Morality is like a religion

[robvalue]

OK. Well, I'd say it's up to them if they said they care or not. They may have other criteria for what it means to "care" about something. If you define care as those emotions only, then no, they don't... but you seem to have built a tautology. I'm probably still not understanding. Sure, people can learn to fool their brains. Or are you simply surprised at the behaviour?

And...I might be being very dense, but I am still not understanding the general point of this. Can anyone help me out?

[Detective L Ryuzaki]

OK. Well, I'd say it's up to them if they said they care or not. They may have other criteria for what it means to "care" about something. If you define care as those emotions only, then no, they don't... but you seem to have built a tautology. I'm probably still not understanding. Sure, people can learn to fool their brains. Or are you simply surprised at the behaviour?

And...I might be being very dense, but I am still not understanding the general point of this. Can anyone help me out?

Our care (incentive) has been defined through science as only being our pleasant emotions and not our thoughts alone as I said before.  I struggle with depression and anhedonia (absence of all my pleasant emotions) and what I am trying to do here is find out if my life and the lives of others who also struggle with depression and anhedonia can still have good meaning.

[robvalue]

Well, I'd say what science has to say about what is "good meaning" is irrelevant to you personally. If you find something good and meaningful, then that's good enough. There's no need for science to validate it. I'm not sure why you want it to...?

We're crossing the line between studying it as a phenomena, and dealing with it as an individual. Those are different things.

I spent a long time with so little positive emotions as to make no difference, so I probably know a little of what it feels like

[Detective L Ryuzaki]

Well, I'd say what science has to say about what is "good meaning" is irrelevant. If you find something good and meaningful, then that's good enough. There's no need for science to validate it.

Then it would be the metaphorical version of good.  Metaphorical meanings are delusional meanings that have no bearing whatsoever in reality.  For example, if you said that someone who died from a heart attack is still alive, then he/she would really not be alive.  You would only be attributing a metaphorical (false) meaning here.

Also, non scientific factors cannot yield scientific results.  For example, if someone personally judged an object or possession as keeping him/her alive, then if he/she were to lose it, then that would not cause his/her heart to stop beating and kill him/her.  If it somehow did, then it would be because there was some other scientific process going on here that killed him/her.  Not because he/she personally judged that object as keeping him/her alive.

So in that same sense, it is not our personally defined version of incentive through our thoughts alone without our pleasant emotions that make our lives good, worth living, and make us lament/enraged over losses.  There is instead a different scientific (mental) process going on here.  It would be your brain fooling itself into thinking that you are having the incentive.  Also, if there is somehow a version of wanting and liking through our thoughts alone without our pleasant emotions, then that would not be the incentive version.  They would not give us any incentive as I said before.

The very act of our brains fooling themselves does not make our lives good and worth living either without our pleasant emotions.  If you had no pleasant emotions and you said the phrase:

"I am fooling myself into thinking I have the incentive to live.  Therefore, my life is good and worth living."

Then this would be a false statement.  It would be no different than the statement:

"I am fooling myself into thinking the Earth is flat.  Therefore, I am going to fall off the Earth."

[robvalue]

OK I've tried my best to help, but I'm afraid I still can't understand what the actual point is. I'm not being rude, I'm probably a bit thick today. Not feeling very well.

You seem to be defining words in such a way as to make a certain conclusion inevitable, and then... either not being happy with it, or challenging us to prove it wrong? I'm not sure. It's not the job of science to tell people how worthwhile their life is, what they should value or how they value it.

I don't know what scientific results you're hoping to get, you seem to have defined things so that there is only one outcome.

Someone else better take over, my brain cell is failing me today!

[Detective L Ryuzaki]

OK I've tried my best to help, but I'm afraid I still can't understand what the actual point is. I'm not being rude, I'm probably a bit thick today. Not feeling very well.

You seem to be defining words in such a way as to make a certain conclusion inevitable, and then... either not being happy with it, or challenging us to prove it wrong? I'm not sure. It's not the job of science to tell people how worthwhile their life is, what they should value or how they value it.

I don't know what scientific results you're hoping to get, you seem to have defined things so that there is only one outcome.

Someone else better take over, my brain cell is failing me today!

My point here is that it is science that proves and disproves things.  Not our personal moral opinions.  Therefore, just because we say and think to ourselves that our lives still have good meaning without our pleasant emotions doesn't make it so.  Science would have to prove otherwise.  And, yes, I am asking for someone to challenge my theory.

[robvalue]

What is the failure criteria for your theory? How could it be proved wrong?

[Detective L Ryuzaki]

What is the failure criteria for your theory? How could it be proved wrong?

If you are asking me what flaws does my theory have, then I don't see any.  That is the reason why I am asking someone who is very intelligent to point them out and explain to me how my theory is false.  That is, if my theory really is false.

[robvalue]

What I'm saying is that a scientific theory should make some sort of predictions, so it can be tested. Yours appears to define words in such a way as to reach an inevitible conclusion. If a theory (or more properly a hypothesis) doesn't make any predictions that can be tested, or have some other way to falsify it, then it can't be a scientific theory. It's just an assumption/tautology.

Are you asking us to discuss the way you define words? That's the only thing I can think of to "test" it. Otherwise I agree that by your definitions, your conclusion is correct. I just don't see that we've learned anything useful on the way.

But again, I'm shit today.

[Detective L Ryuzaki]

What I'm saying is that a scientific theory should make some sort of predictions, so it can be tested. Yours appears to define words in such a way as to reach an inevitible conclusion. If a theory (or more properly a hypothesis) doesn't make any predictions that can be tested, or have some other way to falsify it, then it can't be a scientific theory. It's just an assumption/tautology.

Are you asking us to discuss the way you define words? That's the only thing I can think of to "test" it.

Since I don't have any sufficient knowledge of science, then I cannot think of any experiments or anything of the sort.  Therefore, I am only left to have a debate based upon arguments and such alone.  So I am just simply asking for people to come up with counterarguments against my theory as it is even though there is no scientific methods and such being presented in it.