Why? You've repeated this argument several times without answering the key question about it. If the vast majority of people evaluate the earth to be flat, or the vast majority of people evaluate black people to be of lesser worth than white people (both of which have definitely been the case in some closed communities), then do we have to accept those evaluations as objective truths. If not why is the majority opinion on murder different. All you've given me so far is that murder is a matter conscience (I think the worth of black people is a matter of conscience too, but we'll deal with that later). What you've not provided is your reason why being a matter of conscience suddenly make the majority belief into objective fact. If I argued that all 'purple apples could fly' and you retorted that apples can't fly, it would not be a suitable counter argument to simply point out that purple apples are different because they're purple. You'd expect an argument as to why being purple caused this difference.

So why does the fact that moral rules occur in the conscience mean that, unlike all other beliefs, what the majority think makes a belief into objective fact? — Isaac

You can't make an argument by exception to a point I acknowledge at the outset is not for all, but for some judgments. Comparing judgments about the nature of physical things to moral judgments is a category error. One has nothing to do with the other. Let me break down my argument and you tell me what part is false.

P1 - such a thing as human conscience exists ( please no semantic "exists" arguments)

P2 - I propose that on some moral judgments, an overwhelming number of human consciences would have the same moral judgment.

Conclusion: Some moral judgments are for all practical purpose appear to be objectively true or false regardless of person, culture, time, or place.

What I have been asking for, which has not been answered yet, is how moral relativism explains this phenomenon. Lots of you have typed lots of stuff after I raise this point, none of it in anyway is close to answer.

Gosh, I never thought of that! Imagine that: there are preferences, and, what they are, are preferences. I'm glad to have that information! Move on. — tim wood

Yet you and others continually suppose that per relativist ethics, when an individual is confronted with a different moral stance than their own, they will suddenly be incapable of having or expressing a preference. So how do we explain your cognitive difficulties here?

The conclusion doesn't follow from the premise. The fact that "an overwhelming number of human consciences would have the same moral judgment." does not automatically lead to "Some moral judgments are for all practical purpose appear to be objectively true or false regardless of person, culture, time, or place."

This is exactly why I asked you about what you think makes conscience special in this regard.

We've been through all this before, so let's try not to repeat ourselves.

You say "because some x (human conscience) results in some y (the conclusion/feeling that murder is wrong) the majority of the time, we can take it as objective fact that y is true.

I say that if we apply that logic to other conclusions/feelings which the majority hold, it leads to unsavory conclusions (such as that black people are inferior).

You say it's different because the conclusions resulting from conscience are not the same as other conclusions.

I say, I agree, but like with my example of purple apples, simply because they're not the same doesn't mean the dissimilar thing has the properties you claim it has.

So, one more time. Why does the fact that human conscience leads to these conclusions mean that we can treat the majority conclusion as objective fact, whereas with other types of conclusion (such as that black people are inferior) we do not treat the majority view as objective fact.

I understand the two are different, so please don't just repeat that, I'm asking you why that difference has the effect you're claiming it has.

Talking past each other, I say some degree of objective morality is a better explanation of near unanimous moral judgments on some issues than relative morality.

What I keep asking for, and have not seen yet is how this is explained by relative morality. You all keep telling me I am wrong, without any explanation how moral relativism addresses this.

Someone please make a coherent argument how moral relativism explains that near every human being on the planet would think torturing babies for amusement is morally wrong.

I think our passions (what we desire), impacts our thoughts,...... — Rank Amateur

How would a rational system so hopelessly circular ever get us anywhere?
————————-

on more then a handful of moral choices, nearly every human conscience on the planet would evaluate it the same. — Rank Amateur

If this is the case, and given the choice of deciding whether or not, e.g., is courage worthy of honor, which would seem to suffice for part of a handful of thoroughly objective considerations, it would have to be shown the choice is a moral choice, and, that conscience is responsible for its evaluation. Cases in which the considerations are reversed, yet still fulfil the criterion of objective consideration, re: is arbitrarily taking a human life good, it should be asked whether the choice is predicated on actually taking one, which is indeed a very moral choice, or witnessing the taking of one, which is merely an observation resulting in criticizing a choice without any knowledge whatsoever of its moral circumstance.

Obviously, there are agreements common to humanity in general. But morality is not found in agreements, that being no more than cultural suitability, sustainability, or simply allegiance, but rather, morality is always found in disagreements, and moral philosophy has to do with the reduction to the explanations for them. Its awful hard to say one is acting morally when in fact he acting as is expected of him, in which case his particular humanity (it is not honorable to prosecute a young Muslim American for learning to speak Farsi) couldn’t be distinguished from his general complicity (if you’re America you will speak English, dammit!!!)

If (iff) one thinks morality a fundamental, that is to say, a singular, constituent, human condition, it follows necessarily that objective morality is at best a categorical error and at worst self-contradictory.

I might disagree with the nose analogy — Rank Amateur

You mean that you do not believe that noses are "of bodies"?

Do they grow behind rocks and then travel to your face?

It does seem a tad ironic that the group who argue relative and subjective in regard to morality, act as if this particular view of morality is objectively true. — Rank Amateur

You're probably reading "Morality is subjective" as me saying something other than "Morality is of bodies" in the sense that "Noses are of bodies," despite the fact that I've tried to correct that misunderstanding tens of times (if not hundreds in general on the board)

Non-sequiturs won't do here. — creativesoul

Aren't non-sequiturs only pertinent to arguments? I wasn't forwarding an argument in what you quoted relative to this response. I was simply making some comments.

There's an argument. You are objecting to the primary premiss. The primary premiss is both true and verifiable. — creativesoul

I don't know what argument you're talking about there, but it must be obvious that I don't agree that the primary premise of whatever argument is true.

Moral agency is existentially dependent upon thinking about the rules of behaviour. The rules of behaviour are statements of thought/belief. — creativesoul

Wait so insofar as my ontology of ethics/morality goes, where exactly do you disagree with me?

How would a rational system so hopelessly circular ever get us anywhere? — Mww

Such systems of desire, thought, evaluation of thought, re visit desire, think again have got us all kind of places

If this is the case, and given the choice of deciding whether or not, e.g., is courage worthy of honor, which would seem to suffice for part of a handful of thoroughly objective considerations, it would have to be shown the choice is a moral choice, and, that conscience is responsible for its evaluation. Cases in which the considerations are reversed, yet still fulfil the criterion of objective consideration, re: is arbitrarily taking a human life good, it should be asked whether the choice is predicated on actually taking one, which is indeed a very moral choice, or witnessing the taking of one, which is merely an observation resulting in criticizing a choice without any knowledge whatsoever of its moral circumstance.

Obviously, there are agreements common to humanity in general. But morality is not found in agreements, that being no more than cultural suitability, sustainability, or simply allegiance, but rather, morality is always found in disagreements, and moral philosophy has to do with the reduction to the explanations for them. Its awful hard to say one is acting morally when in fact he acting as is expected of him, in which case his particular humanity (it is not honorable to prosecute a young Muslim American for learning to speak Farsi) couldn’t be distinguished from his general complicity (if you’re America you will speak English, dammit!!!)

If (iff) one thinks morality a fundamental human condition, it follows necessarily that objective morality is at best a categorical error and at worst self-contradictory. — Mww

I don't see how any of that says anything that shows relative morality is a better explanation of near unanimous moral judgments on some issues than some degree of objective morality.

I want you all to leave your beer fueled smoke filled dorm room esoteric philosophy chat, and apply it.

I don't see how any of that says anything that shows relative morality is a better explanation of near unanimous moral judgments — Rank Amateur

Why do you believe that if something is a "product" of our bodies, then it would be inexplicable for that thing to be significantly similar from person to person?

You're probably reading "Morality is subjective" as me saying something other than "Morality is of bodies" in the sense that "Noses are of bodies," despite the fact that I've tried to correct that misunderstanding tens of times (if not hundreds in general on the board) — Terrapin Station

This point is nonsense.


I have given you all a challenge, show that relative morality is a better explanation than some degree of objective morality for the near universal moral judgments on some actions.

That has not been done yet.

Someone please make a coherent argument how moral relativism explains that near every human being on the planet would think torturing babies for amusement is morally wrong. — Rank Amateur

It doesn't. Moral relativism explains how some humans do think torturing babies for fun is OK (by positing that there must therefore be no objective moral fact). Evolution is what explains why near every human being on the planet does think torturing babies for amusement is morally wrong (because it would be difficult to raise the next generation if we didn't).

Why must moral relativism explain what you want it to? Moral objectivism doesn't explain why most people have noses, but that isn't an argument against it.

This point is nonsense. — Rank Amateur

I really wish you'd read it and remember it, though. That you and others won't is why I have to explain it tens, if not hundreds of times, and why I'll continue to have to do so.

I have given you all a challenge, show that relative morality is a better explanation than some degree of objective morality for the near universal moral judgments on some actions. — Rank Amateur

Here's a very simple reason why:

Under subjectivist morality, the only explanation that we need for near-universal moral judgments is that our bodies develop in similar ways--a notion that's quite uncontroversial for most things (otherwise medicine wouldn't work, we'd not be able to explain why almost everyone has ten fingers and ten toes, etc.).

Under objectivist morality, we need to both posit (1) that moral stances somehow occur independently of us, and (2) that we perceive them, cognize them, etc. significantly similarly, which we'd still only solve by positing that our bodies develop in similar ways (due to genetics, environmental influences, etc., just as above).

So per Occam's razor, subjectivist morality is the simpler approach; it doesn't posit unnecessary (and frankly unsupportable) entities. Objectivist morality has to posit the same thing that subjectivist morality posits (bodies thinking things, expressing moral stances, etc.), and it would have to explain commonality on that end via the same approach (bodies developing similarly, with similar abilities, etc., due to genetics, common environmental factors, etc.); but it posits things additional to that, too. The only way it could avoid doing this is by attempting to take bodies out of the equation, but I don't know how you'd do that and still talk about people agreeing on moral stances, people behaving morally, etc.

By the way, I'm saying "subjective" above, not "relative," because we keep using "relative" in contexts where that's not really what we're saying (and I really mean "we" there--I've done this many times, too, in the guise of going with the flow of the thread). Relative ethics/morality is broader than subjectivist ethics/morality (and not even necessarily overlapping with it). Relativists can be objectivists. They can believe that something occurs independently of persons. They'd just say that the thing in question can differ due to differing relations. All of that can be independent of persons on a relativist view. It's subjectivists who say that the thing in question is dependent on persons. Also, subjectivists are usually relativists (as I am), but they wouldn't have to be. A subjectivist could say that something depends on persons, but that it's invariable as such, and thus not relative at all.

An easy way to remember that relativists can be objectivists is to think of physics. Special and general relativity in physics aren't conventionally positing subjective phenomena. They're conventionally seen as claims about objective reality--ways that objective reality is relativistic.

What we still need to figure out, but you won't answer is why you believe that if something is a "product" of our bodies, then it would be inexplicable for that thing to be significantly similar from person to person.

Not to mention that you seem to be inconsistent in your belief about this, because you think that we all significantly similarly perceive objective moral stances . . . unless somehow you believe that perception is not of our bodies. But then how do you get to acknowledgement of objective moral stances, etc.? At some point I'd think you'd have to involve our bodies.

Good.

Although I’ve been burned by commenting to people to whom I’ve erroneously attributed philosophical maturity, I feel I’m on solid ground here. I’m almost positive you’ll never criticize me for failure to approve a thing, when all I had intended was to disapprove some other thing unrelated to it.

I can't help but think that some of this stems from misunderstandings--namely, believing that relativists and/or subjectivists are more or less saying that morality is wildly divergent from person to person, and that it's essentially arbitrary. But no one is actually claiming anything like that.

What I'm saying is that morality/moral stances are something that occurs in minds only (which I believe are brains functioning in particular ways). I'm saying that moral stances do not occur outside of minds. I'm not saying anything suggestive of moral stances being arbitrary, being necessarily widlly divergent, etc.

I'm essentially making a claim about the location of a phenomenon.

There are upshots to what I'm saying, upshots where it makes a difference if we're saying that something only occurs in brains functioning in mental ways versus elsewhere, but the core idea is that moral stances only occur in brains functioning in mental ways.

The encyclopaedia entry you linked to explains much of it. "His view is not, of course, that reason plays no role in the generation of action. His thesis is that reason alone cannot move us to action; the impulse to act itself must come from passion. The doctrine that reason alone is merely the 'slave of the passions', i.e., that reason pursues knowledge of abstract and causal relations solely in order to achieve passions' goals and provides no impulse of its own, is defended in the Treatise".

This, by the way, shows that @creativesoul didn't understand the claim that he was attempting to refute.

Now, what is your argument against this, assuming you have one?

Haven't you ever taken an action that you thought/believed and/or strongly felt was good, right. and/or moral... — creativesoul

Haven't you ever typed up a sentence which doesn't so abuse the English language?

What on earth is "that which existed prior to our awareness and/or naming of it"? — Isaac

It's his crazy pet tangent.

You should adopt a view akin to emotivism because it's factually correct, it's what the world is like. — Terrapin Station

At least you're thinking about it properly, contrary to @Janus. Meta-ethics is about what the world is like with regards to morality. It is not about how the world ought to be. His point that our moral philosophy should aim towards a harmonious society completely misses the point, and he doesn't seem to realise that that is merely an expression of his own personal moral feelings on the matter, nothing more. It is but a projection.

Jesus H. Christ. No, that's certainly not about right. That's the same gross misunderstanding of moral relativism that I've been repeatedly correcting and demonstrating to be a result of bad logic. Unfortunately, you appear to be very far behind and stuck on the same basic error.

No, your reply is what's not reasonable. It is not at all reasonable to assume that absent objective morality, no one should complain about any attempts made by anyone to murder them. That's not just wrong, it's daft. If you genuinely want to understand why that is bad logic, then I suggest going over the responses in this discussion to the aptly named Rank Amateur.

You claim to have read the encyclopaedia article about Hume's moral philosophy, and particularly with regards to his famous quote that reason is the slave of the passions, which you even quoted in the very comment that I'm replying to, yet your comment suggests that you don't get it.

"If you deny reason..."

I don't. It has a role. A subservient role.

This discussion is not a discussion of equals. This discussion is a teacher-pupil sort of discussion, where Tim (nice, but...) is very much the pupil and myself and others are very much the teachers.

Haven't you ever taken an action that you thought/believed and/or strongly felt was good, right. and/or moral... — creativesoul


Haven't you ever typed up a sentence which doesn't so abuse the English language? — S

I think/believe that maybe/possibly you could be right and/or astute in thinking/asking this question, inquiry and/or expostulation.

I didn't say that Kant is a joke, I said that his categorical imperative is a joke, because it is.

And yes, obviously murder is wrong in some sense, and that sense is the sense of wrong that is explained by moral relativism, not the sense of wrong which moral absolutism fails to properly explain and thus resorts to dogmatism and bad logic. Bad logic like your fallacious appeal to absurdity: "But murder is (absolutely) wrong! Superficially, and by my narrow judgement, the contrary seems absurd. Therefore the contrary is false". That seems to be your implicit logic.

Tell me about it. It's bad enough that this discussion is teacher-pupil, but it is far worse when the pupils are bad pupils. Bad pupils repeat the same mistakes without learning from the teacher, and bad pupils are not intellectually honest. I have already effectively expelled one bad pupil for the latter, though he most definitely was a bad pupil for the first reason also.

My argument consisted in showing that your premise, even if true, doesn't refute Hume's claim, only at best your misunderstanding of it. Your understanding of "reason is the slave of the passions" is about as good as your understanding of "meaning is use". And no, that isn't praise.

Feel free to try again, but philosophy is like shaving, and if you keep ending up with cuts all over your face, then that suggests that you're not good at shaving. You are no match for Hume. Not even remotely close.

That post shows that you're a good teacher. The problem is that you're working with bad pupils.

Two words: Ockham's razor. Moral relativism explains that in the way that a normal person would explain that, minus the additional unwarranted assumption of objective morality. We're human after all, as Terrapin keeps telling you. It is no more of a mystery than why lions tend to group together. Have you ever read about the moral philosophy of Nietzsche? If not, you really should look into it, particularly the term "herd morality". Herd-like behavior is not evidence of objective morality, so back to the drawing board you go.

↪Rank Amateur

I can't help but think that some of this stems from misunderstandings--namely, believing that relativists and/or subjectivists are more or less saying that morality is wildly divergent from person to person, and that it's essentially arbitrary. But no one is actually claiming anything like that.

What I'm saying is that morality/moral stances are something that occurs in minds only (which I believe are brains functioning in particular ways). I'm saying that moral stances do not occur outside of minds. I'm not saying anything suggestive of moral stances being arbitrary, being necessarily widlly divergent, etc.

I'm essentially making a claim about the location of a phenomenon.

There are upshots to what I'm saying, upshots where it makes a difference if we're saying that something only occurs in brains functioning in mental ways versus elsewhere, but the core idea is that moral stances only occur in brains functioning in mental ways. — Terrapin Station

I think I understand your point, let me try and paraphrase it back. The moral judgment we as individuals communicate, has an origin in our individual thoughts and reasoning on the issue. And since its origin is internal to each individual, all of them are unique individual judgments.

And there is no more reason to give then that for subjective morality, it is my thought and I am the origin of all my thoughts.


If I have that right, then I say poppy cock that it in anyway answers the question of why all these unique and self determined evaluations are nearly universal on some issues.

You want to brush that off, as well that is just the way we are made, like noses. But that is the entire crux of the issue. We all didn't independently decide we wanted noses and we would put them between our eyes. Something outside the individual decided that we would get a nose and where it would go.

The crux of the issue is source.

Call it evolution or human nature, but the reason there is near universal moral agreement on some issues is, there is some agency that is more universal than the individual that internally demands we have that view. We universally could no more disagree with on conscience on some points then individually decide where we would want to place our individual nose.

It is objective biology and outside individual human desire or judgment where our nose goes, and it is to a high degree outside individual thought and reason what our human conscience tell us is right or wrong about certain issues.

Someone please make a coherent argument how moral relativism explains that near every human being on the planet would think torturing babies for amusement is morally wrong.
— Rank Amateur

It doesn't. Moral relativism explains how some humans do think torturing babies for fun is OK (by positing that there must therefore be no objective moral fact). Evolution is what explains why near every human being on the planet does think torturing babies for amusement is morally wrong (because it would be difficult to raise the next generation if we didn't).

Why must moral relativism explain what you want it to? Moral objectivism doesn't explain why most people have noses, but that isn't an argument against it. — Isaac

"It doesn't " is the best explanation so far

Is it really moral relativism or some form of mental illness that is a better explanation of why some incredibly small number of individuals would think baby torture for fun is morally permissible

evolution is what explains .....

I have said that exact thing, and we are in complete agreement - so by our very nature as it has evolved as species, we all hold near universal views on the morality of some issues - I call that highly objective, don't you?

It seems to me, when Hume said....

“Morals excite passions, and produce or prevent actions”

.....he should have realized his own words suggest morals are antecedent to passions. And when combined with......

“a passion must be accompany’d with some false judgment, in order to its being unreasonable; and even then ’tis not the passion, properly speaking, which is unreasonable, but the judgment”

.....suggests an undefined chronology between an unreasonable passion and the false judgement that goes with it. Is the passion unreasonable because of the false judgement or is there a false judgement because the passion is unreasonable?

And another thing. Hume says what reason is good for, re: science and logic and other relational categories, where it has power and authority, “as it’s proper province is the world of ideas“, but “as the will always places us in that of realities” and “a passion is an original existence”, we are to suppose it is these disparities which prohibit reason from factoring into moral decisions.

If Hume had only recognized the duality of reason itself, the pure and the practical, Kant would have had nothing with which to set the world on fire. Or, more probably, he would have had to find something else with which to set the world on fire.

You're trying and failing to argue against Ockham's razor. Your additional requirement - "And also, morality is objective!" - doesn't improve the explanation. It's not like DNA, it's like luminiferous aether.