Corpses are much different than living bodies, biologically speaking, so no one needs to insert a mind into the equation in order to discern a difference between one and the other. Though the debate about when the moment of death occurs is ongoing and challenging, the “organismal integration” of a living human organism displays activity and functions not present in its corpse state. So materially speaking it’s not because there is no mind that we cremate corpses, but because there is no organismal function and we require a way to dispose of the decaying organic material. Corpses aren’t obviously bad, but the infectious hazards and smells are more than enough reason to dispose of them in such a manner.

I do not think there is any reason to posit an immaterial substance or object when we already have a complex and dynamic organism to consider. Until we learn to value and sanctify that organism itself, evil will persist.

But the point is that you would have to ground the moral difference - that is, the vast difference in moral value between a corpse and a person - in those biological differences. But that's already been shown to be implausible, for all those differences are sensible differences. I mean, corpses smell in a way that living persons do not, but it would be implausible to ground the moral difference in that olfactory difference. I am morally valuable irrespective of my smell. And so on for any sensible- and thus any biological - feature.

It's not difficult to see the difference between something alive and something dead. We see this even with plants. You say something outside space is what makes something alive. We say it's the configuration of the biology and yes biological things die. How are dead bodies suppose to prove we (our identities) are really outside space?

I have arrived at the 'conclusion' that my mind is immaterial, based in part on the argument in the OP - an argument you have not addressed. Stop pronouncing and try arguing something.

You think thinking itself is immaterial and matter dead.

I think that matter has the *potentiality* to be a living loving thinking evaluating thing

There is no full proof argument either way. Even you say "it SEEMS obvious" in your OP

So, if a mind can have moral value despite its conscious states having moral disvalue, then the mind's moral value is not grounded in its mental states. — Bartricks

I think some people who are in certain conscious states have no moral value. You know, like Jeffrey Dahmer, Ted Bundy, Adolf Hitler, Donald Trump.

I didn't argue that one's mental states are incapable of affecting one's moral value. I think they clearly can do. One can lose one's moral value depending on what one freely does or thinks or desires. So I agree that mental states can alter one's moral value, even to the point of eradicating it altogether or making one disvaluable. So, some - some - kinds of mental state may be sufficient for having no value or disvalue. But no mental state is necessary for possession of moral value.

So our mental states are not the source of our moral value, even though they can affect it. I can use my teeth to destroy a bun, but that does not mean the bun came from my teeth.

My example was of undeserved pain. That's a mental state an innocent person can be in. And it seems thoroughly bad. Yet it does not follow that the person undergoing it is bad. Yet it would follow if the value of us derives from the value or otherwise of our mental states.

I don't just think it. Don't tar me with your brush. I 'concluded' it. Big difference. You are just pronouncing. But until or unless you show there to be something wrong with the reasoning that led me to my conclusion, why would I care what you think? Thoughts are ten a penny. Arguments for interesting conclusions are scarce. I give you a diamond, you give me worthless pebbles.

So, some - some - kinds of mental state may be sufficient for having no value or disvalue. But no mental state is necessary for possession of moral value. — Bartricks

Sounds good. When I read "So, if a mind can have moral value despite its conscious states having moral disvalue, then the mind's moral value is not grounded in its mental states." I took that as a disagreement with "some - kinds of mental state may be sufficient for having no value or disvalue." But when you say "But no mental state is necessary for possession of moral value." it makes sense. I was also tired and flip when I read it. I should have taken a seat.

Position: biology is the basis of our rights, thoughts, and value. You state:

"To put it another way, if you think we are lumps of meat - just lumps of meat that happen to think things - then you have a problem when it comes to explaining our moral value."

"And you can't say that we are morally valuable because we are made of meat, because the meat itself is not morally valuable absent a mind inhabiting it."

Without these dogmatic pronouncements you have no thread. But you can't defend them. If you think your identity is not in space and some fairy substance is what you think has value, then you're not in reality

But the point is that you would have to ground the moral difference - that is, the vast difference in moral value between a corpse and a person - in those biological differences. But that's already been shown to be implausible, for all those differences are sensible differences. I mean, corpses smell in a way that living persons do not, but it would be implausible to ground the moral difference in that olfactory difference. I am morally valuable irrespective of my smell. And so on for any sensible- and thus any biological - feature.

I think the moral difference between a fully functioning human being and a corpse is quite profound. The physical differences and biology might not be apparent upon immediate inspection, sure, but the absence of physical and biological activity is. Minding is but one of these activities, but it is no less a function of the material constitution and its array of activities as a living whole. In any case, I cannot see or find any other thing or substance upon which to place value.

Sounds good. When I read "So, if a mind can have moral value despite its conscious states having moral disvalue, then the mind's moral value is not grounded in its mental states." I took that as a disagreement with "some - kinds of mental state may be sufficient for having no value or disvalue." But when you say "But no mental state is necessary for possession of moral value." it makes sense. I was also tired and flip when I read it. I should have taken a seat. — James Riley

Yes, I certainly would not want to deny that our mental states can often affect - and can often affect very dramatically - the moral value of ourselves. So I think - and would hold that widespread rational intuitions corroborate - that we have default intrinsic moral value. But I do not think our intrinsic moral value is inalienable. Our moral value can go up or down according to how we behave and so on. All my argument requires, so far as I can see, is that our default intrinsic value is not itself grounded in our mental states.

You state:

"To put it another way, if you think we are lumps of meat - just lumps of meat that happen to think things - then you have a problem when it comes to explaining our moral value." — Gregory

No, that was a conclusion, not a blank assertion. The argument that preceded that quote - so, you know, the bulk of the OP - established it.

By contrast this:

Position: biology is the basis of our rights, thoughts, and value. You state: — Gregory

Is just an assertion of yours. And it conflicts with the 'conclusion' of my argument. So you need to refute my argument, else all you're doing is nay saying.

In any case, I cannot see or find any other thing or substance upon which to place value. — NOS4A2

But I don't see an objection to my argument. And it is by such means - that is, by arguments of the kind I have presented - that one comes to 'see' that there must something else that bears our moral value apart from our sensible body.

If one insists on sensible evidence for an insensible soul, then one has blinded oneself from the outset. That our sensations provide us with evidence of a sensible body, is something that we learn not from the sensations, but from what our reason tells us to infer from them. So it is by reason, not sense, that one learns one has a sensible body in a sensible world.

And it is by reason, not sense, that one learns that one has intrinsic moral value.

And it is by reason, not sense, that one learns that the bearer of that intrinsic value - so, you - is not a sensible object.

That is a negative definition, but that is not a fault. For again, ruling out candidates is how one progresses. So, we do not have to know precisely what the mind is before we can rule out that it is a sensible object, anymore than a detective has to know precisely who killed Mary before she can rule out that John killed her.

It seems clear enough that though we are morally valuable, we are not morally valuable due to our possession of any sensible feature. Biological features are all sensible features. Thus no matter how complex and subtle the sensible differences may be between a corpse body and one that has intrinsic moral value may be, this will do precisely nothing to challenge my argument.

Am I morally valuable because I have a certain shape? No. And does it do anything to challenge this to note just how complicatedly shaped I am, or that the living me is compared to a corpse's body? No. And likewise for all other sensible features. They just aren't in the running. It has nothing to do with complexity or simplicity. Locate as many sensible differences between myself an a corpse, non of them accounts for why I am morally valuable.

I already quoted every sentence of the OP each at a time to show there is no argument presented. Bye

Look, in my view you're a very silly person who is outclassed by my cat in terms of comprehension skills.
There is clearly an argument in the OP. Quoting individual lines out of context - that is, just ignoring the argument that ties them together - and insisting that this demonstrates that no argument is present, is as stupid as trying to show that Rachmaninov's second piano concerto has no tune because if one re-arranges all the sounds it becomes nothing but a heap of noises.

The previous page I quoted and commented on all of it. It's OK if you can't make an argument but you're too much of a hot head to have a discussion with. Firebrand

No, you just quoted lines and insisted that those lines are just assertions when they're conclusions of arguments. And then you just made a bunch of assertions and did nothing whatsoever to show how they are implied by anything more rationally fundamental.

Look, you don't have a clue how to argue - understandable, given that you can't even identify one when it is given.

It's simple. All evidence for anything boils down to one thing and one thing alone: a self-evident truth of reason.

So, try and find a claim so manifest to reason that virtually everyone's reason will confirm it, or if you can't do that, a claim that is more manifest to reason than its negation, and then find another and then extract their implications by means of a deductively valid argument. If you can do that, then you've made a powerful argument.

So, this is a deductively valid argument form:

1. If P, then Q
2. P
3. Therefore Q

Not because I say so, but because the reason of virtually all of reflective people will confirm that 3 is true if 1 and 2 are.

So, the validity of that argument is itself something that is manifest to reason. That is, virtually all reflective people confirm that their own reason says that if 1 and 2 are true, then 3 will as well. That's the evidence that that argument is valid. The reason of most reflective people represents it to be.

Now, I can express the argument in the OP in that form: that is, I can give you a series of such arguments that leads to my conclusion.

For instance, the reason of virtually everyone will also confirm that we are default intrinsically morally valuable and confirm that our intrinsic moral value has nothing to do with our shape, size, colour or location. Thus, the reason of virtually everyone confirms that we are intrinsically morally valuable 'irrespective' of our sensible properties, not 'because' of them.

That's one of my arguments. And it establishes an interim conclusion: that our moral value is not grounded in any of our sensible properties.

You can just assert that this is not so, but that's the very definition of unreasonable.

So:

1. If the reason of most reflective people represents us to have intrinsic moral value irrespective of any and all of our sensible features, then we have good evidence that we have intrinsic moral value irrespective of any and all of our sensible features
2. The reason of most reflective people represents us to have intrinsic moral value irrespective of any and all of our sensible features.
3. Therefore, we have good evidence that we have intrinsic moral value irrespective of any and all of our sensible features.

Now, do you have any objection to that argument?

I can make any assertion into steps like that too. You haven't prove things outside the world exist, that I exist outside the world, that matter has no potentiality of life and thought, or anything else

Well, a) you can't. And b) if you did, it would become apparent that your premises are nothing more than assertions as opposed to being propositions our reason represents to be true.

Anyway, this is like trying to teach a duck to drive a truck. Realistically we're not going to get beyond the flapping about in the cabin stage.

You're already crazy