What would be an example of a performative contradiction of mine, then? — Terrapin Station

Saying things that there's no way in hell that you actually believe, like that you don't know whether or not I believe that I'm on the moon, and that the meaning of words like these is entirely subjective, and that you have no position in this discussion. Those are purely philosophical positions, and I don't mean that in a good way. And those are just the ones I can remember.

What would determine who it includes? — Terrapin Station

Use your imagination. You say that I don't give straightforward answers, but the reason I do that is because I think that you ask questions without thinking things through properly, even though you're capable of doing so.

We've spoke about this before. Weren't you a teacher?

I'd not have any laws based on psychological effects period. — Terrapin Station

Again. You're not king remember? But how am I to understand this? You're OK with child abuse? Seriously?

Sure, it's possible to be wrong about them, although basically we have to argue counterfactuals and counterfactual truth values are close to impossible. — Terrapin Station

Indeed, but it's a task that is necessary nonetheless because we can only have one policy as a community. We need to work out, to the best of our ability, which policy that should be. Arguments about the likelihood of counterfactuals is really the only way to inject any consensus building into the process (otherwise it's just might/majority power).

In the cases at hand, it's not an issue of disagreeing over what the consequences would be, but feeling differently about the consequences regarding whether they're acceptable/desirable or not. — Terrapin Station

No, I disagree, and this is the point I'm trying to make. The question of whether you find the consequences acceptable/desirable is itself amenable to further analysis of this kind. why do you find those consequences acceptable/desirable? At some point in time during this questioning process you will come to "I just do", but that reality does not, in itself, constitute an argument that any given question (about acceptability/desirability) is at the point.

With free speech, simply taking as our base for the sake of ease (given a 70+ page thread) the consequences @Benkei has recently listed.

What about defamation?

What about spreading lies about a competitor causing him to lose money?

What about copyright infringement?

What about psychological abuse?

What about leaking military plans causing a lot of deaths?

What about leaking company secrets to competitors causing loss of income?

You do not merely find these consequences acceptable/desirable as a matter of foundational feeling, they are too specific for you to have a gut feeling about, you would be thinking about consequences still. Psychological abuse you've already mentioned, you just happen, foundationally, to think that's fine. You think that exposure would make people tougher, less liable to believe lies. But the feeling that people would be better tougher and less liable to believe lies doesn't just pop into your head either, you're still thinking about the consequences, how much better a society would be if people were tougher and less liable to believe lies.

Ultimately, it always comes down to some vision of utopia (your frequent reference to "if I were king"), but society is like a machine, you cannot simply imagine a car that flies (without any modifications) and claim you're just as right as any other in aiming for it. The laws of physics will constrain your options. Likewise with society, the limitations on what a human can do with their brain constrain the options for your utopia in a very real and empirical sense. They also constrain the options for how to get from here to there.

We may not have all the data on what those constraints are, but it doesn't allow for just any old nonsense to get treated as reasonably as mainstream views.

-- just to add, I'm only very intermittently available for a few days, so I might not get around to responding further for the duration.

Yeah, I lost that subthread a bit--I forgot exactly what the context was overall. But basically I'd say the same thing I said above. A measurement can be in accordance with some standard, but it would be difficult to argue for a usage of "correct" that doesn't have a normative connotation. You'd have to keep pointing out that you're using a non-normative "correct," because it would be read with a normative connotation in the vast majority of cases.

The problem is that there's no should to being in accordance with some standard, aside from one personally feeling that way.

You're bringing up too many issues to address at the same time.

You do not merely find these consequences acceptable/desirable as a matter of foundational feeling, they are too specific for you to have a gut feeling about, you would be thinking about consequences still. — Isaac

I think this is the most important thing to address first.

When ethical stance M is foundational for S on occasion O, all that means is that for S, on occasion O, there is no sentential (utterable-in-a-sentence) ethical stance "beneath" or "behind" M.

M can be any conceivable ethical stance.

How can that be the case?

Let's say that S is considering a situation where (this is a real-world occurrence I just heard about this morning) S was shot in the face at close range with a t-shirt gun at a sporting event, causing S to fall backwards, hit S's head on concrete, get a concussion, and have subsequent medical problems. S is contemplating whether S feels it would be morally acceptable to sue the team in question. This is a very specific thing to consider.

Well, in that situation, S can simply feel that either yes, it would be morally acceptable to sue the team in question, or no, it wouldn't be morally acceptable, where S's decision is simply S's intuitive or "gut" feeling, without S's decision resting on some other moral stance that S holds.

You apparently want to argue that this isn't possible (without actually providing an argument that it's not possible).

Meanwhile, I do that sort of thing often myself. I consider some specific dilemma and simply intuit how I feel about it. That stems in part from me coming to believe that principle-based approaches are not a good idea. This doesn't imply that no thought can go into it, but (a) the thought that goes into it might not be any sort of ethical stance, and (b) the thought that goes into it might not be foundational--and really it can't be if it's not an ethical stance, as no non-ethical stance can imply any particular ethical stance.

Again. You're not king remember? — Benkei

I'm telling you what I'd do. What do you want instead--tell you what someone else would do?

I'm okay with "child abuse" when it's only psychological, sure.

With you not being okay with it and wanting to prohibit it, can you answer the question I asked: how would you enforce any laws against psychological abuse? How would you establish that there has even been psychological abuse against kids?

A measurement can be in accordance with some standard, but it would be difficult to argue for a usage of "correct" that doesn't have a normative connotation. You'd have to keep pointing out that you're using a non-normative "correct," because it would be read with a normative connotation in the vast majority of cases. — Terrapin Station

Have you noticed that you're the only one who has this problem? It's a problem that you've invented.

The problem is that there's no should to being in accordance with some standard, aside from one personally feeling that way. — Terrapin Station

It's not a problem now, and it never was a problem to begin with. There's no "should" in saying that something is 7". You're arguing against no one other than yourself on this point, it seems.

Saying things that there's no way in hell that you actually believe, like that you don't know whether or not I believe that I'm on the moon, and that the meaning of words like these is entirely subjective, and that you have no position in this discussion. — S

Without bothering to clear up just what I said, all you're doing there is saying that you're incapable of even buying that someone can have a view that's that different than your own. To some extent it's because folks aren't interested enough to learn the details of what the view actually is (such as my view of what meaning is, how it works, etc.).

We've spoke about this before. Weren't you a teacher? — S

Yeah, I taught a bit when I was a grad student and briefly beyond that. If I were to ask a student to give details or further explain something they were saying and they refused and basically said, "You should know already/I don't believe that you don't know" they wouldn't have received a very good grade.

Have you noticed that you're the only one who has this problem? — S

Would you like to make a wager on whether a large majority (say >85%) of people assign a normative connotation to the word "correct" in various contexts? I'll put up any amount of money you'd like. We'll put it in escrow. Then we'll set up a research project to check whether people assign a normative connotation to that term.

You use the term normatively all the time. The only time you try to not do that is when it's pointed out that you do. I don't know why you don't want to admit that you use the term that way.

It's not a problem now, and it never was a problem to begin with. There's no "should" in saying that something is 7". — S

The "should" is in saying that it's correct to say that it's 7" and that it's correct to use a particular standard. "Correct" is the term that has a normative connotation to the vast majority of people.

The way I'd not be "immune" to negative feedback is this:

You make an argument--an actual argument (it doesn't have to be formal, but at least a rhetorical argument with some logical flow to it), not just a lot of posturing and attitude--that

(a) I've not heard a bunch of times before (in various guises)
(b) I consider at least tentatively plausible and sound
(c) can stand up to sustained tough questioning, objections, etc., so that the idea that the argument is plausible and sound is cemented after that.

Again, that would have to be done in good faith, without a lot of ego-oriented defensiveness, ego-oriented attacks, etc. (in other words--posturing and attitude). And the sustained phase of examining the argument would have to stay on-track, without veering all over the map re bringing up additional issues, questions would have to be answered in a straightforward way, in the detail asked for, etc.

Edited: I was being redundant.
Someone can be correct or incorrect according to a standard, but not in the adoption of that standard. Right?

I don't know why the other posts were deleted. Anyway, again, yeah, obviously I have unusual views, including unusual ethical views. I've stated this many times. As I said, with my political views, I've yet to run into a single other person who agrees with them overall.

Someone can be correct or incorrect according to a standard, — DingoJones

We have a standard.

A particular measurement of x, measurement A, is in accordance with the standard.

Another measurement of x, measurement B, is not in accordance with the standard.

We're going to call measurement A "correct," and measurement B "incorrect."

===========================================================

We present the information above to a large group of random people (who of course haven't been prepped in any way).

Now, we ask those people,

"We ask you to measure x. Remember that measurement A is correct, and measurement B is incorrect. True, false, or not applicable/there's not enough information to answer: you should measure A when asked to measure x."

What percentage of people do you think will answer "false" or "NA/not enough info"?

If you do a google search for "should you do what's correct," in quotation marks, you get exactly ZERO hits.

Why? If "correct" doesn't have a normative connotation to the vast majority of people, this should be a common question.

The only way it's not a common question is if it seems redundant, so that "correct" has a connotation of being what one should do.

M can be any conceivable ethical stance. — Terrapin Station

S can simply feel that either yes, it would be morally acceptable to sue the team in question, or no, it wouldn't be morally acceptable, where S's decision is simply S's intuitive or "gut" feeling, without S's decision resting on some other moral stance that S holds. — Terrapin Station

I disagree with those statements. As I've said, the human brain is a machine, it has limits and a relatively narrow range of normal function. FMri scans done by Eric Corchesne on six month old babies showed activity being processed through the pre-frontal cortex in response to having a toy taken away before they cried. Even a six month old child processes things through the rationalising part of their brain before responding. I've mentioned before the prevailing theory of childhood learning being one of theory testing and rejection.

The majority of the psychological evidence is that if your S is deciding whether to sue without thinking, it is based on previously wired responses from repeatedly following similar patterns, the first examples of which would have been worked out rationally. Its not an honest acceptance of inherent subjectivity, its just lazily relying on rational work done earlier in life without bothering to check it's still valid.

I disagree with those statements — Isaac

That's fine, but as I noted, I do this all the time myself. So I'm left with (a) it apparently being the case that you do not do this--which is fine, and (b) you apparently insisting that people can't be that different than you are--which I wouldn't say is fine when we're doing philosophy (or anything like science, etc.)

Maybe you're claiming something like unconscious moral stances? I don't buy that there are unconscious mental phenomena period.

If you wanted to try to forward an empirical claim that all moral stances of a certain type MUST be based on earlier or intuitive moral stances of another type, whether those other/earlier stances are conscious or not, that would be a near-impossible task . . . and not the least difficulty would arise in trying to plausibly define the types of moral stances to even begin.

Oh, NOW you want to make an appeal to what everyone else thinks. Lol
You didnt answer my question, but instead pivoted to something else. I thought you didnt like that kinda thing? Simple, one thing at a time, right?
Ill try tweaking the question to get a more specific answer.

Someone can be correct or incorrect according to a particular standard, but not correct or incorrect about adopting that standard, right?
(The example standard I was using was the unit of measurement “inch”)

(b) you apparently insisting that people can't be that different than you are — Terrapin Station

It's not about difference from me though is it? Again, this is an empirical matter. I'm not claiming "I behave this way, therefore everyone else should", I'm claiming that the psychological evidence we have indicates that people behave this way.

I don't buy that there are unconscious mental phenomena period. — Terrapin Station

Really? How do you explain Weiskrantz's 'blindsight' experiments, Tulving's procedural memory experiments, Bargh & Chartrand's work on automatic processing, Brook's work on subliminal image recognition...?

I think if we're talking about what's acceptable in philosophy then one thing I'd rule out is making wildly controversial claims without any evidence simply by saying "I don't buy..."

If you wanted to try to forward an empirical claim that all moral stances of a certain type MUST be based on earlier or intuitive moral stances of another type, whether those other/earlier stances are conscious or not, that would be a near-impossible task . . . and not the least difficulty would arise in trying to plausibly define the types of moral stances to even begin. — Terrapin Station

It's not that complicated at all. We have a pretty clear idea, for example, that the pre-frontal cortex is involved in rational thought (people with damage to certain parts of it find rational thought hard), we know it's not much involved in instinctive responses. So if people engage that part of the brain when making moral decisions, they're thinking about some aspect of it rationally. Much oftthis work has already been done.

Decades of research across multiple disciplines, including behavioral economics, developmental psychology, and social neuroscience, indicate that moral reasoning arises from complex social decision-making and involves both unconscious and deliberate processes which rely on several partially distinct dimensions, including intention understanding, harm aversion, reward and value coding, executive functioning, and rule learning

-The neuroscience of morality and social decision-making, Keith J. Yoder and Jean Decety

Let's start with psychological abuse. You can basically verbally abuse your kids because protected by free speech and child protection services can't intervene.

This is a very difficult issue, especially with the “think of the children” rhetoric involved.

I like to think of it this way: if we educated children in the nature of language, and how to better grapple with their feelings when in contact with abusive words, they will learn to negate the bully’s attempts to exert power and coercion through verbal abuse.

I'm claiming that the psychological evidence we have indicates that people behave this way. — Isaac

Can you give an example of the psychological evidence you're referring to? At least that would take the conversation somewhere different.

Oh, NOW you want to make an appeal to what everyone else thinks. Lol — DingoJones

What I've said over and over is that the word "correct" conventionally has a normative connotation. You can use it however you want to use it, of course, but the vast majority of people are going to read it with a normative connotation. S and others kept denying that.

Someone can be correct or incorrect according to a particular standard, but not correct or incorrect about adopting that standard, right? — DingoJones

Someone can be correct or incorrect according to a particular standard if you're saying that "correct" has no normative connotation, and you're just using the word to refer to whether the measurement is according to the standard. (However, the vast majority of people are going to assign a normative connotation to "correct," and S typically uses it with a normative connotation, too, but sure, we can ignore that and choose to use the word in a different way. (We could use the word "correct" to refer to a broken car door--"Pull on the bungee cord to secure the correct before we start driving", or any arbitrary thing we like, of course.))

If we're using the word that way, then being correct or incorrect about adopting a standard could be the case according to some other standard (a standard, Y, of "This is the standard, X, we're going to use" for example). Unless you're using the words "correct/incorrect" in a different, normative, sense in the second instance?

The measurement can not be correct in a normative sense, of course. So if we're saying that the measurement is in line with some standard, that's fine as something descriptive, but as I said many times earlier, what of it? There's no normative weight to it. It's just a way of saying that "This is per this idea of measurement units." Well, okay, and something else can be per a different idea of measurement units.

Would you like to make a wager on whether a large majority (say >85%) of people assign a normative connotation to the word "correct" in various contexts? I'll put up any amount of money you'd like. We'll put it in escrow. Then we'll set up a research project to check whether people assign a normative connotation to that term.

You use the term normatively all the time. The only time you try to not do that is when it's pointed out that you do. I don't know why you don't want to admit that you use the term that way. — Terrapin Station

Just because people who think that the correct answer to the question of what one plus one equals is two, also most likely have related normative beliefs, like that you should answer "two" to that question if you want to give the correct answer, that doesn't mean that the former is normative, or "has normative connotations". The former is still descriptive. Descriptive and normative are two different categories, and mean two different things. The one is not the other. And the one doesn't logically imply the other. The "ought" can't be derived from the "is". You should know that as someone who includes Hume in his list of favourite philosophers.

If I say that "two" is the correct answer, there's no "should" in the meaning of that. There's just an "is". It's entirely descriptive. So no, I don't need to keep pointing out something that isn't there in the first place. If you read something into it, then that's entirely on you. It would be your misinterpretation that leads you to think that.

The "should" is in saying that it's correct to say that it's 7" and that it's correct to use a particular standard. — Terrapin Station

No. There's literally no "ought" in that. The "ought" is in your imagination. And your logic is flawed. I can say that, and I can also say that you should act accordingly. I can hold both the descriptive belief and the normative belief. But it's illogical to conclude from that that I mean the latter by saying the former.

"Correct" is the term that has a normative connotation to the vast majority of people. — Terrapin Station

No, it's descriptive to the vast majority of people. Pointing to different statements which are normative won't make that statement normative. That statement is clearly descriptive. Your logic is flawed here.

I can provide a million-and-one examples where I'm right and you're wrong on this point:

What day is it today?

Wednesday.

(I'm not saying that it should be Wednesday, or that you should think that it's Wednesday, or anything of that sort. I'm not saying anything normative at all. It's entirety descriptive. I'm simply giving the correct answer).

I dont understand why its suddenly important to you how other people use words.
I was correct in surmising that the conversation has moved on, and Im unwilling to sort through the baggage in order to get you back in point, so Ill let it go.

Can you give an example of the psychological evidence you're referring to? At least that would take the conversation somewhere different. — Terrapin Station

The paper I cited is a really good overview. I've not got a good Internet connection at the moment, but I'll see if I can track down a link with no paywall.

The paper I cited is a really good overview. — Isaac

And are you open to a critical examination of the paper and its claims?

I dont understand why its suddenly important to you how other people use words. — DingoJones

S (and maybe Isaac; I know it was someone else) complained about my criticism of calling something correct/incorrect, just because it's common/according to some consensus, etc. by claiming that I'm using those terms (correct/incorrect) unusually in suggesting that there's a normative connotation. And they also claimed to not be using the terms with a normative connotation.

Again, aside from that, if we're saying that we're really not going to use the word with a normative connotation, then pointing out that I'm departing from moral views that are widely-accepted, assuming that's the case, is pointless, because there's zero normative weight to it. It's like pointing out that someone is eating a cookie they made themselves rather than eating a Chips Ahoy. Well so what?

Okay, so you're sure that you'll win the bet re "correct" having a normative connotation. So how much are we wagering?

No, I don't believe that. I think that you're just immune. And part of your immunity is not recognising good arguments. You just see it as that none have been given. And you also insist on being in control of the discussion in order to keep the focus off of you. You're the kind of person who avoids acknowledging things and instead redirects with a question. If someone were to ask you whether you're a human being, the appropriate answer would be "Yes", not "What's a human being?". The latter is a really annoying thing that only philosophical types do.