The issue here is that someone is get stuck and somehow would sacrifice himself for others. — javi2541997

If he's stuck, then he can't sacrifice himself. He has no choice in the matter, he literally can't do anything.

Give the dynamite to the fat man and let him decide. — Banno

And how exactly would you do that? He's literally blocking the hole.

Well, there's an interesting question for them. — Banno

You're the one implying that they're wrong.

But as I've pointed out several times, the empirical evidence is against him on this. — Isaac

Likewise.
But he doesn't seem to care whether his theory of morality actually has the potential for ever being applied by humans.

What are your thoughts about this dilemma? What should you do? — javi2541997

The dilemma is spurious. Fat men (fat like they can block a tunnel) don't go hiking to begin with.

Note to self: Don't follow fat people.

Right back atcha!

It's that moral judgements are inherently collective; and I don't mean that in the way that their conceptualisation is essentially a social enterprise like any other; but that they are judgements about what we, notI should do. — Banno

But the real question for assessing moral reasoning is _why_ we should do something and not do some other thing.

For example, five people can say that we should not steal, but they can have very different reasons for prohibiting stealing. One will say that we shouldn't steal, because if we do, we'll be punished, and getting punished is bad and should be avoided. Another person will say that we shouldn't steal because if we do, other people will think ill of us, and we mustn't risk that. Yet another person will say that we shouldn't steal because the law says we must not steal. Etc.

Why do you ask? — Banno

To get a context on the matter.
You said earlier:

Morality and ethics are about how one is to relate to others. — Banno

This view is far from universal. For some people, for example, morality is all about laws and rules: what matters is that one obeys laws, rules, and it doesn't matter how people feel about that or how they are affected by it.

(Japanese society at large, for instance, is a good example of that.)

You're vacillating. — Banno

?
You'll need to say more.

The law can and often should change. Once it is the law, though, it is the law regardless of its wisdom or morality. — Ciceronianus the White

Yes, and this is a considerable part of the problem. Once a law is passed, it's like boarding a plane: one is stuck with it / on it for a duration of time, with no safe or easy exit.
How does one endure that time, how does one make sense of it?

By which I mean that if law is the reinforcement of morality, what is the mechanism by which that connection is made? — Isaac

When people believe that might makes right.
— baker

Wouldn't that just be self-fulfilling anyway. If some group were not able to enforce some proscription on behaviour then by definition they wouldn't be the 'mighty' in that case. This is true regardless of what the current law happens to say, so can't itself be a mechanism whereby law is tied to morality. — Isaac

I mean that it is people's belief (the fact that people believe) that might makes right that is the mechanism that ties the law to morality, or, rather, morality to law. "Such is the law, therefore, such is moral." (I'm actually paraphrasing a conversation I had with a police officer last summer.)

This fits the 2nd level / stage 4 in Kohlberg's theory of moral development.

Some problems in addressing issues of morality are certainly due to the fact that not the entire population is (or can be) at the same level of moral reasoning.

Yep, though it's more often called the principle of charity in a philosophical context.

Failure to to apply it is pretty rampant here, as with most everywhere. — Pfhorrest

When discussing the dog-eat-dog nature of life, only a simpleton would be indiscriminately charitable, or goodwilled.
IOW, the topics of philosophical discussions are often enough in conflict with charity and goodwill.

That's an agreeable statement. Don't you think, however, that deciphering a larger meaning can aid the living of one's life? — Aryamoy Mitra

That assumes that there exists a "larger meaning" and that one only needs to "decipher" it.
Based on what should one assume that (or better yet: take it for granted)?

The belief that the law must conform to an "assumed standard" of some kind, and isn't the law if it does not, ignores the law; it doesn't explain it. It leads to a fundamental ignorance of the nature of the law and its operation.

What say you to that, if anything? — Ciceronianus the White

In order for people to take the law seriously, they must assume that the law is somehow a reflection of objective reality, objective morality, of "things as they really are". People need to take for granted that the law is more than a matter of political machinations between politicians.

In contrast, take, for example, some people's reasons for disobeying traffic laws: they believe that speed limits are just a way for bureocrats to exert power over other people.

By which I mean that if law is the reinforcement of morality, what is the mechanism by which that connection is made? — Isaac

When people believe that might makes right.

I guess in this way, a question arises, "Does knowing a lot about something, make one more of an expert in philosophical concepts like the human condition?" — schopenhauer1

I think it's an urban myth that this is so. But it can certainly happen that a person who has expertise in one field takes for granted that said field is as important to and revealing of humanity as a whole as it is to said person's career and means of living.

But I am also trying to reveal that people often deem that knowing minutia in a field itself confers by some necessity, better understanding in existential matters like antinatalism. — schopenhauer1

No. If anything, the deciding factors are 1. a person's socio-economic class, 2. that classes don't mix well.

Simply put: rich people (or those aspiring to be so) will not deem arguments from poor people as credible (regardless what the argument is about), and vice versa.

I calls them as I sees them — god must be atheist

This _is_ interpreting them.

Morality and ethics are about how one is to relate to others. The OP ignores this. — Banno

On which level of moral reasoning, according to Kohlberg's theory, would you place the OP's arguments?

This is my main gripe with any kind of hedonism. It ignores the basic psychological fact that our affects are fabricated, in part, from social cues. Part of why we feel good about some things and bad about others is because we interpret physiological states that way as a result of the models we've learnt from our culture. — Isaac

Yes, and "hedonism" can mean so many things, to the point that the term becomes useless.

There are Buddhist and Hindu dharma teachers who looking at pictures like these would say that those ascetics are practicing "sense indulgence". There are cultural systems where "sense indulgence" can mean a great variety of things, from overeating, getting drunk, to never sitting down or holding up one's arms for years.

I think I already clarified this earlier, but establishing a scale against which to compare the morality of situations where one end of that scale is nobody suffering and the other end is abject misery for everyone doesn't mean that I expect (who?) to make that good end the case or else (who?) is a criminal or something. It's a scale. It's just how we compare things. Suffering bad. More suffering worse. Less suffering better. No suffering best. It's not a complicated thing. — Pfhorrest

Define "suffering".

One can examine their life without being pensive over its necessity, but refraining from any contemplation in that regard is antithetical to all philosophy - isn't it? Why assess the structural or metaphysical underpinnings of your life, if you aren't trying to decipher or extract a meaning from it? One can synthesize an epistemic conclusion from the former, but hardly apprehend a motive without the latter. — Aryamoy Mitra

Philosophy is supposed to be love of wisdom.
Wisdom should have something vitally to do with how one goes about one's daily life, 24/7.

Faith is belief despite the lack of justification. — Banno

But there is a justification, namely, one to the effect of, "It is worth it to commit to an ideology that promises salvation, even when the situation seems hopeless, and especially then." It's human nature to want out of trouble. (And it tends to happen that when one is in trouble, not that many options for a way out of it are available. They usually don't put Heidegger's books on the bedside in cheap motels.)

I doubt there are many theists who started out by believing that God exists, and then took the whole project of religiosity from there.
Rather (esp. as far as adult converts go), they started off with an existential despair that they resolved with an ideology of hope. The actual issue of the existence of God is secondary or tertiary to all this.

What drives their faith is that initial existential despair. This also explains why adult converts often lose their faith over time or "mellow out": the religiosity they took up in their state of existential despair helped them overcome said despair, and now with the despair gone, so is their faith.

Atheist:
Most epistemologies agree, broadly, that beliefs can only be considered reliable when they are backed, (somehow), by observation.

Faith would be belief in that for which there isn't observation, and thus, beliefs so backed are not reliable. — John Chlebek

Indeed, but they can still be relevant, because often in life, it's about what is at stake, not what the stakes are.

For example, believing it's worth to apply for a job even though there are a thousand other applicants. Or believing that it's worth to take a course of medical treatment even if the chances are slim.

Me:
"beliefs can only be considered reliable when they are backed, (somehow), by observation."

You can observe that it makes a difference in a person's life whether they are committed to some particular standard or idea, as opposed to whether they are not.
It's justified, reliable to believe that commitment makes a difference.

I'm not sure how to reply to this. But I believe on some level he is begging the question. He said that he has observed that non-observable statements are unreliable. I think his reply would work if he said "I have observed that observable statements are reliable." But the other is just an assumption and is not observable, at least not in the scientific sense he is saying.

More context is needed here, the specific theistic statements he commented on.

Natural selection shows us that morality is a social construction. — Harry Hindu

Could you sketch out how it does that?
I can't think of an unequivocal way to interpret "morality is a social construction".

No, stay and fight!

If the good is, as you said earlier, neither definable nor analyzable, then a great many moral philosophers have been merely spinning their wheels. How can they be so wrong?


I'd like some clarification as well, because people have tried to define "good" and "happiness". Some even come up with supposedly objective, universal standards of those. Clearly, those people don't think that the good is undefinable and unanalyzable as Banno does.
Both camps can't be right.

It's the philosophical position of pessmism that makes one hate life and wishing one would never have been.

The vampire novels of Anne Rice explore the implications and downsides of eternal youth. In the beginning, the novels portray the condition as romantic and erotic. By the end, the novels feature an unending procession of mindless savagery and nihilism. — fishfry

Tolkien's elves are an alternative idea to this.

the error of the primacy of the individual. — Banno

At the end of the day, one lives alone and dies alone. A theory of morality has to account for this somehow. Even more so when we're living in a society where those in positions of power seek to renounce all responsibility, seek to have power and take it away from the individual, and place all the blame and all the responsibility on the individual.

I am first to point out the social embeddedness in and social epistemic dependence of the individual on society. But I'm also pointing out that the society here treats individuals in a hostile, or at best, indifferent manner, as expendable. We're not dealing with a traditional tribal social situation in which individuals are by default seen as assets. A theory of morality needs to account for this.

Don't care. — Maw

A useful theory of morality would offer principles for dealing with precisely such individual, personal situations.

You said earlier:

Insofar as human nature is real, insofar as human well-being is real, and insofar as human suffering is real (often in gratuitous forms), then it seems inescapable that moral realism is justified.
— Maw — baker

and I requested a clarification:

This can go at least two ways: It can be an utopian, idealistic concern for everyone, or it can be a form of narcissism. Hence a request for clarification.

because your formulation doesn't exclude a position like "Whatever enhances my wellbeing and diminishes my suffering is moral (morally good, morally right, just, righteous), even if in the process of this, other people or their property get hurt or damaged".

A justification of moral realism ends up in precisely the type of scenario you're so critical about:

I don't see the point in individualizing ethical questions when wealth inequality soared during a global pandemic which disproportionately affected minority ethnic groups while working classes suffer for the benefit of Capitalists. — Maw

Moral problems are experienced at the level of the individual. I'm not interested in hypothetical scenarios with individuals, but in the point that moral problems are experienced at the level of the individual, and not on some abstract level of "group" or "society".

Yeah, no wonder one hates life and wishes to never have been ...

That's going gently into that bad night.

In light of these three propositions (if you accept them), is it at all worth rationalizing one's being? If not, you're no longer examining your life. If you do, you're likely embarking on an inexhaustible venture. — Aryamoy Mitra

It seems that one cannot not attempt to rationalize one's existence, so it's moot as to whether it's worth to rationalize one's existence or not.

Who decides whether x amount of self-examination is not enough and so still falls under "the unexamined life" which is, purportedly, not worth living?

At what point did that which I call “me” appear? — Present awareness

When someone else considered you such.

Natural selection? — Harry Hindu

In that case, the prospects for a theory of morality are rather hopeless, if we have to wait for "nature" to deliver the verdict. (We'll possibly be dead by then.)

99% of all species that have existed are now extinct. We could say the same for every individual that has existed.. Who's to say that all species are destined to become extinct like individuals are destined to die?

Unless one takes solace and salvation in being a member of a particular species, the above is irrelevant.

Ask a Chan/Zen practitioner. As the Buddha purportedly had taught his disciples — 180 Proof

As far as the Pali suttas go, the Buddha taught nibbana, kamma, and rebirth.

Whether the world is finite or infinite, limited or unlimited, the problem of your liberation remains the same.

Suppose a man is struck by a poisoned arrow and the doctor wishes to take out the arrow immediately. Suppose the man does not want the arrow removed until he knows who shot it, his age, his parents, and why he shot it. What would happen? If he were to wait until all these questions have been answered, the man might die first.

Yes, the standard passage when one is looking for a thought-terminating cliche.

Trying to turn the Buddha's teachings against themselves, by using one teaching to undermine another is inconsistent, to say the least.

It's like a car without an engine
On the contrary, it's more like a Pegasus without wings.

A secularized version of Buddhism (ie. a Buddhism without nibbana, kamma, and rebirth) is a system of beliefs and practices that infantilizes the person who abides by them and keeps them on the level of good boy/good girl morality.

So... for you philosophy is only about setting out definitions? — Banno

If the solution to the problems of good and bad is as simple as you outlined earlier:

The upshot is that the good is not definable, and hence that your enterprise is bound to fail. — Banno

then one has to wonder what all those moral philosophers have been doing for millennia.

Edit: If all (perception and understanding of) reality is subjective then the burden of proof is not on the claimant but on the disagreer. — New2K2

Sounds like the standard approach in religious apologetics.

The burden of proof lies with the less reality orientated disputant - the less authoritative party. — J O Lambert

Agreed. For only such a person would take up that burden.

They each have non-religious sects or schools; — 180 Proof

What use is, for example, Buddhism without nirvana, karma, and rebirth (as the non-religious secular Buddhists would have it)? It's like a car without an engine.

as far as "metaphysical hinge commitments", those are matters of aesthetic taste (i.e. "the absolute" is in the third-eye of the beholder).

Oh. That's bold.

Maybe there is something that survivor's can't even find words for, perhaps because it's not conceptual. It's amazing and even disturbing what people can get used to (being 600 lbs, being paraplegic, cockroach-infested homes, working on the cutting line in a chicken processing plant, etc.) But all of these forms of inconvenience and discomfort aren't necessarily as bad as festering resentment. — T H E

Yes, the resentment festers.

Yet there's something obscene about noble platitudes in the face of others' suffering, and that's why I suggest a more 'materialistic' approach. If things aren't quite bad enough so that you have to move, a gradual resignation to the shittiness of the situation seems like the only option.

There is a point of no return. When one ventures on the path of resignating oneself to a shitty situation, there comes a point from whence on one cannot return to the human race anymore. A point from whence on one will never be accepted as an at least potentially worthy human being anymore. A point from whence on one cannot even conceive of oneself as an at least potentially worthy human being.
Resentment, bad as it is, at least keeps one away from that path, or at least keeps one away from reaching that point of no return. That resentment is the last thing that binds one such person to humanity.

I guess that's moral realism for the underdog.

I guess I know that you already know this, and I wish had something better for you now and for me when things get bad in my life at some point, as they surely will, us being so damned fragile and stuck together down here. Hopefully it's a little comforting to have your suffering recognized. I guess that's a strategy I use, universalizing my trauma, squeezing what juice I can from it.

Thanks.