Is morality objective or subjective?

[Immanuel Can]

I never got to be a mechanic; I got the sack from my job after a year.

We've all been there.

Should we be indifferent to stealing, itself, and only be concerned with God's disapproval of it?

Both, I think. For stealing impacts both man and God. Why should we suppose that if stealing is obviously a crime against man, it cannot simultaneously be a crime against God? It seems obvious to me that we can say both.

Yes, we can condemn a crime against man simply by virtue of its being a crime against God, and for no other reason, but if we condemn it on the grounds of crimes against man being wrong, are we not then making the mistake of letting our personal feelings and judgement about crimes against man play a role in the way we approach morality?

Good catch: but no, I don't think we are.

We would, though, be doing that if we severed the two questions from each other. If we argued that there is a rationale for objective morality that depends on God, and a separate, distinct and unrelated rationale that made it wrong for us to do certain things, and right for us to do others, in regard solely to man, then we'd be in trouble in just the way you suggest.

But the truth is that the duty to God is primary and definitive, and the duty to man -- while just as real -- is derivative. This is what John Locke saw: that man's moral standing is derived from his personal standing as the creature and rightful child of God.

So, for example, it is wrong to steal a) because it is contrary to the nature and revealed will of God Himself, and 2) because your neighbour has also his rightful standing and obligations to God, one of which is his disposition of property that God has given him; so to interfere with his duty, by stealing that property which God has put under his rightful disposal is an act which violates not merely a person's wholeness, but the role God has given him to fulfill, and violates your relationship to his Creator.

That's why severing the two always results in incoherence. We end up claiming that man has "rights" which turn out to be what philosophers have called "nonsense on stilts" (Jeremy Bentham) -- that is, high-sounding language, but language so lacking in underpinnings that when we examine it, it turns out to be supported by nothing.

If man has rights because of God, there's a reason he has rights. If we imagine man has "rights" without that, we become instantly powerless to say why any man has such "rights" at all.

In fact, from our point of view, it is hard to see how there could be such a thing as crimes against man, and we should only see crimes against God.

There's something to that.

What most people don't want to acknowledge is that wronging is not just against another person (who, after all, has really no more power or justification to have anything than one oneself has: the robbed is human, and so is the robber...so who's to say which set of values gets priority?), but is an assault and insult against the inherent right of God to say what each man has, what he should have, how he should use his freedom, and what his ultimate purpose ought to be.

But once we understand that man's rights are derivative, not original with him, then we understand this. Moreover, we understand that it's even quite possible for a person to "sin against himself," since his subjective feelings and wishes to not define what is right or wrong for him, but rather the question of whether, in his various actions and choices, he is actualizing the best "self" that God intended him to be. So a man can morally violate against himself -- most obviously, by recreationally drugging his own body until his mind is damaged, or chain-smoking himself into cancer, and less obviously, by committing acts that make him a bad person, and perpetuate his state as a fallen creature, one incapable of the greatest good -- eternal friendship and fellowship with God Himself.

[Iwannaplato]

That will work for anybody who just happens to share your own values.[/quote]Which is exactly what I said. And then went on to explain how you can convince people with other values. But notice, the issue as presented by you is that you can't and won't try to convince others. This is false. Further people with the same values can differ about the effects of certain things. So all sorts of discussions can take place. Also it's not all binary. People have values and then prioritize values in different ways. There are all sorts of ways a subjective can engage in discussions and arguements in the hopes of trying to move things in the direction they want. And they also can have motivation. Your presentation of the situation was false.

But if they already share your own values, then you have no need to convince them of anything, since they already believe it.

And just to doubly emphasize this, this oversimplifies everything. They could the value and not realize that their policies, goals, methods, laws, were contributing to going against that value. This happens all the time, in discussions between objectivists and subjectivists and mixtures of the two. Then there's the issue of not realizing that by supporting X they are going against another value they have. And that can lead to all sorts of trying to convince them to side with you on an issue. And this isn't even getting into how truly complicated people are in relation to their values. They can have mixed feelings, they can have no thought it through, they may not know how to reconcile value conflicts in themselves in certain situations. Something like needle exchange programs and the issues around that should make it easy to imagine many different ways a subjectivist can try to convince people who want something different from them.

"Convincing," analytically, is something one does to somebody who does NOT (at least at present) share one's own values and assumptions. And it requires providing them with enough rational incentives (evidence, reasons, proofs, arguments) that they cease to believe in their former values and objectives, and start to share yours.

You're oversimplifying, see above.

...one can reason with them based on their values and common values.

That will only be enough if the ONLY thing they lack is a more rational application of the same value-judgments you and they both share.

And despite your 'only' that is the case and focus in thousands of issues and the approaches of convincing for both objectivists and subjectivists.

For example, if I already believe it's good to love my neighbour, you can say to me, "Hey, dude: if you love your neighbour you should be willing to cut his grass when he's feeling sick." And I, being somebody who believes in being kind to neighbours, might say, "Hey, you know, you're right...I should."

Sure, that's one very simple situation. But there are all sorts of much more complicated situations, where policees have all sorts of effects and side effects or moral positions and what seems like the obvious practical application are involved. What happens when private schools get tax support. The distribution of condoms to prevent teenage preganancy and so on. Where extremely complicated causal chains come from policies laws behavior. Here the subjectivist can try to convince using values that other claim to have and may not even be thinking about in the given situation. Most people are both consequentialist and deontological, and the tensions between those two metaethical types of thinking open up all sorts of lines of convincing people who share values or say they do or partly share them or share them but prioritize them differently.

All sorts of room for the subjectivist to try to convince people.

And that's being open about their moral antirealism. They don't even have to mention this and can use objectivist language or neutral language.

But that is not the usual situation, obviously; and it doesn't really require so much convincing as helping me to see the rational implications of my own values.

I think it is vastly more complicated than you are presenting it and also my position is not limited to this. See above and my previous post.

What if I don't believe in helping neighbours? What if I have a fiercely competitive view of humanity? And what if, consequently, I see all my own values tied up with a "win at all costs" or "devil take the hindmost" kind of view of the world...maybe I'm a Social Darwinist, a Nietzschean, a Randian, a monopolist, an egoist, a hyper-competitive type...

Sure, and there are a variety of different approaches to dealing with these kinds of people.

And, of course, as usual, objectivists have the same practical obstacles when dealing with people with different values.

That's when "convincing" is important. In tamer situations, it's hardly even necessary. Just point me to the best implications of what I already believe, and I'll probably go along.

AGain, radical oversimplification. First, dealing with all the information people may not have so they don't realize that they have a tension between two of their values, don't realize the results of their choices, refuse generally to look at what might give them cognitive dissonance. Nuclear weapons will abort babies. Why is that OK? When I was younger a large part of the middle of the country was pronuke and absolutist anti-abortion. And note bringing up this issue may not convince many to rethink one or both positions, but a subjectivist has both motivation and ways to
approach arguments, that generally objectivists ALSO HAVE A VERY HARD TIME CHANGING ANYONE'S MIND AROUND.

But try that with Hamas and Israel right now. Try that with Russia and China.

Try your arguments coming from your metaethical positions that there is objective morality on those situations.
I mean seriously. The implication is the objectivists are somehow doing better. And come on. Hamas and Israel is a conflict between objectivists and sociopaths on both sides. Good luck mediating as a Christian. Show the subjectivists how it's done.

And notice that you are sliding the topic away. First you write as if there is no motivation or reason to convince. Now it's success rates. And it is somehow just assumed that objectivist are more successful in convincing others. LOL.

And your examples are examples of fanatical objectivists. Presenting their cases in objectivist metaethical ways and positions - which are of course available to subjectivists also.

Try that as the principle of a justice system: "Hey, I know you just murdered that shopkeeper by standing on his windpipe, but maybe you were just unaware that that's a bad way to love your neighbour?"

Hey, if you want to think that since I disagree with you I have to be a moron and you present me with an approach I never suggested for such a situation, please do. But it hardly elicits respect from me. Quite the opposite.

Anyway, it seems like I have to rewrite what I already wrote. This is a waste of my time.

[iambiguous]

Then you are an moral objectivist.

Actually, in regard to something like the morality of homosexuality, objectivism comes in two flavors:

1] there is the hardcore objectivist [re God or His secular equivalent] who does insist that it is objectively -- universally! -- immoral.

[and with the religious fanatics some insist further that, if you don't repent for being one, you will burn for all of eternity in Hell]

2] there is the "here and now" objectivist who believes that while, "here and now", they do believe it is immoral, they also believe that given new experience or new relationships or new information and knowledge they might be persuaded to change their mind.

So, which one is it?

Wouldn't there be both pro-homosexuality and homosexuality is morally neutral objectivists also?
There would be sub-varieties:
It's morally wrong to judge sexuality X.
All consensual sex between adults is morally neutral - though some things are not for this subgroup. IOW it is part of an objectivism to assign such sex a neutral moral position...and
people should be allowed to do things that are morally neutral.

Sure, for each of us as individual subjects, there are clearly any number of complex and convoluted social, political and economic permutations possible...given both dasein and the Benjamin Button Syndrome. For example, I was an objectivist for years myself. And even when I abandoned one [Christianity] for another [Unitarianism] for another [Marxism] for another [Democratic Socialism] I was still able to convince myself that morality itself could be grasped objectively...God or No God.

In other words, I was convinced that moral objectivism was the real deal [a few times] and that this would always be the case. It was just a matter of finding the right font. But then John and Mary and William Barrett's "rival goods" became a part of my life. And they changed everything. "Here and now" moral nihilism seems the most reasonable frame of mind to me. Given a No God world.

What's crucial here, in my view, is that, if and when scientists and/or philosophers are able to take points I raise in the OPs here...

https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/viewtop ... 1&t=176529
https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/viewtop ... 1&t=194382

...into account, can they come up with a moral narrative and a political agenda that really does reflect the most rational and virtuous of human interactions?

And, in regard to homosexuality, what might that deontological argument be? Satyr's perhaps? IC's? Henry's?

And my point is that if you have a moral system that says some acts are objectively bad, but you claim that homosexual sex is morally neutral, this is still an objectivist stance on homosexuality.

And my point still revolves less around what one's moral system is and more around how one comes to acquire it given the historical, cultural and interpersonal parameters of their uniquely individual lives. Given that human interactions have managed [so far] to produce quite a few One True Paths:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_r ... traditions
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_p ... ideologies
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_s ... philosophy

Either to Enlightenment here and now on this side of the grave or to this and immortality and salvation on the other side.

I'm still rather fuzzy, however, about how you connect the dots here in regard to both yourself. Given a particular context.

Then there is a range of objectivisms where heterosexuality is considered bad (while homosexuality is not considered bad and sometimes considered good) Some in here...
https://theoutline.com/post/8607/hetero ... n-date-men
I've even seen carbon footprint-based arguments that homosexuality is morally superior.

Yes, and why is that? How is that not the embodiment of daseins living vast and varied lives interacting in a world bursting at the seams with contingency, chance and change? Historically, culturally, socially, politically and economically.

Which is why I often come back to this:

If you were born and raised in a Chinese village in 500 BC, or in a 10th century Viking community or in a 19th century Yanomami village or in a 20th century city in the Soviet Union or in a 21st century American city, how might your value judgments be different?

Or I draw people's attention to films like The Emerald Forest and The Other Son and Toto Le Hero and Twin Sisters. How "just like that" your life can be turned upside down, never ever being quite the same.

And since everything gets interpreted as 'revealing one's team', let me make it clear that I don't think homosexuality is morally wrong. Just pointing out that objectivism is held by pretty much anyone near a mike or computer these days on any side of these issues. The ones you like AND the ones you don't like.

Again, it's not what you think that fascinates me nearly as much as how existentially [re dasein] you came to think this instead of that. Why, say, a liberal prejudice rather than a conservative prejudice? And since there are many, many others who think many, many very different things about human sexuality, what's a philosopher or an ethicist or a political scientist to do?

Arguments can be made pro and con in regard to homosexuality: https://www.firstthings.com/article/199 ... osexuality

Okay, Mr. Moral Objectivist, sift through them all and come up with the optimal frame of mind.

[Immanuel Can]

That will work for anybody who just happens to share your own values.

Which is exactly what I said. And then went on to explain how you can convince people with other values. But notice, the issue as presented by you is that you can't and won't try to convince others.

If I was unclear, let me clarify: you might try to do anything you want, of course; but you won't succeed with a rational conversation partner unless you can provide rational grounds.

And if he already believes in your values, then he doesn't need any convincing.

But if they already share your own values, then you have no need to convince them of anything, since they already believe it.

And just to doubly emphasize this, this oversimplifies everything. They could the value and not realize that their policies, goals, methods, laws, were contributing to going against that value.[/quote]
I said this, actually.

What I said was that the "convincing" you would so would only consist in a discussion of the most effective way to get the values you both already agree on. But I added -- and this is the important bit -- that most people do disagree on questions of value. And that's true even within a single society, and most certainly true across different cultures, demographics, age groups and societies.

So moral convincing is necessary, and necessary with people who have very different value-preferences, but (we must hope) share only your valuing of rationality. So if they are rational, and you are rational, then you can provide them the reasons to abandon their value-preferences and adopt better ones (presumably). But since subjectivism insists no such reasons can be produced, a subjectivist has no tools with which to do this task.

...one can reason with them based on their values and common values.

That will only be enough if the ONLY thing they lack is a more rational application of the same value-judgments you and they both share.

And despite your 'only' that is the case and focus in thousands of issues and the approaches of convincing for both objectivists and subjectivists.

"Thousands of issues?" Then it won't be hard to point to one, will it?

What's one of these issues you think convinces both?

All sorts of room for the subjectivist to try to convince people. And that's being open about their moral antirealism. They don't even have to mention this and can use objectivist language or neutral language.

Again, subjectivists can, of course, contrary to their own beliefs, try to "convince" people by drawing on the language of objectivists, or objective data (neutral?). But subjectivists have already denied that such things can tell us anything about morality: so if somebody is awake and rational, they realize immediately that subjectivists don't believe what they're saying. They're not speaking from subjectivism, but from phony-objectivism. Instead, they've become mere propagandists.

It's like when a so-called subjectivist says, "You ought to be a subjectivist, like me." It's absurd, because according to subjectivism, there's no "oughtness" in such a claim. Why "ought" I to do what a mere subjectivist wants? He says his own view is his own, and that I'm under no obligation to share it: so why is he trying to obligate me now?

Of course, that may fool the foolish, the sleepy, the irrational. But it ought not to deceive the wise, the alert, the rational and the philosopher.

What if I don't believe in helping neighbours? What if I have a fiercely competitive view of humanity? And what if, consequently, I see all my own values tied up with a "win at all costs" or "devil take the hindmost" kind of view of the world...maybe I'm a Social Darwinist, a Nietzschean, a Randian, a monopolist, an egoist, a hyper-competitive type...

Sure, and there are a variety of different approaches to dealing with these kinds of people.

What is the subjectivist way to "deal with" them?

And, of course, as usual, objectivists have the same practical obstacles when dealing with people with different values.

Not the same obstacles. Some obstacles, sure; but at least they don't have the obstacle of having denied that objective facts and rationality are available tools to promote agreement. Subjectivists have.

That's when "convincing" is important. In tamer situations, it's hardly even necessary. Just point me to the best implications of what I already believe, and I'll probably go along.

AGain, radical oversimplification.

No, it's true. That would be all that would be required.

In a discussion between you and I in which we both agreed on the values to be upheld, we only need to discuss the means, the best methods to do what we both already want to see done. But most moral disagreements are not of this easy type. Most of them reflect conflicts of values, not just debating different methods of arriving at the same point.

But try that with Hamas and Israel right now. Try that with Russia and China.

Try your arguments coming from your metaethical positions that there is objective morality on those situations.

Oh, the morality doesn't come from "situations" at all. The moral rightness of a thing, if it's objective, pre-exists the particular situations.

It is wrong for Hamas to kill babies. But it was also wrong for us to do it, when we aborted 80,000,000 a year. And it was wrong when the Romans or Spartans did it. And we didn't learn any of that from the situation; we learned it from reality, and from God. It was always wrong, and always will be, regardless of "subjective" feelings.

And that's what makes it wrong now.

[Age]

...

[iambiguous]

Actually, in regard to something like the morality of homosexuality, objectivism comes in two flavors:

1] there is the hardcore objectivist [re God or His secular equivalent] who does insist that it is objectively -- universally! -- immoral.

[and with the religious fanatics some insist further that, if you don't repent for being one, you will burn for all of eternity in Hell]

2] there is the "here and now" objectivist who believes that while, "here and now", they do believe it is immoral, they also believe that given news experience or new relationships or new information and knowledge they might be persuaded to change their mind.

So, which one is it?

Are what you call "religious fanatics" objectively immoral?
If they are, you're an objectivist. If they're not, you can't sensibly object to them.

How on Earth would I know? After all, over and again I note that objective morality may well exist. And it certainly does if a God, the God, your God does.

But it's one thing to argue that it does because you took a leap of faith or made a wager or read it in the Bible or discoverd hard evidence here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=idDoRft ... SjDNeMaRoX

And another thing altogether to provide evidence that no rational man or women can possibly refute.

Now, let's get back to this:

For a thing to be "rational," it has to rationalize with its own basic assumptions. In logic, we say that a conclusion must "follow from the premises." A claim can be untrue, and yet perfectly rational. For example:

All cats are dogs.
This is a siamese cat.
Therefore it is a dog.

That's not an "irrational" statement, but rather one that is wildly "untrue." It's actually 100% perfectly rational, in that the rational connections are precisely connected in the right way: it's just false, though. Premise one is manifestly false, and so is the conclusion.

But in order to detect the truth of a statement, it has to be rational first. If it is not even rational, we can dismiss it.

Or:

All Hamas members are Jews
Ismail Haniyeh is a member of Hamas
Therefore Ismail Haniyeh is a Jew

Let's run that by the Muslims and the Jews over there now and note their own distinction between "irrational" and "untrue". Will they accept it or dismiss it? Or, perhaps, "accept" or "dismiss" it?

Or:

All atheists believe in God
Iambiguous is an atheist
Therefore iambiguous believes in God

That's the case of subjective "morality." It doesn't even arise to meet the very first challenge of being coherent and rational.

Well, I do agree "here and now" that most of the individual subjects here...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_r ... traditions
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_p ... ideologies

...when challenged, are unable to demonstrate that their own [and only their own] moral assessment is necessarily coherent and rational. But that's the beauty of the human condition for the objectivists. All they need do is to believe that this is true "in their heads" and, as far as they are concerned, that makes it true objectively. Or "objectively". Just ask the folks over in the Holy Land.

Or, here, this example...

God created all things.
Morality is a thing.
This entails that God also created morality.

Which God?

The Christian God exists because it says so in the Christian Bible
The Christian Bible is true because it is the word of the Christian God
Therefore henry quirk will burn in Hell unless he accepts Jesus Christ as his personal savior

You gotta love logic.

[Harbal]

Yes, we can condemn a crime against man simply by virtue of its being a crime against God, and for no other reason, but if we condemn it on the grounds of crimes against man being wrong, are we not then making the mistake of letting our personal feelings and judgement about crimes against man play a role in the way we approach morality?

Good catch: but no, I don't think we are.

We would, though, be doing that if we severed the two questions from each other. If we argued that there is a rationale for objective morality that depends on God, and a separate, distinct and unrelated rationale that made it wrong for us to do certain things, and right for us to do others, in regard solely to man, then we'd be in trouble in just the way you suggest.

But then why did God give us the faculty of having an emotional response to moral issues if he did not want us to be guided by it?

But the truth is that the duty to God is primary and definitive, and the duty to man -- while just as real -- is derivative. This is what John Locke saw: that man's moral standing is derived from his personal standing as the creature and rightful child of God.

Are children not meant to learn to stand on their own two feet, and become independent of their parents? And isn't that what any decent parent would want?

So, for example, it is wrong to steal a) because it is contrary to the nature and revealed will of God Himself, and 2) because your neighbour has also his rightful standing and obligations to God, one of which is his disposition of property that God has given him; so to interfere with his duty, by stealing that property which God has put under his rightful disposal is an act which violates not merely a person's wholeness, but the role God has given him to fulfill, and violates your relationship to his Creator.

Thinking of what you said about our being the children of God, was it also your intention to portray him as such an overbearing parent?

That's why severing the two always results in incoherence. We end up claiming that man has "rights" which turn out to be what philosophers have called "nonsense on stilts" (Jeremy Bentham) -- that is, high-sounding language, but language so lacking in underpinnings that when we examine it, it turns out to be supported by nothing.

If man has rights because of God, there's a reason he has rights. If we imagine man has "rights" without that, we become instantly powerless to say why any man has such "rights" at all.

But men grant each other rights, and put measures in place to protect those rights. And rights are very often granted on the grounds of what many regard as "self evident truths". So, regardless of any opinion as to the legitimacy of that, men do have rights and a basis for them, which need not have reference to God. I am merely making the point that such a thing is possible, but making no comment on whether it is desirable.


Anyway, all that aside, can I ask you a question to help me understand how we could best avoid the danger of allowing subjectivity to enter into our moral outlook? I am going to assume you will say, "Yes, of course you can, so go ahead, ask me anything you like".

Thank you.

Supposing you were to witness, or even read or hear about, a man torturing a child, and as a gift to you, I will make the man a Member of Hamas, and the child Israeli. What do you think your response would be; could you describe it?

[iambiguous]

If morality is subjective, then there's no attitude we "should" have, and no "moral principles" we are obligated to honour...or even to recognize or admit, since everything depends only on how I feel, and only for this particular moment.

Again, however, out in the real world -- historically, culturally, interpersonally -- many of us as individual subjects insist that our own moral narratives are the embodiment of objective morality. God or No God. And some go so far as to insist that if you don't embrace their own, your soul will be damned for all of eternity.

And none of these "technical", "theoretical", "scholastic" exchanges changes that.

Indeed, not only do the moral objectivists among us insist that there are attitudes we should have, but also that if we fail in our obligations to embrace their own "moral principles", then one or another "or else" factor kicks in. And that ranges from being banned from discussions here -- https://knowthyself.forumotion.net/f6-agora -- to, well, Hell itself.

However, if moral principles are objective duties, then the task of ethics is to discover how to apply the broad moral principles to particular situations.

And, yes, the moral principles encompassed in the Christian God's moral Commandments had better be the ones that you embody "here and now" or "there and then" you're...toast?

Then, going from one "particular situation" to the next, you damn well better be asking yourself, "what would Jesus Do?"

Or else.

[iambiguous]

Explain, please, how something can be universal without being objective.

Now this takes me back. Back to a time when ILP was actually still a philosophy forum. I had a prolonged exchange with Mo/Von Rivers about abortion. And, as I recall, we would from time to time get to discussing this -- technical? -- distinctions.

To the best of my recollection, Von Rivers argued that while there was no universal morality in regard to abortion, each and every set of circumstances in which an abortion was performed could be grasped objectively.

Which just made no sense to me. Why? Because no matter the individual context, the conflicting goods themselves didn't go away. In other words, is it more rational and virtuous to allow pregnant women to abort the unborn, or to force all pregnant women to either give birth or be charged with first degree murder. Along with whoever performed the abortion.

[Veritas Aequitas]

That's hard to believe. It isn't a challenge for me. All it says is that in our moral language we act and think as if we are using full scale propositions that can be true and false etc. All cognitivists accept that moral language is a full equivalent to any other discourse. That includes for instance Mackie, whose entire Error Theory is predicated on such language being truth-apt.

With that challenge, Blackburn is raising an issue that his quasi-realist non-cognitivism can account for, which other non-cogs such as Ayer cannot. Namely: that we do use our moral language just like any other sort of language with fully loaded meaningful propositions that have the same form as truth-apt statements of fact. I'll leave it to others to work out for themselves whether his approach actually meets that standard, but it is inarguably a sophisticated and important effort.

It's concerning that you don'tunderstand this stuff. You've been claiming technical superiority in the field of ethics over the "gnats" here for much of the last decade, but this is entry level shit you should have known before you started making any such claim.


This is also concerning. It seems you don't yet understand the differences between non-cognitivism and other antirealist arguments. Again,. you've been at this for many years, you should have mastery of the basics.


You do understand that Blackburn isn't a realist don't you?


I dread to ask wtf you think error theory actually is? Exaclty how badly educated are you in this field where you claim pre-eminence?




You can't seem to decide what anything means. Further up the page, and here, Pete and I and others "cannot escape" something. In the middle though the challenge doesn't apply to error theorists, yet you seem to think error theory is a branch of ... I don't exactly know what.



I'm not. One day I will tell you what theory I do favour, but right now that's much too complicated for you.



You posted your agreement with IC that PH must be a non-cognitivist. Here's a quote of that to remind you. It is jam-packed with mistakes that indicate you don't understand the basic theories involved in this subject matter. You're welcome.

Your thinking [opinion] that I am ignorant of the basic of Morality is only based on YOUR ignorance of the full spectrum of Morality and Ethics.
In a forum like this, there is a limitation to express fully.
If we are to dig into the details, it will reveal I am not ignorant of what your think I am ignorant of.

I had been guessing what your and Peter's moral position is because both of you are cowards in presenting your moral beliefs precisely.
I have even raised a specific thread to understand [not necessary agree with] PH's philosophical [moral] stance.
PH: What is Your Philosophical Foundation?
viewtopic.php?f=8&t=35095 Jun 18, 2022

It is very childish and immature philosophically to hide one's philosophical & moral position and debate therefrom.

If we dig into the details, all we find is that you haven't actually read any of the books. You convert them to Word for no reason and you store them in too many folders. But you never read and understand them.

You don't get that antirealism isn't non-cognitivism, as I have shown. You don't understand Blackburn (who is a non-cognitivist) nor do you get the point of his challenge, which I have explained for you, yet it still goes over your head.

Where did I link non-cognitivism to anti-realism [many types]?

I am familiar with Blackburn's position, it is just that I did not give serious attention to your explanations.
Do you want a serious discussion re Quasi-Realism?
My point is Quasi-Realism is Blackburn acknowledged Moral Realism [re Blackburn's Challenge] but is bias towards Moral Relativism.
What is the issue with that?

Btw, I did not claim to be an expert on ALL the books and articles that I had stored for reading and reference.
What I claimed is, there are some which I had claimed I am reasonably expert at, e.g. Kant's Critique of Pure Reason and some others, but for the rest [majority], I am only familiar with their general idea.
Since they are relevant to my "projects" I had saved them for future references where needed.

[Iwannaplato]

Wouldn't there be both pro-homosexuality and homosexuality is morally neutral objectivists also?
There would be sub-varieties:
It's morally wrong to judge sexuality X.
All consensual sex between adults is morally neutral - though some things are not for this subgroup. IOW it is part of an objectivism to assign such sex a neutral moral position...and
people should be allowed to do things that are morally neutral.

Sure, for each of us as individual subjects, there are clearly any number of complex and convoluted social, political and economic permutations possible...given both dasein and the Benjamin Button Syndrome.

So, it would seem to me, best to point out the objectivisms that are present on all the sides of an issue and not just those of your opponents. Otherwise people will get the impression you mainly notice those objectivisms and not others. I do know that you do this sometimes. That you point out that people on 'your side' are also objectivists. But that's what I was responding to here. It seemed like, in that previous post, the objectivists were on one team. Again, I know that is not your overriding position, however if you have any tendency to focus on the objectivists with positions you like less while leaving out the objectivists whose positions fit with your preferences, then you are undermining your point. What you say is your point, below.

For example, I was an objectivist for years myself. And even when I abandoned one [Christianity] for another [Unitarianism] for another [Marxism] for another [Democratic Socialism] I was still able to convince myself that morality itself could be grasped objectively...God or No God.

Yes, I am pretty sure you have mentioned this...let's say more than a hundred times.

What's crucial here, in my view, is that, if and when scientists and/or philosophers are able to take points I raise in the OPs here...

https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/viewtop ... 1&t=176529
https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/viewtop ... 1&t=194382

...into account, can they come up with a moral narrative and a political agenda that really does reflect the most rational and virtuous of human interactions?

IOW can they come up with the right objectivist position?

And my point still revolves less around what one's moral system is and more around how one comes to acquire it given the historical, cultural and interpersonal parameters of their uniquely individual lives. Given that human interactions have managed [so far] to produce quite a few One True Paths:

Then it seems to me it is much clearer if in any discussion of a specific moral issue, here whether homosexuality is bad or not, you should point out that objectivist positions can be on any side of an issue. If we look at the post I responded to it doesn't seem to reflect your point, but rather seems like a weighing in on the morality of homosexuality: those bad conservatives who have mean objectivist positions on homosexuals. I know you did not say this, but again if you just present one side's objectivism and seem critical of that and do not mention the positions that are objectivist but which you are more aligned with, it doesn't aid your point. The point you mention here.

Yes, and why is that? How is that not the embodiment of daseins living vast and varied lives interacting in a world bursting at the seams with contingency, chance and change? Historically, culturally, socially, politically and economically.

Precisely, so if your point as you say above it to reveal these kinds of things and how they lead to all objectivisms, pointing out one side's objectivisms is misleading. It's not a great way to make your point. It comes off as using your ideas of objectivism to hit the people who have positions you don't like, while remaining silent on the ones you do like. And again, I know that you do call out the objectivism of positions you are sympathetic with. But here you did not and this is not rare.

Which is why I often come back to this:

And since everything gets interpreted as 'revealing one's team', let me make it clear that I don't think homosexuality is morally wrong. Just pointing out that objectivism is held by pretty much anyone near a mike or computer these days on any side of these issues. The ones you like AND the ones you don't like.

Again, it's not what you think that fascinates me nearly as much as how existentially [re dasein] you came to think this instead of that.

I'm pretty clear on what you want to know and point out. And of course I have my own desires and goals.

Why, say, a liberal prejudice rather than a conservative prejudice? And since there are many, many others who think many, many very different things about human sexuality, what's a philosopher or an ethicist or a political scientist to do?

I think that's an odd way to word this. But then you seem to be a subjectivist looking for a way to finally find an objectivist position that can be demonstrated to be the right one.

IOW you could be a subjectivist who isn't looking for what a philosopher (some abstract generalized figure or all philosophers political scientists, etc). need to do to find this.

Arguments can be made pro and con in regard to homosexuality: https://www.firstthings.com/article/199 ... osexuality

Did you really think I didn't know this? That arguments could be made pro and con in regard to homosexuality? I mean, even just knowing I've been reading parts of this thread. Even having read my previous post it should be clear, given I talked about it, that there were objectivist position on various sides of the issue.

Okay, Mr. Moral Objectivist, sift through them all and come up with the optimal frame of mind.

What?! Man you make weird assumptions.

[FlashDangerpants]

Your thinking [opinion] that I am ignorant of the basic of Morality is only based on YOUR ignorance of the full spectrum of Morality and Ethics.
In a forum like this, there is a limitation to express fully.
If we are to dig into the details, it will reveal I am not ignorant of what your think I am ignorant of.

I had been guessing what your and Peter's moral position is because both of you are cowards in presenting your moral beliefs precisely.
I have even raised a specific thread to understand [not necessary agree with] PH's philosophical [moral] stance.
PH: What is Your Philosophical Foundation?
viewtopic.php?f=8&t=35095 Jun 18, 2022

It is very childish and immature philosophically to hide one's philosophical & moral position and debate therefrom.

If we dig into the details, all we find is that you haven't actually read any of the books. You convert them to Word for no reason and you store them in too many folders. But you never read and understand them.

You don't get that antirealism isn't non-cognitivism, as I have shown. You don't understand Blackburn (who is a non-cognitivist) nor do you get the point of his challenge, which I have explained for you, yet it still goes over your head.

Where did I link non-cognitivism to anti-realism [many types]?

I am familiar with Blackburn's position, it is just that I did not give serious attention to your explanations.
Do you want a serious discussion re Quasi-Realism?
My point is Quasi-Realism is Blackburn acknowledged Moral Realism [re Blackburn's Challenge] but is bias towards Moral Relativism.
What is the issue with that?

Btw, I did not claim to be an expert on ALL the books and articles that I had stored for reading and reference.
What I claimed is, there are some which I had claimed I am reasonably expert at, e.g. Kant's Critique of Pure Reason and some others, but for the rest [majority], I am only familiar with their general idea.
Since they are relevant to my "projects" I had saved them for future references where needed.

I quoted your own post for you in which you called Pete a non-cog and definitely were assuming that all antirealists are non-cog.

You have declared yourself a world leading expert in Kant many times. You have written here that Blackburn (an Oxford professor of philosophy) knows less about Kant than you do. Why are you suddenly feigning humility?

You haven't actually read many books have you? In fact in tems of a credibility claim you recently made, you are far behind me in this matter

3. Number of philosophical books read, incl. the critical texts.

Your point might be that "Blackburn acknowledged Moral Realism [re Blackburn's Challenge] but is bias towards Moral Relativism" but that's a stupid point that neither describes any recognisable state of affairs nor makes any difference to anything. Most importantly, you are riffing on the basis of assumptions about a book you haven't read. And you have done that before. You did it a bunch of times when you thought I was really into Rorty for some reason.

[Dontaskme]

It’s not objectively wrong to experience homosexuality.

If somebody believed it was objectively wrong to "experience homosexuality," would they be objectively wrong?

My personal subjective belief is that it's not wrong to experience homosexuality. My personal subjective belief also states that somebody who believes (not me) the experience of homosexuality is wrong, is in my opinion, not objectively wrong to have that belief, that person would be right in their own personal subjective belief to state that the experience of homosexuality is wrong, else why would they even have the belief in the first place, if they doubted in their own mind, whether their belief was true or not? but then they could change their mind of course, in which case they'd still believe their belief is the true and correct one.

When we are talking about personal subjective viewpoints based on belief, these views hold value to the believer in the moment, but since the human mind is extremely fickle, by it's very nature, which is a good thing actually, these human minds can and do often change their viewpoints to the contrary, in that what seemed to be of value to them at one time, can change to having no value at all, always for good reasons.

No other agency can change one's mind, only the mind identified with a particular viewpoint can change it's view according to it's belief, which are based on knowledge they already have.There is no other agency outside of this arena of one's own mind. And that goes for all other minds too, there is no other agency outside of those minds either. We can share our views of wrong and right intersubjectively, but ultimately the mind is made up about what they believe morally to be right or wrong according to the individual mindset, and not by any other mind.

Therefore, whether something is of moral value or not, whether something is right or wrong can only be a subjective belief according to the source of that belief, which is the one who identifies with it. There is no other agency available to draw the belief from.

There cannot be absolute universal irrefutable objective facts that state emphatically that the way we treat each other, either morally or immorally is right or wrong, because people will only have their subjective beliefs and opinions about such matters, as, like I've stated earlier is the only source from where these beliefs and opinions arise.


.

[Veritas Aequitas]

If we dig into the details, all we find is that you haven't actually read any of the books. You convert them to Word for no reason and you store them in too many folders. But you never read and understand them.

You don't get that antirealism isn't non-cognitivism, as I have shown. You don't understand Blackburn (who is a non-cognitivist) nor do you get the point of his challenge, which I have explained for you, yet it still goes over your head.

Where did I link non-cognitivism to anti-realism [many types]?

I am familiar with Blackburn's position, it is just that I did not give serious attention to your explanations.
Do you want a serious discussion re Quasi-Realism?
My point is Quasi-Realism is Blackburn acknowledged Moral Realism [re Blackburn's Challenge] but is bias towards Moral Relativism.
What is the issue with that?

Btw, I did not claim to be an expert on ALL the books and articles that I had stored for reading and reference.
What I claimed is, there are some which I had claimed I am reasonably expert at, e.g. Kant's Critique of Pure Reason and some others, but for the rest [majority], I am only familiar with their general idea.
Since they are relevant to my "projects" I had saved them for future references where needed.

I quoted your own post for you in which you called Pete a non-cog and definitely were assuming that all antirealists are non-cog.

You have declared yourself a world leading expert in Kant many times. You have written here that Blackburn (an Oxford professor of philosophy) knows less about Kant than you do. Why are you suddenly feigning humility?

You haven't actually read many books have you? In fact in tems of a credibility claim you recently made, you are far behind me in this matter.

Since I claimed I am a reasonable expert on Kant's Critique of Pure Reason, I am very confident Blackburn [having read Chapter 7 fully and other parts,] have not fully comprehend Kant fully.

For every book, I make sure I read the 'Preface, Introduction and Conclusion'.
In the Preface of Blackburn's "Ruling Passions .. " he wrote;

• Since then I have exposed the material to seminars in Chapel Hill and benefited from the detailed attention of colleagues and students.
  Jay Rosenberg and Tom Hill tried to ensure that Kant was given due respect;

From the above, Blackburn indicated he had reservations on his own understanding of Kant. Despite the above cross-checking, the finer nuances of Kant's CPR was never thoroughly covered.

Even Henry Allison with more than 40 years as a Professor specializing in Kant admitted openly his missed out a critical point in the Critique of Pure Reason.
In the Preface of his book; Transcendental Idealism: Interpretation and Defence, Allison wrote;

• I was awakened from my “dogmatic slumber" on this issue, however, by the work of a former student, Michelle Grier.
  First in her Dissertation and then, more substantively, in an important book based upon it, Grier has shown conclusively that for Kant Transcendental illusion is inherent in the very nature of human reason.3

If Allison a pro-Kantian could missed out such a critical point, what more with Blackburn an anti-Kantian[?] with superficial knowledge of Kantian philosophy.

3. Number of philosophical books read, incl. the critical texts.

Your point might be that "Blackburn acknowledged Moral Realism [re Blackburn's Challenge] but is bias towards Moral Relativism" but that's a stupid point that neither describes any recognisable state of affairs nor makes any difference to anything. Most importantly, you are riffing on the basis of assumptions about a book you haven't read. And you have done that before. You did it a bunch of times when you thought I was really into Rorty for some reason.

Blackburn consideration for moral realism is a very significant point because most of the moral relativists and moral nihilist rejected Moral Realism outright.

I have a lot of 'hacks' on how to do speed reading.
Tell me what are the critical point [in your opinion] I have missed out in that book?
If it is very significant I would be interested to fill in that gap.

That I had to guess what is your philosophical position is that you are hiding your philosophical views [for whatever the reason] and not be explicit on where you stand.
It is likely your background is 'Analytic Philosophical' where as an ideology it is dying as claimed in many places.
Analytic Philosophical' is an ideology, it is not being analytical and the focus on analysis per se.

[Dontaskme]

I never got to be a mechanic; I got the sack from my job after a year.

We've all been there.

No we haven't all been there.