This is a really broad question but I will keep it short. I have recently finished reading Spinoza's Ethics and one of the things he tried to push is the idea that free will is just an illusion. I have heard of this idea many times before from different philosophers and I generally agree with it by now. I have for now settled with the argument that we cannot control our desires which guide our decisions, thus we are not really free. Now my question is what does the absence of freedom mean for ethics and how can our actions be judged if we cannot really control them. — Leiton Baynes
if she kills him out of intent, then we would morally blame her, but why is that different from control? she still has no choice? — Augustusea
I don't know how to argue for or against the will in terms of metaphysical reality. — Caldwell
I don't know how to argue for or against the will in terms of metaphysical reality. I do use the likes of Hume and Mill to drive the point that agency includes rationality as well as the five senses or empirical observation. — Caldwell
Couldn't agree more. But there's always behavioral cues, Big, that you can gather from me without me being aware, small, I'm giving away my secrets, i.e. liking the fireworks.I can be reasonably certain you saw the firework because I saw it too. Big.
I can only be reasonably certain how it made you feel by analyzing computer data, small. I can't trust you telling me without trusting one of your small four to reliably determine what is going on across all the other 8. — MSC
:) No prob!That's all I wanted to chime in with. I'm trying to keep out of free will debates as I no longer know where I stand on the issue. — MSC
Everything that happens is necessary. The pursuit of change is neither discounted or proved by such an observation. That isn't an argument against Aquinas and Augustine so much as a challenge to them. — Valentinus
Couldn't agree more. But there's always behavioral cues, Big, that you can gather from me without me being aware, small, I'm giving away my secrets, i.e. liking the fireworks. — Caldwell
I think I disagree with the idea that free will presupposes ethics; in any given moment, confronted with a situation that allows a "choice", there is only one course of action that is most moral from the point of view of consequentialism, for example - the one that achieves the most desirable consequences. So one really has no choice if they want to be as moral as possible. One could, however, argue that from the point of view of a law or rule based morality that what must be done in a certain situation is apply a law, and, while there may be different degrees to which the law is applied and different ways of applying it, the law is ultimately applied, so, once again, there is only a superficial amount of choice. — Aleph Numbers
Isn’t morality subjective? Doesn’t it depend on the environment, culture, society in which one finds oneself? So, my morality would be different to yours. So, I don’t see morality as being absolute. There may be common aspects of morality across cultures due to other underlying reasons. For example it is rarely moral to kill someone else because this impacts negatively on the society, though there have been societies where killing people was seen as a way to please the gods, and thus considered ‘moral’. — Roy Davies
You're equating moral beliefs with moral truths, which is the very distinction being considered. Moral realists will argue that there are moral truths separate to our moral beliefs, and that our moral beliefs are only correct if they correspond to moral truths. — Michael
Does a statement of subjective preferences not correspond with the reality of one's beliefs? Is a moral belief held by a culture not a moral truth for them, even if it is subjective? — Aleph Numbers
Perhaps it doesn't correspond to a moral fact, but it seems to me to be a truth nonetheless. When one says "x is acceptable behavior for us", with reference to one's culture, this is a moral truth - for the culture in question this is a statement of what is permitted for that culture. This is more than just a belief.
I think the term you are looking for is "moral fact", not moral truth.
"Moral truth" and "moral fact" are interchangeable for me. If they mean something else to you then reconsider my previous post using "moral fact" rather than "moral truth". — Michael
Not necessarily. One culture might believe that there are men living on the moon. They'd be wrong. That culture might believe that killing the sick is morally acceptable. They might be wrong. — Michael
That there are things permitted for that culture is not necessarily that there is nothing more to morality than what each particular culture permits. It may be that some things are (objectively) wrong even if a particular culture permits them. — Michael
You're equating moral beliefs with moral truths, which is the very distinction being considered. Moral realists will argue that there are moral truths separate to our moral beliefs, and that our moral beliefs are only correct if they correspond to moral truths.
So it's not enough to argue that we each have our own moral beliefs; you also need to argue that our moral beliefs are also moral truths to argue that morality is subjective. — Michael
It seems useless to me to speculate about how any action could possibly conflict with an unknown moral fact. — Aleph Numbers
Maybe there is the fact: one should allow any culture to act according to their subjective morality.
One could also argue from the point of the relativist that the realist has to demonstrate the existence of moral facts. Do they exist out in the universe, or are moral claims tied to some observable entity? Where is the reasoning? — Aleph Numbers
So, I don’t see morality as being absolute. — Roy Davies
What if we lived in a harsh environment where a sick person would mean we have to spend effort on looking after them, to the extent that the entire group might perish? Which is more moral then, looking after the sick person or looking after the group? This is the kind of moral decision many herd animals make (or rather, it is probably built in). For the herd to survive, sometimes the weak and sick have to be left behind so that the predator doesn't take the fitter animals.
So, if morality is absolute, then surely it should be absolute across the board, not just for humans? — Roy Davies
So, morality is optional, then?Morality is a social convenience, nothing more. — Roy Davies
The existence of moral principles is not like proving the existence of physical entities. Obviously, there is a distinction. Some truths can be understood through rational deliberation or meditation. A priori arguments can help with the understanding, and so can empirical ones. But one thing that prevents us from admitting the validity of a universal principle is the constant use of induction or anecdotal accounts of experience, especially in the first person perspective.One could also argue from the point of the relativist that the realist has to demonstrate the existence of moral facts. Do they exist out in the universe, or are moral claims tied to some observable entity? Where is the reasoning? — Aleph Numbers
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