"Ownership' is a statement about property rights"

It doesn't seem that this is necessarily true. If I say that I own someone, then it could be meant that I have engaged in brute force against that person so that they are under my control. There is no need to invoke property rights to make sense of the statement that I own someone else.

"We are not just talking about de facto possession here; a thief who pinches my purse now physically possesses it, but this does not imply that he has a rightful claim to it (a world in which all de facto possession implies a rightful claim of ownership is praxeologically indistinguishable from a Hobbesian state of nature; we might as well not speak of rights at all, if such a world obtained)."

To say that I "stole" an item from you can mean that I have taken something without informing anyone of my action. No need to invoke property rights to describe this action either.

"To speak of a right as 'natural' is simply to say that the right in question is not 'bestowed' upon one by an institution, such as the State. This is pertinent here, because Rothbard is considering the question of starting points: who starts off as the property of whom?"

And why begin with this question? Why not ask the more basic question: are there really such things as natural rights at all?

"Well, one problem is that it does not seem possible to define slavery apart from rights (specifically, property rights, which fundamentally are the only kinds of rights there are)."

Slavery can be described in a politically neutral manner. When brute force is employed to control another, so that that other must obey the whims of the controller under threat of force, then that person is a slave. If someone threatens to torture me unless I do whatever it is that they want, then I am a slave to that person.

"The 'account' of slavery you have just given is not a definition."
Correct, it was a description of slavery. Not a definition of slavery itself.

"It does not give us a set of necessary and sufficient conditions for distinguishing cases of slavery from cases of non-slavery."
I thought it was clear that I was trying to ask for a politically neutral description of slavery that anyone from any political background can agree with. A definition of slavery that is purely descriptive is not necessary, however, since leftists have their own starting principle that hierarchies that find their basis in brute force are illegitimate. Since most have an intuitive believe that actions that justify themselves by brute force are illegitimate, then slavery may be rejected simply based on how the enslaved remains a slave by the slaver. This is why anyone who embraces the non-aggression principle will also reject slavery without having to know the definition of slavery; so even right-libertarians can reject slavery without having to debate the nature of property with the left-libertarian. This is why I find it strange that you think that a definition is truly necessary here.

If I take something from you against your will, is that 'theft'? Not necessarily - maybe it was my property, and you had previously stolen it from me. — Virgo Avalytikh

It looks like you think that if property rights don't exist, then we can't make sense of statements like "he stole my purse." I already noted that these statements can be made sense of without aligning oneself to any political position.

Distinguishing cases of theft from non-theft requires us to have a system of rights in place, and I would suggest that such is also necessary for distinguishing cases of slavery from non-slavery (e.g. employment). — Virgo Avalytikh

You must understand that definitions that are not politically neutral are not going to be accepted by your political opponent and they will charge you with begging the question. If you are debating the definition of property, and your definition of property is biased in favor of individualism, will the left-libertarian agree with you or will he challenge your definition as biased against him?

Think about how Chomsky talks about freedom. When Chomksy describes freedom it is in no way compatible with right libertarianism and while leftists may rejoice upon hearing of it, the right will not be moved at all.

It allows them to make assertions, present them as well reasoned conclusions, and deflect any criticism of their assertions as just a poor understanding of the source.

Do you like Berlinski's book? How good are his criticisms of Chomsky, Pinker and the rest?

Well, I think that in modern times human nature is be defended with nothing but genetic arguments. If so, then essentialism wouldn't be the only way to make a case for there being human nature. Genetic arguments for human nature are philosophically neutral in regards to categories in the relevant philosophical sense.

Russell argued that this is a primitive proposition that must be assumed true without proof.

Why, you ask, we do that? Well, it is hard to see what alternative we have in regards to X =X. Is it possible for a thing to not be itself?

As Robert Adams says, “If God is the Good itself, then the Good is not an abstract object but a concrete (though not a physical) individual” (Finite and Infinite Goods: A Framework for Ethics [Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999], p. 43). If one does want to be a Platonist, it is far more plausible to be a theist, since then putative abstract objects can be seen as either created by God or as ideas in God’s mind, thus giving us a unified view of reality. See the suggestion by C. Stephen Evans, God and Moral Obligation

What exactly does "Good" mean if the words "Good" and "God" are used as a referent for what a thing is? At best, we can say that these words are identical and refer to the same thing, but they don't tell us anything about God or Goodness as these words are as informative as the statement: X is Y, when X = Y, when used by Adams.

"Objectivity: The truth of a moral proposition is independent of the beliefs of any particular human being or human community."

Okay. I agree with this definition. If something is objectively the case, then it is not the case by opinion. So 4 is greater than 1 and this is true independent of anyone's opinion.

"Normativity: Moral considerations, as such, constitute reasons for acting."

So objective moral obligations? Okay, this seems like a definition that I can accept.

"Categoricity: Moral reasons are reasons for all human persons, regardless of what goals or desires they may have."

It sounds like objective moral obligations.

"Authority: Moral reasons are especially weighty reasons."

Well, moral acts that are due to some moral obligation probably find authority in the moral obligation. What do you mean by "weighty reasons?"

"Knowability: In normal circumstances, adult human beings have epistemic access to morally salient considerations."

So knowledge of the moral obligation?

"Unity: A human person can have a moral reason to act or to refrain from acting in ways that affect no one other than the agent who performs the act."

I don't see why this should be a criterion for having moral reasons. Explain?
What if I must act to stop a murderer from taking a life and I so in a way that affects the would-be murder's ability to commit his act?


"Other responses such as the Indefinables ones are ultimately meaningless as ought values are ultimately just turned into facts about deterministic behaviors and nature of beings who by principle can never act or behave outside of their nature, thus any reference of a positive value from a negative value or vice versa in the external world are ultimately just facts about where these naturalistic forces would cause the behaviors/desires of said entities to behave in a certain way, so they ultimately follow the path that their biological natures would have eventually led them to follow, nothing interrupting or helping that path, meaning that anything that will happen in an atheistic world will be the way it is intended to occur rather than supposed to occur including the naturalistic deterministic nature that guides people/entities."

I don't see why this is unless you mean that libertarian free will is a necessary condition for moral actions? If so, then you need to argue against compatibilism.

"Finally (arriving to the main question of this thread) this leaves a non-theistic position to appeal to a view that attempts to derive an Ought value from factual descriptions of actions and behaviors in relation to the relevant entity's nature involved where both nature and descriptive actions align with one another. Or, how Wikipedia describes,

Ethical naturalists contend that moral truths exist, and that their truth value relates to facts about physical reality. Many modern naturalistic philosophers see no impenetrable barrier in deriving "ought" from "is", believing it can be done whenever we analyze goal-directed behavior. They suggest that a statement of the form "In order for agent A to achieve goal B, A reasonably ought to do C" exhibits no category error and may be factually verified or refuted. "Oughts" exist, then, in light of the existence of goals. Few debate that one ought to run quickly if one's goal is to win a race. A tougher question may be whether one "morally ought" to want to win a race in the first place."

I don't see why an atheist is committed to ethical naturalism. Explain?

"Assuming "reasonably" is enough of a compelling force from a libertarian free agent in an athiestic world to follow (as in a deterministic world there wouldn't be anything reasonable about a determined entity acting upon the forces in which it was determined to follow), the issue is that in an atheistic worldview, the entire cosmos is not created, therefore there exists no purpose nor goal for any thing that exists to follow I.e. teleology, as this Wikipedia page demonstrates,
Teleology in biology is the use of the language of goal-directedness in accounts of evolutionary adaptation, which some biologists and philosophers of science find problematic. The term teleonomy has also been proposed. Before Darwin, organisms were seen as existing because God had designed and created them; their features such as eyes were taken by natural theology to have been made to enable them to carry out their functions, such as seeing. Evolutionary biologists often use similar teleological formulations that invoke purpose, but these imply natural selection rather than actual goals, whether conscious or not. Dissenting biologists and religious thinkers held that evolution itself was somehow goal-directed (orthogenesis), and in vitalist versions, driven by a purposeful life force. Since such views are now discredited, with evolution working by natural selection acting on inherited variation, the use of teleology in biology has attracted criticism, and attempts have been made to teach students to avoid teleological language.
(hey, at least this Wikipedia page isn't as biased as their Project Veritas page :joke: )

The issue here, to this argument mainly lies in the Teleology-Teleonomy distinction, where because although there are objective qualities about biology, in order for there to however be any value derived from these objective facts about biological behaviors, there needs to be unequivocally in some shape or form a goal or purpose for these facts or descriptions, but because an atheistic world ontologically committs one to claim and believe that "the quality of apparent purposefulness and goal-directedness" is ultimately behind everything in reality, therefore any value that is normative or has this oughtness quality about it, it is categorically impossible by definition and principle for there to be at the very least any objective moral duties and very unlikely for there to exist any grounds of objective moral values, besides from experience and self inferential introspection grounded in properly basic beliefs of a mysterious phenomena in the aether, which I already stated is nearly an impossible epistemological task to try to ground and validate."


So since atheists reject that things have final causes, that atheists are unable to bridge the is-ought gap? Well, I don't see what would follow. Explain?

"Although one may apply a Descartes existential like argument that makes appeal to a natural rights reference which sort of goes like this
I own my own body
I own what my body produces
I own the ideas that come out of it
I own what I produce with the sweat of my brow
I own the thoughts that I express
I own the property and wealth that I accumulate"

If there was really an atheist that listed all these as facts, to bridge the is-ought gap, then that atheist is engaging in a foolish endeavor.

"The argument here is basically that because you can think that you experience a desire (assuming that you're a libertarian free agent in this view) to be and remain in a specific state of being following said desire, that a self impossed right (which you may personally in an intrinsic fashion, prioritize to be at the top of your desires) is created which compells an obligation for that state of being to not be infringed, violated or overridden by any change in any fashion or form based on this self imposed personal thought."

This also seems to make the atheist needlessly foolish. If the atheist understands the definition of objective morality, then he would never try to make his case with how he feels about something- even if it was about how he feels about his autonomy.

"However, because these thoughts are only intrinsically self referential, although they make an appeal or reference to what one thinks about their own desires being rooted in a nature independent of said thoughts (although this nature is not teleological) (and I should differentiate proberly basic beliefs/axioms with indefeasible experiential beliefs like memory beliefs, or perceptual beliefs, which the experiential reality of objective moral values and duties may be an intrinsic defeater-defeater, that is to say, a belief which is so powerfully warranted that it overwhelms the potential defeaters brought against it. Also I should mention in a moral realist sense, morality has a truth value quality (either right or wrong) although it has an ontic grounding)
Before I move on, sense I'm discussing experiences, beliefs, etc. I think it's worth mentioning destinctions about mental states and properties of the mind
Beliefs - True / False as binary properties. Degree of certainy we have a right to a given proposition. (information that builds on abstract/analytical knowledge/ logic also seems to be empirical through the uncanny application and success of math relationally to external world)
Thoughts - Not true/False
Sensations - proximal stimulus phenomenological map–territory relation (information that builds on axiology/empirical knowledge)
Desires - experienced inclination towards/away something (somewhat axiological in nature through emotion being connected to aesthetic/evaluative value)
although a proper definition of Metaphysics may be worth providing, I should mention that I'm currently in the process of reexamining the distinctions between aesthetics, ethics, and metaphysics, here The Relation of Metaphysics to Aesthetics

nevertheless attempting to start from and to claim that this self-inferential introspection serves the basis for grounding objective values is self contradictory as an ultimate appeal that ultimately boils down to personal introspection or desire which is in its nature subjective (not saying that it's untrue) and evaluative rather than normative, and ultimately only a moral psychological/subjectivist or an amoral/error theory (if solipsism is chosen) of morality are logically attenable, which in a properly basic sense, an external source that is capable of endowing us with a teleological nature and a sense awareness of said nature, as well as this self referential experience/desires that are grounded in this nature that is ultimately grounded from a direct relational connection between said external source and personal nature logically speaking allows these theist to rationally ground their moral values objectively, and with the Moral Devine Command Theory, compels us to follow this nature."

Can you tell me what is the specific argument you have here? Anyone that wants to ground morality on something mind-independent will not try to say that introspection was the basis of morality. Now, this doesn't mean that reason, which occurs in the mind, can't be employed to discover the truth about morality and so reason can be used to discover objective morality. It wouldn't be the basis of morality, but someone like Kant isn't being self-contradictory for employing reason to determine what is morality.

"Although this is just a summary of my theory from some of my published works (and not very technical as that would take too long to formulate, besides the formalities are at times a distraction to the communication of core ideas in an informal setting), are the points that I raised concerning the secularist failied attempt in properly resolving the is ought dilemma due to the teleonomical nature of their arguments, are the points that I raised valid? What are your guys' views about any possible short comings or possible objections that may be raised against the points that I raised?"

I am interested in reading your published works. Can you link them?
I don't know what it is that you think atheists are committed to, in regards to moral realism, but I don't think the biggest problem for atheists is whether or not they can bridge the is-ought gap. The problem for any more theory, whether theistic or not, is if it can defend itself from criticism by contrary moral theories or by moral fictionalists and anyone else who rejects moral realism.

"The objectivity of moral values cannot itself provide such a rationally compelling reason, since Dr. Wielenberg acknowledges that he has no rationally compelling arguments either for the objectivity of moral values or for moral Platonism.[5] He thus cannot overcome the presumption against Platonism and, hence, against Godless Normative Realism. The theist, by contrast, faces no such obstacle because he grounds moral values in a concrete object, namely, God, and so is not committed to a realm of abstract objects.[6]"

Craig is just asserting victory again. I agree that Platonism shouldn't answer Hume's concerns, but neither does the existence of a God that is identical to Goodness. If Craig defeated the secular moral theorists that defend moral realism in this debate, then I would like to read those arguments. I wonder how Craig critiques Kantian ethics.

"Second objection: Godless Normative Realism’s account of objective moral duties is seriously flawed. I’ll mention two problems. First, in the absence of a divine lawgiver, why think that we have any moral obligations or prohibitions?"

How does Craig think that this is a valid way of reasoning? This looks like the appeal to ignorance fallacy, but suppose that is just a question to get the reader to ask himself that question, then the question should be followed up with a hypothetical argument made by an atheist answering his question, giving the atheist the strongest case that can be made for his side, and then Craig can refute that. It looks like Craig is not too familiar with moral philosophy to answer his own question if he is being serious.

"On Dr. Wielenberg’s view, moral obligations are constituted by having decisive moral reasons for doing some action.[17] For example, if I’m trying to decide whether to steal someone’s pocketbook, I examine the moral value of alternative actions and see that I have decisive moral reasons for not stealing the pocketbook. Therefore I ought not to steal it."

Well, if I do something because of an obligation, then there is a reason or explanation for my action. So I can agree with Wielenberg here.

"Dr. Wielenberg’s view has the implausible implication that if you have decisive moral reasons for doing something, you are obligated to do it."

I wish you would have quoted the specifics that detail what it was that Wielenberg was defending. Maybe Craig is right, if Wielenberg confused a moral explanation of why one does X with a moral obligation to do X; however, it is still possible that the moral explanation and the moral obligation, for some moral act, are the same for someone; they don't have to be mutually exclusive. I guess I have to read the book to see what is going on.

"That is incompatible with morally supererogatory acts, like sacrificing one’s life for another, for even though such an act is supremely good, it is above and beyond the call of duty."

I can't comment on this without reading the book. I don't see why risking one own's life should serve as a special problem that any other moral act wouldn't if Wielenberg truly failed to bridge the is-ought gap.

"Moreover, Dr. Wielenberg’s view seems to imply that we are always obligated to do the best thing, whereas in some cases we are obligated at most to do a good thing, not the best thing."

Well, how is Craig determining that we ought to do the good thing over the best thing? In any case, if we ought to do a good thing instead of the best thing, and this is because of the success of some moral philosophy that established this as such, then the is-ought gap has been bridged and the process that allows one to make the choice for a good thing over the best thing is tangential to the topic.

"Even if it were morally better, for example, for you to become a doctor rather than an engineer, you’re not morally obligated to become a doctor, for both are good moral choices."

Why is it a moral choice to be a doctor or engineer? I can think of scenarios that make it seem as if these are good actions, but the act of being a doctor or engineer isn't the good act, it is what is done once one is a doctor or engineer. Suppose that one chooses to be a doctor to help those in poor health that lack the funds, or one becomes a civil engineer so that he can provide clean water to those who have no way of providing this for themselves, is the act of becoming a doctor or engineer good or is the subsequent acts good? Or is the intent, that motivated the pursuit for higher education, what makes it good to pursue either path? I guess I need to read the book to see what was the context of that part of the debate.

"In any case, having decisive moral reasons to do an act implies at most that if you want to act morally, then that is the act you ought to do. In other words, the obligation to do the act is only conditional, not unconditional."

Well, is Wielenberg's thesis really, if you want to behave morally, and you have objective moral obligations, then you will behave morally? Because then what is the point of defending objective moral obligation? You could say if you want to behave morally, then you will behave morally. Now, just because you want to do something, on top of having the obligation, doesn't seem to undermine Wielenberg's position, if he succeeded in bridging the is-ought gap. So I must read the book to see what really is going on.

"But a divine command provides an unconditional obligation to perform some act. A robust moral theory ought to provide a basis for unconditional moral obligations, which Wielenberg’s view does not."

Commands of any kind do not do this.

"The second problem is that Dr. Wielenberg’s view subverts the objectivity of moral duties by undermining freedom of the will. Dr. Wielenberg endorses what he calls “the causal closure of the physical.”[18] That implies that your mental states are causally effete. The mind has no effect on the body. The only causality is from physical brain states to mental states. Thus, mental states are causally impotent states which just float along, as it were, on brain states. They do and effect nothing. In that case, everything you think and do is causally determined by prior physical states.[19] You are an electro-chemical machine, and machines have no moral obligations to do anything."

Well, okay, if causal determinism is true, then libertarian free will is not possible, but is Wielenberg a determinist or is he a compatibilist? Perhaps Craig thinks this distinction is irrelevant because the possibility for moral behavior necessitates libertarian free will, but then he needs to make that argument! A libertarian free willer might agree, but compatibilists don't and Craig would make his case by arguing why compatibilism is flawed.

"Your body is not morally obligated to do anything. What about your self, your mind? On Dr. Wielenberg’s view the self is just a succession of discrete mental states; there is no enduring subject which persists from one moment to another.[20]"

That doesn't mean that moral behavior is impossible. Suppose that there is no persisting personal identity throughout time if I give to charity at t1, but at t2, some other person exists that that moment, then why is it false to say that at t1 there was a good act committed by that person? I can think of reasons that relate to the debate between presentists and eternalists, and temporal logic, but I can't see why the lack of a persisting personal identity would be one of them.

"Thus, there literally is no one who can be held morally accountable for prior acts. Moral praise and blame are impossible, since there is no enduring moral agent."

Moral praise or blame must take into account time.

"Your perception of yourself as a moral agent and your sense of moral duties and accountability are illusions of human consciousness. Thus, the objectivity of moral duties, along with moral agency and moral accountability, is undone by Godless Normative Realism."

Craig should have just argued that if physicalism is true, that the self is undermined, and then try to defend this position; Craig could then argue that if there are no persons, then there can be no good acts carried out by anyone. Time seems so irrelevant here.

There are analytical Marxists that try to do that for Marx. I don't know if you care to read them?

I am not sure that this is the case. While libertarians do indeed hold to self-ownership and the non-aggression principle, they are not simply taken as self-evident axioms. Rothbard, for instance, argues for self-ownership from the impossibility or arbitrariness of the alternatives. One alternative would be that one part of humanity begins by owning another part of humanity, and the other would be that every person in the world is jointly co-owned by everybody. Rothbard argues that the former is arbitrary, since some members of one and the same natural kind are afforded a 'natural right' that others are not, and he argues that the latter is impossible to implement, for all sorts of reasons which I won't rehearse here. Whatever we make of his arguments, the point is that they are not simply stipulated. — Virgo Avalytikh

Why should it be that when I own someone that I am afforded a natural right? Rothbard is already invoking talk of natural rights to describe slavery, and so something of political nature is already assumed when describing slavery. Why not give an account of slavery that is descriptive? Here is an example: when I own slaves it is often against their will.
Or will Rothbard defend his argument without axioms?

"Dr. William Lane Craig for example explains these criticisms of Platonic Atheism in these quotes,

"So the challenge for the atheist is really acute: he has to account for the objectivity not only of moral values but also of moral duties. Even if he postulates a Platonic Good, he has no adequate answer to the question why we ought to do what is good. By contrast, on theism we ought to do what is good because the Good itself has commanded us to do so."

Craig specializes in the philosophy of time, and I actually enjoyed reading his book on the history of the cosmological argument. However, Craig is mistaken if he thinks that naturalism and physicalism being true necessarily entail that objective moral duties do not exist and that atheists are at a loss as to how to defend their existence (given their other metaphysical commitments). I already mentioned Kant's ethics, and that should be enough to show that Craig is too quick in declaring victory here. If moral nihilism is implied by ontological naturalism or physicalism being true, then Craig has to make his case; furthermore, he needs to start identifying the flaws in non-theistic moral realism that philosophers have defended throughout the history of moral philosophy.

"The question then becomes, is a Divine Command Theory of ethics plausible? Here I want to refer you to my recent debate with Erik Wielenberg on “God and Morality: What Is the Best Account of Objective Moral Values and Duties?” In this debate, Wielenberg agrees that divine commands can be a source of objective moral duties (in effect, opposing Cosmic Sceptic), but he presses three objections to Divine Command Theory: (1) DCT arbitrarily singles out divine commands as the only possible source of moral obligation; (2) DCT implies that non-believers have no moral obligations, since many people are unaware of God’s commands and authority; and (3) DCT makes morally wrong acts inexplicable, since God inexplicably commands people to do what He knows they won’t do. These are more substantive objections than Cosmic Sceptic’s, which is based merely on a misunderstanding.

I actually don't find Wielenberg's criticisms very suggestive.

Objection one could be stronger if he stated that non-theistic moral realism is possible and since it is possible, DCT isn't the only possible moral realism and any claim that so and so is good because of God's commands are premature.

Objection two identified what Wielenberg thinks is a consequence of DCT being true, but that doesn't mean that DCT is false so it is useless as an objection.

Objection three is also useless since implicitly accepts that what God commands is obligatory; what it critiques, again, are the consequences that follow. If so many do not act in the way that was identified as moral or good, then this isn't a deficit on what was identified as moral or good, but news about the extent of poor behavior exhibited by humanity.

“Divine Command Theory?” Precisely because it grounds our moral duties in God’s commands! The genius of this theory is that it provides a plausible grounding, not just for moral values, but also for moral duties. Obligations arise as a result of imperatives issued by a competent authority. As the Good itself, God is supremely competent to issue moral commands to us, thereby constituting our moral duties."

It looks like Craig identified Goodness with God himself. There is a lot that can be said about that claim, but I will leave that for later. Right now I will just say that Craig's answer to the is-ought is a failure.

"Atheistic Moral Platonism, which posits an objective Good, all right, but lacks any basis for objective moral duties because the Good is an impersonal, abstract object."

Craig is wrong in his description of why Plato will not satisfy Hume's criticism; the real reason why Platonic Good does not gives moral duties is because Goodness existing does not imply an ought. It isn't because Platonic Forms are impersonal, abstract entities.

"On Atheistic Moral Platonism moral vices are just as real and objective as moral values, and there is nothing that obligates us to align our lives with one set of these abstract entities rather than the other. on theism we ought to do what is good because the Good itself has commanded us to do so"

Suppose that there is the Platonic form of Evil and the Platonic form of Good, Craig's point is that if the form of goodness could obligate, then so too could the form of evil, but then how can a human engage in the participation of the form of the Good over the form of evil without making his own arbitrary judgment and choosing one over the other? Craig should admit that the is-ought gap is satisfied! Simply because there is the Platonic form of Evil that does the same thing doesn't mean that the is-ought gap hasn't been bridged. Now, if Craig doesn't mean to extend the possibility that Platonism can guarantee moral duties with the statement, "and there is nothing that obligates us to align our lives with one set of these abstract entities rather than the other" then Craig is correct that Platonism fails to bridge the is-ought gap, but this isn't because of the possibility of the platonic form of evil. Instead, it is because something being the case, does not suggest that one ought to behave one way or the other.

the best contenders of grounding a value, such as morality as objective has either been a nature of something (whether that being is designed with a teleology, or through a teleonomical (closed-system) impersonal determistic force {such as Neo-Darwinistic mechanisms} that shapes the nature of said being), or in an extrensic rather than intrinsic sense, that beings' nature is objectively valueable insofar as that value comes from the nature of a self necessary (eternal/infinite) personal mind/will that created and designed all aspects of reality including said beings. — Shushi

Why should a nature of any existent thing, even a thing that was metaphysically necessary, ground morality?

"This eliminates the euthyphro dilemma for said self necessary personal mind/will;"

I don't see how it does from the information given in the previous quote.

"because an impersonal source literally still makes human beings an accident by product,"

Why is morality considered to be an agent with a choice-making ability or a mindless thing that exists in a causal series?

"that share no relational value to that objective impersonal mind/will reference like the platonic Good (which really isn't a mind or will, is causally effete and therefore not the single source of all reality) which an impersonal mind is not causally effete,"

So if X is causally impotent, or not in a member of a causal series, then X is not morality?
I just don't see how you came to these criteria for what morality ought to be.
If X is just goodness itself, then why is it necessary for X to also be causally potent, have a will, or exist in a causal series? Perhaps you might respond and say that if X is causally impotent, then morality could not be grounded on X, but that would be because a thing does not ground itself- it is itself. So I don't understand why what something is must be grounded on some other thing for that something to be what it is. What exactly do you mean by grounding?

"it still would be undermineded by the euthyphro dilemma as objective moral values would be independent of it and it wouldn't be the single source of all reality"

Plato's Form of the Good is undermined by the Euthyphro dilemma because objective moral values are distinct from the Form of the Good? I have a hard time following the line of reasoning that you employ so can you explain what you mean?

"or else we are accidental by products with no relation nature with this impersonal mind and thus mankind has no moral worth which would be counter intuitive with our properly basic beliefs,"

It is not clear how it follows that if human origins are due to impersonal processes that humans are without "moral worth." Also, why does it matter if something is believed to be true, even if it is intuitive or commonsensical, in an inquiry about the truth regarding metaphysics? It seems like you jump from beliefs you have about X, to facts about X and I don't follow the reasoning that leads to that jump.

"and epistemologically would be impossible to non-arbitrarily determine what are these objective moral values properties that we share with this unknowable impersonal creator/source,"

So Plato's Form of the Good is flawed because human minds can't know what are the objective moral values that follow from the Form of the Good existing as it does? Suppose that moral knowledge is impossible, this doesn't mean that moral nihilism is true.

"and the dilemma of personal beings (us human beings) coming from impersonal causes raises insermountable objections and mysteries (in a monistic sense) that are equivocally similar to objections being raised about the possibility of a magic wand existing and creating from literal nothing something,"

I am trying to see what this has to do with moral ontology. I think that what you mean to say is that if physical reality is caused to exist by abstractions, then it must be the case that abstractions have causal power, but abstractions don't have causal power, so physical reality could not have been caused to exist by abstractions. If I have misinterpreted your argument, please let me know. The issue I have here is why do you seem to think that anyone would say that impersonal abstractions caused physical reality as a counter to whatever thesis you want to defend? I am certain that the impersonal things that naturalists defend, as the cause of humanity, are other physical things and not abstractions. Now, what do you mean with "coming from" exactly? I have used the word cause loosely, but to say that X is causally responsible for Y can mean different things. I am guessing a cause implies an event from the point you make that "personal beings... coming from impersonal causes raises... objections and mysteries... that are... similar to objections being raised about the possibility of a magic wand... creating from... nothing something" and so I can agree that abstract objects never initiate events, they are thought of as a-temporal after all, and can not bring about an event where some effect occurs. Under this understanding, I agree that abstract objections do not cause anything. I don't know if this allows you to conclude that abstract objects never are the cause of an effect; although I don't believe this, suppose that the "self-necessary" thing is an abstract object, and that all other contingent states of affairs continue to exist because of that thing, then there is dependency between these things and it can then be said that there is a causal relationship between these things. Here, the word cause does not suggest an event.

"creating illogical realities such as making 2+1=4, and other similar oddities; so to summarize an impersonal mind is not significantly any different from deterministic impersonal forces in this context."

Contingent states of affairs existing because of a metaphysically necessary abstract object does sound strange, but it should not be compared to logically contradictory statements. If this is false, it should not be because it is logically impossible.

"However, although a christian might object to whether the biological nature of a being from the by product of deterministic impersonal forces is truly objective or not,"

If something is the case, then why does it matter if one is a theist or not? Now, I don't see why it matters how the mind of the agent came about, if we are concerned about mind-independent reality.

"because in some senses it's not because evolution might change the nature and therefore the values as well,"

If we are concerned about mind-independent reality, then this is irrelevant. The very fact that reality is what it is, irrespective of my opinion, or the opinion of anyone else, is what you need to defend. I think that most philosophers do not think that reality is just what we think it is, or say it is, so you should be in good company.

"or in some senses it is as all beings share this nature that is beyond their subjective opinions even though that nature changes (because biological facts are external to us, and are therefoe not arbitrary unlike a ruling culture/sosiety/government imposing what is moral or personal preference), it still would affect us all."

So evolution could have resulted in creatures with different perceptions and perceptual abilities. I think that this is true, but I don't know of philosophical moral realists that want to argue that because we have so and so belief, by evolutionary origins, that so and so belief is a fact. Who is it that you are critiquing? Is it Sam Harris? I never read him, but I have heard before that he made a silly argument for moral realism that is fallacious for something similar.

"It seems that the theist and atheist can have a conceptually endless nuanced debate on whether there may be a secular source for objective values as exemplified between the debate of Dr. Erik Wielenberg and Dr. William Lane Craig, however Objective duties always seem to be neglected and where the Oughtness of following objective moral guidelines is grounded in."

I don't really read much moral philosophy, so forgive me if I am wrong here, but doesn't Kantian ethics defend objective moral duties without making appeals to anything divine? I mean, you can still think that Kant was wrong, but non-theistic objective moral duties aren't absent in moral philosophy.

"As anti climatic as it may seem, according to theists, the moral commands from an authoratative personal entity, especially if it's the source of all reality and designed everything including human beings,
constitutes as sufficient grounds for establishing not only an ontic source for morality, not only the grounding the objectivity of these values,"

I don't see how this is the case; can you explain it? If there is a thing that is the source of all reality, metaphysically necessary, creator of all physical reality, and capable of thought, why would this entail that this thing is related to Goodness or morality in any way?

"but also the oughtness to follow these imperatives because if there weren't these commands from an appropriate source (like the one that designed us all towards a specific nature, which in the case of christian theism, is the nature of the very self-nessary creator itself, or in other words being intentionally "designed" in the image of God),"

Let's say that God is related to goodness in some way, why should humans do as it commands? Because of this relationship with goodness that God has? If so, then the is-ought gap isn't overcome by that fact alone. I also don't see how you concluded that this command since it originates in an appropriate source, implies that we ought to follow the command. Also, what makes something an appropriate source and why?

"then nothing would compell us to follow these objective standards whether it's the nature of God or the evolutionary nature that we all share and affects our behavior to that specific nature."

Suppose a friend told you that smoking causes lung cancer, and from that fact alone, he thinks that no one should smoke, and you think to yourself, "that fact alone does not seem to explain why one should not smoke," and so you so reply to your friend with, "so what if smoking is hazardous to human health? Why should that mean that I should not smoke?" This is, hopefully, an intuitive example of what the is-ought gap is concerned with. Even if Goodness or Morality is identified with God, it still isn't clear why we ought to obey the commands of God. Just because God is Good? Or because he commands me while being an appropriate source? "So what?" is the question that hasn't been answered.

And it has been agreed for the most part, that moral experience with the appearance of objectivity (which are universally shared in a deep principled sense rather than apparently inconsistent shallow comparisons) is properly basic, in the evidentialist sense, — Shushi

Do you have statistical data of philosophers who specialize in ethics to prove this claim? I didn't know that most moral realists were incline to moral realism because of moral experience. I thought that this just the case for moral intuitionists.

When building a political system, there are starting assumptions that are taken for granted. That I own my own body is the starting point of Nozick, and that coercive control over another is illegitimate is the starting assumption of libertarians (both left and right). Suppose that I ask, why is it that you own your own body? If it a first principle, that I own my own body, then the question will be greeted with the reply that this is what has been taken for granted as true.

I guess your issue is how is it that the left and right-libertarian, have similar-sounding starting assumptions, have differing levels of detail as to how society will be organized?

If we compare Nozick with Chomsky, then Nozick sets out to make the case for minarchism in the form that trained philosophers go about in making the case for anything, but Chomsky doesn't have this background and may not have realized that anyone expected this of him.

Or is your issue, that the starting assumptions of the left-libertarian seem to imply the conclusion that he wants to prove so that they seem too vague?

Take a ball on a cushion and let's assume that they have both existed in that arrangement for eternity. It seems true to say that the ball is causing the indentation in the cushion, even though there is no event of the ball having caused the deny. So this, I think, would be an example of one thing - the dent in the cushion - causally depending on another thing - the ball, without there being any interaction between the two. — Bartricks

Let say that a cause and an effect are temporarily simultaneous to each other, as in your example; by definition an effect depends on its cause for its existence, so if X is the cause of Y- even when X and Y are contemporaneous- then there is still an asymmetrical relation between X and Y; the presence of Y guarantees the presence of X, but not the other way around; therefore, the particular physical thing that refers to Y is causally dependent upon the physical thing X, but the part of physical reality that constitutes Y is not logically dependent upon the part of physical reality that constitutes X.

An effect, by definition, implies the existence of a cause, but the physical reality that constitutes X does not make it so that effects imply the existence of a cause. There is a distinction to be made between causal and logical, and metaphysical dependency

If it is the case that things owe their existence either to themselves or to something else, then "caused to exist" in premise 8, and again in "causal interaction" in premise 9, will have to be defined to include causal, logical, and metaphysical dependency.

So you must be ready to argue that if X has no causal interaction with Y, that this information alone suffices you to conclude that no metaphysical or logical dependency is possible.

I got stuff to do so I will try to keep this conversation going in the future. I appreciate your thoughts though!

I think your conclusion does not follow necessarily from your premises.

One problem is how you go from arguing that immaterial reality has no causal relation with physical reality to therefore no physical things exist. Perhaps immaterial reality does not interact with material reality in one specific causal manner, as in the way that a potter crafts a pot to exist, but that does not seem to preclude the possibility that material reality is metaphysically contingent upon immaterial reality- which may be metaphysically necessary- the point here is that is possible to say that the existence of x causes the existence of y to exist (if x's existence is logically prior to y's existence) and still have no "causal interaction" with y.

Your first premise reminds me of the principle of sufficient reason that Leibniz uses in his argument for God so I thought of this example after reading your argument.

An example of how a thing can have been caused by another and yet still have no interaction with that other can be seen in a God who is argued to be non-physical, changeless, and as such is timeless, and possesses whatever mental state that it is in.

The existence of such a God is logically prior to the existence of its thought so that if there was no such God, then there is no such thought; indeed, the thought's existence is caused to exist (in this example "caused" refers to logical dependency or metaphysical dependency) by something that is not identical to the thought and is thus external to it, since this example assumes that whatever God is that he is not his own thought, thereby satisfying premise one of your argument, but there is also no "causal interaction" between the existence of God's thought and the existence of God, as there can be no causal interaction between the existence of the thing that is logically dependent upon the existence of some necessary thing. So while God may have the power to cause whatever thought he wants, the actions of God's mind does not cause that the existence of God's thoughts are logically posterior upon the existence of God's existence; in this respect, God's mind and the logical dependency that the existence of God's thoughts have on God's existence have no causal interaction.

So we can agree, for sake of argument, that there is no causal interaction between immaterial and material things, but hold that it is still possiblely the case that these two things are metaphysically linked.

In this case, the material reality could have always existed in time and was nonetheless caused to exist, perhaps by the necessary existence of immaterial reality preserving the non-necessary existence of material reality; premise 1-4 suggest to me that you think immaterial reality is unlike material reality in not needing to be caused by something external to it, but correct me if I am mistaken.

There is no contradiction in it being the case that the existence of material reality is caused by the existence of immaterial reality and that there is no causal interaction between immaterial reality's activity the existence of physical reality. Here we see that what a thing is and what a thing does are not the same, so while it can be stated that immaterial reality's activities can do nothing to "causally interact" with material reality existence, the existence of immaterial reality may be the reason for why material reality exists.

The point is not to say your conclusion is wrong, mind you, but that you need to defend a version of premise 9 that argues that if there is no "causal interaction" between two things that that must also entail that there is no metaphysical and logical dependency between those things.

But that is not in itself a reason to jump to the conclusion that premise one should be read as a description of physical things instead of as a metaphysical truth. Suppose that I said that from nothing nothing comes, and then said just look around you, why should it mean that within the realm of immaterial things, some immaterial things may come from nothing?

Well, I guess you interpret the "look around you part" differently from the way that I do. When I read it, it seems to be the equivalent of "nothing moves itself and this is corroborated by everyday experience so you shouldn't doubt what is so obviously self-evident." In fact, I read it as invoking a metaphysical truth, rather than as a description of the behavior of physical things.

In any case, I find your alternative reading of the argument as evidence that the author should have been more clear with how he wanted to present Plato's argument.

We don't know how immaterial things act as causes, only that they do. — Metaphysician Undercover

So then premise 1 is being interpreted to imply that it is true only for physical things while being silent on the behavior of immaterial things.

Okay, so whatever moves the soul is moved by something else and so on and so on?

The argument takes the observation that movements of the body (or the parts of the body which originate the motions of the body as a whole, in your reformulation) are not caused by motions of other bodies. — Metaphysician Undercover

Premise 1, in the manner that it was presented by the author of "philosophy demystified," doesn't make the kind of qualification that you are making. It simply states that nothing moves itself and this is corroborated by our experiences; so Plato expects the listener to accept premise 1 as obviously true and self-evident- it is a metaphysical principle that Plato does not think needs to be argued for. The way you are presenting the argument seems to suggest that premise 1 should only ably to physical things.

So I'd say that the argument is meant to open one's mind to the reality of the fact that the immaterial realm is causally active, and not meant to show that the soul moves itself. — Metaphysician Undercover

I think this is a plausible interpretation. However, Plato would then have to explain the mechanics of the immaterial realm and how it solves whatever dilemma there was in regards to the material realm

Interesting, I think that Searle's emergence, or Hume's bundle theory, ought to be considered before this study proves dualism though.

This still seems compatible with physicalism but I don't feel like going after this tangent right now.

Would you say that the author presents Plato's argument incorrectly?
Or only that his blanket statement on the Greek philosophers was wrong?

Well, your original OP challenged the reader with the idea that "Greek" thinkers (many of whom disagreed with each other strongly) did not understand that parts of living things had their own processes apart from whatever made whole organisms operate — Valentinus

Right, the author made that claim, but I didn't ask if this statement on the Greek philosophers was correct. I was interested in knowing if his proposed critique of Plato's argument had any merit.

So on that point. my point has been amply made — Valentinus

Yes, amply made, yet not on topic, but still interesting and I appreciate it anyway!

This answer will differ for different philosophical perspectives, but I don't think that this is relevant yet since noting that functioning ears are a necessary condition for the perception of noise and not a sufficient condition doesn't get Aristotle to his conclusion that the perceiver is the soul. In any case, I think we are very off topic!

If the brain surgeon stimulated those memories by natural physical processes, which were seemingly located in the brain, then I don't see how this experiment lends itself to any form of dualism. Can you explain what was his reasoning for dualism?

hearing is a process where sounds being made are heard by the individual as sounds being made. — Valentinus

But something other than the obvious instrument turns these feelings into information about what is happening. — Valentinus

When a dog barks, there are waves that are produced that enter the ear canal and the respective parts that are part of whatever allows one to hear. So I think the first quote isn't controversial, but the second quote states that "something other than the obvious instrument turns these feelings into information." Even if it is the case that the ear is not responsible for the recognition that noise was produced, which I agree with you, why should it follow that there is something that is not of the body that is referred to as the perceiver that is responsible for the recognition that noise was made? It seems that sense data is compatible with physicalism and I am not sure why these facts would be brought up by Aristotle.

I agree that there is no such sequence as described:

When you want to scratch your nose, you don't say, 'hey, finger, scratch nose. — Wayfarer

I think that what you are trying to imply here does not necessarily follow from the information given:

Nor does your nose transfer its 'having been scratched' back to the mind via the finger. — Wayfarer

If you were blindfolded, and someone scratched your nose, then you will the sensation of your nose being scratch and the sensation will inform you that your nose was scratched. While it seems correct that the nose does not transfer "its having been scratched" back to the mind by the finger, it seems possible that some other part of the body is responsible for this transfer of knowledge.

This is actually as aspect of the 'subjective unity of consciousness', and it's a matter for which there is no real scientific account. — Wayfarer

So far you presented an argument regarding how we experience sensations and how we don't experience them and I guess you are drawing metaphysical conclusions from those experiences. I think that there are still ways that can also account for those experiences from a scientific world view. For example, I never feel a sequence, such as, commanding my heart to beat and then my heart beating, but it would be a mistake to conclude that my heart beats without any input from my brain. Thus, simply experiencing or not experiencing sensations does not help determine what is under the command of brain states or not. In the end, I don't want to argue that you are wrong simply because there are other possible explanations, but it seems that more arguments are needed before we can come to metaphysical conclusions about these things.

What do you mean by

The recognition that different parts were listening to their own drummer is one of the driving forces of Greek thought. — Valentinus

What do you mean when you say that different parts were listening to their own drummer? I guess I don't understand what you mean by "their own drummer."

ok.

Right, the fallacy of composition. But i don't see what that has to do with Plato's argument for the soul being what moves the body.

ok, i see what you are arguing.

What do you mean?

It really doesn't matter since nothing moves itself (according to premise 1).
So whatever moves the body, soul or not, must itself be moved by something else.