Joe T. & bad arguments vs. my disproof of moral realism
Symmetry
anyway:
JoeOrrion <joeo...@aol.com> wrote in message
news:<20011102154904...@mb-da.aol.com>...
> >If there is no selective pressure to percieve a particular thing, then
> >in effect you are simply left with the random mutation part of the
> >evolutionary process.
>
> Well, not really. You can smell a hell of a lot of different things, right?
> Was their selective pressure to be able to smell every particular thing, or
was
> it more like there was selective pressure to be able to smell certain things
> and also selective pressure to be able to differentiate things via smell? I
> think that's different than saying that we smell particular things only
because
> of random mutations.
There was selective pressure to develop a faculty of smell in general. I guess
I misspoke when I said "particular thing" above. My point was that there was no
selective pressure to develop the general faculty of a moral sense, nor was
there any selective pressure to develop any faculty for some other purpose that
could also be used to discover moral truth.
(Again, Owl would say that 'reason' was just this faculty, but how the faculty
of reason that there'd be selective pressure to develop (logic and whatnot)
could be used to discern moral truths, I don't see.)
> >It all depends on the details
> >> of how normative facts manifest themselves.
> >
> >I used David's theory for my original argument. I don't know why one
> >would think that the ability to percieve normative facts is somehow
> >linked with the ability to see or walk or process information from his
> >5 physical senses in general.
>
> Because, when your mom tells you that you shouldn't do X, then maybe you feel
> bad when you do X. The moral fact (that you shouldn't do X) was transmitted
> via sound. You perceive it internally, via your emotional response when you
> imagine doing X.
First, I don't think its accurate to say that a 'fact' was transmitted (this
has nothing to do with the nonexistance of moral facts).
More importantly, this is not the kind of 'link' that helps the anti-[my
position] position. Just because you can use sound to transmit data to another
person doesn't imply that developing the faculty of hearing would be useful for
percieving the kind of fact that the information is about.
As you seem to note, when you hear the words asserting the moral fact, that
itsself is not the perception of a moral fact. It is a perception of an
assertation about a moral fact. To percieve the moral fact, you need to
consider the assertation and try to involk your moral faculty, after hearing
the sounds representing the assertation. (you seem to understand this, from
your post).
This second step, of being able to use some faculty to determine moral truth
once you've heard and decoded some sounds, would not "come along with" a
faculty of hearing since this second step simply has nothing to do with
hearing. Just because you heard the assertation about a moral fact doesn't mean
you'll try to 'hear' the moral fact, of course.
So, since it isn't hearing, what faculty that we've developled due to natural
selection could we use to determine moral truth?
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JoeOrrion
>selective pressure to develop the general faculty of a moral sense, nor
>was
>there any selective pressure to develop any faculty for some other purpose
>that
>could also be used to discover moral truth.
>
>(Again, Owl would say that 'reason' was just this faculty, but how the faculty
>of reason that there'd be selective pressure to develop (logic and whatnot)
>could be used to discern moral truths, I don't see.)
Well, I think that this is the point you need to argue. If Owl claims that if
you have reason, then you are going to be able to percieve moral facts, then
your argument as it is doesn't have anything to say. You have to argue against
that point, directly. I mean, I think that your evolution argument is clever,
but I think it is too non-specific about the nature of moral facts to really
work well.
>First, I don't think its accurate to say that a 'fact' was transmitted (this
>has nothing to do with the nonexistance of moral facts).
Well, I think I was, and am, unclear about how you can talk about a universe of
moral facts. I was using "moral fact" like a substance or something.
>So, since it isn't hearing, what faculty that we've developled due to natural
>selection could we use to determine moral truth?
I think it is commonly known as the conscience.
Joe Teicher
Owl
news:20011106141859...@mb-mq.aol.com...
> (Again, Owl would say that 'reason' was just this faculty, but how the
faculty
> of reason that there'd be selective pressure to develop (logic and
whatnot)
> could be used to discern moral truths, I don't see.)
I think your objection here is basically: "Intuitively, your view is false."
Don't feel bad, though; that's pretty much the only objection anyone has
against intuitionism that isn't clearly invalid.
Bert Clanton
>
> I think your objection here is basically: "Intuitively, your view is false."
> Don't feel bad, though; that's pretty much the only objection anyone has
> against intuitionism that isn't clearly invalid.
>
>
As opposed to the point of view which holds that moral intuitionism is
"self-evidently true". Humbug, I say.
If I had to choose between the two views, as Owl states them, I'd choose
the view of moral intuitionism as "intuitively false", since it accords
better with my own prejudices--uh--intuitions.
Best wishes,
Bert
Acar
----- Original Message -----
From: "Symmetry" <symm...@aol.compare.com>
Newsgroups: humanities.philosophy.objectivism
Sent: Tuesday, November 06, 2001 2:19 PM
Subject: Joe T. & bad arguments vs. my disproof of moral realism
> ...
> My point was that there was no
> selective pressure to develop the general faculty of a moral sense, nor
was
> there any selective pressure to develop any faculty for some other purpose
that
> could also be used to discover moral truth.
That is a misunderstanding of the metaphor "selective pressure to develop".
There is actual selection, but no actual "pressure to develop". That wording
supports the mystical teleological view. The properly formulated question is
whether such a faculty (if it had appeared by mutation or selection) would
enhance survival, but that is irrelevant to the question of whether the
faculty actually exists, which I assume is the question that is being
discussed. (Haven't followed the thread.)
> ...
> So, since it isn't hearing, what faculty that we've developled due to
natural
> selection could we use to determine moral truth?
I don't think that one can disprove intuition by failure to trace it back to
some inherited survival skill. A whole bunch of mystical things can be
postulated from the faculty of consciousness. One thing seems clear to me:
one can not be a materialist and a mystic at once. (This includes teleology,
by the way).
Carmichael
Symmetry
>From: JoeOrrion joeo...@aol.com
>Date: 11/6/01 4:17 PM Central Standard Time
>Message-id: <20011106171332...@mb-mj.aol.com>
>
>>My point was that there was no
>>selective pressure to develop the general faculty of a moral sense, nor
>>was
>>there any selective pressure to develop any faculty for some other purpose
>>that
>>could also be used to discover moral truth.
>>
>>(Again, Owl would say that 'reason' was just this faculty, but how the
>faculty
>>of reason that there'd be selective pressure to develop (logic and whatnot)
>>could be used to discern moral truths, I don't see.)
>
>Well, I think that this is the point you need to argue. If Owl claims that if
>you have reason, then you are going to be able to percieve moral facts, then
>your argument as it is doesn't have anything to say.
Not the one I just recently summarized, which was more geared toward Friedman's
moral realism. In the original threads on this topic I did address Owl's
position, though.
> You have to argue
>against
>that point, directly. I mean, I think that your evolution argument is clever,
>but I think it is too non-specific about the nature of moral facts to really
>work well.
Basically, similar reasoning to the one I used for hearing and sight work w/
reason. What was the purpose for our faculty of reason evolving? What were the
direct things that we evolved this faculty for? Once we know these, we can look
into whether any of them are in any way helpful in determining what is ethical.
Also, Owl's position suffers because he does not realize how modular the human
brain is. He seems to think we have this big monolithic faculty called reason
such that everything that seems obvious to him must have come from it.
>>So, since it isn't hearing, what faculty that we've developled due to
>natural
>>selection could we use to determine moral truth?
>
>I think it is commonly known as the conscience.
Why would you think this is some faculy that percieves moral truths? And if you
do think it is that, why do you think it evolved?
Symmetry
>Date: 11/6/01 5:58 PM Central Standard Time
>Message-id: <9s9tej$6$1...@slb2.atl.mindspring.net>
>I think your objection here is basically: "Intuitively, your view is false."
>Don't feel bad, though; that's pretty much the only objection anyone has
>against intuitionism that isn't clearly invalid.
>Subject: Re: Joe T. & bad arguments vs. my disproof of moral realism
>From: Owl a@a.a
>Date: 11/6/01 5:58 PM Central Standard Time
>Message-id: <9s9tej$6$1...@slb2.atl.mindspring.net>
More specifically, logic truths imply nothing about morality. They are
completely unrelated That A=A can't tell you whether murder is wrong or right,
nor can the varous 'modus' laws. They are identical in a world where murder is
wrong and in one where murder is right. No mathematical truths imply anything
about ethics. These are the things we would have developed faculties for being
good at. So we know logic/math ability can't help us, what other aspects of
what you call 'reason' did we have some pressure to develop that can be used to
discover moral truth?
IIRC, you simply call anything that seems obvious to you a pruduct of 'reason.'
Also note that, excluding ethics, I am rational (I am good at math and logic
and whatnot), yet for some reason I am unable to percieve these moral facts
that you claim exist. If they really came from the faculty of reason, and if
such a faculty was really one big homogenous non-modular thing for discovering
truths about most everything, then why am I only able to discover logical
truths and not ethical ones?
Owl
> Not the one I just recently summarized, which was more geared toward
Friedman's
> moral realism. In the original threads on this topic I did address Owl's
> position, though.
As I recall, it basically came down to "I just can't believe that."
> Basically, similar reasoning to the one I used for hearing and sight work
w/
> reason. What was the purpose for our faculty of reason evolving?
You mean arguments like: "We evolved sight to detect objects around us on
earth. Therefore, we can't see the stars. If you think you're seeing the
stars, you're deluded."?
> Also, Owl's position suffers because he does not realize how modular the
human
> brain is. He seems to think we have this big monolithic faculty called
reason
> such that everything that seems obvious to him must have come from it.
You suffer from not realizing how versatile the human intellect is.
Owl
> More specifically, logic truths imply nothing about morality. They are
Nor did anyone ever say that they did.
> completely unrelated That A=A can't tell you whether murder is wrong or
right,
> nor can the varous 'modus' laws. They are identical in a world where
murder is
> wrong and in one where murder is right. No mathematical truths imply
anything
> about ethics.
Nor did anyone ever say that they did.
> Also note that, excluding ethics, I am rational (I am good at math and
logic
> and whatnot), yet for some reason I am unable to percieve these moral
facts
> that you claim exist. If they really came from the faculty of reason, and
if
Obviously not, since you have made many normative claims over the time
you've been here--and most of them have even been correct, IIRC. I'm sure
you not only make but act on many more in real life.
> such a faculty was really one big homogenous non-modular thing for
discovering
> truths about most everything, then why am I only able to discover logical
> truths and not ethical ones?
If your question is why you *disbelieve moral realism*, the answer is
because you accept certain bad philosophical arguments. I'm sure you didn't
need to ask that. Of course, you think that I accept certain bad
philosophical arguments, and that dispute won't be resolved by appealing to
our own authority.
Owl
"If you want me to name in one sentence what is wrong with the modern world,
I will say that never before has the world been clamoring so desperately for
answers to crucial problems--and never before has the world been so
frantically committed to the belief that no answers are possible." (PWNI,
58)
Symmetry
>From: Owl a@a.a
>Message-id: <9sf6sr$d58$1...@nntp9.atl.mindspring.net>
>> More specifically, logic truths imply nothing about morality. They are
>
>Nor did anyone ever say that they did.
>
>> completely unrelated That A=A can't tell you whether murder is wrong or
>right,
>> nor can the varous 'modus' laws. They are identical in a world where
>murder is
>> wrong and in one where murder is right. No mathematical truths imply
>anything
>> about ethics.
>
>Nor did anyone ever say that they did.
>
Right, but your position was that we can somehow use our reason to discover
moral truths. I was noting that the things that seem to be generally associated
with reason don't seem to offer any help in this area, and, the things that I
mention are the types of things that there would be evolutionary pressure to
develop.
So, I think it has been pretty well established that the only reason we'd have
any ability to detect moral truth if it existed would be if one of the
faculties that aided in reproductive success were somehow also able to be used
for discovering moral truth. So when you say 'reason' is this faculty, it seems
like you're just sort of mashing our logical faculty in with your ethical
intuitions to create some super-faculty that we have no reason to think is
really linked in this way. The only connection seems to be that you think
they're both obvious. If I remember accurately, you just think your ethical
judgements come from reason because they seem obvious, right?
Is that your definition of reason? The faculty which accounts for any and all
things which seem obvious to you? If not, could you try to define it?
>> Also note that, excluding ethics, I am rational (I am good at math and
>logic
>> and whatnot), yet for some reason I am unable to percieve these moral
>facts
>> that you claim exist. If they really came from the faculty of reason, and
>if
>
>Obviously not, since you have made many normative claims over the time
>you've been here--and most of them have even been correct, IIRC.
Can you give some examples where I have made normative claims? I don't
necessarily doubt that I have, but I am having a hard time thinking of
examples.
>I'm sure
>you not only make but act on many more in real life.
No, for quite some time I have made no normative claims nor have I acted as if
any normative claims are true.
Let me bring up something which I think you may be relying on. Its sort of a
trick of yours, it seems, whereby you take great measures to interpret people
in a way that makes them appear to be moral realists when they really are not.
I think a good example is in the thread where I (rightly, IIRC) claimed that
Mark Y. and Lon B. were not moral realists, when I was trying to point out to
you all the otherwise rational people who did not have this faculty you claim
to have whereupon you can percieve moral truth. Do you remember the name of
that thread? I can't seem to find it in the archives.
>> such a faculty was really one big homogenous non-modular thing for
>discovering
>> truths about most everything, then why am I only able to discover logical
>> truths and not ethical ones?
>
>If your question is why you *disbelieve moral realism*, the answer is
>because you accept certain bad philosophical arguments.
I am saying that I don't think I can percieve moral truths. When I think about
whether a murderer acted wrongly or something, all I get is some emotional
reaction, rather than anything resembling knowledge of some truth.
Mark Young
> I think a good example is in the thread where I (rightly, IIRC) claimed
> that Mark Y. and Lon B. were not moral realists, when I was trying to
> point out to you all the otherwise rational people who did not have this
> faculty you claim to have whereupon you can percieve moral truth. Do you
> remember the name of that thread? I can't seem to find it in the
> archives.
Re: Epistemic normativity and the basis of oughts
I searched for "mark young lon becker" in h.p.o on google and it was the third
one down the list.
...mark young
Symmetry
>Date: 11/8/01 9:18 PM Central Standard Time
>Message-id: <3BEB4A87...@ns.sympatico.ca>
Interesting, I searched for the exact same words and found that thread before I
posted. However, I for some reason 'remembered' that I was the one who had
started the thread in question, thus when I saw Owl had started the thread and
read a little of his post, I concluded that it was the wrong one.
JoeOrrion
>>natural
>>>selection could we use to determine moral truth?
>>
>>I think it is commonly known as the conscience.
>
>Why would you think this is some faculy that percieves moral truths? And
>if you
>do think it is that, why do you think it evolved?
I don't know what the problem is with conscience as moral perceptor. Here is
the process as I see it:
1. I decide to strangle a toddler
2. my conscience says "you should not strangle toddlers."
3. I decide not to strangle the toddler.
My conscience took all the sense data I've ever experienced, as well as my
innate natural properties and sifted through them in some mysterious way to
come out with the fact that I should not strangle toddlers. So, in what sense
is that not percieving moral facts?
Why do we have consciences? I don't know the evolutionary origin, if there is
one, but I think that Freud and his successors have some developmental
theories. I think it has something to do with not losing your penis. So, I
guess that the ability to percieve moral facts come from having a conceptual
mind and wanting to keep your penis (there is obvious selective pressure for
animals to want to keep their genitals intact and functional).
Joe Teicher
Gordon G. Sollars
writes...
> Right, but your position was that we can somehow use our reason to discover
> moral truths. I was noting that the things that seem to be generally asso
> ciated
> with reason don't seem to offer any help in this area, and, the things that I
> mention are the types of things that there would be evolutionary pressure to
> develop.
Do you think that there is any evolutionary pressure to discover true
statements? If there is, then this pressure could apply to any true
statements, including moral ones. That is, moral realism (the view that
moral statements can be true or false) might still be wrong, but your
"pressure argument" wouldn't be sufficient to show that. If there is
not such pressure, then it is possible for very elaborate theoretical
structures, such as evolutionary biology, to be developed and tested by
the human mind even without any direct selection pressure for this
ability to exist.
--
Gordon Sollars
gsol...@pobox.com
Symmetry
>Date: 11/9/01 5:23 PM Central Standard Time
>Message-id: <MPG.16562f581a...@mail.nji.com>
>> Right, but your position was that we can somehow use our reason to discover
>> moral truths. I was noting that the things that seem to be generally asso
>> ciated
>> with reason don't seem to offer any help in this area, and, the things that
>I
>> mention are the types of things that there would be evolutionary pressure
>to
>> develop.
>
>Do you think that there is any evolutionary pressure to discover true
>statements?
There is evolutionary pressure to discover true statements that help one
further their genes. A good way for this to get done is to develop a *general
faculty* that can be used to discover truths which help you further your genes,
since its hard to know beforehand which particular facts an organism will need
to be aware of, so this cannot just be hardcoded into the genetic instructions.
One might even be able to use this faculty in ways other than those that caused
it to develop. Thus, for example, as Owl mentions, there was no evolutionary
pressure to be able to see stars (assume), however our faculty of sight is such
that, the same thing that allows us to see predators or food also lets us see
stars *in the same manner.* There is no mystery about the connection between
seeing reflected light from one source, and seeing it from another. Its quite
natural that our eyes would develop to see light within a special range, and
that any light within this range would be detectable. However, Owl has not
pointed out the conneciton between the perception of moral truths and the
perseption of things which helped organisms further their genes.
>If there is, then this pressure could apply to any true
>statements, including moral ones.
I believe it is incredibly naive to think that humans have some ability to
simply percieve truths in general. If we really do have some faculty that can
percieve truths in general, why do I have these redundant 5 traditional senses?
I mean, why can't I just use the homogenous monolithic faculty which we've
developed to percieve all truth? Isn't it strange how the 5 faculties that we
have developled to percieve data about the world are all seem to have developed
for fairly specific things, but then when the subject of percieving moral truth
comes up, we need to pretend we have one big super-faculty of general
truth-perception?
I for one must use the faculties that I've developled, which percieve just
certain types of data. If I can smell some scent that humans had no
evolutionary pressure to smell in particular, it is because this scent is the
same general type of thing that humans did have pressure to detect. I can point
to the type of thing it is which is of the same type that there was pressure to
sense, and I can also identify exactly how the faculty which developled for
other purposes is now applicable in this case. It does not appear that Owl can
do any of those things.
Gordon G. Sollars
writes...
...
> There is evolutionary pressure to discover true statements that help one
> further their genes. A good way for this to get done is to develop a *general
> faculty* that can be used to discover truths which help you further your
> genes,
Well, perhaps not as general a faculty as some might think, as Cosmides
and Tooby have argued.
...
> I believe it is incredibly naive to think that humans have some ability to
> simply percieve truths in general.
I think that we decide that statements are true or not in a variety of
ways. But moral realism does not turn on whether we have some particular
faculty of perception, but on whether moral statements can be true or
false.
--
Gordon Sollars
gsol...@pobox.com
George Dance
Sure, as "I intuitively feel that x" is the only evidence for x that
intuitionism considers valid.
Note how Owl (in threads I won't even bother to look up here) has in
the past systematically tried to discredit the idea that one can learn
anything by 'observation' of any kind, leaving intuition as his sole
source of knowledge.
Symmetry
>From: "Gordon G. Sollars" sol...@nji.com
>Message-id: <MPG.16566171c0...@mail.nji.com>
>
Ah, here is your reply. Disregard my earlier comment about not being able to
find it.
>> There is evolutionary pressure to discover true statements that help one
>> further their genes. A good way for this to get done is to develop a
>*general
>> faculty* that can be used to discover truths which help you further your
>> genes,
>
>Well, perhaps not as general a faculty as some might think, as Cosmides
>and Tooby have argued.
The less general the faculty, the worse for those who claim to know moral
truths.
>But moral realism does not turn on whether we have some particular
>faculty of perception, but on whether moral statements can be true or
>false.
Indeed. I have not shown moral realism to be false. My argument simply shows
that, if moral realism is true, we have no way of knowing what is good and what
is bad, or what we should do and what we should not do.
It also implies that the reasons why people believe in moral realism have
nothing to do with whether it is true or not. Or, that all the reasons people
have for believing in moral realism are bad ones.
Symmetry
>Date: 11/8/01 11:20 PM Central Standard Time
>Message-id: <20011108220639...@mb-da.aol.com>
>
>>>>So, since it isn't hearing, what faculty that we've developled due to
>>>natural
>>>>selection could we use to determine moral truth?
>>>
>>>I think it is commonly known as the conscience.
Strange that you think this is actually a faculty capable of discovering
knowledge, rather than something more similar to a generator of feelings.
>>Why would you think this is some faculy that percieves moral truths? And
>>if you
>>do think it is that, why do you think it evolved?
>
>I don't know what the problem is with conscience as moral perceptor. Here is
>the process as I see it:
>1. I decide to strangle a toddler
>2. my conscience says "you should not strangle toddlers."
>3. I decide not to strangle the toddler.
I don't see any evidence of recognition of truth here. I just see that you feel
compelled to do something, given certain stimuli. Why think that this
compulsion is motivated by some objective truth that you ought to do something?
>My conscience took all the sense data I've ever experienced, as well as my
>innate natural properties and sifted through them in some mysterious way to
>come out with the fact that I should not strangle toddlers.
Well, it produced a compulsion to not strangle the todler. You are simply
asserting that it is a 'fact' that you should not do so.
> So, in what
>sense
>is that not percieving moral facts?
In what sense is my feeling sad not the perception of an objective fact that
the situation I am in is an objectively sad situation, and anyone who feels
happy in such a situation is mistaken?
I would say your 'moral' compulsions are not truth-perceptions in a similar
manner.
> Why do we have consciences? I don't know the evolutionary origin, if
there
>is
>one, but I think that Freud and his successors have some developmental
>theories. I think it has something to do with not losing your penis. So, I
>guess that the ability to percieve moral facts come from having a conceptual
>mind and wanting to keep your penis (there is obvious selective pressure for
>animals to want to keep their genitals intact and functional).
That sounds like a pretty shitty explaination to me. Even if there were
something to it, it wouldn't really help your argument that the product of our
conscience is actually some sort of truth. All the above would imply is that
our conscience springs from a subjective desire.
I guess according to Freud & friends, females don't have a conscience? Or maybe
females have a conscience because they believe that if they act in a certain
way, they'll gain a penis?
Perhaps our moral compulsions can be better understood by noting that there
were certain behaviors as humans were evolving that furthered their
reproductive success. Hence, a compulsion to engage in these behaviors was
developled. For instance, people are compelled not to strangle their children.
This furthers their genes. There are also reasons why you'd be compelled not to
kill other people in general, or their children, or steal from them, etc.
Gordon G. Sollars
writes...
...
> Indeed. I have not shown moral realism to be false. My argument simply shows
> that, if moral realism is true, we have no way of knowing what is good an
> d what
> is bad, or what we should do and what we should not do.
Now you mention "knowing". Perhaps because you began this line of
argument with David Friedman, based upon some of his webpage material,
all I have previously seen you talk about is "perceiving" rather than
"knowing" what is good or bad. I am perfectly willing to grant that
there is no special "faculty" for perceiving moral truths. It is your
view that we must have special faculties of perception in order to know
/any/ truths? If so, I don't understand why you think this. And if we
do not need such faculties to know some truths, then why would we have to
have a special faculty to know that a moral statement, in particular, was
true?
--
Gordon Sollars
gsol...@pobox.com
Symmetry
>Message-id: <MPG.165bb5f79d...@mail.nji.com>
>> Indeed. I have not shown moral realism to be false. My argument simply
>shows
>> that, if moral realism is true, we have no way of knowing what is good an
>> d what
>> is bad, or what we should do and what we should not do.
>
>Now you mention "knowing". Perhaps because you began this line of
>argument with David Friedman, based upon some of his webpage material,
>all I have previously seen you talk about is "perceiving" rather than
>"knowing" what is good or bad.
Well, I was just pointing out that, if you have no access to any data about
something, and even if you did, you had no means to interpret it, then in
general you won't be able to gain knowledge about this thing.
>I am perfectly willing to grant that
>there is no special "faculty" for perceiving moral truths. It is your
>view that we must have special faculties of perception in order to know
>/any/ truths?
I thought we covered this. I think we need to have some faculty or some ability
that is in some way applicable to the truths at hand.
I can smell a certain scent which my ancestors did not need to smell because
the ability that they did develop is one that easily applies to a variety of
smells. We can understand this by looking into how our system of smell works.
So far I have seen no explaination of why any ability that we have evolved
would be applicable to determining moral truth. People vaugely hint at the
versitility of the mind, but our mind is only versitile in ways which can be
related to abilities that it has evolved.
>If so, I don't understand why you think this. And if we
>do not need such faculties to know some truths, then why would we have to
>have a special faculty to know that a moral statement, in particular, was
>true?
We need faculties that are in some way related to, or can provide some
information on, the thing we are trying to determine. No one has even tried to
give an explaination of how anything we'd have evolved can be used to determine
moral truth.
Jim was saying that, if what is moral is what furthers our genes, then our
perception of these moral facts would aid us in furthering our genes, but this
hypothesis doesn't really add anything of value. If such moral facts did not
exist, then we'd develop compellations to do what furthers our genes anyway.
It is not any harder to simply develop comepllations to do certain things than
to develop some faculty which somehow percieves and interprets moral data, and
then further develop some compellation to do what is moral. Plus, what exactly
is the form of this moral data? We know how data is transmitted to our other
senses. The source of moral data seems like it needs to be some mystical
platonic realm which otherwise wouldn't even need to be postulated.
George Dance
0143.0...@mb-dh.aol.com>...
snip
>
> I guess according to Freud & friends, females don't have a conscience? Or
> maybe
> females have a conscience because they believe that if they act in a certain
> way, they'll gain a penis?
I'm sure quite a lot of females do believe just that, but I wouldn't
use the word 'conscientious' to describe the action that usually
follows from the belief.
snip
Gordon G. Sollars
writes...
> >From: "Gordon G. Sollars" sol...@nji.com
...
> >I am perfectly willing to grant that
> >there is no special "faculty" for perceiving moral truths. It is your
> >view that we must have special faculties of perception in order to know
> >/any/ truths?
>
> I thought we covered this. I think we need to have some faculty or some a
> bility
> that is in some way applicable to the truths at hand.
We have a variety of ways of getting information about the world and many
theories for dealing with it. Further, we have no special faculty that
enables, e.g., a physician to claim "This person is healthy". Do you
think that such a statement cannot be true or false?
> I can smell a certain scent which my ancestors did not need to smell because
> the ability that they did develop is one that easily applies to a variety of
> smells.
You keep referring to perceptions. Do you think that physicists
"perceive" neutrinos or that political scientists "perceived" the
collapse of the Soviet Union? Or perhaps you think that there is no
"fact of the matter" about these things?
...
> We need faculties that are in some way related to, or can provide some
> information on, the thing we are trying to determine. No one has even tri
> ed to
> give an explaination of how anything we'd have evolved can be used to det
> ermine
> moral truth.
I did this in my past discussion on aesthetic realism with Mark Young.
Evolution has provided us with the ability to hear, a sense that provides
us with some of the information that we need to judge that, e.g., Louis
Armstrong was the most important figure in jazz. One of the ways we know
this is by hearing the recordings of musicians who came after Armstrong.
The rest of your post simply repeats your "perception" metaphor, and I
just don't see how it is relevant.
--
Gordon Sollars
gsol...@pobox.com
joe teicher
> >>>>So, since it isn't hearing, what faculty that we've developled due to
> natural
> >>>>selection could we use to determine moral truth?
> >>>
> >>>I think it is commonly known as the conscience.
>
> Strange that you think this is actually a faculty capable of discovering
> knowledge, rather than something more similar to a generator of feelings.
Right, emotions are how your brain presents moral information (among
other things). It's just like how light frequencies are presented to
you as colors.
>
> >>Why would you think this is some faculy that percieves moral truths? And
> >>if you
> >>do think it is that, why do you think it evolved?
> >
> >I don't know what the problem is with conscience as moral perceptor. He
> >re is
> >the process as I see it:
> >1. I decide to strangle a toddler
> >2. my conscience says "you should not strangle toddlers."
> >3. I decide not to strangle the toddler.
>
> I don't see any evidence of recognition of truth here. I just see that yo
> u feel
> compelled to do something, given certain stimuli. Why think that this
> compulsion is motivated by some objective truth that you ought to do some
> thing?
I don't know why it would be universal. I think that moral truths are
limited in application to the person who percieves them through their
conscience.
>
> >My conscience took all the sense data I've ever experienced, as well as my
> >innate natural properties and sifted through them in some mysterious way to
> >come out with the fact that I should not strangle toddlers.
>
> Well, it produced a compulsion to not strangle the todler. You are simply
> asserting that it is a 'fact' that you should not do so.
So now the question is not whether we can directly percieve morality,
but whether morality is factual. I thought that this whole argument
assumed that morality is made of normative facts, which may be of an
entirely different character than positive facts, and which aren't
percievable in ordinary ways.
>
> > Why do we have consciences? I don't know the evolutionary origin, if
> there
> >is
> >one, but I think that Freud and his successors have some developmental
> >theories. I think it has something to do with not losing your penis. So, I
> >guess that the ability to percieve moral facts come from having a conceptual
> >mind and wanting to keep your penis (there is obvious selective pressure for
> >animals to want to keep their genitals intact and functional).
>
> That sounds like a pretty shitty explaination to me. Even if there were
> something to it, it wouldn't really help your argument that the product o
> f our
> conscience is actually some sort of truth. All the above would imply is that
> our conscience springs from a subjective desire.
Certainly, it's a shitty explanation of Freud, but Freud's theories
had some meat to them and since him they have been developed pretty
extensively. The basic idea though is that the conscience comes into
existence during normal human development because of certain
experiences that we pretty much all have when we are very young. The
normative facts that the conscience then detects come from this same
fairly universal well of early experiences. The conscience says
different things to different people because there is a lot that can
go wrong in this process. And, there is other stuff like culture that
comes in later and adds and modifies what's already there. If you
want to find universal morality then what you should do is take
everyone who had a normal childhood, and find the intersection of what
their conscience tells them not to do.
> I guess according to Freud & friends, females don't have a conscience? Or
> maybe
> females have a conscience because they believe that if they act in a certain
> way, they'll gain a penis?
Freud's successors came up with better explanations that worked much
better on both genders.
>
> Perhaps our moral compulsions can be better understood by noting that there
> were certain behaviors as humans were evolving that furthered their
> reproductive success. Hence, a compulsion to engage in these behaviors was
> developled. For instance, people are compelled not to strangle their chil
> dren.
> This furthers their genes. There are also reasons why you'd be compelled
> not to
> kill other people in general, or their children, or steal from them, etc.
That sort of thing is possible, but there are almost certainly also
developmental aspects. A lot of research has been done on it.
Joe Teicher
Mark Young
> We have a variety of ways of getting information about the world and many
> theories for dealing with it. Further, we have no special faculty that
> enables, e.g., a physician to claim "This person is healthy". Do you
> think that such a statement cannot be true or false?
There's an evolutionary basis for the ability to judge healthiness of an
individual. Healthy individuals are more likely to produce healthy
offspring (genetic factors in an environment in dynamic equilibrium), and
healthy offspring are more likely to survive to reproduce themselves.
Hence the ability to separate healthy from unhealthy potential mates is
evolutionarily valuable.
David Buss, a professor at U.Mich. when I was there, studies human
perceptions of beauty, and relates it back to implied healthiness. His
theory is that we perceive beauty because it is a proxy for healthiness.
Healthy people will have shiny hair and even features and walk with a
"sprightly gait". Perceiving beauty allows one to (indirectly and
imperfectly) perceive healthiness and so reproductive potential.
I think Symmetry is looking for some similar evolutionary rationale for
the ability to separate moral from immoral possible partners (whether for
reproduction or only as troop-mates). Hence the continued talk of
"perception".
...mark young
Gordon G. Sollars
> Gordon G. Sollars:
> > We have a variety of ways of getting information about the world and many
> > theories for dealing with it. Further, we have no special faculty that
> > enables, e.g., a physician to claim "This person is healthy". Do you
> > think that such a statement cannot be true or false?
>
> There's an evolutionary basis for the ability to judge healthiness of an
> individual.
Do you think that this basis is what a physician uses? Why bother with
blood pressure, temperature, etc.? Of course, he can note your blood
pressure because, e.g., evolution has provided him with eyes. But eyes
can help determine if you are stealing, as well.
If there really is a underlying property of health (or, I argue, of
"good"), then it would not be surprising that it could be detected in a
variety of ways, some more sophisticated than others.
...
> I think Symmetry is looking for some similar evolutionary rationale for
> the ability to separate moral from immoral possible partners (whether for
> reproduction or only as troop-mates).
Cosmides and Tooby argue that we have an evolutionarily provided
"cheating detector".
> Hence the continued talk of
> "perception".
And such talk is too limited, since information could come to the
"cheating detector" in a variety of ways.
--
Gordon Sollars
gsol...@pobox.com
Full Name
<sol...@nji.com> wrote:
>In article <3BF58F04...@ns.sympatico.ca>, Mark Young writes...
>> Gordon G. Sollars:
>> > We have a variety of ways of getting information about the world and many
>> > theories for dealing with it. Further, we have no special faculty that
>> > enables, e.g., a physician to claim "This person is healthy". Do you
>> > think that such a statement cannot be true or false?
>>
>> There's an evolutionary basis for the ability to judge healthiness of an
>> individual.
>
>Do you think that this basis is what a physician uses? Why bother with
>blood pressure, temperature, etc.? Of course, he can note your blood
>pressure because, e.g., evolution has provided him with eyes. But eyes
>can help determine if you are stealing, as well.
>
>If there really is a underlying property of health (or, I argue, of
>"good"), then it would not be surprising that it could be detected in a
>variety of ways, some more sophisticated than others.
You seem to be implying that you believe you can derive an 'ought'
from an 'is'. Is that your position?
If so, you're wrong. Try to construct a valid argument that goes from
facts (without any hidden, unstated 'oughts') and ends up with an
'ought'. You'll find that you can't.
You can't test, probe, or measure an 'ought'. It's not part of
science. It's not math, either. It's religion.
Gordon G. Sollars
writes...
> Try to construct a valid argument that goes from
> facts (without any hidden, unstated 'oughts') and ends up with an
> 'ought'. You'll find that you can't.
Try to construct a valid argument that goes from facts (without any
hidden, unstated notions of "health") and ends up with the conclusion
that "organism X is healthy". You'll find that you can't.
> You can't test, probe, or measure an 'ought'. It's not part of
> science. It's not math, either. It's religion.
Can you construct a sound argument that it is religion? Or is it your
religion that it is religion?
--
Gordon Sollars
gsol...@pobox.com
Full Name
<sol...@nji.com> wrote:
>In article <roadvtso1sv8tphii...@4ax.com>, Full Name
>writes...
>
>> Try to construct a valid argument that goes from
>> facts (without any hidden, unstated 'oughts') and ends up with an
>> 'ought'. You'll find that you can't.
>
>Try to construct a valid argument that goes from facts (without any
>hidden, unstated notions of "health") and ends up with the conclusion
>that "organism X is healthy". You'll find that you can't.
Your point is unclear to me. Is it that you need definitions? Of
course you need definitions.
>> You can't test, probe, or measure an 'ought'. It's not part of
>> science. It's not math, either. It's religion.
>
>Can you construct a sound argument that it is religion? Or is it your
>religion that it is religion?
The reason I classify it as religion is because the question of what
one 'ought' to do is a big part of religion. It's also part of
philosphy. No, it's not part of my religion to classify 'oughts' as
religion.
Gordon G. Sollars
writes...
> Your point is unclear to me.
When I suggested that "good" named a real property, you hauled out the
"is/ought" chestnut. I am simply challenging you to derive that "X is
healthy" from a set of facts that do not include in some hidden way the
idea of "healthy". I don't think you can do it. If I'm right, will you
then be willing to say that "healthy" is a religious, as opposed to a
"scientific", idea?
...
> The reason I classify it as religion is because the question of what
> one 'ought' to do is a big part of religion. It's also part of
> philosphy.
1) At one time, cosmology was a big part of religion.
2) Are you arguing that religion and philosophy are the same?
--
Gordon Sollars
gsol...@pobox.com
Matt Ruff
>
> When I suggested that "good" named a real property,
Maybe I missed this, but what's the nature of the property? What is
goodness, exactly?
> I am simply challenging you to derive that "X is healthy"
> from a set of facts that do not include in some hidden way
> the idea of "healthy". I don't think you can do it.
I'd be happy to stipulate that "health" is an abstract concept, but one
that can be defined in terms of real physical properties -- and because
of this, I know what "health" means and can easily recognize/test for
it. Can you do the same for "goodness"?
-- M. Ruff
Mark Young
>> There's an evolutionary basis for the ability to judge healthiness of
>> an individual.
Gordon G. Sollars:
> Do you think that this basis is what a physician uses?
Do you mean "Do I think that the physician uses beauty to measure the
health of her patients?" No, that is not what I think.
The point is that we have to notice something before we can investigate
it. There is an evolutionary basis to notice healthiness -- and it
(according to Buss) manifests itself in our perceptions of beauty (among,
perhaps, other things).
> Why bother with blood pressure, temperature, etc.? Of course, he can
> note your blood pressure because, e.g., evolution has provided him with
> eyes.
He needs a whole body of theory to go from observations of columns of
liquid to judgements regarding healthiness. That theory is based on
something that we could already perceive in some way -- else we would
never have come up with the theory.
[...]
>> I think Symmetry is looking for some similar evolutionary rationale for
>> the ability to separate moral from immoral possible partners (whether
>> for reproduction or only as troop-mates).
> Cosmides and Tooby argue that we have an evolutionarily provided
> "cheating detector".
Sounds like a fine angle to work. What is the evolutionary value in it
and how does it manifest itself to us (perceptually)?
>> Hence the continued talk of "perception".
> And such talk is too limited, since information could come to the
> "cheating detector" in a variety of ways.
It could. But it wouldn't unless there were something we could perceive
directly to make us interested in it in the first place.
...mark young
Symmetry
>Message-id: <MPG.165f0342a7...@mail.nji.com>
>> I thought we covered this. I think we need to have some faculty or some a
>> bility
>> that is in some way applicable to the truths at hand.
>
>We have a variety of ways of getting information about the world and many
>theories for dealing with it.
A variety, meaning our 5 senses, yes. Also, some information about the nature
of reality is built-in to our brains, like logical and mathemetical stuff.
>Further, we have no special faculty that
>enables, e.g., a physician to claim "This person is healthy".
Thats because health is a generalization of lots of little things that we
percieve w/ our 5 senses. Goodness is not analagous.
These other more specific characteristics that compose health are definitional.
They are not claimed to posess some special quality other than being what being
healthy is defined to mean.
If you want your concept of goodness to be interesting, things that we percieve
are supposed to posess some property of goodness over and above simply labeling
them as 'good.'
>> I can smell a certain scent which my ancestors did not need to smell
>because
>> the ability that they did develop is one that easily applies to a variety
>of
>> smells.
>
>You keep referring to perceptions. Do you think that physicists
>"perceive" neutrinos
They percieve evidence of them, and use reason to make inferences about their
existance, I assume.
>or that political scientists "perceived" the
>collapse of the Soviet Union?
Well, lots of people percieved this collapse when the soviet union collapsed,
because its collapse was literally a bunch of specific events that occurred.
Goodness is not literally whatever is claimed to be good. There is some thing,
and it supposedly has a *property* of goodness causing us to call it good. Its
quite different from something like health.
>Evolution has provided us with the ability to hear, a sense that provides
>us with some of the information that we need to judge that, e.g., Louis
>Armstrong was the most important figure in jazz.
And importance is some sort of atomic platonic property like goodness? Your
philosophy is pretty messed up.
You seem to think of abstract concepts as somehow a completely different kind
of thing than what was being abstracted from.
Symmetry
>Date: 11/16/01 6:54 PM Central Standard Time
>Message-id: <3BF58F04...@ns.sympatico.ca>
>I think Symmetry is looking for some similar evolutionary rationale for
>the ability to separate moral from immoral possible partners
Not just that, but the ability to seperate moral from immoral anything.
Gordon G. Sollars
> "Gordon G. Sollars" wrote:
> >
> > When I suggested that "good" named a real property,
>
> Maybe I missed this, but what's the nature of the property? What is
> goodness, exactly?
It's an "abstract concept" as you say "health" is. Probably even more
abstract, of course.
> > I am simply challenging you to derive that "X is healthy"
> > from a set of facts that do not include in some hidden way
> > the idea of "healthy". I don't think you can do it.
>
> I'd be happy to stipulate that "health" is an abstract concept, but one
> that can be defined in terms of real physical properties
Every Johnny-come-lately to this argument drags in Hume's claim as if it
were some new revelation. "Just try to derive...", says our most recent
expert on this topic, Mr. Full Name. But when I give a challenge, it's
something like "well, I'm sure "health" can be defined..." OK, go ahead.
> " -- and because
> of this, I know what "health" means and can easily recognize/test for
> it. Can you do the same for "goodness"?
You know exactly what are the requirements for any given organism to be
healthy and how to test them? I find that quite remarkable, although I
am willing to grant that you know more about biology than I do.
--
Gordon Sollars
gsol...@pobox.com
Symmetry
>Message-id: <MPG.165f923cce...@mail.nji.com>
>> There's an evolutionary basis for the ability to judge healthiness of an
>> individual.
>
>Do you think that this basis is what a physician uses? Why bother with
>blood pressure, temperature, etc.?
Our natural ability to judge this is just an approximation to what the
physician has learned. Obviously pre-historic man could not go around with
stethascopes and blood-pressure measurers to get an accurate reading on
everyone he saw.
>If there really is a underlying property of health (or, I argue, of
>"good"), then it would not be surprising that it could be detected in a
>variety of ways, some more sophisticated than others.
But all the ways of detecting things that you try to analogize goodness to,
like health, can be explained fully in terms of our 5 senses and our reason and
whatnot -- the abilities that'd actually further our genes. If people start
measuring things and use their reason to draw a correlation with certain types
of meaurements and, say, death, then there is your non-mystical description of
how physicians can determine health.
>> Hence the continued talk of
>> "perception".
>
>And such talk is too limited, since information could come to the
>"cheating detector" in a variety of ways.
>
You keep saying that. "A variety of ways," you probably think it sounds cool
and wise and whatnot. What you leave out is that this variety that you talk
about is entirely contained within our 5 senses and some reasoning skills that
we have. None of your silly examples about health indicate that we have some
'other' ways of knowing that'd we could use to know of goodness if it existed.
Symmetry
>From: "Gordon G. Sollars" sol...@nji.com
>Message-id: <MPG.1660df9121...@mail.nji.com>
>When I suggested that "good" named a real property, you hauled out the
>"is/ought" chestnut. I am simply challenging you to derive that "X is
>healthy" from a set of facts that do not include in some hidden way the
>idea of "healthy".
Then he could not use simple positive facts like "person P has shiney hair",
since health is simply defined to be a huge checklist of such things.
As I mention before, that you think your health analogy is good suggests that
you can't disitnguish between X being Y because Y is just a generalized term
for having lots of little characteristics that X has, or X being Y because X
has some property of a different type than these previous characteristics.
Gordon G. Sollars
writes......
> >Further, we have no special faculty that
> >enables, e.g., a physician to claim "This person is healthy".
>
> Thats because health is a generalization of lots of little things that we
> percieve w/ our 5 senses. Goodness is not analagous.
I think you are mistaken.
> These other more specific characteristics that compose health are definit
> ional.
> They are not claimed to posess some special quality other than being what
> being
> healthy is defined to mean.
I don't think that you can provide necessary and sufficient conditions
for "health". You are merely assuming on faith that there are specific
characteristics that you could "in principle" specify. You assume this
because you have faith that "health" names a (complex) property and equal
faith that "good" does not.
...
> And importance is some sort of atomic platonic property like goodness? Your
> philosophy is pretty messed up.
Oh yeah? Well, I think /your/ philosophy is pretty messed up! /And/ my
dad can beat up your dad.
--
Gordon Sollars
gsol...@pobox.com
Gordon G. Sollars
writes......
> >"is/ought" chestnut. I am simply challenging you to derive that "X is
> >healthy" from a set of facts that do not include in some hidden way the
> >idea of "healthy".
>
> Then he could not use simple positive facts like "person P has shiney hair",
> since health is simply defined to be a huge checklist of such things.
Where are you keeping this checklist? Let's see it.
> As I mention before, that you think your health analogy is good suggests that
> you can't disitnguish between X being Y because Y is just a generalized term
> for having lots of little characteristics that X has, or X being Y because X
> has some property of a different type than these previous characteristics.
I can tell the difference. What you haven't explained is why a "property
of a different type" is needed. You are assuming that it is, in order
for your argument to work. First you remove "good" (or "ought") from any
connection to the world, and then you say, "See, it has no connection to
the world!". Some trick.
--
Gordon Sollars
gsol...@pobox.com
Gordon G. Sollars
> The point is that we have to notice something before we can investigate
> it. There is an evolutionary basis to notice healthiness -- and it
> (according to Buss) manifests itself in our perceptions of beauty (among,
> perhaps, other things).
If naturalism is correct, then there is an evolutionary basis to notice
what is good - it allows us to live more successfully.
...
> He needs a whole body of theory to go from observations of columns of
> liquid to judgements regarding healthiness. That theory is based on
> something that we could already perceive in some way -- else we would
> never have come up with the theory.
But there is no predetermined maximum distance between sense perceptions
and the theories they support (or fail to support).
...
> > Cosmides and Tooby argue that we have an evolutionarily provided
> > "cheating detector".
>
> Sounds like a fine angle to work. What is the evolutionary value in it
> and how does it manifest itself to us (perceptually)?
Mark, are you dragging your feet, or what? I would have thought the
evolutionary advantage to a social animal of being able to detect
cheating was obvious. And, cheating manifests itself in the world in a
variety of ways, as I have said. It is not as if the meaning of
"cheating" can be captured by a set of "observation statements". Of
course, unless you are a logical positivist, you realize that theories of
physics also rely on terms that cannot be so captured, as well.
...
> It could. But it wouldn't unless there were something we could perceive
> directly to make us interested in it in the first place.
My point is that there are any number of ways to "perceive" that you have
been cheated. How do I perceive that Louis Armstrong was the most
important figure in jazz? With my ears and eyes, of course, not with
some mysterious "importance sense" as Symmetry's straw man requires. Is
there any simple thing, such as the sound of high F, that tells me he was
most important? Of course not.
--
Gordon Sollars
gsol...@pobox.com
Matt Ruff
>
> Matt Ruff writes:
>
>> "Gordon G. Sollars" wrote:
>>>
>>> When I suggested that "good" named a real property,
>>
>> Maybe I missed this, but what's the nature of the property?
>> What is goodness, exactly?
>
> It's an "abstract concept" as you say "health" is.
I figured as much. What *is* the concept?
>>> I am simply challenging you to derive that "X is healthy"
>>> from a set of facts that do not include in some hidden way
>>> the idea of "healthy". I don't think you can do it.
>>
>> I'd be happy to stipulate that "health" is an abstract
>> concept, but one that can be defined in terms of real
>> physical properties
>
> Every Johnny-come-lately to this argument drags in Hume's
> claim as if it were some new revelation.
What claim would that be? (Sorry to be ignorant, but I skipped much of
the required reading in Philosophy 101.)
> But when I give a challenge, it's something like "well, I'm
> sure "health" can be defined..." OK, go ahead.
OK. The easiest definition is probably a negative one: "Absence of
disease or ailment." An organism is healthy if it isn't diseased or
wounded in some way.
>> and because of this, I know what "health" means and can
>> easily recognize/test for it. Can you do the same for
>> "goodness"?
>
> You know exactly what are the requirements for any given
> organism to be healthy and how to test them?
No, I'm not claiming to be a doctor or a vet; what I meant is that,
given my definition of health, I have a good general idea of what a test
for health is like. I'm not sure what a test for "goodness" would be
like, because I don't have nearly as clear a sense of what you mean by
"goodness."
-- M. Ruff
Symmetry
>Message-id: <MPG.16621127db...@mail.nji.com>
>> Thats because health is a generalization of lots of little things that we
>> percieve w/ our 5 senses. Goodness is not analagous.
>
>I think you are mistaken.
You're mistaken about that.
>> These other more specific characteristics that compose health are definit
>> ional.
>> They are not claimed to posess some special quality other than being what
>> being
>> healthy is defined to mean.
>
>I don't think that you can provide necessary and sufficient conditions
>for "health".
Everyone probably has a different notion of health. If you think there is some
real objective correct meaning for what we call health you are (again)
mistaken. People simply develop their own personal notions of what health is
mostly from examples. I cannot give a precise definition of health because my
notion of health is not a precise and rigorous one, nor I doubt is anyone
elses.
If you think that because your mind is able to take lots of little bits of data
from your senses and see some patterns and form some general notion of
something, that what you have this notion of has some existance of its own
apart from being a generality that your mind has produced to help you cope with
reality, then you are 3 times mistaken.
>You are merely assuming on faith that there are specific
>characteristics that you could "in principle" specify.
No, I don't think I could provide a list of characteristics in principle that
most people would be happy with.
>You assume this
>because you have faith that "health" names a (complex) property and equal
>faith that "good" does not.
No, I don't have faith. I understand reality and how the mind works and how bad
philosophers confuse their mental constructs with the outside world.
>> And importance is some sort of atomic platonic property like goodness? Your
>> philosophy is pretty messed up.
>
>Oh yeah? Well, I think /your/ philosophy is pretty messed up!
Yeah, but the difference is that I am right.
> /And/ my
>dad can beat up your dad.
Doubtful. You are probably a lot older than me and hence my dad is likely
younger. My dad is also quite large and strong and plays hockey, hence I think
it is fairly safe to assume that your dad would be destroyed by him. So, eat
it.
Gordon G. Sollars
writes...
...
> Everyone probably has a different notion of health.
I suspect that everyone has slightly different notions about everything,
including things like light and gravity. So what?
> If you think there is some
> real objective correct meaning for what we call health you are (again)
> mistaken.
So there is no objective fact of the matter about health? What
nonsense. When you get a difficult challenge to your own version of
"objectivism", you handle it by evasion. Just like so many Objectivists
around here.
...
> I understand reality and how the mind works and how bad
And here I just thought you were a run-of-the-mill skeptic, not the
greatest genius of all time!
--
Gordon Sollars
gsol...@pobox.com
JoeOrrion
>of reality is built-in to our brains, like logical and mathemetical stuff.
What makes you think that mathematical and logical stuff is built into our
brains?
Joe Teicher
Mark Young
> My point is that there are any number of ways to "perceive" that you
> have been cheated.
There's any number of things you can perceive that'll make you think
you've been cheated. IMO, there's a *feeling* of being cheated, and we
get it when we form the theory that someone is cheating us. The more
empathic of us also get it when we form a theory that someone else is
being cheated. But it is not a perception of a "thou shalt not cheat"
fact, nor is the theory that someone is being cheated a knowledge of
such a fact.
> How do I perceive that Louis Armstrong was the most important figure
> in jazz? With my ears and eyes, of course, not with some mysterious
> "importance sense" as Symmetry's straw man requires.
So any animal with ears and eyes could tell that Armstrong is the most
important figure in jazz? Or is there perhaps more to it than you're
letting on?
...mark young
Gordon G. Sollars
> "Gordon G. Sollars" wrote:
...
> > Every Johnny-come-lately to this argument drags in Hume's
> > claim as if it were some new revelation.
>
> What claim would that be? (Sorry to be ignorant, but I skipped much of
> the required reading in Philosophy 101.)
In /A Treatise of Human Nature/, Book III, Part I, Section I, Hume
famously says that in every "system of morality" the author imperceptibly
shifts from making statements using "is" to ones using "ought" without
providing any justification for this move. This passage is the origin of
the oft repeated "you can't derive an 'ought' from an 'is'" and the
concomitant "Go ahead; just try!".
But note that Hume has not proven that you cannot "derive" an ought from
an is. For over 300 hundred years, you could say "Go ahead just try to
prove Fermat's Last Theorem. See? Can't do it, can you?" But there is
no built in time limit on attempting proofs after which we know that
something cannot be proven.
My hypothesis is that "ought" is used to summarize a vast aggregate of
"is" statements, so the "imperceptible" shift simply occurs when an
"author" thinks that he has given evidence of enough "is"s. It is
possible for an author to be wrong about his evidence and about whether
he has provided "enough".
...
> OK. The easiest definition is probably a negative one: "Absence of
> disease or ailment." An organism is healthy if it isn't diseased or
> wounded in some way.
OK. Then "X is good" if X is not bad or harmful in some way. More
generally, "X is good" implies X is not bad or harmful overall. I think
that you want to add something like this to "healthy" as well, since I
think that many organisms that we would call healthy have /some/ disease
or wound.
...
> No, I'm not claiming to be a doctor or a vet; what I meant is that,
> given my definition of health, I have a good general idea of what a test
> for health is like. I'm not sure what a test for "goodness" would be
> like, because I don't have nearly as clear a sense of what you mean by
> "goodness."
If your sense is "not nearly as clear", why doesn't that simply imply a
less precise idea of what a test would be like?
--
Gordon Sollars
gsol...@pobox.com
Symmetry
>Subject: Re: Joe T. & bad arguments vs. my disproof of moral realism
>Date: 11/16/01 12:58 PM Central Standard Time
>Message-id: <b4cbfeca.01111...@posting.google.com>
>
>> >
>> >>>>So, since it isn't hearing, what faculty that we've developled due to
>> natural
>> >>>>selection could we use to determine moral truth?
>> >>>
>> >>>I think it is commonly known as the conscience.
>>
>> Strange that you think this is actually a faculty capable of discovering
>> knowledge, rather than something more similar to a generator of feelings.
>
>Right, emotions are how your brain presents moral information (among
>other things). It's just like how light frequencies are presented to
>you as colors.
Where does this 'moral information' come from, exactly?
>> >>Why would you think this is some faculy that percieves moral truths? And
>> >>if you
>> >>do think it is that, why do you think it evolved?
>> >
>> >I don't know what the problem is with conscience as moral perceptor. He
>> >re is
>> >the process as I see it:
>> >1. I decide to strangle a toddler
>> >2. my conscience says "you should not strangle toddlers."
>> >3. I decide not to strangle the toddler.
>>
>> I don't see any evidence of recognition of truth here. I just see that yo
>> u feel
>> compelled to do something, given certain stimuli. Why think that this
>> compulsion is motivated by some objective truth that you ought to do some
>> thing?
>
>I don't know why it would be universal. I think that moral truths are
>limited in application to the person who percieves them through their
>conscience.
Universal is not the same as objective. Isn't it your position that there are
facts about moral matters? For instance if I said "In situation X, it would be
right for me to kill person P", then that statement has some objective truth
value? If that isn't what you mean by a moral fact, then we aren't talking
about the same thing.
>>
>> >My conscience took all the sense data I've ever experienced, as well as my
>> >innate natural properties and sifted through them in some mysterious way
>to
>> >come out with the fact that I should not strangle toddlers.
>>
>> Well, it produced a compulsion to not strangle the todler. You are simply
>> asserting that it is a 'fact' that you should not do so.
>
>So now the question is not whether we can directly percieve morality,
>but whether morality is factual. I thought that this whole argument
>assumed that morality is made of normative facts, which may be of an
>entirely different character than positive facts, and which aren't
>percievable in ordinary ways.
Right, I was getting a little sidetracked. Morality is not factual, but we are
assuming that it is for the purposes of discussion. What I should have pointed
out, if I were staying on topic, is that there is no reason you've given to
think that your consciousness is an accurate perciever of moral facts.
Suppose there is some organism and moral data is available to it, and it has
some faculty for percieving this data -- call it its conscience. Suppose some
action is wrong, but this action would further the genes of this organism. Then
such organisms would not develop a response such that they felt bad about this
action, they'd develop one such they felt good about this action. Their
conscience would tell them "this is some moral data of type A" which would
trigger the response of them feeling that it'd be good to do the thing that the
data was in reference to. The action is really wrong, but as you can see theres
no reason to think the organism could know this o ever come to feel negatively
toward the action. If it percieved moral data at all, it could only
differentiate differences in data and use these differences how it saw fit.
There's no reason why it'd know the 'real meaning' of the data if it really
represented something having nothing to do with the reproductive success of the
organism..
>> > Why do we have consciences? I don't know the evolutionary origin, if
>> there
>> >is
>> >one, but I think that Freud and his successors have some developmental
>> >theories. I think it has something to do with not losing your penis. So,
>I
>> >guess that the ability to percieve moral facts come from having a
>conceptual
>> >mind and wanting to keep your penis (there is obvious selective pressure
>for
>> >animals to want to keep their genitals intact and functional).
>>
>> That sounds like a pretty shitty explaination to me. Even if there were
>> something to it, it wouldn't really help your argument that the product o
>> f our
>> conscience is actually some sort of truth. All the above would imply is
>that
>> our conscience springs from a subjective desire.
>
>Certainly, it's a shitty explanation of Freud, but Freud's theories
>had some meat to them and since him they have been developed pretty
>extensively. The basic idea though is that the conscience comes into
>existence during normal human development because of certain
>experiences that we pretty much all have when we are very young. The
>normative facts that the conscience then detects come from this same
>fairly universal well of early experiences.
Are you saying that what you have been calling moral facts are simply facts
about our early experiences? Or residual effects on our brains from those?
Those aren't normative facts.
> The conscience says
>different things to different people because there is a lot that can
>go wrong in this process. And, there is other stuff like culture that
>comes in later and adds and modifies what's already there. If you
>want to find universal morality then what you should do is take
>everyone who had a normal childhood, and find the intersection of what
>their conscience tells them not to do.
You've offered really no argument as to why we'd have a conscience that would
percieve *real* moral facts. All I've seen so far is "this is how I think it
works... we have a conscience that percieves moral facts" All you seem to be
talking about now is some psychological mechanism which is simply the result of
childhood experiences, but this isn't about morality, even if you want to call
it 'morality.'
Symmetry
>Message-id: <MPG.16624f5153...@mail.nji.com>
>> If you think there is some
>> real objective correct meaning for what we call health you are (again)
>> mistaken.
>
>So there is no objective fact of the matter about health? What
>nonsense.
There is no objective fact about how health should be defined -- whether it
should include certain descriptive characteristics rather than others, no. For
some given person's notion of health, then it is a fact whether something would
fit their criteria.
>When you get a difficult challenge to your own version of
>"objectivism", you handle it by evasion. Just like so many Objectivists
>around here.
I am not even remotely close to subscribing to even a version of objectivism.
What exactly am I evading? The only thing difficult I am engaged in on this
newsgroup is thinking of a way to better expression my correct 'dilemma of
death' position so that Mark understands it.
Your silliness is quite simple for me. Perhaps sometimes I am sloppy in
responding to people like you, but your positions pose very little intellectual
resistance.
>> I understand reality and how the mind works and how bad
>
>And here I just thought you were a run-of-the-mill skeptic, not the
>greatest genius of all time!
I meant that I am familiar with them to a high enough degree that I don't fall
into the childish trap of confusing my mental constructs with something
external to me.
Symmetry
>Date: 11/18/01 10:48 PM Central Standard Time
>Message-id: <20011118234217...@mb-cb.aol.com>
Actually now that I consider it, I realize that that was just an alternative
hypothesis I developed awhile ago while arguing w/ Owl.
Owl believes in 'a priori' knowledge. He thinks we can discover logical and
mathemetical truths just by introspection, and that this introspection really
is like a window to the Truth. There are at least two possible alternatives.
One is that we formed our logical and mathemtical ideas purely through
experience, and the other is that they're sort of hardcoded like I mention.
When I was arguing with Owl, he contended that these things made so much sense
that experience was totally unnecessary, hence I picked the latter hypothesis
because it was similar to his view in that way, and by using it I could limit
our disagreement to the issue I wanted to focus on.
So, its possible that no logical or mathematical stuff is built into our
brains. (Actually, some logical stuff about induction pretty much has to be
built into our brains, else we wouldn't be able to learn too well) Certainly
such faculties are. My comments to Gordon don't depend on this though.
Gordon G. Sollars
writes...
> There is no objective fact about how health should be defined -- whether it
> should include certain descriptive characteristics rather than others, no.
More evasion. Are there facts about health or not? Is any physical
condition whatsoever consistent with health? What do you think people go
to physicians for? Is modern medicine a scam, like "psycho-surgery"?
...
> >When you get a difficult challenge to your own version of
> >"objectivism", you handle it by evasion. Just like so many Objectivists
> >around here.
>
> I am not even remotely close to subscribing to even a version of objectivism.
You said "no objective fact". Has your skepticism reached the point
where there are no objective facts? If not, then it is reasonable to say
that you have some "version of objectivism".
> What exactly am I evading? The only thing difficult I am engaged in on this
> newsgroup is thinking of a way to better expression my correct 'dilemma of
> death' position so that Mark understands it.
Mark has decimated your dilemma; the only difficult thing is getting you
to realize that.
> Your silliness is quite simple for me.
Indeed, many things seem simple, once you adopt a simplistic view.
--
Gordon Sollars
gsol...@pobox.com
Symmetry
>Message-id: <MPG.1664dcf2e7...@mail.nji.com>
>> There is no objective fact about how health should be defined -- whether it
>> should include certain descriptive characteristics rather than others, no.
>
>More evasion. Are there facts about health or not?
It is a fact whether or not something is healthy, given the common meaning of
health, sure. There are fuzzy cases though since health is not a very precise
thing.
>Is any physical
>condition whatsoever consistent with health?
Not with what I mean by health.
>> >When you get a difficult challenge to your own version of
>> >"objectivism", you handle it by evasion. Just like so many Objectivists
>> >around here.
>>
>> I am not even remotely close to subscribing to even a version of
>objectivism.
>
>You said "no objective fact". Has your skepticism reached the point
>where there are no objective facts?
You should try to keep the fancy philosophical terms to a minimum in our
discussions, especially that particular term when you mean what you meant,
being that we're on an objectivist newsgroup.
>> What exactly am I evading? The only thing difficult I am engaged in on this
>> newsgroup is thinking of a way to better expression my correct 'dilemma of
>> death' position so that Mark understands it.
>
>Mark has decimated your dilemma
Incorrect.
>> Your silliness is quite simple for me.
>
>Indeed, many things seem simple, once you adopt a simplistic view.
As far as I can see this comment has no special application to this case.
Surely you disagree with me, but how exactly are my views more simple than
yours?
My views about health and morality seem a tad more complex than yours. We have
these things that exist in your mind which you take at face value as having
some external existance. This is more simple than the belief that they are
mechanisms your brain has employed to make thinking easier for you.
And as far as the 'dilemma of death', even assuming that I am a platonist and
think people are abstract platonic forms who are instantiated, that doesn't
seem obviously simpler than people being merely globs of matter.
Gordon G. Sollars
writes......
> It is a fact whether or not something is healthy, given the common meaning of
> health, sure. There are fuzzy cases though since health is not a very precise
> thing.
Precise enough for the science of biology generally and medicine in
particular.
> >Is any physical
> >condition whatsoever consistent with health?
>
> Not with what I mean by health.
Or with any reasonable notion of health. Why would you imply you were
speaking some private language here?
...
> You should try to keep the fancy philosophical terms to a minimum in our
> discussions, especially that particular term when you mean what you meant,
> being that we're on an objectivist newsgroup.
It is an "Objectivist" newsgroup. Capitalizing the "O" is important.
...
> My views about health and morality seem a tad more complex than yours. We
> have
> these things that exist in your mind which you take at face value as having
> some external existance.
You are putting words in my mouth, rather than me putting things in my
head. But perhaps this is because you have discussed moral realism more
with Owl and David than with me.
I take no stand (for now at least) on what sense "health" (or
"good") exists only in the mind. My point is that the concept of
"health" is indispensable to the /science/ of medicine. There is no
mystical mumbo-jumbo about it. There are facts of reality (as the
Objectivists like to say) that affect health, yet the concept is "fuzzy",
as you call it. This opens the possibility (though not, of course, the
certainty - I've never claimed a proof of moral realism) that "good" is
another fuzzy concept also tied to facts in some way.
> And as far as the 'dilemma of death', even assuming that I am a platonist and
> think people are abstract platonic forms who are instantiated, that doesn't
> seem obviously simpler than people being merely globs of matter.
I thought you claimed to be a materialist? That seems at odds with
Platonism. With regard to the "dilemma", your error is not that your
views are too simple, but that they are inconsistent.
--
Gordon Sollars
gsol...@pobox.com
Gordon G. Sollars
...
> There's any number of things you can perceive that'll make you think
> you've been cheated. IMO, there's a *feeling* of being cheated, and we
> get it when we form the theory that someone is cheating us. The more
> empathic of us also get it when we form a theory that someone else is
> being cheated. But it is not a perception of a "thou shalt not cheat"
> fact, nor is the theory that someone is being cheated a knowledge of
> such a fact.
It is (apparently) Symmetry's contention that facts must be "perceived"
to be known, not mine. At one time you agreed that any true statement
stood for a fact. Do you think that all true statements are perceptual?
We do not directly perceive the truth of "This organism is healthy";
instead, that claim is (if it is true) tied to a complex of true
statements.
> > How do I perceive that Louis Armstrong was the most important figure
> > in jazz? With my ears and eyes, of course, not with some mysterious
> > "importance sense" as Symmetry's straw man requires.
>
> So any animal with ears and eyes could tell that Armstrong is the most
> important figure in jazz?
Sorry, I should have put "perceive" in quotes - it is Symmetry who has
the "perception theory of truth", not me. The truth of the statement is
tied to things that I can perceive with my ears and eyes, but an
understanding of what "importance (in jazz)" means is also required to
know that it is true.
--
Gordon Sollars
gsol...@pobox.com
Symmetry
>Message-id: <MPG.16659f2b53...@mail.nji.com>
>
>It is (apparently) Symmetry's contention that facts must be "perceived"
>to be known, not mine.
Not true. You can also arrive at facts by inferring them from data that you
percieve.
Symmetry
>Message-id: <MPG.1664ecfcbf...@mail.nji.com>
>
>In article <20011120220226...@mb-cg.aol.com>, Symmetry
>writes...
>> >From: "Gordon G. Sollars" sol...@nji.com
>...
>> It is a fact whether or not something is healthy, given the common meaning
>of
>> health, sure. There are fuzzy cases though since health is not a very
>precise
>> thing.
>
>Precise enough for the science of biology generally and medicine in
>particular.
Incorrect. These people might summarize what they are doing by talking about
the vauge thing that is health, but if you look into the literature, at medical
studies and whatnot, what they actually study are precise components of health.
You will not find data described like "After the subject took injection A,
their health increased slightly, whereas the health of the subject that took
injection B's health remained about the same."
Rather it will be like "After the subject took injection A, her glocose level
rose from 9 miligrams per cubic foot, to 20.... etc"
That is how medical studies are done. They don't directly try to measure
'health' because health is a vauge abstract thing which we just constructed
with our minds to group a bunch of things together because its useful to do so.
Heath is just a conglomoration of lots of little things, like having normal
blood pressure and not being obese and whatnot. These specific little things
are what is studied by medical science.
They might even name their papers ".... and its effects on health" or
something, but if you look at what they do, you'll find that they're talking
about some specific componnts of what 'health' commonly refers to.
>> You should try to keep the fancy philosophical terms to a minimum in our
>> discussions, especially that particular term when you mean what you meant,
>> being that we're on an objectivist newsgroup.
>
>It is an "Objectivist" newsgroup. Capitalizing the "O" is important.
I thought Objectivists already made that distinction to different between
different types of randians. An Objectivist might be a flagrant ARIan or
something, whereas on 'objectivist' could be someone in the randian tradition
who has some issues with the ARIan form of Objectivism. Isn't that how
"objectivism" is often used here?
>> My views about health and morality seem a tad more complex than yours. We
>> have
>> these things that exist in your mind which you take at face value as having
>> some external existance.
>
>You are putting words in my mouth, rather than me putting things in my
>head. But perhaps this is because you have discussed moral realism more
>with Owl and David than with me.
Perhaps. I noticed in another post that you claimed you literally thought
goodness was a conglomeration of descriptive facts. If that is the case, then
I'd classify you as a moral skeptic, since your view of what good is doesn't
resemble what is commonly meant by 'good.'
>I take no stand (for now at least) on what sense "health" (or
>"good") exists only in the mind. My point is that the concept of
>"health" is indispensable to the /science/ of medicine. There is no
>mystical mumbo-jumbo about it. There are facts of reality (as the
>Objectivists like to say) that affect health, yet the concept is "fuzzy",
>as you call it. This opens the possibility (though not, of course, the
>certainty - I've never claimed a proof of moral realism) that "good" is
>another fuzzy concept also tied to facts in some way.
But 'health' is tied to facts only in that its a concept thats supposed to
express a conglomeration of lots of little descriptive characteristics. If you
think that 'good' is analagous, then I probably agree with you. Look like we
are both moral skeptics.
>> And as far as the 'dilemma of death', even assuming that I am a platonist
>and
>> think people are abstract platonic forms who are instantiated, that doesn't
>> seem obviously simpler than people being merely globs of matter.
>
>I thought you claimed to be a materialist? That seems at odds with
>Platonism.
I am, thats why I had to 'assume' platonism.
> With regard to the "dilemma", your error is not that your
>views are too simple, but that they are inconsistent.
If you mean that I am a materialist yet I rely on a platonic or abstract view
of the self, then you're mistaken. I explained why in my reply to Mark (which
was posted about 5 min ago)
Gordon G. Sollars
> >particular.
>
> Incorrect. These people might summarize what they are doing by talking about
> the vauge thing that is health, but if you look into the literature, at m
> edical
> studies and whatnot, what they actually study are precise components of h
> ealth.
Exactly: "components of /health/". The detailed studies would not
represent knowledge if they were not studies of something. We can make
ever more detailed statements about, and refine the concept of, health
because it names a real, though very complex, property. We can be
mistaken about what furthers health or what exactly constitutes health,
and discover that we were mistaken.
...
> That is how medical studies are done. They don't directly try to measure
> 'health'
That is irrelevant even if true. The idea of health is behind all such
studies.
> because health is a vauge abstract thing which we just constructed
> with our minds to group a bunch of things together because its useful to
> do so.
Mere assertion. You should consider applying some skepticism to your own
views.
...
> >It is an "Objectivist" newsgroup. Capitalizing the "O" is important.
>
> I thought Objectivists already made that distinction to different between
> different types of randians. An Objectivist might be a flagrant ARIan or
> something, whereas on 'objectivist' could be someone in the randian tradition
> who has some issues with the ARIan form of Objectivism. Isn't that how
> "objectivism" is often used here?
OK, but an "objectivist" can also be someone outside the "Randian
tradition" altogether. You can avoid such misunderstandings by crediting
your usual intellectual opponents with having at least a vague notion of
where your views fit in. I think you are aware that I am not arguing
from the Randian tradition; you should know that I don't think you are
either.
...
> Perhaps. I noticed in another post that you claimed you literally thought
> goodness was a conglomeration of descriptive facts.
It is my hypothesis (I think having hypotheses is better than having
either a naive foundationalism or a naive skepticism). More accurately,
that "good" is a complex property (sometimes called a "property-cluster")
that is tied to a vast array of facts, much as "health" is.
> If that is the case, then
> I'd classify you as a moral skeptic, since your view of what good is doesn't
> resemble what is commonly meant by 'good.'
That's a scheme of classification biased toward your own position. Moral
skepticism is commonly divided into "cognitive" and "motivational". But
since I think both that we can know moral truths and can have good
reasons to act on them, I don't qualify as either kind.
...
> But 'health' is tied to facts only in that its a concept thats supposed to
> express a conglomeration of lots of little descriptive characteristics. I
> f you
> think that 'good' is analagous, then I probably agree with you.
Welcome to moral realism! It's a big tent, really, although you might
not learn that from its critics.
...
> If you mean that I am a materialist yet I rely on a platonic or abstract view
> of the self, then you're mistaken. I explained why in my reply to Mark (which
> was posted about 5 min ago)
I'll try to have a look, but I'd prefer to let Mark carry that thread.
--
Gordon Sollars
gsol...@pobox.com
Symmetry
>Message-id: <MPG.1666ded3e4...@mail.nji.com>
>
>In article <20011121190232...@mb-mq.aol.com>, Symmetry
>writes...
>> >From: "Gordon G. Sollars" sol...@nji.com
>...
>> >Precise enough for the science of biology generally and medicine in
>> >particular.
>>
>> Incorrect. These people might summarize what they are doing by talking
>about
>> the vauge thing that is health, but if you look into the literature, at m
>> edical
>> studies and whatnot, what they actually study are precise components of h
>> ealth.
>
>Exactly: "components of /health/". The detailed studies would not
>represent knowledge if they were not studies of something.
And the something they are about are the components. They're also about health
since health is composed of the components, but you're acting like without the
broad fuzzy 'health' these things have no grounding and these medical people
couldn't be gaining knowledge about anything. That's silly. If they do studies
on glucose levels, they gain knowledge on glocose levels and how they effect
people and whatnot.
> We can make
>ever more detailed statements about, and refine the concept of, health
>because it names a real, though very complex, property.
Depends on what you call a real property. Suppose I say that things that are
both blue and weigh between 5 and 6 pounds have the property of blergness.
However, suppose some other person P says that only things that are blue, weigh
between 5 and 6 poinds, and float in water have the property of blergness.
Obviously it is an objective fact whether something has the property of
blergness if we focus on just one of our notions of blergness. We shall use
this example below.
> We can be
>mistaken about what furthers health or what exactly constitutes health,
We can only be mistaken if we were mistaken about what furthers the particular
conglomeration of things that, for us, constitutes health. Pretend you're
claiming that we can be mistaken about what is blerg (that means what has the
property of blergness). Suppose person P says that something fitting my
criteria, but which does not float, is not blerg. I say that it is. Which of us
is mistaken? If I know P's criteria for blergness, then if he says something is
blerg which is not blerg by his own criteria, then we can say he is mistaken in
some meaningful way, but otherwise with blerg, like health, trying to get at
"what blerg really is", or "what health really is" is just a semantic issue
>> That is how medical studies are done. They don't directly try to measure
>> 'health'
>
>That is irrelevant even if true. The idea of health is behind all such
>studies.
You mean health is defined such that it encompasses all the things that such
studies are about. Perhaps, but I don't see why that is interesting.
>> because health is a vauge abstract thing which we just constructed
>> with our minds to group a bunch of things together because its useful to
>> do so.
>
>Mere assertion. You should consider applying some skepticism to your own
>views.
I have, and my view has passed the silliness test, which yours does not seem to
do.
>> Perhaps. I noticed in another post that you claimed you literally thought
>> goodness was a conglomeration of descriptive facts.
>
>It is my hypothesis (I think having hypotheses is better than having
>either a naive foundationalism or a naive skepticism). More accurately,
>that "good" is a complex property (sometimes called a "property-cluster")
>that is tied to a vast array of facts, much as "health" is.
All-right. Moral skepticism rules. :high five:
>> If that is the case, then
>> I'd classify you as a moral skeptic, since your view of what good is
>doesn't
>> resemble what is commonly meant by 'good.'
>
>That's a scheme of classification biased toward your own position. Moral
>skepticism is commonly divided into "cognitive" and "motivational". But
>since I think both that we can know moral truths and can have good
>reasons to act on them, I don't qualify as either kind.
Well, you think we can know moral truths simply because you think they are
actually bundles of descriptive facts, and obviously we can know them. A good
reason to act on them? Extrapolating from your other position, you probably
think a good reason is simply a reason that satisfies various descriptive
conditions. Again that seems to be a sort of tricky way to use the word, if
thats how you are using it. Sort of like when objectivists use 'ought' but
really mean 'is necessary for.' But its hard to muster much righteous
indignation when saying "not stealing is necessary for the greatest furtherance
of your life" as when saying "you ought not steal!" and we all know how great
it feels to be righteously indignant, so objectivists insist on using
traditional moral terms so they can smuggle in some traditional notions of
morality. You remind me of them in that way (aside from the indignation, you
probably take a more subtle pleasure in using moral terms).
>> But 'health' is tied to facts only in that its a concept thats supposed to
>> express a conglomeration of lots of little descriptive characteristics. I
>> f you
>> think that 'good' is analagous, then I probably agree with you.
>
>Welcome to moral realism! It's a big tent, really, although you might
>not learn that from its critics.
Can you define moral realism? If you can be a moral realist by simply calling
some random stuff that exists 'moral', then pointing out how moral stuff
exists, it seems like there could be a more useful way to catagorize beliefs on
the topic.
Even if moral realism is defined in such a way, I'd still not be a moral
realist even if we had the exact same beliefs, since whether or not you're a
moral realist just hinges on whether you choose to redefine some descriptive
things to perhaps fulfil some psychological need of yours. I choose not to
define descriptive stuff as moral since I think its misleading and doesn't
really add anything.
Bert Clanton
>
> Can you define moral realism? If you can be a moral realist by simply calling
> some random stuff that exists 'moral', then pointing out how moral stuff
> exists, it seems like there could be a more useful way to catagorize beliefs
> on
> the topic.
>
> Even if moral realism is defined in such a way, I'd still not be a moral
> realist even if we had the exact same beliefs, since whether or not you're a
> moral realist just hinges on whether you choose to redefine some descriptive
> things to perhaps fulfil some psychological need of yours. I choose not to
> define descriptive stuff as moral since I think its misleading and doesn't
> really add anything.
>
I like Geoffrey Sayre-McCord's description of realism-in-general:
"...realism involves embracing just two theses: (1) the claims in
question, when literally construed, are literally true or false
(cognitivism), and (2) some are literally true. Nothing more." -- in
"Essays On Moral Realism", p. 5.
Moral realism, then, would be just the position that *moral* claims,
when construed literally, have either the truth-value "true" or the
truth-value "false"--not "true-in-a-sense" or "false-in-a-sense" or
"true-for-me" or "false-for-you" or "true(Buddhist)" or "false(Nazi)",
but "true" or "false" when construed as literal statements of fact.
Under moral realism, then, moral claims have truth-conditions, such
that, e.g., if condition C is satisfied by act x, then the moral claim
"Act x is morally right" is literally true.
Different kinds of realistic moral theory postulate different kinds of
truth-conditions for moral claims. One of the major distinctions among
realistic moral theories is the distinction among subjectivist,
intersubjectivist, and objectivist truth-conditions.
According to Sayre-McCord, "[moral] truth-conditions are 'subjectivist'
if they make essential reference to an individual; 'intersubjectivist'
if they make essential reference to the capacities, conventions, or
practices of groups of people; and 'objectivist' if they need make no
reference at all to people, their capacities, practices, or their
conventions".
SUBJECTIVISM: "...According to one view of moral subjectivism, judgments
of value make sense only relative to the desires, preferences, and goals
of the person doing the judging...Or again, a subjectivist about value
might hold that ...whether something has value (or at least whether
something is right) depends on whether it would be approved of by some
observer ideally constituted and situated."
INTERSUBJECTIVISM: "...By spelling out the truth-conditions of moral
claims in terms of the conventions or practices of groups of people,
intersubjectivism grants (with subjectivism) that people figure in the
truth-conditions, but it holds (with objectivism) that the truth of
moral claims doesn't turn on facts about particular individuals.
...Straightforward conventionalism is one version of intersubjectivism
in ethics. It treats moral claims as being about (and not merely
reflecting) the conventions or practices actually in force in the
relevant society. This sort of view has figured prominently in defenses
of cultural relativism...[e.g., by Ruth Benedict]
...[A] way to improve on 'Benedictine' conventionalism is to abstract
from actual practices and people and treat the truth of moral claims as
being determined in some way by the hypothetical conventions or
practices of hypothetical people...Many contractarian views of morality
[hold] that the truth of moral claims turn (sic) on what appropriately
idealized agents would agree to under certain specified conditions."
[E.g., Rawls]
OBJECTIVISM: "...Objectivists hold that the appropriate truth-conditions
make no reference to anyone's subjective states or to the capacities,
conventions, or practices of any group of people...Objectivists of a
naturalistic bent might well identify moral properties with (perhaps
very complex) physical properties and then, with the identification in
hand, use the natural predicates when giving the truth-conditions for
moral claims. [E.g., Richard N. Boyd] The only difficulty facing such a
naturalized objectivism in ethics is finding plausible candidates for
the identification."
My own view is ultimately a version of naturalistic objectivism.
Best wishes,
Bert
Gordon G. Sollars
writes...
...
> If they do studies
> on glucose levels, they gain knowledge on glocose levels and how they effect
> people and whatnot.
How "they effect people and whatnot" is (part of) what health is. It is
health that is being studied, in ever more detailed ways. The details
are studied because of their bearing on health.
...
> Depends on what you call a real property. Suppose I say that things that are
> both blue and weigh between 5 and 6 pounds have the property of blergness.
> However, suppose some other person P says that only things that are blue,
> weigh
> between 5 and 6 poinds, and float in water have the property of blergness.
That would be uninteresting, because you can, by stipulation, make
"blergness" anything you like. But you cannot make "health" anything you
like. Real organisms are healthy or not without regard to what you call
"health". What is required for their health is something that must be
discovered, not stipulated by definition.
...
> We can only be mistaken if we were mistaken about what furthers the parti
> cular
> conglomeration of things that, for us, constitutes health.
Nonsense. What "for us" constitutes health is what constitutes health,
period. It is dependent on how evolution has played out since the
beginning of time. You can lapse into the gibberish of your own private
language anytime you like, but it won't change the facts about what is
required for a given organism's health.
...
> You mean health is defined such that it encompasses all the things that such
> studies are about. Perhaps, but I don't see why that is interesting.
The detailed studies are not done because someone has stipulated that by
doing these things one is gaining knowledge about something arbitrarily
called "health", but rather because by doing these things one actually
/is/ gaining knowledge about health.
...
> Can you define moral realism?
See Bert Clanton's nearby post on the typography of Sayre-McCord.
Basically, to be (some kind of) a moral realist, you have to think that
moral statements can be true or false.
--
Gordon Sollars
gsol...@pobox.com
joe teicher
> >> knowledge, rather than something more similar to a generator of feelings.
> >
> >Right, emotions are how your brain presents moral information (among
> >other things). It's just like how light frequencies are presented to
> >you as colors.
>
> Where does this 'moral information' come from, exactly?
It comes from reality. It comes from the nature of human beings in
general, and the nature of specific human beings.
> >I don't know why it would be universal. I think that moral truths are
> >limited in application to the person who percieves them through their
> >conscience.
>
> Universal is not the same as objective. Isn't it your position that there are
> facts about moral matters? For instance if I said "In situation X, it wou
> ld be
> right for me to kill person P", then that statement has some objective truth
> value? If that isn't what you mean by a moral fact, then we aren't talking
> about the same thing.
I don't know what the requirements are for an objective truth value. I
think that if you said that statement, it would be either true or
false. I also think taht if you wrote "In situation X, it would be
right for one to kill person P," then would still be either true or
false. You can apply your morality to yourself, or to everyone. If,
on the other hand, you divorced that statement from any particular
person saying it, I think you might not be able to determine whether
it is or false. On the other hand, you might be able to. It depends on
what X and P are.
Their
> conscience would tell them "this is some moral data of type A" which would
> trigger the response of them feeling that it'd be good to do the thing th
> at the
> data was in reference to. The action is really wrong, but as you can see
> theres
> no reason to think the organism could know this o ever come to feel negat
> ively
> toward the action. If it percieved moral data at all, it could only
> differentiate differences in data and use these differences how it saw fit.
> There's no reason why it'd know the 'real meaning' of the data if it really
> represented something having nothing to do with the reproductive success
> of the
> organism..
>
Yeah, I get it. This argument seems to rely on accepting a
counterfactual premise. Specifically, it seems to rely on the idea
that their is some sort of way to independently verify that X is
wrong, and then compare that to how the hypothetical organism feels
about X. Well, you can't do that.
> >Certainly, it's a shitty explanation of Freud, but Freud's theories
> >had some meat to them and since him they have been developed pretty
> >extensively. The basic idea though is that the conscience comes into
> >existence during normal human development because of certain
> >experiences that we pretty much all have when we are very young. The
> >normative facts that the conscience then detects come from this same
> >fairly universal well of early experiences.
>
> Are you saying that what you have been calling moral facts are simply facts
> about our early experiences? Or residual effects on our brains from those?
> Those aren't normative facts.
Why aren't they? Why don't you tell me the particular characteristics
of moral facts, so I figure out what might or might not be a moral
fact. You have never characterized them, so my argument has basically
be "this sort of thing seems like me to be a moral fact, and it's
something that people are able to feel directly, and so people can
percieve moral facts." If you think this argument fails because what I
am calling a moral fact is not a moral fact, then you have to tell me
how you determined whether a statement is or is not a normative fact.
Joe Teicher
Gordon G. Sollars
Symmetry
>From: "Gordon G. Sollars" sol...@nji.com
>Message-id: <MPG.1668f26ec1...@mail.nji.com>
>
>> If they do studies
>> on glucose levels, they gain knowledge on glocose levels and how they
>effect
>> people and whatnot.
>
>How "they effect people and whatnot" is (part of) what health is.
Thats because health has beend efined broadly to include it. If I defined glerb
to include how glocose affects people, then how glocuse affected people would
be part of what glerb is. So what?
>> Depends on what you call a real property. Suppose I say that things that
>are
>> both blue and weigh between 5 and 6 pounds have the property of blergness.
>> However, suppose some other person P says that only things that are blue,
>> weigh
>> between 5 and 6 poinds, and float in water have the property of blergness.
>
>That would be uninteresting, because you can, by stipulation, make
>"blergness" anything you like. But you cannot make "health" anything you
>like.
The point that you make is uninteresting. The difference between these two
things is simply that health has a conventional usage and blergness does not
(and that blergness is much more simple).
>Real organisms are healthy or not without regard to what you call
>"health".
And given the meaning of blerg I defined above, real things are blerg or not
without regard to what you or anyone else calls "blerg." You are making no
distinction between the two here.
>> You mean health is defined such that it encompasses all the things that
>such
>> studies are about. Perhaps, but I don't see why that is interesting.
>
>The detailed studies are not done because someone has stipulated that by
>doing these things one is gaining knowledge about something arbitrarily
>called "health", but rather because by doing these things one actually
>/is/ gaining knowledge about health.
Again, that is because health means something which these things are a part of.
I dont see why anyone would think that this means health is some sort of
different type of thing from normal positive criteria.
>> Can you define moral realism?
>
>See Bert Clanton's nearby post on the typography of Sayre-McCord.
>Basically, to be (some kind of) a moral realist, you have to think that
>moral statements can be true or false.
But the problem is, you call descriptive statements moral. So the difference
between you and a moral skeptic is just that you like to label descriptive
things as "moral" as he doesn't. (perhaps because of some need of yours to
emote in a way that is seen by most people are more forceful or significant)
Symmetry
>Date: 11/24/01 12:54 AM Central Standard Time
>Message-id: <b4cbfeca.0111...@posting.google.com>
>> Universal is not the same as objective. Isn't it your position that there
>are
>> facts about moral matters? For instance if I said "In situation X, it wou
>> ld be
>> right for me to kill person P", then that statement has some objective
>truth
>> value? If that isn't what you mean by a moral fact, then we aren't talking
>> about the same thing.
>
>I don't know what the requirements are for an objective truth value.
Well, for instance, "object x is more massive than object y" has an objective
truth value, as the truth or falsity of the statement is 'in the object', or,
not simmply a matter of personal preference or opinion. It seems like your
notion of moral truth just hinges on normal peoples opinions about what is
moral.
> I also think taht if you wrote "In situation X, it would be
>right for one to kill person P," then would still be either true or
>false. You can apply your morality to yourself, or to everyone.
"my" morality? We are not talking about if we can invent arbitrary moral codes
which we can apply in some objective manner.
> Their
>> conscience would tell them "this is some moral data of type A" which would
>> trigger the response of them feeling that it'd be good to do the thing th
>> at the
>> data was in reference to. The action is really wrong, but as you can see
>> theres
>> no reason to think the organism could know this o ever come to feel negat
>> ively
>> toward the action. If it percieved moral data at all, it could only
>> differentiate differences in data and use these differences how it saw fit.
>> There's no reason why it'd know the 'real meaning' of the data if it really
>> represented something having nothing to do with the reproductive success
>> of the
>> organism..
>>
>
>Yeah, I get it. This argument seems to rely on accepting a
>counterfactual premise. Specifically, it seems to rely on the idea
>that their is some sort of way to independently verify that X is
>wrong, and then compare that to how the hypothetical organism feels
>about X. Well, you can't do that.
So now you are comparing moral truths to feelings? Again I point out that you
don't seem to be talking about anything factual.
Now to what you say: no, that isn't my premise, that is my conclusion. The
whole point of my argument is to show that theres no reason to think we have
such an independant means.
All I assume is that, if I can show there is no such means that we could have,
then that is somehow a blow to moral realists. For this to affect your version
of moral realism, you need to accept the 'premise' that you mention. The two
people who caused me to come up w/ that argument did accept that premise, and
if you don't accept it -- if you just associate moral judgements with
'feelings', then I have a hard time understanding why you seem to claim to be a
moral realist.
>> Are you saying that what you have been calling moral facts are simply facts
>> about our early experiences? Or residual effects on our brains from those?
>> Those aren't normative facts.
>
>Why aren't they?
Because there is nothing extra to them to differentiate them from descriptive
facts.
>Why don't you tell me the particular characteristics
>of moral facts,
In general they must have prescriptive content, or be about something being
objectively preferable to something else, etc.. not just about peoples
feelings, which you don't need any new kinds of facts to describe.
>You have never characterized them, so my argument has basically
>be "this sort of thing seems like me to be a moral fact, and it's
>something that people are able to feel directly, and so people can
>percieve moral facts."
I will try to simplify things. If you can understand the is-ought gap, then
moral facts are facts about oughts (or facts of the same type). i.e. facts for
which there actually is a gap between them and 'is' statements. Your notion of
morality does not seem to include such a gap since I can recast your moral
statements about x being wrong as something like "my mom conditioned me to feel
bad about x"
Bert Clanton
Symmetry <symm...@aol.compare.com> wrote:
>
> I will try to simplify things. If you can understand the is-ought gap, then
> moral facts are facts about oughts (or facts of the same type). i.e. facts
> for
> which there actually is a gap between them and 'is' statements. Your notion
> of
> morality does not seem to include such a gap since I can recast your moral
> statements about x being wrong as something like "my mom conditioned me to
> feel
> bad about x"
>
I understand and accept the "is-ought" gap.
There are facts. "Is"-statements are statements about what the facts are.
There are desires, preferences, aversions, etc. One kind of "ought"
statement is a statement about how to get what you want, given the
facts. "If you want X, and the fact about X is that you have to do Y to
get X, then you ought to do Y". Here, "You ought to do Y" means simply
"It is rationally justifiable to advise you to do Y." No desire or
preference on the part of some sentient being, no "ought".
There are *facts* about what maximizes objective benefit over a
population and what minimizes objective harm over a population. (I am
not an egoist.) Some desires and preferences are for things that would
maximize average objective benefit, or minimize objective harm, over a
population; and some desires and preferences are for things that would
not minimize average objective harm, or maxumize objective benefit, over
a population. Some aversions are against things that would in fact
maximize objective benefit over a population, and some aversions are
against things that would in fact minimize objective harm over a
population.
A desire or preference for something that maximizes average objective
benefit, or an aversion toward something that does not minimize average
objective harm, is "practically appropriate"; but a desire or preference
for something that does not minimize average objective harm, or an
aversion against something that maximizes average objective benefit, is
"practically inappropriate". In verbal shorthand, "You 'ought' to do
what would maximize average objective benefit. You 'ought not' to do
what would not minimize average objective harm."
There are also facts about what people simply want or prefer. In my
view, these facts are important for *some* kinds of value-systems (e.g.,
esthetic value-systems), but not for *moral* value-systems. So though
I'm a consequentialist, I'm not a Utilitarian.
To *grossly* oversimplify for ease of exposition: I take morality to be
a system for evaluating all choosable human acts, which classifies any
act as "morally right" if it maximizes average objective benefit over
the population of "moral patients" , and classifies any act as "morally
wrong" if it does not minimize average objective harm over the
population of "moral patients". Morality, as I see it, says, "If you
want to maximize average objective benefit over the population of 'moral
patients', and minimize average objective harm over that population,
then you 'ought' to do, Y1, Y2, ... , Ym, and you 'ought not' to do Z1,
Z2, ... , Zn."
Or, more precisely, "If you want to maximize average objective benefit
over the population of 'moral patients', and minimize average objective
harm over that population, then it it is rationally justifiable for
anyone to advise you to do Y1, Y2, ... , Ym, and to refrain from doing
Z1, Z2, ... , Zn."
Best wishes,
Bert
Symmetry
>Date: 11/30/01 8:44 PM Central Standard Time
>Message-id: <eubiotist-BE0A4...@corp.supernews.com>
>One kind of "ought"
>statement is a statement about how to get what you want, given the
>facts. "If you want X, and the fact about X is that you have to do Y to
>get X, then you ought to do Y".
Yes, I was not talking about that sort of ought. The only kind of ought that I
am talking about is the kind for which there exists a gap between statements
claiming you ought to do something, is positive statements. For any kind of
ought where there is no such gap, I am not talking about it.
>Here, "You ought to do Y" means simply
>"It is rationally justifiable to advise you to do Y."
I do not like that 'rationaly justifiable' term that you use. Surely it is not
unjustified, by the standard of reason, to advise anything. But reason also
cannot justify any action. Why is advising someone of the rational means to
achieve some end, rational?
If you simply mean that "the rational way to achieve your desires is Y" but not
with the added clause "therefore the rational thing for me to do is advise you
of this" then I would agree.
>There are *facts* about what maximizes objective benefit over a
>population and what minimizes objective harm over a population. (I am
>not an egoist.)
Benefit and harm are sort of vauge.
>A desire or preference for something that maximizes average objective
>benefit, or an aversion toward something that does not minimize average
>objective harm, is "practically appropriate";
If you say so. What is the reason for introducing this terminology?
>but a desire or preference
>for something that does not minimize average objective harm, or an
>aversion against something that maximizes average objective benefit, is
>"practically inappropriate". In verbal shorthand, "You 'ought' to do
>what would maximize average objective benefit. You 'ought not' to do
>what would not minimize average objective harm."
But now you are just playing with words. If the 'ought' you talk about now
still has no gap between itsself and positive statements, I see no use in
introducing the concept other than to be able to use loaded terms to better
influence people.
>To *grossly* oversimplify for ease of exposition: I take morality to be
>a system for evaluating all choosable human acts, which classifies any
>act as "morally right" if it maximizes average objective benefit over
>the population of "moral patients" ,
But why should anyone care, given that what you mean by your moral statements
is not something other than a conglomeration of 'is' statements? You might
avoid less confusion if, instead of telling people what you think is morally
wrong, you first defined 'benefit' and 'harm', and then simply pointed out to
them that if you take into account the objective benefit of plankton and
various insects and whatever else you include in your calculations, then action
A will make this total objective benefit higher.
>Morality, as I see it, says, "If you
>want to maximize average objective benefit over the population of 'moral
>patients', and minimize average objective harm over that population,
>then you 'ought' to do, Y1, Y2, ... , Ym, and you 'ought not' to do Z1,
>Z2, ... , Zn."
It seems like you could achieve the same cognative effect if you just dropped
the moral terms and pointed out that you have some preference for maximizing
such things, and that you want other people to have such preferences too.
>Or, more precisely, "If you want to maximize average objective benefit
>over the population of 'moral patients', and minimize average objective
>harm over that population, then it it is rationally justifiable for
>anyone to advise you to
Uh oh, there is that term again.. Hopefully it does not mean anything that is
not rationaly justified by what you've written.
Bert Clanton
Symmetry <symm...@aol.compare.com> wrote:
> >Subject: Re: Joe T. & bad arguments vs. my disproof of moral realism
> >From: Bert Clanton eubi...@charter.net
> >Date: 11/30/01 8:44 PM Central Standard Time
> >Message-id: <eubiotist-BE0A4...@corp.supernews.com>
>
> >One kind of "ought"
> >statement is a statement about how to get what you want, given the
> >facts. "If you want X, and the fact about X is that you have to do Y to
> >get X, then you ought to do Y".
>
> Yes, I was not talking about that sort of ought. The only kind of ought that
> I
> am talking about is the kind for which there exists a gap between statements
> claiming you ought to do something, is positive statements. For any kind of
> ought where there is no such gap, I am not talking about it.
>
My proposal is that in the last analysis *all* "oughts" are of this
type: "If you want X, and you have to do Y to get X, then it is rational
to do Y, and it is rational for someone to advise you to do Y". In
conventional philosophical language, I believe that all "oughts" are
hypothetical, and none are categorial.
There is IMHO an irreducible gap between ordinary "is" statements and
"ought" statements, in that at least by implication an "ought" statement
always includes an "if one wants..." clause, and an "is" statement never
does--unless it's explicitly an "is" statement just about what somebody
wants, in which case there's no "then you have to do.." clause, no
"ought".
> >Here, "You ought to do Y" means simply
> >"It is rationally justifiable to advise you to do Y."
>
> I do not like that 'rationaly justifiable' term that you use. Surely it is
> not
> unjustified, by the standard of reason, to advise anything.
On the contrary, it is irrational to do what will frustrate your getting
what you want, unless some higher-priority desire supercedes that
desire. Likewise, at one remove: if you want someone to get what they
want, it is rational for you to advise them to do what it takes to get
what they want.
> But reason also
> cannot justify any action. Why is advising someone of the rational means to
> achieve some end, rational?
>
You are certainly using the terms "justify" and "rational" differently
than I do. I don't know what more to say.
> If you simply mean that "the rational way to achieve your desires is Y" but
> not
> with the added clause "therefore the rational thing for me to do is advise
> you
> of this" then I would agree.
>
That is certainly what I intended to say.
> >There are *facts* about what maximizes objective benefit over a
> >population and what minimizes objective harm over a population. (I am
> >not an egoist.)
>
> Benefit and harm are sort of vauge.
>
> >A desire or preference for something that maximizes average objective
> >benefit, or an aversion toward something that does not minimize average
> >objective harm, is "practically appropriate";
>
> If you say so. What is the reason for introducing this terminology?
>
Becauses it uses ordinary English words to convey what I want to convey.
> >but a desire or preference
> >for something that does not minimize average objective harm, or an
> >aversion against something that maximizes average objective benefit, is
> >"practically inappropriate". In verbal shorthand, "You 'ought' to do
> >what would maximize average objective benefit. You 'ought not' to do
> >what would not minimize average objective harm."
>
> But now you are just playing with words. If the 'ought' you talk about now
> still has no gap between itsself and positive statements, I see no use in
> introducing the concept other than to be able to use loaded terms to better
> influence people.
>
But there *is* an *irreducible* gap. IMHO, "ought" statements are
inherently conditional statements, such that the antecedent clause
*must* include a term related to desire or preference. But "is"
statements are not inherently conditional, and if they are, their
antecedent clause need not include a term related to desire or
preference.
> >To *grossly* oversimplify for ease of exposition: I take morality to be
> >a system for evaluating all choosable human acts, which classifies any
> >act as "morally right" if it maximizes average objective benefit over
> >the population of "moral patients" ,
>
> But why should anyone care, given that what you mean by your moral statements
> is not something other than a conglomeration of 'is' statements?
Not quite. My "ought"-type moral statements are all conditionals: "If
one wants X, then it is practically appropriate for one to do Y". If you
don't want X, then you can rationally ignore the consequent clause.
But IMHO, a morality that includes only "hypothetical oughts" is
defective. It ignores important questions: "Why want X rather than W? Is
it rational to want just any arbitrary thing or state of affairs? Or do
some wants and preferences 'make sense', and others not?"
I think that some wants and preferences *do* "make sense", and others
don't. I think that wanting what is objectively "good for you", and
being averse to what is objectively "bad for you", make sense; and
wanting what is objectively "bad for you" or being averse to what is
objectively "good for you" doesn't "make sense".
> You might
> avoid less confusion if, instead of telling people what you think is morally
> wrong, you first defined 'benefit' and 'harm', and then simply pointed out to
> them that if you take into account the objective benefit of plankton and
> various insects and whatever else you include in your calculations, then
> action
> A will make this total objective benefit higher.
>
As I see it, I *do* do exactly what you suggest here, as a first step.
"The facts about what produces objective benefit and what produces
objective harm are the following:..." But then I go a step further and
say, "If one wants to maximize average objective benefit and minimize
average objective harm over the population of moral patients, then it is
practically appropriate for one to do Y1, Y2, ... , Ym, and to refrain
from doing Z1, Z2, ... , Zn." And I go a further step: "It would be
practically appropriate for us to maximize average objective benefit,
and minimize average objective harm, over the population of moral
patients. Hence it would be practically appropriate for us all to *want*
to maximize average objective benefit, and to minimize average objective
harm, over the population of moral patients."
If one *doesn't* want to do what is "practically appropriate", as I
define that term, then I don't have very much to say to him.
> >Morality, as I see it, says, "If you
> >want to maximize average objective benefit over the population of 'moral
> >patients', and minimize average objective harm over that population,
> >then you 'ought' to do, Y1, Y2, ... , Ym, and you 'ought not' to do Z1,
> >Z2, ... , Zn."
>
> It seems like you could achieve the same cognative effect if you just dropped
> the moral terms and pointed out that you have some preference for maximizing
> such things, and that you want other people to have such preferences too.
>
While I do in fact prefer maximizing such things, and I do in fact want
other people to share my preferences, my preferences don't suffice to
establish a moral community. To establish a moral community, a whole
bunch of people have to come to agree with me in valuing the same
things. To bring that about, all I can do is to present my moral views
and try to persuade other folks to share them.
BTW: some "naturalistic objectivist" moral philosophers *do* advise
dropping the moral terms, defining "the good" as some conjunction of
natural states of affairs, and defining "right" acts as those which
promote this naturalistic version of "the good". As a "naturalistic
objectivist" myself, I have great sympathy for this approach; but I
don't think it's completely adequate.
> >Or, more precisely, "If you want to maximize average objective benefit
> >over the population of 'moral patients', and minimize average objective
> >harm over that population, then it it is rationally justifiable for
> >anyone to advise you to
>
IMHO, morality is a system of "rationally justifiable advice".
Best wishes,
Bert
Gordon G. Sollars
writes...
...
> Thats because health has beend efined broadly to include it. If I defined
> glerb
> to include how glocose affects people, then how glocuse affected people would
> be part of what glerb is. So what?
So you would be talking about a real thing, whatever it was labeled.
> >> Depends on what you call a real property. Suppose I say that things that
> >are
> >> both blue and weigh between 5 and 6 pounds have the property of blergness.
> >> However, suppose some other person P says that only things that are blue,
> >> weigh
> >> between 5 and 6 poinds, and float in water have the property of blergness.
> >
> >That would be uninteresting, because you can, by stipulation, make
> >"blergness" anything you like. But you cannot make "health" anything you
> >like.
>
> The point that you make is uninteresting. The difference between these two
> things is simply that health has a conventional usage and blergness does not
> (and that blergness is much more simple).
You seem to misunderstand. It is completely accidental that we have
named the real property of health to be "health" and not, say,
"blergness". That you have missed the point is clear from your earlier
post, which I have repeated above. You are claiming there that different
people could define "blergness" differently. But this is simply because
"blergness" is an arbitrary construct. It in no way counts against my
point. The term "health" names a real property that is not arbitrary,
but is fixed by the nature of the organic world. Just stop drinking
liquids for two weeks and you will see what I mean.
> >Real organisms are healthy or not without regard to what you call
> >"health".
>
> And given the meaning of blerg I defined above, real things are blerg or not
> without regard to what you or anyone else calls "blerg." You are making no
> distinction between the two here.
However, as you can see, your point was not that, but rather that
different people could assign different meanings to "blergness". So
what? Definitions, per se, are uninteresting. It is arguments that do
the work.
...
> But the problem is, you call descriptive statements moral. So the difference
> between you and a moral skeptic is just that you like to label descriptive
> things as "moral" as he doesn't.
Just as I say that some descriptive statements indicate the health of an
organism, a real property. My hypothesis is that "good" functions like
"health", although it is less precise.
> (perhaps because of some need of yours to
> emote in a way that is seen by most people are more forceful or significant)
Whatever "needs" I might have, the truth (or falsity) of my position is
unaffected.
--
Gordon Sollars
gsol...@pobox.com
joe teicher
> > I also think taht if you wrote "In situation X, it would be
> >right for one to kill person P," then would still be either true or
> >false. You can apply your morality to yourself, or to everyone.
>
> "my" morality? We are not talking about if we can invent arbitrary moral
> codes
> which we can apply in some objective manner.
That's fine. I didn't say "the morality that you invented
arbitrarily." I said "your morality." I think there is a difference.
>
> > Their
> >> conscience would tell them "this is some moral data of type A" which would
> >> trigger the response of them feeling that it'd be good to do the thing th
> >> at the
> >> data was in reference to. The action is really wrong, but as you can see
> >> theres
> >> no reason to think the organism could know this o ever come to feel negat
> >> ively
> >> toward the action. If it percieved moral data at all, it could only
> >> differentiate differences in data and use these differences how it saw
> >> fit.
> >> There's no reason why it'd know the 'real meaning' of the data if it r
> >> eally
> >> represented something having nothing to do with the reproductive success
> >> of the
> >> organism..
> >>
> >
> >Yeah, I get it. This argument seems to rely on accepting a
> >counterfactual premise. Specifically, it seems to rely on the idea
> >that their is some sort of way to independently verify that X is
> >wrong, and then compare that to how the hypothetical organism feels
> >about X. Well, you can't do that.
>
> So now you are comparing moral truths to feelings? Again I point out that you
> don't seem to be talking about anything factual.
By feels in this statement, I only meant whether the organism feels
that X is good or bad.
>
> Now to what you say: no, that isn't my premise, that is my conclusion. The
> whole point of my argument is to show that theres no reason to think we have
> such an independant means.
No, it is your premise. You say that suppose an organism can percieve
moral data, and in regards to action X he percieves moral data of type
A which he interprets to mean that doing X is good. But in reality
doing X is wrong. There is your premise. Your premise is that there
is some reality in which X is wrong apart from how the organism feels
about X. In practice, of course, "X is really wrong" is an impossible
statement to make, so an argument based on it is pretty useless.
>
> All I assume is that, if I can show there is no such means that we could
> have,
> then that is somehow a blow to moral realists. For this to affect your ve
> rsion
> of moral realism, you need to accept the 'premise' that you mention. The two
> people who caused me to come up w/ that argument did accept that premise, and
> if you don't accept it -- if you just associate moral judgements with
> 'feelings', then I have a hard time understanding why you seem to claim t
> o be a
> moral realist.
It is not my fault that the people you were arguing with are retards.
I am a moral realist because I have observed moral behavior and
experienced moral inclinations. If morality did not exist, then I
doubt I would have observed it.
>
> >> Are you saying that what you have been calling moral facts are simply
> >> facts
> >> about our early experiences? Or residual effects on our brains from those?
> >> Those aren't normative facts.
> >
> >Why aren't they?
>
> Because there is nothing extra to them to differentiate them from descriptive
> facts.
A fact about our early experience is not a descriptive fact. On the
other hand, a residual effect in our minds from our early experience
is not a descriptive fact. It's an effect, not a fact. If moral
facts are physical effects then they are completely different animals
than descriptive facts, which are facts, after all.
>
> >Why don't you tell me the particular characteristics
> >of moral facts,
>
> In general they must have prescriptive content, or be about something being
> objectively preferable to something else, etc.. not just about peoples
> feelings, which you don't need any new kinds of facts to describe.
Is this a moral fact?
You shouldn't kill people. It certainly isn't equivelant to or
reducible to or justifiable in terms of any positive fact that I can
think of. It is it's own thing, and I am able to percieve it.
>
> >You have never characterized them, so my argument has basically
> >be "this sort of thing seems like me to be a moral fact, and it's
> >something that people are able to feel directly, and so people can
> >percieve moral facts."
>
> I will try to simplify things. If you can understand the is-ought gap, then
> moral facts are facts about oughts (or facts of the same type). i.e. fact
> s for
> which there actually is a gap between them and 'is' statements. Your noti
> on of
> morality does not seem to include such a gap since I can recast your moral
> statements about x being wrong as something like "my mom conditioned me t
> o feel
> bad about x"
the fact that my mother conditioned me to feel bad about X may be the
reason that I believe that I shouldn't do X, but I don't see it as
being equivelant to the the moral fact that I shouldn't do X. I think
you might think that I think that "my mom conditioned me to feel bad
about X" makes "I shouldn't do X" true. I don't think so. I don't
think that "I shouldn't do X" is provable by reference to any set of
positive facts. I don't think that the origin of moral beliefs is
particularly relevant, anyway. What's important is the actual
perception of the moral facts.
Joe Teicher
Symmetry
1832...@posting.google.com>...
> >
> > Now to what you say: no, that isn't my premise, that is my conclusion. The
> > whole point of my argument is to show that theres no reason to think we
> > have
> > such an independant means.
>
> No, it is your premise. You say that suppose an organism can percieve
> moral data, and in regards to action X he percieves moral data of type
> A which he interprets to mean that doing X is good. But in reality
> doing X is wrong. There is your premise. Your premise is that there
> is some reality in which X is wrong apart from how the organism feels
> about X. In practice, of course, "X is really wrong" is an impossible
> statement to make, so an argument based on it is pretty useless.
OK, the problem is that I have two arguments. One of them is that
there is no moral truth of the type that Owl or D. Friedman envision,
and another is that, if there were such truth, we couldn't discover
it. You were talking about my second argument I believe, and for some
reason I was thinking of my first.
Now to your comments: My premise can be stated more clearly than you
state it. My premise is simply that, doing X is wrong, in reality,
period. I don't know where this 'some reality' of yours comes from. If
doing X is really wrong, and it is a fact that doing X is wrong, then
how we feel about X can possibly differ from whether X is wrong or
not. Just like what we see can differ from what is really there(
hallucinations or optical illusions ).
I don't see why you assert that "X is really wrong" is an impossible
statement to make. This is exactly analagous to our other senses. You
could just as well say "there is really a tree in front of me" is an
impossible statement to make, because there is no means to verify that
there is really a tree there aside from our 5 senses. So all we can
really say is "my 5 senses give me such and such impressions" but we
cannot make statements about what is REALLY there.
"Your premise is that there exists some reality in which there really
is a tree in front of you, apart from your sensations"
> >
> > All I assume is that, if I can show there is no such means that we could
> > have,
> > then that is somehow a blow to moral realists. For this to affect your ve
> > rsion
> > of moral realism, you need to accept the 'premise' that you mention. Th
> > e two
> > people who caused me to come up w/ that argument did accept that premis
> > e, and
> > if you don't accept it -- if you just associate moral judgements with
> > 'feelings', then I have a hard time understanding why you seem to claim t
> > o be a
> > moral realist.
>
> It is not my fault that the people you were arguing with are retards.
> I am a moral realist because I have observed moral behavior and
> experienced moral inclinations. If morality did not exist, then I
> doubt I would have observed it.
Well, I have observed people acting in ways that are considered moral,
and I have felt various inner compulsions to do things or not to do
things, which I suspect are these 'moral inclinations' that other
people talk about. I just don't understand why people think that it is
an objective fact that you'd be acting incorrectly if you did not act
however some of thes inclinations inclined you to act.
> >
> > >> Are you saying that what you have been calling moral facts are simply
> > >> facts
> > >> about our early experiences? Or residual effects on our brains from
> > >> those?
> > >> Those aren't normative facts.
> > >
> > >Why aren't they?
> >
> > Because there is nothing extra to them to differentiate them from descr
> > iptive
> > facts.
>
> A fact about our early experience is not a descriptive fact.
Sure it is. If I say "at time t0, the marble was at position x0", and
time t0 was in the past, that a descriptive fact. YOu think facts
about the past are not descriptive? How is this any different than
noting that at some time in the past, your mom beat you when you
disobeyed her or something?
> On the
> other hand, a residual effect in our minds from our early experience
> is not a descriptive fact. It's an effect, not a fact.
Right, I was being sloppy.
> If moral
> facts are physical effects then they are completely different animals
> than descriptive facts, which are facts, after all.
I'm not sure how a fact of any type could be the same thing as an
effect of another type. Facts and effects in general seem
incompatible. However, if you are calling descriptive effects moral
facts, then, because there is no gap between "descriptive stuff" and
what you call morality, I pronounce your morality to be rather empty
and uninteresting.
> >
> > >Why don't you tell me the particular characteristics
> > >of moral facts,
> >
> > In general they must have prescriptive content, or be about something being
> > objectively preferable to something else, etc.. not just about peoples
> > feelings, which you don't need any new kinds of facts to describe.
>
> Is this a moral fact?
> You shouldn't kill people. It certainly isn't equivelant to or
> reducible to or justifiable in terms of any positive fact that I can
> think of. It is it's own thing, and I am able to percieve it.
Depends, some people like to define 'should' and 'ought' so that they
reduce to descriptive stuff. For example an objectivist might apply
the following transofmration.. "you shouldn't kill people" => "it
would reduce your ability to flourish if you killed people" where
flourishing is defined as just a bunch of descriptive stuff, and where
these things that are quoted are equivilant.
Suppose, you mean by "you shouldn't kill people" that the action of
killing people is in some way objectively incorrect, or has some other
meaning that cannot be reduced to descriptive stuff, then its a moral
statement.
However, I would suggest that if you believe that, you are confusing
"this act is contrary to my inclinations" with "this act is
objectively incorrect", where of course the former does not imply the
later without some further argument.
s
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Symmetry
>Message-id: <MPG.1673790748...@mail.nji.com>
>> >> Depends on what you call a real property. Suppose I say that things that
>> >are
>> >> both blue and weigh between 5 and 6 pounds have the property of
>blergness.
>> >> However, suppose some other person P says that only things that are
>blue,
>> >> weigh
>> >> between 5 and 6 poinds, and float in water have the property of
>blergness.
>> >
>> >That would be uninteresting, because you can, by stipulation, make
>> >"blergness" anything you like. But you cannot make "health" anything you
>> >like.
>>
>> The point that you make is uninteresting. The difference between these two
>> things is simply that health has a conventional usage and blergness does
>not
>> (and that blergness is much more simple).
>
>You seem to misunderstand. It is completely accidental that we have
>named the real property of health to be "health" and not, say,
>"blergness". That you have missed the point is clear from your earlier
>post, which I have repeated above.
Of course it is accidental. I submit that if I misunderstood you, much of the
blame must rest on you. Maybe what you meant is that "you cannot make health
anything you like" rather than "you cannot make "health" anything you like."
You were talking about two symbols above, "blergness" and "health." The only
reason why we can't make "health" anything we like on some societal scale is
because it is firmly entrenched in everyones vocabulary as meaning health. Of
course we can't make health anything we like, but the exact same comment
applies to blergness, since I just defined it. Blergness is blergness,
regardless of what you want "blergness" to refer to.
>But this is simply because
>"blergness" is an arbitrary construct. It in no way counts against my
>point. The term "health" names a real property that is not arbitrary,
>but is fixed by the nature of the organic world.
Now, here is where you seem to get a little loopy. How do you figure blergness
is more arbitrary than health? Surely health is a more useful concept as far as
human survival and happiness go, and people are more inclind to care about
health than blergness, but what do you mean "fixed by the nature of the organic
world"? How is blergness not fixed by the nature of the world of mass and
color?
>Just stop drinking
>liquids for two weeks and you will see what I mean.
Uh, just compare a blue object between 5 and 6 pounds with some object that
does not fit that criteria, and you will see what I mean. I don't see how any
one of these is any more 'fixed' than the other in a non-cultural sense.
>> >Real organisms are healthy or not without regard to what you call
>> >"health".
>>
>> And given the meaning of blerg I defined above, real things are blerg or
>not
>> without regard to what you or anyone else calls "blerg." You are making no
>> distinction between the two here.
>
>However, as you can see, your point was not that, but rather that
>different people could assign different meanings to "blergness". So
>what? Definitions, per se, are uninteresting. It is arguments that do
>the work.
Indeed, and I have only been mentioning uninteresting definitions because you
seem to think there is some important distinction between blergness & health
here, and you seem to be trying to point it out, but as far as I can see you
aren't doing a very good job, and hence I must make reference to uninteresting
things like definitions to show you that the only way that health is a real
property is in the same way that blergness is a real property.
>> But the problem is, you call descriptive statements moral. So the
>difference
>> between you and a moral skeptic is just that you like to label descriptive
>> things as "moral" as he doesn't.
>
>Just as I say that some descriptive statements indicate the health of an
>organism, a real property.
And blergness is also a real property. If health is not some desciptive
property, then is blergness also not descriptive? If you form a union of lots
of specific decsriptive properties and put them under one label, then is the
referrent of this label suddenly nondescriptive?
>My hypothesis is that "good" functions like
>"health", although it is less precise.
Alright then, again I welcome you to the moral skeptic-club.
To reiterate an earlier comment, if your notion of morality and goodness and
such is so weak and vacuous that there is no 'gap' between it as descriptive
stuff, then as far as I am concerned you are a moral skeptic.
Symmetry
>From: Bert Clanton eubi...@charter.net
>Message-id: <eubiotist-A314F...@corp.supernews.com>
>> Yes, I was not talking about that sort of ought. The only kind of ought
>that
>> I
>> am talking about is the kind for which there exists a gap between
>statements
>> claiming you ought to do something, is positive statements. For any kind of
>> ought where there is no such gap, I am not talking about it.
>>
>
>My proposal is that in the last analysis *all* "oughts" are of this
>type: "If you want X, and you have to do Y to get X, then it is rational
>to do Y
Incorrect. The correct statement is "Y is a rational means to X" but for Y to
be rational, you must hold that obtaining X is rational in itsself. No goal by
itsself is rational or irrational.
>and it is rational for someone to advise you to do Y"
Again, incorrect. Y being a rational means X does not imply that X is rational,
Y is rational, nor advising someone to do either X or Y is rational. All it
means is.. well, Y is a rational means to X.
Coupled with someones desire, you could form a statement like "Y is a rational
means to achieving your desires" but this is different from Y being simply
rational. Such a thing is rather nonsensical and it implies a sort of absolute
justification for Y which does not exist.
> In
>conventional philosophical language, I believe that all "oughts" are
>hypothetical, and none are categorial.
>
But hypothetical stuff can be descriptive, so this doesn't create some gap
between oughts and desciptive stuff, though it may create a gap between oughts
and catagorical descriptive stuff.
>There is IMHO an irreducible gap between ordinary "is" statements and
>"ought" statements, in that at least by implication an "ought" statement
>always includes an "if one wants..." clause, and an "is" statement never
>does--unless it's explicitly an "is" statement just about what somebody
>wants, in which case there's no "then you have to do.." clause, no
>"ought".
But you've never established a "then you have to do" clause in any case
whatsoever. All you've noted is that if Y is a means for X, and a person wants
X, then Y is a rational means to satisfy their desires. One cannot infer that Y
is rational, and one certainly cannot infer that this person then "has to do
Y."
Your trick here seems to be starting out with something like "the person has to
do Y in order to achieve X", and then simply dropping the "in order to achieve
X" part which creates an absolute stateemnt which you have not justified.
>> >Here, "You ought to do Y" means simply
>> >"It is rationally justifiable to advise you to do Y."
>>
>> I do not like that 'rationaly justifiable' term that you use. Surely it is
>> not
>> unjustified, by the standard of reason, to advise anything.
>
>On the contrary, it is irrational to do what will frustrate your getting
>what you want
Don't be silly. Doing things that frustrate getting what you want is just an
irrational way to get what you want. Your attempt to drop part of this sentence
that alter its meaning to give you some absolute (and incorrect) statement are
rather blatant errors that I thought you were above making.
Again, "doing X is irrational" and "doing X is an irrational way to get what I
want" have different meanings.
>Likewise, at one remove: if you want someone to get what they
>want, it is rational for you to advise them to do what it takes to get
>what they want.
Only if you assume that getting what you want is rational. This however does
not make much sense. As I point out before, no goal in itsself can be rational
or irrational. Reason is logically seperate from 'the passions' or however Hume
would put it.
>> But reason also
>> cannot justify any action. Why is advising someone of the rational means to
>> achieve some end, rational?
>>
>
>You are certainly using the terms "justify" and "rational" differently
>than I do. I don't know what more to say.
Sentiments and preferences and whatnot are te material that reason has to work
with. You can think of reason as a sort of black box with your objectives as
inputs and rational ways to achieve these objectives as outputs. These
objectives cannot be rational or irrational by themselves. Reason can tell you
how to achieve the compliment of one of your objectives just as easily as it
can tell you how to achieve your objectives.
Neither are the outputs of this black box simply 'the rational thing to do.' If
you think of them that way, you are 'dropping context' as objectivists like to
say. The outputs are the rational means *to achieve your objective*, but again
this is far different from them being simply 'rational.'
>But IMHO, a morality that includes only "hypothetical oughts" is
>defective. It ignores important questions: "Why want X rather than W? Is
>it rational to want just any arbitrary thing or state of affairs? Or do
>some wants and preferences 'make sense', and others not?"
Wants cannot be rational or irrational. To say a want is irrational would be
like saying it is in some way contrary to reason, but wants are not the subject
of reason. Suppose they spring from biological urges or something, then reason
has nothing to do with want-formation so to make a reason-based appraisal of
these wants by calling them rational or irrational in themselves is incorrect.
>I think that some wants and preferences *do* "make sense", and others
>don't.
They 'make sense' to you, probably in the sense that you want them too. So
what? What does that have to do with reason?
>I think that wanting what is objectively "good for you", and
>being averse to what is objectively "bad for you", make sense;
Because your genes have been selected for such that you'd want this sort of
stuff. Having genes that make you want X, or feel that X is somehow the
natural, most sensical, and best choice does not imply that X is simply
"rational."
George Dance
f5...@posting.google.com>...
> joe teicher <joeo...@aol.com> wrote in message news:<b4cbfeca.0112031252.
> 1832...@posting.google.com>...
snip
> > No, it is your premise. You say that suppose an organism can percieve
> > moral data, and in regards to action X he percieves moral data of type
> > A which he interprets to mean that doing X is good. But in reality
> > doing X is wrong. There is your premise. Your premise is that there
> > is some reality in which X is wrong apart from how the organism feels
> > about X. In practice, of course, "X is really wrong" is an impossible
> > statement to make, so an argument based on it is pretty useless.
>
> OK, the problem is that I have two arguments. One of them is that
> there is no moral truth of the type that Owl or D. Friedman envision,
> and another is that, if there were such truth, we couldn't discover
> it. You were talking about my second argument I believe, and for some
> reason I was thinking of my first.
To be unable to discover moral truth means to be unable to tell if
some statement S is a moral truth or not. If S were a moral truth, no
one would know; and similarly, if S were not a moral truth, no one
would know.
To say that there is no moral truth, is to say of every statement S
that might be a moral truth, that it is not; which requires the
ability to tell whether S is a moral truth or not.
As your two arguments contradict each other, you cannot consistently
claim both.
snip
Symmetry
>Date: 12/6/01 5:09 PM Central Standard Time
>Message-id: <6312c50b.01120...@posting.google.com>
>As your two arguments contradict each other, you cannot consistently
>claim both.
They do not contradict eachother, because my second argument is a hypothetical
one.
I claim that (a) there is no moral truth, and (b) if there were moral truth, it
would not be knowlable to us.
There is no contradiction there.
Let me quote myself:
>> OK, the problem is that I have two arguments. One of them is that
>> there is no moral truth of the type that Owl or D. Friedman envision,
>> and another is that, if there were such truth, we couldn't discover
>> it.
See that "if" there?
Gordon G. Sollars
writes...
...
> Of course it is accidental. I submit that if I misunderstood you, much of the
> blame must rest on you. Maybe what you meant is that "you cannot make health
> anything you like" rather than "you cannot make "health" anything you like."
Sorry. I should have written '/health/' or '*health*' to show emphasis
instead of writing '"health"'. You cannot make health anything you like.
...
> Of
> course we can't make health anything we like, but the exact same comment
> applies to blergness, since I just defined it. Blergness is blergness,
> regardless of what you want "blergness" to refer to.
You were contrasting two different stipulations for the meaning of
"blergness", and you started by saying "Depends on what you call a real
property". I thought that you intended something substantive about real
properties by way of that contrast. Apparently your argument is "I can
make up words". I don't see the significance of that.
...
> Now, here is where you seem to get a little loopy. How do you figure bler
> gness
> is more arbitrary than health?
Because you gave two different definitions for it, and because it had no
reference at all until you introduced it.
...
> I must make reference to uninteresting
> things like definitions to show you that the only way that health is a real
> property is in the same way that blergness is a real property.
That point I already understand. The detour you took through two
definitions of "blergness" left it rather unclear what you were trying to
say. OK, health and blergness (definition one or two?) both name real
properties. And so?
...
> To reiterate an earlier comment, if your notion of morality and goodness and
> such is so weak and vacuous that there is no 'gap' between it as descriptive
> stuff, then as far as I am concerned you are a moral skeptic.
Inventing funny private languages seems to be a hobby not limited to
Objectivists. They like to "prove" things by changing the meaning of
"true"; you prefer to do it by changing the meaning of "skeptic".
As I recall, your view of moral statements is that they are like a dog's
bark. If so, it is disingenuous for you to claim that someone who thinks
moral statements can be true or false holds a particularly "weak and
vacuous" notion of morality.
--
Gordon Sollars
gsol...@pobox.com
Bert Clanton
George Dance <georg...@hotmail.com> wrote:
> To be unable to discover moral truth means to be unable to tell if
> some statement S is a moral truth or not. If S were a moral truth, no
> one would know; and similarly, if S were not a moral truth, no one
> would know.
>
Another reason why it might be impossible to discover moral truth is
that there might be no such thing: that is, that the predicates "true"
and "false" are not applicable to statements involving moral predicates
(e.g., "right", "wrong"). If this is the case, then we would be unable
to discover moral truth because it doesn't exist.
> To say that there is no moral truth, is to say of every statement S
> that might be a moral truth, that it is not; which requires the
> ability to tell whether S is a moral truth or not.
>
But someone who is a non-cognitivist with respect to moral truth, as
above, *has* that ability: he can say with confidence that for any
statement S, S is not a moral truth.
Best wishes,
Bert
George Dance
0753.0...@mb-ba.aol.com>...
> >As your two arguments contradict each other, you cannot consistently
> >claim both.
>
> hypothetical
> one.
You'll have to spell it out, then. As it is, you don't give either
here, just its conclusion.
> I claim that (a) there is no moral truth, and (b) if there were moral tru
> th, > it
> would not be knowlable to us.
Those are conclusions (or opinions), but not arguments.
> There is no contradiction there.
> Let me quote myself:
>
> >> OK, the problem is that I have two arguments. One of them is that
> >> there is no moral truth of the type that Owl or D. Friedman envision,
> >> and another is that, if there were such truth, we couldn't discover
> >> it.
>
> See that "if" there?
Yes, one of your conclusions contains the word 'if'. That does not
show that the argument it follows from is hypothetical.
I have shown you why your arguments are entail a contradiction. You
can either show why my argument to that effect is invalid, or how they
are not your arguments (by giving yours). But simply reasserting your
conclusions shows nothing.
Do you know how to put your arguments in logical form? Or to at least
list their premises and conclusions, so I can do that for you?
Symmetry
>From: George Dance georg...@hotmail.com
>Message-id: <6312c50b.01120...@posting.google.com>
>
>Symmetry <symm...@aol.compare.com> wrote in message news:<20011206211916.2
>0753.0...@mb-ba.aol.com>...
>> >As your two arguments contradict each other, you cannot consistently
>> >claim both.
>>
>> They do not contradict each other, because my second argument is a
>> hypothetical
>> one.
>
>You'll have to spell it out, then. As it is, you don't give either
>here, just its conclusion.
All you are working from are my conclusions. You think that my positions
contradict eachother. It is unnecessary to go into the details of my arguments
to determine if holding them both is contradictory.
I must admit that I did not carefuly read your first reply to me, that I
responded to. I simply noticed a falsity in it, and quickly responded. I notice
know that I could have been more helpful if I would have paid more attention to
your specific error.
> You
>can either show why my argument to that effect is invalid, or how they
>are not your arguments (by giving yours). But simply reasserting your
>conclusions shows nothing.
>Do you know how to put your arguments in logical form? Or to at least
>list their premises and conclusions, so I can do that for you?
Nope, showing you your error will be enough for now.
Here is what I would have said if I had been paying attention the first time I
responded:
George Dance <georg...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:<6312c50b.01120...@posting.google.com>...
> Symmetry <symm...@aol.com> wrote in message news:<30b3ec10.0112051052.459b
> f5...@posting.google.com>...
>
> > joe teicher <joeo...@aol.com> wrote in message news:<b4cbfeca.0112031252.
> > 1832...@posting.google.com>...
> snip
> > > No, it is your premise. You say that suppose an organism can percieve
> > > moral data, and in regards to action X he percieves moral data of type
> > > A which he interprets to mean that doing X is good. But in reality
> > > doing X is wrong. There is your premise. Your premise is that there
> > > is some reality in which X is wrong apart from how the organism feels
> > > about X. In practice, of course, "X is really wrong" is an impossible
> > > statement to make, so an argument based on it is pretty useless.
> >
> > OK, the problem is that I have two arguments. One of them is that
> > there is no moral truth of the type that Owl or D. Friedman envision,
> > and another is that, if there were such truth, we couldn't discover
> > it. You were talking about my second argument I believe, and for some
> > reason I was thinking of my first.
>
> To be unable to discover moral truth means to be unable to tell if
> some statement S is a moral truth or not.
Not exactly. Suppose that I know that there are no moral truths. Then in that
case I would be unable to discover moral truths, since they don't exist. What
you should say is "to be unable to discover moral truth, provided moral truth
exists, means..."
Also, you should say 'implies' instead of 'means', since you cannot get from
what you say is the meaning back to what supposedly means that.
>If S were a moral truth, no
> one would know; and similarly, if S were not a moral truth, no one
> would know
Or, everyone would know that S was not a moral truth, and still no one could
discover any moral truth.
Or, even if there were moral truths, it is possible that people can tell if
something is not a moral truth if it lacks some sort of moral quality, but if
it has this moral quality, they are unable to tell whether this means that the
thing is right or wrong, etc. Therefore they could not discover moral truth if
it existed, but they could still know that moral truth did not exist. That is
the primary way in which you are wrong.
> As your two arguments contradict each other, you cannot consistently
> claim both.
You do not reason well. See above.
George Dance
2714.0...@mb-fc.aol.com>...
> >Subject: Re: Joe T. & bad arguments vs. my disproof of moral realism
> >From: George Dance georg...@hotmail.com
> >Date: 12/7/01 5:01 PM Central Standard Time
> >Message-id: <6312c50b.01120...@posting.google.com>
> >
> >Symmetry <symm...@aol.compare.com> wrote in message news:<20011206211916.2
> >0753.0...@mb-ba.aol.com>...
> >> >As your two arguments contradict each other, you cannot consistently
> >> >claim both.
> >>
> >> They do not contradict each other, because my second argument is a
> >> hypothetical
> >> one.
> >
> >You'll have to spell it out, then. As it is, you don't give either
> >here, just its conclusion.
>
> All you are working from are my conclusions. You think that my positions
> contradict eachother. It is unnecessary to go into the details of my argu
> ments
> to determine if holding them both is contradictory.
It can be done, though it may misstate part of your own argument. In
that case, though, you have no complaint, as you have refused to spell
out that argument yourself.
> I must admit that I did not carefuly read your first reply to me, that I
> responded to.
No problem; it was evident that you did not understand the objection,
and evident that was the reason why. So let me give it again, more
formally.
> > Symmetry <symm...@aol.com> wrote in message news:<30b3ec10.0112051052.459b
> > f5...@posting.google.com>...
> > > OK, the problem is that I have two arguments. One of them is that
> > > there is no moral truth of the type that Owl or D. Friedman envision,
> > > and another is that, if there were such truth, we couldn't discover
> > > it. You were talking about my second argument I believe, and for some
> > > reason I was thinking of my first.
> >
So you are claiming that you know two things:
(a) There is no moral truth of the type that Owl or D. Friedman
envision,
(b) if there were such truth, we couldn't discover it.
These claims are contradictory, as you cannot know both at the same
time.
Suppose you knew (a). Then (a) is true. As (a) is about morality, it
is a moral truth. Therefore, there is a moral truth, which you know.
In order for you to know it, you must have either discovered or
learned it. If you have discovered it, it was possible for you to
discover it; if you have learned it, it must have first been
discovered by someone; in either case, for you to know (a), it must
have been possible to discover (a). Therefore, it must be both that
there is a moral truth (a), and that it must be possible to have
discovered that there is a moral truth (a). Meaning (b) is false, and
therefore you cannot know (b). QED
Or suppose you know (b). Then (b) is true. Then either it is true
that there are no moral truths, or you cannot discover them. Then
either (a) is not a moral truth, or (a) is a moral truth but it is
impossible for you to know that it is. If (a) is not a moral truth,
then either (a) is not about morality or it is not true; as it is
about morality, it must be false. If it is false it is not true, and
if it is not true you cannot know it. Similarly, if (a) is a moral
truth but it is impossible for you to know it is, then you cannot know
it. Therefore, in either case, you cannot know (a). QED
George Dance
3.103633...@corp.supernews.com>...
> > To be unable to discover moral truth means to be unable to tell if
> > some statement S is a moral truth or not. If S were a moral truth, no
> > one would know; and similarly, if S were not a moral truth, no one
> > would know.
> Another reason why it might be impossible to discover moral truth is
> that there might be no such thing: that is, that the predicates "true"
> and "false" are not applicable to statements involving moral predicates
> (e.g., "right", "wrong"). If this is the case, then we would be unable
> to discover moral truth because it doesn't exist.
Right; it's either one or the other. But that's the other horn of the
dilemma:
> > To say that there is no moral truth, is to say of every statement S
> > that might be a moral truth, that it is not; which requires the
> > ability to tell whether S is a moral truth or not.
> But someone who is a non-cognitivist with respect to moral truth, as
> above, *has* that ability: he can say with confidence that for any
> statement S, S is not a moral truth.
But he cannot say T (T = "for any [other] statement S, S is not a
moral truth") with confidence, unless he knows T; and he cannot know
T, unless both T is true, and it is possible for him to know T.
Therefore, as T would be a moral truth (a true statement about
morality) and it is possible for him to know T, it cannot be the case
that, if moral truths existed, it would be impossible for him to know
them.
Conversely (on the other horn of the dilemma), if it were impossible
for him to know moral truths, then it would be impossible for him to
know that T is true, and therefore he cannot know that T is true, and
therefore he cannot say T with
confidence. QED
Symmetry
>From: George Dance georg...@hotmail.com
>Message-id: <6312c50b.01120...@posting.google.com>
>So you are claiming that you know two things:
>(a) There is no moral truth of the type that Owl or D. Friedman
>envision,
>(b) if there were such truth, we couldn't discover it.
>
>These claims are contradictory, as you cannot know both at the same
>time.
>
>Suppose you knew (a). Then (a) is true. As (a) is about morality, it
>is a moral truth.
This is an enormous error, and is probably a major cause of your confusion.
Wrathbone was making the same error earlier.
(a) is not a moral truth at all. If you held that any truth on the subject of
moral truth was itsself a moral truth, then moral skepticism would be
contradictory. The statement "there is no moral truth" would be a moral truth.
Do you honestly think that "there is no moral truth" is contradictory?
If so, you have a weird notion of moral truth -- one that I certainly don't
have.
A moral truth is a truth about what is good, or what one ought to do, etc. The
true statement that moral truth of the above kind does not exist is not a truth
of the moral type, even though its subject is morality. It is not a moral truth
because it does not prescribe anything, or state that anything is good, or
imply anything of the sort.
Another instance of this error:
>Or suppose you know (b). Then (b) is true. Then either it is true
>that there are no moral truths, or you cannot discover them. Then
>either (a) is not a moral truth, or (a) is a moral truth but it is
>impossible for you to know that it is. If (a) is not a moral truth,
>then either (a) is not about morality
Again you confuse the type of a truth with the subject of a truth. Moral truths
are not simply truths about morality. Although all moral truths are in some
sense 'about morality,' all truths about morality are not moral truths.
>QED
Nice try, though.
Symmetry
>From: George Dance georg...@hotmail.com
>Message-id: <6312c50b.0112...@posting.google.com>
>Therefore, as T would be a moral truth (a true statement about
>morality)
This is not the criteria for what is a moral truth. See my other response for
more details.
George Dance
6324.0...@mb-ch.aol.com>...
> >Subject: Re: Joe T. & bad arguments vs. my disproof of moral realism
> >From: Bert Clanton eubi...@charter.net
> >Date: 12/1/01 10:39 AM Central Standard Time
> >Message-id: <eubiotist-A314F...@corp.supernews.com>
> >
> >My proposal is that in the last analysis *all* "oughts" are of this
> >type: "If you want X, and you have to do Y to get X, then it is rational
> >to do Y
>
> Incorrect. The correct statement is "Y is a rational means to X" but for Y to
> be rational, you must hold that obtaining X is rational in itsself. No go
> al by
> itsself is rational or irrational.
That is nonsensical. You are claiming as correct that:
1. A means to an end is rational only if the end is rational; and
2. No end is rational or irrational.
From which it follows by simple logic that:
3. No end is rational. (2 Simp)
4. No means is never rational. (1,3 MT)
5. Every means is irrational. (4 Contra)
As 1 and 2 are correct only if 5 is correct, and 5 is not correct,
then it follows (also by MT) that 1 and 2 are not both correct. QED
(As you seem very confused about what an argument is, I am now using
QED to indicate them.)
> >and it is rational for someone to advise you to do Y"
>
> Again, incorrect. Y being a rational means X does not imply that X is rat
> ional,
> Y is rational, nor advising someone to do either X or Y is rational. All it
> means is.. well, Y is a rational means to X.
So it means:
1. Y is a rational means to X. (stipulated)
2. Whatever is a means to something is a means. (by definition)
3. Y is a means. (1,2 MP)
4. Y is both a means and a rational means. (1,3 Conj)
5. Y is both a means and rational. (4)
6. Y is rational. (5 Simp) QED
So if Y is a rational means to X, that implies that Y is rational; a
conclusion you avoid only by assuming (as above) that "every means is
irrational."
> Coupled with someones desire, you could form a statement like "Y is a rat
> ional
> means to achieving your desires" but this is different from Y being simply
> rational. Such a thing is rather nonsensical and it implies a sort of abs
> olute
> justification for Y which does not exist.
That is of course completely nonsensical; but it's your nonsense. Y
is a rational means to X iff Y is logically entailed by X; if not
doing Y meant that X would not happen, for example. That has nothing
to do with whether X is logically entailed by anything.
> > In
> >conventional philosophical language, I believe that all "oughts" are
> >hypothetical, and none are categorial.
> >
>
> But hypothetical stuff can be descriptive, so this doesn't create some gap
> between oughts and desciptive stuff, though it may create a gap between o
> ughts
> and catagorical descriptive stuff.
So there's no gap. Great!
> >There is IMHO an irreducible gap between ordinary "is" statements and
> >"ought" statements, in that at least by implication an "ought" statement
> >always includes an "if one wants..." clause, and an "is" statement never
> >does--unless it's explicitly an "is" statement just about what somebody
> >wants, in which case there's no "then you have to do.." clause, no
> >"ought".
>
> But you've never established a "then you have to do" clause in any case
> whatsoever. All you've noted is that if Y is a means for X, and a person
> wants
> X, then Y is a rational means to satisfy their desires. One cannot infer
> that Y
> is rational, and one certainly cannot infer that this person then "has to do
> Y."
You'll have to show why that is so. Simply assuming that "all means
are irrational" as a premise does not prove that no means are
rational; q does not follow from (p->q).
> Your trick here seems to be starting out with something like "the person
> has > to
> do Y in order to achieve X", and then simply dropping the "in order to ac
> hieve
> X" part which creates an absolute stateemnt which you have not justified.
No absolute statement was made; OTC, Joe expressly denied that he was
making any. What are you talking about?
> >> >Here, "You ought to do Y" means simply
> >> >"It is rationally justifiable to advise you to do Y."
> >>
> >> I do not like that 'rationaly justifiable' term that you use. Surely i
> >> t is
> >> not
> >> unjustified, by the standard of reason, to advise anything.
Of course it is. If (1) a person wanted an end X, and (2) Y were not
a sufficient means to X and therefore (3) you advised him to do Y,
your advise would not be rationally justified. The logical form of
that is:
1. X
2. ~(Y->X)
----
3. Y
Which is illogical because it entails the contradiction:
4. ~(~YvX) 2 Impl
5. Y&~X 4 Dem
6. ~X 5 Simp
---------
7. X&~X 1,6 Conj QED
> >On the contrary, it is irrational to do what will frustrate your getting
> >what you want
>
> Don't be silly. Doing things that frustrate getting what you want is just an
> irrational way to get what you want.
It cannot be an 'irrational way' unless it is irrational as well as a
way.
What do you find silly about that?
> Your attempt to drop part of this sentence
> that alter its meaning to give you some absolute (and incorrect) statemen
> t are
> rather blatant errors that I thought you were above making.
Again: what are you talking about? No one is attempting to drop
anything.
> Again, "doing X is irrational" and "doing X is an irrational way to get w
> hat I
> want" have different meanings.
Only if the word 'irrational' is being used to mean two things. Is
that what you are claiming?
> >Likewise, at one remove: if you want someone to get what they
> >want, it is rational for you to advise them to do what it takes to get
> >what they want.
>
> Only if you assume that getting what you want is rational. This however does
> not make much sense. As I point out before, no goal in itsself can be rat
> ional
> or irrational.
And therefore all means are irrational. As I've pointed out, that is
a nonsensical assumption; it doesn't make sense to even ask 'Is Y a
rational means or not?', unless it were possible for Y to be either
rational or irrational.
> Reason is logically seperate from 'the passions' or however Hume
> would put it.
Why not actually read some Hume, and find out how he would put it?
You might actually learn something about justifying your opinions (as
opposed to merely asserting them) in the process.
> >You are certainly using the terms "justify" and "rational" differently
> >than I do. I don't know what more to say.
>
> Sentiments and preferences and whatnot are te material that reason has to
> work
> with. You can think of reason as a sort of black box with your objectives as
> inputs and rational ways to achieve these objectives as outputs. These
> objectives cannot be rational or irrational by themselves.
The question is whether the means are rational. If an end cannot be
rational, then: either no means can be rational, or a means can be
rational without the end being rational. So, if a means can be
rational or irrational, it must be the case that either: an end can be
rational or irrational, or a means can be raational or irrational
irrespective of the end's rationality.
> Reason can tell you
> how to achieve the compliment of one of your objectives just as easily as it
> can tell you how to achieve your objectives.
And in either case, the reasoning can be either correct or not: so in
either case, the means can be reational or not. Meaning the
rationality of a means is not dependent on the end.
>
> Neither are the outputs of this black box simply 'the rational thing to d
> o.' If
> you think of them that way, you are 'dropping context' as objectivists li
> ke to
> say. The outputs are the rational means *to achieve your objective*, but
> again
> this is far different from them being simply 'rational.'
What are you talking about? Are you trying to make a distinction
between 'reasoned out in a correct manner' and 'rational'? If so, how
are you defining 'rational'?
> >But IMHO, a morality that includes only "hypothetical oughts" is
> >defective. It ignores important questions: "Why want X rather than W? Is
> >it rational to want just any arbitrary thing or state of affairs? Or do
> >some wants and preferences 'make sense', and others not?"
>
> Wants cannot be rational or irrational. To say a want is irrational would be
> like saying it is in some way contrary to reason, but wants are not the
> subject of reason.
Sounds like more nonsense. If I want X, and reason out that Y is a
means to X, then I want Y. If my reasoning is correct (if Y really is
a means to X), then my wanting Y is rational; if not, not. If I know
my wanting Y is rational, then I have a reason to want Y; if not, not.
> Suppose they spring from biological urges or something, then reason
> has nothing to do with want-formation so to make a reason-based appraisal of
> these wants by calling them rational or irrational in themselves is incor
> rect.
If Y simply sprang from a biological urge, then one would want Y; but
not as a means to X. So if one wants Y as a means, then one does not
want Y simply from a biological urge, but from a processs of reason.
A process of reasoning can be either valid or invalid. If it is
valid, then wanting Y is rationally justified; if not, not. So if it
is possible to want Y as a means, then it is possible to correctly
appraise Y as rationally justified (rational) or not; and anyone who
values anything as a means can make a similar appraisal.
>
> >I think that some wants and preferences *do* "make sense", and others
> >don't.
>
> They 'make sense' to you, probably in the sense that you want them too. So
> what? What does that have to do with reason?
Wanting Y as a means (ie, reasoning: ((Want X)&(X->Y))->Want Y)), has
everything to with reason. It's reason that gives the want.
> >I think that wanting what is objectively "good for you", and
> >being averse to what is objectively "bad for you", make sense;
>
> Because your genes have been selected for such that you'd want this sort of
> stuff. Having genes that make you want X, or feel that X is somehow the
> natural, most sensical, and best choice does not imply that X is simply
> "rational."
Nor does it imply that X is not rational, much less that it is
'neither rational nor irrational'. This sounds like a non-sequitur.
George Dance
2419.0...@mb-md.aol.com>...
> >Subject: Re: Joe T. & bad arguments vs. my disproof of moral realism
> >From: George Dance georg...@hotmail.com
> >Date: 12/8/01 7:03 AM Central Standard Time
> >Message-id: <6312c50b.01120...@posting.google.com>
>
> >So you are claiming that you know two things:
> >(a) There is no moral truth of the type that Owl or D. Friedman
> >envision,
> >(b) if there were such truth, we couldn't discover it.
> >
> >These claims are contradictory, as you cannot know both at the same
> >time.
> >
> >Suppose you knew (a). Then (a) is true. As (a) is about morality, it
> >is a moral truth.
>
> This is an enormous error, and is probably a major cause of your confusion.
> Wrathbone was making the same error earlier.
>
> (a) is not a moral truth at all.
Good point, if you can back it up. Unfortunately, you don't. I made a
pretty simple argument - that, in general, truth means true statement
and moral means concerning morality - which you're calling an error in
this one case, but not giving any reasons for your preferred
definition, or even telling us what it is.
> If you held that any truth on the subject of
> moral truth was itsself a moral truth, then moral skepticism would be
> contradictory. The statement "there is no moral truth" would be a moral
> truth.
That is an excellent reductio ad absurdum argument; my
congratulations. Unfortunately, though, I'm not convinced of the
absurdum, as I'm already claiming a contradiction; so this does
nothing to convince me that a moral truth is something other than what
I believe it is.
> Do you honestly think that "there is no moral truth" is contradictory?
Honestly, yes; it's a universal generalization of the very type
skepticism opposes. The most a consistent skeptic can say is, "I can
see no reasons at all to believe there is any such thing as moral
truth," or "I am as sure that there is moral truth, as I am of
anything" - but he cannot pontificate.
> If so, you have a weird notion of moral truth -- one that I certainly don't
> have.
It's not at all weird. First, it can be supported by definition: a
'truth' is (among other things) 'a true statement,' and 'moral' is
(among other things) 'concerned with accepted rules and standards of
human behaviour." (Oxford Canadian) Second, it matches some of the
explicit definitions that non-skeptics have offered - G. Sollars, for
one, who defines 'moral realism' as the belief that there are true
moral statements.
> A moral truth is a truth about what is good, or what one ought to do, etc
> . The
> true statement that moral truth of the above kind does not exist is not a
> truth
> of the moral type, even though its subject is morality.
How can it be anything else? 'There are no moral truths' declares, a
priori, that statements like 'Murder is wrong' are not true - every
one of them. That may be - but you can't prove that unless it were
possible to know some moral truths, or (at minimum) have standards by
which you can justifiably believe in their truth.
> It is not a moral truth
> because it does not prescribe anything, or state that anything is good, or
> imply anything of the sort.
No? Honestly, does "Murder is wrong is false" state anything other
than that
"Murder is not wrong"? How does "murder is not wrong" avoid being
prescriptive, evaluative, and all the rest?
>
> Another instance of this error:
>
You have not shown the "error," as yet.
> >Or suppose you know (b). Then (b) is true. Then either it is true
> >that there are no moral truths, or you cannot discover them. Then
> >either (a) is not a moral truth, or (a) is a moral truth but it is
> >impossible for you to know that it is. If (a) is not a moral truth,
> >then either (a) is not about morality
>
> Again you confuse the type of a truth with the subject of a truth.
It is confusing to speak of 'types' of truth. Apparently, you are
trying to make a distinction between a truth of morality, and a truth
about morality. As I've tried to show, that's a distinction that
can't be maintained in practice: what authority a moral code has, is
probably the most important fact about it in terms of what it actually
forbids and compels.
> Moral truths
> are not simply truths about morality. Although all moral truths are in some
> sense 'about morality,' all truths about morality are not moral truths.
That is a distinction you cannot maintain. If "Murder is wrong" is a
(potential) moral truth, then "'Murder is wrong' is true" is one. If
"'Murder is wrong' is true" is a moral truth, then "'Murder is not
wrong' is not true" is one. As "There are no moral truths" means (by
strict implication) that "'Murder is not wrong' is not true", "There
are no moral truths" must be one as well.
> >QED
>
> Nice try, though.
Ditto.
Bert Clanton
> Symmetry <symm...@aol.compare.com> wrote in message news:<20011208102242.2
> 2419.0...@mb-md.aol.com>...
> > >Subject: Re: Joe T. & bad arguments vs. my disproof of moral realism
> > >From: George Dance georg...@hotmail.com
> > >Date: 12/8/01 7:03 AM Central Standard Time
> > >Message-id: <6312c50b.01120...@posting.google.com>
> >
> > >So you are claiming that you know two things:
> > >(a) There is no moral truth of the type that Owl or D. Friedman
> > >envision,
> > >(b) if there were such truth, we couldn't discover it.
> > >
> > >These claims are contradictory, as you cannot know both at the same
> > >time.
> > >
> > >Suppose you knew (a). Then (a) is true. As (a) is about morality, it
> > >is a moral truth.
> >
> > This is an enormous error, and is probably a major cause of your confusion.
> > Wrathbone was making the same error earlier.
> >
> > (a) is not a moral truth at all.
I'm truly sorry to have to disagree with you, George, since IMHO you're
generally one of the canniest posters on HPO. But IMHO, "Suppose you
know (a). Then (a) is true. As (a) is about morality, it is a moral
truth."is simply mistaken. The meaning of "a moral truth about item X or
act Y" appropriate to the current discussion is IMHO "a true claim that
an item X is good or bad, or that an act Y is right or wrong". But the
claim "There is no true claim that an item X is good or bad, or that an
act Y is right or wrong" is not a claim that any item X is good or bad,
or that any act Y is right or wrong. Hence it is not a moral claim in
Symmetry's sense. IMHO you can agree or disagree with Symmetry's moral
scepticism. In the last analysis, I happen to disagree. But I think that
your argument that he's committing a contradiction is simply not valid.
IMHO this *is* exactly the same as the error that IMHO Wrathbone
committed earlier.
>
> Good point, if you can back it up. Unfortunately, you don't. I made a
> pretty simple argument - that, in general, truth means true statement
> and moral means concerning morality - which you're calling an error in
> this one case, but not giving any reasons for your preferred
> definition, or even telling us what it is.
>
IMHO, you're failing to distinguish between moral claims and systems
whose constituents are moral claims. IMHO, "moral claim" means "claim
regarding the moral status of some item as good or bad, or of some act
as right or wrong". It does *not* mean "claim regarding *morality as a
system* of moral claims of goodness, badness, rightness, or wrongness".
You seem to be conflating the two meanings.
[snip]
>
> > Do you honestly think that "there is no moral truth" is contradictory?
>
> Honestly, yes; it's a universal generalization of the very type
> skepticism opposes. The most a consistent skeptic can say is, "I can
> see no reasons at all to believe there is any such thing as moral
> truth," or "I am as sure that there is moral truth, as I am of
> anything" - but he cannot pontificate.
>
I disagree. A moral non-cognitivist can say "The predicates 'true' and
'false' are not applicable to moral statements, which are simply
*expressions of feeling*, not *assertions that something has a certain
property, or belongs to a certain category, or participates in a certain
relationship*". While this is not what I believe, I see no
contradiction in it.
> > If so, you have a weird notion of moral truth -- one that I certainly don't
> > have.
>
> It's not at all weird. First, it can be supported by definition: a
> 'truth' is (among other things) 'a true statement,' and 'moral' is
> (among other things) 'concerned with accepted rules and standards of
> human behaviour." (Oxford Canadian)
Your "among other things" reinforces my belief that you are conflating
two distinct usages of the term "moral".
> Second, it matches some of the
> explicit definitions that non-skeptics have offered - G. Sollars, for
> one, who defines 'moral realism' as the belief that there are true
> moral statements.
>
> > A moral truth is a truth about what is good, or what one ought to do, etc
> > . The
> > true statement that moral truth of the above kind does not exist is not a
> > truth
> > of the moral type, even though its subject is morality.
>
I agree.
> How can it be anything else? 'There are no moral truths' declares, a
> priori, that statements like 'Murder is wrong' are not true - every
> one of them. That may be - but you can't prove that unless it were
> possible to know some moral truths, or (at minimum) have standards by
> which you can justifiably believe in their truth.
>
Same problem all over again. IMHO when Symmetry says "There are no moral
truths", he *doesn't* mean "All moral claims, like 'Murder is wrong' are
false statements." What he means is "The predicates 'true' and 'false'
are *not applicable* to moral claims, such as 'Murder is wrong'." That
is not a statement about the rightness or wrongness of murder: it is not
a moral claim about murder! It is a statement about *all* moral claims.*
> > It is not a moral truth
> > because it does not prescribe anything, or state that anything is good, or
> > imply anything of the sort.
>
I'd agree with this usage.
> No? Honestly, does "Murder is wrong is false" state anything other
> than that
> "Murder is not wrong"? How does "murder is not wrong" avoid being
> prescriptive, evaluative, and all the rest?
It *doesn't* avoid prescription and evaluation. It is in fact a
prescriptive moral expression. If I understand him correctly, Symmetry
is not saying "'Murder is wrong' is a false assertion". He's saying,
"'Murder is wrong' is not really an assertion, which can be true or
false. In spite of its grammatical form, it's a prescriptive expression,
equivalent to 'Don't do X'. And prescriptions are neither true nor
false." He can correct me if I misunderstand him.,
> >
> > Another instance of this error:
> >
> You have not shown the "error," as yet.
>
I disagree.
> > >Or suppose you know (b). Then (b) is true. Then either it is true
> > >that there are no moral truths, or you cannot discover them. Then
> > >either (a) is not a moral truth, or (a) is a moral truth but it is
> > >impossible for you to know that it is. If (a) is not a moral truth,
> > >then either (a) is not about morality
> >
> > Again you confuse the type of a truth with the subject of a truth.
>
> It is confusing to speak of 'types' of truth. Apparently, you are
> trying to make a distinction between a truth of morality, and a truth
> about morality. As I've tried to show, that's a distinction that
> can't be maintained in practice: what authority a moral code has, is
> probably the most important fact about it in terms of what it actually
> forbids and compels.
>
Not so, for the reasons given above. A truth about the science of
physics is not a truth about any physical phenomenon. A truth about
sentences concerning aardvarks is not a truth about aardvarks. A truth
about cookbooks is not a truth about foods. For any X, a truth about a
statement or set of statements about X is not a truth about X.
> > Moral truths
> > are not simply truths about morality. Although all moral truths are in some
> > sense 'about morality,' all truths about morality are not moral truths.
>
> That is a distinction you cannot maintain. If "Murder is wrong" is a
> (potential) moral truth, then "'Murder is wrong' is true" is one.
Simply not so, for the reasons given above.
> If
> "'Murder is wrong' is true" is a moral truth, then "'Murder is not
> wrong' is not true" is one. As "There are no moral truths" means (by
> strict implication) that "'Murder is not wrong' is not true", "There
> are no moral truths" must be one as well.
>
But IMHO what Symmetry is saying is "Although 'Murder is wrong' has the
grammatical form of a statement about murder, it is in fact simply an
*emotive expression* of the utterer's attitude toward murder; and as
such, the predicates 'true' and 'false' are not applicable to it. So
'Murder is wrong' is not a true assertion, since it isn't really an
assertion at all."
> > Nice try, though.
>
> Ditto.
On this one, as happens only rarely, I have to side with Symmetry.
BTW, I'm neither a moral sceptic nor an emotivist. I simply think that
your refutation of Symmetry's moral scepticism isn't valid.
Best wishes,
Bert
Symmetry
>Date: 12/8/01 10:15 AM Central Standard Time
>Message-id: <6312c50b.01120...@posting.google.com>
>
>Symmetry <symm...@aol.compare.com> wrote in message news:<20011206131710.1
>6324.0...@mb-ch.aol.com>...
>
>> >Subject: Re: Joe T. & bad arguments vs. my disproof of moral realism
>> >From: Bert Clanton eubi...@charter.net
>> >Date: 12/1/01 10:39 AM Central Standard Time
>> >Message-id: <eubiotist-A314F...@corp.supernews.com>
>> >
>> >My proposal is that in the last analysis *all* "oughts" are of this
>> >type: "If you want X, and you have to do Y to get X, then it is rational
>> >to do Y
>>
>> Incorrect. The correct statement is "Y is a rational means to X" but for Y
>to
>> be rational, you must hold that obtaining X is rational in itsself. No go
>> al by
>> itsself is rational or irrational.
>
>That is nonsensical. You are claiming as correct that:
>1. A means to an end is rational only if the end is rational; and
>2. No end is rational or irrational.
>From which it follows by simple logic that:
>3. No end is rational. (2 Simp)
>4. No means is never rational. (1,3 MT)
Incorrect. What you need to say is "No means is ever rational." What you
actually say means that, there does not exist any means M such that M is never
rational. In fact, for all means M, M is never rational. The predicates
'rational' and 'irrational' do not apply to means by themselves.
>5. Every means is irrational. (4 Contra)
Does not follow. ~rational =/= irrational.
You need to say 'nonrational.'
>(As you seem very confused about what an argument is, I am now using
>QED to indicate them.)
This is rather comical. If there was ever anyone with such poor reasoning skill
who was so into logic and formalizing arguments, I am unaware of it. I suspect
that you are just trying to get back at me for showing you the logical errors
in your attempted derivations of some sort of ethics awhile ago, and for
pointing out to you that "when" was not logically equivilant to "if", and
numerous other instances where I had to give you logical instruction. Maybe you
are just trying to provolk me so that you can learn more, though.
It is true that I have not been giving many arguments lately, and instead have
chosen to simply point out errors and try to illustrate them w/ a helpful
example. You'd think that having your own arguments corrected so many times by
me that you'd realize how absurd your comments are.
>> >and it is rational for someone to advise you to do Y"
>>
>> Again, incorrect. Y being a rational means X does not imply that X is rat
>> ional,
>> Y is rational, nor advising someone to do either X or Y is rational. All it
>> means is.. well, Y is a rational means to X.
>
>So it means:
>1. Y is a rational means to X. (stipulated)
>2. Whatever is a means to something is a means. (by definition)
>3. Y is a means. (1,2 MP)
>4. Y is both a means and a rational means. (1,3 Conj)
Error. The "rational_means" predicate takes two arguments, a means and an end,
and evaluates to true if and only if the means is a rational way to achieve the
end.
Here you only specify one argument. Perhaps you mean that:
Ex( rational_means( Y, x) ) (Ex == there exists an x such that )
That is true. We will replace your ill-formed premise with the one above.
If you have trouble with this, what you are doing is somewhat analagous to
this. X is bigger than Y, therefore X is bigger. "X is bigger" makes as much
sense on its own as "X is a rational means." Bigger than what? Means to what?
Or do you just mean there exists some end for which X is a rational means?
>5. Y is both a means and rational. (4)
Incorrect. the rational means predicate is not funcitonaly equivilant to the
predicate with this definition:
rational_means(Y, X)
{
Ez( means( Y, z )) /\ rational(Y)
}
Where means(Y, z ) evaluates to true IFF Y is a means to z, and rational(Y)
evaluates to true IFF Y is rational. Notice that X appears nowhere in the
definition of the predicate.
In other words, to be a rational means to X is not the same thing as to be both
rational and a means.
X being a rational means to Y means something very very approximately similar
to, "[X occurs] <--> [Y will occur]" (actually, this more closely resembles X
being the ONLY means to Y.)
Saying simply "X is rational" implies that in some sense, X, by itsself, is in
accord w/ reason or something. Try to use the very approximate alternate form
of "X is a (the only, really) rational means to Y", namely "[X occurs]<-->[Y
will occur]" to prove that either X or Y by themselves are somehow in accord w/
reason, or that their negation is somehow 'against' reason. Granted my symbolic
representation is not exact, but its not too bad.
My advice to you is that you should really be more careful in translating
arguments in english into some logical form that you think represents the
arguments. Maybe your logical skills have improved such that you no longer make
elementary logical errors, but this is not good enough. Translating from
english into formal logic requires careful thought. For instance you should
have thought about what a rational means really was instead of thinking it
could be literally translated into the conjuction of being a means and being
rational.
>> Coupled with someones desire, you could form a statement like "Y is a rat
>> ional
>> means to achieving your desires" but this is different from Y being simply
>> rational. Such a thing is rather nonsensical and it implies a sort of abs
>> olute
>> justification for Y which does not exist.
>
>That is of course completely nonsensical; but it's your nonsense. Y
>is a rational means to X iff Y is logically entailed by X;
That is not how 'rational means' is used. You make a huge blunder when you say
"iff" above. Suppose whenever Y occurs, X does not occur, and Y always occurs.
Then your X-->Y holds, but certainly no one would say that Y is a rational
means to X.
>if not
>doing Y meant that X would not happen, for example. That has nothing
>to do with whether X is logically entailed by anything.
Again, X is a rational means to Y certainly does not translate into Y-->X.
Aside from the above problem, you don't capture any notion of causation that
comes w/ the original phrase.
For instance, X = you call your mom and leave a message, Y = there is a message
from you on your mom's answering machine.
Surely we'd say X is a means to Y, and Y is not a means to X. But we could
write X-->Y, which, if we make some simplifying assumptions, is reasonable.
According to you though, this is equivilant to something like "there being a
message from you on your moms answering machine is a rational means to your
calling your mom and leaving a message."
What can we learn from this? Again, be careful how you translate english into
formal logic.
>
>> >There is IMHO an irreducible gap between ordinary "is" statements and
>> >"ought" statements, in that at least by implication an "ought" statement
>> >always includes an "if one wants..." clause, and an "is" statement never
>> >does--unless it's explicitly an "is" statement just about what somebody
>> >wants, in which case there's no "then you have to do.." clause, no
>> >"ought".
>>
>> But you've never established a "then you have to do" clause in any case
>> whatsoever. All you've noted is that if Y is a means for X, and a person
>> wants
>> X, then Y is a rational means to satisfy their desires. One cannot infer
>> that Y
>> is rational, and one certainly cannot infer that this person then "has to
>do
>> Y."
>
>You'll have to show why that is so.
No one has to do anything.
> Simply assuming that "all means
>are irrational" as a premise does not prove that no means are
No one is assuming that premise.
>> Your trick here seems to be starting out with something like "the person
>> has > to
>> do Y in order to achieve X", and then simply dropping the "in order to ac
>> hieve
>> X" part which creates an absolute stateemnt which you have not justified.
>
>No absolute statement was made; OTC, Joe expressly denied that he was
>making any. What are you talking about?
I have no idea who Joe is. I was posting to Bert Clanton, who was making
statements about how individual acts were rational in a way that was not
relative to achieving an end. Not being relative in that way makes them
absolute in the sense I was talking about. Again, it is analogous to the
absolute statement "X is bigger", which I call absolute since it treats bigness
as not a relational or relative thing.
>> >> >Here, "You ought to do Y" means simply
>> >> >"It is rationally justifiable to advise you to do Y."
>> >>
>> >> I do not like that 'rationaly justifiable' term that you use. Surely i
>> >> t is
>> >> not
>> >> unjustified, by the standard of reason, to advise anything.
>
>Of course it is. If (1) a person wanted an end X, and (2) Y were not
>a sufficient means to X and therefore (3) you advised him to do Y,
>your advise would not be rationally justified.
I agree. It would also not be rationally unjustified. unjustified =/=
~justified.
Just as an aside, suppose that my goal was to trick the person into doing Y,
even though Y will not achieve his goals. Then advising him to do Y would be a
rational means to my end, so, according to you, I assume it would be
'rationally justified'. But how can you tell which it is, without referece to
some goal? For my goal, advising him is rationally justified. For his, it
isn't. So, in an absolute sense, is advising him rationaly justified or not?
You cannot just leave 'rationaly justified' hanging there without a qualifier.
Making him follow my advice is not a rationally justifed means for achieving
his goal, but it is a rationally justified one for achieving mine.
>The logical form of
>that is:
>
>1. X
>2. ~(Y->X)
>----
>3. Y
>
>Which is illogical because it entails the contradiction:
This is some comedy here. The issue is whether my advising him in itsself is
somehow contrary to reason. All you are showing is that doing Y and getting X
are incompatible. This doesn't imply that my advising him is unreasonable.
>4. ~(~YvX) 2 Impl
>5. Y&~X 4 Dem
>6. ~X 5 Simp
>---------
>7. X&~X 1,6 Conj QED
Now, what is it that you think you proved? That *advising* him to do Y is
contrary to reason? Not in the least -- you proof is quite far from that. There
was no question that if he did Y he could not get X. Pay attention to what
things mean in english before trying to translate them and feel like you're
doing something useful when you're actually proving some trivial irrelevent
thing that everyone accepts.
>> >On the contrary, it is irrational to do what will frustrate your getting
>> >what you want
>>
>> Don't be silly. Doing things that frustrate getting what you want is just
>an
>> irrational way to get what you want.
>
>It cannot be an 'irrational way' unless it is irrational as well as a
>way.
>What do you find silly about that?
See above. X being an irrational way to achieve Y does not imply simply "X is
irrational" and "X is a way."
X being an irrational way to achieve Y can be taken very approximately to mean
that if X occurs, Y will not occur, or at least will not be any more likely to
occur than if X did not occur. You can try to find a more accurate translation
if you like, but try to get from that to the conclusion that X in itsself is
irrational.
Parsing english in a simplistic and incorrect manner is not cool. Think because
you make these translations.
>> Your attempt to drop part of this sentence
>> that alter its meaning to give you some absolute (and incorrect) statemen
>> t are
>> rather blatant errors that I thought you were above making.
>
>Again: what are you talking about? No one is attempting to drop
>anything.
Pay attention. A transition is made from "X is a rational means to Y" to "X is
rational." The entire relationship to Y is being discarded and it is claimed
that the 'rational' part still pertains to X on its own. That is an instance of
dropping something, and yes, people are trying to do it. You in particular.
>> Again, "doing X is irrational" and "doing X is an irrational way to get w
>> hat I
>> want" have different meanings.
>
>Only if the word 'irrational' is being used to mean two things. Is
>that what you are claiming?
No. Try looking at what things mean and not only their lexical form.
>> >Likewise, at one remove: if you want someone to get what they
>> >want, it is rational for you to advise them to do what it takes to get
>> >what they want.
>>
>> Only if you assume that getting what you want is rational. This however
>does
>> not make much sense. As I point out before, no goal in itsself can be rat
>> ional
>> or irrational.
>
>And therefore all means are irrational.
No, refer to the mention of your error earlier in the post.
> As I've pointed out, that is
>a nonsensical assumption; it doesn't make sense to even ask 'Is Y a
>rational means or not?', unless it were possible for Y to be either
>rational or irrational.
It doesn't make sense to ask that question because what the means is for is not
specified. It is like asking if some location is far or not, without reference
to some point that it could be far from. The rational_means(..) predicate only
makes sense if it takes two arguments.
Since we all know how I hate giving arguments, we shall run through some
exercises now for your benefit. I will assume the rational_means predicate
takes one argument, and I will give you expressions containing this predicate
and you tell me whether they evaluate to true or false.
Of course, we assume the argument is the means.
valueOf( rational_means( eating an icecream cone )) == ?
valueOf( rational_means( going to the zoo )) == ?
valueOf( rational_means( becoming an investment banker )) == ?
Since, according to you, you don't need an end to determine if a means is
rational, I will be expecting answers from you to each of the above.
>> Reason is logically seperate from 'the passions' or however Hume
>> would put it.
>
>Why not actually read some Hume, and find out how he would put it?
Not a good use of my time.
>You might actually learn something about justifying your opinions (as
>opposed to merely asserting them) in the process.
I would not be surprised if the reason you were so into writing out semi-formal
arguments on HPO was due to the inspiration you got from watching me do so
countless times in the past.
>> Reason can tell you
>> how to achieve the compliment of one of your objectives just as easily as
>it
>> can tell you how to achieve your objectives.
>
>And in either case, the reasoning can be either correct or not: so in
>either case, the means can be reational or not. Meaning the
>rationality of a means is not dependent on the end.
Then you will gladly fill in the truth values for the expressions that I list
above, where I only give you a means and ask you to tell me whether or not it
is a rational means.
>>
>> Neither are the outputs of this black box simply 'the rational thing to d
>> o.' If
>> you think of them that way, you are 'dropping context' as objectivists li
>> ke to
>> say. The outputs are the rational means *to achieve your objective*, but
>> again
>> this is far different from them being simply 'rational.'
>
>What are you talking about? Are you trying to make a distinction
>between 'reasoned out in a correct manner' and 'rational'? If so, how
>are you defining 'rational'?
Not really. To determine if some plan is reasoned out in a correct manner, it
is absolutely necessary to know the objective, or what the plan is supposed to
be 'correct for.' If someone gives me a list of steps he is going to take, and
I notice that these steps will lead to outcome X, then, if the plan is designed
to achieve X, the reasoning would be correct. If the design was to achieve
not-X, it wouldn't be. It is impossible to evaluate the rationality of a plan
without reference to what it attempts to achieve. Similarly, it is impossible
to tell whether some action is contrary to reason or not without the context of
the goal that the action is either a reasonable or unreasonable means to.
George Dance
2419.0...@mb-md.aol.com>...
> >Subject: Re: Joe T. & bad arguments vs. my disproof of moral realism
> >From: George Dance georg...@hotmail.com
> >Date: 12/8/01 8:59 AM Central Standard Time
> >Message-id: <6312c50b.0112...@posting.google.com>
>
> >Therefore, as T would be a moral truth (a true statement about
> >morality)
>
> This is not the criteria for what is a moral truth. See my other response for
> more details.
I'm not convinced by what you said (or by what Bert said, for that
matter), but I'm willing to grant it for the discussion, and make the
same argument in a way that does not depend on labels.
You claim that you know both that:
a) there are no moral truths (by your meaning of the word); and that:
b) if such truths existed, it would not be possible for anyone to
discover them.
For you to know (a), it is necessary for you to be able to identify
what a moral truth would be - if you couldn't tell what a moral truth
was, you could not know that there were none. Being able to identify
what a moral truth means being able to determine, for each possible
moral truth that you examine, whether it actually was a moral truth or
not. That entails in turn that, if any of the statements you look at
were indeed a moral truth, you would be able tto tell that it was a
moral truth; meaning, that if there were any moral truths, it would be
possible to discover them. Meaning (b) would be false, and you could
not know it.
Conversely, if you know (b), (b) must be true. So it must be true
that, if there are moral truths, you cannot discover them. Either
there are moral truths, or there are not; that covers all cases. If
there are none, you could not discover them. Therefore, either you
cannot discover moral truth, or you cannot discover moral truth;
discovering moral truth is simply impossible for you. In that case,
though, it is impossible for you tell that there are no moral truths,
for you would not be able to discover one if you found it. Therefore
you cannot tell whether there are any moral truths or not, and
therefore you cannot know (a).
I don't know how I can express this better, except perhaps
symbolically. If you wish, I can take a stab at doing that.
Symmetry
>From: George Dance georg...@hotmail.com
>Message-id: <6312c50b.01120...@posting.google.com>
>> >Suppose you knew (a). Then (a) is true. As (a) is about morality, it
>> >is a moral truth.
>>
>> This is an enormous error, and is probably a major cause of your confusion.
>> Wrathbone was making the same error earlier.
>>
>> (a) is not a moral truth at all.
>
>Good point, if you can back it up. Unfortunately, you don't.
This is mainly a sementic issue. I originally called it an error because I
thought perhaps you actually thought 'there is no moral(in my sense) truth' was
actually a moral(in my sense) truth.' There is nothing non-coventionaly wrong
with using 'moral truth' in your way, other than it is a more limited use of
language which probably impedes your reasoning about moral stuff since it does
not recognize an important distinction.
>Unfortunately, though, I'm not convinced of the
>absurdum, as I'm already claiming a contradiction; so this does
>nothing to convince me that a moral truth is something other than what
>I believe it is.
What do you mean, convince you? We just discovered that your charge of
contradictoryness was a result of you misinterpreting me because you hold a
less subtle definition of moral truth than I do. If you want to show that my
conclusions entail a contradiction, you can't just pretend my words mean what
you want them to mean.
>> truth
>> of the moral type, even though its subject is morality.
>
>How can it be anything else? 'There are no moral truths' declares, a
>priori, that statements like 'Murder is wrong' are not true - every
>one of them. That may be - but you can't prove that unless it were
>possible to know some moral truths, or (at minimum) have standards by
>which you can justifiably believe in their truth.
I can't tell if your 'at the very least' condition is wrong, since I am not
sure what you mean. You'll have to clarify. Maybe you can write up a formal
argument.
Your assertation that 'there are no moral truths' must be some a priori truth
is unjustified.
>> It is not a moral truth
>> because it does not prescribe anything, or state that anything is good, or
>> imply anything of the sort.
>
>No? Honestly, does "Murder is wrong is false" state anything other
>than that
>"Murder is not wrong"?
Nope.
>How does "murder is not wrong" avoid being
>prescriptive, evaluative, and all the rest?
How doesn't it? It doesn't prescribe any action or say that anything is
good/bad, etc. "Murder is not wrong" just means that there does not exist some
moral property of wrongess that murder posesses." That doesn't imply that
murder posesses some property of rightness, nor does it imply that its good to
murder, or its bad, etc. It is entirely without prescription.
>> Again you confuse the type of a truth with the subject of a truth.
>
>It is confusing to speak of 'types' of truth. Apparently, you are
>trying to make a distinction between a truth of morality, and a truth
>about morality. As I've tried to show, that's a distinction that
>can't be maintained in practice:
Where have you tried to show that? Again, maybe you can write up a formal
argument.
>what authority a moral code has, is
>probably the most important fact about it in terms of what it actually
>forbids and compels.
I see the latter as being rather independent. If I make up a moral code that
strongly fobids murder, then if it forbids strongly enough, it could forbid as
much as objectivism or christinaity. Whethere the moral code reflects reality
or not doesn't change the meaning of its content.
>> Moral truths
>> are not simply truths about morality. Although all moral truths are in some
>> sense 'about morality,' all truths about morality are not moral truths.
>
>That is a distinction you cannot maintain.
Hopefully you'll give a reason:
>If "Murder is wrong" is a
>(potential) moral truth, then "'Murder is wrong' is true" is one.
Yep.
>If
>"'Murder is wrong' is true" is a moral truth, then "'Murder is not
>wrong' is not true" is one.
Yep.
>As "There are no moral truths" means (by
>strict implication) that "'Murder is not wrong' is not true",
Poor reasoning, again. "Murder is not wrong" is not a moral truth in my sense,
because it doesn't prescribe action or say anything is good or bad, or anything
ought to be a certain way, etc.
>> >QED
>>
>> Nice try, though.
>
>Ditto.
I don't think I can reply likewise in this post. Even after you were made aware
the sort of criteria I used for whether something was a moral truth or not, you
still asserted that "Murder is not wrong" was a moral truth. That is just
awful. You should be embarassed.
Symmetry
>Date: 12/8/01 7:38 PM Central Standard Time
>Message-id: <eubiotist-D5467...@corp.supernews.com>
>
>A moral non-cognitivist can say "The predicates 'true' and
>'false' are not applicable to moral statements, which are simply
>*expressions of feeling*, not *assertions that something has a certain
>property, or belongs to a certain category, or participates in a certain
>relationship*". While this is not what I believe, I see no
>contradiction in it.
Nor is there any contradiction in saying that, all moral claims are strictly
false, which is my position.
When someone makes a moral claim they are trying to ascribe a nonexistant
property to something. Since these moral properties do not exist, then they are
wrong in ascribing them to things, and all of their moral claims are false.
>IMHO when Symmetry says "There are no moral
>truths", he *doesn't* mean "All moral claims, like 'Murder is wrong' are
>false statements." What he means is "The predicates 'true' and 'false'
>are *not applicable* to moral claims, such as 'Murder is wrong'.
Nope. My position is that all moral claims are false statements. Any statement
which says that something has a property which it does not have, is a false
statement. This is precisely what moral claims do.
>> No? Honestly, does "Murder is wrong is false" state anything other
>> than that
>> "Murder is not wrong"? How does "murder is not wrong" avoid being
>> prescriptive, evaluative, and all the rest?
>
>It *doesn't* avoid prescription and evaluation.
Of course it does. It avoids prescription. You could say it doesn't avoid
evaluation, because you can say it uses evaluation to determine that there are
no moral properties than can be had by anything. But this is not moral
evaluation.
"Murder is not wrong" does not imply anything at all about anything being good,
bad, right, wrong, or what anyone should do.
Symmetry
>Message-id: <MPG.167aaa0f3b...@mail.nji.com>
>> Now, here is where you seem to get a little loopy. How do you figure bler
>> gness
>> is more arbitrary than health?
>
>Because you gave two different definitions for it, and because it had no
>reference at all until you introduced it.
Its more arbitrary in a social or cultural sense. If that is all you mean, then
OK.
>> I must make reference to uninteresting
>> things like definitions to show you that the only way that health is a real
>> property is in the same way that blergness is a real property.
>
>That point I already understand.
Okay, excellent.
>OK, health and blergness (definition one or two?) both name real
>properties. And so?
I thought that you thought there was something more to health, because you were
analogizing it to goodness. I am used to people thinking goodness is some
non-physical property of some other platonic realm, so I was immagining you
thinking of some platonic form for health that people percieved.
>> To reiterate an earlier comment, if your notion of morality and goodness
>and
>> such is so weak and vacuous that there is no 'gap' between it as
>descriptive
>> stuff, then as far as I am concerned you are a moral skeptic.
>
>Inventing funny private languages seems to be a hobby not limited to
>Objectivists.
I think it is you who are using language in a misleading way.
>They like to "prove" things by changing the meaning of
>"true"; you prefer to do it by changing the meaning of "skeptic".
>
I disagree. You like to change the meaning of 'moral', for some reason.
>As I recall, your view of moral statements is that they are like a dog's
>bark.
Not really. In reality, I often say that moral outrage or condemnation has the
exact same amount of significance as a dog's bark. But I think when most people
make moral claims, they claim things that are actually false -- that things
have properties which do not exist. Dog's don't do that.
>If so, it is disingenuous for you to claim that someone who thinks
>moral statements can be true or false holds a particularly "weak and
>vacuous" notion of morality.
I don't call their notion weak and vacuuous because they think moral statements
can be true or false. I think they can be true or false too. All of them are
false, because the properties that they asribe do not exist.
Again, their notions are weak and vaccuous because there is no gap between what
they call morality and descriptive stuff. Therefore, it is true (though you may
disagree due to a reasoning error on your part) that what they call morality
cannot be prescriptive (unless of course you redefine 'prescriptive' too).
George Dance
9136.0...@mb-mv.aol.com>...
> >Subject: Re: Joe T. & bad arguments vs. my disproof of moral realism
> >From: George Dance georg...@hotmail.com
> >Date: 12/8/01 10:15 AM Central Standard Time
> >Message-id: <6312c50b.01120...@posting.google.com>
> >
> >Symmetry <symm...@aol.compare.com> wrote in message news:<20011206131710.1
> >6324.0...@mb-ch.aol.com>...
> >> Incorrect. The correct statement is "Y is a rational means to X" but for Y
> to
> >> be rational, you must hold that obtaining X is rational in itsself. No go
> >> al by
> >> itsself is rational or irrational.
> >
> >That is nonsensical. You are claiming as correct that:
> >1. A means to an end is rational only if the end is rational; and
> >2. No end is rational or irrational.
> >From which it follows by simple logic that:
> >3. No end is rational. (2 Simp)
> >4. No means is *ever rational. (1,3 MT)
>
> Incorrect.
WTF? What is incorrect?; that is a completely sound argument.
> What you need to say is "No means is ever rational."
Which is what I did say was your conclusion (see 4 above). Are you
just saying that it is incorrect to loof for reasons; that you just
asserted this conclusion? (Oh, I see I typed 'never' for 'ever'.
That was just a typo, which I've gone back and fixed, indicated by the
*.)
> What you
> actually say means that, there does not exist any means M such that M is
> never
> rational.
Just a typo, as you would have seen if you understood validity. Get
off it.
> In fact, for all means M, M is never rational. The predicates
> 'rational' and 'irrational' do not apply to means by themselves.
>
> >5. Every means is irrational. (4 Contra)
>
> Does not follow. ~rational =/= irrational.
> You need to say 'nonrational.'
If you want to show a false alternative, you have to give a
counterexample. This is more mere assertion by persuasive definition.
> >(As you seem very confused about what an argument is, I am now using
> >QED to indicate them.)
>
> This is rather comical. If there was ever anyone with such poor reasoning
> skill
> who was so into logic and formalizing arguments, I am unaware of it.
Your lack of awareness /iss comical at times, but so be it. I can be
serious if you can.
> I suspect
> that you are just trying to get back at me for showing you the logical errors
> in your attempted derivations of some sort of ethics awhile ago, and for
> pointing out to you that "when" was not logically equivilant to "if", and
> numerous other instances where I had to give you logical instruction.
Frankly, I cannot remember any such instances. Therefore I can't be
trying to 'get back' or otherwise react to them. QED
> Maybe you
> are just trying to provolk me so that you can learn more, though.
I am always trying to learn more; would that it were mutual.
> It is true that I have not been giving many arguments lately, and instead
> have
> chosen to simply point out errors and try to illustrate them w/ a helpful
> example. You'd think that having your own arguments corrected so many tim
> es by
> me that you'd realize how absurd your comments are.
In many cases, the 'corrections' seem far more absurd than my
arguments.
> >> >and it is rational for someone to advise you to do Y"
> >>
> >> Again, incorrect. Y being a rational means X does not imply that X is rat
> >> ional,
> >> Y is rational, nor advising someone to do either X or Y is rational. A
> >> ll it
> >> means is.. well, Y is a rational means to X.
> >
> >So it means:
> >1. Y is a rational means to X. (stipulated)
> >2. Whatever is a means to something is a means. (by definition)
> >3. Y is a means. (1,2 MP)
> >4. Y is both a means and a rational means. (1,3 Conj)
>
> Error. The "rational_means" predicate takes two arguments, a means and an
> end,
> and evaluates to true if and only if the means is a rational way to achie
> ve the end.
Which was stipulated in the question: what does 'Y being a rational
means to X' imply? (see my premise 1 above)
> Here you only specify one argument. Perhaps you mean that:
>
> Ex( rational_means( Y, x) ) (Ex == there exists an x such t
> hat )
OK, though you've written it badly. Let R be 'rational', M be
'means.'
1. (3x)(3y)(Rx&Mxy) stipulated.
2. ((3x)(3y)Mxy)->((3x)Mx)) definition of 'means'.
3. (3x)(Rx&Mx) 1,2 MP
-------
4. (3x)Rx 3 Simp
> That is true. We will replace your ill-formed premise with the one above.
>
> If you have trouble with this, what you are doing is somewhat analagous to
> this. X is bigger than Y, therefore X is bigger. "X is bigger" makes as much
> sense on its own as "X is a rational means."
No, there are two predicates being assigned. "X is a rational means"
is more like "X is measurably bigger": X is measurable, and X is
bigger than Y (which in this case, though not the one we're
discussing, also has to be measurable).
> Bigger than what? Means to what?
To something else. But: Measurable in relation to what? Rational in
relation to what? Not to that other thing. There are two predicatess
being discussed, one a relational one, and you're apparently confusing
them.
> Or do you just mean there exists some end for which X is a rational means?
Yes; if there were no end, nothing could be a means to it. That is
why that predicate is relational.
> >5. Y is both a means and rational. (4)
>
> Incorrect. the rational means predicate is not funcitonaly equivilant to the
> predicate with this definition:
>
> rational_means(Y, X)
> {
> Ez( means( Y, z )) /\ rational(Y)
> }
>
> Where means(Y, z ) evaluates to true IFF Y is a means to z, and rational(Y)
> evaluates to true IFF Y is rational. Notice that X appears nowhere in the
> definition of the predicate.
What are you babbling about? I specifically eliminated X through
modus ponens. Are you just saying that it should have been done by
assertion instead? Or cannot be done at all? No wonder that, when I
write you, you sense confusion on my part.
> In other words, to be a rational means to X is not the same thing as to b
> e both
> rational and a means.
As you gave no argument, this is an assertion that in no way refutes
an argument.
> X being a rational means to Y means something very very approximately similar
> to, "[X occurs] <--> [Y will occur]" (actually, this more closely resembles X
> being the ONLY means to Y.)
That says "Y is a necessary and sufficient means to X." Whether it is
rational or not, depends on how the equivalence was inferred.
>
> Saying simply "X is rational" implies that in some sense, X, by itsself,
> is in
> accord w/ reason or something. Try to use the very approximate alternate form
> of "X is a (the only, really) rational means to Y", namely "[X occurs]<-->[Y
> will occur]" to prove that either X or Y by themselves are somehow in acc
> ord w
> reason, or that their negation is somehow 'against' reason. Granted my sy
> mbolic
> representation is not exact, but its not too bad.
No, not bad, except that what if formalizes is a complete
misrepresentation.
> My advice to you is that you should really be more careful in translating
> arguments in english into some logical form that you think represents the
> arguments. Maybe your logical skills have improved such that you no longe
> r make
> elementary logical errors, but this is not good enough.
For what, or whom?
> Translating from
> english into formal logic requires careful thought. For instance you should
> have thought about what a rational means really was instead of thinking it
> could be literally translated into the conjuction of being a means and being
> rational.
It sounds as though you want me, not to think as in "to reason", but
to think as in "to remember the Platonic Idea of the 'rational
means'." Sorry, no can do.
> >> Coupled with someones desire, you could form a statement like "Y is a rat
> >> ional
> >> means to achieving your desires" but this is different from Y being simply
> >> rational. Such a thing is rather nonsensical and it implies a sort of abs
> >> olute
> >> justification for Y which does not exist.
> >
> >That is of course completely nonsensical; but it's your nonsense. Y
> >is a rational means to X iff Y is logically entailed by X;
>
> That is not how 'rational means' is used. You make a huge blunder when yo
> u say
> "iff" above. Suppose whenever Y occurs, X does not occur, and Y always oc
> curs.
> Then your X-->Y holds, but certainly no one would say that Y is a rational
> means to X.
OK; it has to be both that Y is necessary to X (X->Y) and Y is at
least part of what is jointly sufficient for X ((Y&Z&W&...)->X).
snip
> >if not
> >doing Y meant that X would not happen, for example. That has nothing
> >to do with whether X is logically entailed by anything.
If X is logically entailed by nothing, there can be no 'rational
means' to it.
> Again, X is a rational means to Y certainly does not translate into Y-->X.
> Aside from the above problem, you don't capture any notion of causation that
> comes w/ the original phrase.
> For instance, X = you call your mom and leave a message, Y = there is a m
> essage
> from you on your mom's answering machine.
>
> Surely we'd say X is a means to Y, and Y is not a means to X. But we could
> write X-->Y, which, if we make some simplifying assumptions, is reasonable.
The only assumption needed is that Y is necessary for X.
> According to you though, this is equivilant to something like "there being a
> message from you on your moms answering machine is a rational means to your
> calling your mom and leaving a message."
No, it isn't.
> What can we learn from this? Again, be careful how you translate english into
> formal logic.
??? As shown by your previus sentence, you seem incapable of getting
even the English right.
> >> But you've never established a "then you have to do" clause in any case
> >> whatsoever. All you've noted is that if Y is a means for X, and a person
> >> wants
> >> X, then Y is a rational means to satisfy their desires. One cannot infer
> >> that Y
> >> is rational, and one certainly cannot infer that this person then "has to
> do
> >> Y."
> >
> >You'll have to show why that is so.
>
> No one has to do anything.
Then you prove nothing, and there is no reason for anyone to believe
you.
> > Simply assuming that "all means
> >are irrational" as a premise does not prove that no means are
>
> No one is assuming that premise.
As I just said, there is no reason for anyone to believe you.
> >> Your trick here seems to be starting out with something like "the person
> >> has > to
> >> do Y in order to achieve X", and then simply dropping the "in order to ac
> >> hieve
> >> X" part which creates an absolute stateemnt which you have not justified.
> >
> >No absolute statement was made; OTC, Joe expressly denied that he was
> >making any. What are you talking about?
>
> I have no idea who Joe is.
Which is of course why you titled the thread 'Joe T. [etc.]'
I was posting to Bert Clanton, who was making
> statements about how individual acts were rational in a way that was not
> relative to achieving an end.
Maybe he was, too. But your spcific reply was to Joe, IIRC.
> Not being relative in that way makes them
> absolute in the sense I was talking about. Again, it is analogous to the
> absolute statement "X is bigger", which I call absolute since it treats
> bigness
> as not a relational or relative thing.
>
> >> >> >Here, "You ought to do Y" means simply
> >> >> >"It is rationally justifiable to advise you to do Y."
> >> >>
> >> >> I do not like that 'rationaly justifiable' term that you use. Surely i
> >> >> t is
> >> >> not
> >> >> unjustified, by the standard of reason, to advise anything.
> >
> >Of course it is. If (1) a person wanted an end X, and (2) Y were not
> >a sufficient means to X and therefore (3) you advised him to do Y,
> >your advise would not be rationally justified.
>
> I agree. It would also not be rationally unjustified. unjustified =/=
> ~justified.
>
> Just as an aside, suppose that my goal was to trick the person into doing Y,
> even though Y will not achieve his goals. Then advising him to do Y would
> be a
> rational means to my end, so, according to you, I assume it would be
> 'rationally justified'. But how can you tell which it is, without referece to
> some goal? For my goal, advising him is rationally justified. For his, it
> isn't.
So it's a means to two different ends. It wouldn't be a means at all,
if there were no end.
So, in an absolute sense, is advising him rationaly justified or not?
Not in an absolute sense - if by that, you mean irrespective of any
ends. Neither your advice, nor what it consisted of, *was* a means in
an absolute sense. Nothing can be, as 'is a means to' is a
_relational_ predicate.
> You cannot just leave 'rationaly justified' hanging there without a quali
> fier.
> Making him follow my advice is not a rationally justifed means for achieving
> his goal, but it is a rationally justified one for achieving mine.
Same thing, either way. If your end is for him to achieve ~X, and you
advise him to do Y, that is rational only if Y is (perhaps jointly)
sufficient to result in ~X.
> >The logical form of
> >that is:
> >
> >1. X
> >2. ~(Y->X)
> >----
> >3. Y
> >
> >Which is illogical because it entails the contradiction:
>
> This is some comedy here. The issue is whether my advising him in itsself is
> somehow contrary to reason. All you are showing is that doing Y and getting X
> are incompatible. This doesn't imply that my advising him is unreasonable.
> >4. ~(~YvX) 2 Impl
> >5. Y&~X 4 Dem
> >6. ~X 5 Simp
> >---------
> >7. X&~X 1,6 Conj QED
>
> Now, what is it that you think you proved? That *advising* him to do Y is
> contrary to reason? Not in the least -- you proof is quite far from that.
> There was no question that if he did Y he could not get X.
So (1) there was not question that if he did Y he could not get X;
therefore, (2) there is no reason for him to do Y to get X; but (2)
advising him to do Y to get X is not contrary to reason. That's clear
enough, except for what you think 'reason' might be.
> Pay attention to what
> things mean in english before trying to translate them and feel like you're
> doing something useful when you're actually proving some trivial irrelevent
> thing that everyone accepts.
Things exist; they don't intrinsically 'mean' anything, in English or
any other language. Perhaps you mean 'what concepts (or words) mean'
- if so, perhaps you should pay some attention to that yourself.
> >> >On the contrary, it is irrational to do what will frustrate your getting
> >> >what you want
> >>
> >> Don't be silly. Doing things that frustrate getting what you want is just
> an
> >> irrational way to get what you want.
> >
> >It cannot be an 'irrational way' unless it is irrational as well as a
> >way.
> >What do you find silly about that?
>
> See above.
Well, some of what your comments above have been silly; do you mean
Joe's comment down here entailed your silliness?
> X being an irrational way to achieve Y does not imply simply "X is
> irrational" and "X is a way."
No, it implies "X is irrational" and "X is (possibly) a way to achieve
Y". Where did you get the idea that something can be a means without
it being a means to an end?
> X being an irrational way to achieve Y can be taken very approximately to
> mean
> that if X occurs, Y will not occur, or at least will not be any more like
> ly to
> occur than if X did not occur. You can try to find a more accurate transl
> ation
> if you like, but try to get from that to the conclusion that X in itsself is
> irrational.
If you can reason that out logically, from accepted premises, then you
will have shown X to be an irrational means to Y. (I'm not going to
do that for you every time.)
> Parsing english in a simplistic and incorrect manner is not cool.
> Think because you make these translations.
Oh, then let me ask: what does 'because' mean in the above sentence?
I think it means 'before', but maybe that's too warm a meaning.
> >> Your attempt to drop part of this sentence
> >> that alter its meaning to give you some absolute (and incorrect) statemen
> >> t are
> >> rather blatant errors that I thought you were above making.
> >
> >Again: what are you talking about? No one is attempting to drop
> >anything.
>
> Pay attention. A transition is made from "X is a rational means to Y" to
> "X is
> rational." The entire relationship to Y is being discarded and it is claimed
> that the 'rational' part still pertains to X on its own.
No. You have attempted to drop it a couple of times, apparently to
create a strawman argment, but you've been caught each time that I can
see.
> That is an instance of
> dropping something, and yes, people are trying to do it. You in particular.
Definitely not.
> >> Again, "doing X is irrational" and "doing X is an irrational way to get w
> >> hat I
> >> want" have different meanings.
> >
> >Only if the word 'irrational' is being used to mean two things. Is
> >that what you are claiming?
>
> No. Try looking at what things mean and not only their lexical form.
Not only do things not intrinsically mean anything, they don't (unless
they're words) have a lexical form, Mr. Lexicographer.
> >> >Likewise, at one remove: if you want someone to get what they
> >> >want, it is rational for you to advise them to do what it takes to get
> >> >what they want.
> >>
> >> Only if you assume that getting what you want is rational. This however
> does
> >> not make much sense. As I point out before, no goal in itsself can be rat
> >> ional
> >> or irrational.
> >
> >And therefore all means are irrational.
>
> No, refer to the mention of your error earlier in the post.
Oh, the 'error' which you failed to prove. Well let's grant it anyway
for the discussion, and rewrite your conclusion as:
And therefore no means are rational.
> > As I've pointed out, that is
> >a nonsensical assumption; it doesn't make sense to even ask 'Is Y a
> >rational means or not?', unless it were possible for Y to be either
> >rational or irrational.
>
> It doesn't make sense to ask that question because what the means is for
> is not
> specified. It is like asking if some location is far or not, without refe
> rence
> to some point that it could be far from. The rational_means(..) predicate
> only
> makes sense if it takes two arguments.
No; as I've shown, it simply requires formalizing the phrase
correctly, by using two predicates.
> Since we all know how I hate giving arguments, we shall run through some
> exercises now for your benefit. I will assume the rational_means predicate
> takes one argument, and I will give you expressions containing this predicate
> and you tell me whether they evaluate to true or false.
>
> Of course, we assume the argument is the means.
>
> valueOf( rational_means( eating an icecream cone )) == ?
> valueOf( rational_means( going to the zoo )) == ?
> valueOf( rational_means( becoming an investment banker )) == ?
>
> Since, according to you, you don't need an end to determine if a means is
> rational, I will be expecting answers from you to each of the above.
As there are no arguments, there is no reason to do any of them; so by
this, none of them are rational; making them all irrational (or
non-rational, if we accept that other assertion of yours for no
reason.) The lack of arguments is distinct from the lack of ends -
one fails to establish their rationality, one their status as means.
> >> Reason is logically seperate from 'the passions' or however Hume
> >> would put it.
> >
> >Why not actually read some Hume, and find out how he would put it?
>
> Not a good use of my time.
Oh? You must mean a 'good' use of your time, irrespective of what
ends you wish to use your time to accomplish; since those ends cannot
be good or bad, there can't be any good or bad ways to accomplish
them, right?
> >You might actually learn something about justifying your opinions (as
> >opposed to merely asserting them) in the process.
>
> I would not be surprised if the reason you were so into writing out semi-
> formal
> arguments on HPO was due to the inspiration you got from watching me do so
> countless times in the past.
I would, since I have no memory of you ever doing more besides make
unproven assertions.
> >> Reason can tell you
> >> how to achieve the compliment of one of your objectives just as easily as
> it
> >> can tell you how to achieve your objectives.
> >
> >And in either case, the reasoning can be either correct or not: so in
> >either case, the means can be reational or not. Meaning the
> >rationality of a means is not dependent on the end.
>
> Then you will gladly fill in the truth values for the expressions that I list
> above, where I only give you a means and ask you to tell me whether or not it
> is a rational means.
As I said; in the absence of any reasons to do them, they're all
irrational.
> >>
> >> Neither are the outputs of this black box simply 'the rational thing to d
> >> o.' If
> >> you think of them that way, you are 'dropping context' as objectivists li
> >> ke to
> >> say. The outputs are the rational means *to achieve your objective*, but
> >> again
> >> this is far different from them being simply 'rational.'
> >
> >What are you talking about? Are you trying to make a distinction
> >between 'reasoned out in a correct manner' and 'rational'? If so, how
> >are you defining 'rational'?
>
> Not really. To determine if some plan is reasoned out in a correct manner, it
> is absolutely necessary to know the objective, or what the plan is suppos
> ed to
> be 'correct for.' If someone gives me a list of steps he is going to take
> , and
> I notice that these steps will lead to outcome X, then, if the plan is
> designed
> to achieve X, the reasoning would be correct. If the design was to achieve
> not-X, it wouldn't be. It is impossible to evaluate the rationality of a plan
> without reference to what it attempts to achieve. Similarly, it is impossible
> to tell whether some action is contrary to reason or not without the cont
> ext > of
> the goal that the action is either a reasonable or unreasonable means to.
Sure; that's trivially true. But since it could not be a plan without
it being a plan for something, and no one would consider it a plan if
it were not; why would anyone consider it either a 'rational' or
'non-rational' plan without reference to that something? Even your
strawman argument fails as an argument.
Gordon G. Sollars
writes...
...
> I thought that you thought there was something more to health, because yo
> u were
> analogizing it to goodness.
Actually, I was analogizing goodness to health. I was hoping that health
was less controversial. My point has been that your arguments against
good could equally be made against health. Since it seems quixotic to
maintain that there are no truths about health, I think your arguments
prove too much, as the saying goes. I have not claimed, of course, to
have established that moral realism is true, only that it remains
reasonable, or at least plausible.
> I am used to people thinking goodness is some
> non-physical property of some other platonic realm, so I was immagining you
> thinking of some platonic form for health that people percieved.
Well, I think that there are "Platonic realms" that are objective, too,
such as mathematics. But I wanted to stay with physical properties, like
those of health, just to lessen the chance of getting sidetracked.
...
> >Inventing funny private languages seems to be a hobby not limited to
> >Objectivists.
>
> I think it is you who are using language in a misleading way.
Well, perhaps, but versions of naturalism have been around at least since
Aristotle.
> >They like to "prove" things by changing the meaning of
> >"true"; you prefer to do it by changing the meaning of "skeptic".
> >
>
> I disagree.
Well, I am familiar with skeptics who say that we cannot know that this
or that is true or false. If I say that this or that is true or false,
it seems hard for me to be a skeptic.
...
> >As I recall, your view of moral statements is that they are like a dog's
> >bark.
>
> Not really.
OK, sorry to have gotten your view wrong.
> In reality, I often say that moral outrage or condemnation has the
> exact same amount of significance as a dog's bark.
That might be true. Of course, some dog barks are /very/ significant.
Have you ever been bitten by a dog?
...
> Again, their notions are weak and vaccuous because there is no gap betwee
> n what
> they call morality and descriptive stuff. Therefore, it is true (though y
> ou may
> disagree due to a reasoning error on your part) that what they call morality
> cannot be prescriptive (unless of course you redefine 'prescriptive' too).
Well, as I have suggested before, I am not big on definitions. Of
course, I have been suggesting that there is no bright line between the
prescriptive and the descriptive (or facts and values), so since you
think that there are, this disagreement between us is bound to play
itself out on a variety of fronts, perhaps including definitions.
So your view is that if a moral theory does not posit a gap, then it is
weak and vacuous. But if it does posit a gap, then it would have some
significance, even though it is false (since a gap assumes properties
that do not exist). That seems like a rather strange sort of
significance, bought at a rather high price. So I'll stick with a weak
theory. After all, I have never claimed that every common belief about
the good is true, only that there are /some/ true beliefs.
--
Gordon Sollars
gsol...@pobox.com
George Dance
snip
But I missed _this_:
> Symmetry <symm...@aol.compare.com> wrote in message news:<20011209182302.0
> 9136.0...@mb-mv.aol.com>...
1.
> > In fact, for all means M, M is never rational.
2.
> > The predicates
> > 'rational' and 'irrational' do not apply to means by themselves.
3.
> > The "rational_means" predicate takes two arguments, a means and an
> > end,
> > and evaluates to true if and only if the means is a rational way to achie
> > ve the end.
From which it follows that:
4. If M is never rational, then either: M is never rational as a
means by itself, or never rational as a means to an end. (LEM)
5. M is never rational as a means by itself, or never rational as a
means to an end. 1,4 MP
6. For M to not be rational as a means by itself, it would have to be
the case that the predicates 'rational and irrational' apply to a
means by itself. (by definition)
7. As they don't, M cannot not be rational as a means by itself. 2,6
MT
8. So M cannot not be rational as a means by itself. 7 Simp
9. Therefore, M is never rational as a means to an end. 4,8 DS
10. If M is never rational as a means to an end, then the "rational
means" predicate never evaluates to true. 3 Equiv Simp
11. Therefore, for all M, the 'rational means' predicate never
evaluates to true. 9,10 MP
QED
Bert Clanton
Symmetry <symm...@aol.compare.com> wrote:
> >Subject: Re: Joe T. & bad arguments vs. my disproof of moral realism
> >From: Bert Clanton eubi...@charter.net
> >Date: 12/1/01 10:39 AM Central Standard Time
> >Message-id: <eubiotist-A314F...@corp.supernews.com>
>
> >> Yes, I was not talking about that sort of ought. The only kind of ought
> >that
> >> I
> >> am talking about is the kind for which there exists a gap between
> >statements
> >> claiming you ought to do something, is positive statements. For any kind
> >> of
> >> ought where there is no such gap, I am not talking about it.
> >>
> >
> >My proposal is that in the last analysis *all* "oughts" are of this
> >type: "If you want X, and you have to do Y to get X, then it is rational
> >to do Y
>
> Incorrect. The correct statement is "Y is a rational means to X" but for Y to
> be rational, you must hold that obtaining X is rational in itsself. No goal
> by
> itsself is rational or irrational.
>
Again, you use the term "rational" in a different way than I do. But as
is my practice in cases where disagreement seems to be over the meaning
of words, I'll cheerfully cede to you the term "rational" as I've used
it here, and re-label the concept which I'm trying to convey here as
"instrumentally appropriate". So, rephrasing my statement:
"My proposal is that in the last analysis *all* "oughts" are of this
type: 'If you want X, and doing Y is a necessary or sufficient means to
getting X, then doing Y is 'instrumentally appropriate'."
Strictly speaking, this is not quite true, however.
Ultimate goals, of course, can't be "instrumentally appropriate", since
they're not instrumental to anything. So if we're to admit ultimate
goals (which I think we must on purely logical grounds, in order to
avoid circular justificational reasoning or infinite justificational
regress), then we have to classify some things as worthy of being sought
for their own sake, without regard to their instrumentality toward
anything else. We can then say, "If one wants to attain ultimate goal X,
and act Y is a necessary or sufficient means to attaining X, then doing
Y is 'instrumentally appropriate'."
I would classify the long-term survival and flourishing of the human
species as worthy of being sought "for its own sake", without regards to
its being instrumental toward any more fundamental goal. So
"If one wants to bring about the long-term survival and flourishing of
the human species, and doing Y1, Y2, ... , Yn and refraining from doing
Z1, Z2, ... , Zn are necessary or sufficient means to the long-term
survival and flourishing of the human species, then doing Y1, etc., and
refraining from Z1, etc., are 'instrumentally appropriate'".
> >and it is rational for someone to advise you to do Y"
>
> Again, incorrect. Y being a rational means X does not imply that X is
> rational,
> Y is rational, nor advising someone to do either X or Y is rational. All it
> means is.. well, Y is a rational means to X.
>
What I'm saying is that *if* one wants X, for its own sake or as a means
to something else, and act Y is a means to X, then *advising* one to do
Y is indirectly 'instrumentally appropriate' as a means to X.
> Coupled with someones desire, you could form a statement like "Y is a
> rational
> means to achieving your desires" but this is different from Y being simply
> rational. Such a thing is rather nonsensical and it implies a sort of
> absolute
> justification for Y which does not exist.
>
But what I *meant* by "rational", in the present context, *is*
"instrumentally appropriate as a means to a goal". I promise, cross my
heart, always to say "instrumentally appropriate" instead of the dreaded
term "rational". Okay?
>
>
> > In
> >conventional philosophical language, I believe that all "oughts" are
> >hypothetical, and none are categorial.
> >
>
> But hypothetical stuff can be descriptive, so this doesn't create some gap
> between oughts and desciptive stuff, though it may create a gap between
> oughts
> and catagorical descriptive stuff.
What I meant was, "I believe that all 'one ought to do Y' statements are
strictly equivalent to 'One wants X, and Y is a means to X, so it is
instrumentally appropriate to do Y' statements.
>
> >There is IMHO an irreducible gap between ordinary "is" statements and
> >"ought" statements, in that at least by implication an "ought" statement
> >always includes an "if one wants..." clause, and an "is" statement never
> >does--unless it's explicitly an "is" statement just about what somebody
> >wants, in which case there's no "then you have to do.." clause, no
> >"ought".
>
> But you've never established a "then you have to do" clause in any case
> whatsoever. All you've noted is that if Y is a means for X, and a person
> wants
> X, then Y is a rational means to satisfy their desires. One cannot infer
> that
> Y
> is rational, and one certainly cannot infer that this person then "has to do
> Y."
>
Again, I'm willing to substitute "It is instrumentally appropriate for
you to do Y" for "You have to do Y". I certainly didn't mean "If one
wants X, and Y is a means to X, then one is unable not to do Y", and I
certainly didn't mean "If one wants X, and Y is a means to X, then one
is obligated to do X". I simply meant "If one wants X, and Y is a means
to X, then it is instrumentally appropriate for one to do X". Nothing
more. One is still perfectly free to do what would result in one's not
getting what one wants: but in that case, I'd say that one's action is
instrumentally inappropriate.
> Your trick here seems to be starting out with something like "the person has
> to
> do Y in order to achieve X", and then simply dropping the "in order to
> achieve
> X" part which creates an absolute stateemnt which you have not justified.
>
I don't think I'm doing any such thing. See the paragraph above.
> >> >Here, "You ought to do Y" means simply
> >> >"It is rationally justifiable to advise you to do Y."
> >>
> >> I do not like that 'rationaly justifiable' term that you use. Surely i
> >> t is
> >> not
> >> unjustified, by the standard of reason, to advise anything.
> >
> >On the contrary, it is irrational to do what will frustrate your getting
> >what you want
>
> Don't be silly. Doing things that frustrate getting what you want is just an
> irrational way to get what you want.
Huh? On the contrary, I'd say: "Doing things that frustrate getting what
you want is an instrumentally inappropriate way of getting what you
want, hence an instrumentally inappropriate act.
> Your attempt to drop part of this
> sentence
> that alter its meaning to give you some absolute (and incorrect) statement
> are
> rather blatant errors that I thought you were above making.
>
Not guilty. Please explain what I've left out.
> Again, "doing X is irrational" and "doing X is an irrational way to get what
> I
> want" have different meanings.
>
Depends on what you mean by "rational" as applied to chosen actions. To
avoid confusion, I've agreed to substitute "instrumentally appropriate"
for "rational", 'cuz that's exactly what I meant by "rational", and you
don't like that usage. That change being made to please you, "Doing X is
an instrumentally inappropriate way to get what you want" is obviously
equivalent to "Doing X is an instrumentally inappropriate way to get
what you want".
> >Likewise, at one remove: if you want someone to get what they
> >want, it is rational for you to advise them to do what it takes to get
> >what they want.
>
> Only if you assume that getting what you want is rational. This however does
> not make much sense. As I point out before, no goal in itsself can be
> rational
> or irrational. Reason is logically seperate from 'the passions' or however
> Hume
> would put it.
>
For X to do what it takes, i.e., Y, to get get what he wants, is
instrumentally appropriate, by definition of "instrumentally
appropriate". Now suppose that I want for X to get what he wants. Then
it is instrumentally appropriate for me to do what it would take to get
X to do what it would take to get what he wants. But my advising X to do
Y (call this Z) might very well have that result. Therefore it is
instrumentally appropriate for me to do Z, i.e., to advise X to do Y.
> >> But reason also
> >> cannot justify any action. Why is advising someone of the rational means
> >> to
> >> achieve some end, rational?
> >>
> >
Because that's exactly what I meant by "rational" in the context of
choosing actions. For "rational", substitute "instrumentally
appropriate". Your question then becomes, "Why is advising someone of
the instrumentally appropriate means to achieve some end, instrumentally
appropriate?" My answer is given in the paragraph above.
> >You are certainly using the terms "justify" and "rational" differently
> >than I do. I don't know what more to say.
>
> Sentiments and preferences and whatnot are te material that reason has to
> work
> with. You can think of reason as a sort of black box with your objectives as
> inputs and rational ways to achieve these objectives as outputs. These
> objectives cannot be rational or irrational by themselves. Reason can tell
> you
> how to achieve the compliment of one of your objectives just as easily as it
> can tell you how to achieve your objectives.
>
I would agree that one's *ultimate* ends can't be described as means to
anything, hence can't be called either "instrumentally appropriate" or
"instrumentally inappropriate". So "ought" and "ought not", as I
understand them, can't apply to ultimate ends. That's what I meant when
I said that there are no categorial "oughts", only hypothetical "oughts".
I do not believe, however, that there can be no grounds for choosing
one's ultimate ends. Such grounds, however, must be "outside the
system". In the case of a moral system, they must be non-moral reasons.
> Neither are the outputs of this black box simply 'the rational thing to do.'
> If
> you think of them that way, you are 'dropping context' as objectivists like
> to
> say. The outputs are the rational means *to achieve your objective*, but
> again
> this is far different from them being simply 'rational.'
>
See above. IMHO, this is a semantic objection which disappears with a
precise definition of "rational" as "instrumentally appropriate".
> >But IMHO, a morality that includes only "hypothetical oughts" is
> >defective. It ignores important questions: "Why want X rather than W? Is
> >it rational to want just any arbitrary thing or state of affairs? Or do
> >some wants and preferences 'make sense', and others not?"
>
> Wants cannot be rational or irrational. To say a want is irrational would be
> like saying it is in some way contrary to reason, but wants are not the
> subject
> of reason.
> Suppose they spring from biological urges or something, then
> reason
> has nothing to do with want-formation so to make a reason-based appraisal of
> these wants by calling them rational or irrational in themselves is
> incorrect.
>
True: wants are usually not originated as the conclusion of any process
of reasoning: they just happen. But some wants, if they elicit action,
are IMHO instrumentally inappropriate as means to, e.g., the survival
and health of the wanter; and other wants, if they elicit action, are
instrumentally appropriate as means to those ends. So wants are not
beyond critical examination by reason. As I said:
> >I think that some wants and preferences *do* "make sense", and others
> >don't.
>
> They 'make sense' to you, probably in the sense that you want them too. So
> what? What does that have to do with reason?
>
See the paragraph just above.
> >I think that wanting what is objectively "good for you", and
> >being averse to what is objectively "bad for you", make sense;
>
> Because your genes have been selected for such that you'd want this sort of
> stuff.
Sure. And your point is?
I agree: some wants are instinctual.
> Having genes that make you want X, or feel that X is somehow the
> natural, most sensical, and best choice does not imply that X is simply
> "rational."
>
Quite true. Wants are subject to reasoned criticism.
Best wishes,
Bert
Symmetry
>Subject: Re: Joe T. & bad arguments vs. my disproof of moral realism
>From: George Dance georg...@hotmail.com
>Date: 12/10/01 11:13 AM Central Standard Time
>Message-id: <6312c50b.01121...@posting.google.com>
>> >5. Every means is irrational. (4 Contra)
>>
>> Does not follow. ~rational =/= irrational.
>> You need to say 'nonrational.'
>
>If you want to show a false alternative, you have to give a
>counterexample. This is more mere assertion by persuasive definition.
No one has to do anything, regardless of what they want. I am just pointing
this out because, taken literally, this is similar to the mistake of saying "if
you want X, then <some means to x> is a rational action."
The correctly formed statement is, "to show a false alternative, it is
necessary to give a counterexample" since a want by itsself cannot imply a
'has.'
Notice that "if you want to show a false alternative, it is necessary to give a
counterexample" would also be incorrect, since nothing is strictly necessary,
and the mere existance of a want is not not sufficient for pinning down what
the necessariness is for. More on this at the end of the post.
>> >So it means:
>> >1. Y is a rational means to X. (stipulated)
>> >2. Whatever is a means to something is a means. (by definition)
>> >3. Y is a means. (1,2 MP)
>> >4. Y is both a means and a rational means. (1,3 Conj)
>>
>> Error. The "rational_means" predicate takes two arguments, a means and an
>> end,
>> and evaluates to true if and only if the means is a rational way to achie
>> ve the end.
>
>Which was stipulated in the question: what does 'Y being a rational
>means to X' imply? (see my premise 1 above)
In (4) it looked like you were speaking of rational means independently from
ends. If you just meant, there is some end for which Y is a rational means in
(4), then that is fine. However, notice that that statement is rather vacuous.
There is no action that is not a rational means to something.
>> Here you only specify one argument. Perhaps you mean that:
>>
>> Ex( rational_means( Y, x) ) (Ex == there exists an x such t
>> hat )
>
>OK, though you've written it badly. Let R be 'rational', M be
>'means.'
>
>1. (3x)(3y)(Rx&Mxy) stipulated.
Uh, no. Y being a rational means to X does not mean that Y is rational.
Appearantly you thought I wrote it "badly" because I did not break up "rational
means" into a conjuction of the predicates "rational" and "means", but my
original objection was that you cannot do this. So, no, I didn't write it badly
at all if you accept that if I write it in a way that clearly expresses my
position, and not in a way that contraidcts my position, it is not bad.
>1. (3x)(3y)(Rx&Mxy) stipulated.
>2. ((3x)(3y)Mxy)->((3x)Mx)) definition of 'means'.
>3. (3x)(Rx&Mx) 1,2 MP
>-------
>4. (3x)Rx 3 Simp
As mentioned previously, there is an error is in step 1. Of course you don't
think it is an error, but it is. X being a rational way to achieve Y does not
imply that X is simply rational without reference to anything else, but that is
exactly what Rx means.
Also, what you do in step 2 appears to be an error. I don't know the exact
details of your notation, though it appears that you are using two different
predicates, and you call them both M. They are difference because they take a
different # of arguments. When you take a two argument-taking predicate and use
one argument, do you mean that, if you leave out y, it is equivilant to 3yMxy?
That seems like a lame notational convention, but it was probably just an error
on your part.
>No, there are two predicates being assigned. "X is a rational means"
>is more like "X is measurably bigger": X is measurable, and X is
>bigger than Y
How you managed to say that a proposition not containing Y means something
about Y, I am not sure.
>> Incorrect. the rational means predicate is not funcitonaly equivilant to
>the
>> predicate with this definition:
>>
>> rational_means(Y, X)
>> {
>> Ez( means( Y, z )) /\ rational(Y)
>> }
>>
>> Where means(Y, z ) evaluates to true IFF Y is a means to z, and rational(Y)
>> evaluates to true IFF Y is rational. Notice that X appears nowhere in the
>> definition of the predicate.
>
>What are you babbling about? I specifically eliminated X through
>modus ponens.
And your implication was false (or rather nonsensical), unless you are using
some queer notation. What you appeared to do was eliminate it by changing the
definition of the M predicate mid-argument. See: ((3x)(3y)Mxy)->((3x)Mx))
> Are you just saying that it should have been done by
>assertion instead? Or cannot be done at all?
Your step 2 is wrong, yes. You cannot do that at all. Mx is ill-formed. Perhaps
you mean 3yMxy
>> X being a rational means to Y means something very very approximately
>similar
>> to, "[X occurs] <--> [Y will occur]" (actually, this more closely resembles
>X
>> being the ONLY means to Y.)
>
>That says "Y is a necessary and sufficient means to X."
Incorrect. The difference in tense of the two terms makes them unsymmetrical
and makes your interpretation wrong. You do not say that an effect is a means
to its cause. Specifically you do not say that some event at time t+1 is a
means to some action at time t (unless you are doing quantum physics or
something).
>> Saying simply "X is rational" implies that in some sense, X, by itsself,
>> is in
>> accord w/ reason or something. Try to use the very approximate alternate
>form
>> of "X is a (the only, really) rational means to Y", namely "[X
>occurs]<-->[Y
>> will occur]" to prove that either X or Y by themselves are somehow in acc
>> ord w
>> reason, or that their negation is somehow 'against' reason. Granted my sy
>> mbolic
>> representation is not exact, but its not too bad.
>
>No, not bad, except that what if formalizes is a complete
>misrepresentation.
A complete misrepresentation huh? Why don't you explain that one. X being the
only means to Y means that, since X is a means to Y, then X-->Y. Since it is
the only means, then Y-->X. I very approximately handle the causation part by
letting X = [X occurs], Y = [Y will occur]. Where is the *complete*
misrepresentation?
>> >That is of course completely nonsensical; but it's your nonsense. Y
>> >is a rational means to X iff Y is logically entailed by X;
Let us just pause to look at the sheer falsity of what you just said. You
boldly and strongly stated (using IFF), something that is glaringly in error.
>> >That is of course completely nonsensical; but it's your nonsense. Y
>> >is a rational means to X iff Y is logically entailed by X;
>>
>> That is not how 'rational means' is used. You make a huge blunder when yo
>> u say
>> "iff" above. Suppose whenever Y occurs, X does not occur, and Y always oc
>> curs.
>> Then your X-->Y holds, but certainly no one would say that Y is a rational
>> means to X.
>
>OK; it has to be both that Y is necessary to X (X->Y) and Y is at
>least part of what is jointly sufficient for X ((Y&Z&W&...)->X).
This is still wrong. It is rather sad that you think you can so easily give a
definition of what "Y is a rational means to X" means with just simply logical
symbols.
(X-->Y) --> (~Y-->~X), but Y being a rational means to X does not mean that it
is the only means, or that it is necessary, but what you write implies that if
Y doesn't happen, X won't happen.
A rational means to get some candy is to buy some. However, if I don't buy
some, I can still get candy in other ways. Hence your definition,
unsurprisingly, is again quite wrong.
>> Again, X is a rational means to Y certainly does not translate into Y-->X.
>> Aside from the above problem, you don't capture any notion of causation
>that
>> comes w/ the original phrase.
>
>> For instance, X = you call your mom and leave a message, Y = there is a m
>> essage
>> from you on your mom's answering machine.
>>
>> Surely we'd say X is a means to Y, and Y is not a means to X. But we could
>> write X-->Y, which, if we make some simplifying assumptions, is reasonable.
>
>The only assumption needed is that Y is necessary for X.
Assumptions that simplify the situation w/ your mom and the answering machine,
was what I was talking about.
>> According to you though, this is equivilant to something like "there being
>a
>> message from you on your moms answering machine is a rational means to your
>> calling your mom and leaving a message."
>
>No, it isn't.
Thats right, but your definition said that it was. Hence, we see that you're
wrong, just like I said.
To recap, you said Y is a rational means to X IFF X --> Y. (you later realized
your error and gave yet another incorrect definition, but when I quote you,
you're still talking about this one). I just gave an example of the form X-->Y
which it was incorrect to interpret thus. Understand?
>> >The logical form of
>> >that is:
>> >
>> >1. X
>> >2. ~(Y->X)
>> >----
>> >3. Y
>> >
>> >Which is illogical because it entails the contradiction:
>>
>> This is some comedy here. The issue is whether my advising him in itsself
>is
>> somehow contrary to reason. All you are showing is that doing Y and getting
>X
>> are incompatible. This doesn't imply that my advising him is unreasonable.
>
>> >4. ~(~YvX) 2 Impl
>> >5. Y&~X 4 Dem
>> >6. ~X 5 Simp
>> >---------
>> >7. X&~X 1,6 Conj QED
>>
>> Now, what is it that you think you proved? That *advising* him to do Y is
>> contrary to reason? Not in the least -- you proof is quite far from that.
>> There was no question that if he did Y he could not get X.
>
>So (1) there was not question that if he did Y he could not get X;
>therefore, (2) there is no reason for him to do Y to get X;
(2) is not my position.
>but (2)
>advising him to do Y to get X is not contrary to reason. That's clear
>enough, except for what you think 'reason' might be.
To determine if advising him is contrary to reason or not, you need more
context. Specifically, you need some goal to relate the advising to, to see if
the advising is an irrational way to achieve that goal. This isn't that hard, I
don't know why you seem to have so much trouble. For some reaosn you want to
automatically take HIS goal as the standard by which all means should be judged
rational or not, in relation to. There is no reason to do this. There is no
more justification for this than taking the compliment of his goal as the
standard.
If I want X, and Y is necessary for X, then we can make no judgement about what
it is rational for you to do (advise me or not) since no end has been
specified. If you want to use my want as the end, that has to be specified
explicitly.
If Osama bin Laden wants to kill you, and in order for him to kill you, he
needs to send you a letter containing anthrax, then, just given that
information, we can determine that it is rational for you to advise him to send
you anthrax, huh? Obviously not, so stop objecting to this.
>> X being an irrational way to achieve Y does not imply simply "X is
>> irrational" and "X is a way."
>
>No, it implies "X is irrational" and "X is (possibly) a way to achieve
>Y".
It does not imply that X is irrational. Try giving an argument to that effect
if you think it does. X is only irrational as a way to achieve Y. X might be
rational as a way to achieve ~Y. There is no way to make a rationality
judgement about X without reference to some goal, and hence saying just "X is
irrational" without giving more information does not make sense.
>Y". Where did you get the idea that something can be a means without
>it being a means to an end?
Obviously I don't hold this position, yet this kind of thinking riddles your
posts. You want to call some things rational without reference to anything that
they are rational for. Given any action, it is always a rational way to achieve
something, and it is always an irrational way to achieve something else. This
indicates that if you want the irrationality or rationality of X to come
directly from whether it is a rational or irrational way to achieve some goal,
it cannot be one or the other by itsself.
An example of you specifically referring to means without reference to any end
is when you introduce the predicate Mx. This is a clear cut example of you
trying to seperate the two. To make sense, you need to write EyMxy or
something, but you nonsensically write Mx.
>> Parsing english in a simplistic and incorrect manner is not cool.
>> Think because you make these translations.
>
>Oh, then let me ask: what does 'because' mean in the above sentence?
>I think it means 'before', but maybe that's too warm a meaning.
Yes, that does mean 'before.' The advice still stands, btw.
>> Pay attention. A transition is made from "X is a rational means to Y" to
>> "X is
>> rational." The entire relationship to Y is being discarded and it is
>claimed
>> that the 'rational' part still pertains to X on its own.
>
>No. You have attempted to drop it a couple of times, apparently to
>create a strawman argment, but you've been caught each time that I can
>see.
A strawman? It is on record that you think statements like "X is rational" can
be true by themselves. Shall I go find the numerous quotes? You honestly deny
that you've made statements similar "If I want X, then X is rational", or "if
someone needs to do X to achieve Y, and they want Y, then doing X is rational."
These are explicit examples of you calling something rational by itsself.
Pay attention closely here, because I can immagine the error you are making.
You might be confused in that you think that since lots of your statements like
this are made in a conditional manner, like "If Y, then X is rational", then
the rationality of X is some sort of rationality that is relational to Y. Not
so. It may depend on Y, but that is not the connection you need. If you are
making this error, you need to reason more carefully. "If Y, then X is
rational," asribes the property of rationality to X and to X alone, in the case
when Y (and maybe in others). Just because Y must obtain for X to be rational
does not mean that when you say that X is rational you do anything other than
ascribe rationality to a single act X.
Symmetry
>From: George Dance georg...@hotmail.com
>Message-id: <6312c50b.01121...@posting.google.com>
>
[snip George's argument]
I will give you at least one day to find what is wrong w/ your argument, and if
you don't get it by then, I will share the answer w/ you.
George Dance
0753.0...@mb-ba.aol.com>...
> >Subject: Re: Joe T. & bad arguments vs. my disproof of moral realism
> >From: George Dance georg...@hotmail.com
> >Date: 12/11/01 10:15 AM Central Standard Time
> >Message-id: <6312c50b.01121...@posting.google.com>
> >
>
>
> [snip George's argument]
>
> I will give you at least one day to find what is wrong w/ your argument,
> and if
> you don't get it by then, I will share the answer w/ you.
By when? You state that you will share the answer after Dec. 13, but
not that you will share it before any time.
Symmetry
>Message-id: <MPG.167ebdd0fb...@mail.nji.com>
>
>Actually, I was analogizing goodness to health. I was hoping that health
>was less controversial. My point has been that your arguments against
>good could equally be made against health.
But that is false. My arguments against goodness assumed a type of goodness
which Owl and Friedman both believe in, which was nonphysical. Or at least,
perception of the good involved tapping into some nonphysical realm somehow.
If you think goodness is just a bunch of descriptive stuff like health is mixed
in w/ some mental abstractions and such, then my argument doesn't apply to that
type of goodness and I suppose we'd be expected to be able to percieve goodness
accurately, if that is what goodness meant. But you then have a more important
problem in that your notion of goodness is lame.
>> >Inventing funny private languages seems to be a hobby not limited to
>> >Objectivists.
>>
>> I think it is you who are using language in a misleading way.
>
>Well, perhaps, but versions of naturalism have been around at least since
>Aristotle.
And naturallism basically says that goodness literally is [some descriptive
stuff], rather than being some non-descriptive type of property which is
ascribed to [some descriptive stuff]?
>> >They like to "prove" things by changing the meaning of
>> >"true"; you prefer to do it by changing the meaning of "skeptic".
>> >
>>
>> I disagree.
>
>Well, I am familiar with skeptics who say that we cannot know that this
>or that is true or false. If I say that this or that is true or false,
>it seems hard for me to be a skeptic.
Well, I'm not sure if 'skeptic' is the right label for me. All of the formal
terms I know about philosophy I have gleamed from Owl's essays. I think he
called people who says all moral statements are false a type of skeptic.
>> In reality, I often say that moral outrage or condemnation has the
>> exact same amount of significance as a dog's bark.
>
>That might be true. Of course, some dog barks are /very/ significant.
>Have you ever been bitten by a dog?
Nope. Surely peoples moral outrage can be significant in a similar manner. For
instance if I was an abortion doctor, I would think that peoples moral outrage
was quite significant wrt my health. But I think people want their moral
outrage to have more significance than being roughly translatable into "boo!"
>Of
>course, I have been suggesting that there is no bright line between the
>prescriptive and the descriptive (or facts and values), so since you
>think that there are, this disagreement between us is bound to play
>itself out on a variety of fronts, perhaps including definitions.
Can you give a definition of something that you think is clearly prescriptive,
something clearly descriptive (those should be easy), and more interestingly,
maybe one or two examples where you think it is unclear?
>So your view is that if a moral theory does not posit a gap, then it is
>weak and vacuous. But if it does posit a gap, then it would have some
>significance, even though it is false (since a gap assumes properties
>that do not exist).
Yes.
>That seems like a rather strange sort of
>significance, bought at a rather high price. So I'll stick with a weak
>theory. After all, I have never claimed that every common belief about
>the good is true, only that there are /some/ true beliefs.
But all these beliefs about the good which are actually true are ones in which
there is no gap between the good that is being ascribed and descriptive stuff?
(or, at least you are not aware of any true statements about the good that also
involve gaps?)
George Dance
0753.0...@mb-ba.aol.com>...
> The post was getting too long, so I had to snip lots of stuff.
No problem.
> >If you want to show a false alternative, you have to give a
> >counterexample. This is more mere assertion by persuasive definition.
>
> No one has to do anything, regardless of what they want. I am just pointing
> this out because, taken literally, this is similar to the mistake of sayi
> ng "if
> you want X, then <some means to x> is a rational action."
It's exactly the same, but I fail to see any mistake. If you want X,
you want X to be the case; if X won't be the case unless you do Y,
then you have to do Y for X to be the case; so if you want X, you have
to do Y to get what you want.
> The correctly formed statement is, "to show a false alternative, it is
> necessary to give a counterexample" since a want by itsself cannot imply a
> 'has.'
'Necessary', though, does imply a 'has'.
> Notice that "if you want to show a false alternative, it is necessary to
> give a
> counterexample" would also be incorrect, since nothing is strictly necessary,
> and the mere existance of a want is not not sufficient for pinning down what
> the necessariness is for. More on this at the end of the post.
> In (4) it looked like you were speaking of rational means independently from
> ends. If you just meant, there is some end for which Y is a rational means in
> (4), then that is fine.
Of course that is what "Y is both rational and a means" has to mean.
> However, notice that that statement is rather vacuous.
> There is no action that is not a rational means to something.
So if you had no end, but just wanted to 'do something,' then all
means would be equally rational (meaning it would make no sense to
speak of any as rational or irrational, as you'd be making a
distinction without a difference). But as nothing can be a means
without it being a means to a specific end, then it is sensible to
make the distinction.
>
> >> Here you only specify one argument. Perhaps you mean that:
> >>
> >> Ex( rational_means( Y, x) ) (Ex == there exists an x such t
> >> hat )
> >
> >OK, though you've written it badly. Let R be 'rational', M be
> >'means.'
> >
> >1. (3x)(3y)(Rx&Mxy) stipulated.
>
> Uh, no. Y being a rational means to X does not mean that Y is rational.
> Appearantly you thought I wrote it "badly" because I did not break up "ra
> tional
> means" into a conjuction of the predicates "rational" and "means", but my
> original objection was that you cannot do this. So, no, I didn't write it
> badly
> at all if you accept that if I write it in a way that clearly expresses my
> position, and not in a way that contraidcts my position, it is not bad.
Well, it doesn't clearly express your position, because it doesn't say
what a rational means is; so how could one know it is impossible?
> >1. (3x)(3y)(Rx&Mxy) stipulated.
> >2. ((3x)(3y)Mxy)->((3x)Mx)) definition of 'means'.
> >3. (3x)(Rx&Mx) 1,2 MP
> >-------
> >4. (3x)Rx 3 Simp
>
> As mentioned previously, there is an error is in step 1. Of course you don't
> think it is an error, but it is. X being a rational way to achieve Y does not
> imply that X is simply rational without reference to anything else, but t
> hat > is exactly what Rx means.
So let's try a rewrite, keeping X for means and Y for end.
1. (3x)(3y)(|-(x->y)&<>(x->y)) "there is an x and a y for which it can
be proven that, if x, then y; and possibly, if x, then y."
2. (3x)(3y)(|-x->y) "there is an x and a y for which it can be proven
that if x, then y." 1 Simp
3. (x)(y)((|-x->y)->Rx) "for any such x and y, then x is rational."
deinition oof 'rational.'
4. (3x)(3y)Rx. "There is an x and y for which x is rational."
That at least expresses what I'm saying; not that there can be any
means without ends (which there can't), but that the rationality can
be distinguished from being a means - which it can, as the action
would be a means if
5. (3x)(3y)(<>(x->y)) were true, and 2 were not.
> Also, what you do in step 2 appears to be an error.
Maybe it was. In any case, I've eliminated that step.
> >No, there are two predicates being assigned. "X is a rational means"
> >is more like "X is measurably bigger": X is measurable, and X is
> >bigger than Y
>
> How you managed to say that a proposition not containing Y means something
> about Y, I am not sure.
Right: the actual (compound) propositions would have to be:
1. "X is a rational means to Y" - X is a means to y, and X is
rational.
2. "X is measurably bigger than Y" - X is bigger than Y, and X is
measurable.
No action can be a means without it being a means to an end, just as
nothing can be bigger without it being bigger than something. So
calling an action a means always implies there is an end.
> And your implication was false (or rather nonsensical), unless you are using
> some queer notation. What you appeared to do was eliminate it by changing the
> definition of the M predicate mid-argument. See: ((3x)(3y)Mxy)->((3x)Mx))
Nothing queer about it; but, in any case, it's gone.
> >> X being a rational means to Y means something very very approximately
> similar
> >> to, "[X occurs] <--> [Y will occur]" (actually, this more closely rese
> >> mbles
> X
> >> being the ONLY means to Y.)
> >
> >That says "Y is a necessary and sufficient means to X."
>
> Incorrect. The difference in tense of the two terms makes them unsymmetrical
> and makes your interpretation wrong. You do not say that an effect is a means
> to its cause.
OK: I should have written:
That says "X is a necessary and sufficient means to Y."
snip
> (X-->Y) --> (~Y-->~X), but Y being a rational means to X does not mean th
> at it
> is the only means, or that it is necessary, but what you write implies th
> at if
> Y doesn't happen, X won't happen.
Right; but your formulation [X occurs]<->[Y will occur] does clearly
imply that if X occurs then Y will occur (X->Y), and therefore, if Y
doesn't happen, X did not happen (~Y->~X). Meaning that [X
occurs]<->[Y will occur] is not what "X is a rational means to Y"
means.
> A rational means to get some candy is to buy some. However, if I don't buy
> some, I can still get candy in other ways. Hence your definition,
> unsurprisingly, is again quite wrong.
It was your definition: "X being a rational means to Y means something
very very approximately similar to, "[X occurs] <--> [Y will occur]"".
But that's a quibble; it is wrong, which is what is important.
> >> For instance, X = you call your mom and leave a message, Y = there is a m
> >> essage
> >> from you on your mom's answering machine.
> >>
> >> Surely we'd say X is a means to Y, and Y is not a means to X. But we could
> >> write X-->Y, which, if we make some simplifying assumptions, is reason
> >> able.
> >
> >The only assumption needed is that Y is necessary for X.
> Assumptions that simplify the situation w/ your mom and the answering mac
> hine,
> was what I was talking about.
>
> >> According to you though, this is equivilant to something like "there being
> a
> >> message from you on your moms answering machine is a rational means to
> >> your
> >> calling your mom and leaving a message."
> >
> >No, it isn't.
>
> Thats right, but your definition said that it was. Hence, we see that you're
> wrong, just like I said.
The definition was wrong, but it was your definition: "X being a
rational means to Y means something very very approximately similar
to, "[X occurs] <--> [Y will occur]"".
> To recap, you said Y is a rational means to X IFF X --> Y. (you later rea
> lized
> your error and gave yet another incorrect definition, but when I quote you,
> you're still talking about this one). I just gave an example of the form
> X-->Y
> which it was incorrect to interpret thus. Understand?
Yes. Your definition is incorrect, and your symbolization is
incorrect.
(the next part makes no sense, as what was actually being discussed
has gone by now. So it's best to snip it.)
snip
>
> To determine if advising him is contrary to reason or not, you need more
> context. Specifically, you need some goal to relate the advising to, to s
> ee if
> the advising is an irrational way to achieve that goal. This isn't that h
> ard,
Or in dispute.
> I
> don't know why you seem to have so much trouble. For some reaosn you want to
> automatically take HIS goal as the standard by which all means should be
> judged
> rational or not, in relation to. There is no reason to do this. There is no
> more justification for this than taking the compliment of his goal as the
> standard.
Well, which is your end? His goal or the complement? Either one has
at least one means that could possibly achieve it, and, if it will
achieve it, then it's a rational means to that end, and therefore
rational. That's the standard for you to judge if a means is
rational.
> If I want X, and Y is necessary for X, then we can make no judgement abou
> t what
> it is rational for you to do (advise me or not) since no end has been
> specified. If you want to use my want as the end, that has to be specified
> explicitly.
Whether it's rational for me to advise you to do it or not, depends on
whether I want you to do it or I don't; whichever is the case, then it
is either rational for me to advise you if that's (at least partly)
sufficient to achieve my end. Of course, if I didn't want either end,
or didn't know what I wanted, I couldn't rationally advise you to do
either action; but who said I could?
> If Osama bin Laden wants to kill you, and in order for him to kill you, he
> needs to send you a letter containing anthrax, then, just given that
> information, we can determine that it is rational for you to advise him t
> o send
> you anthrax, huh? Obviously not, so stop objecting to this.
I think you've constructed a strawman again. I think my original
argument was that, if someone wanted an end (if Osama wanted to kill
me, eg), and if I advised him to to take an action that would not
accomplish the end (to throw the anthrax up into the air and pray that
it lands on me, eg), there would be no reason for him to do what I
advised, and therefore it could not be rational advice to him. But
I'm not sure; I'd have to read the backquotes.
> >> X being an irrational way to achieve Y does not imply simply "X is
> >> irrational" and "X is a way."
> >
> >No, it implies "X is irrational" and "X is (possibly) a way to achieve
> >Y".
>
> It does not imply that X is irrational.
Try giving an argument to that effect
> if you think it does.
OK.
1. " X is an irrational way to achieve Y" is true.
2. "X is an irrational way to achieve Y, therefore X is rational" is
incoherent.
3. "X is an irrational way to achieve Y, therefore X is neither
rational nor irrational" is incoherent.
4. "X is an irrational way to achieve Y, therefore X is irrational" is
coherent.
5. X must be either rational, irrational, or neither rational nor
irrational.
6.. As one cannot coherently believe X to be either rational or
neither rational nor irrational, then one can only coherently believe
X to be irrational.
> X is only irrational as a way to achieve Y. X might be
> rational as a way to achieve ~Y. There is no way to make a rationality
> judgement about X without reference to some goal, and hence saying just "X is
> irrational" without giving more information does not make sense.
"X is an irrational way to achieve Y, therefore X is irrational" does
give more information.
> >Y". Where did you get the idea that something can be a means without
> >it being a means to an end?
>
> Obviously I don't hold this position, yet this kind of thinking riddles your
> posts. You want to call some things rational without reference to anythin
> g that
> they are rational for. Given any action, it is always a rational way to a
> chieve
> something, and it is always an irrational way to achieve something else. This
> indicates that if you want the irrationality or rationality of X to come
> directly from whether it is a rational or irrational way to achieve some
> goal,
> it cannot be one or the other by itsself.
I don't remember every saying any such thing. You'd have to give an
example.
> An example of you specifically referring to means without reference to an
> y end
> is when you introduce the predicate Mx. This is a clear cut example of you
> trying to seperate the two. To make sense, you need to write EyMxy or
> something, but you nonsensically write Mx.
I defined Mx as (Mxy->Mx) (that was a simplification - it should have
been an equivalence - but it doesn't really matter anyway as that
premise is gone).
>
> >> Parsing english in a simplistic and incorrect manner is not cool.
> >> Think because you make these translations.
> >
> >Oh, then let me ask: what does 'because' mean in the above sentence?
> >I think it means 'before', but maybe that's too warm a meaning.
>
> Yes, that does mean 'before.' The advice still stands, btw.
> >> Pay attention. A transition is made from "X is a rational means to Y" to
> >> "X is
> >> rational." The entire relationship to Y is being discarded and it is
> claimed
> >> that the 'rational' part still pertains to X on its own.
> >
> >No. You have attempted to drop it a couple of times, apparently to
> >create a strawman argment, but you've been caught each time that I can
> >see.
>
> A strawman? It is on record that you think statements like "X is rational
> " can
> be true by themselves. Shall I go find the numerous quotes? You honestly deny
> that you've made statements similar "If I want X, then X is rational",
You'd have to find that quote.
> or "if
> someone needs to do X to achieve Y, and they want Y, then doing X is
> rational."
> These are explicit examples of you calling something rational by itsself.
Oh, I get it. It is the same as if: You say that nothing can be
called a 'circle,' only a 'round circle', because a circle has to be
round. I reply that of course it can; if a circle has to be round,
then calling it a circle implies its roundness. You then accuse me of
saying there are circles that are not round; and when I object to
that, your reply is that you have numerous quotes in which I said
'circle' instead of 'round circle.'
> Pay attention closely here, because I can immagine the error you are making.
> You might be confused in that you think that since lots of your statement
> s like
> this are made in a conditional manner, like "If Y, then X is rational", then
> the rationality of X is some sort of rationality that is relational to Y.
Not relational - X is either rational, irrational, or neither - but
certainly conditional on Y.
> Not
> so. It may depend on Y, but that is not the connection you need. If you are
> making this error, you need to reason more carefully. "If Y, then X is
> rational," asribes the property of rationality to X and to X alone, in th
> e case
> when Y (and maybe in others). Just because Y must obtain for X to be rational
> does not mean that when you say that X is rational you do anything other than
> ascribe rationality to a single act X.
I hope we've cleared that up, at least.
Symmetry
>From: George Dance georg...@hotmail.com
>Message-id: <6312c50b.01121...@posting.google.com>
>> I will give you at least one day to find what is wrong w/ your argument,
>> and if
>> you don't get it by then, I will share the answer w/ you.
>
>By when? You state that you will share the answer after Dec. 13, but
>not that you will share it before any time.
It isn't really a logical error like some of the others you've made, so don't
worry too much. I have finals soon, so I shall not have much time, and when I
have come to HPO, I've seen other posts that interest me more to spend my time
on. I will do it sometime, maybe in a few days. You can perhaps put it on your
christmas wish list.