That may be the case sometimes, but it's a mistake to assume neurological measures of 'happiness' like dopamine correlate exactly with what we talk about as 'happiness'. It's considerably more complicated neurologically... — Isaac

Complete agree, and you've said it better than I.

I did not mean to imply that doing what I believe I want to do will therefore make me happy. It's just an attempt.

and sometimes when we make moral-type decisions areas of the brain responsible for things like dopamine response are not even involved. — Isaac

Citation needed.

Things which we talk about as 'moral' decisions are very unlikely to be resolved using any one method. — Isaac

Hard to know what you mean here. Would you mind rephrasing this in other words?

Thank you all for these replies! I sincerely appreciate them, and I hope it's clear in my replies that I'm not here to fire back at them. :)

You know, we're so limited by our language when we discuss these things. There are so many terms in philosophy with multiple meanings.

Just to clearer, myself, here's a key what I mean when I say certain words (please feel free to skip this):

- - -

morals, ethics, good, bad, right, wrong, should, shouldn't = objective moral truths that are built into the fabric of the universe. Not subjective. Things that would be true whether humans existed or not.

(I will typically not use these words, since I don't believe in those things).

thoughts, concepts, opinions about morality, ethics, etc = arrangements of neurons which form our subjective thoughts about morals.

When I talk about something like "emotion", "empathy", "kindness", etc., this is what I mean. I'm referring to the physical representation of those thoughts inside the brain. I also believe that consciousness is probably entirely physical.

Hopefully this can explain what might have seemed like a contradiction in the OP - saying that "objective morals don't exist", while also saying that something like "kindess" does. I meant that thoughts and feelings about kindness do exist, while objective moral truths do not.

- - -

I want to respond to some of what you guys wrote:

I think what you're describing is closer to constructivism or nihilism. — Grre

You know, I think you're right! I checked out moral/ethical nihilism, and I believe this describes what I believe pretty closely - seriously, thank you! Maybe also moral subjectivism - if you interpret "local morals" in a very neuroscience-based way.

It's wonderful to know there are terms for this, and maybe I can learn more about what others have thought.

Constructivism highlights that most things are human inventions-that is that they are socially constructed within social groups (customs, morals, religion, ect.) This does not mean they are not real per say, they are very much real, but more that it means that they are real intersubjectively, meaning within the particular social group that they were created. — Grre

Oof. It hurts to see how much language can get in our way here. English in particular is difficult to work with here. Would it be correct to rephrase what you've said as: "This does not mean these moral ideas are objective truths in the universe, but that people's thoughts about them are real, among members of a specific social group."?

I think utilitarianism is what you are trying to describe here. — Grre

It's not Utilitarianism. I don't believe that actions which maximize happiness are 'good', because I don't believe that 'good' exists. However, someone might prefer them - but when we talk about preferences, we're just talking about brains and atoms.

Which seems to put it squarely as a form of egotism. “The good is whatever I want”. — Pfhorrest

It's also not egotism. Again, because I don't believe "good" exists. So I don't believe that "what I want" is good. I just believe it's what I want. It has no objective moral properties one way or another, because those don't exist. Those neurons just exist, the same way that the atoms in a coffee table exist.

...Which is almost (next to only nihilism) the least defensible position on morality there can be. — Pfhorrest

Since I'm pretty sure moral nihilism describes what I believe, I'd be very interested to hear why it's the least defensible position. - Seriously asking, no argument implied. :)

The usual popular alternatives are varieties of non-cognitivism, which say that moral claims aren’t even trying to say things the likes of which can be true or false. — Pfhorrest

Hmm...On your suggestion here, I did a deep dive into non-cognitivism. On the surface, it seems legit, and not actually in conflict with moral nihilism. But...most descriptions I read of it use a lot of jargon which seems like it may have been invented just to explain this philosophy...meaning that I would need to do a lot more digging before I'd feel comfortable saying I agree with it. Right now, I can't be sure I understand it. Thank you for the suggestion!

But a very few philosophers, including myself, aim instead for a non-descriptivism, while retaining cognitivism. — Pfhorrest

Thanks for this. I found this paper on non-descriptive cognitivism, which I have yet to get all the way through (but will). I just need a dictionary handy while I do. :p

http://www.nyu.edu/gsas/dept/philo/courses/factual/papers/HorganNondescriptive.html

Does this describe your beliefs? I'd love to hear more.

On such an account, moral claims are not descriptions of the world at all, they’re not purporting to describe some kind of moral objects, neither natural nor non-natural, nor are they about people’s views, so they aren’t made true or false by anyone’s agreement or disagreement. But they are nevertheless capable of being objectively, universally, unbiasedly correct. They are just correct prescriptions, rather than correct descriptions; and prescriptions are to be judged by different criteria than descriptions, by appeal to our appetites rather than our senses, but to all of our appetites equally, just like when describing reality we have to account for all of our sensory observations equally. — Pfhorrest

I have a tough time with prescriptions. Again, this may be a language issue - but the simple definition of a prescription as "seeking answers to what should be." turns me off, and here's why: I do not believe in "should". And I'm also confused, because implying that it's even possible that something "should" be, means a prescriptive statement cannot exist with a descriptive statement that "should" is possible. Therefore a prescriptive statement is also a descriptive statement.

Well then they do exist, don't they? — Isaac

I apologize - once again, this is an obstacle of language, rather than meaning. Let me rephrase the quote you responded to:

"This belief system says that objective moral facts do not exist. However, thoughts about morals can exist as arrangements of neurons - but these thoughts are not the same are objective morals. They are just thoughts."

This blunder was one of the reasons I wrote the key at the top of this post. When i wrote "morals" what I should have said was "objective moral facts". People so often refer to their thoughts about morality by the same word "morals", that the two meanings can often by confused, or conflated.

I had hoped to draw a distinction that while people have thoughts about morals and ethics, those thoughts do not describe things that exist outside of our heads. Similarly to how my imaginative thought about a pink elephant is very real - as a thought - but that the pink elephant I'm imagining does not actually exist out there.

Another good example of this is the medieval belief in bodily "humours". For a long time, many people were very confident this was how the body worked. Their thoughts about humours were very real. But humours were not real.

Exactly. We've yet to be graced with any details on this 'accounting' process, which sounds suspiciously like providing some post hoc rationalisation to one's personal 'appetites' to lend them an air of objective authority. — Isaac

You know, I'm not sure if this was actually a response to my OP, or to what Pfhorrest wrote.

but in case the "accounting" process you mentioned was referring to my beliefs, here's how the logic usually goes:

"What do I really want out of this situation? What do I really want to see happen?"

I'm a human with emotions and empathy, so the answer will usually involve helping others, while trying to fulfill my own interests. I've always found that helping others brings some of the most wonderful happiness out of anything one can do. But I don't believe this happiness is objectively good, or that helping other people is objectively good. Just that it causes the biological machine which is me to feel happiness. Which is enough for me. :) Because I believe that's all that's really going on.

Once again, thank you all for responding! And for reading any part of this very long reply. <3