Philosophy of Mind is a useful field of study because it deals with the metaphysics behind the mind--which is certainly not something scientists actually engage in (although they may without realizing it when they formulate their own opinion on the matter).

I think the main reason philosophy of mind is still so prominent is due to the fact that 'awareness' (i.e., the ability to acquire knowledge of one's environment) and 'experience' (i.e., the ability to consciously, subjectively view one's environment) are seemingly severed from one another.

Personally, I used to be an idealist but now I lean to just methodological naturalism (viz., I do not claim knowledge that reality is solely comprised of 'natural' entities) but, since I take the naturalistic approach to acquiring knowledge the only legitimate one we have, I only claim knowledge about the world insofar as I or someone else (that I trust) has been able to empirically test it; and, thusly, my knowledge is conditioned by the human understanding.

To me, any ontological claim that is not just a superficial equivalent to a methodology is, in my opinion, wanting of justification...so much so that I would say it is just another example of human's overstepping the limits of human understanding.

As I am reading through your response, I think it is worth us slowing down a bit and discussing the actual formulas you are deriving and using to make these calculations. Initially, I was just trying to point out the severe counter-intuitiveness to the ethical theory, which I still think is applicable, but I think you are more interested in the formulas themselves.

As I was writing up a response, the primary problem I have is that your calculations are derived from completely unexplained formulas that allegedly are derived from “more existent entities is better”.

For example, on the one hand you seem to deploy a ‘atom-for-atom’ formula (such that an entity with more atoms is better than one with less); while, on the other, you seem to deploy a ‘potential-for-potential’ formula (such that an entity with more potential to act is better than one with less); and, yet another, is that you seem to compare potential for act-potentials as well (e.g., baby is better than a lion when considered as a fully developed adult). Crucially, these formulas are incompatible with each other at worst, hazy and unclear at best—e.g., it is not always true that an entity with more atoms has more acting-potential than one with less, etc.. Granted, I just reverse engineered these based off of our conversation and you have not explicitly endorsed them; but this seems to be what your responses tend to be indicating in your reasoning.

For example, you say that a baby is better than a lion, if one had to choose one over the other, because the former has more potential for act-potential or, as you put it, ‘potential existence’ than the latter; but you also say the atoms is greater in a baby compared to a lion (which is clearly not true, but let’s just grant it is): an adult elephant has clearly more atoms than a newborn baby—so this can’t be an actual formula you are using. The formula may be incorporating atom-for-atom comparisons to some extent into its calculation, but that is not the sole calculation (seemingly) being made here.

Likewise, for example, setting aside that it will lead to counter-intuitive conclusions, if we are just examining the potential for act-potentials, then a sophisticated AI robot has way more potential for acting when fully developed than a fully developed adult human. The intelligence of an sophisticated, state-of-the-art, robot equipped with AI is leagues above the computing power of a human. When I say AI, mean, as a thought experiment, a being with a mechanical body, two arms, two legs, is aware of its surroundings, has desires/goals, and exceptional computation power. Think of like AI robots in movies: the terminator or something like that.

To be completely honest, I don’t think you will be able to come up with an actual exact formula for how to determine what is better even with the knowledge that "more existent entities is better", because there’s always going to be a counter-example which will contradict it; but I am happy to be proven wrong!

Good and Bad can only be deduced from empirical data.

The good and bad are only abducible from empirical data. There absolutely no means of deducing them.

But the concepts themselves have ipso facto moral valence. They necessarily lead to moral implications, although, i agree, there's no moral command as a result of acknowledging good and bad.

So, in this theory, they ‘ipso facto’ have non-normative moral implications. There is no means of determining what one ought to do based off of the categories of good and bad.

I think its a bit of a slick move to claim there's no normative implications for an (what appears to attempt at..) objective categorisation of acts into the same. It sounds more like a statistical analysis that would result in a really, really clear idea of where your morals lie. It's extremely hard to see how the move is open to you to act other than in accordance with the categories and not make an immoral move.

Immoral only insofar as it is a non-normative moral violation. I can say “you did something (morally) bad, but I cannot thereby affirm you did something you shouldn’t have”.

I don't think this is correct, per se. The psychopath can acknowledge that the act would fit this category, for someone else thus defeating the applicability of the categories beyond those who assent to them.

Sure, I was not trying to imply that a psychopath will always acknowledge nor recognize the categories.

I don't understand how 'moral facts' don't have pretty direct normative implications. If we have a moral fact "x is wrong" then to act against that, would be immoral. I have no idea how you find daylight between the two.

Yes, in colloquial speech it is just assumed, blindly, that if something is bad, then one ought not do it. Most people don’t even consider metaethics: they justify there ‘objective morality’ with things like ‘you should not do it because it will harm other people’, ‘you should not do it because God says so’, etc.

Technically speaking, under this theory there is a gap between normative and non-normative moral judgments, which can only be bridged by affirming a subjective moral judgment that implicates one to the other (e.g., “one ought to be good”).

But this betrays those being facts?

I was talking about semantics there, not moral facticity. It is a moral fact that “torturing babies for fun is bad” because this action can be objectively categorized as under ‘being bad’.

Similar to above. Happy to acknowledge i've misinterpreted you, but then I fall back into - then these aren't facts. They're just socially-common concepts

They are facts because the categorization is objective, insofar as the said action is either promoting depravity, disunity, and disharmony or sovereignty, unity, and harmony (or perhaps neither) and this is not subject to our opinions.

Are you able to explain what you're seeing stands between a moral fact, and it's normative implication?

The good is just the form of any action which promotes harmony, unity, and sovereignty; which doesn’t itself reference anything normative. For a normative fact to exist, there must be something which exists mind-independently which itself informs us of what ought to be. I don’t think the way reality is entails how it ought to be; so I am going to deny the existence of normative facts.

Think of the good as the Platonic Form of the good, stripped of its acausal, inert, and eternal existence as an abstract object. It’s more like an aristotilian ‘form’.

To avoid confusion, I am going to use capital letters for theories, and lowercase for propositions.

With the terms we are using here (I have thrown out "In M, P" in favour of "P and M"), I don't think that P relative to M means anything other than P and M.

My point is that ‘p is metaphysically impossible’ != ‘p and M are metaphysically impossible’ != ‘p ^ M is metaphysically impossible’ != ‘!(p ^ M)’.

Now I don't know whether you are using Znot as a theory or a proposition.

ZNOT is a theory, not a proposition.

To avoid this overlap, we should not use 'should' and 'preferable' together to avoid an emotional connotation.

This doesn’t really address the issue though, unless you are conceding that ‘existence is not preferable to non-existence’ or that preference is irrelevant.

Recall that chaos means anything can happen. Which could mean that in 50 years the range between nothing happening vs everything happening exists.

Not quite what I mean. I am saying that in a world with maximal existent entities, chaos between them is always better than order. Chaos, itself, does not entail that nothing might happen: it is the complete disorder and confusion of what exists as it relates to other entities that exists.

By analogy, I am saying a room full of furniture, people, electrons, etc. in a state of continual collisions and disorder is going to be better than where everything is arranged according to specific guidelines (i.e., order) because there is more ‘expressive existences’ in the chaotic room vs. the orderly room. You seem to be noting, with this response, that the existence of the entities in the room may randomly disappear or they may stop interacting with each other. Perhaps tumultuousness is a better term for what I mean than chaos.

Comparing the internal interactions of existence of a single cell to a rock, its pretty self evident which one has more interactions and potential existence.

Sure, but you are basically just saying “more complexity is better”; but, then, a highly complex computer or AI would be higher prioritized and better than a newborn baby. Likewise, an adult Lion, by your own standards, has more “interactions and potential existence” than a newborn human baby: are we supposed to say it is better to have adult Lions than human babies? Is it, likewise, better to save an adult lion than a newborn baby in a crisis, then?

Likewise, I am not sure that a newborn human baby is more complex then unalive ecosystems.

Likewise, if the more interactions and potential existence a thing has the more moral worth it has, then hurricane has more moral worth than a rock, which considering it kills innocent people and damages lives this seems counter-intuitive.

I will stop there for now.

Bob

I deny this entirely. Without something to ground your conception of hte good outside of empirical sense perception, I cannot see how anything but bias or assumption could lead to judging acts as good or bad.

Remember, this theory strips out normativity from the good and bad; and groups the good and bad based off of similarities between actions, just like how we determine other naturalistic conceptions—so this only needs empirical inquiry.

This is kind of my point - what criteria do these acts meet?

They are being grouped together by similarity. Take ‘kindness’ in its colloquial definition of (roughly) “the quality of being friendly, generous, and considerate”: this is a word, and a conception, derived purely from subsuming similar acts (e.g., generosity, friendliness, etc.) under one conception, and does not reference itself whether or not one should be kind. Likewise, a pyschopath serial killer can grasp that what they are doing is unkind to their victim while maintaining that they should keep doing it.

Same with the good and bad: the good includes being kind, as well as other altuistic acts and what not, and the bad includes depravity, disrespect, meanness, etc. The serial killer can likewise acknowledge that what they are doing is bad, while maintaining they should keep doing it.

The only way to synthesize the moral facts, being non-normative, with normative judgments is to subjectively affirm a normative moral judgment that implicates them in doing good; such “one ought to be good”.

I am essentially identifying the good and bad with those events related to ‘caring about living beings’ and ‘disregard for living beings’ (or ‘acts which promote harmony and oneness’ and ‘acts which promote disharmony and disunity’) respectively; because this is, to my understanding, what historically our intuitions seems to lead us to calling ‘good’ and ‘bad’, on a semantic point. However, if one wanted to use the terms differently, then the underlying content still stands.

Because a triangle is analytical. It is a shape with three (tri) angles (angle). "the good" has no such grounding

The good is harmony, unity, and sovereignty. That’s the most abstract I can seem to get with respect to actions.

X is good because of something further(its meeting a criteria/on for instance, held in the subject's mind), which makes it synthetic

Not if we are just abstracting categories of actions, and labelling them ‘good’ vs. ‘bad’ in a sense that ties well into how we typically use the terms.

In this case, I can't see how an a priori concept can be appealed to unless is some kind of Platonic Form-type thing assumed to be 'correct', as it were. We'd need an innate, defined concept of Good and Bad to accurately judge any act - and this would mean we can be wrong about it, empirically.

The good is not a platonic form nor a priori under my view.

But from whence comes a reason to use that criterion? Given the criterion, I think you're off to the races - but I can't understand why I should accept it without an a priori concept for me to heed.

The promotion or actuality of unity, harmony, and sovereignty seems, to me, to be what we are talking about usually when we say ‘something is good’. Even when we say “this is good for me”, we are essentially saying it brings harmony, unity, and sovereignty to oneself.

This seems to betray to concept of morality, and doesn't really answer my issue.

This metaethical theory has two main categories of moral judgments: non-normative and normative. The former are facts, the latter are not. Morality, under this view, is not solely about what is permissible, omissible, or obligatory; it is also about what is good and what is bad.

If something (an act) must be objectively noted as good, rejecting it is immoral. Whats the catch?

It would be immoral only in the sense that it is bad (and violates the moral facts) but not immoral in the sense that you should not do it. I don’t think you are completely appreciating the severed connection between the good/bad and normativity in this theory yet.

Then I see that these are made up and you're putting things in two bins based on a black/white fallacy instead of extending your system to accomodate things that patently don't fit in them. What if one of the blocks is purple??

It was an analogy, and the point had nothing to do with how many colors there actually are.

If I only have two categories, I will put things in the best-suited category.

I am open to there being multiple categories; e.g., a neutral category whereof an action does not promote harmony nor disharmony.

. If you KNOW the good, and reject it, how is that not Immoral?

If by immoral you are implying impermissibility (normativity), then it isn’t (under this view). But if you are meaning just that it is bad to do or that it violates a moral (non-normative) fact, then, yes, it is immoral.

The term traditionally is both of these, I have severed them from each other.

Although I still do not have a firm grasp on your ethical theory, I do commend you for your creativity; as this is very outside of the box! One of the many reasons I enjoy our conversations...(:

For existence to be good, it means there should be existence. So yes, it is preferable to non-existence.

So, ‘X is preferable to Y’ does not entail, by my lights, that ‘there ought to be as much X as possible’. If I prefer vanilla to chocolate ice cream, there is no entailment here such that I should create as much vanilla as possible. So I don’t see how ‘existing is preferable to not-existing’ entails that ‘more existent entities is better’ and, in turn, that ‘the most existent entities should be created’.

To me, ‘X is preferable to Y’ just entails that I should choose X over Y assuming I also accept “I should choose what is preferred”.

Again, even if more existent entities is better, including relations and interactions between those entities, it does not seem very moral at all. I do think this mandates procreation, just as one example.

Its not something I feel that's proven, its more of a consequence of the foundation.

I grant this for now, but I don’t think this is true.

For example, lets say we had a world of 2 existence versus a world of 3 existence, but 1 of those existences in the 3 world could annihilate all existence permanently. Over the course of time, the annihilation would cause an overall decrease in actual and expressed existence than in the 2 existence world.

Yes, so this just gets you into consequentialist territory, and this comes with its own bullets to bite. So what if we knew, with 100% certainty, that enslaving 1% of the population would total net produce a world with more existent entities (and relations and interactions between them) than a world where everyone is free? (perhaps people get lazy, and stop interacting when they aren’t forced to, etc.)

You are committed to working towards a world where we enslave people; based off of your own reasoning here (in the above quote).

You are committed to whatever total net increases “existence” in reality; which is just an act-consequentialist view where the desired goal is “more existence in reality”: this is the exact same as utilitarianism except the desired goal is different, and this lands you into making a bunch of counter-intuitive moral decisions (like the above).

What if, just as another example, the government yanking people out of there homes once a day and thoroughly beating them actually produced more relations and interactions amongst its citizens due to their united effort to resist? Well, total net, it increases expressed existence, so it is good under your view. You say we should skip over morality as it pertains to humans, but this is where is painfully obvious that this theory is super counter-intuitive and downright immoral in many cases (by my lights).

There are a few points I've muddled out and I'm not completely sold on it yet. I definitely want to hear your thoughts on the matter here as this is new.

For now, I don’t have a problem with your categories; I think we have more pressing matters at hand here.

To be clear, only over an infinite period of time and space. In a finite period of time and space, order will generate overall more existence.

I don’t see why this is true. Over interval [1, 50] years a chaotic world will have more ‘new identities’, ‘parts’, and ‘relations’. Order produces a system where things do not sporadically get created: if we only procreate when we are financially stable vs. whenever we want for whatever reason we want, then the latter will produce more existent entities (and relations and what not) than the former. Chaos will always be better in your view.

No, blowing up the submarine and killing all the people onboard before an hour passes is not more moral. For now, just focus on the example given to see if it works within the limitations presented. Don't worry about where this is going until we see where it is first.

Sure, if we are just asking which is better under your view and everything else being equal, then 10 for an hour is better. This is not the pressing issue with the theory though.

It is only when we state Z∧Znot that we end up with a metaphysically impossibility

Z ^ Znot cannot be determined, without clarifying the underlying metaphysical theory N being used, to be metaphysically impossible or possible; Z is, though, relative to Znot. The metaphysical mode of modality is not used in a way such that P is metaphysically impossible iff P ^ M is metaphysically impossible: the latter is a totally different proposition than the former. P does not expand into P ^ M, and it nevertheless metaphysically impossible relative to M. By ‘relative to M’, I mean that this mode of modality is relative to the underlying metaphysical theory, M, being used. Think of it this way: ‘Z ^ Znot’ = X, and X is not metaphysically impossible because Z is; nor does it make much sense to ask if Znot, being a metaphysical theory, is metaphysically impossible or not, relative to another metaphysical theory—it can be done, but it is odd.

Now, I think what you are conveying, and correct me if I am wrong, is that the justification for Z being metaphysically impossible is that we posit Znot and that is incoherent, at the least, with Z; so Z is metaphysically impossible. You represent this as Z ^ Znot, but this is not accurate because you are conflating the proposition which is metaphysically impossible with the justification for it being such. Z is metaphysically impossible, and the justification is that !(Z ^ Znot) ^ Znot → {metaphysically impossible} . Saying ‘Z ^ Znot’ is metaphysically impossible shifts the focus to a different proposition, X, which would have to be evaluated relative to a specified metaphysical theory, N.

The difference is, these categories do not inform me about color. I already have that understanding from some other source, in other words I already have a formula.

You only gain a hazy, not exact, formula of which color to classify an object through induction; which is also true of the good and bad.

But imagine if you gave to this task to someone who has no understanding of what red or blue even meant, and you tell them "red means it belongs in the red pile, blue means means it belongs in the blue pile." The person would have no clue what to do, the categories do not help at all.

Like everything else, of course someone would have to learn the categories; which requires them to abstract out the similarities between particulars. This may be done the hard way, through brute force inductive reasoning of what is experienced, or can be sped up via the help of other people. Kids usually pick up quick the general categories of colors.

Really enjoying this.

I am glad: same here. This is a new creation of mine that may end up being utterly invalid; but it is an intriguing solution to many problems I have with contemporary moral realist theories. We shall see if it holds any weight in time…

Doesn't this pre-supposes knowledge of the Good?

Inducing a concept does not require knowledge of the good: I do not need prior knowledge of the concept of ‘Color’ to create it via reverse engineering it from particular colors I experience. I see this person helping the sick, I see another being generous, another being kind, another having respect for life, etc. and I can abstract out that this is what is ‘good’; and I see a person being demeaning to another, abusing people, torturing animals, etc. and I can abstract out that this is ‘bad’. Now, we could semantically call it something else, but it doesn’t take away from the fact that there are astounding similarities between ‘good’ acts, and likewise for ‘bad’ acts.

As best i can tell, unless you're going to employ Platonic Forms, you can't induce what the Good is from instances.

I don’t see why this is the case: I don’t need to posit a platonic form of a triangle to induce a concept of a triangle.

There is no concept for it to match to

Sure it does, something like ‘any act which promotes harmony of alive beings with each other’.

Triangles, on the other hand, can be understood a priori and an instance matches the concept.

The concept of triangle need not be a priori for my point, as we can use our faculty of reason, as opposed to the understanding, to create concepts, and these can be created based off of reverse engineering similarities between particulars. For example, I don’t have an a priori concept of a car, but I can nevertheless abstract out what a ‘car’ is, conceptually, from the particular cars...and that’s the only way one can do it (in this case).

A: What is a woman? (What is the Good?)
B: Anyone who identifies as a woman (Whatever you identify as The Good)
A: What are they identifying as? (What are you identifying 'it' as?)
B: A woman. (The Good)

I am not arguing this though. The good is a category of acts which is equivalent to something like ‘any act which promotes ...’.

The concept of a triangle is prior to intuition, allowing us to perceive a triangle. Morality has no such basis.

Two things:

1. Just take a different concept that clearly is not a priori if you would like (e.g., a car, a cat, etc.) and my point will still stand; and
2. I don’t think the concept of a triangle is a priori itself, as we are not readily equipped with the concept of every shape in our brains but, rather, are equipped with the proper groundings to formulate them in our representations (e.g., space, time, math, logic, etc.). Knowing, a priori, how to represent a triangle such that one can consciously experience it is not equivalent to the concept of that particular (being represented) being itself a priori.

So, I'm finding it hard to understand how rejecting 'good' behaviour while acknowledging it is 'good' is not a moral choice. I realise you're trying to say 'Good' is not a moral category, but using your analogous example, it seems to be so.

That’s the interesting thing with this theory: the good is non-normative. I can tell you what is good, but not what you should do about it. I can say “it is bad to torture babies for fun” is a moral fact but not “one ought not torture babies for fun” is a moral fact. This entails some moral judgments express something objective, namely non-normative ones, and some don’t, namely normative ones.

Though, in light of the objections i've laid out, I can't see any reason to suspect the induction to Good and Bad is even serviceable. As you say, its grey, and there's no one-size-fits-all. So, in this sense, where's the fact?

When we separate a bin full of red and blue blocks into their respective piles (sorted by color), we do not have to have an exact, sure procedure for deciphering whether each given block is blue or red to say that there is a fact of the matter whether or not it is blue or red (and that it belongs in one or the other pile respectively). Likewise, we may find a block that is a weird mixture of colors, which makes it hard to tell which pile it should be in, but this does not take away from the fact that (1) there are blue and red categories of piles and (2) the red belong in the red and the blue in the blue. What I meant is that this, like morality, is a science of sorts: we cannot armchair philosophize our way into what is right or wrong to do in every possible situation of the real world: we have to live, learn, experiment, fail, and keep trying.

A fact is stance-independent right, but noting something is 'good' IS a stance

Since the good is non-normative, it is not a (normative) stance; and since it is the categorization of similar acts into to more general concepts it is stance-independent (i.e., it does not depend on any subjective stance out there).

However, the idea that someone can reasonably say "I will actively avoid doing good* things" and on your account, that would be A-moral - seems a bit incongruous

This wouldn’t make them amoral, it would (sort of) make them immoral, insofar as they would be purposely doing bad things; whereas amorality is typically the view that it has no moral consideration or weight. For my normative ethical theory, if I were to make one building off of this metaethical theory, I would start off with the subjective moral judgment that “one ought to be good” and then the normative judgments will be synthesized with the moral facts (except for that one normative judgment).

This isn't an easy answer because we're talking about what people should do. But we're not there yet! I know, its a big change in thinking. That's the point. An objective morality shouldn't need people.
…
Its about preferable states.

I get that moral facts are, well, facts...so they aren’t dependent on subjects; but I would say moral facts are about behavior and thusly are only useful to a subject. Yes, we can say it is bad when a hurricane destroys people’s houses, but the relevance of morality is for subjects—not the hurricane. If you are saying something different than this, then I don’t understand what you mean by “morality shouldn’t need people”.

No mandates yet! We aren't to consciousness yet. Just states of existence.

I just meant by “mandate” that it is obligatory to create more existence, because it is directly implied, nay entailed, by:

1. If existence is good, then more existence is better.

And this lands you, at least prima facie, in a super counter-intuitive moral position. That’s my worry. Sure, it could still be true and be super counter-intuitive; but no one is going to accept that we have create as many things as we can.

For a very simple start, lets have universe A, and B. A has two atoms (Aristotelian for simplification), while B has 3 atoms. Comparing the two, which is better according to our foundation? Universe B

I don’t see how B is better. I get that 3 is better than 2 if #1 (that I quoted above), but this makes me question how you derived that more existence is better from existence is good: could you elaborate?
This may just be the ambiguity in “existence is good”. What does it mean for existence itself to be good? Are you just saying “existence is preferable to non-existence”?

Taken to a more human level for a minute, lets imagine that a world with magical unicorns ends up being the most existence.

Like, in number? What constitutes “most existence”? Number of “material” and “expressive” existent entities?

First, lets define pure chaos.

So this section, I don’t think, answered my worry: isn’t this kind of pure chaos you described the best possible reality in your view? This, again, goes against all moral intuitions I have (: You are advocating for the good being destruction and construction alike.

Remember, we're examining morality in this case within particular constraints. In comparing the two situations with the following constraints, we see it is more more al for the 10 'people' to survive for one hour than 1 person to survive for 10 hours.

My point is that the real elephant in the room, which needs to be addressed before discussion which of the two options you gave is better, is that no one will agree that the best option is to blow up the entire submarine, let alone that it is an option at all. You seem to be saying it is not only a validly morally permissible option, but it is, in fact, the best option.

In terms of having to preserve 10 people over killing all but one, most people, including myself, will agree with that. I am trying to size up how many bullets you are biting though with this theory.

I am not saying that we have no way to decipher what is good or bad, I was saying that there is no exact equation to do it--e.g., deontolgy and consequentialism fail miserably.

We determine which is good or bad just like we separate different colored blocks: we induce the general category of the colors and, as best we can, intuit where each given block should go. There will be some blocks with odd shades of colors that really murky the waters, and that is fine because the world is a sticky place.

We induce 'the good' vs. 'the bad' from obvious examples (e.g., torturing babies for fun, helping the sick, being generous, being kind, being selfish, torturing animals, etc.) and then use our current knowledge of them to infer what action to take in a particular nuanced situation.

I would say we can induce 'the good' as, most generally, acts which care about life to the maximal extent possible; and 'the bad' as the negation of it. However, I freely admit that inductions are not necessarily true and that this method of inquiry is sort of scientific.

(yes, there's some incredulity in this question) Are you seriously comparing 'ethical views' to the reality of categories of triangle?

I used a valid analogy for the sake of my conversation with another member.

because this lack of formula does essentially mean you cannot predict 'which' category an act falls into at all, rather than imprecisely

I don’t see why this would be the case. We can induce what ‘the good’ is from its instances, just like how we induce what a triangle is from its instances; and we can use our current knowledge of ‘the good’ to make informed decisions about what can be classified as such.

Your moral intuitions only can do so. They are your categories.

Non-moral intuitions are used to determine the category of ‘the good’, no different than how we non-morally intuit the concept or category of triangularity.

Think of it this way, I can have complete disregard for being kind to others and still being able to derive that it is the subsuming of other actions into one category—e.g., generosity, being nice, respectful, etc. I can recognize this while saying “I don’t want nor am obligated to be kind”: this does not take away from the fact that there is such a thing as kindness, and that category, apart from semantics, is stance-independent. I can choose whether to be kind or not, but it is a fact that being generous, nice, respectful, etc. are kind acts because they are of that category of acts.

Same with the good. Kindness, altruism, truthfulness, etc. are of the category of the good; but, of course, I can choose not to care about them.

My understanding is that realism entails that whether an act is good or bad can be established as a 'fact' in any given instance

Moral realism is a three-pronged thesis:

1. Moral judgments are propositional.
2. Moral judgments express something objective; and
3. At least one moral judgment is true.

Yes, this theory affirms 2 (and 1 and 3, but emphasis on 2 to your point) because the good is stance-independent: there really is a separable category between the good and the bad.

Here’s some extra things to chew on about this unconventional theory:

1. Not all moral judgments are normative judgments, because categorizing actions as ‘good’ or ‘bad’ is purely non-normative.
2. The normative moral judgments stem from a subjective moral judgment; namely, that “one ought to be good”.
3. It follows from #1 and #2, that none of the normative moral judgments in the theory express something objective, but, rather, only the non-normative moral judgments.

This means, that this view affirms #2 only technically insofar as we are talking about non-normative moral judgments; which means that this view is a sort of hybrid between realism and anti-realism, whereof it does affirm that there are moral facts, but none of them are normative. I am not sure what to make of it yet: it definitely exposes my deep anti-realist sympathies.

Therefore, we are stating P. We are also stating X. Thus, we are stating P and X. As I demonstrated here:
…
it entails logical contradiction.

I think we may be circling back around, and I am not sure how else to explain my point of view here other than by repeating: that !(P ^ X) does not entail X is logically impossible—not even relative to P. You are just noting that accepting P and X results in a logical contradiction because !X is affirmed on a non-logical contradiction.

But the goal of the thread was to find something logically possible and metaphysically impossible

Let’s take metaphysical theory, Znot, which posits that philosophical zombies are metaphysically impossible, and let’s call the claim ‘philosophical zombies can exist’ Z, albeit logically and actually possible. Z is considered false in Znot because it is incoherent with another proposition (or set of propositions), let’s say A, that Znot affirms such that !(A ^ Z) ^ A.

This is an example of exactly what you are asking for. Z is logically possible and metaphysically impossible relative to Znot.

Giving us no way of finding something logically possible but metaphysically impossible.

I disagree. Let’s take this by analogy (to actual impossibility):

X = “A human being can fly”

Firstly, X is not logically impossible. Secondly, I think your line of reasoning, and correct me if I am wrong, is that X becomes logically impossible if we accept a theory in physics, P, that posits !X; but this is false.

X is not logically impossible even relative to P when !(X ^ P): instead, we just find it logically impossible to hold X and P—this is different. If X were logically impossible in P, then the logic in P would produce, itself, (X ^ !X); which is does not in the case that P → !X.

Instead, P → !X because of an incoherence, not a logical contradiction in P, with positing X within P. E.g.,:

Y = “X violates the law of gravity”

Which, what they would want to say in this case is that, !(Y ^ X) ^ Y → !X. P, in this case, does not produce a logical contradiction with X such that X ^ !X but, rather, that X ‘violates’ the law of gravity, which Y, and posits if that is true than it is “incoherent”, albeit not logically contradictory, with X. It is perfectly logically validly to posit that “a human being can fly” and “’a human being can fly’ violates the law of gravity”: nothing logically wrong with that.

I think you are conflating the logical impossibility of someone accepting X outside of the theory logically contradicting the theory (i.e., !{X ^ [P → !X] }) with the theory itself demonstrating the logical impossibility of positing X.

In this example, it is logically possible that X but actually impossible that X; but according to your reasoning actual impossibility would collapse into logical impossibility: which does not happen here.

So, with that in mind,:

A spiritual being is logically possible. :up:
A spiritual being is metaphysically possible. :chin:
A spiritual being is physically possible. :down:

For brevity, let’s say “a spirit exists” = X and let’s assume, like you, a physicalistic theory, P, that demonstrates some incoherence with the theory and X such that !X.

1. X is logically possible and is logically possible relative to the axioms and inferences of P.
2. X is metaphysically impossible, because there is at least one proposition, Y, in P that is incoherent with X such that !(Y ^ X) ^ Y → !X.
3. X is actually possible, since you defined it as a “non-physical thing”, as it does not violate the laws of nature, being above nature itself.

Hopefully that helps, let me know.

There being no formula of what is exactly wrong or right in any given situation does not make the categories empty.

Take an example by analogy: Imagine I gave you a bucket of colored blocks and asked you separate them into piles by color. You pick up a red one, put it in the red pile; blue, in the blue pile; etc.

Now, you pull out a block that is an odd mixture of red and yellow such that it is still really red: which pile does it belong in?

Now, I don't answer the question, instead let's say we don't have a great answer: we don't have a formula that let's us know exactly which pile this one should be in. Now, let's take your contention here and see how it holds up. You are saying, analogously, that the categories of 'red block' vs. 'yellow block' vs. 'orange block' are empty because we don't have a formula which exactly determines which block belongs in which one; likewise, you are claiming that it is somehow circular logic that we are informed by the category of 'red/yellow/orange block' on which pile to put blocks. Hopefully, it is clear in this analogy that the categories not empty because we have no exact formula and they still inform us of which goes in which pile.

Ethics cannot be done from an armchair, and there is no exact formula one can use to determine what to do in any given situation: ethics is a science (of sorts).

I would say that we do it like any other categories we make: we induce it from particulars.

I see this right triangle, that obtuse triangle, that isosceles triangle, etc. and I formulate/induce the general category of a triangle. I see someone helping the needy, being nice to someone else, being respectful, upholding a beings sovereignty, etc. and I induce the general category of the good. I see someone torturing a baby for fun, a person being incredibly rude, a person demeaning another, a person being incredibly selfish, a person having complete disregard for life, etc. and I induce the category of the bad.

Just like how I can separate triangles into one pile and squares into another, and more generally shapes into one pile and non-shapes into another, I, too, can put generous acts into one pile and respectful acts into another, and more generally good acts into one pile and bad acts into another.

Am I going to sort each into each pile 100% accurately? Probably not. Does that take away from the plentiful evidence that the categories do exist? Certainly not.

While it's correct to say that a spiritual being is logically possible, it's a contradiction to say a spiritual being exists & physicalism is true.

My point is that X is not logically impossible because X is metaphysically impossible; and pointing out that !(X ^ M) doesn't help prove that it is otherwise. Just because positing X and M entails a contradiction it does not follow that X is logically impossible. I only bring this up because you said something originally along the lines of 'every metaphysical system which X contradicts, makes X logically impossible'. Metaphysical impossibility does not entail logical impossibility. That X ^ M is logically impossible is not the same as X being logically impossible, which is what you need for this to work.

Likewise, I don't even think that all propositions which are regarded as metaphysically impossible are reducible to an axiom in the metaphysical theory. To take your example, physicalism is typically the view that reality is fundamentally 'mind-independent': it may still be metaphysically impossible for their to be a spiritual being even though it does not produce a logical contradiction with this fundamental belief to the theory, as they may say it is metaphysically impossible because the being, let's say, would violate the laws of nature and, let's say, in this particular physicalist theory, everything must be natural--so spiritual beings cannot exist because that is incoherent with, not logically contradictory to, these beliefs they have.

"Everything should not exist" leads to the fact that, "This statement of morality should not exist" and seems quite irrational, we're going to assume the more rational choice.

You say it is irrational…but I still don’t see why.

therefore encouraging and preserving existence should be the fundamental goal.

Encouraging or mandating? This is what I would like to know. Is it morally permissible in your view to not create more existence when there is an opportunity to?

No, that's a bit far of a jump ahead. It would really help at this point if you avoided any sense of human morality and just went along with the fundamental building up of morality. We'll get to human morality, no worry.

See, this is doesn’t make sense to me. What you do evaluate morally if there is no subject? What if a rock had the ‘opportunity’ to create more exist by interacting in a partular way but ‘chose’ not to? Well, obviously, this makes no sense because the rock doesn’t ‘decide’ anything, so why consider what would be better morally for the rock to do? Instead, it is a question of what should we do to the rock, no?

For now, what do you think about my evaluation of expressed existence? Also, did you get to the example of the submarine in the ocean? Let me know what you think Bob.

I admittedly don’t have a good grasp of the theory yet, but I can take a crack at it! Let me attempt at re-reading the OP:

1. If existence is good, then more existence is better.

This seems to be mandating the creation of more things.

2. Any existence which lowers overall existence is evil.

If I have to kill 20 people in my lifetime in legitimate self-defense and I never contribute to the creation of more life and #2, then wouldn’t it follow that I am evil?

Likewise, if we could calculate out that force castrating 10% of the population, let’s say convicts, would total net increase the amount of people or lives, would this then, under your view, be righteous?

What counts as ‘existence’ here? Just things that are alive? What if I am constantly destroying rocks, is that lowering the overall ‘existences’?

Likewise, I don’t think your ‘material’ vs. ‘expressional’ existence answers my above question.

When existence A collides with existence B, something happens. That something is an existence, but a fleeting one. How each individual material reacts when an interaction happens with another material existence would be the expression of each material existence
…
If more existence is better, than more expressions of existence are also better.

This makes it sound like more collisions equals better: but this is just chaos, pure chaos, then, no?

a. Expressions of existence which can yield more potential expressions of existence are better than those that cannot.

This seems, again, like the best world in your theory is one with the most chaos, because that would be what a world would be like with maximal expressions of existence: thing colliding and bombarding other things.

b. Expressions of existence which destroy material existence, or those that lesson the number of possible expressions of existence would be considered evil.

Similarly, it seems to be evil under your view to limit chaos.

Let us take a situation in which a submarine has crashed to the bottom of the ocean. There is no communication with the outside world, no way for the submarine to recover, and everyone on the submarine will die. No one will ever discover what happens on the submarine, as it will be crushed by gravity into a pulp. There are currently 10 people aboard the ship. There is enough air for 1 person to breath for 10 hours. An explosion could happen which would kill 9 people and leave one alive. Which is more moral, 1 person living 10 hours, or 10 people living one hour?
…
Meaning, while the unique life expressions are the same, the potential existence of what those unique life expressions dwarfs that of the single individual. Meaning that it is equal material existence, but more potential existence for ten people to live on hour that 1 person live for ten hours.

But, wouldn’t it be better, if “If more existence is better, than more expressions of existence are also better.” and more existence is better, to cause the submarine’s parts to collide, by way of explosion, with as many things as possible so as to maximize the odds of expressions of existence?

For now, I would like to wait and here your response to these questions before continuing.

Bob

The word is dependent on the content. I suppose you could say it that way too. It's distinctness comes from its dependence. What's in a name?

I don't have a problem with this: that's what I was essentially saying too.

When we choose a certain metaphysics M, a statement that goes against it, for me, would be a statement that goes against one of the theorems of that metaphysics (t.i. logical contradiction), and assuming that every theorem of M ultimately goes back to the axioms of M, we would have (X ∧ ¬X) extending from (X ∧ Y) extending from (X ∧ M).

I believe I agree with everything except for this part. I just don't think that 'going against one of the theorems [or beliefs or statements]" in M entails necessarily a logical contradiction. I also don't see why every incoherence with M would be derivable back to, ultimately, an axiom which results in !X.

I don't see how one can "extend" !(Y ^ X) to (X ^ !X) in virtue of some axiom in M, such that every possible metaphysical theory, M<i>, has that setup.

Of course the word relates to content, but another word can be swapped for that word and related to the same content; thus, the word is distinct from the content. The fact that the word relates to the content does not entail that the content is somehow modified or transformed depending on the word used. That's all I am trying to point out for the sake of the conversation I was having with the other person, and I don't think it is that controversial (but correct me if I am wrong).

:up:

Semantics is about meaning, which is about how and what words relate to what underlying content; and has nothing to do with that underlying content itself. Nature does not care what word you call it.

The only reason I brought it up was because another person in this thread, that I am discussing with, was thinking that the metaphysical mode of modality was tied solely to semantics of the metaphysical theory at hand, which is false.

By incoherence, I mean the strong opposition of two things. That I have both long and short hair, right now, seems very incoherent given the standard understanding of the property of longness and shortness with regards to hair; but it is, nevertheless, not a logical contradiction for someone to have it because the form is ∃x (Bob<x> ^ LongHair<x> ^ ShortHair<x>).

Hey Bob, for some reason I completely missed that you had replied to this. Came in to review it and saw it luckily!

Absolutely no worries! I was wondering… (;

So, the two major problems I have are:

1. I don’t see why it is internally incoherent for moral realists people who accept there is objective morality to affirm that “there should be nothing” if that particular theory accepts that it is a moral fact that “there should be nothing”.

2. I don’t really understand your idea of morality being objective, and I think a lot of our disagreement is due to the murky waters here. You seem to think that a moral judgment is objective if it doesn’t violate the laws of logic and can be accepted by rational agents, I don’t think this is at all what objectivity is.

I don’t think we are making much headway on the above, so I am just going to continue and see where this goes.

So, let’s say “there should be something”: does this simply mean that “existence is preferable to non-existence” or does it mean that “we must create as many existent things as possible”? I seem to get, from re-reading the OP, that the latter is what you are going for—but, if that is the case, (1) I don’t see how this follows from disaffirming that “nothing should exist” (as I can very well accept that it is false that “nothing should exist” without thereby conceding that “we must create as many existent things as possible”) and (2) this seems to contradict common-sensical moral intuitions (which perhaps isn’t relevant to your point) in the sense that it seems to be a sort of biting of a bullet (e.g., we would have to force people to procreate, etc.).

If I don't know if "Contradictions should be encouraged" is real, I can follow the logic to realize it contradictions itself, so then in conclude contradictions should probably not be encouraged.

This is circular...but, then again, so is all fundamental reason and logic. — Bob Ross

Circular logic is self-confirming. This is self-contradicting.

That’s true, but my point was that you were self-confirming (as you put it): you presupposed that it is false that “contradictions should be encouraged” in order to prove it should not be.

Morality is a choice between two potential realities. Of course reality as it is right now does not tell us how it should be, because we're not evaluating a change in reality by either comparing to the past, or evaluating a change for the future. Only when we think, "Well, what if we change reality to include X, would that be better?" are we discussing morality. P1 only regards the present therefore does not regard morality.

Exactly, this is why I affirm P1 (and it sounds like you do to): which would entail moral facts cannot exist. Again, I still don’t understand what exactly a moral fact is under your view...it seems to just be something rational agents affirm.

If there is an objective morality, this is the only way tor it to be rationally coherent.

Why? There’s nothing internally incoherent with a moral realist claiming that “nothing should exist” because that is a moral fact.

Take the idea that if it is true that "Existence should be" is the foundation for an objective morality, lets have fun thinking what that would entail based on the OP.

I’m trying (: , but I don’t understand what you mean by objective morality at this point. Maybe we can move on to my questions (above) about what exactly is meant by “existence should be”.

Can you elaborate on this? I am not sure what you mean by underlying contents or underlying meaning, as something that could be beyond semantics. Do you mean the relationship of that semantic content with other semantemas?

Semantics is about words—i.e., what is the best or chosen word to describe something—and not the what those words reference themselves (i.e., their underlying content). “Car” is a word, comprised of 3 characters and is from the english language, which refers to that which we call a ‘car’: the underlying content which the word ‘car’ refers to is a car (I denote the word—viz., the semantics—with quotes and the underlying content it references without it here). You may come along and say: “but, bob, what you call a ‘car’ would be much better described, in english, as a ‘biscobbo’” and I say something to the effect of “I don’t even think that is a word in the english language and therefore, within the context of english, is not a better suited word to describe what I mean by a ‘car’”--this is semantics.

When I say X violates the laws of M, I mean that the proposition X is the opposite of one of the laws of M. So basically, by stating M, we state all its axioms, and by definition of X, one of its axioms would be ¬X. By stating X and M, we entail a logical contradiction therefore, no? Because we are stating X∧¬X.

Firstly, metaphysical impossibility does not entail that it is derived from an axiom of the system. In its most abstract, a proposition, X, is metaphysically impossible for a metaphysical theory, M, iff M → Y ^ !(Y ^ X) [i.e., M entails a proposition, Y, which is incoherent, but not necessarily logically contradictory, with X]. In this form, it is clear that something could be metaphysically impossible yet logically possible, because Y ^ X is not a logical contradiction; instead, the argument rests on the idea that Y strongly, in a non-logical sense, opposes X.

Secondly, you threw a curveball here because you posited !X as itself simply affirmed in M, so, of course, affirming M ^ X leads to a logical contradiction (in this case). However, it is important to note that the logical contradiction here does not lead to X being logically impossible, it leads us to X ^ !X being logically impossible--which is not what you are trying to argue. This is because M ^ X leads to a logical contradiction which is only due to the fact that one also affirms M which leads to !X—so X is not logically impossible but, rather, it is logically impossible for it to be true that M ^ X in this case because it can be expanded to [M → !X] ^ X.

My main point here is that metaphysical impossibility does not entail, necessarily, logical impossibility.

while I am using a definition that also talks about whether one of the premises of a statement contradicts the other statement.

You may, then, be using it in the sense of a non-logical contradiction, which is perfectly fine; but that would not get you to logical impossibility. Only by conflating non-logical contradictions (like actual/physical and metaphysical contradictions) with logical ones would one be able to bridge that gap.

P1 Socrates is a human
P2 Every human is a non-reptile
C Socrates is a non-reptile
P3 (C) Socrates is a non-reptile
P4 Socrates is a reptile

No this is a logical contradiction, not a non-logical contradiction or incoherence. The abstracted form is essentially:

ϕ := ∀x (Human<x> → !Reptile<x>)
φ := ∃x (Human<x> ^ Reptile<x>)

The logical contradiction is that ϕ ^ φ → ∃x (!Reptile<x> ^ Reptile<x>)

So, basically, when we say, it is metaphysically impossible for something to happen in a metaphysical system, we are saying, given a metaphysical system M and a proposition X, "In M, X is impossible"

Correct.

it seems that whether X is possible or not boils down to the semantics of M, that is, whether some of the properties or consequences of X are in contradiction to the axioms of M, making untrue analytic statements.

I wouldn’t say that metaphysical impossible is derived solely from the semantics of M but, rather, the underlying meaning associated with those semantics. Semantics is just the analysis of words, not its underlying contents.

I guess you could say the same about physical statements, in a sense.

Correct, the physical/actual mode of modality is analogous to both the logical and metaphysical modes thereof: it is possibility, necessity, contingency, and impossibility juxtaposed with the presupposed mode of interpreting them.

But the issue is that the laws of physics are given to us through the scientific method, while metaphysical laws are not, each person has their own metaphysical views

A contention about the methodology of physics vs. metaphysics is of no concern to the definition of metaphysical impossibility.

However, as a side note, I agree that metaphysics is a much looser study than physics; however, there are actual methodological conventions which (good) metaphysicians adhere to. The difference mainly is that there is far less education on what metaphysics is let alone what the proper method is for its inquiry, so most people who engage in it do it very poorly.

Then the statement P1 "In S, light goes faster than c" is logically impossible

No. “In S, light goes faster than c” is logically possible because the logic, if generated within a truth table, does not result in every result being false (e.g., there is no logical contradiction in it); whereas it is physically/actually impossible given our current scientific knowledge.

Remember, the logical mode of modality is only concerned with, well, logic, which pertains solely to the form of reasoning. P1 is just a proposition, p, which cannot itself entail a logical contradiction: you would need to demonstrate, in the form of the argumentation, that, in its most abstract, a truth-table of the formula results in false all the way down.

On the issue of metaphysics, however, for a metaphysical system M and a self-consistent proposition X that violates the laws of that system, "In M, X" seems to be logically impossible

It will always be logically possible so long as the logic does not always produce false (e.g., has no contradiction in it), even if M is internally incoherent (viz., ‘incoherence’, as I use it here, does not refer to a logical contradiction but, rather, a looser contradiction in the system such that two propositions held as true in M seem to strongly oppose each other, although there is no logical contradiction therein).

So in the case of epiphenomenalism, we end up with a logically impossible statement or a logically possible statement that has no evaluation in metaphysics yet

I am not sure I followed this part, so I can’t really comment.

I hope this post was not jumbled and that it was understandable to you, as I think you drive a good point that suffers from the issue I posed above. Maybe I made some grammar mistakes or skipped a word which made a sentence unintelligible; tell me so, so I can fix it.

I appreciate your response, and I hope my response here is adequate enough to address your points!

Bob

Good OP. Personally, I don't see why we should accept that space and time, or space/time fabric, is a substance--as they seem, to me, to be merely the forms of our experience. If they are simply the modes by which we cognize objects, then the objects themselves are beyond space and time, or space/time fabric. I honestly don't think we will ever understand the world sans space and time (conceptually) because it is so ingrained into our mode of experiencing it; and this is why we end up with all sorts of problems with the big bang theory when taken not as a convenient model but, rather, as if it is literally what the universe is in and of itself.

Yes, it is entirely possible that some things have no causes or that there is an infinite of them: I don't really see how one can decipher which one is more plausible: if time and space are not substances, then causality (in a spatiotemporal sense) doesn't exist either but, rather, is a representation of (nonspatiotemporal or otherwise) relationships of objects in-themselves.

Another interesting point (to me) is that knowing the negation of a concept doesn't necessarily entail any real knowledge of it, and, in this case, thusly, being directly acquainted with temporality (like we all are) doesn't give us any insight into the nature of atemporality. Most people think "well, atemporality would just be no change, and so I envision an object, like a chair, which is frozen in time": but is this a really accurate understanding of the nature of atemporal objects and their relations to other objects? I don't think so. So when people start trying to come up with hypotheses about 'prior to time' in the big bang, I think, in summary, (1) time doesn't exist (as a substance) and (2) even if it did neither of us have any clue what the nature of atemporality really is at all.

After all the metaphysical reductionism, desire is a mere want, the satisfaction of which is anything sufficient for it, hence, contingent. A desired goal may be specific in itself, but makes no allowance for its satisfaction, which may still, then, remain contingent. An accomplishment indicates a satisfaction in itself, a particular goal, but a necessary accomplishment manifests as a satisfaction of a specific goal achievable only under a certain condition, hence not contingent.

I think I understand now, the ‘desire’ is just the want for something; whereas the ‘accomplishment’ is the happiness it may bring us upon achieving it—correct?

This relates to the topic at hand iff the adherence to a subjective principle from which an act according to a categorical imperative the principles prescribes follows, is the one and only permissible means leading to a necessary accomplishment, re: worthiness of being happy.

I see now. So ‘worthiness’ is being used in the sense, here, of ‘accomplishment’, right? From this, it follows that we only ever accomplish, and consequently acquire happiness, when we have performed something worthy or perhaps have a character that is worthy (virtuous). Correct?

In this way, a guy may be worthy of being happy, even if the prescription from his own principles cause him to act in such a way he feels no happiness at all.

So, are you saying that in order to accomplish a goal, which brings about happiness, the means may itself not bring any happiness—is that right? Because I can agree with that.

Happy and happiness are just words, those alledged “fuzzy concepts”, that represent a specific kind of feeling. One could use righteousness, positive well-being, or the like. The word as used here is meant to indicate a fundamental human aesthetic condition. Call that whatever you like, I suppose

Fair enough. I think my issue is that worthiness of happiness (i.e., what constitutes an “accomplishment”) seems to be, in your view here, fundamentally “regarding other people as ends in themselves”--but this is predicated on the assumption that everyone would subjectively agree to this, and I don’t think most would. Also, what if they gain accomplishments by defining worthiness in a different way than “being considerate of others”? That seems feasible, at least prima facie, to do, doesn’t it?

In other words, what makes someone actually worthy of being happy other than completing their own subjectively defined goals such that they accomplish them; which could certainly include “regarding people as worthless”.

In a system where the agent is a causality, contradiction is impossible

True.

If there were such a thing, and it was a universal condition, there would be no need to, e.g., turn the other cheek, or, engage in the ol’ eye-for-an-eye routine. And that would make everybody happy, or if not so much happy, then at least to release them from having to worry about being a target of them.

For it to be a universal condition, everyone would either have to agree to it; and I don’t see what convincing argument one can give to get everyone on board with a single (subjective) principle.

Takes an awful lot of presuppositions for this all to work, but none of them are particularly far-fetched.

I like where your heads at, and am intrigued to here more: it, indeed, is not bad at all (:

I just mean historical, pyschological, and physiological analysis of human's seems to point to a 'boiler plate' human, although we don't have complete knowledge of it yet, such that there is a way which a human--absent of outside infringements, impediments, and influence as well as biological defects--would develop into as time goes on and on...until death. It seems, indeed, like we are 'wired' a particular way, but we can be influenced (externally) or damaged to the point where we do not live up to our human (biological) potential. Does that help?

Actual, or also called physical, possibility is a mode of thought in modality whereof something is possible iff it does not violate the laws or currently held beliefs about nature (about the physical world).

I would have thought that metaphysical impossibility precludes actual possibility.

It very well might, depending on whether one believes in a higher 'realm', so to speak, than nature herself--e.g., it is, for some theists, actually impossible for someone to jump to the moon, with nothing but their bare body, from San Francisco but it is metaphysically possible for a God-incarnate to.

Sort of. I wouldn't say that the argument is that we should do whatever keeps us at balance to survive, but, rather, align ourselves with our nature as a species: does that imply homeostasis? I thought homeostasis was just an individual's ability to maintain balance in the physical system of which is themselves (i.e., their organism).

What is the question?

There is no such thing as freedom because everybody is enslaved to either ego or conscience.

Firstly, it is incredibly important to define what one means by freedom in philosophy of free will: I suspect this definition of 'freedom' is toto genere different than contemporary definitions. For me, as a compatibilist, I would say that 'free will' is 'the ability to choose in accordance with one's will'.

Secondly, ego vs. conscience is a false dilemma--e.g., my conscience could force me to be egoistic and my ego could compel me to follow my conscience and, not to mention, I could be driven by neither.

Fourthly, even if one was forced to either follow their 'ego' or their 'conscience', then it depends on what exactly one means by that whether my definition (above) of free will is compatible with it or not. If you just mean that they are abiding by their own will, which happens to be to follow their conscience or to be super egoistic, then I see no reason to accept, even if it weren't a false dilemma, that free will does not exist.

Metaphysical impossibility is any proposition which violates the presupposed metaphysical theory, no different than how actual/physical possibility is predicated on our scientific theories. The main difference is that metaphysical theories are way more controversial than scientific theories (and there is absolutely no consensus on the former).

E.g.,:

For some in philosophy of mind, philosophical zombies are metaphysically impossible, but actually and logically possible.

For some theists, it is metaphysically impossible for there to be more than one god; for something to exist which is not contingent on God; etc.

For some in metaethics, it is metaphysically impossible for moral facts to exist, albeit actually and logically possible.

For physicalists, it is metaphysically impossible for there to be a mind which is more fundamental than matter (or whatever fundamental mind-independent entities constitute their theory).

And the list goes on and on, and is contingent on the specific metaphysical theory (worldview) in play.

I just meant the function in terms of a perfectly healthy organism relative to its species, not that there is an author to those functions. We say "a human is 'intended' or 'biologically wired to' see if they are not defective.

Right off the bat, maybe I shouldn’t comment, being more a subjective moralist than a normative ethicist,

Your thoughts are always welcome, Mww :heart:

…..in which is violated the fundamental moral condition, re: the worthiness of being happy. The argument is that he who is a moral agent in the strictest sense of the idea is thereby worthy of his being happy, which is the same as his happiness being given by his accordance with his own moral law.

My only worry here is that it isn’t the necessarily the case that a person’s absolute end is their own happiness—viz., happiness may be a means towards something else for someone, or not a means nor an end at all.

I would say that I agree with this section if we replace happiness with, more abstractly, one’s absolute end.

so if you claim I should not treat myself as a means to an end because it violates the FET, there’s something wrong with the FET.

This is fair: if I cannot use myself as a means towards an end, then I am not actually able to set out my own absolute ends. The idea was supposed to be that no one can be used as a sole means toward any end, so that would technically include oneself.

The something wrong might be as little as….. an end cannot be a desired goal, as you say, but is instead a necessary accomplishment

I didn’t understand the distinction here between “desired goal” and “necessary accomplishment”: could you please elaborate?

Now, ethically speaking, or, speaking from the perspective of a community predicated on moral agency, which just is a kingdom of ends in its strictest sense, putting the pieces of this particular puzzle together, you get to the conclusion that, if all members of the community are worthy of the happiness they each have, they must have all acted in accordance with a subjective moral principle. And if they are all happy within the community, which is the same as all happy with each other, they must have all acted in accordance with a subjective moral principle common to each member. Another name for a principle common to all which abide by it, is a universal law. And that subjective command which adheres to such law, is a categorical imperative, the formula for which in a community would be, then, treat each member as an end in himself, just as I treat myself.

Notwithstanding my quibble with happiness being necessarily the core of moral agency, I think this makes sense; but my issue is, although it is very practical, that it isn’t a commitment one has simply by being committed to being rational; instead, people have to genuinely (subjectively) obligate themselves to get along with other people: they must accept being a part of a kingdom of ends.

I am trying to avoid these kinds of moral anti-realist motivated normative theories, because moral realists are going to have an easy time dismissing them (and I think most people will not find it convincing): why should I care about being a member of a kingdom of ends?

Instead, I think, it would be much more convincing (especially to the layman) if it followed from the avoidance of a logical contradiction—e.g., because if you don’t, then you are being irrational...that’s a much harder bullet to bite then simply lacking the preference to care about other people. I am having a hard time coming up with one though.

Disclaimer: without “happiness” as the fundamental human aesthetic condition, re: what everybody wishes he had, and without “worthiness of being happy” as the fundamental human moral condition, re: what everybody ought to have, and a method for relating one to the other, none of the above is of any use and can be disregarded without fault.

What do you mean by “worthiness of being happy”? What would make one worthy of that in this view you have outlined?

Here's a new argument I was thinking of:

P1: One should abide by the intended function(s) of their organism.

P2: It is an intended function of the human species to care about the well-being of minds.

C: TF, a human should care about the well-being of minds.

What do you think?

I mean its incoherent, and therefore likely not going to be the objective morality if it exists.

Why is it incoherent? I think we both agree it isn’t internally incoherent, but why is it externally incoherent? Are you just saying it is incoherent with what most people consider to be moral/immoral? Because I can agree with that.

If I don't know if "Contradictions should be encouraged" is real, I can follow the logic to realize it contradictions itself, so then in conclude contradictions should probably not be encouraged.

This is circular...but, then again, so is all fundamental reason and logic.

The conclusion is, "Existence should be."

So, the original argument doesn’t work, because you were saying it is due to a contradiction—which we both agree now doesn’t exist. So what is the new argument for “existence should be”? Is it that it doesn’t coincide with our moral intuitions?

None of these reasons mean that there is an objective morality, but they are reasons I think its worthwhile to search for one.

I understand that it can be very compelling that [human] morality is something objective of which we are grasping, as opposed to projecting; and I’ve even flirted with moral non-naturalist views, like moral intuitionism, to try and get there...all to no avail.

1. There are universal moral decisions across cultures. Why? What's the underling fundamental that causes that?

Because the human species is a standard deviation curve, and, just like intelligence, there are certain moral intuitions which tend to be biologically baked into our species.

2. We are moral to animals. Some animals even show signs of morality

Again, something being biologically motivated doesn’t make it objective itself. With evolution, I would expect that other species, like intelligence, will have bits and pieces of what we do...we are the more complex biproduct of all those tiny steps evolution took and they are also a part of that.

3. There are various other contradictions and debated issues with many versions of subjective morality. That tells me that over the eons we've spent studying it, we haven't come up with an acceptable solution.

Doesn’t entail that moral realism is true.

4. There is great value to having an objective morality. Such an understanding can bridge cultures, religions, and further the understanding and progress of humanity.

I would say there’s great value in having an agreed upon moral standard, not that it is ultimately objective.

5. Humans are made out of matter. I do not see us as separate from the universe, but very much a part of it.

Agreed.

I find it odd that suddenly morality pops up and its only a human condition. I believe there is something underlying this beyond just evolution that allows morality to express itself through us.

And this is where I started flirting with moral intuitionism (; I don’t think there is anything underlying it other than biological motivation.

None of these reasons mean that there is an objective morality, but they are reasons I think its worthwhile to search for one.

Fair enough. I do think that there are many reasons (that are compelling) to be a moral realist but, at the end of the day, it is false; and this is why I really like my counter-argument to moral judgments expressing something objective:

P1: The way reality is does not entail how it ought to be.

P2: Moral facts are ways reality is such that it informs us how it ought to be.

C: TF, moral facts cannot exist.

It cuts right to the chase...sure, you can initially find it intuitive that morality is objective, but if you accept P1 then there’s not way they do.

But first we have to build up what morality actually is when it gets to the human level.

I don’t understand quite yet, within your view, what the moral facts are true in virtue of and so this makes no sense to me. “existence should be” is a claim, a reason, a statement, which is subjective: it’s that it corresponds to something objective that makes it true in the case of objective morality.

This entails that when you affirm that morality is objective that there are moral judgments which are made true in virtue of reality, and are not made true in virtue of our pyschology—so what is it, then? Platonic forms, naturalistic empirical inquiries, etc.? — Bob Ross

So far? "Existence should be" As I noted earlier, its time to read the rest of the OP.

Two things:

1. Your proof no longer works for “existence should be”, because there is no contradiction.

2. That is a claim: what is the underlying state-of-affairs in reality that makes it true? Or what makes it objectively true in your view?

Your OP doesn’t explain at all why it is objective, just that it is allegedly true because its negation leads to a contradiction.