Ben Shapiro vs Neil deGrasse Tyson: The WAR Over Transgender Issues

[Sheldon]

It seems like you're suggesting that moral arguments, even from objectivists, are presuppositional? Apologies if I have misunderstood, but if not then I agree, we must base our moral worldview on some axiom, even if it is subjective. Then we can make objectively true claims about how best to be "moral", but the word moral then defines a subjective position at it's core. I have already said for example, that I have no problem encompassing harm into moral discourse, as it is expedient to do so. Though this I think remains a subjective view. 

I was asking you if the moralizers use of the term immoral was equivalent to the round earthers use of the term flat. 

No, not equivalent, subjectivity / objectivity is a scale, not a binary condition. 

I think you're wrong about expediency, btw. I think it takes a hell of alot of time and effort to fully consider harm. 

Though very little to see the consequences of leaving harm out of moral discourse. The expedient part is avoiding the consequences of leaving harm out of moral discourse. I also don't think it's possible, as it is likely hardwired in us by evolution, both stopping it (unnecessary) and using it (necessary). 

1. Objectivist claims can also be wrong and still be objectivist claims. Just as a fun aside...2 contradictory moral absolutes are not a problem for metaethical subjectivism. 

1, What makes them wrong if not lacking sufficient objective evidence, or being subjective? 
2. No, I can see that, I find absolute claims far less useful than subjective ones based on a careful examination of the consequences of our actions, but then I would. 

 In a truly subjective world, all genuinely held moral claims are as true as any other and all for the same reasons none of which having anything to do with the specific content of the claims or the nature of their expression, even contradictory claims are all simultaneously true.  

Well I think this is true for the subjective axioms we decide to base our morals on, I don't see any way around that. A perhaps more troubling thought, is that moral progress is not possible in any objective way. What would we be measuring it against? 

Sheldon I think this then would the kind of subjective axiom I am talking about. A basis for objective claims about morality, that is itself subjective. 

We can add health and the badness of crack addiction to the pile with flatness and immorality. 

Flatness can objectively measured, as an apprentice I learned this the hard way, when asked to hand scrape a surface table. I don't know how to objectively measure moral claims, without subjective axioms. Just as we can objectively measure the physiological harm of crack use / addiction, so I still think this is a false equivalence. 

I think this leads down to why we bother with morality at all, leaving aside the precursors are likely in our evolved past, societal cohesion without some understanding, or some ability to learn what is and is not acceptable behaviour to the group. This would explain why we find including harm in a morality expedient, though I think it is still a subjective axiom when we examine the reason, or go deeper as you say. When I asked earlier you said that without including harm in moral discourse, morality would be meaningless. So in a way we form a priori subjective opinion we use as a moral axiom, on which to base our moral worldview. 

Immorality is a linguistic axiom, in that sense, no matter which metaethical theory is true. 

I agree, but those axioms vary, from person to person, place to place, across time, and cultures etc..

More than one way to skin a cat, more than one road into a town, sure.  Society's moral moratoriums are, on their own, relativist rather than subjectivist or objectivist in a metaethical sense. Moral statements that are misreported emotions are not cognitivist at all.  Cannot be subjective, relative, or objective.  They are not truth alike, they just masquerade as such.  But let's add it to the pile.  Emotivism and relativism are all subjective as well.

I struggle here, as while I understand that metaethical relativism and subjectivism are two distinct philosophies, something can be both relative and subjective, so they overlap in some ways. As we discussed, the exclusion of moral absolutes for example. 

You accept the consensus of experts in their fields -except- when it comes to ethics, it seems, even though those professional ethicists also have scientific evidence to support their logical assertions. 

Ethics is not a scientific discipline of course, though it can be studied as a subject of social-scientific study. 

Words, word use, explicitly distinct and disparate cognitive and noncognitivist basis, health, harm, expert consensus, logical demonstration, and empirical evidence are all "subjective".  

I agree, but they are not equally subjective. 

This is what I mean when I say that repeating "everything is subjective" is not a good argument against objectivity 

I am not sure where anyone thinks I said this? I know what an argumentum ad ignorantiam fallacy is, and I try to avoid them. I am simply saying that when people make what they call objective moral claims, in my experience they rest ultimately on subjective axioms. The claims the world is flat and the world is not flat, may both be subjective, but they are not equally subjective, and for a reason. 

Do you believe that your assertions that morality (and any other poor dead soldier already discussed or yet to be discussed) is subjective....are objectively true..... or is that also subjective? Is it absolutely objectively/subjectively true, or conditionally subjectively/objectively true?

I don't believe we can make moral assertions that don't ultimately rest on subjective claims. There is a significant epistemological difference between disbelieving a claim, and making a contrary claim. I try not to overstep when it is unwarranted, but am always prepared to recant claims if I think they are unsafe. 

“variation in moral codes from one society to another and from one period to another, and also the differences in moral beliefs between groups and classes within a complex community… make it difficult to treat those judgments as apprehensions of objective truths” 

John Mackie
I am inclined to agree, and there are many others of course.