Objective morality as a proper basic belief

[Astonished]

Empathy does not make a moral act right or wrong.

It may make it desirable, preferable, but not right or wrong.

There is no such thing as a moral act.  Only what we perceive as moral. 

You cannot objectively define morals, you can only subjectively define them.  For example: Why is being gay wrong? 

"Because God Says so!" is a subjective answer.  Why is what god says so moral?  If God says "Murder your children" is it immoral to not murder your children?
"Because it's against nature!" is also a subjective answer.  Why is going against nature immoral?  If it's one's nature to kill, is it immoral NOT to kill then?
There's only subjective answers to the question.

And certainly no 'deeper' or 'ultimate' meaning.

[The Grand Nudger]

So it is a fact that harming living beings is wrong?

It is a fact that it is harmful and that humans value health and harmony over pain and misery (barring some massive defect). 

These sound like objective statements.  I'm sure that you wouldn't have any trouble demonstrating that they were true by reference to facts.  I'm sure that you could provide evidence.

So there it is. It's based on what you value; living over dying, health and harmony over pain and suffering, the idea of live and let live rather than paranoia and mistrust, security over fear, fulfillment over apathy, intellect over idiocy, rationality and reason over superstition and delusion. 

These, too, seem to be objective statements about the nature of man, the nature of morality.

Don't you think it might be possible to construct an objective moral proposition out of these facts? Couldn't an objective moral proposition help to explain, fundamentally, why we prefer one side over the other...in each of those pairings?

[Astonished]

So it is a fact that harming living beings is wrong?

It is a fact that it is harmful and that humans value health and harmony over pain and misery (barring some massive defect). 

These sound like objective statements.  I'm sure that you wouldn't have any trouble demonstrating that they were true by reference to facts.  I'm sure that you could provide evidence.

So there it is. It's based on what you value; living over dying, health and harmony over pain and suffering, the idea of live and let live rather than paranoia and mistrust, security over fear, fulfillment over apathy, intellect over idiocy, rationality and reason over superstition and delusion. 

These, too, seem to be objective statements about the nature of man, the nature of morality.

Don't you think it might be possible to construct an objective moral proposition out of these facts?  Couldn't an objective moral proposition help to explain, fundamentally, why we prefer one side over the other...in each of those pairings?

So, out of 7 billion people, if they were all perfectly mentally healthy, you expect any of them to be perfectly fine with being lowered into a pit of starving rats headfirst? For fuck's sake. If we're using well-being as a metric, then there are objective ways to say what's good for health and what's bad for health. ACTIONS themselves are not objectively good or bad for this. If I had to stick a knife in your throat to give you an emergency tracheotomy and save your life, that's an exception to the general rule that stabbing someone in the neck that would otherwise always be bad for your health. That's why well-being is such a good metric, the facts about what's good or bad are simple, while the actions that lead to one or the other can be situational, meaning they're not rigidly adhered to like religious doctrine which only changes at the tip of a sword. Nor are they based on irrationality, like thinking that homosexuality will cause earthquakes and therefore it must be bad because it is harmful.

And when you remove religion from the equation, most of those dichotomies I pointed out stop really mattering to people because they'll stop valuing the parts that they currently do under the delusion they're suffering from. Which is objectively BAD for their health, at least mentally. The placebo effect of thinking you have no worries because this life is a pit-stop can help but the deleterious side effects that go along with that don't exactly balance out. The reason we should (if using well-being as a metric) prefer the former in each of those examples is because those will lead to well-being while the latter in each can empirically be shown NOT to, random flukes notwithstanding (but this would be akin to blowing one's entire salary on the lottery on the off-chance they'll win, it's statistically insignificant).

[The Grand Nudger]

So, out of 7 billion people, if they were all perfectly mentally healthy, you expect any of them to be perfectly fine with being lowered into a pit of starving rats headfirst? For fuck's sake.

OFC I wouldn't...but I don't understand how you got that from anything I said?

If we're using well-being as a metric, then there are objective ways to say what's good for health and what's bad for health. ACTIONS themselves are not objectively good or bad for this.

Is smoking objectively good or bad for my health?  Is smoking objectively good or bad, morally...for risking harm to my children in the form of illness or disease or death of a parent, for example?

If I had to stick a knife in your throat to give you an emergency tracheotomy and save your life, that's an exception to the general rule that stabbing someone in the neck that would otherwise always be bad for your health.

It's not an exception to the general rule of trying to avoid doing harm to others..and, when possible, to help them.  In fact, it;s difficult to describe -why- giving me an emergency trach is good and stabbing me in the throat is bad -without- reference to these very objective metrics.  

That's why well-being is such a good metric, the facts about what's good or bad are simple, while the actions that lead to one or the other can be situational, meaning they're not rigidly adhered to like religious doctrine which only changes at the tip of a sword. Nor are they based on irrationality, like thinking that homosexuality will cause earthquakes and therefore it must be bad because it is harmful.

I'd hesitate to say that the facts about what is good or bad are simple, especially in some actual dillemma (which giving someone a tracheotomy is not - that one is pretty simple).  Let;s lay that aside though.  It's interesting that you mention religious beliefs like that..because..if you'll notice...even though they're objectively wrong..it;s still an attempt to make some moral proposition based on harm.  The harm a gayquake might cause..or, more commonly, the harm a gaygasm does to one's soul, in their belief system.

And when you remove religion from the equation, most of those dichotomies I pointed out stop really mattering to people because they'll stop valuing the parts that they currently do under the delusion they're suffering from. Which is objectively BAD for their health, at least mentally. The placebo effect of thinking you have no worries because this life is a pit-stop can help but the deleterious side effects that go along with that don't exactly balance out. The reason we should (if using well-being as a metric) prefer the former in each of those examples is because those will lead to well-being while the latter in each can empirically be shown NOT to, random flukes notwithstanding (but this would be akin to blowing one's entire salary on the lottery on the off-chance they'll win, it's statistically insignificant).

You're talking alot about religion, religious morality, or moral absolutism....but my objective moral propositions have nothing to do with those things?

[Astreja]

Empathy does not make a moral act right or wrong.

It may make it desirable, preferable, but not right or wrong.

If something is desirable or preferable, it is subjectively right.  That's as close as we can get to morality.  When someone's subjective idea of right and wrong is in disagreement with that of the culture he lives in, as long as he isn't harming anyone else there is no cause for action.  If, on the other hand, his actions violate others' rights by causing them harm, that's a matter for law enforcement -- not for gods or philosophers.

[The Grand Nudger]

Philosophers provide the intellectual justification for what law enforcement does (and cannot) do, Astreja. Would an objective moral philosophy...or at least one which attempts to approach an objective moral philosophy, in your opinion, be useful to law enforcement? Might it improve the quality of law enforcement?

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Dial back the clock, for example.  Law enforcement used to be in the business of killing witches.  Between you and I I think that we can agree that this was not based on anything even remotely -approaching- objective facts about witchcraft, or objective moral facts of the matter regarding witchcraft.  

Witchcraft isn't real, and it isn't harmful.  

What then, is the moral or factual justification for burning a witch?

[Astonished]

Like talking to a child, I swear.

You challenged my assertion that there were objective statements about humanity having a sense of self-preservation and instincts to that effect. My hyperbolic example had the desired effect of getting you to admit that it held water. You have a hard time separating objective facts from objective concepts, which is the problem here, I think. The PRINCIPLE of wanting to maximize well-being and minimize suffering is an objective metric we can strive for but MORALITY is based on the actions we take that either have a net positive or net negative (or potentially zero) impact. You can change the PRINCIPLE to be whatever the fuck you want, your actions will still be consistently the same but the consequences will be different depending on what principle you're trying to make a positive or negative impact on. But I reject all principles to define morality other than well-being and will not discuss any others unless they can prove themselves to be better and so far none have ever been proposed. The framework of well-being is easily defined and doesn't allow for extraneous crap like the well-being of our imaginary friends.

Don't bullshit me about your objective moral propositions having nothing to do with religion, religious morality, or beliefs revolving around that, the fact that I have repeatedly debunked the notion of there being any objective morality (in a religions context or otherwise; but why would anyone bother arguing it outside of a religious context anyway? Unless they wanted to look stupid for the attention) over and over in this thread alone shows me that you're either failing to comprehend something very simple or just being obstinate.

Well-being is grounded in objectively determined, empirical evidence, so as I have said, religious belief belongs nowhere near that whether or not it pretends to give a fuck about maximizing well-being and minimizing harm (while simultaneously promoting slavery and denouncing free thought and rationality.) Religion needs to stop being allowed to elbow itself into the table of good ideas and pretend it's not completely out of place there.

[The Grand Nudger]

Like talking to a child, I swear.

Okay?

You challenged my assertion that there were objective statements about humanity having a sense of self-preservation and instincts to that effect. My hyperbolic example had the desired effect of getting you to admit that it held water. You have a hard time separating objective facts from objective concepts, which is the problem here, I think. The PRINCIPLE of wanting to maximize well-being and minimize suffering is an objective metric we can strive for but MORALITY is based on the actions we take that either have a net positive or net negative (or potentially zero) impact. The framework of well-being is easily defined and doesn't allow for extraneous crap like the well-being of our imaginary friends.

Actually, I challenged your assertion that there can be no objective morality, but if some brilliant trap was laid...I'm not seeing it?  You seem to be able to provide not only objective facts about our health..but also objective facts that could form the justification for an objective moral fact of the matter.  

Net positive, neutral, or negative effect with respect to what? Well being, right?

Don't bullshit me about your objective moral propositions having nothing to do with religion, religious morality, or beliefs revolving around that, the fact that I have repeatedly debunked the notion of there being any objective morality (in a religions context or otherwise; but why would anyone bother arguing it outside of a religious context anyway? Unless they wanted to look stupid for the attention) over and over in this thread alone shows me that you're either failing to comprehend something very simple or just being obstinate.

You can't debunk a secular objective morality by commenting on religious moral absolutism.  That's not how that works, that's not what that word means.   Wondering about my motives tells us what?  That you have suspicions?  Lay them on the table, they'll be easy to confirm or deny...lol.  

Well-being is grounded in objectively determined, empirical evidence, so as I have said, religious belief belongs nowhere near that whether or not it pretends to give a fuck about maximizing well-being and minimizing harm while simultaneously promoting slavery and denouncing free thought and rationality. Religion needs to stop being allowed to elbow itself into the table of good ideas and pretend it's not completely out of place there.

Why are you still talking about religion?  I'm talking about well-being grounded in objectively determined, empirical evidence.

[brewer]

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Is plagiarizing or quoting William Lane Craig without giving credit one of those "wrong" moral thingy's?

Actually its not William Lane Craig's quote. It is from Michael Ruse who is an atheist.

Sorry, my mistake. Found it in an article by WLC. Does it matter who you took it from without giving credit? Or do you plan to dodge and by default take the moral high ground?

[Astonished]

There IS no objective secular morality. That's a paradox. You expect that kind of thing out of a theist proponent, but attaching it to any sort of secular humanist philosophy, it's just...blech. There's no way to say 'X action is always across time and regardless of who perpetrates it, bad/good morally'. Objective principles can be established as the framework for good or bad, yes, but not actions across the board. If your principle isn't well-being, but getting god's dick hard or soft for example, your actions are going to be different in terms of whether they're morally good or bad, aren't they? So if you've got your standard, you evaluate your actions and those are subjectively good or bad depending on circumstance. Morality is about actions and their consequences but because the principle can change depending on your viewpoint, it's better to ground it in something that can be determined empirically. Even then, science can reveal new information and potentially yield something that would merit changing the foundation and principle. It's in flux based on what we learn and as we improve our understanding.

Let's also not forget that people are subjective creatures. What I consider good for my well-being might differ from what you think, but if I have a certain goal in mind, there may be a trade-off that has to be made for some benefit in the long run that just can't be seen or which I value more than you happen to (like owning a very expensive car despite it putting a big dent in my savings that could be better spent elsewhere or something. Or I just may prefer a certain approach to things like how I get bad news delivered or if I prefer to have someone be bluntly honest with me even if it hurts my feelings as opposed to preferring to be handled gingerly. Those are subjective principles, where a higher priority is placed on honesty in one case than another, but honesty itself is still part of the overall principle.

So there's no objective 'good' or 'bad' actions, and even the principles are in flux even if there's a certain goal in mind and there are simplistic definitions to it. 'Life and health - good' and 'Death and suffering - bad' is all well and good if you want to label those as objective but there's gradients and what work for some don't work for others in all cases. All we can do is our best, and negotiate, honor the social contract we believe will best benefit us according to what we value, and take care to learn and evolve. Objective standards don't leave room for any of that. That's just asking to kowtow to an authoritarian dictator, and as I pointed out, not even that gets you anywhere with objective standards.