P3: To value something entails it is not an end in itself. — Bob Ross

Eh? If we cannot value ends, then how can we value means?

The other problem here is that you do not actually arrive at Kant's maxim. For example:

The formula is thus: one should never treat a person as solely a means towards an end, but always (at least) simultaneously an end in themselves—i.e., FET. — Bob Ross

Presumably you also hold to: <To value something entails it is solely a means towards an end>. Thus, on your view, no end in itself can simultaneously be used as a means to an end.

I’m sorry but I’m not going to read 20 different papers to try to understand your position. Would you mind giving, in you own words, an answer to my question? How do you justify your belief that no one should torture babies? — Michael

I don't think you're a serious interlocutor and I've explained in detail why I am not interested in engaging you.

You keep asking Bob Ross to rationally justify his claim. You must do the same. — Michael

This is a thread about moral subjectivism, not moral realism. Please stay on topic.

This is a thought challenge where I try to form the perfect commandment for anyone that isn't religious. — mentos987

To offer a criticism: why do you think your commandment is perfect? What do you mean by that word, "perfect"? I think your commandment would be helpful unto personal growth and lessening general misery, but I don't have a reason to think that it is perfect.

Assuming that knowledge is (at minimum) justified true belief, what is the justification for the belief that no one should torture babies? — Michael

;

If I say “I believe one ought not torture babies for fun” is a moral judgment that is true in virtue of the belief, then you will say I am question begging. — Bob Ross

Do you actually believe that moral claims are true in virtue of beliefs? That is the question. I don't think you even believe yourself.

It is the same reasoning that leads you to believe that “I feel pain” is infallible makes “I believe one ought not torture babies” infallible: they are self-referential. “I believe I feel pain” is not self-referential: it is a belief about a fact about one’s current state of pain or lack thereof. “I feel pain”, in the sense I think you are talking about, is self-referential: if I have it, then I have it: it isn’t referring to something else, like ‘I think 1+1=2’. Same thing with moral judgments. — Bob Ross

But, "No one should torture babies," is not self-referential. It is referring not just to oneself, but also to 8+ billion other people.

Ok, so, at the end of the day we are talking in circle because you keep asserting “beliefs have nothing to do with the moral judgment’s truthity” and I assert the opposite. To resolve this, instead of looping around and around, we need to provide arguments. — Bob Ross

I have provided an argument: "Because I believe it to be so," is not a rationally justifying statement.

I would have to convince you that you shouldn’t torture babies... — Bob Ross

If this is so then your response is not a (rational) justification. It does not rationally justify. Beliefs do not rationally justify moral claims. You admit that more is needed.

(by means I have described in length in the OP) — Bob Ross

Again, if something is truth-apt then it can be argued for directly. Your OP presumed that it can only be argued for indirectly and accidentally. It seems that you do not believe such claims are really truth-apt if they cannot be argued for directly and/or rationally justified.

“No one should torture babies” seems an awful lot, within the context of what you are saying, as expressing something objective, which obviously moral subjectivism cannot account for because it doesn’t think those exist. If you mean “I believe no one should torture babies, and that justifies me in stopping people from torturing babies”, then, yes, my theory can handle that just fine. — Bob Ross

Yikes. :groan:

Either the proposition, "No one should torture babies," is true, or else it isn't. Your belief can't make it true. You know this. Or you will upon further reflection. If you have no way to rationally justify a claim, then it is otiose to call such a claim "true." This whole "subjectivism" approach assumes something like the idea that beliefs, in themselves, can make moral claims true, and this is patently false. Such approaches are non-starters.

I sent J the following in the course of a discussion we are having, and I thought I would post it here as well given its relevance:

Since these and the like consequences follow from the fear theory, it is hardly surprising that people should look for some other way to ground the ideas of obligation and of wrong. Such another way is supposed to be provided by the appeal to duty. Here the idea is that one should obey the rules and respect others’ right because it is one’s duty so to do. This duty is not dependent on the presence of any fear or self-interest, nor does it oblige only those who are afraid. It obliges everyone without exception, including especially fearless tyrants. For this reason the duty in question is said to be categorical and to bind categorically. The most readily intelligible statement of it is still the Kantian one, that one should treat others as ends and never simply as means. To treat people as ends is to respect them as creators of their own world and not to reduce them to instruments for the creation of one’s own world.

Doubtless it is true that the obligation to treat people as ends in this sense is commonly regarded as categorical and binding on all. In particular, the obligation is not held to vary according to the varying presence of some motive or passion. The fearless, for instance, are not excused from the obligation by their fearlessness, nor are their violations thereby any the less violations or any the less wrong. The problem with the appeal to duty is not that it fails to capture the categorical character of obligation but that it fails altogether to explain and justify this character. All it does is assert that the obligation is categorical. It does not tell us why it is categorical, nor does it tell us why the obligation is an obligation. If we were to ask these questions, all we would be told is that we are bound because we are bound, that we should obey because we should obey, and that disobedience is wrong because it is wrong.

I am not exaggerating here. Kant himself speaks about the categorical imperative in almost these words.[9] At any rate, he says that the foundation of the categorical imperative, or what makes it into a command we are obligated to obey, is that it comes out of the wholly incomprehensible ground of our noumenal freedom. We cannot penetrate further into its obligatory character than that, which is to say we cannot penetrate into it at all. Of course, Kant would deny that just because we cannot say why disobedience to the categorical imperative is wrong, or what its wrongness consists in, therefore we do not know that it is wrong. On the contrary, he says, we know full well that it is wrong, and we know this because the phenomenon of its wrongness is given to us directly in our ordinary sense of duty. But this does not help. We may be able, by turning to the phenomena, to assure ourselves that there is such a thing as wrongness or doing wrong. What we want to know, however, is what this wrongness amounts to, and Kant tells us nothing on that score. The categorical imperative is not an answer. It is only a sophisticated way of refusing to answer. ‘You ought because you ought,’ is all it says. A tyrant or a devil could easily avail himself of this command. Besides, we are hereby brought back to the same problem as before. The idea of wrongness has not now been explained but explained away. It has been reduced to the idea of being forbidden. At all events, to say, on this theory, that something is forbidden because it is wrong is to say that it is forbidden because it is forbidden.[10]

The trouble with this categorical imperative of duty is that it is far too categorical. The ‘ought’ has been so absolutized that it has been severed from any foundation in the good and knowledge of the good. It can only be obeyed blindly, if at all.[11]

[...]

…The first alternative, the Hobbesian alternative, appeals to the good of self-interest and the second, the Kantian alternative, appeals to an imperative that commands independently of any good, self-interested or otherwise. Neither alternative has turned out to be acceptable. The defect of the second was its failure to appeal to any good. The defect of the first was its appeal to a self-interested good. The obvious solution is to appeal to a good, but to a good that is not self-interested. The good appealed to must be an other-interested and other-directed good. In short, the good of others must become a primary and direct object of our action, and not a secondary and indirect one. Such a good will, because it is a good, ground an obligation and, because it is an other-directed good, ground an obligation to be other-directed and not self-directed. Thus it will, at the same time and by the same fact, avoid both the Kantian and the Hobbesian defects.

[9] Groundwork, GS, vol. 4, p. 401; see also Essay 2 above.
[10] Cf. the problems Euthyphro gets into with Socrates over the definition of piety and impiety in the Platonic dialogue of that name. See also Nietzsche Beyond Good and Evil, part 5, and Genealogy of Morals, where this morality of the ‘ought’ is presented, so to say, as the fear of the slave pitched at the level of an ideological scream.
[11] See Essay 2 above. This same criticism of Kant was classically made by Max Scheler in his Formalism in Ethics, pp. 190-94. It is repeated by John Crosby, in his The Selfhood of the Human Person, p. 209. — Peter L. P. Simpson, “On Doing Wrong, Modern-Style,” in Vices, Virtues, and Consequences, pp. 66-8

That’s true — Bob Ross

And the point here is that opinions about vanilla ice cream are not moral judgments.

A belief never makes a moral judgment true. — Leontiskos

Why? Doesn’t me believing vanilla ice cream tastes good make it true that my stance is that ice cream tastes good? — Bob Ross

That's not a moral judgment, as you just admitted.

All reasoning for why a proposition is true is fallible; so I am not sure what you mean here. — Bob Ross

Your point depends on infallibility. You want to say that there are beliefs that are true simply in virtue of themselves existing. My point was that while infallible judgments do exist ("I feel pain"), they are not beliefs. We do not say, "I believe I feel pain." An infallible judgment is a matter of strict knowledge, not belief.

You would be wrong about that if you actually don’t believe it; — Bob Ross

I would be wrong whether or not I believe it. Belief makes no difference.

The statement “I love yogurt” can be true relative to me and false relative to you, because we need to know who we are referring to by ‘I’. — Bob Ross

Yes, and we are talking about predications regarding others, not predications involving only oneself. That's the whole point! "No one should torture babies," is not like, "I love yogurt." "I have brown hair," is not like, "Everyone has brown hair."

If I disapprove of something for myself, it does not follow that I disapprove of it in others. — Leontiskos

This is a straw man: if you disapprove it for everyone, then you disapprove it for everyone. Obviously, if you only disapprove of yourself doing something, then, of course, you don’t necessarily disapprove of it for other people. — Bob Ross

How is it a strawman when you agree with my claim entirely?

What do you mean by “personal/subjective reasons”? I would say that some propositions are made true in virtue of beliefs we have—e.g., “I believe people shouldn’t torture babies”, “I like chocolate ice cream”, etc. — Bob Ross

So then you think this is a rational exchange:

• Leontiskos: Why should I not torture babies?
• Bob Ross: Because I believe you shouldn't.

You are just begging the question with “justificatory force”: sure, I don’t approve of forcing someone to eat chocolate ice cream, but if I did then I wouldn’t have a problem with—hence approval/disapproval. — Bob Ross

Of course I am not. Does or does not the claim, "Because I believe you shouldn't," justify the question at hand? Either your belief justifies your claim or else it doesn't. If it does justify it then a perfectly rational Leontiskos would respond, "Ah, wonderful response. I am now convinced. You have justified your claim." I am concerned with what is rational and what is irrational.

The point here is that we have a moral claim that we know to be true, such as, "No one should torture babies." If moral subjectivism is unable to rationally justify such a truth, then moral subjectivism is an inadequate moral theory. If moral subjectivism is unable to rationally justify any universal moral truths, then moral subjectivism is a preposterous theory. If—as seems to be the case here—the moral subjectivist is able to do nothing more than assert their own personal beliefs, then clearly moral subjectivism is unable to rationally justify such truths.

You seem to be trading on the obvious truism that all our judgements are mind-dependent to draw the unwarranted conclusion that all existence must be mind-dependent. Existence and judgement are thus unjustifiably conflated. — Janus

Yes, quite right. :up:

For the classical realist the extramental world can be known in itself precisely through the rational, perspective-grounded mind. — Leontiskos

'I promise to give you a pie", uttered without. duress and so forth, places the speaker under an obligation to provide the pie. It brings about the obligation. — Banno

Indeed. I think John Searle's paper on the topic is quite good: ' How to derive "ought" from "is" ' (The Philosophical Review, Jan., 1964, Vol. 73, No. 1 (Jan., 1964), pp. 43-58). (link)

Is the best we've gotten, though. Im unsure you caught what i was trying to say.
I agree with you, in principle, but there has not been any account which does what you're positing to establish the truth of any moral statement. — AmadeusD

See:

The point here, though, is that belief qua belief is insufficient to justify moral claims.

I should say, this isn't true, and to the high, high statistical degree in which is does consist, it's mainly people pretending that they understand the work an expert has done, to accede to the expert's belief without saying as much. — AmadeusD

Yes, there are arguments from authority. But such a thing is more than mere belief. It is belief + authority.

↪Leontiskos Nice list. Yes, that's the way to proceed, looking at how the words around "obligation" are used rather than just making up a definition. — Banno

Thanks, I agree. I've lost the thread of this thread, and that's probably for the best. :grin: In any case, good posts in this thread. :up: I am reluctant to enter into the fray of these sorts of threads unless I see others arguing for sensible positions.

Is the only coherent justification for moral truth other than divine command presented, though. — AmadeusD

I was arguing that it is not coherent. No one would ever say, "Oh, well if you believe it, then I surely must accede."

The moral realist will say that you should follow the moral precept because it is true. It is true that you should not torture babies. This route is open to justification and reasoning. Unlike belief, truth is a sufficient reason. A belief matters if it is true, and it is never true merely because it is believed.

If X in “Jane believes X” was “vanilla ice cream tastes good”, then I don’t think you have a hard time seeing why your analogy to math fails. — Bob Ross

But “Vanilla ice cream tastes good,” is nothing like, “One ought not torture babies.” Only from the latter can we infer something about what is permissible, omissible, or obligatory. According to your own definitions, the former is not a moral statement. Again, the simple fact that someone believes something cannot make anything permissible, omissible, or obligatory. This is all the more obviously the case when it comes to claims about other moral agents, such as the general permissibility of torturing babies.

The belief is what makes the judgment true in moral subjectivism. — Bob Ross

A belief never makes a moral judgment true. “Why is it impermissible for me to torture babies?” “Because I believe it is.” That’s simply not a valid reason. No one is obliged to not-torture babies because you believe it to be so.

For example, let’s go back to the “Jane believes ice cream tastes good”: does this belief not in virtue of its own judgment make it true? I think so. — Bob Ross

The example is irrelevant because it is non-moral, having nothing to do with what is permissible, omissible, or obligatory.

But the tangential point is that you are confusing all sorts of things even in this case. “Jane believes ice cream tastes good,” is a third-person proposition, and what you say of it is obviously false. A first-person statement like, “I feel pain,” is infallible, but belief statements are not like this. To say, “I believe I feel pain,” is therefore already confused, and is therefore an unused sort of locution. The same holds with, “I enjoy ice cream”/“I believe I enjoy ice cream.” Infallible statements are usually not belief statements, and to make them so is to stretch the sense of 'belief'. But again, these are non-moral according to your definition in the OP.

I find nothing incoherent with “Jane believes everyone should not torture babies” even though it is only true relative to herself—I would imagine you beg to differ on that one (; — Bob Ross

Of course I differ. On your account Jane utters self-apparent falsehoods. If I said, “Leontiskos believes everyone has brown hair,” this would be a false statement, and particularly problematic insofar as I know that not everyone has brown hair. Saying that it is “true relative to myself” is a non-response. The statement is about people other than myself, and therefore its truth value must take into account more than just myself. Appeals to subjective reasons for supra-subjective claims are insufficient, and therefore irrational.

Cognitive approval/disapproval, — Bob Ross

The same contradiction arises here. If I disapprove of something for myself, it does not follow that I disapprove of it in others. And if I disapprove of it in others without sufficient reason to do so, then I am being irrational. Subjectivist reasons are insufficient reasons. It would be exactly as insufficient to say that someone should eat chocolate ice cream because I like chocolate ice cream. This is irrational. Private reasons for public claims are irrational reasons. A public claim requires a public reason.

Look, do you yourself even think personal/subjective reasons are able to justify claims about other persons? The reason it is irrational to say that someone should eat chocolate ice cream on the basis of my own idiosyncratic taste is because the putative reason does not have justificatory force for the sort of claim in question. This seems quite obvious, and I would be surprised if you are unwilling to admit it. Your deeper claim seems to be, "Yes, it is irrational. But your moral realism is irrational too, so I am justified in doing this." But even if moral realism were irrational, this would not justify you in doing irrational things.

The problem with @Michael’s approach is that it disregards one’s responsibility to argue for a coherent moral theory and not contradict oneself. Michael has admitted that his own holdings are self-contradictory, but he ignores this fact and instead just argues with everyone. That is, he argues with noncognitivists, error theorists, subjectivists, and moral realists alike. Since his own position is self-contradictory he feels himself at his rights to argue against all possible positions simultaneously. It turns into argument for the sake of argument, a form of eristic. It is the act of arguing against everything without simultaneously arguing for anything, all while ignoring or continually dismissing the fact that his holdings and his approach are incoherent in themselves. I say this is not philosophy, and that is why I do not wish to engage it.

:gasp: :rofl: :lol: — hypericin

You are projecting your "gotcha" mentality onto others. This was not a joke. Michael freely admits that his moral theory contains unresolved contradictions. My academic reference post was a direct response to his quandary (link).

Of course, not everyone is able to recognize the obvious contradictions in their thought. :wink:

Hmmm…isn’t “Jane believes one should not torture babies” refer to what is ‘permissible, omissible, or obligatory’? Seems to be to me, even if it is just an expression of what jane subjectively believes. — Bob Ross

No, it refers to what Jane believes to be permissible, omissible, or obligatory. There is a crucially significant difference. From, "Jane believes X," one cannot infer anything about what is permissible, omissible, or obligatory; just as from, "Jane believes 28^28=33.13*10^39," one cannot infer anything about mathematics. Therefore, "Jane believes X" (regardless of what 'X' is) is not about what is permissible, omissible, or obligatory. It is about the fact that an opinion is held, and has no bearing on the question of whether that opinion is true or false.

If I say either A, B, or C are true and A is false and B is false, then C must be true. If you turn around and say ‘I also think C is false’, then you are wrong about one of them being false. If you think C is false, then which of the other two do you think is true? — Bob Ross

Fair enough. I am limiting my involvement, arguing that C is false.

That’s fair. I actually edited this with my addition of an elaboration on how moral judgments express something that is subjective. — Bob Ross

Hmm, okay...

That’s the whole point of contention: moral subjectivism allows moral judgments to be beliefs. — Bob Ross

All judgments are beliefs. Again, "12*12=144" is a judgment, but it is simultaneously a belief. To judge that something is true is at the same time to believe that it is so.

‘I believe one ought not ...’ is the moral judgment under moral subjectivism and not ‘one ought not...’. It still meets my definition of ‘moral’ signification because it is still a subject-referencing normative statement which expresses ‘what one ought to find permissible, omissible, or obligatory’. — Bob Ross

This is equivocal. "I believe X" usually means, "I believe that X is true." You want it to mean, "I happen to hold belief X." You want it to be parallel to, "She believes X." But in the third-person case the ambiguity disappears, because there is no implication that the speaker (the "I") also believes/judges regarding X.

Correct. Judgments are beliefs. — Bob Ross

Heh. Thank you. This turns out to be quite relevant. :wink:

I would say that it is the latter in my case, if I am understanding correctly. This is what I mean by the moral judgment (the belief) being an upshot of one’s pyschology and not a moral fact out there. — Bob Ross

I am skipping these sorts of quotes because they just go back to the question about Jane.

Why? “I believe one ought not ...” is expressing something pertaining to what one ought to hold as permissible, omissible, or obligatory, no? — Bob Ross

This goes back to that equivocation and I vs. She (and, in the first-person case, belief qua belief vs. belief qua judgment).

Statements about belief cannot be binding at all because they are not moral statements. — Leontiskos

Moral judgments (which are beliefs about what one ought to be permissible, omissible, or obligatory under my view) are binding to the subject at hand. I can’t say “I believe one ought not torture babies” and then in the next breath say “but I don’t believe that it is impermissible to torture babies”: which one is it? — Bob Ross

A moral judgment is not a statement about belief, it is a statement about what is permissible, omissible, or obligatory. It makes no difference that a belief ends up being about what is moral. If a statement is about [the fact of a belief being held] then it is not about [the specific determination or judgment that the belief contains]. I can say, "She believes X," without myself believing X, and there is a subtle (but precarious) manner in which something analogous also applies to the first-person case.

The other thing to note is that to judge that (no)one ought torture babies, is to judge that everyone is bound to not-torture babies (and not merely myself).

Yes. I am not sure what the contention was here: perhaps I am misunderstanding you. So prong-2 of my thesis is that they express something subjective: a sentence expressing something non-objective is to express something subjective—they mean the same thing to me. Are you saying something could be non-objective and not subjective? — Bob Ross

And so what is the subjective thing that a moral proposition expresses?

Perhaps I could revise it to expound more on how moral judgments expressing something non-objective entails it is expressing something subjective. To me, it seems like it is impossible for a statement to express something that is non-objective and non-subjective: truth, on the other hand, is an emergent property, so to speak, of statements’ relationship to reality and is beyond those bounds. — Bob Ross

I do agree that truth bursts these boundaries. That was my point with the 12*12=144 example.

- :up:

- Dude, I'm not here for eristic. The only philosophical thread I've published is an anti-eristic thread. If you're looking to argue for the sake of argument, you'll need to find someone else to do it with. I was under the impression that you cared to resolve your moral self-contradiction. Apparently I was mistaken. You're a half step removed from Monty Python's "Argument Clinic."

Proof by contradiction is a valid argumentative response. — Michael

"That's not moral and I refuse to say what I mean by 'moral'," is not a proof by contradiction, it's just sophistry.

I’m not the one claiming that there are moral facts. — Michael

You are precisely the one claiming there are moral facts. I am the one claiming there are binding normative propositions. ()

Were morality to have anything to do with suffering and its absence, for example, and were this to itself be included in the objective category of subjectood as just mentioned, then the truth of morality could be appraised as grounded in subjectood - and this such that it could be universally knowable in principle. — javra

For example:

A1. Ceteris paribus, I should not cause suffering for myself
A2. Others are like me
A3. Therefore, ceteris paribus, I should not cause suffering for others — Leontiskos

The question in this case is whether, "Suffering is evil," is a subjective or objective truth. As noted above, I think, like 12*12=144, this is an objective truth known by a subject. The ontological reality of suffering differs in certain ways from the ontological reality of mathematics, but I think both propositions are objectively true.

(Again, I don't think the subjective/objective distinction ultimately holds up.)

I think it's a fundamental point, but one that has been lost sight of. — Wayfarer

Agreed, but I am at a loss as to how to bring it back into sight.

What exactly is wrong with my approach? — Michael

It's purely defensive or eristic and not inquisitive. It looks more like fly-swatting or contradicting than philosophy. And as far as I'm concerned, to reject a definition without providing an alternative is bad faith argumentation. It's, "Effort for thee, but not for me." You're the one with a self-contradictory moral philosophy (). Maybe you should be doing a bit of the work?

All I am saying is that this seems inconsistent with how moral language is actually used. That strikes me as a justified descriptive claim. Perhaps you want to say that moral language isn’t actually used correctly? — Michael

Common usage is characteristically imprecise. Adverting to that imprecision is no way to do philosophy.

1. "You ought to let me stitch you up. You're bleeding out."
2. "You ought to take this bandage. Your wound is exposed to the debris."
3. "You ought to take this food. You look hungry."
4. "I have some peanuts here, would you like some?"
5. "You enjoy Radiohead? I have their newest album on my phone. You should have a listen."
6. ...
7. "You shouldn't execute that innocent man."
8. "You should free your slave."
9. "You shouldn't steal from that impoverished woman."
10. "You shouldn't use racist language."
11. "You shouldn't cut in line."
12. "You shouldn't smoke near your children."
13. "You should adopt a rescued dog."
14. "You shouldn't throw recyclables in the garbage."
15. "You should donate to help save the whales."
16. "You should speak in a kinder and softer voice to my pet."
17. "You should watch where you are walking so you don't step on any ants."
18. "You should keep out of the shadows to keep the demons away."

Which of these are moral utterances? Where should we draw the arbitrary line?

This describes the subjective in the former sense. But what if those truths - like life-lessons or existential facts - that can only be understood 'in the first person'? Those that are not objective in the sense of corroborated by third-person measurement but real nonetheless? — Wayfarer

I see the distinction you are trying to make, but I am not convinced that your second category does not collapse back into your first category. Presumably your second category is something along the lines of qualia. But the difficulty is that qualia can be understood through language. I can speak about the perception of red, and you will know what I am talking about given your experiences.

'In order to know the truth we must become persons of a certain sort'. — Wayfarer

Yes, but this is a rather rarefied point. Presumably this is what you mean by your second category? This illustrates the very difficult gulf between ancient ethics and modern ethics. I have not yet found a way to bridge it. I mostly attempt to speak to moderns through their own paradigm.

Also, the "subjectivists" on this forum don't seem to be saying at all what Pieper is saying. On a related note, "Situation ethics" is interesting, and has some similarities with Aristotelianism, but this too is not something I have seen promoted on these forums.

I appreciate your elaborate, substantive, and thought-provoking response! Hopefully, I can adequately respond.

I think the heart of our disagreement (and correct me if I am wrong) is twofold:

1. A lack of a positive account of pronge-2 P2 of the moral subjectivist thesis; and
2. The implications of true moral judgments expressing something subjective (e.g., is that even possible?). — Bob Ross

Yes, but more precisely than (2), "P2: There are true moral judgments and they are not an expression of something objective." It is precisely the non-objectivity that I am concerned with.

...then the only option left is that they express something objective. Sure, this is a negative argument, in a sense,... — Bob Ross

It is entirely negative. It is a disjunctive syllogism, as noted above.

My only point here is that if you believe that we have good reasons to reject C, then you can’t agree with me that !A and !B... — Bob Ross

My point is that rejecting A and B is insufficient when C is also implausible. C must be supported positively.

Under moral subjectivism, when taken literally, ‘one ought not torture babies for fun’ is not true, not cognitive, and not a (valid) moral judgment but, rather, must be rewritten as ‘I believe one ought not torture babies for fun’. The latter is cognitive (being a fact about one’s psychology), is true in my case, is a valid moral judgment. — Bob Ross

[Important]

In your OP, in the section, "A Case for Moral Cognitivism [Prong-1]," you state something quite different. You give a moral proposition about driving drunk and claim it is truth-apt. If we are to argue about this moral proposition then it must be objectively truth-apt.

What you do here is pivot to instead talk about belief. "George believes such-and-such." This is not a moral proposition, but it is truth-apt and objectively true or false. Yet the subject of cognitivism (and binding morality) is moral propositions, not belief propositions.

This is the same sort of thing as the example I gave in my last, "Tomorrow I am going to wear my ugly Christmas sweater." This statement is true in virtue of the agent's intention. Your statement is true in virtue of the agent's belief. But neither is a moral proposition. Neither one pertains to normative judgments about actions "permissible, omissible, or obligatory." According to your own OP, mere statements about someone's beliefs are not part of moral language.

For you it is sentences which at least validly purport facts which do not pertain to our psychology... — Bob Ross

No. As noted in your previous thread, I reject your exclusive distinction between what is moral and what is psychological. Beliefs are always psychological, as is the mathematical belief I set out in my last post. No one believes we have non-psychological beliefs. The truth of a moral statement regards the truth of a moral judgment, and statements about belief are not moral statements. The statement, "Jane believes one should not torture babies," is not a moral statement, it is only a statement about what Jane believes. Jane's statement, "One should not torture babies," is a moral statement, because it pertains to what is "permissible, omissible, or obligatory."

Note that if you claim that Jane's belief is "psychological" in the sense that it is grounded by one of her values, then the exact same question applies to that value. We must then ask if the value is truth-apt, and if so, if it is true or false. Only if the value is true can the moral statement be true (and therefore binding).

Admittedly, I need to spruce up my terminology on this point in the essay, because I see how I made this part a bit confusing. By non-factual moral judgment, I just meant that the disapproval, the preference, which underlies the psychological fact that “I believe one ought not torture babies”, is non-factual (which is exactly why I call it a preference). Technically, saying they are non-factual moral judgments is contradictory to what I outlined above as a moral judgment (which is the belief, not the underlying non-factual preference). So, yes, I agree that preferences are not moral judgments, but I would say that moral judgments are the upshot of those preferences. I will add this to the essay in a little while (when I have time). — Bob Ross

Okay, good. Again, the key here is that preferences are not judgments and judgments are not preferences. The corollary is that truth-apt judgments cannot flow from non truth-apt preferences, unless the judgment is merely about the preference/belief (as explained above). Yet if it is merely about the preference/belief, then it cannot be moral in the sense you set out (pertaining to what is permissible, omissible, or obligatory).

That’s true. I should have made this more clear in the OP: the truth is the indexical belief which is universal insofar as either one does indeed have the belief or they don’t, thusly making truth absolute and expressing something objective (even though it is just a fact about one’s psychology, which is an upshot of non-factual dispositions a person has).

‘I believe one ought ...’ is universal insofar as either it is true that the person being referenced by the indexical statement does believe one ought … or they don’t. However, the belief itself, being just an upshot of one’s psychology, is not expressing something objective: it is not latching onto a moral fact out there. — Bob Ross

Statements about belief cannot be binding at all because they are not moral statements. They don't pertain to what is permissible, omissible, or obligatory. Thus they are non-universal, but also non-binding by their very nature.

I don’t think there is such a thing as ‘objective’ or ‘subjective’ truth: truth is absolute, and it is the relationship between subjectivity and objectivity such that thought corresponds with reality. I take it to be two different claims to say “truth is objective/subjective” vs. “this proposition expresses something objective/subjective”. — Bob Ross

And do you go on to say that the moral subjectivist believes that moral propositions express something subjective?

Best,
Leontiskos

Lol, another victory lap after a series of senseless posts. You are a classic time waster, and you don't know what the hell you you are talking about. — hypericin

I must stop at some point. Of the thousands of philosophical conversations I have had, this conversation with you has been one of the most definitive. Only very few times have I seen someone contradict themselves as obviously as you have contradicted yourself in these recent posts. At such a point it is very easy to walk away, for the evidence speaks for itself, and beyond that, there is nothing more to be done on my part. In any case, you are the one who failed to respond to my final post: . One could of course ridicule such a person for their irrationality and self-contradiction, or respond to their angry outbursts which occur as a result of their self-apparent irrationality. I do not find this to be necessary in this case. In all seriousness, good luck. I hope you change your position.

(I only request that you do not edit these recent posts and falsify the record.)

Sigh. — hypericin

See your own response:

This feels like a narrow account of subjectivism that few would endorse.

In my view, people ultimately make moral judgements and decisions according to their own values and moral sense. These values and this sensibility are in turn informed by enculturation and group-think, but also by biologically based moral instincts (innate senses of fairness and justice, empathy), as well as individual experiences and preferences. This is "subjectivism" as none of these are objective features of the world (right?), but seems poorly captured by "if everyone were to say so". — hypericin

---

I'm tired of chasing you guys around in your circles. I think this is a good place to leave it, and in my opinion my recent posts to have saddled him squarely with the contradiction at hand.

---

@Michael, on the other hand, has been reduced to a flow chart approach, designed for evading philosophical dialogue:

1. If someone makes a claim which implies, in any way, that another normative proposition is true, and my intuition does not find that normative proposition to be a "moral" proposition, then I say, "Ah, but such-and-such implies that a non-moral proposition is moral."
2. If someone asks me what I mean by "moral," then I say, "I don't know what that word means."
3. If someone demonstrates a normative proposition which is moral according to my intuitions, then I say, "Ah, but that's a command, and nothing more. I don't know why I should listen to commands."

(A sophistical way to ward off any possible objections and circumvent deeper moral inquiries.)

Why should one thing I believe be accounted for by another? — hypericin

Given that metaethics is about the grounding, foundation, and rationale of moral statements, a metaethic which allows no room for normativity does not provide an adequate foundation for a normative ethics.

I admit that this is an apparent contradiction... — hypericin

Thanks.

A better wording would be something along the lines, "I would phrase the theory not that one should listen to their conscience, but that one does". — hypericin

When I was speaking about the law of non-contradiction and the first principle of practical reason, I would have said, "We should and we do." You say something distinctly different, "It's not that we should, but that we do." If you wish to change the claim to say, "We should and we do," then you are free to do that. That is what I would say.

...due to your taking the two quotes out of context. — hypericin

I insist that this is not the case. The claim that you originally made follows with logical necessity from the non-normativity of your theory. Your theory, if it is to be non-normative, must affirm that, "It is not true that one should follow their conscience." It is no coincidence that you affirmed this proposition, even if the proposition was not the sole or primary purpose of the sentence to which it belonged. Note, too, that you were answering my question, "Is your subjective conscience theory intended to be normative?" To answer that question requires answering the 'should' question.

(The theory you hold denies normative truths and yet you "personally" affirm normative truths.)

There is no contradiction between holding a metaethical theory describing what ethics is, while holding normative views on what one ought do. — hypericin

There is a contradiction if they follow Hume in his is-ought distinction, for in that case a non-normative metaethical theory will not account for a normative ethical theory.

Both may reside comfortably in the same brain. And here they do not contradict one another. — hypericin

Hypericin, you have literally contradicted yourself in this thread:

I would say not that one should listen to their conscience... — hypericin

I personally believe that one should follow their conscience. — hypericin

Do you not admit that this is an apparent contradiction?

No. And I'm really beginning to doubt you truly understand the distinction between normative and descriptive, or an ethical and metaethical theory. — hypericin

Just so you know, normative/non-normative does not map to ethics/meta-ethics. It's a conflation that pops up occasionally, but this is the first time in this thread.

You asked me whether my theory was descriptive or normative, and I very clearly answered that it is descriptive. Then you demand that it contain normative claims. What sense does that make? To describe things like "ought" without making ought-claims is not to deny that "ought" is normative. — hypericin

My concern is that you purport to provide a non-normative theory and then begin flirting with normativity, and given the large number of times I have seen subjectivists flip-flop, I am keen to address this from the beginning.

I personally believe that one should follow their conscience. But this 'should' has no place in a descriptive moral theory. That "one should follow their conscience" is a moral claim like any other. — hypericin

I agree.

But think about that. You simultaneously hold that one should follow their conscience, while at the same time considering yourself a non-normative subjectivist who is propounding a non-normative theory. Your non-normative theory says, "Many people do follow their conscience but I do not say you should follow your conscience." Yet you simultaneously hold the belief that one should follow their conscience. You simultaneously say that 'You should follow your conscience.' It would seem as if your beliefs contradict your system (and this has of course been my main contention in conversations with subjectivists).

So how do you resolve this apparent contradiction?

Some quotes from Aristotle:

But the happiness which consists in the exercise of the reason is separate from the lower nature. (So much we may be allowed to assert about it: a detailed discussion is beyond our present purpose.)

Further, this happiness would seem to need but a small supply of external goods, certainly less than the moral life needs. Both need the necessaries of life to the same extent, let us say; for though, in fact, the politician takes more care of his person than the philosopher, yet the difference will be quite inconsiderable. But in what they need for their activities there will be a great difference. Wealth will be needed by the liberal man, that he may act liberally; by the just man, that he may discharge his obligations (for a mere wish cannot be tested,—even unjust people pretend a wish to act justly);. . .

[...]

Our conclusion, then, is that happiness is a kind of speculation or contemplation.

But as we are men we shall need external good fortune also: for our nature does not itself provide all that is necessary for contemplation; the body must be in health, and supplied with food, and otherwise cared for. We must not, however, suppose that because it is impossible to be happy without external good things, therefore a man who is to be happy will want many things or much. It is not the superabundance of good things that makes a man independent, or enables him to act; and a man may do noble deeds, though he be not ruler of land and sea. A moderate equipment may give you opportunity for virtuous action (as we may easily see, for private persons seem to do what is right not less, but rather more, than princes), and so much as gives this opportunity is enough; for that man’s life will be happy who has virtue and exercises it. — Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics, X.8

Good points, explanations, and elaboration. This reminds me of the "silver rule": do not do unto others as you would not have them do unto you.

Since ‘moral’ language signifies ‘what one considers permissible, omissible, or obligatory’, it follows that any action a person commits implicitly concedes some moral truth. — Bob Ross

I think this is a fairly good OP. I think it improves significantly on your previous account. I am glad to see that you are trying to get away from the taste-based idea we discussed a few days ago. Your ability to revise your views is laudable.

I think this idea that the sphere of morality encompasses all acts is absolutely correct, and you are the first TPF member I have seen to explicitly accept this view. I also think your arguments for moral cognitivism are sound.

P2: There are true moral judgments and they are not an expression of something objective. — Bob Ross

This could be the central contradiction in your system. I think this commits you to the idea that there are objective truths which are not grounded in objective realities, which seems to be a contradiction. More concisely, "subjective truth" is chimerical (i.e. it is something which may seem attainable at first, but always fades into the horizon like a mirage). More on this. . .

For moral subjectivists, they are not expressing something objective when stating ‘one ought not torture babies for fun’ because it is colloquial short-hand for ‘I believe one ought not torture babies for fun [and that is an upshot of my psychology]’. If a moral subjectivist is deploying those sort of moral judgments as if they express something objective, then they simply aren’t moral subjectivists (or they are confused). — Bob Ross

When one states, "I believe one ought not torture babies for fun," I would interpret that to mean, "I believe it is objectively true that one ought not torture babies for fun." After all, what is the "truth" of moral cognitivism if not objective truth? Isn't all truth 'objective' in this relevant sense?

The second common objection is that enforcing preferences (i.e., non-factual moral judgments) is unfair, wrong, and impermissible. — Bob Ross

A non-factual moral judgment is not a preference. More, a preference is not a judgment of truth. To affirm a moral proposition is to make a judgment, not to have a preference. Preferences are not judgments and judgments are not preferences.

The third most common objection is that there is no moral disagreement if moral subjectivism is true, and this seems implausible. If ‘I believe one ought not torture babies’ is a moral judgment which expresses something subjective, then it appears as though one person can affirm this proposition (validly) and another disaffirm it (validly): so what disagreement could possibly be had if there is no fact-of-the-matter to dispute? I contend that this is an invalid importation of a moral realist’s metaethical framework, of which is baked-into, implicitly, the concept of ‘disagreement’. There is still disagreement in morals even if moral judgments express something subjective and it is useful to have moral conversations: it just doesn’t quite look the same under a moral subjectivist’s metaethical framework—the concept of ‘disagreement’ looks different. When one affirms ‘one ought not do X’ and someone else disaffirms it, then they can engage in a fruitful moral discussion... — Bob Ross

This seems like a denial of cognitivism. Propositions which are true or false can be argued about in a straightforward way. Your five workarounds would be possible but not necessary on such a case.


A basic problem that I see in this account is the way that it founders on the subjective/objective distinction (which is not an ultimately coherent distinction in the first place). For the realist a truth, such as 12*12=144, is objective and subjective, in the sense that it is objectively true and yet it is always and only ever known and appropriated by an individual subject. Objective truths are known by subjects. For the moral realist it is the same. "Do not torture babies for fun," is an objective truth, known by a subject.

The related problem is similar. If a truth is not universally knowable, then it cannot be universally binding; and if the ground of a truth is accessible to only a single subject, then it is not universally knowable. Offhand I can think of two kinds of subjective truths: truths known by a subject on the basis of private information; and truths made true by a subject's intentions. For example, "I enjoy pock-marked lilies," and, "Tomorrow I am going to wear my ugly Christmas sweater." The first sort cannot function as a universally binding moral truth because it is not universally known to all. The second sort cannot function as a universally binding moral truth because moral truths are not thought to be contingent on any human will. Apparently some moral subjectivists think certain instances of the second sort, such as the decree of a king, could function as a subjective moral truth. This is more plausible than any other account I can think of, but I haven't yet met anyone who takes the King's decree to be morally binding.

Logically, Prong-2.P2 is the heart of subjectivism and yet it receives no positive support or elaboration. You don't even say what a subjective, binding truth is supposed to be, or how it could work. Your argument is purely negative. Your disjunctive syllogism is something like, "A or B or C. We have good reasons to reject A and B. Therefore, C." The problem is that we also have good reasons to reject C.

Do you agree? — wonderer1

Not so much. I do appreciate your more serious recent posts, and I shouldn't have allowed Joshs' comments to poison the well of your posts. At the same time, I think you are prone to twist things in a rhetorical direction instead of addressing the central issues. I am not really interested in a rhetorical focus on terms like "moral badness," "evil," "blame," etc. In my philosophical lexicon these are all very precise terms, used to address serious questions. Yet in your mouth they seem to be merely pejorative, and your posts end up becoming a kind of excoriation of these terms conceived as pejorative.

For example, if you look at my first post you will see that I sidelined the question of whether the failure is moral as rather unimportant, purely definitional (). I gave my reasons why I believe it is bad, why it is a failure, why it should be avoided, etc. In contrast, both in the post I was responding to and the post you responded with, you are are preoccupied with rhetorical-pejorative terms, such as "moral failure," "evil," etc. (and this is a little bit ironic given your allusion to Zen).

People shouldn't contradict themselves or make intellectual mistakes. They do happen, and then we correct them (because we know they are bad). "One swallow does not make a summer." But those who contradict themselves with abandon and without qualms, or assert and publish what they know to be false, are intellectually dishonest and intellectually depraved. They have made a habit out of bad intellectual acts, and have hence become unreasonable and untrustworthy in matters of the intellect. I don't really care whether we call this a moral failure. I don't think most people have any precise idea what they mean when they use that term, "moral."

The lengths to which folk go to avoid admitting this are extraordinary. — Banno

Agreed. "You can lead a horse to water..." There are a lot of folks here who are not genuinely interested in doing philosophy, and others who are capable of doing philosophy but choose not to on certain topics.

This is why Plato was so harsh on the Sophists: because Sophistry is Philosophy's evil twin, in large part indistinguishable from it. I wrote <a post> looking at Plato's conditions for philosophical dialogue, and that passage of the Meno is something I occasionally return to.

I haven't written a thread on morality because I am convinced the moral sophists are too thick on the ground for it to be fruitful. The only reason I wrote that <reference post> is because I came to believe that there were people who were genuinely interested in and troubled by Anscombe's thesis. Or in other words, that some people are interested in serious moral philosophy. I'm sure moral realists would be more willing to expound their theses if they believed that they would meet with genuine philosophical interaction.

I say that a claim like “you ought listen to my music” isn’t a moral claim because I recognise how people use moral language and recognise that they don’t use moral language to describe such a claim.

I accept that a claim like “you ought not hurt puppies” is a moral claim because I recognise how people use moral language and recognise that they use moral language to describe such a claim. But I don’t know what they mean when they describe it as a moral obligation, which is why I’m asking you to explain it. — Michael

But you also vacillate on things like A3, so it's hard to believe these ever-shifting tactics are in earnest:

Edit: The other problem here is that you have consistently ignored the central question of whether A3 is moral. The evasiveness that you have been displaying becomes particularly rarefied when it comes to this question, which was a central question in the first place. Whenever possible, you say, "That claim is not moral." Yet you can't do this with A3, and so the evasion becomes more pronounced in that case (↪Michael). — Leontiskos

With A3 you shift tactics, saying, "That's just a command. I see nothing but a command." (Well of course it's not a command, because it's the conclusion of a practical syllogism!)

Else, consider when you claimed that the dilemma you posed () was an "inclusive or" ().

-

If the first isn’t a moral obligation but the second is then a) what does it mean to say that the second is a moral obligation and b) what evidence or reasoning determines that the first isn’t a moral obligation but the second is? — Michael

You are the one claiming that they are different, not me. You are the one presuming your own definition of moral without defining or defending it. I have given two definitions now. You have given none, despite making claims about what is and is not moral.

If you don’t recognise the difference between a moral obligation and a pragmatic suggestion then you ought try reading some philosophy. — Michael

When you speak of a "moral obligation" you are clearly speaking of a Kantian moral obligation. I think I understand this better than you do. I am not a Kantian. I don't think Kant's Groundwork holds up. I have directed you to freely available academic articles illustrating the problems and context of such an approach. You are the one who ought to try reading some philosophy.

You do not have to call our talk of "what might be done, what ought be done, what's the best thing to do, and so on" moral, if you do not wish to. That's neither here no there. But there are such sentences, and some of them are true. QED. — Banno

Right.

You think non-cognitivists and error theorists don’t say that I should brush my teeth or that it’s best if I don’t eat too much sugar? — Michael

Nope, because the central issue is the is-ought divide, and, "I should brush my teeth" is an 'ought'. They will reduce it to a hypothetical claim and avoid giving any sort of non-hypothetical support to that claim. Conceived as a binding or non-hypothetical 'ought', they would have as many problems with it as anything else.

Added in an edit to the earlier post:

Your argument was that contradictions inevitably occur, and therefore they are not bad. Wounds also inevitably occur. Are they bad? Should they be avoided? Should we apply bandage and salve, or leave them to fester? — Leontiskos

Doesn’t seem like a moral obligation though... — Michael

Well we've already been through this. I give a definition of 'moral' and demonstrate a moral claim; you say it isn't moral; I ask what you mean by 'moral'; and then you say you have no idea (e.g. ). I'm going to step off the merry-go-round and simply point back to my post <here>, which was intended for any who have a serious interest in this topic.

Edit: The other problem here is that you have consistently ignored the central question of whether A3 is moral. The evasiveness that you have been displaying becomes particularly rarefied when it comes to this question, which was a central question in the first place. Whenever possible, you say, "That claim is not moral." Yet you can't do this with A3, and so the evasion becomes more pronounced in that case ().

- Thanks, I appreciate that. I think it is important that the thread titles and OPs match the content of the threads.

Like “you ought to listen to my music, it’s really good”? — Michael

Sure, suggestion, advice, command, remonstrance, etc. These are all interpersonal 'oughts'. I gave my fuller account here: .