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Blaze The Great

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    Is there an objective morality?

    in Serious Discussion

    Posted

    Why do I think that? It's just by definition true. Ethics = morality = system of beliefs about right and wrong. Go look at a dictionary.

    Morality has to be totally objective or subjective. There's no middle ground.

    Again, from what I've read, they are not the same. The articles seem to be very confused as to whether morality is a personal system and ethics are more widely used principles, or vice versa, but they all seem to agree that they are different. They are both beliefs about right and wrong, yes, but they are different in the way they are applied to said beliefs.

    Is there an objective morality?

    in Serious Discussion

    Posted · Edited by Blaze The Great

    It's not possible, I think. Objectiveness and subjectiveness are complete opposites in nature. It's like being 50% alive and 50% dead, or claiming something is composed of 50% matter and 50% antimatter. It's not possible. If morality does not depend on what we think, then it is definitely objective. If it does, then it is definitely subjective. There's no middle term, like "morality depends on what we think and doesn't depend on what we think". It would be a self contradictory definition.

    I don't know. Maybe you're right. But in the examples I provided, if morality is objective, then you could let the world die instead of killing the person who intended to launch the worldwide nuclear arsenal, because killing is immoral (according to your personal morality. I don't know). However, on the flipside, if morality is subjective, then nothing can be called immoral. And if laws are based in morality (as it seems to me they are), and everyone has subjective morality, then what basis do we even have for laws? Maybe I'm appealing to consequences here, but I see the negatives outweighing the positives from a subjective morality. Subjective overall morality is far worse than objective overall morality, but neither is a perfect solution. Objective morality should have common sense used alongside of it, and subjective morality...well, when everything is permissible if you believe in it, then you need to be REALLY careful.

    Is there an objective morality?

    in Serious Discussion

    Posted

    Ethics and morality are the same thing.

    You're religious right? You have to be a moral realist, because according to religion there is an objective morality determined by God.

    ===

    A note about error theory. I think that, for semantic reasons, the view that every ethical statement is false is not a good one. Rather, every ethical statement is neither true nor false. This version of error theory is much more reasonable.

    Why do you think that? I'm just curious, because it seems fairly obvious that ethics are derived from our morality, but are they really as simple as a bunch of people's moral beliefs put together?

    As for me, I'm more or less a moral realist. I don't think morality can be totally objective, nor can it be totally subjective. If it was totally objective, and we weren't supposed to lie, but lying could save someone's life, then that person would be dead. While on the other hand, if morality is completely subjective, going on a killing spree could have the same moral value for one person as donating $1 million to charity could have for another. But more or less, even if God didn't exist, I'd be a moral realist.

    Is there an objective morality?

    in Serious Discussion

    Posted

    I don't really see how that's an impossibility? The only thing impossible there is a reconciliation of the view of ethics you're proposed (moral relativism) and that of moral realism. They are not compatible.

    On moral realism, consider this; we accept that "truth" can exist independantly of a human mind. "The world is not flat" is a mind independant truth. If someone believes the world is flat, that does not change that the fact is independant of their thought. Equally, a moral realist believes that some ethical truths are mind independant. However, there is an obvious difference, the first is empircal, wheras the second is closer to the realm of counterfactuals, in that they do not really have a robust form to them (ie it is true that if you had killed yourself yesterday then you wouldn't be here today). So to define the existance of that truth is pretty much impossible, but to prove the opposite is also pretty much impossible. You simply have to make what you will of the world and the reasonings supporting a realist or anti-realist position. A moral realist position claims that with reasoning and intuition, we can come to know ethical truths - that humans can know The Good.

    A big sticking point in realism vs anti-realism (outside of morality), is in the nature of what facts/truths are and how they relate to the world. Do facts exist and we only discover those facts, or do we create proofs that establish facts?

    Well unless everything I have read is wrong (I haven't done thorough research, mind you, but I've read several different things), then ethics are generally societal principles created for determining proper conduct, whereas morals are generally more personal judgments about right vs. wrong. So, if ethics are created by society to focus on conduct, then it is impossible for them to exist independently of people. Now, MORALS can definitely exist independently of people, as they are our personal biases towards right and wrong, as opposed to the biases of a group on proper conduct. However, if ethics are society's method of determining good conduct, then they can't exist without our opinions.

    ...Maybe I'm looking into this too much/too little. Like I said before, correct me if I'm wrong. Also, upon studying a little more, I realized that this entire time I've been debating for subjective ETHICS, as opposed to subjective MORALS. Woops.

    Is there an objective morality?

    in Serious Discussion

    Posted

    All humans of normal intelligence are experts on basic morality based on the fact that they experience their lives and such. You don't need to teach someone advanced ethics for them to develop a rudimentary ethics from their environment, culture and innate intelligence,

    I don't specialize in ethics, but:

    Moral realism: ethical truths are objective, exist independently of people's opinions.

    Moral relativism: ethical truths are not objective and do not exist independently, and they can vary depending on different cultures. For example, it is independently true of Nazi Germany that it is righteous to kill Jews. Ethical truths exist because of the opinions of people in different cultures.

    Moral subjectivism: may be a form of moral relativism, but in its most extreme, it could be the view that ethical truths exist for each individual person. Ex: it is right for Hitler to kill Jews because he hates them a lot.

    Divine command theory: whatever is right is what God commands

    Error theory: there are no moral truths whatsoever, ethical statements are always false

    Expressivism: moral propositions (murder is wrong) express the feelings of the one who uses that claim towards murder (for example, when Rapier says murder is wrong he means "murder!!" where the "!!" is something bad)

    So unlike what Rapier was saying, moral subjectivism and error theory are two _completely different views_.

    Err...correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't the bolded part an impossibility? Since ethics is defined as proper conduct in society's eyes, then isn't it impossible for ethics to exist independently of the opinions of people? Or is it that ethics remain the same cross-culturally and can't be redefined by any culture?

    Is there an objective morality?

    in Serious Discussion

    Posted

    Think about a society where, for the sake of keeping a majority happy, a minority is explored, subjugated and mistreated. Such a society would be morally acceptable under utilitarian morality views, because the amount of happiness is maximized. This is one of the most basic problems I can see with utilitarism. It only cares about making the maximum number of people happy, despite the unhappiness that a minority might suffer from such action. Like Emiya Kiritsugu, I guess.

    That's a fair point, but shouldn't the goal to be maximizing a good result? Granted, you have to take this idea with a little bit of common sense and caution. I know it sounds rude, but if there is no better outcome, why not use utilitarianism to achieve this? Of course, that goes for all other ethics principles, but especially this one because of the weighing of good vs. bad results.

    Is there an objective morality?

    in Serious Discussion

    Posted · Edited by Blaze The Great

    Uh, I think so? If a perfect being, who knows everything about morals, ethics and, well, literally everything about every field of knowledge, says x is true and y is false, I am inclined to believing them. But moral objectivism doesn't need to be religious, although religious moralities need to be contained in moral objectivism (for it is the decree of their deity).

    About a way that allows us to determine objective morals... I don't know. I'm placing my chips in a philosophical theory which I'll address on the bottom quote.

    Well, there's Kant's categorical imperative. According to him, we should (paraphrased) "act in such a way that your actions become an universal rule". Which means that if I steal, I am accepting that stealing should become an universal rule. But stealing can be judged as bad by our reasoning, because it surely is harmful. Therefore, stealing should not be an universal rule, and thus, I should not steal. That way we can find moral truths through reasoning.

    I think this is rather flawed because even stealing is not always wrong. Suppose I need a medicine very badly and I will die in 3 days if I don't have it. I have absolutely no means to get that medicine if not through stealing. Would my action be wrong? It seems our judgments can't be held equally for all cases, and it seems very dependable of the concrete case we are dealing with, much like it is done in law. ... I guess I really don't know.

    My main problem with this is, without a proper basis for morals, or "right and wrong", I'm not sure how we can properly determine what is absolutely moral and absolutely immoral. Actions must be, in my opinion, rationalized based on the situation, and as you said, not every case is the same.

    And this reminds me of the ethics principle utilitarianism, for some reason. I've seen it criticized before, and I don't understand the basis for said criticism, especially when it comes to act utilitarianism. May sound like a stupid question to some, but weighing the benefits vs. harms of one activity, especially in one specific case as opposed to a general rule, seems like a perfectly rational basis for actions.

    Is there an objective morality?

    in Serious Discussion

    Posted

    The issue is that we as humans are subjective. I've never met a human with absolutely no bias, so none of us can claim to be purely objective beings. Therefore we have a subjective worldview, and in turn a subjective view of everything we see. We can't know what is absolutely right or absolutely wrong (unless God hypothetically came down and told us himself what was right), so we have to infer. We can try to weigh the rightness of acts (utilitarianism) but no system is perfect. I suppose in a way I am comparing making absolute and objective morality synonymous, but I don't see enough of a difference not to.

    I do agree with you in that I want to see what some of the smarter people have to say, as I'm probably even less qualified than you.

    Is there an objective morality?

    in Serious Discussion

    Posted

    I, personally, do not think that morality can be objective, because your view of morality can often depend on your worldview. Some people believe in absolute morality (ie, morality is unchanging, set-in-stone, permanent) and this is very popular with the religious. Others believe in moral relativism, which says that morals are flexible and change over time with how we understand the world. That in itself seems enough to me that morality can't be objective, because we choose how to view morality from a personal standpoint.

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