All morally permissible actions are not immoral.
Abortion is morally permissible
Therefore, abortion is not immoral.

A desire that's bound to result in frustration, I might warn. But if you want to continue this line of thinking I'd suggest a new thread on meaning, so as not to get too off-base for @Banno's topic of inquiry. I think that another tangeant on meaning would detract from the overall discussion on Moore, "... is good", and so forth -- even if other views, such as beliefs about meaning, surely will influence the way we think through a problem.

Well, that's pretty far astray from here, I must say. :D I can agree to disagree. But you can see, I think, where my line of reasoning is going, yes?

I'm not ignoring meaning. In fact you could say my entire objection to emotivism hinges on meaning -- since I'm claiming that moral statements are meaningful, that that meaning is derived from their form as a proposition, and so they have the meaning of being true or being false (Regardless of whatever other meaning they may also have).

"It is raining" has the same truth-aptness as "It is good", and "I think it is raining" 's meaning is different from "It is raining".

Well, I've been restricting myself to the nature of moral language -- namely that moral statements are not special with respect to other statements. So a convention with respect to language would effect on the ontology of language, naturally enough, though we are beginning to run around in circles since usually we don't take language as an object of some sorts.

So in saying that moral statements are truth-apt, the phenomena under consideration is moral language -- whether or not moral statements have a semantics or no. By analogy I'd say something like "All people born under the sign of cancer are moody and perceptive", or other astrologicial statements have meaning, are truth-apt, because of the form they take. The statement itself, of course, is false, and may even include names without an existing referent -- such as the case with Zeus.

But the statements still have meaning. I understand what they are saying, and they are true or they are false.


A bit long winded, but the point here is that in the sense of the wider world I wouldn't say my position commits me to the notion that linguistic convention commits me to the ontological reality of moral facts, or some such. It just accounts for the apparent fact (though it can be explained away) that moral statements are propositions.

I did misunderstand you, but I don't think this follows. It's not because it's a widely held belief that I say moral statements are truth-apt. It's because of the form that they take -- they are of the same form as any other proposition.

What's not appealing in the sense that you're using that term is the suggestion that beliefs must have some merit just because they're strong beliefs or common beliefs. That approach would suggest that we should still be performing rituals, making sacrifices, etc. to ensure a good harvest, to stave off natural disasters, etc. — Terrapin Station

But I did not say that beliefs must have merit because they are strongly held beliefs. I said that emotivism does not account for the phenomena under consideration -- and in particular, that it sort of just ignores or explains away the fact that moral statements are of the form of propositions, and propositions are truth-apt.

From where I stand the usual explanation for this is that moral statements are only apparently truth-apt, but not really truth-apt -- they are expressions of emotion like "boo" or "hurrah", or some such. It saves the theory, but from my perspective it's a convenient just-so story.



EDIT: I'd also just like to note that the line of thought I've been pursuing here is error theory, which is just a little funny to categorize as a strongly held belief that is some kind of sacrosanct tradition.

When I say "It is raining" does that, on your view, mean the very same thing as "I think it is raining"?

Besides neglecting statements and all this above, emotivism cannot take account of conflicting wants/preferences and moral duty. — creativesoul

I think the line of thinking would be to say that we have conflicting emotions, and moral duty is just another emotion, a sort of pleasure, that some people have.

But I agree that "Boo" and "Hurrah" don't quite capture the emotions, even if they are the logical equivalent.

The spirit in which it's forwarded is akin to a scientific examination. It's not based on whether anyone finds it appealing or not. We want to know what the phenomenon really is. — Terrapin Station

By appealing I mean that the account is convincing, explains all the phenomena under consideration, or some such -- it makes an appeal to our rational judgment, not that the conclusion is unsavory or unwanted.

The problem with emotivism is that it does not account for moral phenomena -- in particular, it does not explain why it is that people hold moral beliefs as if they are true or false. It misses out on the semantics of moral statements: they are true or false. Perhaps, in the end, moral phenomena are decided by emotions, and emotions are non-cognitive, so how people reason about moral phenomena is through non-cognitive means. But this still leaves out the fact that moral statements are of the form of propositions, and that people treat them as if they are true.

Even if we think there is no fact to the matter that seems to be a big flaw in what emotivism accounts for. You can append a theory that such statements are only apparently truth-apt, but in fact are not -- but that strikes me as too convenient.

Well, sure, you can double-down and bite the bullet. But can you see why someone might find the theory unappealing? It seems somewhat elaborate and unnecessary to claim its all emotion, on the face of things, and goes against what we mean by moral statements.

I agree with that.

Alright, then we are in agreement I think -- I'm only saying that when people say "It is good" that this is what they mean -- they do not mean "I think it is good", but rather "It is good" is true.

What distinguishes a moral fact from other facts is the implied act. Don't kick the pup. SO it is true that we do something more with moral statements than other statements. — Banno

Cool -- so I think we are pretty close save for my lack of understanding what a moral fact is. Perhaps it does not matter? But maybe it does too.

A moral fact is an implied act. So abstaining from kicking the pup, even though it pooped all over my nice shoes, is the implied act. I feel like kicking the pup, but I do not act on that feeling because it is a wrong thing to do.

What if I did act on the feeling? What is it about the implied act that makes the moral statement true? Surely this would not make the moral statement false, else whatever we did would just make moral statements true, and then they'd all be true -- which isn't exactly what we mean by saying such and such is good or bad. Quite the opposite.

But where is our implied act, then, if we do not do it? Maybe I'm just not following.

Yes, definitely.

If "It is good" means "I think it is good" why wouldn't you just say "I think it is good"?

In the case of facts we don't have a problem appending "I think" when we wish to describe our beliefs. And similarly so with moral statements -- "I think we should help the poor -- I think it is a good thing to do" works perfectly well to describe my beliefs. Why substitute beliefs as the referent when we are perfectly capable of stating our beliefs on the matter clearly?

Its only claim is it has a future much like ours, and exactly like ours at the same level of biological development and it is morally wrong to deprive a future like ours — Rank Amateur

I'd say that its claim is false. But furthermore, the falsity of this claim does not seem to matter for the argument. It's the future like ours that matters, not the biological description -- which is really only suited to species-level, rather than individual-level, description anyways. Biology doesn't make a descriptive claim on some individual about its status as an organism, but rather makes a claim based on the usual features of organisms generally -- and I suspect, like most scientific definitions, it is a working definition for the purposes of understanding life.

So we can put aside the biological description, I think. I'll ask again, though, just to be sure -- do you think this is true, or do you believe that biology is important to the future of such-and-such? Does the description matter at all?

To me it really doesn't seem to. I'd just say that such-and-such constitutes an organism some time after birth, so though the organ has a future like ours it still is not a unique human organism.

Well, now that I know the script I can at least rehearse :D

My initial temptation was to jump down the "biological unique human organism" rabbit hole. But upon reflection I don't think I will because I can't help but feel that we don't really care about the biological facts of what constitutes an organism. We care about human beings. We don't care if the scientific world classifies such and such as an organism or not, which surely does not have in mind debates about good or evil in their classifications. Whether such and such achieves homeostasis, reproduction, or what-not is of theoretical interest only, and not moral interest.

Would you agree with that? Or not?

I am more than happy to address any point in any argument I have made, but on such a long and scattered thread - if you could kind of clearly state the concept or issue you want me to address. With all the scattered words over all these pages - easy to find a few to highlight and argue. But I will do my best — Rank Amateur

Fair enough, and sorry for that. I wasn't reading closely enough. My thought was with respect to where I responded to you here: https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/250860

When I said --

I don't think I quite see how it avoids the personhood issue, though. That's at least my failing in reading you. If it does I'm not understanding how it does so -- when I read you saying "people like you and me have a future that we value" and "A significant harm of killing us is the loss of that future" I cannot help but think -- well, yes, people like you and me do value our future. This is true.

And then wonder how we count "People like you and me" -- and that's where it seems to me personhood is assumed by yourself, or I'm just not understanding what it is about the future that is not personhood that makes it valuable.

Others have said the same, like @Banno, so I don't think I'm alone in my beffudlement. I'm trying to read you as charitably as possible, but I can't see why your argument is something we should care about unless it is the future of people we care about.

Engaging in a bad habit of double-posting:

Also, that being said, I should say there is some sense in which it makes sense to say there is a fact to the matter -- that what is good is good, and what is evil is evil. Usually cases of conversion seem to fit that bill; we often do, through our mistakes, change our minds about what moral propositions are true (in that we believe them to be true, even if they are false). I'd say that's the strongest argument for there being true moral propositions. I just compare such cases to cases where I change my mind because I was mistaken about some fact, and that empirical element seems to not quite be there in the case of moral propositions so the rational conclusion is that they must all be false in spite of their apparent semantic content.

I agree that a proposition is true or false, and that moral statements are of the form of propositions.

However, given that there is no fact of the matter, they must then all be false.


That being said it seems to me that there is an extra-logical function which moral statements inhabit. Something like a promise or an admonition -- these aren't exactly truth-apt functions, but they are still things we are doing with words. In saying something is good we are still doing something in spite of the falsity of the statement. What is that, though? I don't know.

I gave up being amazed at our ability as humans to justify killing the people we want dead a very long time ago. — Rank Amateur

To justify the people we want dead? So the future value of people is what we care about, yes?

It seems to me that this point is still unaddressed by you. You claim academic authority to ignore the point about people, but even you use the plain language that makes the most sense of the arguments you're making -- that people's lives are at stake, according to yourself. So you skip the quagmire of personhood while still caring about future value in your argument because of the quagmire of personhood -- it's just unaddressed and assumed.

Do you have a simple counterexample? — ChrisH

Silentio?

I'm watching the news about the first conviction in the UK for female genital mutilation. It's not part of 'our' culture, but it is part of the culture of some parts of Africa. We don't put bones in our noses, but we do put silicone in our tits, and we do sanction male genital mutilation. We are a bit inconsistent, and in large part it is simple myopia, rathe than any lack of insight. — unenlightened

My immediate reaction was to think of the differences between these and other practices, but I think I would say that, hey, a solution of context-dependency doesn't always work.

I'm tempted to say myopia is a part of the human condition. When we set out to work out a broader vision we can do so in conversation or thought -- but we have yet to figure out how we can do so as a group. Has any culture really done so? Maybe, maybe not. But at least our collective culture has a problem planning for the long-term -- we are like an adolescent chasing after the ephemeral now without any effective means for self-control.

And we are defensive about this too. Hence the claims to cultural superiority -- "The greatest country on Earth"


But I believe I've started to grasp the knot you're pointing out, at least, so thanks for that. How to untie it? I don't know right now.

Because your usage simply does not reflect how words such as like and dislike are commonly used. — ChrisH

Oh? How is that determined?

And supposing it to be the case, then why does it matter?

I asked you earlier for an example of an indivisible aspect of an object of evalutaion which resulted in both a 'like' and 'dislike' response. Can you come up with anything? — ChrisH

https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/252264
https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/252348

Not that this is the only example ever or anything. From my perspective, at least, what I'm talking about is common knowledge -- and to try and make the human heart fit into some kind of rationalist mode is, at least by my lights, just an error born of a desire for rationalism rather than a desire to see how people actually are. Sometimes what you say is the case -- there are certain aspects that we have a different relationship to. But sometimes that's not what we mean or have -- we have different emotions towards the same person or aspect.

In my view this is implausible. — ChrisH

Why?

It's OK. The general notion is that not only is Abraham under consideration, but the very same act of Abraham is under consideration -- so you could say that this is the same aspect of Abraham. Silentio never resolves the conflict, but goes back and forth between judging Abraham a moral monster or a knight of a faith and seems to hold both beliefs simultaneously.

Now, I don't think we have to be quite as intense as Kierkegaard makes his namesake in our own attachments -- it was just something that came to mind that demonstrates how we can feel seemingly opposing emotions towards the very same thing.

Have you ever had the (dis)pleasure of reading Fear and Trembling?

Silentio's account of the knight of faith and Abraham comes pretty close to a plausible account that is far better than anything I've cooked up.

I suspect that I'm not quite in the culture you describe, just to be up front about that. Or perhaps I'm like an adopted son who still has memories of another family -- so I'm just trying to wrap my mind around the difficulty that perhaps I do not quite feel, but trying to remain sensitive to too.

Here's something about that though -- perhaps your culture is not the only culture that sees itself as a culture. There is a kind of thought that I think I can empathize with in that there are people who don't see their own culture. But I think I'd posit that this is the case in all cultures -- that there are people who don't have a kind of self-awareness of their milieu, and there are people who do have that self-awareness. As early as Herodotus we have people who began to recognize that mores are relative to one's culture. Not everyone, and not even on the whole given what evidence we have ,but it was not unheard of either.

The real horn of your dilemma comes from not just recognizing oneself as a culture, but as you put it wanting both weak cultural relativism and rejecting radical cultural relativism and nihilism. Perhaps this conflict couldn't come about without an awareness of oneself as culturally conditioned, though, so perhaps that aspect is distinctive to your culture -- in that there are more people who are reflexively aware of themselves as inhabiting a culture.

What if what is good for us is not what is good for them? In which case we are not radical relativists, but perhaps our absolute moral propositions are context-sensitive.

The point here, to get back to the OP, is that moral realism is appealing because it explains why it is we can feel desire for something while simultaneously thinking that something is morally wrong. If there is a fact to the matter, if our feelings don't dictate right and wrong but only direct our actions, then it makes sense to say that I like such-and-such but I believe that it is wrong.

. I said that it doesn't make sense to not dislike x but to feel that x is immoral where we're not equivocating. — Terrapin Station

Is "not disliking" different from "Liking"? The double negative confuses me. I'd say it's quite possible to like something you believe is immoral. Not sure about "not disliking".

When you divide up a referent into its aspects I'd say that doesn't quite get at the structure of desire very well. Our desires are often in conflict. Saying "I love and hate such and such" makes more sense than to say "I like this part of such and such and hate this part of such and such" -- not because of the logic, but because these two sentences don't say the very same thing and the first sentence references a real phenomena -- a love-hate relationship. It's the sort of relationship where you simultaneously feel conflicting emotions about so and so or such and such, and isn't about dividing up someone or something into various aspects.

Temptation is similar to a love-hate relationship, except that there is a moral dimension whereas that is not necessarily the case with a love-hate relationship. Isn't this why the moralists among us are actually more driven to stamp out the things they find morally disgusting? Because they also feel called by them?

Not always, but certainly some of the time.

@ChrisH -- this is still farily general, but more specific. Does this help?

For example, you might have temptation to eat a piece of cake. You like the taste, you'd love eating it, but you don't like the calories (maybe you're trying to lose weight), the health issues (maybe you're worried about or you have diabetes), etc. — Terrapin Station

That is a pretty light form of temptation, I'd say. Plus it's quite rational.

Substance abuse comes closer to what I have in mind, or strong beliefs about sexual mores. These aren't exactly rational attachments, and so desires can compete and be at odds with one another with respect to the very same object.

Let's try a positive formulation.

I'd say it is possible to desire X, and to desire the abolition of X. One can be simultaneously attracted to and repulsed by the same object of desire -- this is because allure and repulsion are separate emotions and gets around the logical possibility of "X ^ ~X"

Is the paradox that yours is a culture which allows nativism in other cultures in the name of diversity, but disallows nativism with respect to itself?

I'm just trying to restate what you're getting at succinctly and clearly.

What's the difference? I'd say that this is exactly what temptation looks like -- to object to something yet want it.

I'd say that your statement makes sense. Isn't this the structure of temptation? To like something which one objects to?

Who gets to speak for the fetus in that case? And that was the point I am making, are you 100% sure it deserves no moral standing in the discussion? — Rank Amateur

The mother does. In some ideal sense I'd say the father too, but it's too idealistic to the practical realities of birth and who shoulders the costs of birth.

It's not that the fetus has no moral standing -- it's that the mother is the one in the best position to make that judgment, more than any other person, and in terms of universal prescriptions at least, the mother's worth is infinitely greater than what is effectively an organ.

Worthless? Surely not. But by my estimation the mother is clearly a person, and the fetus clearly is not, so there isn't really any basis of comparison.

I think that some moral considerations are not black and white, and that abortion is the sort of action that falls in that category. The best way to proceed, in such cases, is to allow people to make the decision on their own because the complexity of the situation is too great for a universal prescriptive rule.

Some actions are just straightforwardly wrong, and it would be inappropriate to have that much permissiveness in those cases -- like murder or slavery.

But abortion is not clear cut. I think that mostly stems from the fact that there are multiple things we care about in conflict with one another, plus the (relatively recent) history of equating abortion to murder to intensify those emotions.

Agree, and in the actual argument marquis address it. But the argument is not about any future, it is about a future, like ours. — Rank Amateur

Marquis did, but I think his argument is a bit different from yours. At least if we're thinking of the same paper that he's famous for. Maybe he's made modifications that I'm unaware of.

I was wondering how your argument might deal with this.

I have addressed this issue in the argument, and it is about non-justified killing. Hopping not to run off into a side argument, I ask we don't spend time arguing what is or is not justified. — Rank Amateur

Sure, that's fine. I was mostly supplying this to say that my theory is able to match yours, since you claimed that one of the benefits of the FOV argument is its ability to account for why murder is wrong -- so I was just displaying that personhood can also function like this. We don't need to get into what I agree would be tangential about which is better at representing the ethics of killing.

The entire purpose of the FOV argument is to avoid the personhood issue.

In short form it is quite simple and intuitively true.

Despite the coffee shop philosophy, we - people like you and me have a future that we value.
A significant harm of killing us is the loss of that future — Rank Amateur

I don't think I quite see how it avoids the personhood issue, though. That's at least my failing in reading you. If it does I'm not understanding how it does so -- when I read you saying "people like you and me have a future that we value" and "A significant harm of killing us is the loss of that future" I cannot help but think -- well, yes, people like you and me do value our future. This is true.

And then wonder how we count "People like you and me" -- and that's where it seems to me personhood is assumed by yourself, or I'm just not understanding what it is about the future that is not personhood that makes it valuable.

Now the biology

About 2 weeks after conception there is a unique human organism

You, me and every human on the planet can directly trace our existence in time and space as a biological entity to such a unique organism that could only have been us.

What you moliere are living right now was the future of that one unique organism at one time.

The argument is it is wrong to unjustifiably deny a human future of value, like ours at anytime in our unique development

The argument is based mostly on pure biology, one inference that futures such as ours are valuable, and an application of ideal desire to the fetus

The argument has holes, mostly around the issue of ideal desire. But it had lasted 30 years because to a very high degree the premise is true and the logic is sound.

I think it's just the best contender in town that at least claims to not rely upon theological premises, so it lasts because there is nothing else. But that's just me :D

The thing that I always find ironic in these discussions is how so many folks, who value science so greatly in the theist, atheist discussions abandoned it in a heart beat in the personhood issue.

And the same folks how value reason so greatly in the theist,atheist discussions, are willing all kinds of twists of reason when it comes to the personhood issue, as below

Hrrmmm? Have we talked about a/theism and science before? I honestly don't remember.

FWIW, I try to be consistent. Obviously I fail at times.

The fetus is not a person because it does not have trait X
But there are all kinds of things we are happy to call persons that don't have trait X

Ok, let me modify trait X so it only applies to a fetus

Which just make the argument a fetus is not a person because the fetus is not a person

As your, it is not sentience, it is the history of sentience that is important, There is only one kind of human without a history of sentience, a fetus at some stage. Take out all the parts in the middle and your point is just a fetus is not a person because it’s a fetus

So for yourself it seems like a shell game ,basically. If you come up with one thing that's wrong, then there's something else to put forward. So it seems like the conclusion is just assumed to be true, and the premises are ad hoc, more or less, and so not really a principle worth considering.

I don't think that personhood has a singular trait. It's a morass of traits. And, for whatever it happens to be worth, it was only after reading up on the philosophy of abortion that I believed as I do now -- I used to be more pro-life.

Not that this is to persuade you, or anything, but I'm just letting you know where I am at. I don't think I'm playing a shell game -- so at least I am not doing so intentionally.

Yes! That's exactly what I'm saying -- personhood is not a metaphysical category (though if we are cognitivists then we should supply some criteria by which to make a judgment), but an ethical one.

Technically I wouldn't say a newlyborn has all the qualities of a person, but in the interest of laying down a line that is on the safe side I say birth is a good point because at least at that point there is a separate body.

I just quote this below because I think we've come to a terminus on the other subjects.

What? It's very relevant for anyone who considers personhood to be the key determining factor with regards to value and morality in relation to abortion. Quite a few people here have made it clear that that's what they consider, yourself included it seems. — S

How so?

It seems to me the question of personhood is just when something is considered worthy of such and such a consideration. One could frame this cognitively or non-cognitively, though, so whether our meta-ethical stance is one or the other doesn't seem to bare on the normative question. So if we are non-cognitivists about persons then there would be no real rule, but rather an emotive state, which decides when we treat such and such as a person, whereas if we are cognitivists then we'd set out some criteria to assist in judging this that or the other.

Or if we are somewhere in-between, which I think I'd say I am, then we'd say that our emotions are clearly a determining factor in which rules we follow, but rules are the means by which we discuss moral matters and consider them for revision or change --so you'd have both.

Further, we could frame things in terms of actions instead of in terms of personhood -- so the values we are thinking of are the acts one chooses. But whether we be cognitivists or non-cognitivists on the matter we can make an argument both ways.