Yes, that would be a good idea. I cannot follow what your saying now, so maybe a definition, or even a description of what you think free will is. You said something about libertarian free will, but to me that doesn't seem at all consistent with the principles you are arguing. But maybe you have a different idea from me, about what constitutes libertarian free will. — Metaphysician Undercover

Fair enough. I would suggest that for an agent to have libertarian free will, it must be the case that their actions are caused by the agent themselves and not wholly determined by preceding events (I think I'd also add that they aren't random but that's maybe a debate for another day), and that their actions are in-principle not wholly predictable with 100% accuracy prior to their occurance (Lapse's demon is impossible).

So are you saying that the "free" in "freedom" has a different meaning from the "free" in "free agent"? I assume also, that since you assert that defining "free agent" with "free will" is not self referential, then the "free" of "free will" has a different meaning from the "free" of "free agent". This is getting very confusing to me, and the likelihood of equivocation is looming large. — Metaphysician Undercover

I mean, I think freedom and free will are different things. As I have said before, I would say that freedom is the ability to understand and make choices (and I would say that the kind of freedom that we should care about morally is the freedom to make one's own choices). To understand and make choices is the use of one's free will and one's rationality. Having free will is not the same as being able to use it to make your choices (since those choices might be restricted in some way). When I talk about a "free agent" I mean an agent possessing free will. I am not making a claim about how restricted or unrestricted their freedom is.

You were attempting to make a distinction between the physical forces of the universe, and the force someone uses to force a person to do something. You said: "This sounds like equivocation to me. Surely you don't mean to equate "force" as in to force someone to do something with "forces" as in the physical forces of the universe." — Metaphysician Undercover

Yes, because "forcing" someone to do something means something different than the "forces" of the universe, and I was very confused that you seemed to be using them interchangably.

That is because I want premises for the purpose of proceeding logically. If we allow the ambiguity of words meaning numerous different things, then we open ourselves to equivocation and logic becomes useless. Then there is no point to proceeding. That's why I'm now looking for some clearly defined terms to provide for us some agreeable premises for logic. — Metaphysician Undercover

I think we can be clear about what we mean even if words have more than one possible meaning.

This is self-referential. You define "free agent" with "free will", but nothing tells us what "free" means. — Metaphysician Undercover

This is not self-referential at all. I define "free agent" with reference to free will. I feel like I already explained what I mean by free will but I can do so again if you would like.

Now "freedom" becomes totally meaningless. "Free" to me, as the common dictionary definition indicates, means unrestricted. Now you say freedom might be restricted, or it might not. That leaves "freedom" itself as nothing.

And as I've shown, the "ability to understand and make their own choices" is not freedom at all. Because you qualify "their own choices", with moral principles, this phrase, as you define it, just refers to a type of restriction. And as far as I understand "free", restriction is opposed to "free". — Metaphysician Undercover

First, freedom is not meaningless, it is simply different from being a "free agent" in the sense of an agent with free will. To have free will and to have the freedom to express it are different things.

Second, you haven't shown that. You have insisted it, usually backing it up with a misunderstanding of what I've said or the assertion that I should be using words the way you would prefer. It is freedom to make a certain kind of choices.

Third, I'm not saying that what freedom is could be restricted or not. I am saying that being a "free agent" in the sense of having free will is not the same as having freedom to express that free will (as mentioned above).

The point is that you have named a special type of restriction, one which is imposed upon a person by another, and you have singled this out as if it has special moral significance. What my explanation of your "locked in the room" example shows, is that whether or not a restriction is imposed by another person is usually very insignificant relative to the required decision making at that time. If you find yourself locked in a room, the issue of whether or not someone imposed this upon you intentionally ought to have very little significance over the choices you need to make at that time. And in general, in cases where we find ourselves confronted with unwanted restrictions, whether these restrictions are natural, or artificially imposed, ought not have a serious affect on our decisions making. We must work to understand the restrictions, and free ourselves from them, not worry about who, why, or if, someone laid them on us. Therefore "imposed by another" is not a species of "restriction" which is important to distinguish at this time. We need to first understand what "free" and "restricted" mean, in their basic sense. — Metaphysician Undercover

I mean, aside from the fact that someone has acted wrongly in this case, I am generally inclined to agree. But I don't think I ever suggested or implied that someone's freedom being restricted or violated by another person was in some way more significant than it being violated by something else. You said that restrictions were inherent to the person, and I was simply pointing out that this seems like a silly way to conceptualize restrictions. In this case, there was another person involved, but there need not be. We might imagine a similar case where a rock has fallen on your leg and trapped you under it, thereby restricting your freedom. It would be very strange to categorize the rock on your leg as an restriction that is inherent to you or in some sense internal. It is a thing that has happened to you that is restricting your freedom.

OK, but since "freedom is restricted" is a blatant contradiction, and you seem to believe that "restricted" represents the truth in this matter, we need to start with the premise that the agent is not free. The agent is restricted. Whether or not you believe in free will is irrelevant now, what you believe is that the agent is restricted, and therefore not free. Now we can proceed to outline the nature of the restrictions.

I believe, as I said earlier, the most important and significant restriction is the nature of time. It is impossible to alter the past. And, it's not the case that this type of restriction is not morally relevant, because this restriction affects everything we do, that which is morally irrelevant, as well as that which is morally relevant. — Metaphysician Undercover

Again, you seem to want words to only mean one thing, and they don't.

A free agent is one that has free will. Their freedom (their ability to understand and make their own choices) might be restricted, or it might not. If it is restricted, I would say that was a bad thing. But such a restriction would not stop them being a free agent in the sense of having free will.

I'm not really sure what point you are making in your discussion of the person locked in the room.

This qualification, "that someone has imposed upon you" such and such restriction, is generally insignificant, and unimportant. Consider that you suddenly find yourself locked in a room. And, your desire is to be free. Look at the possibilities for the means to freedom, which I mentioned above. That someone has imposed the restriction on you is completely irrelevant. However, when we look at the memories from the past experience, this qualification may be significant. If you think you might call the person on your phone, and get them to let you out, then it would be important. But this is unlikely, so the qualification that it "is a restriction that someone has imposed upon you", is probably completely irrelevant to your desire for freedom. — Metaphysician Undercover

Whether it is relevant to your escape attempts is a seperate issue to whether the proper way of thinking about it is a restriction inherent to you or a restriction someone has imposed on you.

I'm not entirely sure what points you are making as they seem to bounce around a lot.

Again, to be a free agent is to have free will, even if your freedom is restricted.

Also, I think this way of thinking about restrictions is just incorrect. If someone has locked you in a room, that is not a restriction inherent within you. That is a restriction that someone has imposed upon you. I mean, there's a sense in which you wouldn't be restricted by this were it not for your inability to pass through solid matter. Is this the kind of thing you are raising, that the things that restrict our freedom are contingent upon various physical facts about us?

That's human nature, people hold fast to the beliefs they have. Because of this, I think moral philosophy is the most difficult field You are not listening to me. I am not listening to you. I think the analogy is good. — Metaphysician Undercover

Well, I think you're half right.

Are you not listening, in denial, or do you seriously not understand this point? The fact that force often appears to restrict freedom does not justify the proposition "force restricts freedom".

Exceptions to the rule indicate that the rule is faulty. What is required is a comparison of cases where force does restrict freedom to cases where it does not restrict freedom, and this will reveal what really restricts freedom, and why there is the appearance that it is force which restricts freedom. — Metaphysician Undercover

I am not suggesting "force restricts freedom" as a rule. You suggested a rule and I am pointing out that it isn't accurate.

"Free" implies a state of being unrestricted, yet we are surrounded by forces. So if forces are restrictions, we could not be free — Metaphysician Undercover

This sounds like equivocation to me. Surely you don't mean to equate "force" as in to force someone to do something with "forces" as in the physical forces of the universe.

I think 'goal' might be more appropriate there as I think Aristotle would say that things can have a final cause without the capacity for intentions, but for moral agents I think I see what you mean. Though I wonder whether that means you think you can't have a final cause you are unaware of, or if you think this amounts to being unaware of your intentions.

I don't think I dismissed the importance of teaching.

In Plato's cave the prisoners refuse to listen to the escapee. They think the sun has ruined his eyes for he cannot see the shadows with the same clarity they can. Plato seems to be making the point that the enlightened cannot necessarily share their wisdom with those who see only shadows. I'm not saying I agree, just that I'm not sure you analogy is doing the work you want it to.

The point is, that we cannot proceed from this proposition "force restricts freedom", as a premise, because it is a false proposition. Therefore if we want to understand how freedom is restricted, and proceed with a true premise about this, we really need to look elsewhere. — Metaphysician Undercover

No, the point is that you claimed that one thing does not cause another. I pointed out that it often does.

As for understanding how freedom is restricted, it seems that it is restricted in lots of ways, and that an understanding of what it means for it to be restricted is probably more useful to recognizing them than making sweeping generalizations. That being said, as a broad generalization, we could do a lot worse than 'force restricts freedom'. As a heuristic, this seems like it would get us to the right answer more often than not, given that 'forcing' someone to do something is pretty directly opposed to them having a choice in the matter.

I think calling intentions a final cause might be quite different from how that term is generally used. I confess I'm not entirely sure what you mean by the term in this context as you seem to be using it in quite a different way from the teleological sense. Also, I don't think intentions are or should be the focus of morality (which will come as no surprise given I am a consequentialist).

Consequentialism does indeed judge whether actions are good based on their consequences, but consequentialism by itself isn't a moral theory. Utilitarianism, freedom consequentialism, even egoism, give moral guidance for what actions should be done based on either their consequences or their expected consequences (there's a whole discussion to be had about expected value vs actual value here, but let's not get into that).

I don't think the primary goal of moral philosophy is to incline or inspire people to act well. I think it is determine what it is to act well. While it is reasonable to say that a goal of moral philosophy is to share moral truths with people, I would say its primary goal is to discover them in the first place.

I don't think I said that influencing people to do immoral things is not morally relevant. I think I said that libertarian free will makes this complicated as the consequences of someone else's actions are caused by them, not by you, though you seem very clearly to have contributed to them. It's potentially a difficult question to pin down, and I would freely admit that I don't really know how free will works (assuming we have it). But I don't think the issue is in not having enough causes in our proposed ontology, I think it is that free will is weird.

If you are stating "force restricts freedom", as a proposition, a premise for a logical proceeding, then it is implied that force always restricts freedom. And if what you meant was "force sometimes restricts freedom", then please state it that way. The problem though is that if you did state it that way, it wouldn't carry the logical force required for your argument, and that's why you stated it the other way. — Metaphysician Undercover

I am fairly sure that what I said, and what I meant, was that force very often restricts freedom. You were the one that suggested that force does not restrict freedom, I was simply pointing out that this is not the case because it often does. I need not show that it always does to show that you are wrong, only that it sometimes does. In this case, it often does.

I would say that morality is the way in which persons ought to be or act, where "ought" is understood in a universal and objective sense.
— Dan

Can i clarify something here (not realated to any previous discussions)?

Is this to insinuate that you can only conceive of "universal or objective" morality, or simply that the concept of Morality is this - and so, whether or not any theory obtains is irrelevant? — AmadeusD

What I mean to say is that this (the definition given in the quote you have used here) is what I take morality to be and what I mean when I am discussing morality. I do not mean to insinuate that this is the only definition of the word "morality" I could concieve of, though I might say that morality defined thusly (or perhaps very similarly) is the kind worth discussing.

I'm not sure what you mean by "and so, whether or not any theory obtains is irrelevant" so I've left that alone as I feel you might need to explain your reasoning a bit more there before we can discuss it.

I suggest that your conclusion, "that consequentialism is the appropriate form a moral theory should take" restricts your ability to understand the true nature of freedom. "Freedom" in it's normal usage, also the sense of "free will" denies the necessary relation between posterior and prior (after and before). This means that the concept of "freedom" does not accept as true, the determinist proposition that after is determined by before. Because of this, consequentialism, which bases its judgement of before, on after, is not suited to any moral philosophy which accepts "free will" as true,

What you do, is that instead of accepting this incompatibility, which ought to force you to choose one or the other (freedom or consequentialism), or neither, you propose a compromised sense of "freedom". This is a restricted sense of "freedom", qualified by "to make one's own choices". Here, "one's own choices" is defined by consequentialist principles. So your proposition is a sense of "freedom" which is defined by consequentialist principles. However, since "freedom" in the sense of "free will" is incompatible with consequentialist principles, your proposition consists of a freedom which is incompatible with free will. — Metaphysician Undercover

There is almost quite an interesting point here, but free will doesn't require that nothing is caused by anything, only that our choices are not wholly caused by preceding factors. It is not incompatible with consequentialism (and in fact, I would say that consequentialism is incompatible with a lack of free will inasmuch as all morality is) because the consequences of our actions are still caused by those actions. Though, admittedly, consequences such as other people acting immorally is quite weird to determine given that you can't really cause other people to make immoral decisions if you assume free will in the libertarian sense (which I do), but you can certainly contribute to such decisions, such as by providing them information (false or otherwise) without which they would not have made that decision. For example, providing the whereabouts of a abused spouse to their abuser would contribute to the immoral action of that abuser continuing to abuse their victim or indeed killing them etc.

Here's a fine example. In this statement, "very often" is the important, or significant qualifier. The truth and reality that force very often restricts freedom does not necessitate the inductive conclusion "Force restricts freedom". The qualifier "very often" does not provide the necessity required for a valid inductive conclusion. So the evidence you present as cases in which force does restrict freedom, do not serve to justify your proposition "force restricts freedom", as a valid, evidence based, inductive principle.

This is an example of how consequentialism relies on faulty inductive propositions. The determinist principles at work here, are as follows. We see that in the particular case, and even specific cases, the posterior is determined by the prior. In these cases, force is what restricted freedom. Because we see a causal relation we say that force caused restricted freedom. This is a case of looking backward in time. We can look at a multitude of such events which have occurred, without comparing the type of force, degree of force, and a slew of other factors, and we see that force "very often" restricts freedom. This commonly referred to as "cherry picking" which supports faulty induction. Then we see the cause/effect relation which creates the appearance of necessity, and we are inclined toward the faulty inductive conclusion "force restricts freedom".

But if we look toward the future, instead of looking toward the past, we see the inevitable nature of "force". Force itself is necessary, as inevitable, an unescapable aspect of reality. However, we understand ourselves as beings with free will, who can understand, and often avoid the restrictive aspect of force. We can even strategize and use force to our advantage. Looking at the future, from the perspective of "free will", nullifies, and invalidates, the faulty inductive conclusion "force restricts freedom". This is because from the perspective of "free will", what happens after what is happening now, is never necessitated by what is happening now. The concept of free will breaks that necessity, that the posterior (the after) will be determined by the prior (the before). The concept, "free will", allows that a freely chosen choice, at any moment in time, can affect what occurs afterward, in a way which is not determined by what occurred before. This breaks the inductive necessity of the cause/effect determinist assumption, that the after will be determined by the before. Without this necessity, inductive propositions like the one in your example, and similar one's employed by consequentialism, do not qualify as valid moral principles.

This is commonly understood as the gap between is and ought. The inductive principles state what "is the case", at the present, based on observations of the past. But moral principles look to the future and state what ought to be. So moral philosophy seeks to have an effect on the approaching time, in a way which is not determined by past observations, "what is", but by freely chosen choices, guided by knowledge and understanding, which produces "ought". — Metaphysician Undercover

Lot going on here. First, necessity is not required for inductive reasoning. Second, "force restricts freedom" does not imply that force always restricts freedom and is in fact technically true if it occurs even occasionally, let alone very often. Third, you kind of lose me when you start talking about force itself as this seems very divorced from the concrete reality of examples like "if you cut off my arm, you reduce my freedom over my arm". Fourth, as mentioned above, free will isn't incompatible with consequentialism because consequentialism doesn't require everything to be casually determined, only that consequences can result from actions. There might well be breaks in causality when it comes to free agents decision points, and what we should say about this is potentially an interesting topic, but it certainly seems that we can agree that actions can have consequences, so it seems that those actions can be assessed by reference to those consequences. Fifth, that isn't really what the is-ought gap is at all.

What you call "universal and objective sense" has been revealed as faulty inductive reasoning. — Metaphysician Undercover

I'm not even sure what you mean by this, but I'm fairly sure it's incorrect.

This is to clarify that when I am discussing morality and theories thereof, this is what I am talking about.

You seem to be claiming a consequentialist bias because I am a consequentialist. I suggest that this is not bias but rather a considered evaluation that consequentialism is the appropriate form a moral theory should take. You seem convinced that consequentialism must be concerned with "observable" consequences. While it is certainly the case that observable consequences are much eaiser to measure, they are not the only ones which can be morally relevant for a consequentialist theory. Also, you accuse me of not considering an act itself immoral regardless of its consequences. Well yeah, no kidding. That is not a consequentialist "bias," that is just what consequentialism is. The morality of actions is determined by their consequences, that's very much the whole thing.

Force very much does restrict freedom. It does so very often. When people are murdered, when they have their bodies maimed and their property destroyed by explosives, when they are captured and held against their will, these are all examples of their freedom being reduced by force employed by another party. But presumably all of this is obvious.

Again, I have not had to overide any definitions. I have offered to provide a formal definition, but heard nothing back on the matter.

I would say that morality is the way in which persons ought to be or act, where "ought" is understood in a universal and objective sense. We have already discussed at length your issues with me using the word "freedom." I have attempted to be specific in what I mean, but you still seem to be caught on the word, rather than the concept. I think "freedom" is the most appropriate word for the ability of persons to understand and make their own choices, but you are welcome to disagree (and indeed you have). However, I have been pretty clear in how I am using the word throughout this discussion.

Obviously, deception creates exactly that type of misunderstanding. For example, when I am choosing which park to walk in, you lie to me and tell me park X is currently closed, this creates misunderstanding about the choice I am making, reducing my understanding of the choice I am making. I would go so far as to say that all cases of deception do this or something similar, that's what deception does, creates misunderstanding in the person concerning choices they are making. Even in the innocuous joke deception like April Fools day, the "joke" is brought about by making a public display of how the person misunderstands one's own choice in reaction to the deception. — Metaphysician Undercover

This is neither obvious nor the case. People are capable of misunderstanding a great many things beyond just the nature of the choices that belong to them.

It is unwise for you to dismiss this situation, when a person is listening to another to be educated, as the fault of the student, for allowing oneself to listen to the other. When an individual "takes one's own choices away", due to the attitudinal nature of being human, with the desire to know, this is no less forceful than strapping the person to the chair. In fact, in this situation it is much more forceful, because strapping to the chair does not force them to listen and accept, but the person's disposition does force them to listen and accept. — Metaphysician Undercover

Yes it is. It is entirely less forceful. Making your own choices is not being forced. It is not reducing your freedom. It is using it. I feel like we have been over this point quite a bit, and we are in danger of devolving into nuh-uh territory, but I absolutely do not agree to your categorizing of someone making a choice as them being "forced by their disposition". Rather, I think they have free will, and have exercised that free will in this case.

and you completely ignore what one person does to another person's mind through communication, claiming this is not morally relevant. I believe that this is due to your consequentialist bias. — Metaphysician Undercover

I don't ignore this, nor is my view due to any "consequentialist bias". Rather, I simply disagree that these cases constitute taking away someone's ability to understand and make their own choices. As I have explained to you. That you seem to be dismissing my stated reasons and asserting that I have hidden motives for this (and other things) is, to my mind at least, not a very useful way of discussing something. Imagine if I were to dismiss your stated reasons for everything you have said and ascribe to you some sinister ulterior motive, perhaps one you are not even aware of. I think this is unlikely to further the discussion.

However, the results of a person's actions which affect the minds of others, to influence the ideologies, desires and wants of those others, which ultimately have great influence over the person's actions in the world, are dismissed as not morally relevant. — Metaphysician Undercover

Not necessarily. It might be morally relevant if a person convinces someone else to do something immoral by providing them misinformation. This information doesn't need to cause them to misunderstand their choice, it could still be immoral if it leads to bad consequences. This is entirely consistent with consequentialism. But giving other people information, whether true or not, is not in itself taking away a choice that belongs to them.

The issue is as I've shown, that not every choice regarding what happens to one's own mind, body and property, is one's own choice. In many cases (examples I have provided), you have said that a choice regarding one's own mind, body, and property, will have an effect on others, which makes you judge the choice as not one's own, due to that effect. So you negate your own definition, with a whole slew of exceptions, principally if the choice restricts another's capacity to understand and make one's own choices, then the choice does not belong to the person. You really do override your own definition. How does it make sense to you, to define one's own choice as a choice regarding one's own mind, body and property, and then proceed to dismiss a whole bunch of choices regarding one's own mind, body and property, as not qualifying to be one's own choice, for some other reason.

It might be more accurate to define one's own choice as a choice regarding one's own mind, body, and property, which does not interfere with another's choice regarding one's own mind, body, and property. But this would be very problematic, because most choices interfere with others, in some way or another. That would leave "one's own choice" as a rather useless principle. So you have described a special type of interference, and this becomes the base of your exceptions. The problem which you and I have, is that we do not agree on when the named boundary, outlining the exceptions, has been crossed. And, there can be no clear solution here due to the issue of self-reference. Therefore we will likely always disagree and there will be no principles available to resolve the disagreement. — Metaphysician Undercover

I'm not sure you have shown this. There are potentially some complicated cases, but I don't think the ones you have suggested, such as stealing my car, are among them. These seem pretty clear.

We clearly disagree about the nature of deception. I think that you do not understand it at all, trying to belittle its effect. I don't think homework on my part will resolve this, I think you need to look more closely at what deception really is, rather than just considering one very uncommon type, being "deceived about the nature of the choice they have to make". This doesn't even make sense. Convincing a person that they "have to make" a specific choice, is an act of deception itself. — Metaphysician Undercover

Not "have to" in the sense of must. "have to make" in the sense of the choice that they have. I can give some examples that don't involve property if you like, though they can get a bit distasteful as sexual consent is the next most obvious case.

The issue is not whether deception is "wrong". The issue is whether it restricts another's capacity to understand and make one's own choices. And, regardless of the fact that your refuse to recognize this, the answer is yes, it does. Deception creates misunderstanding therefore it restricts a persons capacity to understand and make one's own choices. On the contrary, education increases one's capacity to understand and make one's own choices, but faulty education, even if it's not intentional deception, restricts that capacity by creating misunderstanding. — Metaphysician Undercover

It might create misunderstanding, but unless it creates misunderstand about what choice the person is making (or what it is to make such a choice), then it doesn't reduce their ability to understand and make that choice.

Of course it does. Can't you see that? Me lying to you about the car caused you to misunderstand the gift, which you accepted, but you may not have accepted it if you knew the truth. You had a lack of understanding within your own choice to accept the gift — Metaphysician Undercover

I didn't misunderstand the choice to accept the car though. I understood what I was accepting, which was the choice that belonged to me. I didn't understand your nefarious plans to ruin my reputation and, had I understood this, I might not have accepted the gift, but whether or not you set out on such a plot was not a choice that belonged to me. The choice that was mine to make was whether to accept the car you are presenting me with, possibly in a certain condition specified by you, and your deception didn't make me misunderstand that choice.

Of course it reduces their ability to understand and make their own choice. When they believe the lie, their choice is based in a misunderstanding. This explicitly means that their understanding has been reduced. How can you think otherwise? — Metaphysician Undercover

They might make their choice based on a misunderstanding, but it is not a misunderstanding of what choice they are making. It is only the person's ability to understand and make the choices that belong to them that is being used as the measure of value here. I think you think I am setting a higher bar here than I am.

You are flatly denying what is obvious. A choice to educate another person is a choice to do something with that person's mind, just as much as a choice to steal another's car is a choice to do something with another's property. That it must makes sense to the person to be able to teach it to the person, does not imply that teaching isn't doing something with another's mind. It's just a condition, like in order for me to steal your car I need to be in the proximity of it. — Metaphysician Undercover

If I choose to educate you, you might simply walk away, or not check my post, or simply ignore what I'm saying. Unless I am strapping you to a chair and forcing you to listen, then I'm not taking your choice away. Can you see how this is quite clearly different from you taking my car?

This is incorrect. You very clearly said that when I use my own mind, body, and tools, to take your car, this is not a choice which belongs to me, even though I am using my own mind, body, and property. But when using my own property has an effect on your property which is morally irrelevant, then you allow that it is my own choice. Clearly you allow whether you believe that a choice is right or wrong, to influence your judgement as to whether the choice belongs to the person. — Metaphysician Undercover

Yeah, because it's a choice about what to do with my stuff. Choices of what to with your own stuff belong to you, choices of what to do with mine (or anyone else's) don't. Think of it this way: There are things that belong to you, specifically your mind, body, and property. Where only those things are concerned, you get to make all the decisions. When it comes to other people's stuff, such as their minds, bodies, and property, those choices belong to them. Is that a clear way of thinking about it? I can give you a more formal definition if it would help.

I don't agree with this. I think choices are very specific, while desires may be more general. I believe the proper representation is that my desire is to take a walk (something general), and my choice is to take a walk in that specific park. The choice is what inclines one to act, and it is always specific, never general. For example, hunger manifests as a general desire to eat, but when a person decides to eat, it always must be a specific thing which they chose to eat.

I believe this difference between the general desire, and the specific choice is very important to moral philosophy. Since desire is general, and choice is specific, this allows us to mitigate the effects of desire, because we can entertain numerous possibilities as to the specific thing which will fulfil the desire. So, in the example of taking a walk in the park, the general desire is to take a walk, but it is not a choice until I choose an actual pace to walk. In the meantime, between desiring to walk, and actually choosing to walk (which requires a specific place to walk), I can consider the moral consequences of the different specific possibilities. — Metaphysician Undercover

But the choice which belongs to you is the choice to take a walk, not to take a walk in that specific park. Though any exercise of that choice might involve a specific destination, the destination is not the thing that belongs to you, and no particular destination (as opposed to any other) is required for you to exercise that choice.

You're obviously not understanding my criticism, so let me put it in another way. When judging whether a choice is one's own or not, you often refer to how the choice affects another's capacity to make one's own choices. This is an overriding principle, it overrides your definition of one's own choice, as a choice which involve one's own mind, body and property. It overrides your definition, because many examples I have given you, of choices which concern my own mind, body, and property, you reject them as my own, on the basis that such a choice would restrict another's ability to make one's own choices. So do you agree, that the true definition of one's own choice, the one which you are actually applying, is a choice which does not limit another's capacity to make one's own choices? But that definition suffers the problem of being self-referential — Metaphysician Undercover

I'm not sure that I do this at all. I'm not necessarily opposed one's own choices being in part determined by whether those choices belong to someone else, but I think I have been fairly consistent that your own choices are those regarding what happens to your own mind, body and property. I don't think I have introduced an overriding principle so much as you have claimed that you stealing my car is your choice to make because it involves your own body, when it is clearly a choice of what to do with my car.

It is you who is continually ignoring the fact that lying and deception actually do take away peoples' ability to understand and make their own choices. Lying and deception creates misunderstanding which is clearly contrary to someone's ability to understand and make their own choices. — Metaphysician Undercover

It is only contrary when the person is decieved about the nature of the choice they have to make. Decieving them about other things (even things that might influence what choice they make) does not reduce this ability. There's quite a good paper by Hallie Liberto regarding sexual consent that could potentially help clarify this discussion a bit if you don't mind some homework.

This is obviously wrong. That's exactly what lying and deception does do, reduces their ability to understand and make their own choices, through the means of misunderstanding. How is it possible that misunderstanding does not reduce a person's ability to understand one's choices? To put it in terms of property (which seems to be the only terms you understand), imagine if I give you a car, and I say here, I bought this for you. So you drive it and it turns out that you are driving a stolen car. Doesn't this "misunderstanding" demonstrate clearly to you, how lying and deception reduces the ability to understand one's own choices? And it isn't just in some cases, it's in all cases, because that's what deception is, the creation of misunderstanding for the purpose of manipulating the person's choices. — Metaphysician Undercover

This is a fine example of deception being wrong. The person thinks they are making one kind of choice but they are actually making another. That's fine. I have no issue with deception sometimes being wrong, I'm just pointing out that it often isn't. To use a different example, imagine you buy me a car which I accept because I believe it to be a gift in good faith. Unbeknown to me, you have chosen this car because you wish to ruin my reputation. Perhaps it has been recently voted the worst car for the environment and you intend to smear me for being irresponsible. You lying to me about your reasons does not reduce my ability to understand and make the choice to accept the car. Your reasons were never my choice to make.

This is a bit of a silly example, but there are plenty of sensible ones we could use too. For example, imagine you tell people at a party that you are an olympic athlete so they will think you are cool. This does not reduce their ability to understand or make their choice to spend time with you (I think I would say that the nature of this choice that belongs to you is de re, rather than de dicto). This is a much more realistic example of lying not reducing a person's ability to understand and make their own choices.

Further, I think it is you who are getting too caught up on property. You keep asserting that it is all I care about, but it just isn't.

You are ignoring the comparison. Choosing to deceive, and choosing to educate are both choices concerning doing something with something that isn't yours. You are doing something with the mind of another. Yet you allow that choosing to do these things with the minds of others are choices which belong to a person. However, when it's something like walking in the park, you say that it is not a choice which belongs to the person because it involves property which does not belong to the person. Clearly, "property" is valued higher than "minds". To do something with property which does not belong to you is not your own choice, but to do something with a mind which doesn't belong to you is your own choice. — Metaphysician Undercover

I wouldn't categorize choosing to try to decieve as a choice regarding what to do with someone else's mind. It might affect them, but it isn't a choice of what to do with them. Same for education. For example, I might continually tell you that I don't value property more highly than mind or body, but I can't make you learn that.

See, there you go, switching definition. What is important, according to your definition, is whether the choice concerns one's own mind, body, and property. Now you say, "what is important is whether someone's ability to understand and make their own choices is reduced/protected or not". Which is the defining feature? They are not the same. You simply switch back and forth, as convenient, and in this way you avoid the criticism. When it suits you, one's own choice is a choice concerning one's own mind, body and property, but then other times it serves you better to say that one's own choice is a choice which doesn't reduce another's ability to make one's own choices. The latter is a self-referential definition. — Metaphysician Undercover

I'm not switching the definition, I'm talking about two different things. Whether a choice belongs to someone is about whether it is a choice of what to do with their mind, body, or property. Whether a choice is right or wrong (or good or bad) is about whether it reduces or protects (or neither) someone's ability to understand and make those choices that belong to them. Same definitions as always.

I'm starting to think you really are suggesting lunacy. — Metaphysician Undercover

Given what you are inferring from everything I say, I don't doubt it. What I would ask is to read what I've written with the assumptions that I am being consistent and am at least moderately intelligent. This will likely lead to fewer misunderstandings.

This makes no sense to me. Choosing to take a walk, is a choice of what to do with my own body, how does choosing a specific place to walk change this? Don't we always choose a specific place to walk? — Metaphysician Undercover

It's a matter of what constitutes reducing your ability to make a choice. Your choice is to take a walk, so stopping you taking a walk would take that choice away from you. Your choice is not to take a walk in that park, so that park not being there does not reduce your ability to make a choice that belongs to you.

This is a fine example of the problem you create by discarding your stated definition of one's own choice, and taking up a new problematic self-referential definition. Now, all of a sudden, "one's own mind, body, and property" has no definitional bearing, because you've replaced it with not "taking someone's choice about their mind away from them". But in doing this you negate the original definition as inapplicable, so I have no idea what "someone's choice about their mind" actually means, just a self-referential definition. — Metaphysician Undercover

I'm not changing any definitions. Again, you seem to be interpreting me in a very strange way. When I say "Because none of these things involve taking someone's choice about their mind away from them" I mean that none of the actions you have mentioned reduce the person's ability to understand or make their own choices.

See, now you've gone completely to the new definition, if the choice one makes "does not take away their choices about their mind", then it does not rob them of the capacity to make their own choices, and therefore it is a choice one can make. However, you've negated the original definition "choice concerning one's own mind, body, and property", so that we cannot even refer to it in our judgement as to whether the choice is truly one's own (by the original definition).

Clearly, by the original definition, the choice to teach someone, just like the choice to deceive someone, is a choice about what to do with another person's mind. But we cannot discuss this, because "one's own choice" has been given a new definition, "does not take away another's capacity to make one's own choice", Furthermore, "another's capacity to make one's own choice" is strictly qualified with "one's own property", such that another's choice always concerns one's property, and one's mind is completely irrelevant, as your attitude toward teaching and deceiving reveals. — Metaphysician Undercover

Again, no new definition. The choices one can make are not only their own choices (choices that belong to them). Rather, only one's ability to understand and make one's own choices (choices that belong to them) needs to be protected. You seem to be bulling past this distinction and it is causing confusion. Neither of the things you have mentioned involve taking away someone's ability to understand and make their own choices, so they aren't morally problematic.

It's very clear, that in your judgement, as to which choices qualify as "one's own", property is valued higher than one's mind and body. Look at the example of taking a walk. That's a choice concerning one's own body. However, as soon as we determine the specific property upon which the walk will be taken, the nature of that property takes precedence and becomes the determining factor as to whether the choice is one's own or not. And this is the case in all of your examples, stealing etc., as soon as there is property involved in the choice, ownership of the property overrides all other features of the choice, becoming the determining factor as to whether the choice is one's own or not. But, things involving another's mind, like teaching and deceiving, have no such determining influence. — Metaphysician Undercover

This is not "very clear" at all. It is simply not the case. Whether or not other people lie to you is not a choice that belongs to you, so lying to someone does not reduce their ability to understand or make their own choices (by itself, obviously it could in some circumstances). The case of the park is not a case of choices over property trumping choices over one's body, it is simply a case of the choice to do something being different from the choice to do something with a specific thing that isn't yours. For example, the choice for you to swing your arm might be a choice that belongs to you, the choice for you to swing your arm into my face is not. Me not providing my face to be swung into does not reduce your ability to understand and make your own choices, just like your local authority not providing you a park does not reduce your ability to understand and make your own choices. I am merely being specific and you are infering things I am not implying.

However, in the case of teaching or deceiving, where the choice clearly involves an intentional effect on another's mind, there is an exception imposed, it is judged as not morally relevant. Why is the choice to use the public park not provided the same exception of not morally relevant? — Metaphysician Undercover

An effect is not what is at issue. What is important is whether someone's ability to understand and make their own choices is reduced/protected or not. In both the case of not providing a park and the case of lying to someone, it is not.

By the principle you demonstrate here, the choice to speak is not a choice which belongs to a person. The air we breathe is public, just like the park, and choosing to speak into it is not a choice which belongs to the person, just like choosing to walk in the public park does not belong to a person. This is the problem you've caused yourself by giving priority to property as a principle for judgement as to what constitutes one's own choice — Metaphysician Undercover

No, much like choosing to go for a walk is a choice that belongs to a person, choosing to speak also is a choice that belongs to someone. Choosing to speak into that specific air isn't a choice that belongs to someone. If a wind blew past and they were suddenly speaking into different air, that wouldn't wrong them, just like choosing to walk in that specific park is not a choice that belongs to them such that they would not be wronged were that park not there. Seriously, you would find it much easier to understand what I'm saying if you stopped assuming I was suggesting something lunatic. I'm not. I am saying that the choice to walk in a specific park is not one that belongs to you, but the choice to go for a walk is.

This is exactly the problem you have created by replacing the definition of one's own choice, "choices concerning ones own mind, body, and property", with the self-referential definition of not interfering with another's capacity to make one's own choices. Now, it is impossible to be specific about which choices are one's own, because there is no definition. — Metaphysician Undercover

Again, I haven't replaced any definitions. I have been consistent in how I am using these terms throughout.

This makes no sense at all to me. How is it that choosing to amputate my arm is a choice of what to do with my own body, but choosing to take a walk is not? Is it only choices to injure myself which qualify as choices of what to do with my own body? How can it not be the case that choosing to take a walk is choosing to do something with my own body? — Metaphysician Undercover

I didn't say choosing to take a walk isn't a choice that belongs to you, but choosing to take a walk in a specific park, as opposed to somewhere else, does not belong to you.

See, another's property is considered in the judgement, but another's mind is not considered. You argued that teaching is irrelevant, so I assume that giving false information, and lying are also not morally relevant. You argued that making someone angry has no moral relevance. — Metaphysician Undercover

Because none of these things involve taking someone's choice about their mind away from them. There are certainly things that might do this, but simply lying to someone, or teaching them something, does not take away their choices about their mind. You might well disagree with me about what constitutes the choices that belong to a person regarding their mind (and it certainly seems that you do) but that doesn't mean I don't value the choices a person has over their minds as much as I do those over their property. I simply don't agree with you that some of these things, such as teaching someone, constitute taking away someone's choice regarding what to do with their mind.

The latest thing you said, to indicate that you value property higher than body and mind is that a walk in the park is not a choice about the health of one's own mind and body, it's a choice about the public property, the park. You prove this by saying that the choice is no one's because the property is public, even though the choice is about doing something with one's own mind and body. You continually demonstrate this, judging whether a choice is one's own or not, by reference to property, and with complete disregard for what the person is doing with one's mind and body, and how the choice will affect the minds of others. It's very clear evidence that you value property over minds. — Metaphysician Undercover

Again, this is just incorrect. The choice to take a walk in a specific park very much relies on that specific park. The person doesn't own that park, so that choice does not belong to them. If the park is removed to make way for something else, that person is not wronged by no longer being able to walk in that specific park. If they were not able to go for a walk at all that would indeed be reducing their ability to make their own choices regarding their body, but the choice to go for a walk in a particular park clearly isn't a choice that belongs to the person. It isn't about property mattering more than one's body or mind, it is about being specific about what choices belong to a person and which don't. You are very quick to interpret what I'm saying in a way that supports your assertion that I value choices over property more than choices over body and mind, given that I am telling you that I don't, perhaps it would benefit you to consider whether you might be interpreting me wrong when you keep coming to those conclusions?

Mind and body are not at all accidental. Choices about what to happens to do with your own mind, body, and property, are yours. Choices which aren't about that aren't yours. Unless someone has built a park around you such that you can't go for a walk at all without crossing it, then yes walking in the park is a choice about how to use some public property, not about what to do with your body. A choice about what to do with your body might be, for example, whether you want your arm amputated. I would be inclined to agree that one's mind and body are more important than one's property (though exactly how that works I'm not sure, hence the original post).

Sure it's different, but the difference is insignificant. Instead of having individuals divided by distinct goals, as I described, your proposal divides by distinct groups, sects of humanity. Individuals cannot cooperate without common goals, and distinct groups or sects cannot cooperate without common goals. So the very same problem persists, but instead of consisting of individuals who cannot cooperate because they do not have the same goals, it consists of groups pf people who cannot cooperate because they do not have the same goals. — Metaphysician Undercover

No, it's not insignificant. I think a lot of people share some common goals, but not that all people share one common goal.

Oh, that's very problematic. Means are deemed as "good" in relation to goals. If there is no system for judging ends then differing ends will produce inconsistent and conflicting "goods". If we couple this with the principle you propose, of no common goals for all humanity, then humanity becomes disunited, unable to resolve the question of who\s goods are the real goods. — Metaphysician Undercover

Not at all, because I don't think morality is the same thing as rationality, so there can be moral good without it being something that all rational agents would agree on as their goal/end.

Since, as described above, you value property higher than an individual's mind, you restrict one's choices (and ends) according to property based principles (what we get to do in relation to property). And property based principles require an assumed equality of individuals. Equality of individuals reduces to an equality of ends, what I desire is equal to what you desire, therefore we have equal access to ownership of property. — Metaphysician Undercover

I mean, all of this is wrong. I don't 'value property higher than an individual's mind' at all. This is exactly what I mean by you misunderstanding me to such a degree that I wonder if it is intentional. I have never said that, and I think I have been pretty clear that I don't think that. But you keep insisting that I do think that and then running with that assumption. I mean, I don't think what you've said here follows either, but that is all secondary to the fact that the core assertion here, that I value property over individual's minds, is just incorrect.

You're really losing me Dan. How can there be a choice which does not belong to me , and yet does not belong to someone else? Who's choice is it? What type of existence does this choice have? I can see how it might be considered as a possibility, but how is it a choice? — Metaphysician Undercover

The choice to say, write your name on the moon, does not belong to anyone. Nobody has a "right" to do so, so we not need to protect anyone's ability to make that choice.

Wow, you do have strange beliefs, don't you? — Metaphysician Undercover

I mean, strange in the sense of uncommon, sure. But you did ask what my problem with traditional moral philosophy is and many disagreements come down to starting assumptions.

How could you justify cooperation without common goals? — Metaphysician Undercover

I didn't say people don't have common goals. I said I take issue with the idea there is a goal or end that all of humanity is aimed at. Big difference.

Since human beings are rational animals, how could they be inclined to do what is moral, if it is not rational to do what is moral. Your claim makes not sense. — Metaphysician Undercover

Again, in brief (and heavily simplified) I think Hume is broadly right that we should consider rationality more in terms of means-ends, rather than specificying rational goals.

This is the issue I took up with you already. I do not see how your position could be justified. When one decides that another's end is as valuable as one's own, this is just to make another's end one's own. It is logically impossible to make the ends of others as valuable as one's own, because all this means is to adopt another's as one's own. So only the ones judged as being valuable enough to be adopted as one's own are truly seen to be as valuable as one's own, and this is only by way of actually making them one's own. Therefore to keep moral principles aligned with truth, we must hold that one's own ends are always the most valuable to the person. — Metaphysician Undercover

I'm not entirely sure what you mean here. Are you taking issue with me disagreeing with this assumption, or are you claiming that I'm making this assumption?

The latter (what you propose), provides no basis for judgement of the ends of others, because they already must be assumed to be just as important as one's own. — Metaphysician Undercover

I don't think I have ever claimed or implied that individuals need to consider the ends of others as important as they consider their own ends.

But it isn't morally bad to make another's choice. That's what we already went through. It is generally good to save a person's life, for example. That's where your theory ran into problems, and you had to make all sorts of exceptions to allow that making another's choice is sometimes good. So, you do "get to" make choices which are not your own. Then this whole distinction (choices which do belong, and do not belong to the person) falls apart as meaningless, because what you are really trying to protect is choices which are morally good. — Metaphysician Undercover

You've made a category mistake. Making someone else's choice for them, taking it away from them, is bad. It might not always be wrong (for example, killing one to save five) but it is always bad. It always counts against the action. There are lots of choices that aren't yours that would be good and/or right to make, but not belonging to you is not the same as belonging to someone else.

Actually, I think that might be very helpful if we are to get anywhere in this discussion, because it might help me to understand why we are so far apart. On the other hand, you seem firmly attached to your beliefs, and I to mine, so it's unlikely we will get anywhere anyway. — Metaphysician Undercover

In briefest of brief, moral philosophy tends to rest on assumptions that I think are either incorrect or at least unfounded. Some of those include but are not limited to (and not all moral theories rely on the same assumptions of course, I'm just giving a few examples):

* That there is some end that all humanity is aimed at or some goal that all humanity pursues
* That if there were such an end or goal, it would be morally valuable (which in turn can often rest, though not always, on metaethical assumptions about what the point of morality is)
* That it is rational to do what is moral (and sometimes vice versa)
* That is is irrational to make an exception of yourself or treat your own ends as more valuable than those of others (this one can be a bit more complicated than this and the extent to which I have an issue with it depends a lot on how this is fleshed out)

It's a "turn around" because at first you were just distinguishing between choices which belong to a person and those which do not, and claiming to protect the ability to make the one type. Now you imply that there is a mechanism in place which would restrict one's decision (therefore one's mind), to only make choices which one gets to make. So instead of looking forward to the future "I want to promote the ability to make one's own choices', you are now looking back at the past 'there is a mechanism which has been put in place which prevents one from making choices which are not one's own'. — Metaphysician Undercover

No. I am not claiming any such mechanism. I meant "you don't get to" in the sense that it is morally bad for you to make my choices for me.

But dismissing it as wrong, without showing these reasons, is to show complete disrespect. — Metaphysician Undercover

Is it? Again, I'm not sure that's true. Further, given the depth and breadth of traditional moral philosophy, explaining why it, as a whole, is wrong would be quite the undertaking, and we seem to have trouble even communicating what seem to be fairly simple ideas. If you would like me to explain why I think why much of moral philosophy is barking up the wrong tree, I can do it, but that might be getting rather off topic.

Motivation is a large aspect of "one's mind". If it is not important to FC, then your principle, "one's own choice", defined by you as a choice concerning one's own mind, body, and property is not consistent with FC. — Metaphysician Undercover

I'm not sure what you mean by this.

You are changing the goal post. You spoke about protecting a person's ability to make one's own choices. When I suggest that stealing your car is a choice I might make, you said it is not my own choice to make, because it concerns your property. Then you defined "one's own choice" as a choice about what to do with one's own mind, body, and property.

Now you have turned things completely around, saying "you get to choose what happens...and not what happens to...". You are now not talking about "one's own choice" in any stretch of the imagination. You are now telling everyone what they must and must not choose, so you are imposing your own choice onto the minds of others, "you get to choose...". How could this be a choice which belongs to you, to impose such restrictions on the choices of others? — Metaphysician Undercover

Again, the goalposts are where they always are. I'm not sure what you think I am turning around here. Is it "you get to choose" that you are taking issue with? What do you take that to mean that is different? I think you may be reading something different than what I am writing as I have been saying the same thing (though sometimes in different ways in order to clear up any confusion) from the off.

As discussed, I strongly disagree with this. And it is things like this, and your complete disrespect for conventional moral philosophy, (saying that it is wrong), which make me realize that you truly are way off track. — Metaphysician Undercover

This seems to be to be the fallacy of appeal to tradition. Also, on a related note I'm not sure I would consider saying something is wrong to be "complete disrespect"

Your principle, "one's own choice" states that the choice concerns one's own mind, body, and property. This implies that the motivation for the act, as that which concerns one's "mind" is just as much a determining factor as one's property. The car thief uses one's own mind, one's own body, and one's own tools, to achieve one's own ends. As I said, most all choices ought to be considered "one's own choices", by the dictates of your primary definition. — Metaphysician Undercover

I doesn't imply that at all. Motivation is not important in FC. I certainly didn't suggest that any choices one makes that in any way involve things that belong to you therefore belong to you. You are free to choose what happens to your body, but not to my car.

However, you do not accept your own definition — Metaphysician Undercover

It isn't my definition. It is your definition. Again I did not define it this way. I am not overriding anything, I was never suggesting that anything you do that in some way involves your mind, body, and property is your choice. I was suggesting that you get to choose what happens with your own mind, body, and property, and not what happens to the minds, bodies, and property of others.

Furthermore, you then place undue restrictions on your judgement as to which ways that one's choice affects others, are to be prioritized, to match the prejudice of your preference. — Metaphysician Undercover

No, I dismiss feautres of actions that do not involve protecting or limiting the ability of persons to understand and make their own choices. I do not dismiss effects on one's mind. There are quite a few effects on one's mind that one could have which would be morally relevant. But someone being upset is not one of them. You are, again, putting words in my mouth that do not belong there.

We're very far apart on this. What I pointed out to you, is that to steal your car is a choice of what I want to do with my own body. That it is your car being stolen, is completely accidental. I want to get myself from A to B, so I grab a car, or I want to make some quick cash, so I grab a car, and sell it. Whatever the case, what I want, and what I am doing with my own body, is the primary motivation here. Theft is fundamentally a selfish act. That it is your car which enters into my plans and not some other thing, or things, is purely accidental. There is no essential relation between my choice and your car, so my choice to steal your car is not at all "about your car", it is about my own selfish wants and desires, what I want, for myself. The choice shows complete disregard for you and your property, rather than your representation of it, as a choice about what to do with your property. — Metaphysician Undercover

You are confusing the motivation for the act with the act itself. Your stealing my car is very much about what happens to my car.

You are simply in denial, refusing to accept that I completely understand you, after weeks of quizzing you, but I also completely disagree with you. You have demonstrated very clearly that the concept of "one's own choice" which you propose, cannot be made to be coherent. That you insist it to be coherent, when I've demonstrated its incoherency, shows not a misunderstanding on my part, but denial on your part. — Metaphysician Undercover

I only don't believe that you understand me because in almost every post you have made, you have misrepresented me dramatically and/or accused me of making a claim I have not made.

You have not demonstrated anything of the sort. You may have claimed it, but you have not in the least demonstrated it. You have asserted that some definitions that aren't the same as what I have said don't work and you have insisted that stealing my car constitutes your own choice because you use your body to do the stealing. I am still not sure if you would like a clear explanation of why this isn't so or if you are being facetious in this case.

The problem I pointed out involved using self-reference in a definition. What happened was that you first defined "one's own choices" as a choice relating what to do with one's own mind, body and property. Then I pointed out that every choice which a person makes, relates to what to do with one's own mind, body, or property. And, what is really at issue is how one's choice to do something with one's own body, affects others. You moved to define "one's own choice" based on how a person's choice of what to do with one's body, affects others. So you came up with, if the choice doesn't limit another's ability to make one's own choice, then it is one's own choice.

Clearly, what you have proposed is a self-referential definition. I prefer to characterize it as infinite regress rather than circular. Q. How do we know if the choice is one's own? A. if it does not limit another's ability to make one's own choice. Q. How do we know if another's ability to make one's own choices has been limited if we do not know what it means to make one's own choice, other than that it is a choice which does not limit this ability of another? See, we cannot ever get anywhere because we do not know what it means to make one's own choices, other than that it doesn't affect another's ability to make one's own choice. But we cannot make that judgement as to whether it affects another in this way, because we don't know what it means to make one's own choice, other than that it doesn't affect another's ability to make one's own choice. — Metaphysician Undercover

I'm fairly sure I didn't propose any of that. I think I pointed out that choosing to steal my car is a choice of what to do with my car, not your body. It's a choice that belongs to me, not you.

You have been unable to even adequately define your primary principle "the ability of persons to understand and make their own choices". Your attempts have been reduced to a meaningless self-referential definition. — Metaphysician Undercover

I think I've been pretty clear on what I mean and given a fairly clear and consistent definition. You seem intent to interpret what I'm saying in a strange way, then when I clarify that was never what I meant, you take me to be changing what I'm saying and interpret what I'm saying in a different (but no less strange) way.

According to the op, you have spent the better part of ten years trying to resolve the issues of your moral theory. You have become so stymied that you now offer $10,000 to anyone who can resolve the problems with your theory. I suggest that it is high time for you to consider that the reason why you cannot solve the problems is that your theory is simply wrong, therefore there are issues which are impossible to resolve. — Metaphysician Undercover

I have of course considered that I might be wrong, but I think we have good reason to think this is our current best bet. Certainly you misunderstanding me is not good reason for me to change my mind.

Yes it is circular. It's a self-referential definition, as I described. And that's a huge problem for the concept of "rights" in general. The definition of any specific right is always having to be reinterpreted because of that circularity. It's not a rigorous definition because every time that it reflects back on itself in an unwanted way, the definition has to be adjusted to the situation. This is why it's not a real definition, it is intentionally allowed to be adaptable because a rigid definition would run into problems. — Metaphysician Undercover

Self reference does not, in-itself make for circularity. Eg, the moral relativist might coherently say that there are no objective normative truths and no objective metaethical truths except this one. That references itself but is clearly not circular. Likewise, it isn't circular to say that one's freedom of movement does not include blocking someone else in such that they cannot move. Especially given that other people's choices are not the extent of what defines what choices belong to a person.

Dan, you continue with the very same trickery, to turn things around. Anger is the consequence here, not the cause. The question is whether a choice which causes another person emotional distress is one's own choice. I believe that causing another person emotional distress, such as anger, is just as morally relevant as causing another person to lose one's property, through theft. In fact, I would go even further, to state that I believe that the reason why things like theft are morally relevant, is because they cause emotional distress. If theft did not cause emotional distress, no one would care about it, and it would not be designated as bad.

I am starting to think that you are being ridiculous. Instead of listening to the problems of your ill-fated theory, you have gone into denial about its problems, and are now resorting to trickery in an attempt to get around the problems. — Metaphysician Undercover

You haven't raised problems, you have raised misunderstandings. You might well be right that people migth not think theft was bad if it did not cause emotional distress, but they would be wrong. What is wrong would still be wrong even if all the world thought it right.

Also, you were the one who brought up anger causing immoral actions. I was simply pointing out that this isn't so. That isn't a dodge, that is addressing another thing you said.

This is blatantly incorrect. When I choose to say something to you, this is a choice of what to do with you. When I engage you in this way I am anticipating a response. The act of engagement is not about itself, it concerns the eliciting of a response. The intent of the act is to get a response from you, therefore it is "a choice of what to do with you". This is even more evident in my example of education, which you seem intent on ignoring. "To educate" is what you do to another. — Metaphysician Undercover

Again, no it isn't. You don't do things "with me". You say some words and you might well hope for a response, but I might also walk on past. Unless you're chasing me down and tying me up, you haven't decided what to do with me.

Your principles are arbitrary. You assign greater moral value to a person's property than you assign to a person's mental well-being. Stealing a person's property is "morally relevant", but causing a person emotional distress is not "morally relevant". Not only are your principles arbitrary, they are completely backward from accepted moral philosophy. — Metaphysician Undercover

They are not aribitrary, they are based on the ability of persons to understand and make their own choices. It is certainly true that I am going against accepted moral philosophy but accepted moral philosophy is wrong.

No, this makes no sense at all, for the reasons explained above. One's emotional well-being, and mental stability is of the highest value. Therefore emotional distress is a consequence which is of the highest degree of relevance to determining the morality of an action. As I said above, the reason why stealing one's property is morally bad is not because it leaves you without a specific object, it is because it causes emotional distress. — Metaphysician Undercover

Do you actually mean it doesn't make sense in that you don't understand, or do you just not agree?

That is not the issue. "One's own choice" is defined as a choice concerning what to do with one's own mind, body, and property. It is not defined as a choice which does not prevent someone else from making one's own choice. The latter is not a definition, it is a fallacy of a "circular definition", a self-referential definition. And I've already explained to you why the choice to steal your car is just as much a choice concerning my own mind, body, and property, as are the choices which lead to beating another in a competition.

Anyway, I explained to you how hurting another emotionally may lead to anger, or other feelings which could result in an attack on the person, or some other vengeful activity. So I do not think you have any argument there — Metaphysician Undercover

First, it isn't circular to suggest that the limits of rights (or freedoms) should be where they abut upon those same rights (or freedoms) of another.

Second, anger doesn't "result" in attacks on other people, or other vengeful activity. People are morally responsible for their actions even when angry. Anger doesn't "make" people act violently, they choose to.

Again, you misrepresent the issue. It is not a matter of whether teaching a person "reduces someone's ability to understand and make their own choices", it is a question of whether the decision to teach a person is a choice about one's own mind, body, and property. Clearly, the choice to teach a person is just as much a choice concerning someone else's mind, as the choice to steal a car is a choice concerning someone else's property. — Metaphysician Undercover

If you choose to say something on the street corner, that thing might affect me, but it is a choice of what to do with yourself, not what to do with me. If you steal my car, it is a choice of what to do with my stuff. As I said before, whether someone is affected by your choice is not the appropriate measure of whether that choice is yours to make or not. Certainly, if they were affected in a morally relevant way (by which I meant their ability to understand and make their own choices were reduced/protected/etc) then that would affect whether it was morally justifiable to make that choice whether or not it was yours (though the choice whether to steal my car or not is pretty clearly not yours).

Sure, there are other options, like making an arbitrary distinction like you have, which as I explained, has principles weighted by your personal preferences. You think for example, that stealing a person's car has more moral significance than educating a person does. I think it is very clear that the opposite is true. Stealing a person's car has a one time, flash-in-the-pan effect on the person, which is very minimal in the scale of a person's lifetime, but educating a person has a lifelong effect on the person. — Metaphysician Undercover

I have not made an arbitrary distinction, but a principled one.

I spent a long time, at the beginning of this thread, trying to explain to you how any choice which a person makes limits that person's options, therefore restricting the person's freedom. Now you seem to be starting to understand, expressing how another person's choice may limit one's freedom. To fully understand this principle you need to recognize that a person's own choice limits one's freedom even more than the choice of another does. — Metaphysician Undercover

All of that is incorrect. A person's freedom (their ability to understand and make their own choices) is violated when those choices are made for them against their will (such as my choice to have my arm broken or not). It is not violated/restricted/reduced if I choose to break my own arm. In this second case, my freedom is exercised.

Oh sure, earlier you refused to distinguish between the choice, and the action which follows from the choice. Now, when it serves your purpose, you separate the act from the choice, to say that emotional distress does not contribute to the goodness or badness of the consequences of an "act". However, it is simply trickery, sophistry, to dismiss emotional distress in this way. Anger clearly contributes to the choices a person makes, producing consequences which are bad, bad actions. Therefore it has moral value in relation to choices. I am surprised that a person of your intelligence level would resort to such a sneaky trick, just to try and support a failing theory. — Metaphysician Undercover

There's no trick here. Again, I think you have misunderstood. Actions (or choices if you prefer), in any consequentialist framework, are judged by their consequences. What I am saying is that emotional distress is not a consequence which is relevant to determining the morality of an action (or choice). Does that make sense?

As for anger, it might contribute to someone making a bad choice. It might also contribute to someone making a good choice. Either way, the anger itself is not morally valuable. The consequences of that choice (or action, if you prefer) are what make it good or bad. Specifically, whether it protects or violates the ability of persons to understand and make their own choices.

As the examples we've discussed demonstrate, your goal is to impose a very arbitrary, and not at all well defined distinction between different types of "effects on others". Based on this ill-define distinction, you say that some types of choices belong to a person (are one's own), and other types of choices do not belong to the person (are not one's own). Your claim, that these "limits" are "pretty clear", is blatantly false. As evident from the examples, the proposed limit is arbitrary and weighted to your personal preferences. For example, when I damage your property (steal your car) this is weighted towards "not a choice which belongs to me", but when you damage my ego (beat me in a competition), this is weighted towards "a choice which belongs to you". — Metaphysician Undercover

Do you really want me to explain why stealing my car prevents me from being able to make choices about what to do with my stuff, but beating me in a competition does not, or are you just being facetious?

Please refer back to our earlier discussions about how education, and the establishing of habits of thinking, is a means by which people exercise considerable influence over the minds of others. The effects which education has are very significant, therefore choices made to educate others ought not be classed as one's own choice. Furthermore, any time that a person asks another for assistance, this would not be based in one's own choice. — Metaphysician Undercover

But just like when you said this the first time, you're just wrong that habits and education reduces someone's ability to understand and make their own choices (though miseducation of the kind that leads to people not understanding their own choices would obviously be morally relevant).

The issue is, that since we live in a communal world, then once we start to apply your proposed principle of distinction in a consistent way, we end up with very few choices which are actually "one's own". This leaves the question of why do you want to protect the ability to make such choices. How are such choices at all valuable? — Metaphysician Undercover

You aren't simply applying it in a consistent way, you are insisting on applying it either in such a way that our own choices can't affect others at all or in which any choice that you make with your own mind (which is presumably all of them) are your own choices. These are not the only options, and neither is one I would endorse.

You appear to be totally neglectful, and ignorant of the temporal nature of choices, which was discussed earlier. Choices relate to future possibilities, we must consider the past as determined. After you've had a bone broken, you cannot choose not to have it broken. You can wish that it did not happen, but such wishes must be separated out from, and dismissed as irrelevant to, the decision making process of a healthy mind. — Metaphysician Undercover

There's a few issues here. First, what choices one has access to and what choices one ought to have access to are not the same thing. Second, the choice is taken from me in the moment of arm breaking. It's no use saying that I don't have the choice once you've taken it from me, that is precisely the problem.

In Christian ethics, the separating of the past, from decisions toward the future, is very important, and this manifests in the confession/forgiveness process. "Jesus died for our sins" is a proposition which allows us to separate ourselves from the mistakes of the past, and move forward with a clear conscience. — Metaphysician Undercover

Christian ethics also relies on supernatural entities which almost certainly don't exist, human sacrifice, and eternal punishment, often for "crimes" which harm no one, so you'll excuse me if I don't take my cues from that.

Like the beginning of your post, this at the end, is also blatantly false. Emotional distress is of immense moral importance. Anger for example is a contributing factor to a vast array of immoral acts. The angry person may act in a vengeful way, and this would mark a turning from making "one's own choices", toward choices which do not belong to the person ( even by your standards). Therefore it would be very foolish to dismiss emotional distress as not morally relevant. For example, if I injured you (broke a bone in the other example) this may send you into a condition of emotional distress (anger), and even though you maintain the ability to understand and make your own choices, you start to make choices which do not belong to you (revenge). — Metaphysician Undercover

Again, we are getting into trouble because I am saying that the emotional distress is not morally relevant in the sense that it does not have moral value or disvalue that contributes to the consequences of an action being good or bad, are you are reading that as saying something else. Hopefully I have cleared up that misunderstanding.

I have explained why the choices to be protected should be restricted to one's own choices. I don't think it is vague to say you get to decide what to do with your own mind, body, and property. I think the limits of that (eg, your mind, body and property, not mine) are pretty clear.

You breaking my bone very much affects my ability to understand and make choices about my own body, such as whether I want my bones broken. You causing me emotional distress by, say, revealing a secret I would prefer stay hidden, does not. It is not my choice to make to keep the secret hidden. Pain is kind of a weird one, and one I discuss in my thesis somewhat but I'm not sure I ever perfectly nailed. It's a relatively minor issue though. Emotional distress, on the other hand, just isn't in itself morally relevant. If someone is made sad, or happy, it doesn't matter morally. What matters is whether they are able to understand and make their own choices.

The choice to have ones organs crushed (as in your example of being hit my a car) belongs to me, and by taking the ability to make that away from me, you have acted wrongly. The choice to not lose a contest does not belong to you, so I have not taken your ability to make choice away from you. A choice can indeed affect others while still being one's own choice. Because these are your own choices, mostly these won't affect someone in a morally relevant way, (though it is possible that they could and then there would be a genuine moral conflict). You being unhappy about losing a competition is not morally relevant because your happiness is not morally relevant. Only your ability to understand and make your own choices. Winning the competition was not your choice to make, and me beating you in it certainly would not constitute me taking away your ability to make your own choices.

I really do not understand what you could possibly mean by "higher moral value" here. Perhaps you could explain. Suppose I\m watching the approach of a tornado. I see that it misses all the houses in the neighbourhood, and rips through a forest instead. You say that there is moral value in this situation. Can you explain what you mean? Is it because the tornado could have killed people, but didn't? I could have got hit by a bus yesterday, but didn't. Does that mean there is moral value in the consequences of the bus not hitting me? Does any situation which can be judged as either negative or positive have moral value? — Metaphysician Undercover

Yes, in the sense that it has higher moral value than some other set of consequences that could have occurred. Consequentialism is all about judging the consequences of actions by their moral value in order to determine if that action is right/wrong/permissible/etc. You can't judge the "actions" of the tornado, because it isn't a moral agent, but you can certainly say that the set of consequences which has occurred is morally better (more moral value is realized) than the set of consequences which would have occurred were it not for the tornado changing its direction.

But the example does not concern your ability to make your own decisions, it concerns the question of whether deciding to use your car in this situation is a choice which belongs to me or not.

Or, are you now distinguishing whether a choice belongs to me or not, by how it affects others' ability to make their own choices? That's what it appears like. If my choice doesn't restrict your ability to make your own choices, then the choice belongs to me. That would be very problematic. — Metaphysician Undercover

No. When I said that me giving consent to allow you to borrow the car makes it morally permissible to do so, that is not me saying that it makes it a decision which belongs to you. The use of my car is a decision that belongs to me, because it's my car. Which is what I said previously. I then made an offhand remark about the difference between borrowing and stealing a car, and how this is due to the difference in whether my ability to understand and make my own choices is restricted/violated or simply exercised. These are seperate points.

Again, it appears like you are defining "one's own choice" in relation to whether the choice restricts the ability of others to make their own choices. This would lead to an infinite regress without ever determining what it means to make one's own choice. — Metaphysician Undercover

It is not accurate to say that is how I am defining one's own choices.

Sure, but in order for this principle to have any meaning, and to be able to be brought to bear on any real situations, we need to know what "their own choices" means. First you said that these are choices which concern one's own mind, body, and property. Then you allowed that in some situations, such as consent or agreement, choices concerning another's mind. body, or property also belong to the person. Now you seem to be saying that so long as the choice doesn't restrict another's capacity to make one's own choice, then the choice is one's own choice. This gets me no closer toward understanding what you mean by one's own choice. — Metaphysician Undercover

I did not say the second and am not saying the third. The choices which belong to a person are the ones concerning what to do with one's own mind, body, and property. I did not say, and do not think, that in cases such as consent or agreement, choices concerning another's mind, body, or property belong to anyone other than that person.

OK, so we've gone around a big circle. Let me get back to the issue as it was then. In general, choices which are judged as morally good, are not choices which belong to the person at all, if this means concerning one's own mind, body, or property. This is because morally good choices are about the mind, body, and property of others. So, how do you justify wanting to protect choices which belong to the person? And please, don't go off on a tangent again, speaking about how choices which belong to the person may affect the body or property of another in an accidental way, because the morally good acts, which we want to consider, are when we intentionally act in a good way. Why have a principle which promotes protecting the ability to make one's own choices, when a much better principle would be to protect the ability to make morally good choices. Neither of these principles is about protecting freedom of choice, so that idea is just a ruse anyway. — Metaphysician Undercover

I'm not sure what you mean by "morally good" choices here. I am presenting a theory of what morally good choices are, specifically the ones that protect the ability of persons to understand and make their own choices. I have posited that this is the best candidate for a measure of moral value because it is applicable to all persons and bases moral value on the very features that make us moral agents in the first place.

Also, it is about freedom, specifically the freedom to make your own choices. That is not in any way a ruse.

This example is not comparable. Pushing the kid is an intentional act, whether or not the intent is to kill the kid. Since it is an intentional act, the perpetrator is held accountable. If it was done as a joke, and the possibility of death was completely unforeseen, then the punishment would likely be less than if it was a planned murder. Regardless, the joke and the murder are both intentional acts. In you other example, the tornado does not act intentionally, so the consequences of its activities are not judged for moral value.

If this is what you really believe, that the consequences of inanimate activities can be judged for moral value, then it constitutes a significant difference of opinion between you and I. — Metaphysician Undercover

I mean yeah, those consequences can still be judged for moral value in the sense that they can be consequences that are morally good. It doesn't make sense to say the tornado "acted" rightly, but the consequences that occur, the situation which results, has higher moral value than what would have occurred in the situation where the tornado destroyed your house.

See, your principle of "a choice which belongs to the person" is exactly as I say, based in moral judgement. When the choice is to do something "morally permissible" with another's body or property, then it qualifies as "my own choice". When the choice is to do something not "morally permissible with another's body or property, then it does not qualify as "my own choice". Therefore, just like I told you earlier, your goal to protect persons' ability to understand and make their own choices, is not a goal of protecting freedom at all, it is a goal of protecting moral restraint, i.e., to choose only what is "morally permissible". — Metaphysician Undercover

That doesn't follow at all from what I said. My ability to understand and make my own decisions isn't restricted by me freely making a decision to allow you to use my car. Rather, it is exercised.

This is not true. You now admit to allowing that choices of what to do with another's body or property also qualify as choices which belong to you. This consists of things like a shared game, consensual sex, using borrowed property, etc.. It seems like so long as the choice is to do something morally permissible, it is one's own choice. So it is becoming more and more clear that your principle is not to protect the ability of people to understand and make their own choices (to protect some sort of freedom), but to protect the ability to understand and make choices which are morally acceptable (some sort of moral restraint). — Metaphysician Undercover

That is neither what I said nor what I meant. Consenting to sex is a choice that belongs to you, but having it is not (in the sense that if no one is keen to participate in that activity with you, your ability to understand and make your choices has not been restricted.

No, I was a little surprised that a theory which claims to protect one's freedom of choice, is really a theory which only supports morally permissible choices. I'm not too surprised now, because I brought this to your attention, at the beginning of our engagement. I thought I'd give you a chance to explain yourself though, but we're not getting anywhere. — Metaphysician Undercover

It is a theory of what choices are morally permissible, but that all flows from whether those choices protect or violate the ability of persons to understand and make their own choices. Making their own choices is (usually) morally permissible, but not all morally permissible choices are choices which belong to the person making them.

You aren't saying the same thing though. Before, you said that choices which belong to a person are choices concerning one's own mind body and property. You continue to assert that, but your examples show clearly that choices concerning the mind, body, and property of others are also choices which belong to the person. This appears like inconsistency, but it's not necessarily. If we surmise that your principle is really "the ability to understand and make choices which are morally permissible", rather that "the ability to understand and make one's own choices", then the appearance of inconsistency is resolved. — Metaphysician Undercover

Again, you are reading things I'm not writing. You seem to be finding additional meaning between my words that I'm not putting there and, I submit, isn't there at all. For example, I haven't said that choices concerning the mind, body, and property of others belong to the person at all. I think if you'll look back over those examples, you will find I didn't make that claim and didn't use those words. I certainly talked about choices involving the minds, bodies, and properties, of others, such as when those choices might be morally permissible and when they might not be. I also talked about things like sex, in which I said that the choice that belongs to you was to consent to such an act, but that the choice to have it with someone (in the sense mentioned above in this post) was not yours. It is not yours specifically because it requires the body of another person. This inconsistency isn't between my views, it is between what I am writing and what you are reading it to mean.

We have a deep difference as to what constitutes "morally valuable" In my understanding, what provides moral value to the consequences of an act is the intent of the conscious agent. If you remove the necessity of intent, then choice is only relevant in an accidental way. This would make it very difficult to justify your principle that choice is the best measure of value. If we can produce morally good results without making choices, why should we protect the ability to make choices? — Metaphysician Undercover

No, the moral value in the consequences does not require intent. This is very much the point of consequentialism. Whether you meant to push the kid out of the way of the bus or whether you just thought it would be funny to push a child over, the consequences are just as good. I've already explained why I think we should use the ability of persons to understand and make their own choices as the measure of value, and that reason wasn't because intent is necessary to result in good consequences.

As I said, all decisions to act, or do anything at all, are choices about what to do with one's own mind, body, or property. That someone else's property might also be involved is accidental. This includes my decision to steal your car, as an example you said was not a choice which belongs to me. It now appears to be a choice which belongs to me because I am using my own body and tools. However, now you insist that stealing is not a choice which belongs to me because there is no consent. You really have provided absolutely no principles to distinguish between a choice which belongs to a person, and one which does not. — Metaphysician Undercover

It isn't a choice which belongs to you because it is the choice of what to do with my car. It doesn't "accidentally" involve my car as you put it. It is precisely about what happens to my car, specifically whether I keep it in front of my house or you take it and sell it for scrap metal. It's not that complicated.

You simply introduce these terms, "consent", "agree", and you act as if whatever it is which is referred to by them magically converts a choice which appears to be one which does not belong to a person into one which does. We are talking about the ability of a person to understand and make one's own decisions. How does you giving me consent to borrow your car, affect that ability of mine, in relation to my choice to use your car without your consent? You are making no sense. — Metaphysician Undercover

Consent doesn't "covert" the choice from belonging to one person to belonging to another. In the example given, the consent is the relevant choice to participate in a game or contest. What you have quoted there doesn't include anything about consent and cars. That being said, if you did obtain my consent to use my car, then that would make the use of my car morally permissible because I have made the choice that you can use it and it is my car, so you haven't taken my ability to understand and make those choices which belong to me away from me through your use of it (which you would have in the case where you stole it)

You have not been clear at all. First, you insisted that "one's own choice" was a very special sort of choice, such that if I chose to steal your car this is not my own choice because it was a choice which involves your property. Now you insist that all choices I make which involve my own mind, body and property are my own, even if they involve your body or property as well. This implies that any choice I make, to do anything at all, including stealing your car, is my own choice, because it involves doing something with my own body and mind. But now you've arbitrarily added a constraint, "consent", or "agree", as if this makes a difference. How many other arbitrary constraints are you going to add, to mold and shape this concept "one's own choice", to suit your purposes? Will you make a new exception every time a situation comes up which your principles cannot deal with? — Metaphysician Undercover

I don't insist that. The choices which belong to you are the choices of what to do with your mind, body, and property. That doesn't mean that because you murdering something "involves" using your body, it is your choice to make. Whether or not your murder someone isn't choosing what you do with your own body, but with theirs (and their mind).

Sorry, are you really surprised that in a theory that focuses on the ability of persons to understand and make their own choices, that what those persons agree or consent to is relevant to what it is morally acceptable to do to them?

I haven't been making exceptions, I have been attempting to quash the strange ways you have interpreted my theory. But it is like playing whack-a-mole. I keep trying to clarify the same points and you keep intepreting that as me claiming something different and often bizarre. Without wanting to sound like too much of a jerk, I think if you look over our previous conversations with the assumption that I have been saying the same thing the whole time, they would make more sense to you.

When judging the consequences of an action, you can say they are good or bad in a moral sense there something morally valuable being increased/decreased/promoted/protected/restricted/violated. The tornado wasn't "right" to turn away, but the outcome was good.

I haven't changed my mind at all. All of these choices are choices about what to do with the mind, body, and property of the person making them, not that of others. What you seem to be missing is that choices about what to do with one's own mind, body, and property can affect the interests of others without in any way restricting their ability to understand and make choices regarding their own minds, bodies, and property. This isn't a different definition. I have been saying the same thing the whole time, and it is the same thing you will find in the primer you read or sources referenced in it that explain this in greater depth.

That was not my definition, that was how you incorrectly interpretted my definition. The choice to steal a car isn't yours because the car isn't yours. The choice of what to do with my car is mine because the car is mine. The choice to play a game with me isn't per se yours, but the choice to agree to play a game with me, to play games with those who will play them with you, is yours because it is a choice of what to do with your own mind and body (maybe property depending on the game). If I don't want to play, like in the case of you taking my car, you don't get to make that choice for me. But if we are both choosing to participate in the game, we are both making choices about what we do with our own minds and bodies, and that's no problem.

Again, it's always been the same definition. You just seem to be having trouble grasping it. I feel like I've been pretty clear, so I must wonder if it is in some way intentional.

I am not "admitting" anything, let alone "finally" given that all of this was in the thesis that I referenced in the initial primer. What I am arguing for is the ability of persons to understand and make their own choices. That is limited in the sense that it only concerns persons' own choices, not all choices, but that isn't even slightly the same as "moral restraint". It is very much freedom.

You keep talking about which choices are morally acceptable as if that is something we can know in advance, but the whole of a normative theory is to determine what choices/actions are morally acceptable (and unacceptable, obligatory, supererogatory, etc). It is fair to say that choices which are not morally acceptable shouldn't be protected, but what determines whether a choice is morally acceptable is down to its effect on the ability of persons to understand and make their own choices.

I disagree. The moral value is in the act itself. Consequentialism measures the act by the outcome, but it does not place the moral value in the results of the act. The outcome is judged as an indication of the intent. The tornado has no intent, there is no moral value in the outcome of its activities. The "good" in not having the house destroyed is a different sense of good, like "good fortune". This sense of "good" is judged by a scale other than a moral scale. — Metaphysician Undercover

No, it is a good outcome in the sense of a morally good outcome. One we should aim to acheive. If we could have turned the tornado, we should have. Consequentialism tends to derive the right (the morally right action to perform) from the good (the thing which has value), so while it isn't right that the tornado didn't destroy your house because that implies moral agency, it is good.

We were not talking about restricting choices, we were talking about the type of choice, the ability to make which, deserves protection; one's own choices. I asked you why the ability to make these choices merits protection. If the choices concern only what belongs to the person, then what good are they? The tornado example is clearly not relevant. Also, in your other example, choices concerning a contest are not one's own choices, by your definition. A contest concerns others, so this means that the choices are not one's own, and that example is no good either. — Metaphysician Undercover

Okay, I understand what you are taking issue with now, but you're just wrong. My choosing to enter those contests that will have me is a choice that belongs to me. There are a bunch of choices like this, such as choosing to have sexual intercourse with someone. The whole thing isn't one person's choice, but each person chooses to consent to such an act and this choice belongs to them. Entering contests is not much different. You don't get to choose to enter a contest that won't have you, but you can choose to sign up, to do your best to win, etc.

Again, my point with the contest analogy was that choices that belong to me (or you, or anyone) can indeed affect others, and that's not a problem. If I own a piece of art that I have on display, but one day decide to destroy it instead, that affects others, but it is still my choice to make. Your claim that choices that belong to a person can't affect others is just wrong from the off.

I mean, I think we are likely to get tied in knots with this since you still seem unclear on what I am saying, but fine, I'll say something about why the ability to understand and make our own choices is the best candidate for moral value. I'm not going to go over everything, but I'll give what I think is the best reason:

If we assume that morality applies to all free, rational agents, then it seems that what we want is a measure of moral value that applies to all free, rational agents. The ability to understand and make choices fits this bill, as it essentially the ability to exercise one's free will, rationality, and, in a sense, agency. If we don't include measures which make up part of this one (such as just being able to understand choices), then it is essentially the only measure of value which applies to all moral agents, possible as well as actual.

As for why it should be constrained to their own choices, rather than any choices, this is more of a modus tollens. If we considered all possible choices, then this would lead to constant moral conflict and may render the moral theory unable to be action-guiding. Given that that is rather that moral theories are for, where the ability to understand and make choices should be protected is limited to choices over things that a person owns, specifically their mind, their body, and their property.

There, that is why I think this is the best candidate for moral value: it applies to all moral agents and allows for morality to be action-guiding.

I would say the correct moral theory is the one that's true. I was using "correct" to mean true. Happy to sub in the word "true" there if you prefer.

I think you're probably wrong about no one being happy if we all cared about our everyone's happiness, but I also am not making that assumption. I was merely using it as an example of an assumption that underlies a different moral theory.

To say the tornado acted in a morally good way would be a category mistake. To say the outcome, that of not having your house destroyed, is morally good, in the sense of having high moral value, is entirely sensible. To say that it was a morally good thing that happened that the tornado didn't destroy your house is also sensible.

We haven't discussed "consent" at all. But, by your definition of what constitutes a choice which belongs to a person, consent from another would not suffice to convert a choice which is not one's own into one which is one's own. — Metaphysician Undercover

Nor would it need to? I'm not sure what you are taking issue with here.

This is contrary to your definition of "one's own choice". You defined this as a choice concerning only what belongs to the person, one's mind, body, and property. A contest is something public, so choices concerning a contest are not one's own choices. Whether or not your choice restricts my ability to understand and make my own choices, is not an accurate indication as to whether or not your choice is your own choice. There are many choices which are not one's own choice, and so they have an effect on others, but the effect is not to restrict another's ability to make one's own choices. — Metaphysician Undercover

I'm not sure what you are saying here. You said that protecting only those choices that belong to a person means that any choice that affects others must be restricted. I am pointing out that this isn't the case and giving an example where this is clearly not the case.

A good candidate for a measure of value is one that is likely to be correct. In order to consider what is most likely to be correct, we make some assumptions, or theory selection criteria. For example, utilitarianism selects happiness based on the assumption that whatever humans pursue for themselves they should also pursue for others based on the additional assumptions that not doing so would be irrationally making an exception of yourself and doing that would be immoral, and that humans all pursue their own happiness. As I've pointed out before, this doesn't mean that right choices have to make the person making them happy, just as my theory claiming that the measure of value we should use is the ability of persons to understand and make their own choices means that right actions need to be one's own choices. There is no conflict here.

Moral value and praiseworthiness are very different things. When a tornado changes course and doesn't destroy someone's house, that is morally good, but the tornado isn't morally praiseworthy. When it comes to judging actions, it would be more accurate to say my theory judges them as right, rather than praiseworthy, since whether we should praise something is another action that we would need to evaluate the consequences of. I did in fact explain how to judge whether actions are right or wrong, permissible, impermissible, obligatory, or supererogatory in the primer you read.

I mean, there is a sense in which we affect others by like breathing air that touches their stuff, but it is reasonable to assume consent to this by them taking their stuff outside with all the people who need to breathe. And, as we have previously discussed, quite a lot of the things you think of as restricting someone's freedom just don't. For example when you say "When we take into account the fact that anytime an intentional act has an effect on others then it is not properly called "one's own choice"" this is just wrong. There are lots of intentional acts one could make that affect others but are entirely that person's own choice. If I beat you in a contest, I have affected you with my choices, and in ways you would presumably prefer I didn't, but I haven't restricted your ability to understand and make your own decisions. It wasn't your choice whether you won the contest or not, so my denying you that opportunity doesn't affect you in a morally relevant way. These restrictions you are worried about are of your own invention.

As I have said, I am happy to answer why I think that is the best candidate for moral value, but I would like to ensure we are on the same page first and that you understand what I am claiming before I explain why I am claiming it. As for "How do you justify the value of this type of choice, "one's own choice", when this is not even the type of choice which produces good acts?" That is simpler to answer - that is a complete non-sequitur. The fact that these choices are not the ones which are often not the ones which are morally praiseworthy has nothing to do with whether it is a good measure of value. Just like choices don't need to be enjoyable ones in order for the utilitarian to think they morally good, choices don't need to be our own in order for the freedom consequentialist to say the same.

I would agree that the freedom to choose X includes the freedom not to choose X, but that isn't an issue here because that is entirely consistent with the idea that only freedom over those things which belong to a person ought to be protected. The freedom to speak includes the freedom to stay silent, the freedom to live includes the freedom to die, etc.

Again, you seem to be getting worried about the word "freedom." Feel free to just say "the ability of persons to understand and make their own choices" if you prefer, as that is what I mean by "freedom" here.

No, I would say that we should judge the morality of choices by reference to their consequences and that the measure of goodness/badness of those consequences is how ability of persons to understand and make their own choices is protected/violated. I feel like I've said this many times, and you are still attempting to interpret what I'm saying to mean anything other than what I am saying.

It sounds like you are saying that it is not coherent to say that a person is free to choose X but not free to choose Y. Or free to do what you like with X (in this case, your own mind, body and property) but not with Y (other people's).

Maybe it would help me if you told me what you think it is I am claiming as simply as possible. Then maybe we can get to the bottom of where this misunderstanding is coming from.

I would say that morality is about how persons ought to be or act in a universal and objective sense, though I would concede that if you wanted to use "ethics" to refer to that and "morality" to refer to the norms and codes that exist, that would be fine too. This is very much a discussion about my attempts to discover the correct moral theory and solve the problem of how to weigh persons' freedom to make different decisions against one another.

In your temperature analogy, the ability of persons to understand and make their own choices is not like the boiling point of water or the freezing point of water. It would be more like the average amount of kinetic motion per atom (not a perfect analogy here, but certainly closer). Which is to say, it's the thing we are using as the measure of value.

To your second point, that doesn't answer my question. Is you issue that your don't think freedom can be valuable because you don't think it is coherent to talk about being free to do something but not free to do something else?