I'm not sure that that's really a problem. Compare for example commercial value. Something is commercially valuable, in an intransitive way, if there are people out there willing to pay a lot for it. It is also transitively valuable specifically to them, but it being transitively valuable to someone or another makes it in an intransitively sense valuable in general. I can see someone making the same case for morality working that way; actually, though I don't yet know how much I agree with Bartricks, off the top of my head it sounds like a lot of ethical positions I generally agree with could be characterized that way (e.g. something is morally good in an objective sense to the extent that it satisfies some people's appetites and doesn't dissatisfy others).

I'm not sure that that's really a problem. Compare for example commercial value. Something is commercially valuable, in an intransitive way, if there are people out there willing to pay a lot for it. — Pfhorrest

That's not intransitive. It's only valuable to the people who value it. It's not universally valuable or valuable independently of the particular individuals who value it. (And being valuable intransitively especially wouldn't follow from the supposition of value only being an individual phenomenon.)

it being transitively valuable to someone or another makes it in an intransitively sense valuable in general — Pfhorrest

Yes, this is the point that @aletheist was trying to make above (and having about as much luck as the rest of us in getting through to the OP). That something can be valuable is a judgement about how it is possible to have a subject relate to it, not about any subject actually relating to it. A bike is ride-able even without anyone riding it - this absolutely has to be the case otherwise no-one would ever be able to have invented the bike because no-one would have been able to conceive of it as being ride-able without someone first having ridden it.

I am acting under a moral theory that, more than believing it should be universal, I believe it is universal for the example that I gave. And as I mentioned throughout both my first two posts, I don’t believe all morality is universal but specifically for the example that I worked with in the post that is what I will subscribe to. Again i acknowledge the value of these definitions but I believe context would’ve given you the answer that I just provided and I would love to hear your thoughts on my argument itself (if you have any objections, if you tends to agree, etc.)

The rest of what you said was ignorant gibberish. Continental philosophy is where you belong! — Bartricks

:grin:
No The rest of what I said is over your head. 'Continental philosophy' is merely another pole of one of your dichotomy games. I doubt whether 'neurophilosophy' for example, which also questions 'logical thinking' can be be deemed to be 'continental' .

Yes, this is the point that aletheist was trying to make above (and having about as much luck as the rest of us in getting through to the OP). That something can be valuable is a judgement about how it is possible to have a subject relate to it, not about any subject actually relating to it. A bike is ride-able even without anyone riding it - this absolutely has to be the case otherwise no-one would ever be able to have invented the bike because no-one would have been able to conceive of it as being ride-able without someone first having ridden it. — Isaac

If we're just saying that something is "able to be valued," nothing would be excluded from that. And everything would be able to be both positively and negatively valued.

At any rate, Bartricks wasn't saying anything about it being a possibility that someone might value something when he used the term "valuable."

If we're just saying that something is "able to be valued," nothing would be excluded from that. And everything would be able to be both positively and negatively valued. — Terrapin Station

Only if we were talking in absolutes, and I don't think there's any need to do that when it comes to morality. Anything is also ride-able (to take my example) in that anyone, in their opinion, could claim to be 'riding' anything, but the concept what is 'sensibly' ride-able is, and has been, nonetheless very useful in, for example, the invention of the bike. The reason why other prototypes were mentally discarded before even being made is because they were considered to be not ride-able by the inventor. But not considered that way just for the inventor, considered that way universally. Doing so was inaccurate, but useful.

There is no reason at all why such should not be the case, for example, when trying to derive laws that are widely agreed upon (prior to something like a democratic vote to check they are truly widely agreed upon). The law-makers can make a useful judgement about what is really valuable and what is unlikely to be so. Humans are not that diverse.

This pragmatic sense is the only sense in which the term has any meaning at all, otherwise we've just defined it away, which seems pointless.

At any rate, Bartricks wasn't saying anything about it being a possibility that someone might value something when he used the term "valuable." — Terrapin Station

Yes, that was the point of the objection in that form. It makes his first premise incoherent.

There would be no way to make sense out of saying that someone could "ride a neutrino," because it's not physically possible. But an individual could positively or negatively value anything. It's not physically impossible to positively or negatively value anything. We don't need to do incomprehensible (or very vague and fantastical) things to the term "value" for that.

it's not physically possible. — Terrapin Station

How do you know it's not physically possible? We don't currently have any mechanism by which fundamental particles can be made to carry a human, but that doesn't make it physically impossible. Maybe we could one day convert humans to data contained within other dimensions and somehow 'attach' that multi-dimensional data to a fundamental particle (in our common dimension).

We can't do this right now (nor probably ever) because of the limitations of the physical world as we currently know it. Part of those limitations as we currently know them, are the workings of the human brain. So far we do not have evidence that humans randomly value things, so far our valuing of certain things is incredibly similar. Similar enough to draw very useful conclusions from.

How do you know it's not physically possible? — Isaac

Because we know something about neutrinos and how they interact with bodies.

Other dimensions? That's incoherent nonsense stemming from the reification of mathematics by mathematical platonists.

Re the comment about valuing similar things, you're confusing contingency with physical possibility.

Re the neutrino comment, you're confusing physical and logical possibility, by the way, although the logical possibility there relies on loose, vague, fantastical nonsense.

Yes, but we also know something about human brains (the source of value). For some reason you're treating what we know about physics as being unequivocal fact and yet treating what we know about human brains as being irrelevant, and I don't understand why.

Of course riding a neutrino is fantastical nonsense, but you cannot rule it out as a physical impossibility because our knowledge of physics is not complete. We do not know everything there is to know about physics. We just know some of it.

We also do not know everything there is to know about the human brain, but, like physics, we do know some of it. To treat that knowledge as irrelevant to constraining options regarding what subjects reasonably can and cannot do is dogmatic and unproductive. It is not unreasonable to say that, based on what we know about the human brain, a healthy adult probably cannot morally value a pile of sick. We have disgust mechanisms, empathy mechanisms (via mirror neurons, a limited number of neurotransmitters, which only have a limited range of possible functions... There are limits to what the brain can do, and if (for practical purposes) you're talking about the vast majority of healthy brains, those limits are even more constraining.

What you've done there is change my argument to a different one to fit your agenda - the agenda of showing my argument is invalid at any cost.

What was the thesis that my argument was addressing? Was it the thesis that 'some' moral values are 'some' of my values?

Nope.

What is the thesis that moral values and 'some' of my valuings - my values - are synonymous?

Nope, although I did address that one too for I have said time and time again that the same argument can be run for any subset, just as it can be run for your values as well as it can be for mine.

It was the thesis that moral values are my valuings. That is, that being morally valuable involves nothing more than being valued by me.

That thesis.

Again: I stress that the same argument can then be run for any subset of my valuings, and the same argument can be run for your values (and any subset of them). And again for any groups valuings. And it was precisely by going through this process that I ended up at the conclusion that therefore moral valuings are valuings of just one subject. I mean, how else did I get to that conclusion!?!

But again, the thesis being considered in the argument we're focussing on right now, is whether ALL moral values are synonymous with being valued by me. Not 'some' valuing activity of mine, but just 'being valued by me'.

Now, the word 'valuings' is ugly, I know, and some pointed this out, but I used it on purpose - to convey that what we are considering is whether the valuings constitutive of moral valuings are synonymous with my valuings - that is, my valuing activity.

So, are moral values - moral valuings - identical with my valuings? To express it a different way: is 'being morally valuable' synonymous with 'being valued by me"?

Well, if being morally valuable and being valued by me are synonymous, then if I value something, necessarily it will be morally valuable.

That's true. Obviously true. Do I really need to explain why? If "being morally valuable" is one and the same as "being valued by me" then if I value something, it is "being valued by me", which - by hypothesis, is what "being morally valuable" is being supposed to consist in. I don't know how to make that clearer. The thesis is that 'being morally valuable" and "being valued by me" are synonymous. The same. Identical. One and the same. Samey samey sameingtons. The same. And if they are, then it follows - obviously follows - that if I value something, it will inevitably be morally valuable because 'being morally valuable' just is to be being valued by me. Nothing more, nothing less.

Put some symbols in there if you want, and use terms like 'modal' too if you like - but just realize, as any competent English speaker surely would (if, that is, they were not fanatically obsessed with my argument turning out to be invalid) that what I am saying is that if moral values and my values are one and the same, then if I value something it must be morally valuable, because 'what it is' to be morally valuable just is to be being valued by me. I mean, that's the thesis under consideration (a thesis I reject, of course, before someone decides I endorse it).

So is that clear? Is premise 1 now clear?

Premise 1 says "If P, then Q"

P says "if moral values (all of them, not some of them) are my values (so, if being morally valuable is one and the same as being valued by me).

Q says "if I value something, necessarily it is morally valuable"

It is true. Not false. True.

Now what about premise 2?

Well, what is 'not Q'? If Q is "If I value something, necessarily it is morally valuable" then what is the opposite of that?

This: "If I value something, it is NOT necessarily morally valuable". And that's what premise 2 says.

Premise 2: If I value something, it is NOT necessarily morally valuable"

It follows from those that "being morally valuable" is not the same as just being valued by me.

That is, the thesis that for something to be morally valuable it is sufficient that I be valuing it, has been demonstrated to be false.

Now what about a subset of my values? What about things I am valuing on Tuesday, or things I value and value valuing? Well I said - umpteen times in fact - that the same argument can be run for any subset of your valuings that you care to identify. Any subset. Any at all. Could moral valuings be identified with what you value when you're wearing green? Nope - same argument will be valid and sound for those. Could moral valuings be identified with what you value on Tuesdays alone. Nope - same argument will be valid and sound for those too. Just run them. But you don't need to, do you - it is obvious that it is going to work just as well for any subset.

And what goes for my valuings - all of them and any subset - will go for yours. The same argument with your valuings or some subset of them - will be valid and sound.

How else did I arrive at the conclusion that moral values are the values of a single subject - someone who is not me, not you, not anyone other than herself - apart from by this winnowing process? Put in any of your values - any of them - and the same basic argument will demonstrate that moral values are not identical with them.

All you have done is change my first premise and then show me how arguments with different first premises are invalid. What was the point in that?

Yes, but we also know something about human brains (the source of value). For some reason you're treating what we know about physics as being unequivocal fact and yet treating what we know about human brains as being irrelevant, and I don't understand why. — Isaac

So you're arguing that there are things it's physically impossible to positively or negatively value?

I use the term 'continental philosophy' to mean 'bullshit' and 'continental philosopher' to mean 'failed analytic philosopher who has now decided to try and impress young people in bars and lecture halls with bullshit and can only be employed by English and Media studies or some other Disney discipline'.

I use 'analytic philosophy' to mean 'philosophy'.

Am I misusing these terms?

So you're arguing that there are things it's physically impossible to positively or negatively value? — Terrapin Station

Yes. The brain (which does the valuing) is just a machine. I can't think of any good reason at all not to think that the limits and trends we observe in psychology are limits and trends imposed by the physical make up of that machine.

Valuing is a thing that machine does, so I don't see any reason not to presume that the limits and trends we observe (with respect to valuing) are not limits and trends imposed by the machine.

We have not yet observed an undamaged brain morally valuing a pile of sick, we have a sound theory as to the mechanism that might cause such a limit, so it's completely reasonable to hold the theory that a pile of sick is not morally valuable (ie cannot be valued by the machine that does valuing).

I doubt whether 'neurophilosophy' for example, which also questions 'logical thinking' can be be deemed to be 'continental' — fresco

I have no idea what that might be, and I am not sure I want to know. Sounds like it will be second-rate philosophy combined with second-rate neuroscience, but perhaps I'm cynical.

I am acting under a moral theory that, more than believing it should be universal, I believe it is universal for the example that I gave. And as I mentioned throughout both my first two posts, I don’t believe all morality is universal but specifically for the example that I worked with in the post that is what I will subscribe to. — username

Two systems could have one or more common rules but still generate substantially different outcomes. In that sense, a single rule out of context does not say particularly much.

One example would be the system of Presburger arithmetic. With only addition defined, it is complete. With only multiplication defined, it is also complete. With both simultaneously defined, it is incomplete. (Highly counter-intuitive, isn't it?) Therefore, saying anything about the rule for addition or for multiplication, outside context, is not particularly meaningful.

It is like discussing the steering wheel for a car in absence of the remainder of the car. Systems are typified by the interconnectedness of their rules. Therefore, you need to look at the complete list of rules in a moral system before drawing conclusions.

I defined how objective and subjective are being understood here. Stop trying to make this about labels rather than theories.

Subjective means 'made of subjective states' - that is, states of a subject-of-experience, a mind.

Objective means 'not made of subjective states'.

If you don't like those definitions, then just deal with it or start up your own thread in which you use them as you wish. — Bartricks

Sorry. Didn't mean to divert the topic.

Anyway...

You want to prove god exists by way of demonstrating that a god is a necessary subject that values morals. You haven't been able to show that a god is a necessary subject that values morals yet. Yes, you claim humans can't be the subject that values morals but you haven't proved it.

It was the thesis that moral values are my valuings. That is, that being morally valuable involves nothing more than being valued by me.

That thesis. — Bartricks

Some things are morally valuable to others. Some of your values are not moral. Thus being morally valuable must include something more than just being valued by you.

:joke:

Same problem. Different set of statements.

I jolly well have!

First, I don't want to prove a god exists, I want to establish what moral values are.

Second, I have proved it and no-one has raised the least reasonable doubt about any premise at all.

Moral values are valuings. That is, for something to be morally valuable is for it to be the object of a valuing relation. What else could it consist in? Nobody has said anything to suggest this premise is false. At best some have simply pointed out - as if I didn't know - that some objectivists may want to reject this. Well, yes. But want away. Wanting or needing to reject a premise is quite different from raising any reasonable doubt about its truth.

I then pointed out that only subjects of experience - minds - value things. Anything can be valued, but only subjects of lives value things. So, though anything can the object of a valuing relation, not anything can be a valuer. In fact, one thing and only one kind of thing can be a valuer - a subject.

I then pointed out - and this seems to have been the main bone of contention in this thread thus far - that moral values are self-evidently not my values or yours. Any of them. I cannot make something morally valuable just by valuing it. My valuings - all and any of them - do not constitutively determine what's morally valuable. And that goes for any of us.

So, though being morally valuable involves being the object of a subject's valuing attitude, it manifestly does not involve being the object of any of our valuing attitudes.

I am led by this - as will anyone else be who follows the argument - that being morally valuable involves being the object of the valuings of a subject who is none of us, but is Reason.

And that subject is a god.

And as some things clearly are morally valuable, that subject - the god - exists.

So there: I bloody well did prove it. :razz:

And my argument is a damn sight stronger than the standard moral argument for a god.

For it applies to the prescriptions of Reason.

And no-one can intelligently deny that the prescriptions of Reason exist.

There are some moral error theorists out there. And I think moral error theory is manifestly false, of course (because it is). But whatever we think of moral error theory, the fact is any argument for it is an argument - an appeal to Reason - and thus even moral error theorists must, if they think there really is reason to believe there theory is true - accept that prescriptions of Reason exist.

And thus everyone - but everyone - must accept that Reason, the subject, the mind, 'She', exists.

So again, I blood sodding well have proved it. :razz: And I did it without any symbols or without saying 'modal' once.

P says "if moral values (all of them, not some of them) are my values (so, if being morally valuable is one and the same as being valued by me).

Q says "if I value something, necessarily it is morally valuable" — Bartricks

Let me try to explain the set objection like this. Consider 3 dimensional measurement (depth, height, width). Measuring is something a subject does, and something being measurable means it can be measured by a subject.

P says "if depth measurements (all of them, not some of them) are my measurements (so, if being depth-measurable is one and the same as being measured by me).

Q says "if I measure something, necessarily it is depth-measurable"

This is patently false, because it is possible for you to measure 2-dimensional objects, yet they are not depth-measurable, they have no depth.

All things in the set {things which are depth-measurable} are in the set {things which are measured by me} (not in the real world, of course, but in our hypothetical). But the set {things which are measured by me} is not exhaustively constituted by the set {things which are depth-measurable}, also there are {things which are height-measurable} and {things which are length-measurable}.

So simply saying things which are depth-measurable are measured by me does not sufficiently lead to the conclusion that if I measure something it is necessarily depth-measurable (it might be one of the other types measuring I do). To lead to your conclusion you need a stronger identity (as others have already pointed out). You need to say that depth measurements (morally values) are exhaustively the same as you measuring something (your values).

So your argument, as it stands, still allows that moral values are your values because it does not lead to absurdity you suggest (where simply by valuing something you make it morally valuable). It is possible to value something without making it morally valuable and still maintain that moral values are your values. You do this by claiming that moral values are a subset of your values. Same as aesthetic values are. So when I value something I might be morally valuing it, but I might not. I might be aesthetically valuing it. These are still all my values.

So, if you want to raise an objection to the idea that moral values are my values, you'll have to take a line other than the argument that this leads to a situation where me valuing something makes it morally valuable.

and everyone (but in response to this particular post; I'm still not clear how to quote-reply), If I may make a quick observation before bed: Bartricks' argument seems structurally very similar to how Berkeley's subjective idealism seemingly demands the existence of God to sustain a common reality in the face of his radical empiricism.

I am of the opinion that such radical empiricism can be sustained without resorting to God to maintain a common reality, resulting in an empirical realism or physicalist phenomenalism. I am also of the opinion that a radical hedonism (all good lies in the satisfaction of "desires", though I'd quibble about that terminology some) can be sustained without resorting to God to maintain a common morality.

And that "objectivity", contrary to the OP definitions, more typically means such commonality, an un-biased-ness, and "subjectivity" likewise means the opposite of that, bias; and that such radical empiricism and hedonism, if somehow or another held together with some common, shared, mutual sense of reality and morality (respectively), do not make the resultant views of reality and morality non-objective, in that more typical sense, despite the "subjectivity" (in the OP sense) of the radical empiricism and hedonism they contain.

Will try to elaborate more tomorrow, sleep now.

What you've done there is change my argument to a different one to fit your agenda - the agenda of showing my argument is invalid at any cost. — Bartricks

In what way are my examples inadequate, precisely?

So, are moral values - moral valuings - identical with my valuings? To express it a different way: is 'being morally valuable' synonymous with 'being valued by me"? — Bartricks

It's not, because the things that are "valued by me" include more than just my moral values. One is a subset of the other.

that what I am saying is that if moral values and my values are one and the same, then if I value something it must be morally valuable, because 'what it is' to be morally valuable just is to be being valued by me. I mean, that's the thesis under consideration — Bartricks

So, to be clear, is the thesis that "my values" and "moral values" are identical in a strict sense? Every member of "my values" is also a member of "moral values", and vice-versa?

Or merely that every moral value is a personal value, but not the other way around?

Premise 1 says "If P, then Q"

P says "if moral values (all of them, not some of them) are my values (so, if being morally valuable is one and the same as being valued by me).

Q says "if I value something, necessarily it is morally valuable"

It is true. Not false. True. — Bartricks

It's true if all and only Moral values are my values. I.e. all of my values are moral values. Otherwise it doesn't follow.

Well, what is 'not Q'? If Q is "If I value something, necessarily it is morally valuable" then what is the opposite of that?

This: "If I value something, it is NOT necessarily morally valuable". And that's what premise 2 says. — Bartricks

If Q is "if I value something, necessarily it is morally valuable"

Then not Q is: "If I value something, necessarily it is not morally valuable".

Edit: I edited the part above since my earlier version may have been wrong.

Your sentence is not a case of "not Q", because Q could still be true: If I value something, it is not necessarily morally valuable, but it could be.

All you have done is change my first premise and then show me how arguments with different first premises are invalid. What was the point in that? — Bartricks

I have merely changed the name of the variables:
Moral values - men
my values - mortals
I - Socrates.

Validity can be assessed irrespective of the name of the variables.

I see. I understand now why moral values can't be determined by humans - our valuing x, whatever that may be, doesn't automatically make it moral. You then go on to say it's reason that decides what is or isn't morally valuable. From here I can't see the connection with God. If reason determines morality why have a god at all? After all reason has the upper hand right?

Isn't this Euthyphro's dilemma?

Does god determine what's right or does reason determine what's right?

If it's god then by your own logic god can't be the subject of moral values. What if he thinks killing and rape are good?

If it's reason then again god isn't the subject of moral values. He uses reason just like us. Also it would make god at best redundant and at worst nonexistent.

The problem is you're trying to shift the subject of moral values to a god while simultaneously claiming reason determines moral values. This can't be done because reason isn't a godly prerogative. Humans can reason too.

We have not yet observed an undamaged brain morally valuing a pile of sick — Isaac

Why are you introducing words like "healthy" or "undamaged"? I'm not saying anything like that. Are you saying that for "unhealthy" or "damaged" brains, there's nothing that would be physically impossible to positively or negatively value?

Why are you introducing words like "healthy" or "undamaged"? I'm not saying anything like that. — Terrapin Station

I'm saying that moral valuing can reasonably be said to be an activity that healthy, undamaged minds do. Healthy, undamaged minds are machines, the range of possible functions of which are limited. It is not unreasonable to form theories about what those limits might be based on our observations. One of those theories might well be to do with the limits of what it is possible for these brains to morally value.

This process (theorising about limits based on observations) is no different to any other epistemological venture, including the idea that one cannot ride a neutrino.

Here (and elsewhere) you seem to be working on the presumption that people can value anything, can have any foundational principles, can believe anything to be the case. The human brain is the source of all these feelings. It is a physical machines like any other, all physical machines we have so far encountered have had their range of options limited by their physical characteristics. I don't see any reason to think brains are any different and therefore theories can reasonably be held about objective limits to the feelings that they can have.

Your original claim, which I objected to was "If we're just saying that something is "able to be valued," nothing would be excluded from that."

Your assertion there that nothing would be excluded from that is a very controversial and wildly unsupported assertion for the complete uniqueness of the human brain among all other mechanisms (biological and merely physical) which we have ever encountered, all of which have had their range of possible states constrained by their natures.

Thank you for taking this on, you're doing a far better job than I could. I hope this is not too much of a burden on your time.

To be defined is always the primary ground for some subsequent cognizant ability. That's your words. — creativesoul

No, actually, they are not. Not quite.
(To be defined).....is to be conceived, which is always the primary ground.....

Those are my words. Please recognize the temporal displacement native to the statement.
———————

If one is using common language to take account of one's own mental ongoings, then one needs to recognize a particular terminology. If one cannot recognize that particular terminology, one cannot possibly be thinking about it. — creativesoul

Granted, of course. Nevertheless, in his normal course of events, e.g., some arbitrary objective appearance, one doesn’t take account of his own mental machinations, insofar as he is not thereby examining how cognitive relations manifest according to rules, such that those machinations arrive at a cognition proper to that occasion. In such case, the cognition is merely an inference abstracted from experience.

In any case, people don’t make mistakes in cognition a priori because they have mis-defined something; people make mistakes in conversation a posteriori because they have mis-defined something. People make mistakes in cognition because they misjudge a conception, and if it should be talked about it thereafter, the mistake in conception will necessarily manifest as a mistake in the definition that linguistically represents it.

Remember my disclaimer, which I probably should have qualified with “cognitive reductionism”. It’s just that I would have expected you to recognize that conditional and accept it as such, even if I can’t convince you of its theoretical validity.

Your facile comment about 'misusing terms' is merely a bit of belligerent posturing to cover up either your indolence regarding keeping up with the literature, or an admission of a limited intellect.

From the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy article on neurophilosophy.

Computational and cognitive neuroscience was delivering an alternative kinematics for cognition, one that provided no structural analogue for folk psychology’s propositional attitudes (e.g. statements about morality) or logic-like computations over propositional contents.

ITALICS MINE

If this is too difficult for you, let me know.

So what would be something that you believe it would be physically impossible to positively or negatively value?