Objective morality as a proper basic belief

[RoadRunner79]

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If that is the case, then it seems incoherent to condemn such acts.

We know taste in food is subjective, if ISIS members ate a food you disliked, would you condemn them and say them eating and enjoying that food is wrong?

So if morality is also subjective, why would you say it is wrong what ISIS members do when they rape little girls?

I mean, you will never say it is wrong if they eat and enjoy a food you dislike, so why you say they are doing something wrong if they rape a little girl?

If you really believed morality is subjective, then when you hear that they rape little girls, you would respond in a way such as "well, i find that disgusting, but its not wrong".

Is that what you believe?

Where this falls down, of course, is that having food isn't the same as rape.  I find pizza - in all forms - to be revolting and anathema to decent people.  But when you or anyone else eats a pizza, you aren't harming anyone.  You can't seriously expect us to consider that gustutatory preferences are on the same moral level as the pain and suffering that accompany the rape of a child.

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You and your ilk also routinely make the mistake that 'objective morality' and 'universal morality' are the same thing.  That morality is subjective is a fact sustained by observation and the history of our species.  We no longer, for example, toss an unwanted or malformed infant on the local rubbish tip, but a Roman mum who did so would be behaving morally.  Morality varies from time to time and even from place to place in the current era.  If what you mean when you say 'objective morality' were the case, then the ancient Assyrians would have the same moral strictures in place as the modern Japanese, who would follow the same moral code Dutch Jews  in 1656 (look it up).

The fact that moral rules are clearly shaped by geography, religious traditions, and (to a surprisingly large extent) economics, the notion that there is some overarching standard of universal morality doesn't hold up.

Boru

I see this quite a bit in response to the discussion of objective morality.  I don't believe that it is a good argument for a morality that is subjective.  This argument (if correct) would also mean that science and our understanding of the universe is also subjective. Would you make the same comparison between the ancient Assyrians and the modern Japanese and come to the same conclusion in regards to their scientific beliefs?  This clearly not the case, because the universe doesn't change, based on the subject.  It is a difference between how or what we know, and what is the nature of the topic being discussed (epistemology vs ontology).  Knowledge by it's nature is necessarily subjective.  What you know, is not what I know (it is based on us as individuals). That which is objective however is independent of our knowledge of it. Normally from scholars what I see being discussed is the ontology of morality, not it's epistemology or even evolution.  In fact, when one compares the moral principles or practices of a person or culture, they are necessarily weighing it against a standard which is outside of that culture or subject.

I would disagree that equating objective with universal is a mistake (although I'm open to argument on this).  If it is objective, then by definition it is independent of the subject or universal among subjects.  This is regardless of their belief of the topic, and whether it is correct or wrong.  I would agree, that objective does not mean absolute.  The boiling point of water at a given altitude and pressure is objective and universal regardless of the person or even their mistake in measuring it.  However I specify the pressure, because the boiling point of water is not absolute, but relative pressure.  Someone boiling water at sea level is going to get a different result then someone doing the same in Denver.  However not because it is based on the subject observing or anything within them.

I find that most who argue for moral subjectivity either don't understand the argument (that it is talking about ontology and not epistemology).  Or that they are inconsistent between their belief in moral subjectivity and their actions.  It is quite difficult for us to act as if morality is subjective.   Here is and article about Seven Things you cannot do as a Moral Relativist  I might quip a little over the authors choice to call it relativism vs subjectivism (as I already discussed that objective does not equate to absolute).  However I think his reasoning is sound, with this small change, and I believe that it is the meaning that the author intended to convey.  Normally, when someone insists that morality is subjective, I ask what in the subject; morality is based on?  In application, I find that almost no one is a moral subjectivist.  And if there is someone who applied this belief consistently, most would think that there is something wrong with them.