[Is there an objective morality?]

"The" moral realist view already has an absolute set of identifiable values, one of which is "slavery is wrong"?

No, the moral realist view has axioms such as "increase the overall happiness in the world." Those axioms lead to the conclusion "slavery is wrong."

It has nothing to do with what people think. Morality is completely independent of what people think.

[Is there an objective morality?]

"We can all agree" "even if someone disagrees" is the contradiction. "We can all agree" is meaningless when you limit "all" to people who agree with you. I think we can all agree that this is a contradiction, even if someone else disagrees.

There is no contradiction whatsoever between the statement "morality is objective" and "people can have different moral views."

To say that "we can all agree" is not the same thing as "morality is objective." Say everyone thinks slavery is right. On the moral realist view, that does not mean that slavery is objectively right. Because on the moral realist view, slavery is wrong.

You nitpicked a part of Rapier's argument that was wrong, but the rest of his argument is right.

[Is there an objective morality?]

Sorry, but this statement seems shocking to me. If we distance ourselves completely from reality and reason on a purely abstract/philosophical point of view, then ANY action might theoretically be defined like that, but in real life, imagine how you would deal with somebody who tries to eat a child alive. I understand it might be interesting to somebody to reflect in abstract ways, but "eating children" is just too much....

One way of dealing with it is to invent an ethics, much like how we invent mathematics. So utilitarianism might not be ultimately true, but it's still useful to us.

It's also not ultimately true that Jill is a better unit than Volug, but it would be useful for us to say so.

[Is there an objective morality?]

"Doesn't mean it's the case"? By itself the sentence (considering how it's worded) sounds like "it's not true that eating children alive isn't ok". I hope you didn't mean that eating them alive IS ok or that you would be willing to have anything to do with somebody who eats them alive?

Eating children alive is neither ok nor not ok. The proposition "eating children alive is morally acceptable" is neither true, nor false. So it's not the case that it is true, and it's not the case that it is false.

[Is there an objective morality?]

I'm not saying cases where people eat their children don't exist. I'm saying it is abominable. Simple. One would need to be brainwashed by obscure and irrational cultural and traditional views to deny this obvious truth derived from our reason and intuition, like the cannibalists you mentioned. How is this even controversial?

I don't care if it is permissible or not in error theory (yes, I understood it doesn't make any judgment of value, nothing is acceptable or unacceptable in ET, ok). I'm strictly speaking about what should be morally acceptable, regardless of what error theory says. And eating children alive should not be morally acceptable, whatever error theory says or does not say about it (because from what I understood from your post, error theory makes no judgment of value of this case). I don't need to accept error theory or operate thinking it is true - nor would I even do so, because if nothing can be acceptable or unacceptable under a view, then necessarily anything goes. After all, on moral error theory, things like rape, persecution and genocide aren't possible to be judged as right or wrong.

I thought error theory was inside moral subjectivism, but actually I was wrong. It is contained within moral anti-realism, instead. I mistook both. My bad.

Isn't it contained within moral realism? If not, why?

I don't care about what you think should be the case. It should be the case that eating children alive isn't ok, but just because it should be the case doesn't mean it is the case. The world isn't a nice and fair place. There is no objective morality, just like how there is no God, or afterlife. These things make us feel comfortable and we believe in them because they make us feel comfortable, but they don't exist.

I suppose I agree with that, but for there to be value, there has to be a valuer. Who is the valuer in this case?

Here's how it works. In ethics, you determine the one thing that has intrinsic value (value for the sake of itself). In some views, this might be happiness, or pleasure, or whatever. Everything else has extrinsic value. Everything else has value/negative value in so far as it leads to the increase or decrease of pleasure, or happiness.

You measure the value of a world, or an action, based on the overall intrinsic value. The world with the most intrinsic value overall is a world that is objectively better than a world with less intrinsic value, according to the moral realist.

According to the negative utilitarian, a world of sociopaths has the same intrinsic value as the world of happy people. This is intuitively false, so negative utilitarianism is false.

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.

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.

[Is science incompatible with religion?]

There are many things in life which are not fair regardless of what you believe in. Evolution has dictated that douchey McJockstrap is more likely to reproduce despite being a horrible person barely able to hold a job at a hotdog stand simply because he has genes that make him appeal to women and Kim Kardassian exists as well. But here is the key misconception. You have assumed that, because some of the Bible has changed over the years due to various reasons, the book is now invalid. This is roughly akin to getting a new OS, discovering it doesn't have Minesweeper, and declaring it the worst thing ever. The core message of Jesus, the key to how it all works, comes from the most simple of statements. Do unto others what you would have them do unto you. Sure, that may be an oversimplification, but it is also the core of Christianity. From that the rest can be built out and understood. Just because you disagree with someone or they outright violently hate you doesn't mean you should spite them back; but rather to turn the other cheek and do your best to treat them well.

So.. why doesn't God make things fair so that his followers don't burn in Hell forever because they misunderstood the Bible?

[Is there an objective morality?]

But how do we determine who is an "expert" in morality and who isn't? You say that all humans are, but then why would some people's intuitions regarding morality contradict those of others(like the cannibalism example you've talked about)? I have an idea, but I would very much appreciate if you expand on this. Also, could you explain to me what the difference is between relative and subjective morality?

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_.

Don't you mean a world with nothing but sociopaths? I assume that's what you mean, but if not I'm confused. Well, it would be a horrible world to live in for a person who is not a perfect sociopath, but if every person was a perfect sociopath, I can't see why it would matter.

Yes, that's what I meant.

No, just consider: compare the overall value of a world filled with 1000 sociopaths who experience no pain or happiness, and the overall value of a world filled with 1000 people who experience extreme happiness and no pain whatsoever.

Negative utilitarianism says both worlds are equally valuable. No, that is unintuitive. The latter world is far more valuable. Thus negative utilitarianism is false.

[Is science incompatible with religion?]

Except that's not really the case. Sort of...

Firstly the Bible has been handed down for several thousands of years. At the least ~2,000 or so if one only considers the New Testament. Now, I'm not going to claim that the Jewish scholars failed to scribe down God's word perfectly, I'm gonna give them the benefit of the doubt here, but there are many OTHER people whom have written the Bible in said time between Jesus's time on Earth and now; not all of whom were exactly perfect scribes. So you have copy degradation (you know, how if you copy something, then make a copy using the new copy, and so-on, eventually the copy has completely degraded), the fact that the Bible has been translated multiple times now, and cultural interpretations added in. Then you have the fact that the Bible was NOT compiled by God but, rather, by man. There are several books in the Bible that, while key to Christianity, are distinctly not God's word (EX: Psalms. A literal songbook). Once again, giving the benefit of the doubt here, the people who compiled the Bible from the various records, accounts, and letters probably did their best to keep it true to the word of God, but that's not the same as being 100% accurate. In fact the reason that there are four separate gospels is that all four focused on different events and viewpoints even if they were describing the same person and happenings.

So between the time, translations, additions/omissions, and the general fallibility of man the Bible isn't exactly the most consistent thing around. I still believe it to be true; just... taken with the grain of salt that it was God who dictated but man who wrote it.

Another way to phrase it in more... FE... terms would be imagine someone making a tier list and getting it 100% accurate and even 80% of the arguments fairly right, but there is still that 20% that's different. It's different, changed a bit, but still true through and through.

Then why doesn't God just snap his fingers and fix it by making it much more clear? It's not fair for Christians to suffer because of people's mistakes 2000 years ago, who are long dead.

[Is there an objective morality?]

Lol Rapier, you're so naive. Ok here's some proof:

http://enlightenment.supersaturated.com/johnlocke/BOOKIChapterII.html

And are there not places where, at a certain age, they kill or expose their parents, without any remorse at all? In a part of Asia, the sick, when their case comes to be thought desperate, are carried out and laid on the earth before they are dead; and left there, exposed to wind and weather, to perish without assistance or pity. It is familiar among the Mingrelians, a people professing Christianity, to bury their children alive without scruple. There are places where they eat their own children. The Caribbees were wont to geld their children, on purpose to fat and eat them. And Garcilasso de la Vega tells us of a people in Peru which were wont to fat and eat the children they got on their female captives, whom they kept as concubines for that purpose, and when they were past breeding, the mothers themselves were killed too and eaten.

http://www.vice.com/read/hanging-out-with-cannibals-georgia-rose-377

It doesn't matter, my point stands. If it is true, then killing children to eat them with soups and cut vegetables is morally acceptable. That can't be acceptable.

Stop repeating this. Nothing is acceptable OR unacceptable in error theory. I'm not going to explain this over again, reread my posts. Phoenix Wright has the right (pun not intended) idea.

[Is there an objective morality?]

what if everyone had the same culture, thus (roughly) the same intuitions? or, if we "close off" differing cultures from each other, are each respective culture's morals objective within their own culture?

Doesn't matter.

Can you imagine a world in which people have the common sense intuition to make children fat in order to cook them? Yes.

Can you imagine a world in which people think 1+1=3? I think that would be logically contradictory since it's in the innate nature of a human being to not be that stupid.

[Is there an objective morality?]

Bolded part can be used to justify any atrocity a person can think about.

So you don't understand error theory of morality, ok.

Yes, people can have common sense intuitions completely contradictory to ours. People in Papua New Guinea might think flying a plane into a kindergarten full of innocent children might be fine in order to cook their meat and eat them, for example.

But error theory says that nothing can be justified or unjustified based on morality. Morality is just nothing at all.

I personally utilize natural rights as one of the basis for moral judgment. If it is someone else's natural right to be born free, no one has the right to turn them into slaves.

Most philosophers think there are no such things as rights. Rights are only tools used to accomplish a greater good, such as maximizing overall happiness.

[Is science incompatible with religion?]

I don't know for sure, nobody can KNOW 100%. But the religious people I personally know give a good example in my opinion. If they interpret religion in a certain way and that makes them better, who we are to say religion is bad by default? If a person doesn't harm anybody and does quite the opposite and religion plays a role in it, I see no point in renouncing religion for that person. Everybody has their own way to become a moral person.

If the Bible is so hard to interpret, that just makes it a poorly written book. How can a poorly written book be the word of God? God can't make any mistakes, by definition.

[Is science incompatible with religion?]

And that's sad. Such people ruin religion when it could be an instrument of morality and hope. To be honest, I maintain my religious beliefs partially because I try to take example from the Christians I personally know, who are almost all honest, welcoming, friendly and helpful people.

Are they ruining religion, or are they just portraying its true nature?

You're trying too hard to assign a metaphorical reading to everything in the Bible you don't agree with. That's what we call "cherrypicking." It's a horrible way out of the bad quotes of the New Testament, since the burden of proof is on you to show that there are metaphorical readings of "burning forever in Hell." There aren't any.

[Is science incompatible with religion?]

When he was alone, the Twelve and the others around him asked him about the parables. 11He told them, “The secret of the kingdom of God has been given to you. But to those on the outside everything is said in parables 12so that,

“ ‘they may be ever seeing but never perceiving,

and ever hearing but never understanding;

otherwise they might turn and be forgiven!’a ”

Jesus says here that God speaks in parables so that people who don't have the secret of the kingdom of God can never understand or perceive his stories, so that they end up going to Hell. It's very obvious what it means, it's not open to interpretation.

However, I think that the "cutting the feet off", "burning" forever in hell etc are still allegorical things, it would be too primitive for a supreme being like God to use real-life fire and literally "fry" the sinners.

Ha ha. This is really funny because it shows how much more advanced modern morality is compared to medieval morality and religion. You're more moral than the God of the New Testament. They aren't allegorical at all, it really means that sinners are going to burn forever in Hell.

When I watch religious programs (both Islam and Christianity), they often talk about people burning forever in Hell. So this is quite literal and not a joke at all. What would be the point of a metaphorical reading? What else could it mean? Nothing.

As one of my professors put it, the Bible is good for those who have the morality of a toddler. You're better than that and can see the flaws with the morality that religion gives us.

[Is there an objective morality?]

Oh, right, because negative utilitarianism only cares about minimizing pain, but not about maximizing happiness (it doesn't even touch happiness, contrary to what I believed). My mistake was silly.

Another question about this: Isn't the whole minimizing pain business a means to maximize happiness, in a negative utilitarian view? If it is, then I was right for saying such society is not contained within negative utilitarianism's purpose.

Well, going for the basics now, what constitutes a moral action? Is killing innocents wrong because it does harm to an individual and is detrimental to the continuinity and survivability of a society? Or is there a better criteria for judging that I don't know?

Bolded part: no, because minimizing pain has intrinsic value (it has value in and of itself, it just is valuable to minimize pain). There is no value in and of itself to maximize happiness, but indeed it has extrinsic value because it often minimizes pain.

What constitutes a moral action? There are millions of views out there in the world. It could be wrong because one believes in a desert-adjusted utilitarianism view, for example, where the amount of happiness is adjusted in terms of how much a person deserves it. Killing people denies the happiness that they will experience over their lives. Where does desert come in? For example, Hitler's happiness would decrease the overall value of happiness because he doesn't deserve to be happy at all.

===

I don't think an objective morality exists but I also don't like people who go like: "WELL ISNT IT OBVIOUSLY SUBJECTIVE? PEOPLE NEVER AGREE ON ETHICAL CASES." There are infinitely many uncontroversial cases (such as flying a plane into a kindergarten full of innocent children) so I don't find this a very convincing line of argument.

It's harder than that to establish why there is no objective morality. The reason I think morality isn't subjective is because common sense intuitions about morality can vary so strongly, while other common sense intuitions like the existence of the external world, 1+1=2 can't vary across communities. (There are tribes which don't have number words in their language so they don't know 1+1=2, but this is a lack of an intuition rather than having the opposite intuition, so this is just a different case).

Consider a community like Papua New Guinea in which cannibalism is accepted. I think they actually grow up certain children and make them fat just so they can eat them, make soup out of them and etc. They think what they're doing is right and this is a very natural intuition for them. Who are we to tell them that what they're doing is wrong? They grew up in that way and they think they're right. Their intuitions are completely different from ours. So I think morality can't be objective since intuitions about them vary depending on one's culture.

Mackie argues that the best explanation of these phenomena is that moral judgments “reflect adherence to and participation in different ways of life” (1977: 36). This, at least, is a better explanation than the hypothesis that there is a realm of objective moral facts to which some cultures have inferior epistemic access than others. The example Mackie uses is of two cultures' divergent moral views regarding monogamy. Is it really plausible, he asks, that one culture enjoys access to the moral facts regarding marital arrangements whereas the other lacks that access? Isn't it much more likely that monogamy happened to develop in one culture but not in the other (for whatever cultural or anthropological reasons), and that the respective moral views emerged as a result?

A more advanced argument in favor of error theory is as follows, but I'll try to make it as simple as possible. Moral properties are really weird. To say that an action is righteous is different from every other property you can use to describe that action, such as being a relation between two objects, taking 100 seconds, etc. Such properties are weird because no other property like them exists. By Occam's razor, we can eliminate moral properties from our theory of metaphysics, so there is no morality. It's basically like saying that morality is like an invisible pink unicorn.

[Is there an objective morality?]

But you just told me perfect sociopaths don't feel happiness. How can I maximize happiness in a world where it does not exist? How can negative utilitarianism be concerned with maximizing happiness in a world of perfect sociopaths (who can't feel happiness)?

I think happiness and sadness are two faces of the same coin. Someone who can't feel happiness/sadness is also someone who can't feel sadness/happiness. If negative utilitarianism is concerned with maximizing happiness, then it does not advocate for a society with perfect sociopaths, who feel no pain nor happiness. Rather, utilitarianism's purpose is lost.

Actually, this has led me to think a bit more. If a hypothetical society gets rid of pain, how can we know happiness? We only know happiness because we know suffering. By eliminating suffering, do we not also eliminate happiness? If "happy" is our eternal, natural state, then it loses all the speciality the term carries. ... Uh, I'm not sure about this, I confess, but it seems like an interesting way of thinking. It was first brought by Epicurus, wasn't it? I should read a bit more about this.

...You asked about the difference between maximizing happiness and minimizing pain, I answered your question. Read my post again.

The difference is that a world of perfect sociopaths in which there is no pain or happiness is worth exactly the same as a world in which there is maximum happiness and no pain according to the negative utilitarianism.

[Is there an objective morality?]

What is the difference between "maximizing happiness" and "minimizing pain"? If I say I want to maximize happiness, do I not also mean I want to minimize unhappiness (pain causes unhappiness, so I naturally would also want to minimize pain)? These statements seem like synonymous to me.

I think I can. A society where indiscriminate murders, rapes, thefts are morally acceptable is a society that crumbles in itself. So it is desirable to disencourage such actions by outruling them as wrong or immoral.

Perfect sociopaths for example feel no pain or happiness. According to negative utilitarianism, a world with perfect sociopaths would be equal to a world in which everyone is happy and has no pain.

[Is there an objective morality?]

There appears to be a fundamental difference between moral intuitions and the intuitions described in the quoted part of the pdf. The latter deal with actions taken to achieve goals(taking care of infants, saving people from fires, and winning a game of chess), while the former deal with what goals are moral and what goals are immoral. Due to this, I do not think this is a good reason to trust moral intuitions. I am not confident in my wording, but I hope I got my point across.

They don't deal with actions taken to achieve goals. For example, to say "this child has sepsis" does not mean that the doctor is taken any action to achieve any goal whatsoever.

No, they both deal with propositions such as the following:

"This infant is suffering from sepsis."

"It is moral to save a dying person's life.

And so on. Both kinds of intuitions deal with the truth value of propositions such as these.

I'll give a better post later.

Negative utilitarianism(instead of maximizing happiness, minimizing pain is the goal), for example. If I recall correctly, some utilitarians avoid this by having the goal be maximizing average happiness per person, but I cannot remember what this variation is called.

Where did you read this? Has this view actually been defended by a professional philosopher? It sounds like a complete joke to me.

Imagine a world which has no pain or happiness whatsoever. Like a world with no sociopaths. Is that the best possible world? Negative utilitarianism would say so, but ABSOLUTELY NOT. That's a horrible world to live in lol. It'd be like living in Singapore or something.

You're awfully young aren't you? Glad to see some smart kids interested in philosophy. Feel free to PM me any questions you want.

[Is science incompatible with religion?]

I don't wish to go into a objective vs subjective moralality debate (that's a 2000 year old monster), but your quote seems to imply that morality exists solely to enforce societal order. That contradicts your stated belief that morals are objective (how can morality be objective if its existence in its present form relies solely upon how society ended up today?)

Regardless, even if you believe relevant moral dilemmas are 90% subjective and 10% objective and I would say that it's much more subjective than 90%, given that for any given scenario I can guarantee the existence of a variation in which there are two easily arguable sides), that would make morality subjective overall, which brings me back to my original point: science, which is ideally 100% objective, cannot be used to create subjective moral rules.

In fact, how would you even possibly use "science" to find a solution to questions like "is abortion morally acceptable?" As long as there is something science cannot do and religion can, there's a need for religion.

(Trying to get the discussion somewhat back to the original topic here.)

Ethics is either completely subjective or completely objective, there's no middle ground.

Bolded part: Variations aren't valid since you're not considering the same scenario. It doesn't change the fact that I've proven that there uncontroversial cases, so I win.

Also, it's poor manners to ignore the quote from the New Testament I posted and keep repeating that there's a need for religion. The use of the Bible prevents us from giving women equal rights, giving animals rights, and so on.

Jesus tells us what he has planned for those that he dislikes. They will be cast into an "everlasting fire." 25:41

Jesus says the damned will be tormented forever. 25:46

Mark

Jesus explains why he speaks in parables: to confuse people so they will go to hell. 4:11-12

Jesus sends devils into 2000 pigs, causing them to jump off a cliff and be drowned in the sea. When the people hear about it, they beg Jesus to leave. 5:12-13

Any city that doesn't "receive" the followers of Jesus will be destroyed in a manner even more savage than that of Sodom and Gomorrah. 6:11

Jesus criticizes the Jews for not killing their disobedient children as required by Old Testament law. (See Ex 21:15, Lev 20:9, Dt 21:18-21) 7:9-10

Jesus tells us to cut off our hands and feet, and pluck out our eyes to avoid going to hell. 9:43-49

These quotes make Jesus look pretty evil.

[Is science incompatible with religion?]

Please, take a situation which doesn't seem to be completely obvious. Ask everybody in the world whether abortion should be legalized.

I can even spin endless variations of your scenario to make it less black-and-white. Ex: Is it morally acceptable to fly a plane into a kindergarten of 20 innocent children to save the President of the United States?

Doesn't matter if there are situations which aren't completely obvious. All I was doing was challenging the claim that ethics is obviously subjective, and it is not obviously subjective since there are infinitely many cases in which ethics is uncontroversial.

On what objective fact is "Flying a plane into a kindergarten full of innocent children is wrong." based on? I would love to know, because determining if there is an objective morality is very important. In fact, I might make a topic about it.(if it does not exist already)

Also, are you not appealing to the majority?

It's based on common sense intuitions.

Hey, bolded part is actually a pretty great question that made me think for a while. I never thought of that. It sure seems like relying on common sense intuitions is appealing to the majority. But I think common sense intuitions aren't valid simply because the majority of people have them. http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/intuition/

We do have good reasons to trust them, as science shows:

Consider recent research on “intuitions” in naturalistic decision making (Klein 1998). Such research has shown that agents with sufficient experience in a given domain (e.g., neonatal nursing, fire-fighting, or chess) make decisions on the basis of a cognitive process other than conscious considerations of various options and the weighing of evidence and utilities. Such expert “intuitions” that some infant suffers from sepsis, that a fire will take a certain course, or that a certain chess move is a good one, appear immediately in consciousness.

We can consider all humans as experts on basic morality (like flying a plane into a kindergarten) and on things like the existence of the external world, so we have good reason to trust them.

[Is science incompatible with religion?]

Also, at the end of the day, science cannot give us ethics, because science (should be) objective, which ethics clearly is not.

Is it really that clear? Ask anyone out there in the world who isn't a complete loon (or a philosopher): is it wrong to fly a plane into a kindergarten full of innocent children? I'm pretty sure everyone will say no.

[Is science incompatible with religion?]

The Old Testament is full of cruelty and injustices; theoretically the New Testament was needed just for that, to set things right; if science and religion contradict each other, then there is also no less contradiction between the 2 Testaments. Another example: they talk about animal sacrifices, burning their flesh, and this allegedly is "a smell that Our Lord likes" or something like that. Surely not something compatible with the concept of a merciful incarnation of Supreme Good that God incarnates. I think no moral religious person would consider the Old Testament as even a part of their moral guidelines in life.

That quote is from the New Testament.

[Is science incompatible with religion?]

Religion provides guidelines, moral standards, and worldviews.

We have to ask, are they good ones? The Bible has stuff like this:

I do not permit a woman to teach or to assume authority over a man; she must be quiet.

If anything, religion seems to give us the wrong answer about what is moral in many regards like women's rights.

[Planning for Data Transfer]

Here's what I did in my best transfers playthrough:

18 without any kind of abuse:

Ike: Str, Skl, Spd, Def, Res

Calill: Mag, Skl, Spd

Largo: HP, Str, Skl, Spd

Ilyana: Str, Mag, Skl, Spd, Res

Janaff: Str, Def

Tormod: Mag, Spd

Nephenee: Str, Skl, Spd, Def

Haar: HP, Str, Spd, Def

Sothe: 38 HP, 20 Str Skl Spd Def, 28 Luk, 17 Res

Marcia: Str, Skl, Spd, Def, Res

Jill: HP, Str, Skl, Spd, Def, Res

Tanith: Str, Spd, Skl, Def

Oscar: Str, Spd, Skl, Def

Tauroneo: Str, Spd

Boyd: HP, Str, Skl, Spd

Titania: Str, Spd

Giffca: Str

Ulki: Str, Def

Mia: Str, Spd

Lucia: Str, Spd

Staff abuse in Endgame:

Rhys: Mag, Skl, Res

Elincia: Mag

Soren: Mag, Skl

Reyson: Mag, Skl

These are probably the most humanly practical optimal transfers for LTC, and I'm sure they'll be just as helpful in any HM playthrough, LTC or not.

[Planning for Data Transfer]

Transfers aren't really that important in NM. Just use the ones you already have, and don't exert any effort to get better transfers.