Reducing "the way X is" to only ever apply to static description is not reasonable - particularly in the face of the user of the phrase telling you that's not baked in. — AmadeusD

Sure, someone can use "square" in a way which does not exclude a circle from being a type of square, and assert "this is the way I choose to use that term", insisting that the other person in the discussion must accept such incoherency if they want to continue discussion, but what's the point? How could this be conducive to understanding?

In reality, if understanding is our goal, we must seek out such sloppy usage, define the boundaries of contradiction and adhere to them, thus annihilating the sloppy usage. So if someone insists that they want to use "state" or "the way X is" as a descriptive term which would include "actively changing" into the category of being a "state", I would simply dismiss myself from the discussion, recognizing it as conducive to misunderstanding rather than understanding, therefore not a productive discussion.

The matter of what the user of the phrase is demanding is not relevant. Each individual must make the judgement of what is reasonable, and what is not reasonable, for oneself. You judge what I am insisting on, two incompatible categories, as unreasonable. But I judge what you and Dan are insisting on, describing (what I apprehend as) two incompatible features of the world by the same terms, as unreasonable. We judge each other to be unreasonable, refuse to agree, and this makes discussion of that subject pointless.

As evidence of the pointlessness of accepting Dan's demands, and adhering to my principles, I point to Dan's claim of having spent close to a decade trying to resolve this problem. I argue that it is Dan's failure to establish clear boundaries of contradiction, thereby allowing contradiction and incoherency to permeate the usage of words which is being demanded, which creates the illusion to Dan, that an unresolvable problem might be resolved. Therefore Dan obliviously trudges onward failing to recognize where the unreasonableness really lies.

The digression has helped me to understand why you've spent the better part of a decade trying to do something which I quickly apprehended as impossible. Your approach is to 'loosen up' definitions, or the meanings of words, when two principles are incompatible, believing that using words in this sloppy way will make the two incompatible principles compatible. So for example, (I'm not saying that this is what you have done, I'm saying it's a similar example), if the traditional way to understand "free will" is incompatible with the traditional way of understanding "determinism", then if one could 'loosen up' the meaning of one or both of these terms, that person might create the appearance that the two are compatible. And so we have what is called "compatibilism".

I think that this is best described as sophistry. But the loosening up of definitions allows ambiguity and equivocation, which propagates misunderstanding. Further, the loosening up of the meaning of "understanding" allows you to say that you have a good understanding even though misunderstanding inheres within what you assume to "understand" ( "one can absolutely misunderstand some element of mathematics yet still have a good understanding of mathematics generally").

What you demonstrate is that you allow the incoherency of contradiction to penetrate deep within what you assume to be "understanding". You allow that a person might be judged as having a good understanding of X even though there are elements of misunderstanding within that supposed "understanding". This is a sneaky, sophistic way of violating the law of noncontradiction, by allowing that the contradictory property inheres within the affirmed one. 'Blackness inheres within the white of that objects.'

By not performing a proper analysis, and distinguishing which elements are understood, from which are misunderstood, and simply allowing the incoherent notion that misunderstanding inheres within understanding, you deny yourself the possibility of a true (real) understanding. You refuse to purge yourself of misunderstanding by accepting this incoherent idea that misunderstanding may be a part of a good understanding.

So, in summary, what you have demonstrated is that you "loosen up" definitions in the sophistic way. You do this to make opposing, incompatible principles appear to be compatible. This produces misunderstanding of basic, fundamental, and foundational, ontological principles. Then you argue that even if there is misunderstanding hidden deep within my claimed "understanding" it might still be a good understanding.

Back to the op. Succinctly stated, your belief that there is such a thing as "objective right" is incompatible with your belief that there is value in free choice. If there is such a thing as "objective right" then there must be an objectively right thing to do in every situation, and the objectively right thing to do would be assigned the highest value. Freedom of choice, which would allow a person to choose something other than the objectively right thing, therefore cannot be assigned any value.

So you 'loosen up' the meanings of these terms, to use them in a way which promotes the appearance of compatibility, but all this does is foster misunderstanding. The misunderstanding which is evident within your use of terms like "free choice", and "freedom", disables you from recognizing the incompatibility because it was designed to hide that incompatibility. However, the incompatibility cannot be vanquished by hiding it, so it persists and prevents you from adequately resolving the problem you present n the op. Now, instead of recognizing that this sloppy use of words has propagated misunderstanding, and this misunderstanding has veiled the true nature of that problem, you choose to argue that your "understanding" might still be a good one, even though misunderstanding inheres within it.

I mean, I don't agree that implies indicates necessity, but putting that to one side, are you suggesting that to misunderstand something is to not understand it at all surely there are degrees of understanding? — Dan

In my understanding, there is two distinct senses of "implied". One means what is indicated by evidence, the other means what is indicated by logic. The first sense does not produce necessity, because "evidence" does not provide the required certainty. The other sense, being valid logic, produces logical necessity. So for example, All men are mortal, and Socrates is a man, "implies" that Socrates is mortal, by logical necessity.

The latter sense, the one of logical necessity is the one used in the argument about the relation between understanding time and understanding human actions. When we say that an understanding of human actions "implies" some understanding of time, it is a logical relation being referred to. We are saying that any understanding of human actions necessarily consists of some understanding of time, through a logical relation between "the understanding of human actions" and "the understanding of time". In the example above, when we say Socrates is a man "implies" that Socrates is mortal, we are referring to a relation of logical necessity between "man" and "mortal", in the very same way. Understanding human actions implies, due to logical necessity, some understanding of time.

With respect to the relation between degrees of understanding, and misunderstanding, this is what I tried to explain to you earlier, as two distinct things. When we are learning things, mathematics in school for example, we go through degrees of understanding as we increase our knowledge. Never can this be classified as "misunderstanding" unless the student learns a wrong thing, goes in a faulty direction. "Misunderstanding" consists of mistaken knowledge, when someone learns something which is wrong. Since it is mistaken, and wrong, it cannot be any degree of understanding.

'll thank you to keep your rudeness to yourself. — Dan

I'll try, but since it is the lounge, inhibitions loosen, then spontaneity and habit guide the tongue.

I am denying obviously incorrect claims that you haven't backed up properly. You haven't provided logic and evidence, you have provided fallacious arguments, usually backed by improper definitions of terms. — Dan

Uh, continuing with the ...assertions. Look Dan, you assert that what I say is incorrect, and my arguments are fallacious, but you do not address them. You just assert, assert, assert.

I pointed out this was wrong and then explained what the is-ought gap is, and that you were using it improperly. — Dan

This is incorrect for the following reasons. You explained how you interpret the meaning of the "is-ought gap", and I proceeded to show you how that understanding of the principle was completely consistent with what I was arguing, how I was "using" the is-ought gap..

See, I produced an application of that principle, the is-ought gap, I applied it to what we were arguing. Then you provided an understanding of the is-ought gap, and I showed you that your understanding is consistent with my application. However, instead of accepting my application, or even trying to demonstrate that it is not consistent with how you understand the principle, you simply denied my application, and asserted that I am wrong. Then you topped that off with something extremely rude, and downright stupid:

"I don't know what any of this means. It looks to me like you don't understand what many of the words you are using mean."

How can you proceed from the premise that you cannot understand me, to the conclusion that I do not understand myself?

But let's take a fairly everyday usage of "now" and say that the physical properties of the universe (where things are, what state they are in, etc etc) are changing now. That is a claim about the way the world is. — Dan

This is an invalid implication. Consider how I explained the logical sense of "implies" above. Now, take a look at your proposition "the physical properties of the universe are changing now". Your claim is that this proposition implies something about "the way the world is". It does not, for the reasons I've already explained to you. Simply put, "the way the world is" implies that there is a way that the world is, while "the properties of the universe are changing" implies that there is not a way that the universe is, because it is in a condition of changing. There is no logical relation, therefore no logical necessity, because the two are incompatible.

See, you simply ignore the logic applied to the meaning of the terms, and insist and assert things which if accepted, render the words incoherent and meaningless. What's the point? We wouldn't be able to get anywhere if we accepted things like that.

You say this is pedantic, but pedanticism is extremely necessary here. We are trying to get a handle on moral principles, a field in which the deeper we delve into it, the less relevant empirical evidence becomes, due to the is-ought gap. Therefore the only thing we have to guide us, to keep us on the straight and narrow, is strict adherence to rigorous principles. Without that, we can claim anything as ought, right, good, etc..

I have pointed out the goal of metaphysics and ontology and explained that that is a goal directed at objective truth. — Dan

No, you have merely asserted that. It is nothing but your opinion, and as I said, it's a principle you assert for the purpose of begging the question. If you know Plato, you would see that goals are named as "the good". And, you'd understand that "the good" is distinctly other from "objective truth". Again, the difference between the two denies the possibility of logical implication.

That doesn't follow. Requiring some understanding of something does not imply that having a misunderstanding of time would result in a misunderstanding of human action as one might have some understanding but also misunderstand something to with time — Dan

It doesn't follow, for you, because you didn't follow the argument. That is evident from this misrepresentation. Allow me to restate it please.

The argument starts from the primary premise which you and I agreed on, "understanding of human actions implies some understanding of time". "Implies" here, indicates that "some understanding of time" is necessary to understanding "human actions", as an essential part of the concept indicated by "human actions". That word "implies" indicates the logical relation, some understanding of time is required for an understanding of human actions. Do you understand the premise?

Now the second premise is "a misunderstanding of time". "Misunderstanding" means something other than understanding, as we've discussed earlier. A person thinks oneself to understand, and appears to oneself as having an understanding, but the thing which appears to the person as an understanding, is not an understanding at all, it is something other than an understanding, and actually opposed to understanding, so it is properly called "misunderstanding".

The conclusion drawn from those two premises is that the person who has a misunderstanding of time will necessarily have a misunderstanding of "human actions". This is because the concept "human actions" is dependent on "some understanding of time", and "misunderstanding of time" signifies a lack of understanding, something other than understanding. which appears like understanding but is not. Therefore, what appears to the person as an understanding of "human actions" would really be a misunderstanding, according to the extent that "understanding time" is required, necessary, or essential to, "understanding human actions", indicated by that word "implies".

These are not stupid assertions. You keep claiming things that are blatently wrong and I am just pointing it out. — Dan

There you go, backing up your use of stupid assertions with more stupid assertions. We'll have an infinite regress of stupid assertions, with nothing justified. How is the statement "you are blatantly wrong" supposed to indicate anything to me other than how stupid you are?

Have you ever been in this situation? You demonstrate to someone what you believe to be sound logic, premises backed up with good evidence, and arguments of valid logic, and the person replies "you're blatantly wrong". So you provide more evidence and logic, and the person persists with "that's simply incorrect". Wouldn't it occur to you, that the person is just countering sound logic with stupid assertions?

The way something is does not imply it is the only way it ever will be. You are asserting that it does, but it just doesn't. — Dan

I made no such assertion, that's a complete misrepresentation. I said "the way something is" refers to something static, unchanging, as "the way", and "is" refers to the present time, now. I never said that this implies that it hasn't changed in the past, or that it implies that it will not change in the future. So your representation of what I said is clearly wrong.

But I also said that the proposition "there is a way the world is" is contrary to evidence. This is because evidence indicates that the world is changing at the present time, now, which is what "is" refers to. So your statement "the way something is" indicates something unchanging at the present, now, while allowing that this static condition of now, might change in the future, or past.

This statement is clearly contrary to reality. In reality, known by empirical evidence, things do not change in the past, nor do they change in the future, they change only at the present, now. That is the only time when change occurs, at the present. So the evidence is clear, you are the one who is blatantly wrong. Things are not static now, as "the way something is" indicates, with the possibility of change in the past and future, in reality things are changing now, with the possibility that the named thing might be the same in the past or future.

It's not a contradiction because you are adding an assumption of staticness which you aren't entitled to. — Dan

I'm adding no extra assumptions, "constant state", were your words, and "state" implies static.

The claims of ontology and metaphysics are descriptive claims about the way the world (or possibly worlds) is (or possible are). They are very much concerned with objective truth. — Dan

Again, an unsupported assertion, which is the basis of the fallacy of begging the question, that you commit.

Hitler killing millions of Jewish people was a bad thing. One might think that I should prevent him from doing so. However, the situation I find myself in is that this happened many years before I was born and, alas, I have no time machine. Thus, I cannot do this. Because I cannot do this (due to the situation I find myself in) it is not the case that I ought to do it. — Dan

Are you presenting this as evidence of how important an understanding of time is to moral philosophy. That's what I argued since the beginning. And I also said that the biggest, most significant restriction on one's freedom is that the past cannot be changed. Both you and Amadeus dismissed this fact as irrelevant to moral philosophy.

Now I see that you are starting to understand how time actually does restrict one's freedom to act. You call it "the situation", but if you keep looking at your example, you'll see that the description names time as applying the restriction. This is indicated by the condition "I have no time machine". This shows that if you had a time machine, the restriction would not apply, therefore it is time rather than "the situation" which is limiting your freedom.

Similarly let's say I come across a child drowning on my way home from work. One might think that I ought to jump in and save the child. However, for the sake of argument, I am paralyzed from the neck down and so cannot do so (also there is no way I can use my hypothetical wheelchair to push a stick over to them etc etc etc). Since I cannot jump in and save the child (due to the situation I find myself in) it is not the case that I ought to (though perhaps I ought to call for help or something else that I am capable of). — Dan

I don't see your argument. What you "ought to do" is determined by intention, not the situation. As I said, the context is the intention, the context is not the situation. Intention dictates the end, the situation dictates the means. So if "ought to save the child" indicates the good intention, then you ought to do this regardless of the situation. This means that if the situation limits your means, it only makes the task more difficult. You can't swim, so you think of the stick method. That doesn't work so you try something else, etc. etc. etc., maybe even call for help.

The fact that you provide all these different alternatives indicates that you recognize "ought" belongs to the intention, "save the child" in this case, and not to any particular one of the specified means, which are dictated by the situation. "Ought" therefore, is not restricted by the situation, nor is it restricted by what is apprehended as what "can" be done. We must allow that it transcends the situation, as intention transcends the situation, inspiring us to find the means to get through seemingly impossible situations.

This issue of "ought" being restricted by the situation is very similar to the issue of "ought" being restricted by "the information which one has". This is a defeatist attitude which allows "the good" (what is intended), to be compromised unnecessarily by the way that one perceives "the situation". This is is conducive to cop outs, excuses, and rationalizations as to why one did not do what ought to have been done. Sorry, I was limited by the circumstances".

When you allow "ought" to be restricted by the situation, or by the information which one has, then you need a whole slew of other principles applicable in all the different circumstances, to determine, at what point do I stop trying to find ways to save the child, at what point do i stop seeking further information. To properly deal with this problem, we need to allow that "ought" transcends the situation. Therefore, "situation" is irrelevant, as I said.

I mean, I'm not sure whether I understand time or not, but I have a reasonable guess. I think if this is the bar you are setting for understanding time (assuming that this understanding is correct, but let's not get into a discussion of time) then I think I would probably agree that understanding something like scrambing eggs probably implies some understanding of time. — Dan

OK, It looks like we finally have some agreement on something. Understanding of human actions "implies some understanding of time". From this, we can also conclude that a misunderstanding of time would result in a misunderstanding of human actions.

Since moral philosophy is an attempt to understand and evaluate human actions we can conclude that the moral philosopher requires sound premises regarding the nature of time. Therefore "a discussion of time" is not to be avoided, but is a necessity.

It doesn't imply that. You are inferring that inappropriately. — Dan

Again, you keep making stupid assertions like this without any justification. I explained very clearly how "the way the world is" implies staticness. Allow me to reiterate:

"The way" implies one way. And "one way" implies unchanging. If the world was changing (unstatic) at the time designated by "is" (now), we could not truthfully call it "the way" the world is, we'd have to say "the ways" which the world is (now).

I'm really tired of such stupid assertions, where you simply ignore my logical demonstrations and make a contrary (stupid) assertion.

I didn't say it is the "one" objective truth. I said that if the world is in a constant state of change, then that is something that is true about the way the world is. It's not a subjective description at all. It is an objective claim which may or may not be true. People certainly disagree about things that are objective all the time, it's just that some of them (sometimes all of them) are wrong. — Dan

This is simple begging the question, in the way I explained. You assume that the statement "changing is the way that the world is" is meant to represent an objective truth, rather than what the author claims, that it is meant to represent a subjective opinion. And this assumption provides the conclusion you desire "if the world is in a constant state of change...". That's begging the question, making an assumption which produces the desired conclusion.

You do not seem to have a firm understanding of ontology and metaphysics. Propositions in these fields are speculative, and not meant as "objective truth". These are like unproven hypotheses in science. They are not proposed as objective truths, they are proposed as theories to try with evidence and logic, in a procedure which would hopefully lead toward understanding.

So we can take your representation "the world is in a constant state of change", or my representation, "changing is the way that the world is", and analyze such propositions for the potential of truth. Now we can see that each representation is self-contradicting in the way described above. "State of change" is incoherent by contradiction, as well as "changing is the way" is incoherent by contradiction, as explained above.

Therefore opinions like those, which appear to express what is intended as "objective truth" must be rejected because of incoherence. This leaves us with two distinct and incompatible approaches, the approach of staticness, "the world is in a constant state", and the approach of activity, "the world is changing". Empirical evidence supports the latter, "the world is changing". Now we must dismiss all such propositions which appear to express opinions intended as objective truth, as inadequate for an accurate ontology, metaphysics, and consequently moral philosophy.

"Is" in the is-ought gap refers to descriptive claims, rather than normative claims. — Dan

Right, but can't you see that "descriptive claims" are essentially claims about "the way the world is"? These are claims which are intended to purvey an "objective truth". And, as explained above, this approach is inadequate for ontology and metaphysics. And, because this approach produces faulty ontology and metaphysics, it is also a faulty approach for moral philosophy.

So ontology, metaphysics, and moral philosophy must assign priority to change, as changing is how we actually know the world. Once the world is understood to be known as changing, rather than misunderstood to be known by descriptive claims, which imply "objective truth" (is), then we seek normative claims which involve judgements concerning good and bad changes (ought).

Do you really need me to justify what "the situation one is in" refers to in the context I've used it here? — Dan

Yes, that's exactly what you need to justify. And, the problem is as I've explained above. The "situation" is always rapidly changing, Therefore, in reality, what is actually happening in any real circumstances, is that there is activity which cannot be understood through descriptive claims intended to represent an "objective truth" concerning "the situation".

Furthermore, since this is what is actually going on (rapid changes), and the subject is conditioned to deal with what is actually going on, through evolutionary forces, these changes are understood through the context of intentions, wants, desires. Therefore reference to "the situation one is in" is meaningless and irrelevant. The person is in the midst of rapid changes, which are understood by that person in relation to (within the context of) what is intended, wanted, or desired by that person. The proposed "situation one is in" has no relevance.

If you really believe that "the situation one is in", is of any relevance here, you need to justify that opinion.

Eh, I'm not sure that this is true. Perhaps to fully understand an activity requires an understanding of time, but I think this is a very high bar you are setting for understanding an activity. I think one can understand making scrambled eggs with a fairly low-level of understanding of the nature of time itself. — Dan

I know, I expected a reply like this. You and I have significant difference in how we understand "understand". You seem to think that if a person can recognize a thing, and call it by the appropriate name, the person "understands" that thing. That's how you described "understanding one's choice".

But you are clearly inconsistent with your usage of the term. Now, to suit your purpose, you want a "low-level understanding of the nature of time" not to qualify as "understanding", though you insisted on an extremely low level, in the other case.

To understand "making scrambled eggs" one must understand temporal order, which action is first, second, and after this and after that. In "understanding" any human action, it is necessary to recognize the temporal order of means to end. The means are carried out as the actions necessary to bring about the end, which follows the means in time, as the effect of the causes. Also, in the case of your example, scrambled eggs, as in most cases, the means are most often very complex, requiring a temporal order of causes and effects within the means required to bring about the final effect, the end, which is named "scrambled eggs".

If that is indeed true, then that is the way the world is. I am not assuming a staticness. — Dan

You contradict yourself. "The way the world is" implies a staticness. That is unavoidable, "the way it is" indicates one unchanging thing "the way". Any change and it could no longer be called "the way" it would be a different "way". We cannot say "the way it is" without implying staticness because "the way" implies one unchanging "way".

This is why, if someone says "changing is the way that the world is", it's meaningless incoherency which can be interpreted in the two opposing ways I explained. You say that this means "change" is the one "objective truth" that we have about the world. I say that this means that that there is no "objective truth" about the world. I say that the statement "changing is the way that the world is", ought to be interpreted as a descriptive opinion about the world, rather than an objective truth. But you do not seem to understand what it means to accept a statement as meant to be a subjective description which people can either agree or disagree with, rather than as meant to be an objective truth.

This is where we have significant disagreement concerning the actions and communications of human beings. You think that communications and actions are in general, directed and guided by ideas about objective truth, while I think that actions and communications are guided and directed by subjective opinions concerning personal wants and desires. What I tell you is that the idea of "objective truth" only starts to influence our actions and communication when there is disagreement.

Also, I didn't suggest zooming out to the maximal amount. Again, that is something you have added in there. I suggested that we could zoom out. For example, when describing a river, it is silly to describe the position of each water molecule because (apart from practical considerations) they're moving. Likewise, we might seek to describe the physical laws of our universe, the phenomena we find in a particular location (for example, on earth), the logical laws that apply in all possible universes, etc. — Dan

The requirements for the description are context dependent. When attempting to understand flow patterns, erosion, etc., it is very beneficial to understand the activity of individual water molecules. This is studied in hydraulics and wave features.

This is the point. The most general statements, (most zoomed out), "the world is this way..." are completely useless in guiding human actions because they have no applicability. Applicability is determined by the particular circumstances. And, the particular circumstances are a feature of the individual's wants, needs, desires, or intentions. So if the person's intent is to make a map of the river, the description required is completely different from the description required if the person is trying to understand flow patterns and erosion.

Therefore "context dependent" refers to the person's intentions. The context which determines what is required of the description, is the person's intentions. So the requirements for the description, whether zoomed in or zoomed out, are "context dependent", where "context" is intention.

What is, especially when it comes to the is-ought gap, does not indicate a static condition of things at all. — Dan

Since you are going to keep insisting this, without explanation as to how this is possible, as you've done in other instances, I'm going to ask for justification. How does "what is" refer to anything other than a static unchanging situation, without the attempt at justification reducing the statement to meaningless incoherency? As I said above "the way it is" refers to one unchanging way, as does "what is". If "change" is invoked, then a before and after in time is also implied, and this negates "is", which refers to the present, "now". Then you no longer have "is', but a temporal distinction between two distinct times, before and after.

As for how one might relate to the other, there are some ways in which they relate. The most obvious being that ought implies can (and can do otherwise), so the situation one is in and what actions they are capable of taking limit the space of things it can be the case that they ought to do.

Also, I would suggest that normative claims are also claims about objective facts, just objective moral facts. That an action being right, or wrong, or good, or bad, is also a part of objective reality to be discovered. — Dan

You haven't justified "objective moral fact". Nor have you justified that "the situation one is in" refers to anything other than the context of one's intentions, as I explained above. So none of this has any bearing on the understanding of human actions until these assumptions you throw around can be justified.

I don't know how this relates to what I said. I would say that moral philosophy deals with the activity of moral agents, which includes but is not limited to, most adult humans. Whether I would say that understanding an activity requires an understanding of time depends on what you mean by this. — Dan

I mean, that since time is an essential aspect of activities, then to correctly understand any activity requires a correct understanding of time. For example, animality is an essential aspect of being human, so to correctly understand what it means to be human requires an understanding of what it means to be an animal.

It doesn't really imply that as we can zoom out temporarily rather than trying to specify a present moment which as past by the time we express the point. Though, this is largely irrelevant as, again, points such as whether time is relative to speed are themselves claims about the way the world is. Even being in a constant state of flux is a claim about the way the world is. — Dan

You are attempting to avoid the issue rather than address it.

If we "zoom out", such that "the present" is a day, a month, a year, or a million years, then the changes which are occurring at the present, get increasingly significant as we zoom out, and it makes less and less sense to even think that there is "way that the world is". And if we zoom in, the changes get faster and faster, and it becomes more and more clear that change is of the essence of the world, rather than any assumed state of being (way that the world is).

So if we "zoom out" the maximal amount, like you suggest, we end up being able to make the most general statement only, "the world is changing", or " a constant state of flux". That is supposed to be "the way the world is". This is just like your claim, that even if there is no "objective truth", that there is no objective truth would be an objective truth. Then we could choose to interpret "the world is changing" as indicating that this is the way that the world is (your interpretation), or that there is no such thing as the way that the world is (my interpretation. We'd both be right, with contradictory meaning.

All this does is provide a good demonstration to justify my claim, that "objective truth", or "the way the world is" is completely irrelevant to moral philosophy. This is because "objective truth" can only refer to the most zoomed out, general statements, while moral philosophy needs to apply to the particular actions of here and now.

Again, this is the separation between "is" and "ought". "What is" is a general statement indicating a static condition of things, while "what ought to be done" is a specific action unique to the particular circumstances of individual persons here and now. Until you demonstrate how one might be related to the other, your starting point of "what is" remains irrelevant" to "what ought to be done".

This is nonsense. To the extent that time is relative to the speed one is going, that itself is a fact about the world. — Dan

Do you not agree that moral philosophy deals with human activity? And, to adequately understand "activity" of any kind requires an understanding of time.

You seem to be taking "there is some way the world is" to mean "there is some way the world is and nothing ever changes". — Dan

No, that's not the meaning I am assuming.

I assume that in the phrase "the way the world is", "is" implies the present time. However, our sense observation (empirical data) indicates that the world is always changing at the present time. Since the world is changing (in flux) at the present time, it is impossible that there is a specifiable "way that the world is", because "is" implies the present time. This is the basic fact which Einstein takes advantage of with his principle called "the relativity of simultaneity".

I put it to you that there exists a world beyond what we believe in. And that world is some way. — Dan

OK, so you propose a dualism, what is referred to by "the world", and what is referred to by "some way" that the world is.

I put it to you that this dualism is fundamentally incorrect. Time is passing, and as time passes things change. Therefore there is no such thing as "the way that the world is". Your claim that the world is "some way" is demonstrably incorrect through demonstrations of empirical evidence. The theory of special relativity shows this quite clearly. The fact that time is passing makes "the way that the world is" best understood as perspective (frame) dependent, and this way of understanding, is to assume that there is no such thing as "the way that the world is".

Furthermore, since moral philosophy deals with human activities, actions, which require the premise that the world is actively changing, in order to properly understand human actions, your proposal (the "world is some way)" would leave us incapable of producing a moral philosophy. Your premise that the "world is some way", is inconsistent, and incompatible with the true premise, that the world is active and changing. Therefore this premise of yours that the "world is some way", would seriously mislead us, make moral philosophy unintelligible, leaving us incapacitated in that faculty.

This is why I tried to explain to you, that first and foremost, prior to proceeding into any moral philosophy, it is necessary to have a very clear understanding of the nature and reality of time and change. This provides the ontological basis which makes moral philosophy intelligible. Without this, one might start from a faulty ontological principle such as that the "world is some way", which would make true moral philosophy impossible.

This problem commonly manifests as the is/ought distinction. The premise "the world is some way" is an "is' premise. The "ought" premise assumes that the world is actively changing, and there is a way which we as human beings, should act within this active world.

I only don't understand what it would mean to discuss the existence of God without the assumption of objective truth. I do assume that the truth is objective, and so I understand what it would mean for God to exist. The reason I don't think He does isn't that I don't understand the claim. I was pointing out the incoherence of your worldview, not expressing my own. — Dan

As I've been trying to tell you, "objective truth" is irrelevant to moral philosophy. If there is such a thing, it falls within the category of your ontological assumption that the "world is some way". This is an ontological assumption which is fundamentally incompatible with the ontological assumption required for moral philosophy that "the world is actively changing".

I don't think it does produce a dualism. — Dan

You state it yourself, as a dualism. There is "a world", and there is "some way" that the world is. Obviously these two are not the same, because then you would just state "there is a world". However, if this is really your desired starting point, we can apply Aristotle's law of identity, and claim that by the law of identity (a thing is the same as itself), the world, and the way the world is, are one and the same.

If you take this approach, you still need to allow for the reality of change, activity within the world to be able to proceed into moral philosophy which deals with activities. And change requires potential, the possibility of change, so we still need a basic dualism which allows for a separation between "the world" (the way that the world is, being one and the same as the world), and the real possibilities for change. The way that the world is, is changing, and this implies real possibility, potential.

Now, the dualism proposed here is not the traditional dualism of "the world", and statements or ideas about the world (the world and the way the world is), it is a dualism of "the actual" and "the potential". We must allow that both of these aspects of the world are equally real, but mutually exclusive, in the way of a dichotomy. Also, each must be accepted as equally important to any moral philosophy.

This, I propose to you, is the way to deal with the two incompatible principles which you desire to employ, moral consequentialism (based in the assumed reality of what actually "is"), and the freedom of the individual (based in the assumed reality of potential, possibility). But you need to understand the dichotomy, and how the two are based in incompatible principles, due to the difference between "being" (what is), and "becoming" (change). So we represent them as a dichotomy due to the reality that they are incompatible.

No, facts about the world are not statements. The world is as it is, regardless of what we say about it. Statements and facts are not the same thing. Things aren't "chosen" to be true, they just are. — Dan

I don't see why you can't understand the problems with what you are arguing. "Facts about the world" implies two distinct things to make it coherent; what is referred to with "facts", and what is referred to with "the world". Likewise, "the world is as it is" implies a similar subject/predicate division. There is "the world" which is referred to, and there is "as it is" which is referred to. These two referents, "the world" and "facts" in the one case, and "the world" and "as it is" in the other case, are the two things which are judged to correspond, in a judgement of "truth".

Now, the "facts" cannot be a part of "the world", because then we would need facts about those facts, and facts about those facts, and this would cause infinite regress, denying the possibility that any facts are complete, because no facts could include facts about themselves without implying a vicious circle. This means that we must assign to "the facts" a separate realm, a separate part of reality from "the world", in a form of dualism, allowing "the facts" to transcend "the world". We could say that "the facts" exist in God's mind, or we could just assign to them their own separate realm distinct from the world without even invoking God. However, this choice, at this time, is not important.

What is important though, is for you to recognize that if we deny the existence of "God", because we do not understand what it would mean for God to "exist", then to be consistent we need to exclude the existence of such objective "facts" for the very same reason.

Therefore, when you choose to proceed from principles which exclude God, for the reasons you describe, we must also exclude "facts" in as similar way, by applying those same principles. This we must do, to maintain consistency. Then we must revise statements like the following:

Assuming that there is a right answer to get to, that there is a world beyond just whatever we believe, is necessary to have any kind of sensible discussion. So no, we can't avoid this assumptions. We must make them.

We cannot assume that there is a "right answer to get to", because we've excluded the reality of a "right answer", with the argument that we do not know what it could mean for the right answer to "exist".

I propose therefore, that we start with a different principle, something like this: 'The individual subject ought to try to do one's personal best, in the particular circumstances, of one's unique situation'. Notice, that this principle does not require the assumption of "the existence of the best possible answer" in an objective sense. It requires only the assumption of "one's personal best", which is a subjective sense of "best possible answer".

I'm not sure what this kind of "usefulness" even means. Things like predictive power don't make sense if there isn't an external world that has phenomena in it to be predicted. — Dan

The issue is not whether there is "a world". That we can take for granted. So there is no problem with the term "usefulness", it refers to the means we employ toward achieving our ends within our world.

The question is whether there is such a thing as "facts about the world". This produces a dualism between "the world", and "facts about the world". You imply that you accept such a dualism when you refer to "an external world" here, already implicitly invoking the internal/external division.

If I decided that you agreed with me, would that mean there was no sense in discussing the point anymore? — Dan

Generally yes, an agreed upon principle becomes an established "fact", so to speak, forming the grounds for conceptual structure. That thing we call 'the sun", that is "the moon", "1" stands for the numerical value of one, and "2'" stands for the numerical value of two, for example. Once we have agreement we can quit discussing what we ought to call these things, and move on toward more elaborate conceptual structures. But if we meet someone who does not agree, then we need to either discuss again, to justify our principles, or change and adapt the principles to allow the other's perspective, or simply exclude the other as not reasonable.

I'm not sure what this means, so I don't know whether I agree. — Dan

What I was saying, is that we might assume "objective truth", if you insist. But then as we work toward our goal of understanding and obtaining the objective truth, as you describe our goal ought to be, we would come to understand that the goal of objective truth is not what guides and directs the vast majority of human beings in the vast majority of actions. In reality even philosophers who seek objective truth in philosophy, do not seek it in their mundane activities, which is the majority of their activities. And the majority of people are not even philosophers seeking objective truth in philosophy. They only appeal to "objective truth" in cases of disagreement, as I explained. But the majority of human actions are carried out without interference or objections from people disagreeing, causing the need to appeal to "objective truth".

That there are facts about the world that would be true whether or not we believed them. — Dan

But "facts about the world" are statements about the world. Who judges what qualifies as "about the world", and makes the appropriate statements rather than some other statements, if not "we"? Do you not see that someone must choose "the correct" statements about the world, and make them, for there to be existent facts about the world? Or do you believe that every possible statement is already made, so that includes all the facts and also all the falsities?

I mean, it makes a big difference. If we assume there is a right answer to questions, we might have reason to seek it. If we don't assume there is a right answer, or that anything is true independant of our believing it, then we need not search for evidence, or engage in logical reasoning, we can just make up whatever shit we like instead. — Dan

If we did not assume that there was an objectively "right", or objectively "true" answer, then "usefulness" would be what we seek in our theories, our answers, and reasoning. And, for the most part the evidence of modern science supports that this is the case. The capacity to predict is what is generally sought in science, as the means toward usefulness.

How do we tell if others agree if the fact of their agreement is determined wholly by our beliefs, as is, presumably, the fact of their existence? — Dan

It's not hard to tell that others agree, they say so, just like you and I say that we disagree with each other.

Objective truth is the bottom of any subject worth discussing. Assuming that there is a right answer to get to, that there is a world beyond just whatever we believe, is necessary to have any kind of sensible discussion. So no, we can't avoid this assumptions. We must make them. I've been willing to allow a lot of silly assumptions and definitions for the sake of argument, but I'm afraid I cannot make any assumption do away with the assumption that truth is objective.

As for "right" being objective, that is what I mean by "right". It is possible that such a thing as objective morality doesn't exist, that moral error theory is correct, but "right" as I understand the term, isn't subjective. — Dan

OK, let's assume that there is such a thing as "objective truth", as you insist that this must be the starting point. Do you agree that we are on the path toward objective truth if we recognize that objective truth is not what directs us in our actions? What directs us, is our wants, needs, desires, our intentions.

I think we are pretty much at an impasse Dan. We have no hope of understanding each other, as we go deeper and deeper in opposite directions.

I said "objective truth", like "objective right", implies a mind independent of human minds (God) in order to interpret a statement and to judge whether it is right or true. You said that is not the case, because a claim, or statement is the meaning of the words, and this either corresponds with reality or not. I say that a statement or claim exists as symbols, and that meaning is only determined by a mind which hears or reads them. Then this mind may make a judgement about corresponding with reality.

I mean, it doesn't. It assumes that these things are relative, rather than absolute. But that, if true, is taken to be objectively true. — Dan

This is another excellent example of how your begging the question misleads you into misunderstanding. Relativity theory assumes that motions are relative, as you say. However, physicists do not take this "to be objectively true", they take it, and use it as a useful theory. Relativity theory was developed by Galileo who noticed that planetary motions could be described by either the geocentric model, or the heliocentric model. Even though he recognized that the true model is the heliocentric model, he realized that truth was not necessary in representing motions. As long as we produce a model which is useful for the required purpose, truth is completely irrelevant.

Your faulty premise, that people look for truth in theories, statements etc., rather than usefulness, misleads you into believing that physicists apply relativity theory as if they are applying objective truth. This is a mistake, because the founding principle of relativity theory is that truth is not important, and completely irrelevant, because all that matters is usefulness. Then your argument, which concludes that relativity would be objectively true if taken to be true, is a matter of begging the question from that faulty premise, because in reality "true" if applied to relativity theory would mean useful. Science uses a pragmatic theory of "truth", where "true" means useful, especially for prediction.

Again, I think all of this judgement stuff is completely the wrong way to be looking at things and is very much putting the cart before the horse. — Dan

The issue is "choice", therefore the nature of "judgement" ought not be dismissed in this way.

However, I'm not sure what it even means to say that God exists if we can't discuss the objective truth of the universe. Like, if God can exist for some people, does that mean those people get to have objective truth, but it only exists for them? Because that's not really how something being "objective" works. — Dan

"Objective truth" has no meaning for you, it's just something you assert. You assert that statements of claim have "objective truth" independent of any minds judging them as true. But this is unintelligible, meaningless nonsense.

You haven't demonstrated this, you have asserted it based on the dubious assertion that truth is a judgement. — Dan

There's a lot more to my claim than that. A statement needs to be interpreted, compared to the thing which it is a statement about, and then it can be judged for truth or not. You seem to believe that a statement either corresponds with something, or it does not, and that's all there is to it. That belief is both useless and meaningless.

I mean, I think we are demonstrating right now that without the assumption that there is a right answer, this discussion is entirely meaningless. To return to the example of God, without assuming that whether He exists or not has a correct answer, then all of these claims about Him providing a basis for objective truth are meaningless. — Dan

You are intentionally ignoring the point. Whether or not there is a correct answer is what is the meaningless question. You know, like we discussed already, we could assume that there is an "objectively correct" answer, but we''ll never know whether we have it, so the assumption is meaningless to us. So the assumption of a "right answer" is completely useless because ti makes no difference to us whether we assume it or not.

What is at issue is whether we can agree on something. If we agree, then we have something to work with. If we are working on it then we must believe it is right, each of us individually with a subjective belief. Whether or not the thing we agree on is "right" in some transcendent (objective) sense, is irrelevant. All that matters is that we agree, because agreement allows us to get things done. And we don't need to stop and worry about whether we are doing "the right" thing, because we've already agreed that it needs to be done therefore we do believe it is the right thing. But if someone else comes along, and disagrees, then we need to start all over again, and look for agreement with that person.

What are the criteria for justifying a belief on that assumption and why are those criteria any better than any other? — Dan

The criteria for justification is agreement. Isn't this obvious to you? If you demonstrate your reasons for believing what you do, and the other person agrees, it has been justified. If the other does not, it has not been justified. If some agree and others do not, then there is more work to be done, to complete your justification.

God doesn't provide a basis for objective anything. You've got things backwards. In order to assert that God exists (in the sense of existing for everyone, rather than in the sense of tomatoes being disgusting), then we must assume that things can objectively exist. — Dan

OK, then let's dispense with all ideas about "objectivity" here. You've been claiming "objective truth", and "objective right", and I've explained that these terms only make sense to me in a religious structure. To me, assuming such things as "truth exists", and "rights exist", is just as bizarre as the religious claims of "God exists". So for the sake of agreement, and having a starting point, can we get rid of all such bizarre statements about "objectivity", and start from the bottom, the subject?

Biden ramped it up for no other reason than politics. — NOS4A2

What a surprise. Aren't all wars about politics?

We’ll have to see what Trump does. In any case, whatever they do, it will be an order of magnitude greater in transparency. — NOS4A2

Don't hold your breath on that one. Remember, he said he'd stop the war before taking office. Is it transparent what he is doing now?

As we’re winding down the one-term presidency, the demented Joe Biden gives Ukraine the go-ahead and the weaponry to fire ballistic missiles into Russia, further escalating the war and leaving a mess for the next administration and the world. — NOS4A2

Yes, war seems to be ramping up, contrary to Trump's claim that if elected he'd have the war stopped before even taking office, because he knows Putin so well. It appears like Trump's close ties to Russia will be significantly strained this term, by this clash of personalities, as each of these individuals attempts to prove oneself to be the most powerful man in the world. This time around though, Trump will acknowledge no debt owed to Russia for his position. The dog unleased will turn on the master, and the table is set for disaster.

I agree it implies self-contradiction, because the position that truth is subjective is itself contradictory.

Would you instead say that your claim, that truth is subjective, is false for me? If so, why are you trying to convince me of something false? — Dan

There is another solution, as I've indicated, "God".

So model-dependent realism isn't a theory of physics so much as the philosophy of science, and it doesn't assume a lack of objective truth so much as thinks its the wrong thing to be focusing on. As for relativity and the multiverse, neither of these assume a lack of objective truth at all. You have badly misunderstood these theories. — Dan

Relativity very clearly assumes a lack of objective truth about motion. All temporal concepts, velocity, momentum, etc., are frame of reference dependent.

If we assume that truth is subjective, then what the heck do any of these claims mean? What are you claiming when you claim I am begging the question? Are you claiming I am actually begging the question, or just that you believe I am? — Dan

Obviously, from what I've written, the claim is what I believe about your premises. When I say "you are begging the question" it means I believe you are begging the question. I mean that's pretty obvious isn't it? That's what any such statements of claim consist of, expressions of what one believes. Sometime we emphasize the strength of such a belief by saying "I strongly believe...", even we might insist "it is true that...", or "it is a fact that...", but in reality these are statements of what is believed. Surely you must recognize this. Don't you?

"Do what appears right based on the information you have" is pretty reasonable advice and is not the same as "rush to judgement and don't gather more information". — Dan

Clearly, the phrase "based on the information you have", instructs one not to seek more information. And, the reason why the doctor's act, in the example, ends up being judged as wrong, is the failure to seek more information. So your instruction "Do what appears right based on the information you have" is very faulty, as it encourages the type of decision making which produces the wrong decision in the example.

No, God does not provide the grounds. Even if he existed, that wouldn't show anything about morality at all. That being said, if truth were subjective, I'm not really sure what the claim "God exists" would mean. Would he just exist to the faithful, but not to the nonbeliever? — Dan

As I said, "God" provides the grounds for what you call "objective truth", and "objective right". What I explained is that "true", and "right" are judgements, and if we assume that there is such judgements independent of those made by human beings (this is what constitutes your meaning of "objective truth" and "objective right") then we must assume an agent which makes these judgements. That is commonly known as "God".

Second, you haven't provided the assumption of objective truth to be false. — Dan

I know I have not proved the assumption of objective truth to be false. I have very clearly demonstrated that the assumption of objective truth requires the assumption of some sort of divine mind (God), to justify it. Therefore the assumption of objective truth implies the assumption of God.

This is due to the fact that "true" and "right" are judgements, and judgements are only made by minds. You have asserted, and insisted, that such judgements exist independently of minds, that it's simply "fact" that X is true, or Y is right. I have asked, to no avail, for you to justify these assertions.

You said that objective truth is irrelevant to most human actions, I pointed out it isn't. — Dan

You provided one example. I explained why your example is not representative of "most human actions".

When you say "this is what human beings care about" what does that even mean? Does it mean "this is what I think they care about" or "this is what they care about, in my world". If the truth is subjective, then aren't we just arguing about our favorite dinosaurs here (and everywhere)? If I think that this isn't what people care about, aren't I right? In what sense could I be wrong? — Dan

Yes this is a fairly good representation. You just need to refine it a bit to understand what I am showing you. If you switch "aren't we just arguing about our favorite dinosaurs here" with "aren't we just arguing about God here", then you would be on the road to understanding clearly.

What I am saying is that by claiming "objective truth", and "objective right" to support your moral philosophy, this means that God is what supports your moral philosophy. However, you insist that your moral philosophy is not supported by God. So, I am showing you what a moral philosophy which is not supported by God actually looks like, and this is "subjective truth", and "subjective right".

You really do not seem to like moral philosophy which is not supported by God, you find concepts like "subjective truth" and "subjective right" to be incoherent. So I ask you, why not just accept the fact that you really do believe in God? If moral philosophy without God is incoherent to you, and you profess a moral philosophy which relies on God, then doesn't this mean that you believe in God?

There is another option I've given you, "an out". This is to justify your claim that there can be objective truth, and objective right, without God. Simply asserting that a statement corresponding with reality is a fact rather than a judgement, does not justify. You need to show how there could be a correspondence between a statement, which consists of a bunch of symbols, and the way things are in the world, without a judgement being made.

You have made a claim with no evidence and now seem annoyed that I am dismissing it just as easily. If you want to make a point about what people believe, I suggest you back it up with some form of evidence. Though, again, I'm not sure why you would be trying to convince me of anything if truth were subjective. Are you just trying to recruit me to your worldview? Not a matter of correct or not, but just a kind of intellectual tribalism? — Dan

I've given you very clear demonstration of how "objective truth" requires God. You dismissed God. So I showed you what "subjective truth" consists of. Now you dismiss that. What do you choose at this point?

"Opinion" here is a little vague, so I'm going to clarify. Do you mean to suggest that everything you have been saying up until now amounts to nothing more than a matter of taste? You may as well have been telling me why I should like tomatoes? Is that your position here? I want to be sure. — Dan

I wouldn't call it "taste", I'd call it "belief". Tastes are generally not justifiable. Beliefs are often justifiable, but sometimes not. When a belief is not justifiable, it may be classed as more like a taste. I have justified my belief, that objective right and objective truth require God, but you have not justified your belief that these do not require God. So I assume that to be a sort of "taste".

How exactly do we discuss goals if there is nothing to judge against whether the goal has been met beyond opinion? — Dan

Where's the problem here, it's a matter of agreement, and agreement forms convention. Has a particular goal been met? If we agree, then the conclusion is accepted and we move on. If not then we decide what else needs to be accomplished, we do that and then we agree. If there is disagreement about what needs to be accomplished, then we might look into the possibility of an "objective truth" on the matter. Why is this difficult for you to understand?

I did consider that and in fact wrote all of those assumptions out in full. My post is seven pages long and details all possibilities surrounding this. If you don't think so, perhaps on the basis of reading it, then that's just your opinion and it isn't true for me. — Dan

I agree with you, "subjective truth" is very difficult to wrap one's head around. You asked me what I believe in, and I did not answer you. I told you that the choices are two, God or "subjective truth".

I want to get a clear indication from you, as to what the premise are for our procedure, which is to analyze your theory. We need to take one approach or the other. I have no problem to choose "objective truth", "God", along with a shit load of baggage which weighs us down like a ball and chain, but I also have no problem to choose "subjective truth", which frees one of all that baggage, but also makes morality extremely difficult to understand. I do have a problem with any attempt to combine these two incompatible perspectives because that produces incoherency.

I mean, few ways we could go about this. Probably the easiest way is to entertain the idea that the idea that opposite proposition is correct and realize that this would be self-defeating (saying that "truth is subjective" would itself be a claim that would be, if truth were indeed subjective, be objectively true). This also works for "there is no objective truth" and other similar propositions — Dan

Haha, that's funny, but obviously incorrect. If the claim "truth is subjective" is true, that in no way implies that the claim is objectively true. Such a conclusion would require defining "true" as "objectively true", which of course is what "truth is subjective" denies. So your stated conclusion implies self-contradiction, or at best requires begging the question by proceeding from the premise that "true" is defined as objectively true.

Absolutely no theory in physics is contrary to the idea that there is an objective truth about the nature of reality. — Dan

Are you serious? Have you heard of "relativity", "multiverse", "model-dependent realism"? These theories are all based in principles which assume no objective truth.

If there is really more than one universe (though exactly what that means is a bit messy and it's not clear that we are all using the same meaning when we talk about a "multiverse") then that would be a true fact about the world. — Dan

This is an indication of the inclination to beg the question as explained above. If you start with the assumption (premise) that "truth" means "objective fact about the world", then any time that someone claims to make a true statement you will conclude that this means that the person has stated an "objective fact about the world". However, this would simply be a misunderstanding, caused by the inapplicable, and unstated premise which you decide to insert just to support your ontology.

In other words, you take a principle which supports your ontology "truth means objective fact about the world", and you apply it toward understanding another ontology which is incompatible, based in principles which contradict this principle of yours. The result can be nothing other than a misunderstanding of the ontology which you apply the incompatible premise toward understanding. So, in the example which you state, "multiverse" implies a multitude of worlds, therefore it is impossible that statements referring to a "multiverse" are statements about "the world". You have simply applied an ontological premise which is inconsistent with the ontology proposed, and the incoherency produced by the contradiction demonstrates that it is impossible for you to understand the "multiverse" ontology in this way.

This is just a misunderstanding. A better way of describing this is that instead that from the point of view of the agent, it appears right. — Dan

Now you are saying something completely different. You are no longer judging the act as "right" ("you" being the third party observer to the doctor's act), You are judging the act as wrong, and saying that it appeared to be right to the person making the choice, at that time. This is very different from saying that the act "is" right from that perspective, it is saying that the act "appears to be right" from that perspective.

If you are familiar, this is the ancient distinction outlined by Aristotle, between "the apparent good", and "the real good". The goal of the moral philosopher is to shape (conform, or in terms of this thread "restrict") an individual's mind so as the apparent good becomes consistent with the real good. Now, the problem is as we've discussed, that the real good always stays in the category of unknown, at the time of decision making, because we cannot foresee the future. And, as the theologians demonstrate with their ontology, and what I'm trying to impress on you, the concept of "the real good" requires a divine mind "God" to support the validity (justification) of the concept.

In fact, it isn't, but I think "do what appears to be right based on the information you have" is a pretty good rule of thumb, and so one we might want to promote, even if sometimes it leads to doing things that are wrong (in an actual-value consequentialist sense at least). — Dan

From the principles described above, the distinction between real good and apparent good, you are taking things in the wrong direction here. Moralists do not encourage people to "do what appears to be right based on the information you have". That would encourage rash judgement, proceeding immediately without taking any time to look for other options. This is exactly the issue I pointed to concerning habitual actions. The information which comes immediately to mind is very limited, inclining one to act quickly according to the habit, without seeking any other information, even though further information is very often right in the memory somewhere, it is just not brought to bear on the immediate problem due to the force of habit. Instead, the moralist encourages individuals to recognize and acknowledge the difference between the apparent good and the real good, and make a judgement as to the likelihood of it being the case that what appears to be right in the current situation, is consistent with what is really right.

For your reference, "what is really right" needs to be grounded in sound arguments, or else the entire system breaks down. In theology "God" provides the ground. Your portrayal of consequentialism does not provide such a ground. This is because "what is really right" is based in the outcome, the effects of the act, and there is always an element of "unknown" due to accidents. So in the example, the doctor's actions will always be judged as "wrong" if the patient dies, no matter what precautions are taken. This means that there are cases where there is no "right" choice. Furthermore, to acknowledge that there is a "right choice" in any situation requires applying determinist principles, 'X will necessarily cause Y', and this denies the reality of freedom of choice. In short, because of the determinist principles, consequentialism is defeatist, fatalist.

This is also my response to your comment regarding me pointing out that the person doesn't know the future. Again, I think you're assumptions are getting in the way of you understanding here. I suggest that you try reading what I have said again while assuming that I am not in denial and that what I am saying is coherent. — Dan

What are you insinuating here? Are you saying that the fact that no one can know the future with certainty, is irrelevant? If I read your work with this assumption, and that assumption makes your work appear to be incoherent, and I explain this to you, then the onus is on you to dispel this assumption. Prove to me that this assumption is irrelevant, or false, like I prove your assumption of "objective truth" is false. The problem is that proving my premise false requires determinism, which renders choice making irrelevant, and proving my assumption irrelevant requires a false representation of choice making. So we are left with the conclusion that you are in denial.

This is bollocks. We (or at least, a lot of us) absolutely do care about whether what we believe is true. You can see this when, for example, asking why people would not want to be hooked up to an experience machine. — Dan

Sure, there is a vast multitude of situations within which the idea of "what we believe is true" is given priority. And so, it is not hard to find examples. What I pointed out, is that in the vast majority of time, what we want or desire is given priority over "what we believe is true". In general, "what we believe is true" is only prioritized in cases of disagreement.

It's hard to see how your example demonstrates that "what we believe is true" is prioritized over "what we want or desire". We would have to actually examine the reasons why the decision was made,

Certainly we have some. We do talk about subjective things. But a) I think you're just wrong about human's attitudes on this front. And b) if you were right (which I'm fairly sure you're not) then that would be so much the worse for humanity. — Dan

This is consistent with the majority of your replies now. You simply assert that you think I am wrong, but you provide no support or justification, the reasons why you think I am wrong. And, it's becoming increasingly clear that these reasons are that you are applying faulty premises, as explained above. These are ontological premises about reality, "objective truth", and faulty premises about how a person's belief in "objective truth" ("what we believe is true") effects one's choices and actions.

You are making claims about the world while also claiming that objective truth isn't important. This is nonsensical. — Dan

I don't see why you claim this. People express opinions all the time, and others recognize them as opinions. A problem arises when people express opinions as fact, and people wrongly recognize the opinions of others as fact. Once you acknowledge that opinions about "the world" are opinions, and opinion will never obtain to the level of "objective truth", then you will understand that "objective truth" is irrelevant when discussing opinions about "the world".

Imagine that I agreed with you that there is no objective truth in the world, how would we discuss whether people believed this or not? We can't check the world, since there would be no objective truth to it. Further, how could you be sure that we don't agree? Sure, you could check the things you think I've written, but there would be no objective truth to a) whether I wrote them, b) whether I believe or don't believe what I wrote, c) whether I'm right or not about what I might or might not believe. So the discussion would quickly become completely meaningless. — Dan

i don't see any of these problems. You are making up imaginary problems, by misapplying faulty premises as explained above. We do not need to make any of those judgements which you claim are required. Those are only required under your faulty premise, that objective truth is necessarily important to discussion. But this is clearly not the case. We can discuss what we want, our goals, agree and produce common goals, we can proceed to discuss opinions about the nature of reality, while recognizing that these are opinions, and we can agree on these opinions when this is conducive toward achieving our goals, all without ever considering anything about "objective truth".[

quote="Dan;948828"]I put it to you that if you walk into the road when a car is coming it won't matter whether you believe that the car is going to hit you, whether you judge that the car hitting you will kill you, or whether you define getting hit by a car the same way I do: you will be just as dead.[/quote]

That's your opinion, but you clearly haven't considered all the possibilities. The driver of the car may hit the brakes, or swerve, to mention a couple other possibilities. What you've demonstrated with this example is how the force of habit restricts your thinking and decision making (limits your freedom), so that you jump to a conclusion ("you will be just as dead"), without considering all the relevant information.

Change requires things that change, usually in the form of movement, but nevertheless, something empirical, whereas time itself does not change. — Mww

A further distinction to made here is the difference between movement, which is a change of place known by one object's position relative to another, and internal change, which is a change within an object itself. The latter need not show itself to empirical observation.

A problem which has developed in modern physics, is the tendency to represent an object as consisting of parts, which are in themselves objects, so that internal change is represented as change of place (movement) of parts. Then all change is reduced to movement, change of place.

This is a problem because it leads to either an infinite regress of smaller and smaller parts, or else we must assume fundamental parts which are unchanging (eternal). Because of this problem, it is best to maintain the distinction between change of place and internal change, as a fundamental ontological principle.

True and false is not a subjective judgement. Our claims are either true or false independant of what we think (in many cases. — Dan

I'm sorry to keep pestering you on this matter, but that is an assertion which needs to be justified. You can claim this over and over again, but repetition does not constitute justification. So you give me no reason to even consider this claim: "Our claims are either true or false independant of what we think".

First, that is the world we live in. We are behind the veil of perception and certainty about the truth of the world (in at least most cases) is forever denied to us. — Dan

If, the truth about the world is forever denied from us, then how do we know that there is such a thing. This is the problem. You assume, and claim, that there is such a thing as "the truth of the world", but since it is denied from us, we have no real evidence that there is such a thing. This renders your claim as completely unsupported, nothing but a baseless assertion. Furthermore, theories in modern physics, "multiverse", "model-dependent reality" etc., are contrary to this assertion.

That claim you make is most likely just a reflection of your intentions. You want it to be, that there is a "truth of the world", because that would represent a very complex reality in a simplistic way, facilitating an easy moral philosophy for you. But if that assumption you make is wrong, then so too is your moral philosophy.

Therefore we need to start with a principle which is a recognition that the assumption that there is a "truth of the world" is not a known fact. And this is why religion provides a better starting point than what you propose. Religion proposes that we have "faith" that there is such a thing as "the truth of the world", and this is distinctly different from what you propose, that there is such a thing as the truth of the world.

Also this really applies to observable facts more than deductive arguments, so presumably isn't such an issue for discussions of morality. — Dan

Deductive arguments need to be grounded in premises which will be judged to be true, or else the arguments will be dismissed as unsound. Therefore discussions of morality which are based in principles which will be judged as false (eg "there is a truth of the world") will be dismissed accordingly. The solution is to replace the faulty premises with better premises (eg "we can have faith that there is a truth of the world").

Are you being facetious here? I also said "from the point of view of the person making the decision". Do you think that perspective involves knowing the future? I'm not employing two valuation systems at all, I am explaining a fairly simple point about actual-value consequentialism. — Dan

I really can't believe that you do not see that you employ two distinct valuation systems. It's so clear and blatant, how can you not understand this? Are you so deep in denial, that you cannot even stop to look at, and understand the meaning of what you write?

You have one system which evaluates from the perspective of what you call "from the point of view of the person making the decision". Evaluation from this perspective does not involve knowing the future, i.e. the consequences of whatever act is chosen. From this perspective, (this proposed evaluation system), your judgement renders the chosen act as "right". However, you also apply a judgement produced from the evaluation system described as the perspective of "actual-value consequentialism". From this evaluation system, the consequences, therefore the future of whatever act is chosen is known. And from this perspective you judge the act as "wrong".

This demonstrates very clearly what I argued much earlier. A clear understanding of the nature of time is of the utmost importance to moral philosophy.

Since the two judgements here, "right" and "wrong", (one including the future from the act, the other not) are contrary, it is impossible that both could be the product of the same system of evaluation. That would imply contradiction within that system, and incoherency. Therefore we must conclude that there are two distinct systems of evaluation being employed, and the contrariness of the respective judgements implies that the two are incompatible.

I mean, true and right are not judgements. They are properties which we often make judgements about. Just like we make judgements about the chemical composition of a substance. It's actual atomic makeup is not the same thing as our judgement of it, and our judgement can be more or less accurate depending on how closely it matches reality. — Dan

These are all judgements. "Properties" are judgement we make about things. That X is "the chemical composition of that substance", is a judgement, "the sky is blue" is a judgement, "the grass is green" is a judgement. These judgements reflect our perceptions, and our usage of words, such that if we agree, we conclude that we are saying something true about the world. But "truth" in this case is dependent on agreement, convention in word usage, corresponding with our perceptions. There is nothing to prove that the said properties are actually independent of our perception. (This is a common theme here a TPF, you ought to look over some other threads, like Wayfarer's "The Mind-Created World" for example).

There are a whole host of reasons why not believing in objective truth is not a viable position, but the easiest to explain is that there is no point in anyone talking to you about anything if you don't think there is an objective fact of the matter. You say the world is flat, I say it's round. I can try to convince you using various pieces of evidence, but if you don't think that there is a world out there that contains the answer and we can at least try to compare our beliefs to (though of course there are challenges to doing so given that we cannot see outside of our own perceptions), then there is no point having the discussion in the first place. Or any discussion for that matter. — Dan

This is not at all reflective of reality, and it is actually a very clear indication of how your misunderstanding greatly misleads you in your approach to moral philosophy. Human beings are intentional creatures. We move around with wants, desires, aims and objectives. What you call "objective truth" is irrelevant to most human choices and actions. In most cases, we don't care about any supposed objective truth, we just want to get what we need or desire. Therefore our interactions, communications, are shaped and formed around these intentional activities rather than any assumption of an objective truth.

So the above paragraph of yours expresses the opposite of the reality of the situation. Human beings can, and do in most cases, have all sorts of discussions and other sorts of interactions, with the belief of whether or not there is an objective truth about the matter of their interactions remaining completely irrelevant. As long as we have adequate understanding of meaning, allowing us to communicate our wants, desires, and goals, also allowing us to produce, and work together toward common goals, "objective truth" is irrelevant.

The question of "objective truth" generally only arises when there is disagreement. So our moral philosophy needs to reflect this. Our choices, actions, and consequently interactions, are based in our wants, desires, and intentions. They are not based in a belief in "objective truth". As it is very clear that moral philosophy deals with human choices, actions, and interactions, it is also very clear that moral philosophy needs to be based in an understanding of human wants, desires, and intentions, rather than a belief in an "objective truth". The faith in "objective truth" is a mechanism employed to deal with disagreement.

The claim is the meaning of the symbols or vocalizations, not the symbols of vocalizations themselves, and a claim can indeed be a true or false. — Dan

The meaning of symbols, is as interpreted by an individual mind, and is therefore subjective. Therefore true or false is a subjective judgement. I explained this already, with the examples of the meaning of "understand", "truth", and "world". But you don't seem to understand.

When someone says it, that is them making a judgement. But whether it does or not is not a judgement, but a fact. — Dan

This would be a useless fact, if true. Whether or not the claim actually does correspond, as "fact", would be impossible for anyone to know, so even if this were true, these "facts" would be useless and irrelevant to our discussion. Furthermore, also if what you claim is true, then as human beings, only having access to our subjective judgements, we could never know whether it is a fact that what you claim is a fact. So the claim does nothing for us.

So we have a dual level of irrelevance. We could never know the truth (the fact) of any claim, so our subjective judgements would guide us anyway. On top of this, we could never know whether the claim that there is such facts is itself true. So the claim is completely useless and does nothing to aid us in finding truth because it makes truth necessarily beyond our grasp.

When I claim the world is round(ish) that is a judgement, but my claim is either true or false depending on the actual shape of the planet, and would be true or false regardless of whether I (or anyone else) judged it as such. — Dan

You are completely ignoring what I explained. The words "world", "roundish", need to be defined, interpreted for meaning, and the reality itself needs to be judged as fulfilling the conditions of the interpreted meaning. Therefore your claim here is completely incoherent.

No, I am saying that in circumstances that were identical from the point of view of the actor (since the doctor didn't know about the weird niche circumstances at play here), the same action (by which I mean the same in all relevant regards) would not be wrong, but right. — Dan

Then it's incoherent to judge the doctor's actions as wrong. By "all relevant regards" the doctor's actions were right. See, you excluded the consequences, (the patient's death) from "all relevant regards". However, it is the consequences by which you made the judgement "wrong", so clearly the consequences cannot be irrelevant. You are providing a very good demonstration of incoherency, and why you need to accept the fact that you employ two distinct, and incompatible, valuation systems..

A lot of what you are claiming seems to be steeped in highly dubious meta-ethical assumptions, possibly ontological ones as well. So I'll ask you again, what are the assumptions that are hiding behind these points? Are you claiming that there is no objective truth at all? Or that there is simply no objective truth regarding morality? — Dan

The ontological principle involved here, is the conclusion that the assumptions of "objective truth", and "objective right", require God for justification. This conclusion is derived as I've explained, from the true premise that "true" and "right" are judgements. I invite you to propose another form of justification, other than God, but simply asserting that this is "fact" is not justification.

We can make a judgement of whether some claim is true, but whether it is true or not is a fact about that claim, not merely a judgement made by us. — Dan

As I said, this is incomprehensible to me because whether or not a statement of claim is true, is dependent on interpretation of the statement, and comparison with reality. Such comparison only minds can perform.

As I said, whether a statement of claim is true or not is a judgement. In no way can truth or falsity be understood as the property of the claim itself, which is simply an ordered collection of symbols.

If someone was using terms in such as way as to make their claim meaningless, then you might point this out, but generally speaking what is much more interesting is to focus on the substantive claims being made. — Dan

You seem to be missing the point. What I claim is that you use terms in such a way as to make your claim valid, but if analyzed, the meaning required is really unintelligible, such as your use of "true" above.

If you defined "world" in that way, then I might well point out that it's a very strange definition that isn't connected with how we normally use the word. — Dan

Right, and that is what I am pointing out about your use of "understand", it is not comprehensible. And now, your use of "true", and "right", are simply unintelligible.

I am using "truth" in a fairly general sense, but I think I'd be happy with something like "corresponds to reality" as a basic definition for the purposes of this discussion. I don't think it's strange to suggest that claims really are true or false, and that this isn't merely a judgement made by people. — Dan

Can you not see that "corresponds to reality" refers to a type of judgement? Whenever someone says "that corresponds to reality", this indicates a judgement. How could it mean anything other than this?

it is entirely consistent to say that this person acted wrongly but that we still want people to act the same way in the future. — Dan

OK, you're saying that you want people to act wrongly. That's exactly why I am arguing that this type of consequentialism really does not suffice for providing moral guidance.

Sorry, do you not think that things are objectively true at all? Or do you not think moral claims are objectively true (or false)? There is a big assumption hiding behind this statement, and I'd like to get it out in the open. — Dan

As I said, such objectivity requires God. Since truth is a judgement, we need something other than a human mind to make that judgement, if we assume such "objectivity".

The issue is not whether or not I agree with objectivity, the issue is that it is incoherent to believe in such objectivity, without a belief in some type of god for ontological support.

I'd like to get this assumption out in the open, because I think I've been pretty clear about my meta-ethical assumptions here. — Dan

You've been clear, but the assumptions which you clearly assert prove to be incoherent.

So, could you please state for the record what your meta-ethical position is. Do you think morality is constructed? Subjective? Relative? What's the story? — Dan

This is not about what I believe, we are discussing the coherency of your theory. My beliefs are only relevant so far as they bear on your theory. Whether or not I personally believe in God is irrelevant here.

Also, as linguistic claims go, "right" and "wrong" being objective facts about actions is probably the standard usage. I think moral objectivism is still the standard pre-theoretical position, though I will admit that this is in flux at the moment with a reasonable amount of relativist nonsense floating around. — Dan

Again, "right" and "wrong" are judgements. If you want to provide support for your claim that a judgement can be objective, without a God who makes that objective judgement, then be my guest.

HUGE yikes. — AmadeusD

HUGE yilkes,
Is what I LIKES

I am not assuming any gods at all. What I am assuming is that there are moral truths objectively of our views. When we claim that something is right (in the moral sense), I suggest we are making an objective claim about that thing which can be either true or false. — Dan

"Truth" is a judgement we make of a statement. Without a god, who do you propose, makes these statements and judgements?

It appears we may have a similar issue with "truth" to the issue we had with "understanding". You assume a meaning which is completely incoherent to me, and continue to use the word that way as if I ought to understand you.

It isn't a subjective judgement though. It is a claim that can be objectively correct or incorrect. As a simple example, if I say that the world is round (or you know, roundish) and you say it is flat, we aren't both right. — Dan

I don't see how the example serves the purpose. In order for one of us to be correct, we need someone to judge the meaning of "world", and the meaning of "round", "flat", etc.. It is actually very possible that we both are correct, because I could be using "world" to refer to something which you would never agree to.

This is exactly what has happened in this thread. You use "understand" and "truth" in a way which makes no sense to me. And, you might actually be correct in your argument based on that meaning. The meaning is like a premise though, so to prove your argument unsound, I must prove the falsity of your meaning.

So in your example, if I say "the world is flat", and I hold a conception of "the world" in which it is flat, then "the world is flat" is correct, and to prove me wrong you need to prove that my meaning (conception) of "the world" is false. Likewise, to prove your moral position to be unsound, I am faced with the task of proving that the meaning you assume for words like "understand", and "truth" are false. This is a sort of dialectics. But if in such a debate, a person adheres to the false definition, fails to understand the falsity of it, or for some reason refuses to accept the falsity of it, argumentation becomes pointless.

This is another case of you getting very concerned with language where it really isn't necessary. — Dan

Based on what I presented above, "getting very concerned with language" is necessary. I can define "the world" as what can be seen within the horizon that extends 360 degrees around a person, and the world is "flat" by that definition, even if "the world" of multiple people overlap to make a universal flat world. Likewise, you can define words like "truth", "understand", and "same", in absurd ways to support your theory. The only way to show you that your theory is wrong, unsound, is to demonstrate that your use of language does not reflect reality, is therefore false.

I could instead say that we should praise the initial action because we want other people in situations that seem identical with regard to relevant factors to act in the same way with regard to relevant features of the action. — Dan

Sure, but if this is the case, then on what basis do you say the action was wrong? You are saying that people ought to be taught to always act "the same way" in any situation which appears to be to a significant extent "similar". But then you are also saying that in this particular case the person's act, who acted "that way" was wrong, yet you are using it as an example of how people ought to act. Can you not see the inconsistency? It's blatant, and blatant inconsistency is not productive in teaching because people dismiss it as ridiculous, and counterproductive.

I agree it is a big problem for such theories. — Dan

Another nail in the coffin. At what point do you give up on providing exceptions to the rule, trying to prop up a deficient rule, and simply bury the faulty rule?

No, you don't need to consider any of that. If someone does the right thing for the "wrong reasons", it's still the right thing. — Dan

That's a faulty judgement, based in your misunderstanding, of an objective, independent "truth", or "right", outlined above. You really need to work on this misunderstanding, figure out the reality of the situation.

It seems pretty clear that the doctor could have given the patient a physical exam which, in this example, would have led to them discovering the problem. And, in this case, based on what happened, it seems reasonably to say that they should have (on an actual-value view. — Dan

That is not clear at all. The person was dying. The doctor acted in an emergency situation. You only say that the doctor could have, and should have, "given the patient a physical exam" because that is consistent with discovery of the information, according to the contrived example. Maybe in another example, the patient's spouse was standing in the hall with the information, and the doctor 'could have and should have' asked the spouse. The problem is glaring. The doctor has no way of knowing which of the countless possible options are going to reveal the information, and cannot proceed toward pursuing them all until information is revealed, or the patient dies.

I mean, this is surely obvious. What's right is right regardless of whether there is a rule that says its right. What's wrong is wrong regardless of whether it is prohibited. I find it very difficult to believe that you haven't heard that sentiment before. — Dan

Again, clear indication of a faulty use of "right". I'll be waiting for you to either dispense with this idea altogether, or support it with some sort of god. I mean you might try to support it otherwise, but I've seen enough of that to tell you it's all smoke and mirrors of sophistry. So rather than have me make fun of your attempts, let's just get on with the either/or option.

As a fairly easy-to-understand example, do you think that killing a child for fun would become less wrong if the laws prohibiting it were repealed or the social norms prohibiting it were no longer held by the majority? — Dan

This is a question of do I believe in God or not. If I believe in God, then I assume an independent God who interprets, understands, and upholds judgement on this rule, "killing children for fun is wrong", as correct, regardless of what human beings think. If I do not believe in God, then so long as not every human being agrees that killing children for fun is wrong, then the proposed rule remains debatable. So the issue is more complicated than the way you present it, because even if the majority thinks that it's not wrong, and the laws are repealed, then it is not wrong by those laws, but to the minority who do not agree, it is still debatable.

I don't see any other possibility.

No. What people are okay with and what is right are very often different. What's right is right regardless of whether people agree. — Dan

That "X is right" is a judgement, just like "this thing I'm typing on is a keyboard" is a judgement. Are you assuming "God" to make this judgement "regardless of whether people agree? If so, I will dismiss it, just like you dismissed my reference to religious principles earlier in our discussion. Therefore there is nothing to justify your claim "What people are okay with and what is right are very often different".

In the same way there is often a difference between what people think is true and what is actually true in any other context. — Dan

Again, "X is true" is a judgement. So this statement is dismissed on the same basis as the one above.

I mean, it's the same in terms of relevant factors used to make the decision. I think that's what we'd normally call the same situation. — Dan

We cannot use an appeal to common vernacular in the use of "same" to support rigorous logic. This is why we have a "law of identity" to support logical procedures.

The doctor acted wrongly because their actions led to bad consequences that were avoidable had they acted differently. On an actual-value view of consequentialism where an action is judged based on the actual value of it's consequences, this makes the action bad and also wrong (in that the doctor should have done something different). — Dan

This is untenable as a working principle. If this was an accepted moral principle, then any time which someone could apprehend a better possible outcome than what actually occurred, they'd have grounds to say that the action had "bad consequences", and was therefore wrong. And since there are always accidentals involved in any situation, every act would be arguably "wrong". Therefore, as a moral principle, your proposed "actual value" perspective is completely useless.

It's very clear that this type of consequentialism is absolutely inadequate to provide principles for moral judgement. What is actually required to make a moral judgement is to consider the situation of the person prior to the choice, one's intentions, the specifics of the circumstances, along with the consequences. As is very evident from your example, basing judgement solely on consequences is woefully inadequate, and may be considerably misleading.

In this case, the doctor gave the patient something to which they were deathly allergic and which led to their death, and the doctor could have learned this and acted differently. So, the action turned out to be wrong. — Dan

You paid no respect to my counter example. If "the doctor could have learned this" is a principle acceptable to the judgement of whether the doctor acted wrongly or not, then we'd have to allow that the doctor should have gone off and rummaged through the patient's car, one's house, all files on record anywhere, even keep searching all information in the universe, before acting. This principle is nonsense and completely unacceptable.

Again, following protocol is not a reason to think an action is right. Protocol has very little to do with right or wrong. — Dan

Wow! I've never heard that before, not even in the "In praise of anarchy" thread. Following rules has very little to do with right or wrong? What planet are you from Dan?

Do you mean something non-normative by "morally acceptable"? I mean, it's very clear that following the standard procedure is not always morally acceptable in the sense that it is morally permissible, but perhaps you mean something like "people will generally be okay with it" or something to that effect. Is that the case? — Dan

There's nothing non-normative on my part. You are the one who has already admitted to having non-normative principles. Look, if people are ok with it, then it is morally acceptable. Isn't that obvious to you?

Surely you would agree that what people would accept, or what people would think is the right thing to do, is not the same as what actually is the right thing to do, right? — Dan

No. How could there be a difference?

I mean, the consequences of praising the action are going to depend on the future actions of those that find themselves in the same situation, so their perspective is very relevant. Also, yes, the situations wouldn't be completely identical. They would be happening at different times for a start. But they may be identical in terms of relevant information that one might use to make the decision at hand. — Dan

If the situations are not identical, then it is false to refer to them as "the same situation". You just contradict yourself by saying "the same situation... wouldn't be completely identical".

If you call it what it is, "a similar situation", then you ought to understand that what I said earlier applies.

What is required is to analyze the action and separate the good from the bad, such that the good can be praised and the bad condemned in order to avoid similar wrongful actions. But analyzing and separating good from bad is completely different from simply praising the wrongful action.

To use the same example I gave before, perhaps the call that the doctor made would be correct most of the time and, in the time-sensitive situation they find themselves in, checking for the niche circumstances which caused it to be the wrong call here would cost more lives than it saves. I'm not really sure what you are finding difficult about this. — Dan

You haven't provided me with the principle by which you judge the doctor's action to be wrong. You simple assume it to be wrong, and say that it is wrong by "an actual-value or some expected-value view", but this gives me no principle, therefore no reason to believe it was wrong. As far as I can see, the doctor followed protocol, therefore we can judge the actions as right, even though the person's life was not saved.

Are you suggesting that a doctor ought to look to see what is tattooed on the bottom of one's foot before attempting to save a person's life? What else do you think the doctor ought to do before proceeding, look through one's car, go to the person's house and rummage through all files and bookshelves? Your conclusion that the doctor's action was wrong makes absolutely no sense at all. The person died, but that does not make the action of the doctor trying to save that life, wrong.

You need to provide a reason why you think the doctor's action was wrong. I gave you the reason why I think the doctor's action was right, the doctor followed protocol. Now you need to give me the reason why you think the action was wrong. That the person died accidentally while the doctor was working, does not make the doctor's actions wrong. Otherwise every time a person died in surgery the doctor's actions would be wrong. A doctor's actions always involve risk of something bad happening, so probability dictates that a bad thing will happen from time to time. Unless there is negligence the doctor's action is not wrong.

s it possible you mean something non-standard by protocol? Like, something like "the best available methods of achieving the desired ends based on all known information" or something to that effect? I mean, I think you'd still be wrong, but that would be at least less egregious than suggesting that following a protocol was the same thing as acting rightly. — Dan

No, "protocol" means something like "standard rules for any procedure". It does not mean "best available method", just the conventional or standard method. There may be other ways available if one seeks them, judgeable as better or worse.

The issue is that this is the common practise in many cases, to simply follow protocol. Since it is the common practise, and it is also very "morally acceptable" that it is the common practise, this means that it is "morally acceptable" to just follow standard rules rather than considering whether the standard rules represent the "best available method". Protocol therefore is the means by which we simplify decision making, and we increase efficiency of actions. by accepting that seeking other options is unnecessary. And, as I've been arguing, while you seem to disagree, following protocal is very clearly morally acceptable.

Compare this to what I said earlier about "habit". Following protocol is a sort of habit, a habit designated by social constructs as a good habit. What I said was that habit restricts our freedom, by inclining us away from considering options. What we have here is that the person follows protocol (acts by habit), and since this is the morally accepted way of acting, the good habit, it is morally acceptable that the person does not consider whether this is the "best available option". The person simply does not even consider other options, and therefore has one's freedom to choose other options restricted. By choosing "protocol", the person disallows other options to enter one's mind, to be considered, and therefore the choice for actions in the situation are restricted to the actions indicated by the protocol.

The point now is that the choice of using "protocol", which is a self-limiting of one's freedom to choose, is very much morally acceptable. In fact, it is often the norm. And, the things which we call "norms" often serve as a sort of protocol. So I think it is pointless for you to argue that following protocol is not the right thing to do, as what you claim is not consistent with reality. Any situation where it is claimed that protocol is wrong would require that such a claim be justification, because the correctness of protocol is otherwise taken for granted.

I mean, I've already explained this. They wouldn't seem like different actions from the perspective of the actor because they would have identical information. — Dan

I think this is impossible. Never does a person find oneself to be in the exact same situation twice. Even the experience of Deja vu has some differences. Furthermore, we are talking about the perspective of the person who is supposedly judging the act to be both wrong and praiseworthy, so this would be irrelevant anyway.

No, I am suggesting that in some cases we may conclude that the wrongful action should be praised and we should not try to avoid it happening again because doing so would have worse consequences. — Dan

This makes no sense. If not allowing the action to happen (I cannot allow the qualifier "again" because the same action cannot happen twice) would have worse consequences, how could the action be judged as "wrongful" in the first place. You explicitly state that not allowing it to happen would have worse consequences. Therefore we need to conclude that the action produced the best possible consequences, when the choices are restricted to 'make action A or do not make action A', and therefore it cannot be judged as wrong.

The only way to make it wrong is to propose that there was a better course of action. But this implies that the action is not praiseworthy.

. A consequentialist would say that the way we should make our moral decisions is by reference to their likely consequences. — Dan

If there is relevant protocol, the method for producing the desired consequences is to consult protocol. If in situation A, and desired outcome is Z, then protocol M is to be followed. That is the purpose of protocol, it is the convention for producing the desired consequences.

I don't understand how you can argue that protocol is irrelevant in decision making. Protocol is produced from experience with consequences. It's a form of science science, empirical evidence from experimentation.

Then, since praising it is a seperate action (that will have consequences for future actions conducted in different circumstances) we can determine that praising this action will likely have good consequences and so praise it. — Dan

This is incoherent. If the action is evaluated as "wrong", it is impossible to conclude that simply praising that action would have good consequences. Thi is because the elements which make the action wrong are praised equally with any other elements. "Future actions conducted in different circumstances" are irrelevant in this context, because "different circumstances" implies different actions.

What is required is to analyze the action and separate the good from the bad, such that the good can be praised and the bad condemned in order to avoid similar wrongful actions. But analyzing and separating good from bad is completely different from simply praising the wrongful action.

We have significant differences of belief concerning "meaning" and "understanding" which makes further discussion on that issue rather pointless.

I agree that those are two different evaluation systems, but when making moral decisions, we don't need to consider how closely some protocol was followed, we just need to consider the consequences (or possibly the expected consequences) of the action. — Dan

The glaring problem here, is your reference to "how closely some protocol was followed". This means a judgement after the fact, as does "consequences". However when judging a person's decision, and the decision making process, we must acknowledge that the person decides to the act before the act occurs. In the person's decision making process, and consequently in the judgement of that decision, protocol is very important.

You can limit "moral decisions" to judgements made after the fact, and exclude the relevance of protocol, but this will not provide us with principles for decision making. Your morality will consist of after the fact judgments, essentially excluding the possibility of "ought" statements (being the basic protocol), if you insist that whether or not protocol is followed is not relevant to moral decisions.

It could. I am very much saying that the same evaluative system could say that an action was wrong, but we should nevertheless praise it. Not praise a different action, praise the action that took place in this instance, regardless of the fact it was wrong. — Dan

This is incoherent. And, your explanation for it referred to the same act in different circumstances. As I explained, different circumstances make for different acts. You could mean "the same type of act". Otherwise you still have not provided any explanation as to how this statement might be coherent.

No, it does not need to be a desired thing. Someone might not care about whether they continue to experience things or not, but still understand that their death would stop them from doing so. — Dan

But that's not knowing what the choice "means" which is your definition. "Meaning" is defined in relation to purpose, intention.

I mean yes, you could absolutely do that. The point is that if the person doesn't understand that if they die, they can't keep doing stuff, then they haven't really understood what death is. — Dan

Again, this would be not knowing what the choice "means", consequently not "understanding", by your definition.

This is profoundly incorrect. Following protocol is very much not the same as acting rightly. Protocols are often wrong, as you can see by simply looking at protocols through history that were based on terrible reasoning or poor understanding of the world. Even when the protocol itself is good, it may not have taken account of the circumstances people find themselves in or may be designed to avoid the dodgy judgment of idiots. — Dan

This just demonstrates the dual evaluation you employ. Notice that you replaced "right" with "good", later in the paragraph. "Good" and "right" are not equivalent. The doctor is right, correct, not mistaken if protocol is followed, but the protocol itself maybe judged as bad. Notice the two valuation system. 1) How closely was protocol followed? 2) Is the protocol good?

Consider the difference between the validity of a logical argue, and soundness. Validity requires only that the protocol (rules) be followed. But soundness requires also that the premises be judged for truth. Judging the logical procedure for validity, and the judge the premises for truth, are two distinct types of judgement requiring two distinct evaluation systems.

There aren't two systems of evaluation. There is one system that is evaluating both the rightness or wrongness of the initial action and the rightness or wrongness of praising that action (which is another action). — Dan

If this were the case, it would be impossible to say that the same act was both wrong and praiseworthy. The same system which judges the act as wrong could not also judge praising the same act as right, without self-contradiction. Your examples are faulty because you replace "the same act" with "the same type of act in different circumstances". So in the case of your examples, the praising is of a type of act, it is not a praising of the act which is judged as wrong.

I would say I am using language pretty clearly and consistently. I've tried to explain things in several different ways when you don't understand the first time, but perhaps you are having trouble because we are discussing too many points at once. Would it be easier to prune this discussion down and tackle one point at a time? — Dan

I don't see any point. We simply disagree on fundamental principles and progress appears impossible..

Omg! Apply it to them. As I said, I can't really discuss things with someone like you. — Clearbury

I've noticed that. I want to focus on reality, talk about the way things are, and allow that to have due bearing on the propositions we make. But you want to keep your mind within your fantasy, and not allow reality to impose itself in any way. Of course that leaves you in no position to discuss anything with someone like me.

People like that aren't worth the bother because they're just a lot of work - one has to try and educate them, which isn't why I'm here - — Clearbury

If you are not here to educate us on why anarchy is praiseworthy, then why are you here? I mean simply praising anarchy is rather pointless, unless you can show why it ought to be praised.

In being an educator you need to assume that the person to be educated has no knowledge of the subject which you profess. Therefore you need to start from the basics, make them very clear, and then move on to the specifics. You are doing the opposite, starting form some very specific assumptions, but then you cannot show any general principles which would support these specific assumptions. So you appear to be lost.

Most people have no idea just how bad the police are at solving crimes, — Clearbury

The assumptions you make are glaringly false, often to the point of being ridiculous. There is no "lack of competition" in the work of solving crimes. Have you not heard of "private investigators"? Anyone can take of the task of solving crimes, there is no monopoly here. So if the police are terribly bad at this task, it is not the result of no competition.

yes, because those street battles between competing supermarket chains and banks are really common — Clearbury

Did you read my post? I didn't say anything about competing supermarket chains, or banks. I said something about individuals who hire competing private security companies for private interests.

Battles are expensive. The private sector hates them. Politicians love them....
Price wars is what you'll get. — Clearbury

You just spout random ideas with no grounds in reality, Clearbury. Why don't you actually think about some of these things for a while? How could banks or supermarket chains even exist without governance? These entities are features of the type of state that we live in.

What you seem to be doing, is taking all the aspects of our type of state which you dislike, taxes, violence by police, etc., and separating them from the aspects of our type of state which you do like. Then you claim that if we get rid of the governance, "the state" itself, we will rid ourselves of all the negative aspects, and be left with the positive.

Sorry to have to burst your bubble, shatter your illusion, but reality just is not like this. Many "things" have both desirable and undesirable aspects. Annihilating "the thing" which supports these properties does not leave you with the desirable properties, while ridding you of the undesirable. You need to provide for yourself, a more sophisticated approach to this problem, if you want to address it seriously. Have you read Plato's "Republic"? It's very educational, concerning different types of states, different types of people, and justice in general.

What if, as a private security company in an anarchy, I decide to extract payment with menaces? That is, I operate like a mafia? Well, those whom I threaten would hire another security company to protect them - to protect them from such menaces. — Clearbury

Yes, I'll hire my private security company, you hire yours, Moliere will hire another, ssu another, etc.. Then these companies will each be operating for different private interests and a street battle will be inevitable.

We don't have state issued shoes. If we did, they'd be awful.. — Clearbury

Have you ever seen army boots? These are top quality, as is the case with most stuff issued by the military. Why do you think that products issued by the government are necessarily "awful"?

Imagine there are two supermarkets near you, one is run by a really nasty piece of work. It pays its employees poorly and has a reputation for treating them badly and for treating customers badly as well. The other doesn't. Which one would you shop at? The nice one, of course. Most nice people would, anyway. — Clearbury

Are you saying that the government pays poorly, and treats their employees badly? Which government behaves like this?

The private sector will provide all of those things. Anything a government provides, the private sector can provide. There is no invisible obstacle preventing private companies from building prisons. If enough people want to pay a company to imprison some people, a private company - private companies - will emerge that will bid for their business. Or, chances are, some much more efficient way of dealing with rights transgressors will be developed. — Clearbury

I am still waiting for you to address the issue of building roads, expropriating property, and land ownership in general. How is the private sector going to provide for ownership of land? Is each person just going to claim a section, and hire their own private security company to defend it? What happens when I want the same section you want, and there's no deeds? Would we each have to hire our own private company to provide us with a deed?

It's people who come up with solutions, not governments. And violence is something people are capable of using. The point is that it will be used more sparingly and justly in an anarchy than it will be if we all decide instead that just one tiny group of people get to determine when and where to use it. — Clearbury

You must be joking. There would be no prisons, why go through the trouble of trying to organize and maintain prisons, when it's so much easier to shoot first and not have to worry about answering questions later? Your naivety is overwhelming.

Look at what you are saying. You are saying that if every person gets to decide when and where to use violence, there will be much less violence then if only a few people get to decide this. And, I'll add, the government hired "tiny group" have special training.

So, you think that if 100,000,000 people are free to use violence, whenever and wherever they determine it's needed, this will result in less violence overall, than if only 100 people are free to use violence wherever and whenever they determine it's needed. I assume you have some evidence or statistics to back this claim up?

I think there's an argument similar to this which promotes the right to own firearms for defense. The proponents say, that if more people own firearms then there will be less incidences of firearms being used for crime. You should check the statistics on this:
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/more-guns-do-not-stop-more-crimes-evidence-shows/

In the child's case, it is a matter of not understanding what the choice entails, what it means to make that choice. In the case of the person buying the shirt, so long as they understand what it means to buy the shirt and understand that they are buying it without knowing that it is 100% cotton, then the choice is understood. — Dan

"What it means to make that choice" in the case of the child, is to acknowledge an end to experiences. That's what you said. "Experiences" is the desired thing, and if it were not, it would be irrelevant to knowing what it means to make that choice. It is only by being the desired consequence of staying alive, that experiences are relevant to the child's choice of dying, and therefore essential to "understanding" what it means to make that choice.

Otherwise, you could replace "end of experiences" with end of anything which the child does, eats, cries, sleeps, etc., and claim that understanding the choice requires understanding any one of these. This means that the child might think that what the choice means, is the end of crying and suffering. Generally, we'd call this "misunderstanding". That's why you framed "understanding the choice" as recognizing it to mean the end of experiences, because experiences are what is desired.

Likewise, "what it means to buy the shirt" is to understand that buying it is contrary to the desired thing, to buy a shirt only if it is 100% cotton. The two cases are very similar. In each case, there is a choice which is contrary to what constitutes the desired thing; 1) continued experiences, 2) to buy a shirt only if it is 100% cotton. "Understanding" of the choice, i.e. "what it means to make that choice" describes the situation in which the person recognizes that the choice is contrary to what is desired.

Sorry, are you genuinely suggesting that if someone follows protocol, their actions cannot be wrong? I mean, I have a lot to say about what a silly view that is, but I just want to confirm that this is actually what you are suggesting before I start tearing into it. — Dan

Yes, by definition, to follow protocol is to act in the right way.

I'm not suggesting we condemn the action. You're bringing condemning into it. Condemning, like praising, is another action we can take after the fact, which might be right or wrong based on its own consequences. The action can be wrong, and yet praiseworthy. That is also seperate from whether the protocol is praiseworthy. It might be that the doctor followed protocol and it is a sensible protocol and we should praise their actions but, nevertheless, their action in this case turned out to be wrong (on an actual-value or some expected-value view). It might also be the case that the doctor didn't follow protocol because the protocol is stupid, and we should praise their actions, but they were still wrong in this case, and we should condemn the protocol. There are not multiple systems of evaluating here, there are multiple actions to evaluate. — Dan

Your use of these words is amazingly confusing. That's because you do not stick to definitions, and you introduce ambiguity.

There clearly is multiple systems of evaluation. There is one by which you judge the act to be praiseworthy, and another by which you judge the act to be "wrong", what you call the "actual-value view". You clearly say "the action can be wrong, and yet praiseworthy". Why can't you acknowledge that such a statement requires two systems for evaluation?

That it is an act which judges praiseworthiness, and this act can itself be judged, is irrelevant to the fact that this is an act of judgement, which requires a system of evaluation. Without a system of evaluation, the judgement of praiseworthy would be random and irrelevant for that reason. But it clearly is not irrelevant in what you write. Therefore the judgement must be based in a system of evaluation.

I think all the anarchist conclusion really requires is that it is wrong to extract payment with menaces for deciding - without being commissioned to do so - to protect another's rights. — Clearbury

So this is the motivation for your anarchism, you dislike taxation?

Well, the solution lies with individuals recognizing that government is not needed — Clearbury

Who is going to maintain the roads and all the infrastructure?

For instance, food production distribution is almost entirely conducted by the private sector, at least in first world countries (and that's partly what makes them first world). — Clearbury

But of course, distribution is done through the use of roads maintained by the government. Sure, you might claim that the private sector could build roads, but who is going to collect funds for this, and what force will they use to collect money from those who do not wish to pay, claiming that they will not use the roads? And who will be in charge of expropriating the required land for such infrastructure?

Speaking of land, without the government and its keeping of official records like title deeds, how are we going to know who owns what land? I guess we just fight it out? Oh no, no one would ever resort to violence over a property dispute, that would be irrational.

This is what I think of as one of the fundamental philosophical problems for anarchy: the problem of warlords is such that no matter what path to abolishing the state that you take the "bad" kind of anarchy will arise — Moliere

Clearbury seems to have no grasp of the concept of land ownership.

Engage with the arguments I make and not strawmen. — Clearbury

The problem is that your arguments are based in premises which are far removed from reality, i.e. false. Therefore it is necessary to demonstrate the falsity of your premises, rather than engage with the logic of your arguments, in order to demonstrate that your arguments are unsound.

If replacing your false premises for true premises constitutes making a strawman, to you, then so be it. You can continue to live in your "hypothetical" world of "hypothetical" contracts, and ignore the abundance of signed documents which are all around you, (birth certificates, other forms of identification, title deeds, bank accounts, insurance, etc..) indicating that said contracts are very real, and not merely "hypothetical", if that is what you wish. But what is the point to ignoring reality, just because it is inconsistent with the premises of your favoured argument? Don't you see how such behaviour only misleads you?

Think for a while of reality... — ssu

Careful what you ask for. Clearbury is prone to designating anyone who asks for such as irrational, and then proceeding to ignore that person for engaging with the reality of the situation, rather than Clearbury's hypothetical situation.

The problem is that this is a hypothetical contract and hypothetical contracts are worthless and do not justify treating others in the hypothetically agreed-to ways. — Clearbury

You seem to be quite adept at ignoring all the aspects of reality which are not consistent with your argument.

A person does not choose to be born into the situation they are born into. That there is a (hypothetical) contract over your head when you are born, is just a brute fact, just like there is a sun over your head. The contract is signed at the time of birth, by the baby's parents and the doctor, it's called a birth certificate. The person is just a baby, so the parents need to make all the required signatures for the baby. Once the documents are signed, you cannot escape this reality, that the contract is signed, and the paper trail is created. You may run and hide though, perhaps in a different country or something like that.

You can argue against the right that your parents have to sign these documents which make you identifiable to the powers that be, as a legal subject just like you can argue against the right that your parents have to even provide you with a place in this cruel world, in the first place, but what's the point? It's already too late for that, just like it's already too late to preach anarchy as a means of getting out of the contract your parents signed for you. In reality, you have no right to live at any particular location on this earth, unless you have that signed document, because you have no right to any real estate.

magine a child claiming that they want to die. However, the child does not understand what it means to die, they do not appreciate that such a thing is permanent and that it means an end to all experiences. This child does not understand this choice because they don't know what it means to make it. — Dan

I do not see how this is substantially different from the shirt buying example. The child does not know that death is contrary to what is desired, more experiences. That is what you describe as not understanding the choice. This is equivalent to the shirt buyer not knowing that choosing the shirt of unknown fabric is contrary to what is desired, only to buy 100% cotton. In both cases, what is called not understanding one's choice, is a matter of not recognizing that the choice is contrary to what is desired.

I mean, I think I probably can imagine this sort of agent, but that doesn't really matter as what you are describing is different from the kind of agent I posited. Specifically, the agent I described does not need to actually choose, it just needs to understand the choices it has. — Dan

I don't follow, and don't see how this makes a difference. To understand the choices which one has, requires that the person put them into the context of the desires which one has. This is exemplified by your example of the child who wants to die, and fails to understand this choice by not putting it into the context of wanting more experiences.

Can you really not imagine actions that led to bad consequences but which would, under most circumstances, lead to good consequences? — Dan

No, as I said, this statement demonstrates a failure of identification. All actions are context specific. An action under one set of circumstances is a different action from an action under a different set of circumstances. The doctor who acts without checking information within the file does not make the same act as the one who acts after checking the file but not the foot. You talk as if the same act could be bad under one set of circumstances, and good under another, but clearly these would simply be two different acts, one praiseworthy the other not.

You can produce all the examples you want, but I think that once you start trying to describe these various acts, you'll quickly understand what I mean. The praiseworthy act requires a different description from the condemnable act, to justify these distinct judgements, and is therefore a completely different act.

We are presumably praising the action because we want people who are in identical-appearing circumstances to act the same way. — Dan

How is this logical. The act was judged as wrong. How could it be possible that we would want to encourage people in identical-appearing circumstances to act the same way? That's totally illogical.

If the person performing this action did not know about the reasons why it would turn out to be wrong, and we would not want people in future to take the time to check for those specific circumstances (perhaps the action in question is time-sensitive), then praising that action seems entirely reasonable. — Dan

If you bring into the discussion other circumstances, which were not apparent to the decision maker, then you are not dealing with "identical-appearing circumstances". You are introducing other circumstances.

How could you ever conclude that praising the action of the person who failed to take the time to check the specific circumstances, and this resulted in a wrongful action, is a reasonable thing to do? It's completely illogical.

I do not have such an agent. I have one that understands choices without having desires. — Dan

That is what I insist is impossible. To understand that a choice is "a choice" is to associate it with what one wants or desires. Without any desires or wants, an agent would not apprehend possibilities as "choices" because there would be no motivation for the agent to select anything.

praising wrong action because in most circumstances doing the same thing (or, you might say, performing the same action) would be right — Dan

Again, this suffers a failure to properly identify the supposed action, and it is completely illogical for the reason I explained. In another set circumstances it would be a different action, and that different action might be praiseworthy. The other action, in the other set of circumstances, which is judged as wrong, is not praiseworthy.

For a simple example, imagine a doctor administering a medication to save a patient that is rapidly dying. This patient, unbeknownst to the doctor, is deathly allergic to that medication. That information was not on any of their charts, but instead tattooed on the sole of their foot. Assuming that we don't want doctors to be checking patients' feet for tattoos in the future (due to any delay potentially proving fatal), we might well praise what the doctor did in this scenario. Their action led to bad consequences (the patient died), so on an actual-value view (and some expected-value views) of consequentialism, what they did was wrong. However, in seemingly identical circumstances, we would want doctors to act in the same way, so we praise the initial action as the best call available given the information that the doctor had. — Dan

This example demonstrates very well the illogical nature of your dual evaluation system approach. In reality, the doctor has a standard protocol to follow. If the doctor follows the protocol the actions were correct and praiseworthy. If the patient then dies, this does not mean that the doctors actions were wrong. You are judging "wrongness" here by a different valuation system. You are saying that the patient died, and this is bad, therefore there must have been something wrong about the doctor's actions. But if the doctor followed the proper protocol then the actions were not wrong, and so your "actual-value view" (the second evaluation system) is completely irrelevant.

Do you still not see how these two systems for evaluating acts, are fundamentally incompatible, leading to contradiction such as the one in this example? Since they are incompatible, they are incommensurable, and it is illogical to attempt to bring one to bear on the other. Either we praise the doctor's actions for following protocol, or we condemn the doctor's actions from an "actual-value view", but to do both is illogical. Another option you might be interested in, is that we praise the doctor's actions, but condemn the protocol, arguing that a doctor ought to take stricter measures on determining such information. But condemning the protocol is distinctly different from condemning the action of the individual as wrong.

In the part I've just quoted: I find consistency and correspondence/conformity to reality to be deeply entwined. This in so far as reality, whatever it might in fact be, can only be devoid of logical contradictions (for emphasis, where an ontological logical contradiction is a state of affairs wherein both X and not-X both ontically occur simultaneously and in the exact same respect). For example, if reality is in part tychistic then truths will conform to this partly tychistic reality in consistent ways - thereby making some variant of indeterminism true and the strictly hard determinism which is currently fashionable among many false. — javra

The point I was trying to express, is that reality is what we make it to be, as in the the op, mind created world. So to correspond with reality means to be consistent with the principles we state as being those which describe reality. This puts logic in a sort of awkward place. We might say that reality is such that it is devoid of logical contradictions, but what this really means is that this reality which is devoid of logical contradiction is the product of a desire to maintain the law of non-contradiction. Ontologies have been proposed in which the law of non-contradiction is not necessarily true. This would mean that these principles give us a different reality.

It's a whopper of a metaphysical claim that realty is devoid of logical contradictions - although I so far find that everyone at least implicitly lives by this conviction. But, in granting this explicitly, then for any belief to be true, in its then needing to conform to reality to so be, the belief will then necessarily be devoid of logical contradictions in its justifications (which, after all, are justifications for the belief being conformant to reality, or else that which is real). So if a) reality is consistent (devoid of logical contradictions) and b) truth is conformity to reality then c) any belief which is inconsistent will not be true. — javra

So this is where things get difficult. Let's say that we assume a reality which allows for logical contradictions. Then, logical contradictions may be consistent with reality. Therefore a true belief may be logically inconsistent. But remember, we create reality by naming the principles which describe it. So if we think it's a better reality, we can insist that contradictions be avoided. Aristotle for instance saw a need to allow for violation of the law of excluded middle to create a reality including potential and possibility, but he insisted on maintaining non-contradiction.

If non-physicalism, then the numbers made use by maths could in certain situations represent incorporeal entities, such as individual souls or psyches. In the here very broad umbrella of the latter, one could then obtain the proposition that "one incorporeal psyche added to another incorporeal psyche added to another incorporeal psyche can via assimilation converge into one possibly grander incorporeal psyche" - thereby holding the potential of producing the 1+1+1=1 proposition, which will contradict the 2+2=4 proposition — javra

This is sort of what Platonism does. A numeral represents an object known as a number, so one object plus one object equals one object. However, the objects each have different values, and the value is represented by the numeral, so we do not have 1+1=1.

So as to not overly focus on Chistian beliefs, I should maybe add that the non-physicalist understanding of numbers as I’ve just outlined it pervades popular culture at large: from the notion that (non-physical) being is one (as in the statement, "we are all one," or the dictum of "e pluribus unum") to the notion that in a romantic relationship the two can become one. With all such beliefs being disparate from the stance that 1+1 can only equal 2 in all cases. — javra

Platonism pervades mathematics. We learn in school the difference between a numeral and a number. The numeral "2" signifies an object, which is the number two. Then what is important is the value assigned to the object. So two really does become one, but that one has a distinctly different value from what the other two each have. And in a fundamental way it is consistent with the physical approach in the sense that the values indicated are the same. However, there is a non-physical object which is added in.

Yes, it certainly is pivotal to what my argument for global fallibilism consists of.

But, again, I find no reason to doubt the truth of 2+2=4 in the absence of inconsistencies. And 2+2=4 is certainly consistent. — javra

There is more to truth than consistency, there is also the matter of correspondence with reality. This is why interpretation is pivotal. To judge whether 2+2=4 is consistent we need a statement to determine 'consistent with what'. The "what" here forms the basis of the supposed reality which we will judge correspondence with.

So for example, in basic arithmetic we might interpret each "2" as signifying two objects, the "+" as signifying an operation of addition, the "=" as signifying equivalence, and "4" as signifying four objects. But more sophisticated mathematicians might interpret "2+2" as signifying an object, and "4" as signifying an object, and "=" as signifying "is the same as". The "reality" which "2+2=4" corresponds with (is consistent with), making it true, is determined by the principles (axioms) which the interpretation is based in.

...might in fact be the right interpretation of the proposition... — javra

This I believe is the key phrase toward understanding javra's position on this matter. We must consider "2+2=4" to be a sequence of symbols requiring interpretation, to abstract meaning. And, there is always some degree of subjectivity which enters that process of interpretation. So, when two different people produce two different descriptions, (interpretations) of the meaning which they each abstract from the phrase "2+2=4", we can judge one as a better interpretation than the other. And, if we leave the possibility open, that we can always find a better interpretation, then the question of "the right interpretation" remains unanswered.

Yes, watch me. I can be just as immature as you are. You want to immaturely run away and ignore anyone who produces evidence and logic which proves your theory to be wrong. But we can run after you and hurl insults.

Please come out of your daydream and start to consider the way things are. In the real world irrationality runs rampant. And, you'll find that the real world full of evil is a safer place to live, than a fantasy world where everyone thinks the way you want them to.

I've already said that understanding a choice isn't about one's reasons for making it so I don't think we need to go over that ground again. Quite apart from that, you're the one who is suggesting that this is all post hoc rationalization. I wasn't suggesting this. — Dan

I just cannot grasp what you mean by "understand". As I think I've shown, your use of the word does not match what you say it means. If "understanding" a choice requires knowing what that choice means (as you state), this implies "what it means to the person making it". And knowing what it means to the person making it is to position it within the context of the person's thoughts. That means the reasons for it. Therefore knowing the reasons for the choice is a requirement to "understanding" the choice, by your stated definition of "understanding a choice".

I mean, this seems pretty easy to understand to me. I was pointing out that an agent that has no desires seems imaginable and therefore possible and that such an agent could still understand the choices that belong to it/them. What part tripped you up? — Dan

I cannot imagine an agent who chooses, and also has no desires. We could imagine it making a random selection, but then we'd have to question what causes it to act on one possibility rather than another. And we'd see that the cause of the acting would be external to the so-called "agent" which is supposed to act in this way, therefore this would not be the act of an agent at all. If we are to assume an agent which actually chooses one possibility over another, (rather than being caused by an external force to make a random selection) then we must assume some sort of desire, or reason, for this agent to choose one possibility rather than the other.

Now we consider whether we should perform action 2 (praising action 1) or actino 3 (condemning action 1).
We determine that, though action 1 was wrong, praising it will lead to better consequences than condemning it (perhaps it would usually work out well, but did not in this case due to perculiar circumstances). — Dan

Dan, if action 1 is judged as wrong, due to its consequences, then how is it possible that praising action 1, because this could lead to better consequences is correct? It's already been determined that action 1 led to bad consequences, that's why it's judged as wrong. We cannot praise that action because it "could lead to better consequences", because the action already occurred, and it led to bad consequences. The only way to make a future 'similar act' lead to better consequences is to recognize the mistakes, so as to avoid them. But this is not praising the action, it is recognizing that it is not praiseworthy, and looking for ways to change it for the better.

The specifics of the act, the peculiarities of the circumstances, are part of the overall information and identity of "action 1". If you remove those specifics, to say that in other circumstances a similar act could lead to better consequences, then this similar action no longer qualifies as "action 1", the identified act which was judged as "wrong". So to say that this 'type of action', in other circumstances, might be praiseworthy is not to say that action 1 is praiseworthy. You are clearly making an error of misidentification, and not actually saying that action 1 is praiseworthy, but that a 'similar act', in other circumstances might be praiseworthy.

I really think that you have fallen into deep denial Dan. Instead of recognizing the problems with your theory, and trying to iron out those wrinkles, so that the theory might correspond with reality, you are making different sorts of fantastic imaginary scenarios, fabrications to provide evidence for your theory. But these are purely fictional scenarios, which are demonstrably impossible, so they have no correspondence with anything which could actually occur in the real world, and it just demonstrates how your theory is out of line with reality.

You have here in the preceding post, a scenario involving an agent which makes choices without any form of desires, in order to justify your claim that "understanding" a choice does not require consideration of what a person wants. This leaves you with an unintelligible definition of "understanding".

And, you also have in that same post, an imaginary scenario where an action which is judged as the wrong choice, could actually be praiseworthy because it might produce better consequences in different circumstances. But obviously this is an impossible fictitious scenario, because in different circumstances it would be a different action.