Yes, it appears that social existence is key to the question of morality, gives it some semblance of truth and objectivity but note this is telelogical in character - morality (justice) is needed to run society in the best way possible, its truth is secondary or irrelevant. — TheMadFool

Yeah, you can see this if you challenge the morality of humans continuing to survive. They you can't use the argument that justice is good for society, since the existence of society is now under question, morally speaking. Which some environmentalists and anti-natalists do on grounds of hedonism or concern for other living species. What possible fact about the world would settle that dispute?

It's just for humans to survive. Is that statement truth-apt?

Moral claims can't be true i.e. when someone claims everyone is equal, a moral claim, he does not do so because it is true, incidentally it isn't. Ergo, moral claims must be about something else - bewitchment by language? What that something else is...??? — TheMadFool

This is again to want something's being "true" to be the reason why we claim it; truth here being a standard that moral claims can not meet because they do not work like how a proposition or statement are true. This is what the bewitchment of language allows for: that since one word can mean one thing (a certain way), we take all language to mean one thing in the same way. But claiming a moral truth works differently. The value it has is to the extent we are willing to relinquish the judgment of it and allow for the reasoning it has, prepared to see ourselves in its expression.

Morality is made up by humans like math — TheMadFool

Well, but not like math though. And we also "made up" carpentry, and international tariffs, and apologizing, and dancing, and vengeance, and fairness. The sense of truth which I am discussing is tied to the world as much as the life of etiquette. Justice can be corrupted, perverted, politicized, and simply die. Moral truth is kept alive through us, made up of us.

Yeah, you can see this if you challenge the morality of humans continuing to survive. They you can't use the argument that justice is good for society, since the existence of society is now under question, morally speaking. Which some environmentalists and anti-natalists do on grounds of hedonism or concern for other living species. What possible fact about the world would settle that dispute?

It's just for humans to survive. Is that statement truth-apt? — Marchesk

Noble Lie/Gennaion Pseudos/Pious Fiction: Religion and its baby Morality

Before getting started here, let me reiterate my appreciation for your philosophical acumen. I consider you as one of the few actually doing philosophy, even while disagreeing with, or perhaps not fully understanding, the philosophy you do. That being said, going back to the beginning....

the structure of a moral claim is not a statement (known to be true) — Antony Nickles

.....does that mean not a known true statement, or, not a statement at all? I took it to mean not a statement at all, insofar as I hold the structure of moral claims to be grounded in the moral feeling alone. The expression of my poverty or well-being is also derived from feelings, but the pledge respecting that expression is a statement, and because it expresses a subjective condition a priori, it must be known by me to be true.

Then you continue with.....

the structure of a moral claim is not a statement (known to be true), but that it is a claim that expresses my/our poverty or wellness — Antony Nickles

...which appears to say, the structure of a moral claim is not a statement but it is a claim that expresses. But a claim that expresses can very well be a statement known to be true. Continuing....

a claim that expresses my/our poverty or wellness(...). My claim is not a theory but my pledge to be responsible for its state — Antony Nickles

.....it must be assumed my poverty or wellness regards a moral condition, for it is certain the moral condition is the only condition for which full responsibility can be pledged.

But still, the structure of a moral claim......not a statement, an expression by pledge, a pledge of acceptance, acceptance of responsibility, responsibility of my poverty or wellness, my moral poverty or wellness.
————-

Diamond proposes that a moral claim can be general, as universally claimed (...), most importantly, is that I am claiming it — Antony Nickles

This is what happens when language philosophy is treated as something useful. That a moral claim can be general, is very far from the claiming of it, and is the root of the haphazardness of the entire discussion. Diamond.....or you.....should have said, a moral claim-ing can be general, which means anyone can do it, which is certainly a true moral statement. Everyone DOES claim his morals, comes implicit in being a moral agent.

When you say, “I am claiming it”, you intend to be understood as staking a claim on, taking possession of, subscribing to....some personal moral dictation. Which is what every moral agent already does; it is how he IS a moral agent in the first place. The claiming you’re doing, the claim you stake, the subscription to which you hold, is merely the principle of your responsibility for your moral poverty or wellness. All well and good, couldn’t be otherwise. But to say you are claiming responsibility for mine, or that I pledge anything about yours, is outside the realm of moral consideration. Hence, the question concerning the relation between morals to ethics.
—————-

It’s easy to lay claim; it’s impossible to lay claim without thinking about it. Given enough thought, a theory falls out naturally, and from that, it is clear....

The claim of a moral principal and an aesthetic judgment are expressed in a similar structure — Antony Nickles

.....is only superficially true, insofar as aesthetic judgements are grounded in a subjective condition with respect to empirical predicates, re: the beautiful, but the claim of a moral principle, claim here taken from your implication of staking a claim in a moral principle, claim-ing a moral principle, taking possession of it implicitly re: the sublime, in your case apparently, responsibility, are grounded in a subjective condition predicated on pure practical reason. Similar structure in subjective condition, but nonetheless very different in their respective expressions, the former being a judgement expresses as a cognition, the latter being necessary ground for the judgement, expressed as a feeling.

Even language philosophers, with all the needless verbiage of context and usefulness and whatnot, must acknowledge that no principle can be itself a judgement. Still, without a theory to show how, which Everydayman doesn’t care about but still feels, while the philosopher must because he feels, it’s easy to lay claim to a principle without ever considering the source of it, and consequently, the truth of its necessity.

The structure of a moral claim to truth....is its principle.

:100:

The structure of a moral claim to truth....is its principle. — Mww

:100: :100:
Carbon compressed: a diamond!
(Uh, the gem of great value, that is, not the author.)

The idea of wanting something to be "truth-apt" is to have something to depend on, justify our acts, ensure agreement, etc. The sense of a statement that is true or false takes our place--which I say is the structure of a moral claim, in our having to be true to something. — Antony Nickles

Let's just say that there is more than one sense of truth. One basic sense is where you accept or reject a proposition. This sense is well tracked by language: pretty much anything that can be stated as a meaningful proposition is truth-apt in that sense. But then, as you point out, there are senses that extend beyond one person and past the here-and-now.

I am interested in the performance of "accepting" a claim without doing anything; I've called this platitudes, slogans, quotations; but that is to put the responsibility on the speech, not the speaker. — Antony Nickles

There clearly is a sense of morality that does not necessarily imply action. Otherwise we couldn't have had moral attitudes towards past events, or generally anything in which we cannot partake or just don't happen to have an occasion to partake, and that's clearly not true. One can moralize without acting - indeed, since "passions" are what motivate and guide our actions in the first place, how could they not precede actions? And when one fails to act, that doesn't retrospectively render one's attitudes amoral.

Morality is, as you say, a commitment that one takes upon oneself: commitment to be and to do as a moral principle demands of you. But such a commitment does not arise just at the moment "when we are lost as to what to do." Just as with morally-neutral decisions, at the point when a decision is contemplated, all the beliefs and attitudes that will inform that decision are usually already in place. And just as with non-moral beliefs and attitides, that is possible because we have been developing those beliefs and attitudes all throughout our lives, long before this particular action opportunity presented itself.

the structure of a moral claim is not a statement (known to be true)
— Antony Nickles

.....does that mean not a known true statement, or, not a statement at all? I took it to mean not a statement at all, insofar as I hold the structure of moral claims to be grounded in the moral feeling alone. — Mww

Not a statement known or judged to be true or false, so, not a statement (is there any other); the idea of a declaration is more appropriate, announcing to everyone that it is me staking myself to this truth. This is not a feeling, say, Humean. A moral truth is part of our world (there are criteria and rationale) though not a claim about the state of the world.

The expression of my poverty or well-being is also derived from feelings, but the pledge respecting that expression is a statement, and because it expresses a subjective condition a priori, it must be known by me to be true. — Mww

Diamond.....or you.....should have said, a moral claim-ing can be general, which means anyone can do it, which is certainly a true moral statement.[/quote]

I meant general, as not specific (see discussion above re Wittgenstein), but also that I claim it to be a truth for all of us, which is a claim to community as much as it is to truth.

to say you are claiming responsibility for mine, or that I pledge anything about yours, is outside the realm of moral consideration. — Mww

Your responsibility is your own, but I hold this truth to be available to both of us, acceptable to both of us, but that you must come to it yourself or reject it, and, though, your reasons may be yours alone, that you are categorically answerable to them.

The claim of a moral principal and an aesthetic judgment are expressed in a similar structure
— Antony Nickles

.....is only superficially true, insofar as aesthetic judgements are grounded in a subjective condition with respect to empirical predicates, re: the beautiful — Mww

My point in drawing a connection is that an aesthetic claim is made as universal, in the sense that you can see it for yourself in what I show you that can be seen. This is not a claim of a subjective condition, or a justification from a subjective position (I don't want to go down a Kantian rabbit-hole, but it is along the lines of the form of the beautiful). To say it is "subjective" is to judge the personal by the desired, imposed criteria of certainty, the achievement of which is the erasure of our responsibility for truth entirely.

but the claim of a moral principle... here taken from your implication of staking a claim in a moral principle, claim-ing a moral principle, taking possession of it implicitly re: the sublime, in your case apparently, responsibility, are grounded in a subjective condition predicated on pure practical reason. — Mww

Your characterization of the acceptance of a moral truth implicitly, as in the sense of without question or reservation, is not the structure of the acceptance; I am accepting to be responsible for it, to it. My reasons are my own, as are my reservations. In addition, I am not accepting one thing, or asking you to do the same, for my or a set of reasons which we agree to, but within its depth and breadth, though perhaps not to all of it, but which is mine to be held to, by.

their respective expressions, the former being a judgement expresses as a cognition, the latter being necessary ground for the judgement, expressed as a feeling. — Mww

I am pointing out a categorical requirement, apart from the picture of only a dichotomy of reason or feeling (irrationality). I call it categorical because it is implicit of the structure of what a moral truth is, my part in it, to it, is part of its grammar as Wittgenstin will call it.

no principle can be itself a judgement... it's easy to lay claim to a principle without ever considering the source of it, and consequently, the truth of its necessity. — Mww

There is no necessity for it except that which you see in it, or are willing to be answerable for in its rejection, to endlessly attempt to reconcile ourselves within it, to it, of which we are the source (not my reason or feeling, independent of my responsiveness).

Morality is made up by humans like math — TheMadFool

So that it is made up makes it not truth-apt? But "1+1=2" is true; and so is "The bishop stays on the same colour squares" and "slavery is unjust".

But it might be worth considering further. Let's look at Anscombe's shopping list. If it is a list of all the things she bought, it will be true if it lists all and only the things she bought. If it is a list of the things she is intending to buy, is it still true if it lists all and only the things she intends to buy...? I'm wiling to consider alternatives.

As to the justice of slavery: 's reply misses the relation between justice and slavery, perhaps because Sushi seems to think of justice in terms of punishment - "payment for one's actions" - rather than equity. To understand justice one needs to go further by realising that "payment" implies a reciprocity between one's actions and what one deserves; justice insists that what one person deserves for a given action be the same as for another. Here's a good definition of justice:



Being forced into voluntary slavery is not an example of justice. The injustice implicit in slavery is in the inherent inequity it introduces between slave and owner.

And taking that even further, it is entirely consistent for someone to agree that slavery is unjust, and yet also keep slaves; provided they reject the moral imperative that one ought be just. That's one of @Marchesk's points.

My concern would begin with whether justice was real or just a social construct. — Marchesk

Social constructs are not real? That's not quite right. Injustice is very real. Again, thinking in terms of justice not being an "objective feature of the world" obscures its import. Objective or not, it is a feature of the world! Always remove "objective" and "subjective" from an utterance in order to check what work they are doing.

So, @TheMadFool, you are right that there is a sentiment in some who read Wittgenstein to say that moral statements are not truth-apt. I'm not convinced by their arguments. But the point that moral truths are not found by examining how things are holds; the direction of fit is muddled.

I'll go over the difference in direction of fit one more time. To decide if "the cat is on the mat" or "The cat is not on the mat", one looks at how the world is, and makes a choice as to which words fit. But making observations is of no help in deciding if "the cat ought be on the mat" or "the cat ought not be on the mat" is true. Rather these last are an expression of an intent to act upon the world.

(Note the distinction between equity and equality used here.)

at the point when a decision is contemplated, all the beliefs and attitudes that will inform that decision are usually already in place. And just as with non-moral beliefs and attitides, that is possible because we have been developing those beliefs and attitudes all throughout our lives, long before this particular action opportunity presented itself. — SophistiCat

:up:

it might be worth considering further. Let's look at Anscombe's shopping list. If it is a list of all the things she bought, it will be true if it lists all and only the things she bought. If it is a list of the things she is intending to buy, is it still true if it lists all and only the things she intends to buy...? I'm wiling to consider alternatives. — Banno

If we consider that not every act is intentional (chosen), but nevertheless certain acts include being willing to answer for them (more than just "did you intend to...?), then we are not like the investigator, who may get the record of the world wrong, but we also would not be said to have made a mistake in what we intended (to do). The mistake we may be said to make in relation to a truth is that we wish to excuse ourselves of our obligation to it, our promise to stand for it (to welch, I think Austin says); we may have made an error in the sense of not realizing the terms and implications I was committing to, but this is not to denigrate its truth, but, reflect on me.

I'll go over the difference in direction of fit one more time. To decide if "the cat is on the mat" or "The cat is not on the mat", one looks at how the world is, and makes a choice as to which words fit. But making observations is of no help in deciding if "the cat ought be on the mat" or "the cat ought not be on the mat" is true. Rather these last are an expression of an intent to act upon the world. — Banno

The direction we take is thus not towards the world, to express it correctly, truthfully, but towards our desires and intentions. I would qualify this as the expression of those in this case, which is to say the history of the things that have been said about this truth. And, since our language contains our interests and judgments in the world, that they reflect on ourselves. Do I fit the life (the list) of what our truths are to be?

And I am taking a moral claim as a conclusion of what we ought to do, as different than a truth we are asked to accept absent a call to a specific action, not decided before taking, in light of taking, or what that act should be. The necessity for action is as yet undetermined, but I nevertheless am in position to choose whether I will stand ready (thereafter) in response (either way).

My concern would begin with whether justice was real or just a social construct. — Marchesk

Your acceptance of a claim of what justice is thus appears contingent on your knowledge of it. And one answer I take as a wish that there was a fact about it, and the other would be some sense that we made it up or agreed to it, as if there were no necessary fact about it. I would say there is no "fact" about a moral truth that will satisfy the criteria to obviate your place in the state of its truth, but that, nevertheless, it is not insupportable, only not without our part, our bringing them to life, carrying them forward in our culture, adapting them to new contexts, allowing them to constitute us and compromise us.

Wittgenstein declares that we are not of the opinion (that it is not a matter of knowledge) that the other has a soul (p. 179). An aspect, a possibility, dawns on me (or we are blind to it) and we accept an attitude about someone's soul, as in the position I take toward others; my acts treat them as if they have a soul. The relation we have to a moral truth is to put myself in such a position to it (as part of the grammar of how such a truth works).

So that it is made up makes it not truth-apt? But "1+1=2" is true; and so is "The bishop stays on the same colour squares" and "slavery is unjust".

But it might be worth considering further. Let's look at Anscombe's shopping list. If it is a list of all the things she bought, it will be true if it lists all and only the things she bought. If it is a list of the things she is intending to buy, is it still true if it lists all and only the things she intends to buy...? I'm wiling to consider alternatives. — Banno

What I meant was justice or other moral entities are more a thing of human minds, internal, than a thing of the world, external. You will not, I repeat not, find a single instance of justice or other moral rules instantiated in the world save those by us, humans, and that too with the greatest difficulty. The world, the universe, I wish to point out, is not just or good in any sense of that word.

Isn't that the whole point of the is/ought framework of morality. What is is unsatisfactory (dukkha) i.e. the facts/truths as they stand are amoral, even immoral, and hence we make up/imagine a different world in terms of how it ought to be.

The world was/is/will be, by and large, morally indifferent bordering on outright immorality i.e. if there are truths, they all pertain to badness, how cruel the world is - confirmable, empirically, with ease.

Humans came along and discovered, it must've been shocking & disappointing, this and hence, religion, other ethical systems, was/were born as attempts to correct this rather frightening flaw. Only after this, in the human, did good become truths, verifiable in the thoughts/speech/actions of people and people only.

There is nothing good about the world, nature is red in tooth and claw; every moral statement you make - you should do this or you shouldn't do this - is false in the real world. Nobody follows moral codes except under some imagined/cooked up system of ideas, very human ideas.

It looks as though I'm conflating truth-apt with false but, in some sense, that which is not truth-apt and that which is false are both not about our world.

Social constructs are not real? That's not quite right. Injustice is very real. Again, thinking in terms of justice not being an "objective feature of the world" obscures its import. Objective or not, it is a feature of the world! Always remove "objective" and "subjective" from an utterance in order to check what work they are doing. — Banno

Sure, but granting that something is a social construct makes it rather arbitrary. Different societies create different constructs. The Romans thought slavery was justifiable. We don't. Who adjudicates between the two?

Or to put it another way, who decides that equity is the fundamental moral value and not courage, holiness or an eye for an eye? Different societies value different things. We see this difference between the East and West over individual rights versus the collective good. Which is more important? Depends on who you ask.

If I make a statement that social construct A is moral, what grounds that? Is it just because the particular society I happen to live in values construct A? But if I grew up in a difference society I might find myself valuing construct B.

Your acceptance of a claim of what justice is thus appears contingent on your knowledge of it. And one answer I take as a wish that there was a fact about it, and the other would be some sense that we made it up or agreed to it, as if there were no necessary fact about it. I would say there is no "fact" about a moral truth that will satisfy the criteria to obviate your place in the state of its truth, but that, nevertheless, it is not insupportable, only not without our part, our bringing them to life, carrying them forward in our culture, adapting them to new contexts, allowing them to constitute us and compromise us. — Antony Nickles

My issue is that if morality is entirely human-made, then there's no objective truth to it, except for sociological facts about this person's morals and that cultures morality. Which means that anyone's morality, including our modern enlightened since of fairness, is arbitrary. Nothing real makes it true. It's historical contingency that we end up valuing what we do. Or perhaps there's an evolutionary explanation for a tendency of the species to construct fair societies, despite our numerous failures over the past few thousand years.

Nothing else in nature cares whether we treat each other fairly. Whether we succeed or not, the universe is totally indifferent.

justice insists that what one person deserves for a given action be the same as for another. — Banno

Slavery for all! It is ‘just’. If you litter the streets then slavery! It is just and deserv … wait a minute!? You call it ‘punishment’ and I call it ‘cost’. It’s basic economics from my perspective. Nothing comes for free - especially freedom.

It appears I misunderstood the point of the OP so this is a side issue.

When it comes to equality I’m in the camp of equality of opportunity not equality of outcome. The boxes picture is a nice twee analogy but in other situations it can be less than easy to agree (especially when defining ‘justice’ based on identity groups).

My issue is that if morality is entirely human-made, then there's no objective truth to it... Which means that anyone's morality, including our modern enlightened sense of fairness, is arbitrary. Nothing real makes it true. — Marchesk

This is the story relativism tells. But you will notice it begins with the desire (demand) that truth meet a standard that does not include us, as math does not, nor science. But this is not the nature of truth, and so its condemnation is our doing, not its failing. We deem ourselves "arbitrary" because we don't meet the very standard we impose in a desire to avoid ourselves being responsible, avoid ourselves being known if we are. Our interests, our judgments, are the long history of a moral truth, which we paint as partial, contingent, irrational, but it is ours, our culture, our duty, in which to make who we are, what our culture will be, our country, in relation.

To desire a third party (criteria) to arbitrate a truth between you and I--to wish for a rule to tell me what is the right thing to do--is to abdicate a moral conversation before we have even begun. The fact is that we may not come to agreement but we can have a disagreement for reasons we understand and will know at least what each stands for.

Not a statement known or judged to be true or false, so, not a statement (is there any other); the idea of a declaration is more appropriate, announcing to everyone that it is me staking myself to this truth. — Antony Nickles

In the same way that a statement could have no meaning to the subject receiving it as it may to the subject constructing it, to stake a claim to a moral truth by a subject, could have no meaning to the subject receiving that declaration. I don’t care what truth you stake yourself to, but at the same time, recognize the necessity of a truth you stake yourself to. But I sure as hell might care how you express it.

a moral claim-ing can be general, which means anyone can do it, which is certainly a true moral statement.

I meant general, as not specific (see discussion above re Wittgenstein), but also that I claim it to be a truth for all of us, which is a claim to community as much as it is to truth. — Antony Nickles

Ok, I see. Your statement, “Diamond proposes that a moral claim can be general, as universally claimed (...), most importantly, is that I am claiming it”, merely indicates the declaration that a universally claimed moral truth is also claimed by you. You are declaring your pledge of responsibility to a moral truth generally claimed by everyone, or, claimed universally.

Yeah, but if there was a universally claimed moral truth, you saying you’d also claim it, is superfluous. It’s universal......you’ve already claimed it. You’re advocating a tautological condition, from which withdrawal is impossible. That’s herd mentality writ large, at the expense of the very intrinsic human condition of moral autonomy, is it not?
—————

Your responsibility is your own, but I hold this truth to be available to both of us, acceptable to both of us, but that you must come to it yourself or reject it, and, though, your reasons may be yours alone, that you are categorically answerable to them. — Antony Nickles

What truth? The truth Diamond proposed, or the truth that my responsibility is my own. For dialectical consistency, I shall suppose the former, the latter of course being uncontested.

This is to have cake and eat it too, which are mutually exclusive. For any universally claimed moral truth, such as Diamond proposed, the reasons for the claiming of it are irrelevant, insofar as the judgement arising from those reasons, will always and only end in responsibility for claiming of that truth, no matter what it is. Otherwise, it is not universally claimed, hence, self-contradictory.

Furthermore, there inhabits a categorical error: in the first there is said to be a universally claimed general moral truth, the rejection of which would be impossible, in the second there is the assertion of the availability of a possible general moral truth, but universality is not found in it, which permits its rejection. That I am categorically responsible for my reasons and by association my judgements given from them, does not immediately demand I am categorically responsible for accepting a general moral truth.

If I must come to a truth of my own accord, under the auspices of my own reason, and that necessarily a priori, how is it possible for you to claim it must be acceptable to me? The only way you can know whether or not I accept, is the action I exhibit in response to it. But I can act as if in acceptance, but rationally reject the truth asserted as available to me.

So, inevitably, we arrive at the Kantian rabbit hole, as all proper philosophy seems to do:

“The old question with which people sought to push logicians into a corner, so that they must either have recourse to pitiful sophisms or confess their ignorance, and consequently the vanity of their whole art, is this: "What is truth?"...”

————-

no principle can be itself a judgement... it's easy to lay claim to a principle without ever considering the source of it, and consequently, the truth of its necessity.
— Mww

There is no necessity for it except that which you see in it, or are willing to be answerable for in its rejection, — Antony Nickles

Absolutely. The necessity contained in principles is as we see it, as we understand them, insofar as they are born from us. From that, it follows that granting the exception is negation of universality (of a general moral truth). Willingness to be responsible for rejection is negation of validity (of truth).

Universal claiming of a general moral truth is not impossible. There can be a moral truth available and acceptable to everyone, although I argue its possibility is vanishingly small. The onus is on those advocating that it isn’t, to present, not a mere claiming of, but a justification for, why it isn’t.

HA!!! What’s the average human worth? 23 cents, or some such? Inflation....19?

You and I can reminisce about cigarets at 25 cents per pack, gas at 18 cents, the nickel candy bar, 10 cent ice cream cones, two scoops for 15. But what brought it home for me was reading real estate for-sale signs in the window of a Lexington, Mass., RE office. Houses for around $1.5 M. Fifty-or-so years before, just $15,000 (that, then, very expensive). That a one-hundred-times increase. And Maine keeps up, on the coast.

And people: as salvage, not much. Probably worth more as manure producers than as manure itself, though cows do it better. But aspirationally or in terms of higher production, more. I don't know what the world's GNP is, but even divided by 7.5B is likely still a respectable amount. If only it could be more equitably distributed.

My parents went into a serious hole paying for the house I grew up in, and the land included with it. My first reenlistment check would have paid for it three times over. Now, that amount would only partially pay for a decent used car.

My dad gave me a quarter once, for not lying about wearing this ungodly stupid rain hat when I got off the bus. I gave my son $10 for raking leaves, and people used to give me $100 just to walk through their door.

The more things change, the more they stay the same.

How about Cicero and the notion of right reason? It is a democratic value to know the truth because right reason is essential to things going well, and wrongly reasoning can lead to trouble. Education for good moral judgment is about understanding cause and effect and the importance of right reasoning. This also goes with Socrates' concern about expanding our consciousness because if we don't know enough, we are more apt to make bad decisions. And the miracle of democracy is having many points of view, a broad consciousness.

Ignoring the pandemic because of not wanting to close businesses and loose votes, cost Trump the last election because of the number of people who voted against Trump's reasoning. If the goal is to eradicate a deadly disease, Trump obviously did not have the right reasoning. I think moral judgment based on truth is very important.

...justifiable... — Marchesk

...but not equitable. Seems to me this argument is based on word-play.

The world, the universe, I wish to point out, is not just or good in any sense of that word. — TheMadFool

It'd be difficult to maintain both the world is amoral and that the world is immoral.

One or the other. Not both.

One or the other. Not both. — Banno

Or we could say that morality is not a domain that applies to nature. It's a category error to apply morality to the universe.

...but not equitable. Seems to me this argument is based on word-play. — Banno

Sure, as long as we admit morality is based on words we make up (in the language game of society).

It'd be difficult to maintain both the world is amoral and that the world is immoral.

One or the other. Not both. — Banno

:ok: Correctamundo!

Two ways of looking at it:

1. Non-pandeistically: The world is amoral

2. Pandeistically: The world is immoral

How about Cicero and the notion of right reason? It is a democratic value to know the truth because right reason is essential to things going well, and wrongly reasoning can lead to trouble. Education for good moral judgment is about understanding cause and effect and the importance of right reasoning. This also goes with Socrates' concern about expanding our consciousness because if we don't know enough, we are more apt to make bad decisions. And the miracle of democracy is having many points of view, a broad consciousness — Athena

I agree that a broad education is important. It does bring up the issue again of avoiding a rote understanding of truth. I take this as the difference between "knowing" the truth and accepting it (telling myself rather than being told). As well as understanding its depth of meaningfulness, we come to its importance as a personal process, a journey of my life maybe as much as my acknowledgement of its implications. The reading of Cicero that stuck with me was that it mattered to the truth who I was as a person, which I read as that I am part of the state of a truth. That this can be done well or poorly, rather than right or wrong. That we are not here concerned about ends (things going well).

You are declaring your pledge of responsibility to a moral truth generally claimed by everyone, or, claimed universally. — Mww

A claim to the truth is made as if it were universal, as there is no reason it can't be (the other is in the same position with a rejection). I make it in a universal voice, as Wittgenstein makes his claims to a grammatical remark or difference, such as that believing is like hoping and not thinking (#574).

That I am categorically responsible for my reasons and by association my judgements given from them, does not immediately demand I am categorically responsible for accepting a general moral truth. — Mww

No, it's that a truth is accepted or rejected--that's how it works--it is not proved true and false (that's a different kind of true). Not that it is a demand by me, but that, like the pain of the other, it is a claim upon you, who you will be, in response.

Willingness to be responsible for rejection is negation of validity (of truth). — Mww

Well being willing to provide a reasoned rejection to a claim to truth is at least more courageous than refusing to answer at all (say, sliding out behind logic, science, that it's all irrational). I'm not sure just being responsible is a negation, but I will say the possibility of rejection is not an immediate fracturing of community. There is the opportunity for rational disagreement.

The onus is on those advocating that it isn’t [a small, vanishing chance for truth], to present, not a mere claiming of, but a justification for, why it isn’t. — Mww

I acknowledge that we shouldn't blindly accept things, but, as I have said, you should see for yourself. Otherwise, this seems very cynical. I would call for more of us to attempt to see the truth in something rather than demanding that the other provide justification first. Our job as philosophers is to seek the truth, stand in the other's shoes (on their terms), find something of worth even though there may be a weakness (make their argument the strongest case you can), acknowledge more and not dismiss out of hand, etc. I take this as Diamond's hope for the truth, for us to think well on its behalf. Prefunctory skepticism lacks intelligence and imagination just as much as blind obedience. @Banno@Marchesk@tim wood

Good talk. Thanks.

I agree that a broad education is important. It does bring up the issue again of avoiding a rote understanding of truth. I take this as the difference between "knowing" the truth and accepting it (telling myself rather than being told). As well as understanding its depth of meaningfulness, we come to its importance as a personal process, a journey of my life maybe as much as my acknowledgement of its implications. The reading of Cicero that stuck with me was that it mattered to the truth who I was as a person, which I read as that I am part of the state of a truth. That this can be done well or poorly, rather than right or wrong. That we are not here concerned about ends (things going well). — Antony Nickles

Oh my, that last sentence seems like a good left jab that I was not expecting and my head is spinning. :lol: I was thinking yes I agree with what you are saying all the to that last sentence.

Take the threat of covid for example. If we do not eradicate it right now, it will become endemic instead of pandemic. That means it will be so much in our population it will be like the cold of the flu, something we live with forever instead of an irradicated disease.

Endemics, on the other hand, are a constant presence in a specific location. Malaria is endemic to parts of Africa. Ice is endemic to Antarctica. — Intermountain Health Care

We really need to get this right or we are not getting rid of Covid.

Another example, Mao meant well when he ruled how farmers would plant and how food would be managed, but he was scientifically wrong and that lead to millions of people starving to death. Trump ignoring the scientific evidence about pandemics is the same thing, with almost the same results of millions dying, but this time the problem might not go away.

Another example is Biden's Budget Plans. If he is right the US will be greatly benefited. If he is wrong it could mean economic disaster.

Democracy means nothing if it is not "concerned about ends". The moral is, if we don't get it right, things will go very wrong.

The reading of Cicero that stuck with me was that it mattered to the truth who I was as a person, which I read as that I am part of the state of a truth. That this can be done well or poorly, rather than right or wrong. That we are not here concerned about ends (things going well). — Antony Nickles

Because then it was not the right or wrong of it, not least because who knew what that was anyway. Instead it was the good man, or the best man, and what he did or had to say, and how he did it or said it. All this under rhetoric, and there unremarkable; and the failure to properly grasp the difference from logic - supposing it a red-headed child of logic - means a failure to understand argumentation itself, supposing that to be merely a matter of demonstration, when in fact it cannot be that.

Democracy means nothing if it is not "concerned about ends". — Athena

I didn’t mean to disagree, just to differentiate what I was discussing. Truth in this sense is more like a founding principal than a decision about what to do, how we are to decide in a moral quandary. Of course I do agree with the need for a reasonable discussion about those issues, and, when we extend into the unknown, we are in a similar structural position of responsibility to an ethical decision as the acceptance of a principal. Though I would think the context is more concrete with a decision about what to do.