Philosophy Now Forum

henry quirk wrote: ↑Tue Dec 15, 2020 4:43 pm

Peter Holmes wrote: ↑Tue Dec 15, 2020 4:39 pm

henry quirk wrote: ↑Tue Dec 15, 2020 4:33 pm

did you ever pay attention, pete?

Just telling it like it is, Henry.

nah

Yep. We're talking about moral facts, Henry. And you're wrong. Tough to hear, I know. But you're a moral degenerate, and my animal god tells me you're gonna burn in hell for your immorality.

Peter Holmes wrote: ↑Tue Dec 15, 2020 4:47 pm

henry quirk wrote: ↑Tue Dec 15, 2020 4:43 pm

Peter Holmes wrote: ↑Tue Dec 15, 2020 4:39 pm
Just telling it like it is, Henry.

nah

Yep. We're talking about moral facts, Henry. And you're wrong. Tough to hear, I know. But you're a moral degenerate, and my animal god tells me you're gonna burn in hell for your immorality.

I'm gonna eat your animal god...gonna grill it...nice sear on both sides...

henry quirk wrote: ↑Tue Dec 15, 2020 5:38 pm

Peter Holmes wrote: ↑Tue Dec 15, 2020 4:47 pm

henry quirk wrote: ↑Tue Dec 15, 2020 4:43 pm

nah

Yep. We're talking about moral facts, Henry. And you're wrong. Tough to hear, I know. But you're a moral degenerate, and my animal god tells me you're gonna burn in hell for your immorality.

I'm gonna eat your animal god...gonna grill it...nice sear on both sides...

Sacrificing the incarnated god? All part of the plan.

Peter Holmes wrote: ↑Tue Dec 15, 2020 6:31 pm

henry quirk wrote: ↑Tue Dec 15, 2020 5:38 pm

Peter Holmes wrote: ↑Tue Dec 15, 2020 4:47 pm
Yep. We're talking about moral facts, Henry. And you're wrong. Tough to hear, I know. But you're a moral degenerate, and my animal god tells me you're gonna burn in hell for your immorality.

I'm gonna eat your animal god...gonna grill it...nice sear on both sides...

Sacrificing the incarnated god? All part of the plan.

when you write your bible, get it right: HENRY QUIRK

I don't wanna see no 'hank' in there

so: I'm pilate...excellent

Peter Holmes wrote: ↑Tue Dec 15, 2020 12:01 pm

Veritas Aequitas wrote: ↑Tue Dec 15, 2020 10:52 am

Peter Holmes wrote: ↑Tue Dec 15, 2020 10:33 am Extraordinary. All that research, and you can't do the one thing you need to do, which is to show how a moral assertion can be empirically verified or falsified.
All you've done is invent a question-begging 'moral framework and system of knowledge'; claim there are moral facts within it, which you insist must be verified empirically and philosophically, though you've failed to provide one example; and finally say we should adopt that non-existent moral fact as a standard. And notice the 'should' in the previous sentence.

Why 'should' we adopt any moral standard?
Is it a fact that we should, or only an opinion?
Answer: at the bottom of any moral argument there's a moral judgement, which is therefore subjective.

It is dumb a 'Answer' from your kindergarten class.

I agree
Why 'should' we adopt any moral standard?
is a very fair question.
Upon any answer to the above question,
we must continue to ask 'Why' Why? and Why? ....
I have answers for many of the thereafter 'Whys'.

Another is my approach is reinforced by many other tools.
One amongst many is
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coherentism

Note my forte is in Problem Solving Techniques,
it would be careless of me to overlook the basic and essential Five-Whys Technique [not necessary 5-Whys, it can be as many as possible to get to the proximate or ultimate set of root causes]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Five_whys

• Five whys (or 5 whys) is an iterative interrogative technique used to explore the cause-and-effect relationships underlying a particular problem.[1] The primary goal of the technique is to determine the root cause of a defect or problem by repeating the question "Why?". Each answer forms the basis of the next question.

Okay, why should we adopt any, or any particular, moral standard? Is it a fact that we should, or only an opinion? Use your technique and demonstrate that there's a fact at the end that answers those questions. Be brave. Put your money where your mouth is.

It is my discretion, I am not going to waste time here on 'why the need for moral standards'.

I believe it is sufficient for me to prove moral facts exist as verified and justified within a moral framework and system, thus morality is objective to answer the OP.

Veritas Aequitas wrote: ↑Wed Dec 16, 2020 5:19 am

Peter Holmes wrote: ↑Tue Dec 15, 2020 12:01 pm

Veritas Aequitas wrote: ↑Tue Dec 15, 2020 10:52 am
It is dumb a 'Answer' from your kindergarten class.

I agree
Why 'should' we adopt any moral standard?
is a very fair question.
Upon any answer to the above question,
we must continue to ask 'Why' Why? and Why? ....
I have answers for many of the thereafter 'Whys'.

Another is my approach is reinforced by many other tools.
One amongst many is
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coherentism

Note my forte is in Problem Solving Techniques,
it would be careless of me to overlook the basic and essential Five-Whys Technique [not necessary 5-Whys, it can be as many as possible to get to the proximate or ultimate set of root causes]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Five_whys

• Five whys (or 5 whys) is an iterative interrogative technique used to explore the cause-and-effect relationships underlying a particular problem.[1] The primary goal of the technique is to determine the root cause of a defect or problem by repeating the question "Why?". Each answer forms the basis of the next question.

Okay, why should we adopt any, or any particular, moral standard? Is it a fact that we should, or only an opinion? Use your technique and demonstrate that there's a fact at the end that answers those questions. Be brave. Put your money where your mouth is.

It is my discretion, I am not going to waste time here on 'why the need for moral standards'.

I believe it is sufficient for me to prove moral facts exist as verified and justified within a moral framework and system, thus morality is objective to answer the OP.

QED. Explaining why we need moral standards is easy. Showing it's a fact that we should or ought to have moral standards is what you can't do - because it isn't a fact. It's just an opinion.

But I agree. All you have to do is show that there are moral facts. And you, along with all other moral realists and objectivists, have failed so far - because the very idea of a moral fact is incoherent.

Veritas Aequitas wrote: ↑Wed Dec 16, 2020 5:19 am

Peter Holmes wrote: ↑Tue Dec 15, 2020 12:01 pm

Veritas Aequitas wrote: ↑Tue Dec 15, 2020 10:52 am
It is dumb a 'Answer' from your kindergarten class.

I agree
Why 'should' we adopt any moral standard?
is a very fair question.
Upon any answer to the above question,
we must continue to ask 'Why' Why? and Why? ....
I have answers for many of the thereafter 'Whys'.

Another is my approach is reinforced by many other tools.
One amongst many is
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coherentism

Note my forte is in Problem Solving Techniques,
it would be careless of me to overlook the basic and essential Five-Whys Technique [not necessary 5-Whys, it can be as many as possible to get to the proximate or ultimate set of root causes]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Five_whys

• Five whys (or 5 whys) is an iterative interrogative technique used to explore the cause-and-effect relationships underlying a particular problem.[1] The primary goal of the technique is to determine the root cause of a defect or problem by repeating the question "Why?". Each answer forms the basis of the next question.

Okay, why should we adopt any, or any particular, moral standard? Is it a fact that we should, or only an opinion? Use your technique and demonstrate that there's a fact at the end that answers those questions. Be brave. Put your money where your mouth is.

It is my discretion, I am not going to waste time here on 'why the need for moral standards'.

I believe it is sufficient for me to prove moral facts exist as verified and justified within a moral framework and system, thus morality is objective to answer the OP.

We can all agree that there is a need to have moral standards. But these standards need to change to reflect changing needs, beliefs and cultural norms.
The history of morality is an argument, since morals cannot be purely objective. People might want to select what they see as objective facts to support certain cases, true. But other people select OTHER objective facts to support different moral cases. And so the argument ensues. There is no answer to this argument as history shall, once again, reject for a new set of moral rules.
Morality is an empty authoritarian gesture if it cannot show the fluidity necessary to adapt to changing times and conditions. Any human society that does not change suffers damaging stasis, and cannot persist. There are no objective moral rules for very good reason, and you should suspect the motives of those pretending that there are.

Peter Holmes wrote: ↑Wed Dec 16, 2020 9:00 am

Veritas Aequitas wrote: ↑Wed Dec 16, 2020 5:19 am

Peter Holmes wrote: ↑Tue Dec 15, 2020 12:01 pm
Okay, why should we adopt any, or any particular, moral standard? Is it a fact that we should, or only an opinion? Use your technique and demonstrate that there's a fact at the end that answers those questions. Be brave. Put your money where your mouth is.

It is my discretion, I am not going to waste time here on 'why the need for moral standards'.

I believe it is sufficient for me to prove moral facts exist as verified and justified within a moral framework and system, thus morality is objective to answer the OP.

QED. Explaining why we need moral standards is easy. Showing it's a fact that we should or ought to have moral standards is what you can't do - because it isn't a fact. It's just an opinion.

But I agree. All you have to do is show that there are moral facts. And you, along with all other moral realists and objectivists, have failed so far - because the very idea of a moral fact is incoherent.

Nope!

There are moral standards everywhere from various moral systems [e.g. God's standards, various traditions, social, conventional], but they have not justified why moral standards are necessary in the penultimate [no ultimate] sense to the proximate 'WHY'.

Actually it is your sense of 'what is fact' is incoherent.
You have not yet proved a 'fact-in-itself' [feature of reality, state-of-affairs, that is the case] that is totally independent and unconditional upon a FSR/FSK exists.

What you deemed as 'fact' is actually sited at the very edge between the no-mans' land and that of la la land.
see From 'No Man's Land' to 'La La Land'
viewtopic.php?f=5&t=31341

Sculptor wrote: ↑Wed Dec 16, 2020 9:58 am We can all agree that there is a need to have moral standards. But these standards need to change to reflect changing needs, beliefs and cultural norms.
The history of morality is an argument, since morals cannot be purely objective. People might want to select what they see as objective facts to support certain cases, true. But other people select OTHER objective facts to support different moral cases. And so the argument ensues. There is no answer to this argument as history shall, once again, reject for a new set of moral rules.
Morality is an empty authoritarian gesture if it cannot show the fluidity necessary to adapt to changing times and conditions. Any human society that does not change suffers damaging stasis, and cannot persist. There are no objective moral rules for very good reason, and you should suspect the motives of those pretending that there are.

The above exposed your nakedness on the topic of morality.

Morality-proper is not about authoritarian moral rules that are to be imposed upon individuals with any human society.
For that we have criminal and other related laws which are confined to politics, the legislature, the police and the judicial (judge or jury).
Morality is independent of politics.

There is also the pseudo-morality from God who imposed supposed 'moral' commands to believers, but that is generic to all humans.

There are also the varying and relative moral systems from various tribes, customs and societies.

You need to shift paradigm from relative pseudo-morality to morality-proper.

Morality-proper is confined to the individual[s] only [assisted {not imposed} by society] and his moral self-development in alignment with the inherent moral function [moral compass] within and generic to ALL humans.

In Morality-proper [factually] the individual is his own legislature [inherent moral standards], police and judge and jury within his brain, mind and body on moral matters.

Get off off your dogmatic and bigoted pedestal.

Veritas Aequitas wrote: ↑Thu Dec 17, 2020 5:58 am

Peter Holmes wrote: ↑Wed Dec 16, 2020 9:00 am

Veritas Aequitas wrote: ↑Wed Dec 16, 2020 5:19 am
It is my discretion, I am not going to waste time here on 'why the need for moral standards'.

I believe it is sufficient for me to prove moral facts exist as verified and justified within a moral framework and system, thus morality is objective to answer the OP.

QED. Explaining why we need moral standards is easy. Showing it's a fact that we should or ought to have moral standards is what you can't do - because it isn't a fact. It's just an opinion.

But I agree. All you have to do is show that there are moral facts. And you, along with all other moral realists and objectivists, have failed so far - because the very idea of a moral fact is incoherent.

Nope!

There are moral standards everywhere from various moral systems [e.g. God's standards, various traditions, social, conventional], but they have not justified why moral standards are necessary in the penultimate [no ultimate] sense to the proximate 'WHY'.

Actually it is your sense of 'what is fact' is incoherent.
You have not yet proved a 'fact-in-itself' [feature of reality, state-of-affairs, that is the case] that is totally independent and unconditional upon a FSR/FSK exists.

What you deemed as 'fact' is actually sited at the very edge between the no-mans' land and that of la la land.
see From 'No Man's Land' to 'La La Land'
viewtopic.php?f=5&t=31341

Oh, you seem not to have read or remembered or even understood my previous remarks. Let's try again.

1 From a dictionary: a fact is a thing that is known to exist, to have occurred, or to be true. (Oxford Concise). My gloss on this is that a fact is a feature of reality that is or was the case, or a description of that feature of reality - but you can stick with the dictionary definition, if you prefer.

2 It follows that what you call a moral fact must be a thing that is known to exist, to have occurred, or to be true. Leaving aside the 'to be true' part, which can only be said of a factual assertion - a linguistic expression with a truth-value - a moral fact must be a thing that is known to exist or to have occurred. And leaving aside the strange idea that a moral fact is a thing that is known to have occurred - that leaves us with this: a moral fact must be a thing that is known to exist.

3 Any description - any truth-claim - exists in a descriptive context. So the idea that we can talk about a thing-in-itself is incoherent. As a consequence, I don't claim that there are things-in-themselves, or facts-in-themselves. I have no idea what they could be, so that even denying they exist is incoherent. Please don't endlessly re-erect that straw man. Let's stick to things that are known to exist.

4 So we're back to your claim that a moral fact is a thing that is known to exist. And you claim that such a thing can be empirically shown to exist. So all you have to do is show an example of such a thing. And remember, the claim 'humans ought not to kill humans' is a linguistic expression, and we're trying to leave language out of this discussion.

5 If it is a fact, the fact that humans are 'programmed' not to kill humans' isn't a moral fact, anymore than the fact that, say, lions are 'programmed' to kill antelopes is a moral fact. These are just facts about some kinds of mammalian behaviour. Judgement as to the moral propriety of leonine 'programming' and behaviour is a separate matter from the nature of that 'programming' and behaviour. And by the same argument, judgement as to the moral propriety of human 'programming' and behaviour is a separate matter from the nature of our 'programming' and behaviour.

6 To conclude, our 'programming' not to kill humans does (or may) qualify as what we call a fact - a thing that is known to exist, whose existence is empirically verifiable (or falsifiable). But that doesn't make 'the moral wrongness of killing humans' a fact - a thing that is known to exist, whose existence is empirically verifiable.

Peter, perhaps if you think of the OP question from the point of view of an all powerful being, you can then imagine that all facts , however we group them ,are eternally true i.e. 'objective'.

It may be helpful to fancy this all powerful being as God the creator, or it may suit your style better to imagine the all powerful being as eternally true laws of nature.

Belinda wrote: ↑Thu Dec 17, 2020 12:54 pm Peter, perhaps if you think of the OP question from the point of view of an all powerful being, you can then imagine that all facts , however we group them ,are eternally true i.e. 'objective'.

It may be helpful to fancy this all powerful being as God the creator, or it may suit your style better to imagine the all powerful being as eternally true laws of nature.

1 What we call objectivity is independence from opinion when considering the facts.

2 If a fact is what we say it is - and how could it not be? - then the existence of an all-powerful creator god, or of eternal 'laws' of nature, is irrelevant.

3 If there are no moral facts, they can't be grouped with facts in any way whatsoever.

4 The only features of reality that can be true - in the sense that they can be false - are factual assertions - linguistic expressions. So if there are 'laws' of nature, they can't be true or false. That's a cateogory error. And I think it's vital to be precise about it.

Peter Holmes wrote: ↑Thu Dec 17, 2020 1:33 pm

Belinda wrote: ↑Thu Dec 17, 2020 12:54 pm Peter, perhaps if you think of the OP question from the point of view of an all powerful being, you can then imagine that all facts , however we group them ,are eternally true i.e. 'objective'.

It may be helpful to fancy this all powerful being as God the creator, or it may suit your style better to imagine the all powerful being as eternally true laws of nature.

1 What we call objectivity is independence from opinion when considering the facts.

2 If a fact is what we say it is - and how could it not be? - then the existence of an all-powerful creator god, or of eternal 'laws' of nature, is irrelevant.

3 If there are no moral facts, they can't be grouped with facts in any way whatsoever.

4 The only features of reality that can be true - in the sense that they can be false - are factual assertions - linguistic expressions. So if there are 'laws' of nature, they can't be true or false. That's a cateogory error. And I think it's vital to be precise about it.

Laws of nature cannot be true or false. I agree. However all we can know about laws of nature we know from scientific research and from the arts of prophets and other artists, and all of these are fallible. There is no difference between what you have learned to call 'moral laws' and other laws of nature.The special category of 'moral law' exists only as long as some boss men, such as was Moses, say it exists.

Here's a question from the other Forum..

Thoought our local clown would like to answer it with his talented objective system of morality.

To do the "test" you must give your honest opinion about morals and honesty of the four characters in our story of Sherwood Forest. Forget any preconceived ideas you may about them - this is a different sort of story from all the others. Ready?

The Sheriff of Nottingham captured Little John and Robin Hood and imprisoned them in his maximum-security dungeon. Maid Marion begged the Sheriff for their release, pleading her love for Robin. The Sheriff agreed to release them only if Maid Marion spent the night with him. To this she agreed. The next morning the Sheriff released his prisoners. Robin at once demanded that Marion tell him how she persuaded the Sheriff to let them go free. Marion confessed the truth, and was bewildered when Robin abused her, called her a slut, and said that he never wanted to see her again. At this Little John defended her, inviting her to leave Sherwood with him and promising lifelong devotion. She accepted and they rode away together.


Now in terms of realistic everyday standards of behavior, put Robin, Marion, Little John, and the Sheriff in the order in which you consider they showed the most morality. There is no "right" answer, and I'll give the psychologist's analysis for you.

Sculptor wrote: ↑Thu Dec 17, 2020 11:09 pm Now in terms of realistic everyday standards of behavior, put Robin, Marion, Little John, and the Sheriff in the order in which you consider they showed the most morality.

In terms of realistic, everyday standards of human behaviour - WHY do you want to establish such a ranking? What purpose does it serve and how would such a list be used?

Because, as far as I can tell - it's entirely idiotic.

If the thought experiment simply culminates with a ranked list which serves no further purpose, and informs no further decision-making, then any ranking is of equivalent utility. Randomise it!

Alternatively, rank them according to the prison terms you expect each of them to get if convicted.

The Sheriff and Marion are in for corruption and defeating the ends of justice.
Little John and Robin are properly looking at armed robbery.