Atheism and Ethics

[The Grand Nudger]

Well, I thought we'd agreed on at least one objective standard?  You and I both accept that a thing can be objectively harmful regardless of whether or not someone get's a kick out of it - that a thing can be objectively harmful regardless of personal or public ignorance.  No?

i actually think we disagree that this is a standard. Harm is indeed measurable and objective, but harm itself is not a standard it is a matter of physics chemistry and biology. A standard can be applied to it, where more harm is bad and less harm good, and luckily we both subscribe to that. The question of whether that standard is down to a moral realist conception of morality being accurage though is the dispute. I mentioned it being objectively bad regardless of what people think earlier as an example of a typical moral realist position that I have heard / read.

I'm using it as a standard, and it's easily the most common standard on earth.  You think "an objective standard can be applied to it"... I have to ask, what do you think realism is saying if not that?