(March 15, 2026 at 4:43 pm)Fake Messiah Wrote:

(March 15, 2026 at 3:56 pm)Disagreeable Wrote: There are many reasons people can have false beliefs. If people thought slavery was moral then I'm not sure what their reasons were.

Maybe the reasons were that morals are not objective or universal, but stem from society and upbringing.

I don't think that the fact that people can be wrong about morals is evidence that morality is not objective. It's evidence that moral beliefs are not universal but that's not the same thing as them not being objective.

If morals are objective then it could mean something like: If the Nazis killed or brainwashed everyone so that everybody in the world thought that the holocaust was morally justified, it wouldn't make it morally justified.

Or if everyone in the world approved of slavery it wouldn't mean that slavery is moral.

Universality is different to objectivity.

(March 15, 2026 at 6:18 pm)Paleophyte Wrote: Or they knew full well that they were doing themselves a favour and didn't much care what happened to the black man. Either way you cut it, what we once considered moral, we don't anymore. Human sacrifice and stoning people to death are no longer considered socially acceptable behavior.

I agree that it may be the case that a lot of slave owners knew that what they were doing was wrong but they didn't care.

The fact that it was once considered moral doesn't mean that it ever was.

(March 15, 2026 at 11:21 pm)Thumpalumpacus Wrote: Veganism and vegetarianism both have palpable objective results which seem to be more ecologically sound -- less methane in the air, less pigshit in river deltas downstream making dead zones, and so on. Does that make them more moral?

It's one factor that may be relevant to morality. But it's not the only factor. The harm directly done to animals may be a big factor.

The fact that veganism is more ecologically sound than an omnivorous diet may be morally relevant to a degree and it may be sufficient for making an omnivorous diet at least partially immoral, because of the harm caused by the ecological unsoundness, but I don't think that it's a necessary condition for making an omnivorous diet immoral.

(March 15, 2026 at 11:21 pm)Thumpalumpacus Wrote: It's not praise, because acting to reduce ecological damage in order to support your own species may still do harm onto others.

Yeah, whether reducing ecological damage does more or less harm to people overall is an empirical question. It may or may not be a sufficient condition for immorality, but, again, I don't think that it's a necessary condition for immorality.

(March 16, 2026 at 11:58 am)Disagreeable Wrote:

(March 15, 2026 at 6:18 pm)Paleophyte Wrote: Or they knew full well that they were doing themselves a favour and didn't much care what happened to the black man. Either way you cut it, what we once considered moral, we don't anymore. Human sacrifice and stoning people to death are no longer considered socially acceptable behavior.

I agree that it may be the case that a lot of slave owners knew that what they were doing was wrong but they didn't care.

The fact that it was once considered moral doesn't mean that it ever was.

If people don't consider something moral, then how can it be? Are you suggesting that there's some sort of external moral truth? Seems dodgy.

(March 16, 2026 at 1:18 pm)Paleophyte Wrote:

(March 16, 2026 at 11:58 am)Disagreeable Wrote: I agree that it may be the case that a lot of slave owners knew that what they were doing was wrong but they didn't care.

The fact that it was once considered moral doesn't mean that it ever was.

If people don't consider something moral, then how can it be? Are you suggesting that there's some sort of external moral truth? Seems dodgy.

Exactly. Morality is what people practicing it decide it is. In the heyday of Rome, it was moral to expose malformed infants. In the Aztec empire, it was moral to cut out the hearts of still living people. Even today, there are moral strictures that make those of us in Western culture gasp with disbelief.

‘Anyone who thinks that good manners are the same everywhere and that folks are just folks has never been further out of Podunk than the next whistle stop.’ - Robert Heinlein

Boru

(March 16, 2026 at 1:18 pm)Paleophyte Wrote:

(March 16, 2026 at 11:58 am)Disagreeable Wrote: I agree that it may be the case that a lot of slave owners knew that what they were doing was wrong but they didn't care.

The fact that it was once considered moral doesn't mean that it ever was.

If people don't consider something moral, then how can it be? Are you suggesting that there's some sort of external moral truth? Seems dodgy.

Do you find the mere possibility of morality being something independent of opinion dodgy?

To answer your questions: I'm suggesting that moral truths external to people's opinions is possible.

Can morals exist outside the human mind? No. What human is purely objective?

Logic only exists in the human mind (and computers, I suppose; but pretty sure morals can be programmed into them), but it doesn't seem to be subjective. It's just that without logic, human thought becomes incoherent.

(March 16, 2026 at 2:25 pm)Mister Agenda Wrote: Logic only exists in the human mind (and computers, I suppose; but pretty sure morals can be programmed into them), but it doesn't seem to be subjective. It's just that without logic, human thought becomes incoherent.

Yet morality is not always logical.

(March 16, 2026 at 2:18 pm)Thumpalumpacus Wrote: Can morals exist outside the human mind? No. What human is purely objective?

When you say that morals cannot exist outside the human mind how are you defining 'morals'? Are you talking about moral beliefs?

Because, of course, moral beliefs cannot exist outside of the human mind but the question as to whether those moral beliefs can be based on facts or not is still open.

Sure, you can have moral beliefs based on facts with it still being the case that there are no moral facts (for example, someone could base their belief that abortion is or isn't wrong on some fact as to whether the fetus can experience pain, but the fact that it's wrong to cause pain may still not be a moral fact). But regardless of what we base our beliefs on the question as to whether there are actually any moral facts is still open as well.

(March 16, 2026 at 2:31 pm)Disagreeable Wrote:

(March 16, 2026 at 2:18 pm)Thumpalumpacus Wrote: Can morals exist outside the human mind? No. What human is purely objective?

When you say that morals cannot exist outside the human mind how are you defining 'morals'? Are you talking about moral beliefs?

Because, of course, moral beliefs cannot exist outside of the human mind but the question as to whether those moral beliefs can be based on facts or not is still open.

Sure, you can have moral beliefs based on facts with it still being the case that there are no moral facts (for example, someone could base their belief that abortion is or isn't wrong on some fact as to whether the fetus can experience pain, but the fact that it's wrong to cause pain may still not be a moral fact). But regardless of what we base our beliefs on the question as to whether there are actually any moral facts is still open as well.

Rosewood and maple are both used as guitar fingerboards; that is a fact. I prefer rosewood, myself. That is an opinion.

I can base an opinion on facts. It is still an opinion.