Subjective Morality?

[DLJ]

...
Previously someone said killing is both immoral and moral based on the conditions of situation. My view, changing based on conditions/circumstances makes the moral position subjective.

The word you're looking for is 'contextual'.

'Situational' ethics is also acceptable.

[bennyboy]

The answer to:

1 + 1 =

is conditional, depending on the base number system in which it's contextualized.  In base 10, the answer is "2"; in binary the answer is "10".  Neither answer is subjective.

What might be considered subjective is whether the answers are considered identical, given that the are equivalent in value, but different in notation.

Nice.

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It's the simplest thing in the world to understand, and this will double as an answer for bennys q.  Is rape only wrong as a matter of your opinion, or is there something about rape which would be true regardless of your opinion (or anyone's opinion, or anyone's agreement) that makes rape wrong?

It's a matter of opinion, commonly shared in our modern Western culture due to societal norms.

There are certainly some who think that rape, at least in some forms, is fair play. "Sometimes you just gotta take the pussy" is something I've heard frequently enough. Their problem is that fewer and fewer people are (at least I think) around who will agree with them-- they are increasingly likely to be called out and possibly jailed.

[The Grand Nudger]

It's a matter of opinion, commonly shared in our modern Western culture due to societal norms.

Then your moral appraisal is subjective.  Easy enough, right? An objectivist would tell you that it was some thing x about rape, not some thing x about your opinion that made it wrong.

Chances are you refer to some thing x about rape, yourself. : shrugs :

There are certainly some who think that rape, at least in some forms, is fair play.  "Sometimes you just gotta take the pussy" is something I've heard frequently enough.  Their problem is that fewer and fewer people are (at least I think) around who will agree with them-- they are increasingly likely to be called out and possibly jailed.

People can be wrong.  It's a thing we do.

[Silver]

People can be wrong.  It's a thing we do. 

I enjoy pointing out those wrongs.

[robvalue]

Agreeing on the thing we're actually measuring and making "factual statements" about is important; if everyone is talking about something slightly different (like the god situation), generalisations become meaningless.

[The Grand Nudger]

Absolutely.

[ohreally]

What is morality measuring, feelings?

[robvalue]

What is morality measuring, feelings?

It could be. It’s such a vague term that it can cover pretty much anything you want, for the purposes of a particular discussion. It’s usually in the realms of codes of conduct; but when studying the phenomena within an individual, feelings regarding different issues can provide a baseline for morality. The former is often called ethics.

I think this a very interesting point, really. We all have raw, emotional reactions to things which "tell us" how to view them. But we’ve since developed past the point of needing to make fight/flight decisions; so we can now have meta-morality, where we study our own feelings, and decide whether they hold any logical validity. For example, I have had emotional reactions to people before based on nothing more than ridiculous stereotypes. I’m aware that this is where the feeling is coming from, so I disregard it as much as possible in the absence of any actual evidence for concern.

[The Grand Nudger]

The term "morality" is alot like the term "health".

[Dr H]

Did you omit the "morals" from my statement and just flip to conditions in math?

Previously someone said killing is both immoral and moral based on the conditions of situation. My view, changing based on conditions/circumstances makes the moral position subjective.

My point is that "conditional" is not the same as "subjective".

Two people might view the same killing, under the same conditions, and one might judge it to be moral, and the other might judge it to be immoral.  That is subjective.

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How is that self-evident?

The flourishing of, say, Rickettsia prowazekii or Vibrio cholerae anywhere in my vicinity is decidedly NOT good by my standards.

YMMV.

I guess that depends on what your standards are. 

Living things come in conflict. The thriving of saber-tooth tigers maybe was not compatible with that of cavemen. Negotiations are largely ethical questions. How much are we justified in killing in order to encourage our own flourishing? 

People used to say that morals were based on "human flourishing," but I think we've learned to be less self-centered.

And we should consider carefully our reasons. If we dislike some living things purely for aesthetic reasons or personal preference, I suspect that modern ethics will encourage us to re-think that. 

But I see your point: certain examples are easy to agree on.

Yes, which brings the concept of "self-evident" into question.

To me, that's just the more general case of, for example, the claim of some evangelical preachers who insist that the Bible is a "self-interpreting book".