I did not realize there was such a thing as normative moral relativism, forgive my mistake. — m-theory

I don't think you made a mistake. Although wikipedia lists 'normative moral relativism' as one of three categories of moral relativism, I have never encountered a normal moral relativist either in person or on the internet. I suspect that it is an empty category whose only use is as a straw man by religious apologists who want to argue that being a moral relativist means that one would have no complaint against, and take no action against, a genocidal dictator.

If there are any normative moral relativists out there, I'd be fascinated to hear from them, since it seems to me that the putative worldview of this straw man category is self-contradicting.

Maybe I'm missing something, but it seems to me that if the quantum computer can contain 2^1000 bits of information, and it is in the observable (from Earth) universe, then the observable-from-Earth universe contains more than 2^1000 bits of information, and hence cannot be described in 2^412 bits.

What am I missing?

That's an interesting approach. I don't share it, but it's fascinating to me because it's like the inverse of Presentism. Presentism says that the only thing that exists is the Present. Whereas your approach seems to say that the Present does not exist and is an illusion arising from (beliefs in?) the Past and (expectations for?) the Future.

We have current raw experiences. I feel warm. My back is sore.

I would call the example of a tree an interpretation of an experience. Dan Robinson, in his lectures on Kant's CPR, asks 'Does a dog see a tree?' He agrees that the dog experiences a certain pattern on its visual field, but it requires the Transcendental Aesthetic and the transcendentally-deduced Categories to interpret that pattern as 'A Tree'.

Because categorisation takes time, I feel inclined to agree that - whether one is a dog or a human - one cannot currently experience A Tree. However, I believe that one can currently experience the uninterpreted pattern the tree makes on our visual field, and the uninterpreted feeling the bark has against our fingers.

One's interpretation of one's raw experiences as emanating from a tree may be mistaken. One can also have an illusory memory of a raw experience of a visual pattern or roughness against one's fingers. But one's current experience of the pattern or the roughness cannot be mistaken.

I don't think we can be mistaken about our current experiences, but we can be mistaken about past ones. That is, we can believe we had a past experience that we never actually had. 'Recovered Memory' is the famous example of that. 'Last Tuesdayism' is another (more far-fetched) example - where we recall experiencing last Monday, but actually our memories of that were implanted when the world was created on Tuesday.

If the quantum computer is in the visible universe, why would the answer to the first not be more than the answer to the second? (assuming they are converted to use the same units. As written above, they seem to have different units, one counting bits and the other counting states).

I don't see how having a computer, quantum or otherwise, that can store enormous volumes of information helps in simulating the universe, if the computer is in the universe. Let the info storable by the computer be A and the info in the universe outside the computer be B. Then, as long as B is nonzero, for the computer to simulate the universe it has to store at least volume A+B which, no matter how mind-bogglingly large A is, will be more than the computer can store.

The main nuance I had in mind is that one can, by using certain higher-order logical languages, formally express a version of the Liar Sentence. However the languages in which one can do that are known to be inconsistent, meaning that one can derive contradictions in them without even introducing any non-logical axioms.

Those contradictions are closely related to the set in Russell's Paradox of set theory, as is the Liar Sentence. Because one cannot trust a language in which contradictions can be proved (as demonstrated in Marchesky's post above), such languages are excluded from the serious consideration of higher-order logics. That is done by putting constraints on what constitutes a well-formed sentence in the language. Those constraints make it impossible to formalise the Liar Sentence in the language.

There is a pretty good introductory explanation of this in this note from Washington Uni.

Who is saying there is no formal definition of a contradiction? Not me. I gave a definition in both of my last two posts.

The extent to which the rules are made by the powerful as opposed to made by the majority depends on how democratic the society is. Either way it's politics. One of my aims as a moral agent is to work to get my moral values incorporated into the rules of those societies I can affect. I am neither powerful nor persuasive, so I am not terribly good at that, but I do what I can.

And again... are you merely telling us facts? or telling us what should be done? — anonymous66

Neither. I was answering your question, which was not about either of those alternatives. Your question was about what I would do, in a situation in which somebody is doing something that I find morally abhorrent, but which they do not.

Why should they care? Firstly, they are very likely to care without any encouragement from me, because my dislike of seeing others suffer is very widely shared in the human population. To the extent that it isn't, the challenge to me is to try to persuade enough people to care so that action is taken. That's what is happening in political debate.

Lastly, you observe that a - presumably incurably psychopathic - serial killer will not care. That doesn't matter. All I need to do is to persuade enough people to take action to arrest and imprison him. What the serial killer thinks about that is irrelevant.

As Michael said, none of them are in the required form to be a contradiction. The required form is 'L and not-L'. None of those sentences contain an 'and'.

That's the standard presentation of the Principle of Explosion, which is that any well-formed sentence (Q in this case) can be proved from a contradiction. The contradiction is Line 1, and that's a proper, formal contradiction, which is the sentence 'L and not-L' for any well-formed sentence L. The derivation of Q is valid.

I agree with everything in that post. What I am saying is that the Liar sentence in natural language does not give us line 1 in that proof. The Liar sentence is not of the form 'L and not-L', and attempts to derive a sentence of that form from the Liar sentence make untenable assumptions.

They function similarly to transitive verbs without objects. — Terrapin Station

I like that. It's a very neat analogy.

Morals are what a 'moral agent' uses to decide what actions to perform. So all that matters is what each moral agent decides. I am a meta-ethical moral relativist, so I believe there is no mind-independent 'fact' about whether fascism is bad. But in my ethical system fascism is bad, so I fight against it. If enough people share that moral conclusion, enough anti-fascism action will occur for fascism to be defeated (for now. But like He-Who-Must-Not-Be Named it will always return). So part of taking action against something that is bad in my moral framework is to try to persuade others to reach the same moral conclusion in their frameworks, so that they will help me in my attempt to defeat fascism. In doing that I may use language that implies I believe that there is a mind-independent fact that fascism is bad. But that's just because such patterns of speech can be rhetorically effective, and are more readily understood, rather than revealing an underlying ontological commitment to the existence of mind-independent moral facts.

(2) We are animals. We differ from non-human animals in various ways, just as human animals differ from one another.

(3) Absolute certainty about anything is impossible. Pragmatic certainty is another matter.

I suppose you get the point. — Question

I'm not sure I do. Are you just suggesting that we're doomed, because the US right will probably manage to block any effective action from the US? If so, I suspect that you're correct about the US, but that doesn't necessarily mean no action will be taken. It's a long shot but I think that there is a faint hope of a solution coming from China, who stands to suffer much worse from climate change. Since they don't have to worry about democratic elections, they can take action much more swiftly and decisively. And with the continuing growth in their economic power and the decline of that of the US, before long they may be able to force the US to follow suit, particularly if Europe joined them in that effort (as would be the case if it were happening now).

I doubt that that situation can arise soon enough to avert catastrophe. But at least there's a chance.

Once the man is a Sage, the means of happiness, the way to good, are within, for nothing is good that lies outside him. — Plotinus

What do you reckon Epicurus would make of that? — Wayfarer

I think he would have dismissed the second part ('nothing good lies outside him'), which sounds worthy of the most devoted pessimists on this forum. But the first part may be interpreted as suggesting that a necessary condition for eudaimonia is to gain better control of one's own mind - one's reaction to events and one's desires - and that seems to me to be quite Epicurean, as well as Stoic and Buddhist.

I'm interested to hear from those that claim that governments cannot provide measures that address the problem, as to whether that's because (a) they think nobody can solve the problem or that (b) it can be solved but governments have no role to play in that.

If (a), I fear you may be right, but I think it's worth giving it our best shot anyway, given how dire the consequences of continuation of business as usual seem likely to be.

If (b) then I'd love to hear how you believe that externalities can be internalised without compulsion from government (or quasi-governmental organisations like the UN or WTO).

I agree, we do use it, and I should have included the word 'necessarily' in that sentence you quoted ('does not necessarily a contradiction make ....'). But my understanding of what it means for a natural language sentence to contain a contradiction is that it is equivalent* to a formal sentence that contains one.

I have never seen any other definition of contradiction that is sufficiently objective to enable one to determine in all cases whether the definition is satisfied.

* 'equivalent' in the sense that the user of the sentence would not object to the translation as inaccurate, if the meaning of the translated sentence were explained to them.

It's not a contradiction unless one can set the contradiction out as a deduction in a formal logical language. And my point is that, in the process of trying to do that, one encounters obstacles that lead one to realise that there is no contradiction there. There's a bunch of nuances to this that I've left out for the sake of brevity. But we cannot even begin to consider them until somebody makes the attempt to formalise the sentence.

A bunch of natural language words does not a contradiction make, no matter how much it may feel as though they do.

I know that Graham Priest is interested in the problem. He discussed it with some of us on the old forum. Although I think there are a number of great philosophical contributions that Priest makes, I think he is mistaken about the Liar Paradox.

Just post the representation and language definition tomorrow, and we can discuss that. References to books are the second quickest way to kill a thread around here (surpassed only by references to videos).

It sounds like you think there is a representation of the sentence in a formal logical language. I would be very surprised to see such a thing, and suspect that it either lacks in formality or doesn't sufficiently represent what people feel the natural language version says.

Post the representation, with details of the formal language being used, and we can discuss it.

I never said nor meant to imply that he did these things. I was talking about myself, — Thorongil

It would be a good idea to change the first sentence of that post, because it reads to me as well as though you are quoting Einstein. The best option would be to leave Einstein out of it altogether. He is probably the second most quoted source after the Bible in religious arguments and, just like the bible, one can always find a quote that supports either side of an argument.

If that Liar Sentence is true, then it follows that it is also false — MindForged

Not necessarily. All we can say is 'it feels as though it ought to follow that it is false'. In order to convert that into an unqualified statement like 'it follows that it is false', we need to translate the statement into a formal logical proposition, since we can only make definite statements about those. But it's in the attempt to make that translation that we hit obstacles.

In other words, we can't discuss whether certain solutions to the 'problem' are valid until we have identified a problem. If the only problem is that the sentence feels unintuitive, and the things one feels like one ought to be able to deduce from it feel as though they would contradict one another, then that's not a problem of psychology, not of symbolic logic.

Someone said this to me today that "when you break it all down everything is futile". — intrapersona

It depends what 'futile' means.

One possible meaning is 'absurd', in which case the statement is just a less elegant restatement of Camus' famous observation of life's absurdity which, seemingly paradoxically, can be a magnificently life-affirming statement.

Another meaning is something like Keynes's observation that 'In the long run we are all dead'. When Keynes says it, he's making an important point about economics, that while we do need to focus on long term as well as short term goals, there is a diminishing utility as that long term gets further away. But some nihilists adopt this to mean that there's no point in doing anything here and now - which begs the question 'what do you mean by no point?'. To me there's plenty of point. If I can create pleasure or remove harm from somebody else or for myself, that is all the point I need.

There IS a like facility: it is to write a post saying why you liked another post. Because this is a philosophy forum rather than a fan site, that second post needs to contain philosophical reasons why you found the post likeable, otherwise it may be deleted.

I don't see any good reason to provide a second like facility, especially one that contains no information beyond brute popularity. This forum is not The Bachelor.

I would not define Obama as the Obama process at all but as the one who undergoes the process and is fully present at every stage of the process as the entity that undergoes it. — John

The question is what is this 'the one' to which the sentence refers. It sounds like the elusive 'persistent self'. Hume searched but couldn't find it. Nagarjuna denied it existed. I find myself currently persuaded by their arguments, so to me the definition of a person as a process is far more intuitive and less problematic than as a metaphysical object called a self.

I agree though that for somebody whose metaphysics does include a notion of a persistent self - a 'soul' perhaps - it would make sense to define a person that way.

Just to expand a bit on the answer of Babbeus: 'logical form' is not a standard term, but sounds like it is describing a sentence in a formal logical language, or a natural language sentence that is unambiguously equivalent to such. Hence it is a string of symbols, with no assumed meaning.

When we talk about 'truth' of a sentence we are implying a meaning for it, which requires that there be a semantics. In the study of logic the relationship between syntax and semantics is covered by the study of semantics. A Theory T in a Language L is a bunch of syntactically valid sentences in L, with no assumed meaning. A Model M for T is a conceptual structure whose elements correspond to certain elements ('terms') of L via a mapping called an Interpretation. A sentence S in the Theory is 'true' in M if the relationship(s) in M that are implied by the Interpretation of S in M actually hold.

It seems very much unlike that to me. Everyone that has ever said a kind word to a lonely person has made a valuable contribution. Major technological achievements in the main do little to nothing to alter the amount of happiness in the world. As soon as humans are a little way above subsistence, technological innovations and the associated increases in wealth seem to have almost no effect on happiness.

Much as I am in awe of giants like Newton and Einstein, I doubt that any of their discoveries had any material impact on the overall happiness of the world.

There might be more room to talk of artistic achievements bringing people happiness. But even there I think it is limited. One can get as much joy from listening to a song sung by a bunch of enthusiastic amateurs as from listening to the Mormon Tabernacle Choir perform the B Minor Mass.

It is in the little, personal things that great contributions are made, and such contributions happen all the time, by the unknown and unsung.

I would love to see how one of you can persuade me back. — Emptyheady

I can't see any need to persuade you back. Virtue ethics is an excellent moral framework that will produce similar ethical conclusions in the vast majority of situations one is likely to encounter, so I doubt that society will be any the better or worse for you or I choosing to switch between a utilitarian and a virtue ethics framework.

The example of group rape reminds me of Bernard Williams' silly thought experiment about the explorer and the indians (there was a good essay about this by Paul on the old site). Firstly it misunderstands how a utilitarian would likely analyse such a situation, and draws the wrong inference about what they would conclude, and secondly, the situation suggested is so far removed from anything I'm ever likely to encounter as to be irrelevant to practical ethics.

I wouldn't say I was a committed utilitarian, in the sense of being convinced that every decision I ever make should be made on utilitarian principles. I always leave the door open for other influences, be they deontological, virtue-based or something else. But so far I don't think I've encountered a moral dilemma for which one of the other frameworks that seem reasonable to me (which excludes things like divine-command and honour-based systems, as well as anything to do with Ayn Rand) clearly recommended a different decision from the one I came to via utilitarianism. Nor do I expect that to happen in the remainder of my life.

Sure I've had dilemmas, but I've found that in such cases the other systems were as unclear as utilitarianism about what the best action was.

Yes, I can't see any ambiguity either. Nor any problem with consistency. Certainly I don't recall encountering problems with consistency in my day-to-day ethical decision-making.

I don't think it is intuitively accepted amongst the populace, as to accept it implies ascribing rights to a fertilised ovum, and hence being opposed to abortion at any term. According to that interesting survey posted by Barry (here), in all Western countries except the USA, the vast majority of people have no problem with early-term abortion and, even in the God-fearing USA, just over half have no problem with it.

As to what alternative I have to offer, I just go with Jeremy Bentham's 'Can they suffer?'. This is completely consistent with my intuitions and just feels absolutely right. I understand that for some others, things like Freedom are more important, but for me 'Can they suffer' is the most important moral principle.

That post argues that any member of the species homo sapiens has moral agency, moral responsibility and rights.

Such an assertion is fundamental and one either accepts it or not according to whether it is consistent with one's intuitions - whether it 'feels' right. Pro-lifers accept it, for instance. Apparently you accept it. I don't, because it seems bizarre to me, given that it implies that a single-cell fertilised ovum and a brain-dead body kept alive on a ventilator both have moral responsibility. Since moral responsibility is a rubbery term that can be made to mean almost anything one wants it to mean, one can neither prove the truth or falsity of such an assertion. It just seems weird, and feels wrong, to me, so I don't accept it.

No, none of those. Simply that you're a proponent of lying. — Wosret

Things are getting more confusing. We now have two sentences I don't understand, rather than just one:

(1) 'I am opposed to lying in the abstract'; and
(2) 'I am a proponent of lying'

What does each of them mean, and can their truth value change according to context?

If the universal abstract I'm opposed to lying — Wosret

I like that statement of it because, for me, it highlights one of the main problems of the CI, which is that to me this statement either simply means (1) ' I think that in most situations it is wrong to lie', or it means (2) 'to lie contributes <insert number> negative points to the moral worth of an action' or (3) it means nothing at all.

For instance, for me, sticking needles into toddlers satisfies both 1 and 2, but there are rare situations in which I support it - most notably, immunisations against certain deadly diseases, and local anaesthetics for necessary operations. It makes no sense at all to me to say that even in those situations I am 'universally abstractly' opposed to sticking the needle in the toddler, unless all that means is 1 or 2. Under interpretations 1 and 2, the decision to inject the toddler in those situations is not a departure from the moral principle arising from a weak moral agent making sub-optimal decisions in the heat of the moment, but rather a careful application of the moral principle.

Provide a link and - if it's not the entire post - a paragraph number, and I'd be happy to do so.

If, in a rights-based ethical framework, moral agency were held to be a necessary condition for having rights, it would seem to follow that it is morally acceptable to mistreat babies and probably also many toddlers.

We need to go beyond the vague 'What if I were a woman?' as that is not actually a question. We can be more concrete by asking a specific question, such as 'how would I feel?' or 'would I still be attracted to women?' in the counterfactual of me being a woman.

What that means to me is 'What would it be like to be a person that has the same feelings, inclinations, prejudices, memories and habits that I have, but to have the body of a woman'. Another way of considering it is 'What would it be like if I woke up one morning and found that my body had changed to be female?' - like in Kafka's Metamorphosis (cockroach) or John Wyndham's 'Consider her ways' (some sort of hive mother), or the many body-swap movies ('Big', 'Suddenly Thirty', 'Dating the Enemy' etc). Strictly speaking, this other way of approaching it is not a counterfactual because it is about potential future events, and we don't know for certain that such an event will not occur.

Have you read about Counterfactual Definiteness (CFD)? It casts an incisive, illuminating light onto the ideas of possible worlds and all the philosophy that surrounds that. Counterfactual Definiteness is the assumption that it is meaningful to talk of things being other than they are - eg what if I had measured the photons with my detector at an angle of 45 degrees to the horizontal instead of 30? An assumption of Counterfactual Definiteness is necessary in deriving Bell's Theorem in Quantum Mechanics. Rejecting the assumption is the main escape route for those that want to hold onto an assumption of Locality (no influence propagating faster than light speed). From the experiments that have been done based on Bell's Theorem, it appears that either CFD or Locality has to be given up.

your view cannot say this, because as you've just gone through explaining, you cannot tell the difference between these two scenarios — The Great Whatever

There is only one scenario - lookalike impostor murders American presidential candidate named Barack Obama with Kenyan father, takes his place, and nobody notices. There are two ways of describing it - Kripke's and mine. You seem to be claiming that there is a difference - other than choice of words - implied by the two descriptions of the single scenario. You have not explained what that difference is.

You have no criterion by which to say which of the two is Obama, because you've stipulated that stipulating such a thing is impossible. — The Great Whatever

I don't need to say which is Obama because in my description, we only talk about which one is like our world's Obama in almost every respect, and that one is the murder victim.

What practical difference is there between Kripke's and my descriptions of this scenario?

The difference is the two have different truth conditions. For example, what you say is truth condition of the counterfactual could be fulfilled by supposing that some impostor heard about Obama, was jealous of his political power, so took on his name and killed him to take his place, all while knowing Mandarin. This is the sort of scenario that verifies an individual like B.O. who is president, has the same name, etc. speaks Mandarin. But it's not a scenario in which Obama speaks Mandarin; it's one in which his impostor does. — The Great Whatever

I agree that in that situation Obama does not speak Mandarin. That's because the real Obama in that imaginary scenario is the one that was killed, and that one does not speak Mandarin. As I understand it, for Kripke as well as for me, there can only be one process in any visualisation that corresponds to a given rigid designator. In the situation you have described, that process is the person that was killed by the impostor. So on my interpretation, as in Kripke's, the impostor is not Obama.

So that scenario fails to differentiate between the two forms of words, as they both lead to the same conclusion.