Atheism and Ethics

[Lucian]

I am still not because I can’t see an obvious link between harm and some mind-independent non-institutional categorical imperative existing as a property of the universe.

Do you think that there are only moral facts if they are mind-independent categorical imperatives? If so, why? Maybe there are facts about wrongness and maybe wrongness is about harm because  that makes sense of moral language. Which is the metaethical point.

For me, the fact that there are facts about harmful actions is enough. Because wrongness is about harm.

So I guess there can be moral facts if we define morality as being about wrongness and wrongness as being about harm. But it seems tautological and just an arbitrary definition. Why should I care about harm (I do, but by what standard should I). Perhaps that is not a mind independent (non-institutional) categorical imperative, and if so fine I get on board with it and fail as much as the next man and succeed hopefully at least as well. But to be moral realist to me is to say that this isn’t just a matter of definition, it is a matter of a property (of the universe?) that exists, that our actions can live up to or fall short from. We don’t think that there are objective standards about tickling (apart from the way my brother bullied me with it as a child and might explain a lot), so why think there are standards about harm