Deconversion and some doubts

[vulcanlogician]

Yes, I think morals are an obligation, more real than any other obligation. But this doesn’t mean we are compelled to follow them whether we want to or not, like the laws of gravity.  

The similarity here would be to love. I love my daughters more than anything else in the world. Love places a great deal of demands and obligations on me, to not fail them, or do them wrong, to raise them rightly, to be a good example, etc... These obligations placed on me by love, are more real to me than any sort of legal obligations.

But what if you didn't love your daughters? What if you hated them? Would you still be "obligated" not to fail them?

For me, I seriously do not like Muslim fundamentalists. But does that give me the right to chop off their heads? No. I must respect their personhood, and I must respect the fact that me chopping their heads off is no better than them chopping off the heads of atheists or gays. Better than may be the operative phrase here. And not "obligated to." None of my life duties obligates me to do anything. If I fail in some of my duties, there may be consequences. But that doesn't mean that consequences determine my duties. "The Good" or the "making things better than they are, are what defines my moral objective.

(1) A property P is genuine if it figures ineliminably in a good explanation of observed
phenomena.
(2) Moral properties figure ineliminably in good explanations of observed phenomena.
Therefore
(3) Moral properties are genuine.


The ability of putative moral properties to feature in good explanations is one perennially attractive argument in favour of the metaphysical claims of realism. The initially attractive thought is that moral properties earn their ontological rights in the same way as the metaphysically unproblematic properties of the natural and social sciences, namely by figuring in good explanatory theories. So just as, for example, a physicist may explain why an oil droplet stays suspended in an electro-magnetic field by citing its charge, or a social scientist may explain high levels of mental illness by citing income inequality, a ‘moral scientist’ may explain the growth of political protest movements or social instability by citing injustice. Likewise, just as an observer of the physicist may explain why he believes that the oil droplet is charged by citing the charge itself, and an observer of the sociologist may explain why she believes that income inequality exists by citing the inequality itself, an observer of the ‘moral scientist’ may explain why they believe that a situation is unjust by citing the injustice itself. In such cases, it appears that the instantiation of a moral property – injustice – is causally relevant in producing an effect – a political protest movement or moral judgement.

http://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/1930/1/T...prints.pdf

[/quote]