(August 26, 2019 at 9:07 pm)Acrobat Wrote:(August 26, 2019 at 6:14 pm)Grandizer Wrote: Watches are designed to tell time. They don't ought to do anything. There's no ought (in the strong moral sense) with watches.
Watches are designed with an intrinsic purpose (telos) to tell time. Human beings similarly have an intrinsic purpose to be Good. If my watch wasn’t telling time, it’s not serving the purpose in which it’s supposed to served, in same way human being not doing good, doing bad are not serving the purpose in which they are suppose to serve. In fact we use parallel type of language here, immoral human appears broken, we use expressions as inhumane, absence of humanity, etc.
Human beings evolved to be, well, human (prone to be selfish in some contexts and altruistic in others and human in all contexts). They weren't designed specifically to be Good (this is such a bizarre way of using the English language, btw).
And often times, when a human individual has been referred to as broken, it is because they were considered to be behaving in ways that are not socially acceptable (this is not necessarily the same as moral).
Quote:When most of us address immorality, when I tell my daughter she did something wrong, it’s with such implications in mind. That when she does something wrong, that she ought to have done what was right, ought to have done what was good, not as some subjective goal assigned to her by herself, me, or society, but one she’s endowed with, posses regardless of her subjective opinions or preferences, one she can no more deny, than a conscious watch can deny its purpose to tell time.
It's very possible, however, that there is a hidden premise here that you may not be conscious of, and you only believe that there isn't any.
Psychology, man. We don't have access to most of what goes on in our brains because most of what goes on psychologically is not consciously brought to light.
Quote:I don’t so much as follow a goal, but rather recognize one, one that I recognize as one not of my own creation, yours, or societies. In fact I often don’t follow it, give in to immorality, and find the idea of being good to be a struggle, and hard work, rather than something that comes naturally or something easy. But I can’t deny that the goal/purpose is a matter of some fundamental truth, rather than some subjective preference, as you implied. To actually view it as subjective, would require that I lie to myself, deny the earth is round.
You telling me about the various feels you have, but there's no indicator that any of this has brought you close to the truth on this matter.
Quote:This teleological view, isn’t a position I reasoned my way into, it’s the default assumption, the prevalent view of humanity, of a toddler, or a child, as teleology so entwined into our perceptions of reality, that it’s very difficult to be rid of.
If a toddler could articulate his moral perception, this is what it would look like.
Very young children have clearly wrong conceptions of how the world works. They think rocks were made so we could scratch our backs on them. Do you really want to appeal to young kids as a support for your position?