'm sure I read about a Christian theologian - may have been one of the Fathers - who said that part of the quiet satisfaction experienced by the blessed in heaven is seeing former loved ones ripped to bits in hell. What a fucking horrible religion.

There have been many fine Christians. They generally managed to cherry pick their way through the Bible to a lovely set of beliefs. Like the liberation theologists in Latin America.

[Peter Holmes]

I probably would have realized, but in forums like this one jokes elsewhere are often asserted straight.

I find it amazing what moral is often considered to be. Not the specific morality, but how the morality is supposed to function in the person. Yeah, my nature is saturated with evil and really I want to [fill in the commandment breaking urge] but there's Hell and God's orders, so I don't.

Heaven must filled with passive-aggressive, self-hating God-fearers roiling with unfulfilled, unintegrated urges.

It's been said that the best thing about philosophy is the jokes. Not mine, I realise.

And I'm sure I read about a Christian theologian - may have been one of the Fathers - who said that part of the quiet satisfaction experienced by the blessed in heaven is seeing former loved ones ripped to bits in hell. What a fucking horrible religion.

There have been many fine Christians. They generally managed to cherry pick their way through the Bible to a lovely set of beliefs. Like the liberation theologists in Latin America.

Again, agreed. But I think the nastiness at the heart of the myth - the death cult - always leaves what Empson called the familiar bad smell of Christianity. We can be rational and good without - and sometimes in spite of - religion.

[Iwannaplato]

Again, agreed. But I think the nastiness at the heart of the myth - the death cult - always leaves what Empson called the familiar bad smell of Christianity. We can be rational and good without - and sometimes in spite of - religion.

We've got no good way to do some good old double blind research - like 1000 Christians + 1000 [atheist humans], put in same conditions, test for later behavior and attitudes (or some stuff anyway). Compare and contrast. Send the results to another university for repeat. But I do think there are some terrible core ontologies and messages in Christianity. Some things improved on stuff that went before, some things got worse. But all the sacrifice is good, service and slave relations to the deity are good, guilt good, separations of politics and morals, the war on desires and body, sexism, deprioritization of this life/earth, self-hate presented as goodness, messed some stuff up more than pagan and indigenous religions did - and I think led to how much hate was aimed at anything indigenous or pagan. And don't let me get started on the idea of original sin.

[Immanuel Can]

Whims have nothing to do with objective truth. Objective truth remains stable. Whims come and go.

Whims are a feature of subjectivism. When one follows one's feelings and impressions, one finds one's feelings change.

Neither does morality have anything to do with objective truth.

That's just an assumption. Assumptions don't become true merely by being assumed.

And subjective moral values aren't whims, they don't just come and go like a sudden desire for ice cream.

Some do, some don't...but all can. So you just can't count on anything, from a subjective point of view.

You don't need to worry about that; I'm never going to be coming to you for moral advice.

Or being able to give it to anyone, apparently,

I don't tend to give moral advice, as morality is about following your own moral sense, not that of someone else.

Actually, that's pretty easy to show to be untrue.

What we use morality for is creating a society. We use it for grounding a common commitment to justice. We use it for explaining to others our rights and entitlements, and for making sure we are respecting theirs. In fact, if you were the only person on Earth, or simply the only one that was important in the moral equation, you'd never need anything like a "morality" at all. All you'd ever have to ask is, "What do I subjectively feel like doing right now."

That isn't a moral question, by anybody's definition. It's just a subjective one.

whatever you offer to somebody could change immediately.

Some of my moral opinions have changed over time, but I can't remember any that underwent a sudden, there and then, change.

The process won't matter, or how fast it is. What will matter is that at one point you believe a thing is good, and then later you believe that the same thing is wrong. What that shows, for certain, is that either then or now, you're simply wrong.

And the reason we know that won't be my opinion, but your own manifest infidelity to your own formerly or now-claimed moral axiom.

In principle, it can change anytime. It does not, therefore, offer the observer even a single trustable moral axiom.

As I said before, in principle, whatever you believe about God now could change at sometime.

Since it's a probabilistic judgment based on substantial data, it would take a vast quanity of contrary data to undermine probabilistic confidence in it.

You can't offer anyone a trustable moral axiom any more than I can.

Actually, I can: because the grounds on which I offer it are objective. That leaves them free to test, examine, question and calculate the probabilities for themselves, and arrive at their own convictions. But a subjectivist view can't offer them a single thing.

Unless someone has exactly the same beliefs about God as you have, which I imagine will be relatively few folks, why should they trust what you have to say?

I'm not asking them to believe me. I'm asking them to consider rationally what morality would entail, and premise their judgment on what seems probabilistically true, given the available data. I'm quite happy for them to make their own assessment; I am only pointing out that that assessment will have to be more empirical, and not merely subjectivist.

That seems too little work for a view supposed to be about "morality" to be able to do. I think most sensible people will see that, and realize they have to look elsewhere for information about morality than to subjectivism.

I don't know about sensible people, but most decent people will know to look to themselves.[/quote]
I'm not arguing ad hominem, as if I'm saying that they're stupid for disbelieveing me. I'm not the issue at all. I'm saying that even on subjectivist assumptions, moral subjectivism comes up empty. It can't offer anyone a single moral precept they could even hypothesize, since it really means no more than "What one feels at the moment."

That's just not morality, by definition. Morality, if it's going to be a useful concept at all, has to do more work than subjectivism can do, because subjectivism can do none at all. It can't justify a concept of justice, or frame terms for a society, or even arrange a detente between individuals. Those are things we need morality to do; and if a conception of morality cannot do any of that work, then it's of no use even to entertain it. We may as well not bother.

Interestingly, even to say, while intending subjectivity, "I think I'm a good person" would require me to invoke objective morality. For unless "I" and "good person" are separate concepts, and the predicated concept "good" exists as distinct from the concept "me," then that sentence predicates absolutely nothing: it means the same as, "I am I," which is a circular and vacuous claim...it says nothing. But if "I" and "good person" are distinct concepts, and the latter objective, so that "I" could potentially have been a "bad person," but have chosen to be a "good person," then "good person" is a concept that is not subjective. It has to be assuming some objective content.

So are you "a good person"? And if you don't know whether you're "a good person" or "a bad person," then I think it's fair to say you have nothing you can say about yourself that reflects a moral value. That's just analytically obvious, because morality deals with values like good and bad. If you can't play in that game, you can't have a moral opinion at all. But subjectivism denies the objective reality of those terms, and renders the claim, "I am a good person" or "I am a bad person" vacuous. It has no content. It means nothing.