Objective morality: how would it affect your judgement/actions?

[Sal]

Because "wrong" in this sense is a value judgement. It isn't right/wrong in the sense of a measurement.

 Why would that be a problem?  Why would something being related to or pursuant to a value judgement be barred from being a fact?  Cant a value judgement be based on a measurement?  Aren't all measurements based in standards?

A measurement is independent upon my reading, someone else can make a measurement and come to the same measurement as I've measured. Not so for value judgements, my red cannot ever be your red. My "murder is wrong" isn't a measurement in the same sense as something being "red", at least, I think so.

I'm unsure as to what facts can be said on morality, still. It seems to me you have a tenuous and/or broad definition of "facts". For me a fact would be something like "there are 8 planets in the Solar system" or "the radius of Earth is 6,371 km", something that is not a fact would be "the sky is blue", what is blue in this context? How do you define "blue"? Facts are objective truths while something like "the sky is blue" is subjective, while in the adverse the "light scattering of the atmosphere is ~490–450 nm" which of course is what most people probably experience the color blue. That is an example of the difference between a fact and something like an opinion.

[The Grand Nudger]

 Why would that be a problem?  Why would something being related to or pursuant to a value judgement be barred from being a fact?  Cant a value judgement be based on a measurement?  Aren't all measurements based in standards?

A measurement is independent upon my reading, someone else can make a measurement and come to the same measurement as I've measured. Not so for value judgements, my red cannot ever be your red. My "murder is wrong" isn't a measurement in the same sense as something being "red", at least, I think so.

Are you sure?  Is the measurement that slavery or murder causes harm dependent on your reading?  If you didn't take the reading, and someone else did, there might be no harm to detect?

Is the harm caused by either of those things merely an artifact of your subjective experience? Nothing to dso with the people involved..the slaves, for example? No means to test whether or not they've been palpably harmed? No long term projections, no lasting effects, no assessments of the arc of history or economy? No way to know whether or not a murder victim was harmed?

We both talk about red because we both observe light in that range, and we have a common language to describe what we perceive. There is a fact of red (there are many, in truth..but for simplicity's sake ). Are there no similar facts of murder and slavery? Is there no similar fact of harm?

Moral realism is alot simpler than most people think. It takes some moral statement at face value, concedes that it does purport to report a fact - something about some x that makes it wrong, and that -if- that something is factual, then the moral statement is a factual moral statement.

[Losty]

I assume the question is not meant for me. I find the idea of “moral facts” to be completely ridiculous.

[The Grand Nudger]

Probably to do with some of the "moral facts" you've been bullshitted about. In my experience...that's a main driver to objection.

[Sal]

Moral realism is alot simpler than most people think.  It takes some moral statement at face value, concedes that it does purport to report a fact - something about some x that makes it wrong, and that -if- that something is factual, then the moral statement is a factual moral statement.

I guess I'll just concede that I don't understand moral realism, at this point.

My main contention to "factual moral statement" is that they seem to be fluid and dependent upon the person making the claim, not some "out there" observable fact.

[The Grand Nudger]

That would be the very opposite of a factual moral statement. Those statements are meaningfully subjective moral statements. We should probably try to get rid of as many of those as we have that inform our actions.

As I asked above...is the conclusion that someone who has been murdered has been harmed somehow dependent on you, personally? If you didn;t think they;d been harmed...would that mean that they hadn;t been? Can you change your opinion on that..and, if you did...would changing your opinion change anything about the act..specifically, would it mean that the murdered person was unharmed?

[Joods]

This is mainly aimed at people who believe that "objective morality" is a coherent concept, and that there can be some sorts of statements about it which are independent of all opinion. I'll let each person approach it with whatever definition of morality they want.

Let's say you discovered that you are incorrect about some position you currently hold. You have concluded so far that, "A is a moral/immoral action, under circumstances C". Add whatever other caveats you like. Now imagine that you have access to "moral facts" somehow, and that it shows the opposite to be true.

Which of your positions would you be willing to reverse? Would you now act differently, and judge others acting that way differently?

Personally, I don't care about any such "facts", as I feel it would represent nothing more than some specific way of evaluating actions. Without a supporting argument as to why I should change my position by adopting this system, I won't be changing my actions or my judgements. I don't see it as a factual matter.

I want to participate. Can you dumb this down with an actual example so that I can comprehend it? 

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Seriously - I have a comprehension issue and am this stupid that I don't understand what you are talking about.

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[The Grand Nudger]

If you once thought that something was Really Bad™...but later learned that it wasn;t....would that change your opinion of that thing, or your actions in regard to that thing, or pepple who engage in that thing, etc?

[Silver]

All I know is that if facts are presented, my mind can be changed. I'm not talking theistic types of facts, which are as close to facts as ice is to fire. I'm talking empirical facts.

[The Grand Nudger]

Yeah, that;s the general idea.  We do seem to be able to change pour minds presented with new facts, and that does seem to alter our behavior and decisions and appraisals of others.