No it doesn't lead to that conclusion as I explained elsewhere. You didn't understand that argument, that's all. I feel sorry for you about that as it wasn't tricky. But anyway, do try to focus on this thread.

I do. I have philosophical contributions to make and I am full of humor. Thus I post.

No, I obviously do not agree with that. What do you mean by Western philosophy? Do you mean 'using reason to find out what's true'? That is, do you just mean 'philosophy'? Or what? I mean, that was the question. So what are you talking about??

And if you do indeed mean 'using reason to find out what's true', then what on earth do you mean by 'going beyond' it? Do you mean just making stuff up? Do you mean waiting until someone says some sounds that make you feel all mystical and important and then just believing what they say because you like feeling mystical and important? Is that 'going beyond'? Why not just read proper philosophy while drunk - it'll induce the same feelings. Is that going beyond?

Curiouser and curiouser. So once more, what's Western philosophy, then? I have said what I think it is: it's just philosophy and the word western is redundant. You seem to confirm that, for you agree that Peter Tsu is not doing Chinese philosophy despite the fact he's Chinese and a philosopher, and that St Augustine wasn't doing African philosophy despite the fact he was African and a philosopher. Now I'd say it's because Peter Tsu and St Augustine are actual philosophers - they both use reasoned argument to seek the truth rather than using b.s to impress the ignorant.

So, can we agree then that to qualify as doing 'Eastern' philosophy or what have you, it's important that you 'not' be using reason to find out what's true?

What do you mean? There are differentafeas of philosophy - normative ethics, metaethics epistemology, aesthetics and so on. And lots of different positions within each area. All consistent with philosophy being the practice of using reason to find the truth.

And yes, I would of course reject the continental analytic distinction. What use is it? If someone says they specialize in continental philosophy then I think that they are not a philosopher at all but just someone who specializes in saying nothing eloquently (and thus they belong in and English department, not philosophy).

If they're not making an argument, then they're not philosophers. Easy.
And no, musicians and poets and artists are not, qua those activities, philosophers. Don't be silly.

I've read the rest of your post. And yes, you are confused.
I have defined my terms and if you dislike my definitions that's your problem not mine. You haven't yet addressed anything I argued in the op. Do so and I will respond, but otherwise I really can't be bothered debating labels with you any more.

You would agree with me, then, that it is rather silly to talk of western philosophy as if it is something. We should just talk of 'philosophy' and pay no heed to where the philosopher happened to be born.

Whether someone is a philosopher depends on what they are doing, not on where they come from.

If they're not arguing something, they're not philosophers. So, Descartes is. Lao Tzu isn't. Peter Tsu is. Buddha isn't. And so on.

I still haven't heard an answer to my question - there's a prominent proponent of moral particularism who is Chinese. I am familiar with his work. Does his work qualify as Chinese philosophy?
When I read philosophy articles, I typically don't notice who the author is. I read the content. I don't look or think about the author. I think I speak for most philosophers when I say that. After all, that's how the peer review system works. Articles are assessed on their own merits and authors have to avoid saying anything that would allow a reviewer to identify them. So articles stand alone and who wrote them is entirely irrelevant - which is good, no?

So again, am I reading Chinese philosophy when I read Peter Tsu's workonmoral particularism, or is Chinese philosophy something else? If so, what?

What about when I read St Augustine - am i doing African philosophy? If not, why not?

Isaac, go away. You have nothing philosophical to contribute and you seem humourless.

So you admit you did not read the op? Christ, are there any people here who actually think, have enough basic respect to read an op before shooting their half-witted thoughts all over the place, and know how to argue?

oh, did you argue something? I didn't detect an argument. Just b.s.

Er, what? OP. Read the OP.

B.S. Pure and simple.

What on earth are you on about?
If a view is true, is it also false? Yes or no? Does it change if you go to China or India?

Two views about the same subject matter must contradict each other otherwise they are not different views at all, but the same view differently expressed.

If a view is true, it is not also false.

Thus, if there are two or more theories about one and the same subject matter at least one of them is false.

Thus, there is only one true theory of everything.

I recently read an article on moral particularism written by a philosopher who happens to be Chinese. Does that qualify as Eastern philosophy?

Focus. This thread is about the compatibility of God and antinatalism and whether God's existence would positively imply antinatalism.
My view that God demonstrably exists, and my view that if God exists then everything that happens to us is deserved, are distinct views. Perhaps because you have trouble distinguishing between the arguer and the argument you think that any thread I start is a thread about any view I hold. That's a mistake.

Odd reply. I did not suggest that only in the west is reason employed or that what distinguishes western philosophy is its use of reason. The opposite. I said that philosophy itself is just the practice of using reason to find out what is true. Thus there is no such thing as eastern philosophy either. There's just philosophy.

And I am not talking about whether they are true. I am talking about their compatibility!

Can't quote as on mobile. But second paragraph: Dunning and Kruger.

Third paragraph - I don't know what you're talking about.

No, you are a derailer who prefers to address me than anything in the OP. So, try again without- without - expressing your view about me. See if you can

Tedious. Stop focusing on me and address the op.

This is partial reply because I am about to go up mountain.

However, I'm not the only one who defines moral subjectivism (or ethical subjectivism) in such terms that is compatible with a minimalist form of moral realism. — Cartesian trigger-puppets

OMG! i am not denying they're 'compatible'. Sheesh. I am saying that subjectivism does not include a commitment to moral realism. Blimey. This isn't hard. Subjectivism is a view about what morality is made of. It is not a view about what exists.

What is morality made of?

Subjective states.

Do those subjective states exist?

Yes = subjectivist moral realism

No = subjectivist moral nihilism.

See?

Now stop blithering on about moral realism. It is not a commitment of any of the views I outlined!!

Individual subjectivism - which is a view about what morality is made of, not about whether it exists or not - is false. So obviously false that it isn't taken seriously in the contemporary debate. That's why I defined 'naturalism' in a way that precluded it (naturalism, on my usage, is the view that moral properties can be identified with 'objective' natural properties).

You're clearly someone who prefers labelling things to actually assessing the credibility of the views that the labels are attached to.

This is my thread, yes? I defined my terms. So those definitions are the only ones you need to worry about. You don't need to educate me about how terms are used. A) you're clearly not qualified to do that as you keep misusing them and B) it doesn't matter how they are used, what matters is the credibility of the views that are being attached to.

The views that I have assessed to be stupid (and you can put any label you want on them) are these:

Moral properties can be identified with objective natural features. (A view I have - entirely conventionally - identified as 'moral naturalism')

Moral properties are non-natural properties (A view I have identified as 'non-naturalism')

There are no moral properties as such, rather when we make what appear to be moral statements we are actually doing something like expressing an attitude or issuing a directive (a view I have identified as 'expressivism').


Those are the views that I have said are stupid. I have argued they are stupid. Most contemporary philosophers agree with me that at least two of those kinds of view are indeed stupid, and thus most agree with me that the bulk of the views are stupid.

Are they stupid? If you think they're not, defend one. Show me that I am mistaken in what I have said about them.

Don't - don't - go on about moral realism.

I am a moral realist, ok. I understand what the term means in a way that you do not. I am one.

I guess you did not read where I said there was nothing there worth addressing. — Sir2u

Well that's false. The arguments I have made show that God's existence implies antinatalism. That's quite significant, as anyone with an inquiring mind would recognise.

Funny you should mention that. My job is one of the reasons why I am bother to post here. — Sir2u

You're job is to derail discussions?

I am actually a teacher, I teach people to explain things to other people. — Sir2u

Like everything else you have said, I find that highly implausible.

AND I AM SO HAPPY TO SEE THAT SOMEONE ELSE FUCKED UP THEIR JOB WHEN THEY TAUGHT YOU. — Sir2u

Glad to see you're acknowledging you're bad at your job. But nobody taught me to teach. You don't need a teaching qualification to teach at a university.

I have never had a student as screwed up as you. — Sir2u

They're called 'pupils' at your level, not 'students'.

Anyway, we're getting distracted by your pathetic attempts to insult me. Let's return to the OP.

One of my points was that God's existence is compatible with antinatalism.

In an earlier post we had this exchange:

Back to the OP: do you think omnipotence involves having created everything?
— Bartricks

No. — Sir2u

So, you think that omnipotence is compatible with not having created everything.

Yet you are now insisting that God's existence is not compatible with antinatalism.

So on what basis do you believe that? Do you think that the combination of omnipotence and omnibenevolence entails that the being possessed of such features will have created us? How? By hypothesis antinatalism is correct - for the question is whether God's existence is compatible with it - and thus being omnibenevolent would involve 'not' creating people. That's why the only basis upon which one could maintain that antinatalism and God are incompatible is if one thought that omnipotence (or omniscience) required having created everything. See? Or does this make your mind go a bit fuzzy and start hurting?

You're just confused. Realism in ethics, like I say, is the view that moral statements are truth apt and some of them are true. You are conflating realism with objectivism. But I have already explained this.
Anyway, it is all beside the point as this thread is not about moral realism, but about the stupidity of the metaethical theories known as ecpressivism, naturalism and non naturalism - the dominant theories of contemporary debate. None of them is essentially realist as they are not theories about what actually exists, but theories about what it would take for morality to exist. I have said this umpteen times now and it doesn't seem to be registering.

I have also explained why individual subjectivism - which is 'not' a subject of contemporary debate - is false. You have not responded to that criticism, but instead gave two unsound and question begging arguments, one for individual subjectivism and one for expressivism.

More from the Hugh Janus. Nothing you just said was correct or addressed the op.

Exactly what I'd expect to come out of a Hugh Janus.

Here is how I defined naturalism:

The naturalist believes that the moral properties of rightness and wrongness and goodness and badness can be identified with objective natural properties. I say 'objective' because no contemporary metaethicist would defend individual subjectivism about morality (because it's really, really stupid). — Bartricks

Note, then, metaethical naturalism broadly construed does, or can, include individual and inter-subjectivist views (assuming, that is, that subjects are natural objects, which is something many - myself included - would deny). But because such views are unbelievably stupid and rejected by everyone who knows their beans, I defined naturalism as being the view that identifies moral properties with 'objective' natural properties.

It's not the "lifeless natural world", idiot, and it's not a matter of being "issued directives". but of understanding the origin of ethics, and being able to define ethical concepts in terms of facts about us as individuals and societies. — Janus

No it isn't. That isn't what the quote said. The quote said what I said. Do you have any expertise in this area, Hugh? Or do you not have the first idea what you're talking about?

I don't understand how claiming that some moral statements are true commits me to moral realism — Cartesian trigger-puppets

It's just the definition of moral realism. Moral realism 'just is' the view that moral statements are truth apt and some of them are true.

Evaluative propositions seem to be capable of expressing things beyond that which is physical, natural, material or concrete, and it is here where realistic models struggle, if not fail utterly, to provide satisfactory descriptions. — Cartesian trigger-puppets

Moral realism is not a view about the truth conditions of moral propositions. You seem to be using 'moral realism' to denote some kind of moral naturalist realism.

Like I say, moral realism is the view that some moral statements are truth apt and some of them are true.

But I don't know why we're discussing this - of what relevance is it to what I have claimed in the OP?

On the converse, non-evaluative language, such as if I were to say, "Torture is wrong," what I am expressing is a feeling or opinion about torture. When I say "Torture is wrong," what I mean is something like, "I disapprove of torture," or "I have a preference against torture". Since moral language seems to express the speaker's beliefs, it seems that me being against torture is what makes my statement true when I say "Torture is wrong." Though it is fallacious to reason, "I believe x, therefore x is true" using descriptive language that assesses the state of the natural world, as with other fields of knowledge, it seems to work for ethics for this reason. — Cartesian trigger-puppets

That's expressivism, not individual subjectivism. And it is false, indeed silly. It's obviously false - what actual evidence do you have that it is true? Actual evidence, not just painfully perverse re-interpretations of moral statements.

It doesn't appear to be true (wrongness seems to be something I recognise, not something I do). If it did appear to us to be true, then it would appear to us all that all we are using moral language to do is to boss each other around. If I say "Xing is wrong" I am just telling you not to do X becasue I disapprove of it (and we would recognise this). Well, then "get lost!" would be an appropriate response. Yet "get lost" as a response to "Xing is wrong" doesn't make sense.

Yes. The point is that whether God's existence is compatible with the truth of antinatalism does not depend on whether or not God exists.

For example, the existence of Dodos is compatible with the truth of antinatalism. That's true, regardless of whether any Dodos exist.

No though. I'm well paid.
— Bartricks

So, am I. — Sir2u

Yes, well people are very generous aren't they?

Anyway, you're still not addressing anything in the OP.

It seems you agree that God's existence is indeed compatible with antinatalism (and thus agree with me that omnipotence does not essentially involve having created everything).

But do you, then, agree with my case for thinking that if God exists, the truth of antinatalism is positively implied?

No, you are simply misunderstanding naturalism. The view that moral prescriptions come from individuals is individual subjectivism, not naturalism (as I have defined it).

Naturalists identify moral properties with objective natural properties.

Objective natural properties can't issue prescriptions and nor is any collection of them itself a prescription. Thus the view is false and stupid.

That holds just as true for sociological facts if we include those among natural facts. So, if we say that moral rightness is one and the same as some sociological fact, then either that fact has to issue a prescription (which is stupid) or the fact and the prescription are being identified with one another - which is a category error and a very stupid one at that.

You yourself are just very confused - too confused to be able to understand my response above, no doubt - and are conflating dispositions to get the impression of, and believe in, moral norms and values with the norms and values themselves. Hence why you are going to keep rabbiting on about animals and the development of moral beliefs and think that by thereby doing you are providing some kind of support for something. It's a tedious rookie mistake.

Address the op or go away Hugh.

Turn your brains on and think. Why does possession of the omni properties imply God created everything?? Put down your bibles, dust off your reason and try and use it.

Clue: it doesn't.

You think God created everything for one simple and embarrassingly stupid reason: it says so in the bible.

That's all you got, right? Not a philosophical reason, but a scriptural one. Way to go!!

And here's a quick demonstration the God did not create everything.

1. If God created everything, then he created sin.
2. God did not create sin
3.Therefore, God did not create everything.

So, Hugh, if I tell myself to do x, it is necessarily right for me to do x?

Look, this thread isn't about individual subjectivism about morality. For that view is so stupid only those with no philosophical training in ethics think it is true (hence why so many here are do convinced of it).

Like I say, individual subjectivism about morality has about as much to be said for it as individual subjectivism about cakes.

Just argue something. Stop lamely declaring - without argument - that my case is 'garbage'. If you can't argue anything, at least insult me better

An argument. That was not an argument. Explain why the omni properties imply that their possessor created everything.

Present an argument for that.

You're too confused.

Just read the OP and address something argued in it. Simple.

Now, in the OP I argued that the existence of an omnipotent, omniscient, omnibenevolent being is compatible with the truth of antinatalism. And I gave interesting arguments for that view. I argued that being omnipotent does not -contrary to widespread belief - require having created everything. That's important, becasue if that is false then God is incompatible with antinatalism.

I then argued that God's existence, combined with the nature of the world we live in, positively implies the truth of antinatalism.

Address something I argued.

Proposition one states that the position of Individual Moral Subjectivism falls under the meta-ethical framework of cognitivism, which is a view in philosophy that ethical statements express propositions. A proposition is simply a statement which is capable of being true or false (it has truth value; is truth apt). — Cartesian trigger-puppets

Yes, I know. But I didn't say 1 was false, did I? I said 2 was false.

You're building a commitment to moral realism into individual moral subjectivism. That's just confused.

So what I am proposing is that moral statements such as "Genocide is wrong" express a proposition similar to non-evaluative statements such as "The sky is blue". I'm saying that both these kinds of statements have the property of being either true or false. — Cartesian trigger-puppets

I know. This is not in dispute. Individual moral subjectivism, moral naturalism and moral non-naturalism all take moral statements at face value: that is, as truth-apt propositions.

What they are not committed to is the claim that some of those statements are true. That's an additional claim, one that then makes the relevant subjectivist, naturalist or non-naturalist into a 'moral realist'.

The theory that water is made of tiny molecules is not equivalent to the theory that some water exists. The theory that unicorns are horse-type creatures with naturally growing spirally horns coming out of their foreheads is similarly not a theory about what exists. And the theory that moral properties are reducible to an individual's subjective states is also not a theory about what exists.

Realism also makes the claim that moral statements have a truth value, and that some of those truth values are true, but, in addition, realism also claims that such truth values exist objectively, as in a mind-independent property of the world. — Cartesian trigger-puppets

No, you're conflating moral realism with objectivist moral realism. Look, this is all just a labelling matter of no importance to the issues under debate. But we might as well get clear about how to use these terms.

Moral objectivism is the view that the truth conditions of moral statements are objective properties of some kind or other. Naturalism and non-naturalism are both kinds of moral objectivism.

Moral subjectivism is the view that the truth conditions of moral statements are subjective properties of some kind or other. Individual subjectivism, inter-subjectivism and divine command theory are all kinds of subjectivism.

Moral realism is the view that some moral propositions are true. So you can have individual subjectivist moral realism, inter-subjectivist moral realism, divine command moral realism, naturalist moral realism and non-naturalist moral realism.

The reason you're conflating moral realism and moral objectivism is that most contemporary moral realists are also moral objectivists. Why? Because individual and inter-subjectivism are stupid views that no-one who knows their beans takes seriously.

Now, I stress that all of this is really beside the point. For these are just labelling matters. This is what matters, what the OP is about, and what you need to address:

Individual and inter-subjectivist views about morality are stupid (as is generally recognized among the experts, but not among the public). Why? Because moral norms do not appear to be norms we ourselves are issuing. The view that they are, in fact, norms we ourselves are issuing is as stupid as the view that the outside world is a figment of one's imagination.

The same applies to non-cognitivist or expressivist views. Expressing a subjective state is a different linguistic activity to describing it. But the same information is conveyed. As with individual subjectivism, there is simply no evidence that expressivist views are true, and plenty that they are not. Those who endorse them do so because - by their own admission - they lack moral intuitions (and this, combined with staggering arrogance, then leads them to conclude that we're at root expressing ourselves when we use moral language, not attempting to describe the world).

Moral Naturalist views are stupid too, because it is stupid - indeed, insane - to think that the natural world can issue instructions to us and value things.

Moral non-naturalist views are equally stupid, perhaps even more stupid. For it is equally insane to think that non-natural properties can issue instructions to us and value things. And to posit such things becuase one acknowledges that natural properties cannot do such things makes the non-naturalist possibly even more stupid than the naturalist.

As most contemporary metaethicists defend either some form of expressivism, or naturalism, or non-naturalism, we can conclude that contemporary metaethics is stupid. And note too, the battalions that defend these views are of roughly the same size, and so the majority of the philosophical community does, in fact, agree with me.

So far you have not said anything to address my claims. Rather you have argued that some form of individual subjectivism is true and gave two arguments. One of those was unsound and question begging. The other also had those features but even if it didn't would have established the truth of a different view from the one you were using it to defend.