I've put this in the religious section as it's particularly pertinent to religious views of morality. I have made a little quiz to try and break down the over-complication that some people apply to morality, and then I've written a short essay on my views of objective moralities including my recent thoughts.
Morality breakdown quiz:
When I say "people" below, you can read it as "yourself", "other people" and/or "animals" where appropriate.
(1) Do you think morality is about considering the consequences of your actions on people, and giving them suitable respect?
Yes: Go to question 2.
No: I personally have no use for whatever you think morality is. You are welcome to your own idea. But it is not relevant in any discussion that is about how actions affect other people. End quiz.
(2) Do you think morality is concerned with any other goal?
Yes: Go to question 3.
No: Go to question 4.
(3) Do these other goals ever cause a conflict with the goal in question 1?
Yes: These other goals are compromising your care of people. Ask yourself if these goals are really important enough to allow this to happen. Go to question 4.
No: The other goals are redundant. Go to question 4.
(4) Do you have a good idea about what hurts people, and what helps them?
Yes: Go to question 6.
No: Go to question 5.
(5) Do you have a good idea about what helps and hurts you?
Yes: Good, you can assume roughly the same kind of thing will apply to others too. Go to question 6.
No: You should seek professional help at the earliest opportunity. End quiz.
(6) Do you care about other people?
Yes: Your morality, or at least the part of it detailed in question 1, is motivated by empathy. It is a natural byproduct of the evolution of our species. End quiz.
No: Go to question 7.
(7) Are you prepared not to hurt people, in order to avoid the repercussions this will cause on yourself?
Yes: Your morality, or at least the part of it detailed in question 1, is motivated by pragmatism. End quiz.
No: You are a sociopath. Unfortunately, you will not fit in well with society. If you have any desire to become a part of society, I recommend seeking professional help. If not, life will become very difficult for you and those around you, and not much can be done. It is fairly likely you will end up in prison.
Objective moralities discussion:
A morality, or a moral code, is some sort of system that a person uses to determine their behaviour under different circumstances. Since there are (theoretically) an infinite number of possible circumstances a person could be in, a complete moral code would also have to be infinite in scope. This is unrealistic, so most people work from a set of underlying principles, and apply them as best they can to whatever system comes up.
So let's say a person, at any given moment in time, has a complete list of moral principals. Say they could write them all down as a list, and that they would reasonably cover any situation between them. That particular list or principals could be seen as objective. The exact same list could be given to someone else. Or everyone in the world could decide to use it. So if two people are both using list A, then their opinion about list A makes no difference, from the point of view of what the list actually says.
Of course, when someone puts a list of principals into practice in any given situation, the way they interpret the list and apply it to the intricacies of the problems facing them is going to be subjective. Everyone will be likely to make different judgement calls, once you study their behaviour over a variety of situations, even with the same list. So the list is objective; the use of the list is not.
This means there are an infinite number of objective moralities- plural. There is no limit to the number of and complexity of the principals on that list. All that remains is for any particular person to select one of those objective moralities. They may use it for a length of time and then replace/update it with another, or they may in theory use it their whole lives. The second is pretty unlikely, and would probably only be the result of a serious level of indoctrination which blocks any kind of self reflection.
The idea that there is "an objective morality" is a nonsensical one. As I've shown, there are an infinite number of moral codes. All that would be left is for someone to claim that one of them is "the best". But to be able to compare any kinds of things, you need a criteria. What is the criteria? For example, here are some numbers:
3, 8, 11, 15
Which is the best number? It's a meaningless question, right? Unless you know in what way it's meant to be the best, it's pointless to even ask.
An obvious question is which objective morality is best to maximise the well-being of people (and animals). Most people probably consider this to be a goal, if not the goal, of morality. However, for people who don't share this goal, or hold it secondary to other strange notions, such a criteria is not going to be agreed. Neither side can declare themselves to have "the best" morality when they haven't agreed what it even means to be the best.
Let's say we agree that the goal is just to maximise well-being. That raises the next problem: how do you measure well-being? There are a multitude of aspects, and everyone will have differing opinions as to how important they are relative to each other. They will also consider the importance of the wellbeing of non-human life as compared to humans differently. So unless some universal method of "measuring" wellbeing is agreed, you can't even begin to pick out a "best morality". You could certainly make a very strong case that some were now objectively better than others. That would be very simple, in cases where an obviously harmful principal is replaced by a less harmful or even helpful one. But for cases where the principals come into conflict, as is almost continually the case in real life, there is going to be a large element of subjectivity. Even if it was agreed by science/medicine that there was an objective way to measure well-being, that would still be a subjective choice from an infinite number of objective ways of measuring it. So now the "best" morality is just a function of the choice of measurement.
So to sum it all up: objective moralities are available, an infinite amount. We each select our own from the possible ones. We will all have our own reasons for this decision. Once basic goals have been agreed, some moral principals can be easily seen to be superior to others. But no morality can be declared "the best" without subjectively choosing an objective way to measure wellbeing (or whatever other goals morality may be seen to have); and as such is only conditionally the best. And even if we agreed on an objectively best set of principals, the way any individual person puts those into practice would be subjective, unless they were so detailed as to literally cover every possible situation ever. This is totally unrealistic, bordering on us being programmed like robots.
Morality breakdown quiz:
When I say "people" below, you can read it as "yourself", "other people" and/or "animals" where appropriate.
(1) Do you think morality is about considering the consequences of your actions on people, and giving them suitable respect?
Yes: Go to question 2.
No: I personally have no use for whatever you think morality is. You are welcome to your own idea. But it is not relevant in any discussion that is about how actions affect other people. End quiz.
(2) Do you think morality is concerned with any other goal?
Yes: Go to question 3.
No: Go to question 4.
(3) Do these other goals ever cause a conflict with the goal in question 1?
Yes: These other goals are compromising your care of people. Ask yourself if these goals are really important enough to allow this to happen. Go to question 4.
No: The other goals are redundant. Go to question 4.
(4) Do you have a good idea about what hurts people, and what helps them?
Yes: Go to question 6.
No: Go to question 5.
(5) Do you have a good idea about what helps and hurts you?
Yes: Good, you can assume roughly the same kind of thing will apply to others too. Go to question 6.
No: You should seek professional help at the earliest opportunity. End quiz.
(6) Do you care about other people?
Yes: Your morality, or at least the part of it detailed in question 1, is motivated by empathy. It is a natural byproduct of the evolution of our species. End quiz.
No: Go to question 7.
(7) Are you prepared not to hurt people, in order to avoid the repercussions this will cause on yourself?
Yes: Your morality, or at least the part of it detailed in question 1, is motivated by pragmatism. End quiz.
No: You are a sociopath. Unfortunately, you will not fit in well with society. If you have any desire to become a part of society, I recommend seeking professional help. If not, life will become very difficult for you and those around you, and not much can be done. It is fairly likely you will end up in prison.
Objective moralities discussion:
A morality, or a moral code, is some sort of system that a person uses to determine their behaviour under different circumstances. Since there are (theoretically) an infinite number of possible circumstances a person could be in, a complete moral code would also have to be infinite in scope. This is unrealistic, so most people work from a set of underlying principles, and apply them as best they can to whatever system comes up.
So let's say a person, at any given moment in time, has a complete list of moral principals. Say they could write them all down as a list, and that they would reasonably cover any situation between them. That particular list or principals could be seen as objective. The exact same list could be given to someone else. Or everyone in the world could decide to use it. So if two people are both using list A, then their opinion about list A makes no difference, from the point of view of what the list actually says.
Of course, when someone puts a list of principals into practice in any given situation, the way they interpret the list and apply it to the intricacies of the problems facing them is going to be subjective. Everyone will be likely to make different judgement calls, once you study their behaviour over a variety of situations, even with the same list. So the list is objective; the use of the list is not.
This means there are an infinite number of objective moralities- plural. There is no limit to the number of and complexity of the principals on that list. All that remains is for any particular person to select one of those objective moralities. They may use it for a length of time and then replace/update it with another, or they may in theory use it their whole lives. The second is pretty unlikely, and would probably only be the result of a serious level of indoctrination which blocks any kind of self reflection.
The idea that there is "an objective morality" is a nonsensical one. As I've shown, there are an infinite number of moral codes. All that would be left is for someone to claim that one of them is "the best". But to be able to compare any kinds of things, you need a criteria. What is the criteria? For example, here are some numbers:
3, 8, 11, 15
Which is the best number? It's a meaningless question, right? Unless you know in what way it's meant to be the best, it's pointless to even ask.
An obvious question is which objective morality is best to maximise the well-being of people (and animals). Most people probably consider this to be a goal, if not the goal, of morality. However, for people who don't share this goal, or hold it secondary to other strange notions, such a criteria is not going to be agreed. Neither side can declare themselves to have "the best" morality when they haven't agreed what it even means to be the best.
Let's say we agree that the goal is just to maximise well-being. That raises the next problem: how do you measure well-being? There are a multitude of aspects, and everyone will have differing opinions as to how important they are relative to each other. They will also consider the importance of the wellbeing of non-human life as compared to humans differently. So unless some universal method of "measuring" wellbeing is agreed, you can't even begin to pick out a "best morality". You could certainly make a very strong case that some were now objectively better than others. That would be very simple, in cases where an obviously harmful principal is replaced by a less harmful or even helpful one. But for cases where the principals come into conflict, as is almost continually the case in real life, there is going to be a large element of subjectivity. Even if it was agreed by science/medicine that there was an objective way to measure well-being, that would still be a subjective choice from an infinite number of objective ways of measuring it. So now the "best" morality is just a function of the choice of measurement.
So to sum it all up: objective moralities are available, an infinite amount. We each select our own from the possible ones. We will all have our own reasons for this decision. Once basic goals have been agreed, some moral principals can be easily seen to be superior to others. But no morality can be declared "the best" without subjectively choosing an objective way to measure wellbeing (or whatever other goals morality may be seen to have); and as such is only conditionally the best. And even if we agreed on an objectively best set of principals, the way any individual person puts those into practice would be subjective, unless they were so detailed as to literally cover every possible situation ever. This is totally unrealistic, bordering on us being programmed like robots.
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Please visit my website here! It's got lots of information about atheism/theism and support for new atheists.
Index of useful threads and discussions
Index of my best videos
Quickstart guide to the forum
