Sam Harris's _The Moral Landscape_ put NOMA to rest for me.

Even if we suddenly agreed that moral questions cannot be informed or elucidated with science, would we really want to insert religion as the "magesteria" of morality? Why the hell not moral philosophy or humanistic ethics? Gould's default reversion to religion as the 'moral' realm only highlights his bias and distressing level of cognitive dissonance.

What's the difference between this and just making stuff up?

(February 17, 2015 at 12:32 pm)FatAndFaithless Wrote: Even if we suddenly agreed that moral questions cannot be informed or elucidated with science, would we really want to insert religion as the "magesteria" of morality? Why the hell not moral philosophy or humanistic ethics? Gould's default reversion to religion as the 'moral' realm only highlights his bias and distressing level of cognitive dissonance.

And how would we get to a moral philosophy or humanistic ethics outside of religion? Would it not be through observation, testing, and re-evaluating things as time marches on? Would it not be an evolving societal ethos? What would one call that process of observation, testing, and amending ideas as new information becomes available or as environmental pressures change?

(February 17, 2015 at 12:43 pm)SteelCurtain Wrote:

(February 17, 2015 at 12:32 pm)FatAndFaithless Wrote: Even if we suddenly agreed that moral questions cannot be informed or elucidated with science, would we really want to insert religion as the "magesteria" of morality? Why the hell not moral philosophy or humanistic ethics? Gould's default reversion to religion as the 'moral' realm only highlights his bias and distressing level of cognitive dissonance.

And how would we get to a moral philosophy or humanistic ethics outside of religion? Would it not be through observation, testing, and re-evaluating things as time marches on? Would it not be an evolving societal ethos? What would one call that process of observation, testing, and amending ideas as new information becomes available or as environmental pressures change?

Gee..it's almost as if bald, untestable, unassailable, unrevisable fiat assertions about morality are archaic and unhelpful...

I'm really fed up with this idea that there is a domain of enquiry "beyond science".

Just stop it already. Thanks.

(February 17, 2015 at 12:50 pm)robvalue Wrote: I'm really fed up with this idea that there is a domain of enquiry "beyond science".

Just stop it already. Thanks.

What is beauty? Is that inquiry susceptible to the scientific method?

(February 17, 2015 at 1:21 pm)Parkers Tan Wrote:

(February 17, 2015 at 12:50 pm)robvalue Wrote: I'm really fed up with this idea that there is a domain of enquiry "beyond science".

Just stop it already. Thanks.

What is beauty? Is that inquiry susceptible to the scientific method?

"Beauty" is an opinion.

(February 17, 2015 at 1:21 pm)Parkers Tan Wrote:

(February 17, 2015 at 12:50 pm)robvalue Wrote: I'm really fed up with this idea that there is a domain of enquiry "beyond science".

Just stop it already. Thanks.

What is beauty? Is that inquiry susceptible to the scientific method?

Science could measure our reactions to different stimuli, create hypotheses about these reactions, test these hypotheses experimentally, ...

Art must have goals and those goals can be measured. For example, some music is designed to be relaxing. Other music is designed to be cathartic. The "Piss Christ" was designed to communicate the artist's feelings about Christianity (I assume). ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piss_Christ )

Beauty could be examined by the brain states it produced in the guy experiencing it I guess.

But yeah, an opinion on something is fine, it's not a way of finding stuff out, and it's not a claim. No uber-method is being pretended.