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In Defense of a Non-Natural Moral Order
#11
RE: In Defense of a Non-Natural Moral Order
(August 22, 2019 at 11:23 am)DLJ Wrote:
(August 22, 2019 at 10:01 am)Acrobat Wrote: ...
I'm curious to hear others' thoughts on this?
...

Do you want the long answer or the short answer?

The short version is the definition of morality:

An evolved, human governance / continuity management system.
This system is an evolved extension (in the cognitive domain) of the pre-human immune system, endocrine and limbic system architecture and requires an ethical baseline (requiring memory), emotion-based thresholds, event-detection (e.g. deception detectors; a conscience) and reasoning (hence consciousness). It is enabled / influenced by chemical inhibitors and inducers and social constraints and drivers.

A longer answer would include the interaction of the individual and the environment. It's the latter that gives the illusion of 'objective'.

If you want a complete answer, it would involve algorithms (how we get from sense data to ethics) and a tentative map of the above mentioned 'ethical baseline', which hints at an explanation for transcendence, holocausts etc. Lemme know if you're up for that level of detail.

Evolution accounts for all the biological sensory components that recognize objective things, like my ability to see the table, feel its weight, etc.. are all a product of evolution, but the table, the object being perceived, nor the good, are the product of evolution.

(August 22, 2019 at 11:38 am)no one Wrote: I thought we've already discussed this?

Morality is what I say is right.
Immorality is what I say is wrong.

Which is about as true, as saying the earth is round, because I say you.
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#12
RE: In Defense of a Non-Natural Moral Order
As is our ability to engage in moral reasoning with regards to those moral objects we apprehend.

No point in leaving that out of what evolution accounts for.

This is also the main avenue for criticisms of subjectivity.
I am the Infantry. I am my country’s strength in war, her deterrent in peace. I am the heart of the fight… wherever, whenever. I carry America’s faith and honor against her enemies. I am the Queen of Battle. I am what my country expects me to be, the best trained Soldier in the world. In the race for victory, I am swift, determined, and courageous, armed with a fierce will to win. Never will I fail my country’s trust. Always I fight on…through the foe, to the objective, to triumph overall. If necessary, I will fight to my death. By my steadfast courage, I have won more than 200 years of freedom. I yield not to weakness, to hunger, to cowardice, to fatigue, to superior odds, For I am mentally tough, physically strong, and morally straight. I forsake not, my country, my mission, my comrades, my sacred duty. I am relentless. I am always there, now and forever. I AM THE INFANTRY! FOLLOW ME!
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#13
RE: In Defense of a Non-Natural Moral Order
The Earth isn't round.
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#14
RE: In Defense of a Non-Natural Moral Order
To what extent are you comfortable blurring the lines of objectivity and subjectivity? I tend to view objectivity as an abstraction, deduced or assumed, from our subjective experience. We don't have direct access to it in the first place, because it is all filtered through our senses. In other words, we only have access to our direct conscious subjective experience.

The lines being blurred, it's also useful to treat subjective experience in a objective sense. It's objective that people see the holocaust as immortal, and in that sense it is perhaps reducible to the natural biology of brains.

Disclaimer: I'm not a philosopher so I'm probably using these terms very loosely and inaccurately, but my general argument should still be discernable.
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#15
RE: In Defense of a Non-Natural Moral Order
(August 22, 2019 at 12:10 pm)Acrobat Wrote: ...
Evolution accounts for all the biological sensory components that recognize objective things, like my ability to see the table, feel its weight, etc.. are all a product of evolution, but the table, the object being perceived,  nor the good, are the product of evolution.
...

Calling them "objective things" is question begging. Why not just call them 'objects'?

Was there a 'not' missing near the end there? If not and I take you literally, then we agree... 'good' is a product (an artefact) of evolution.
The PURPOSE of life is to replicate our DNA ................. (from Darwin)
The MEANING of life is the experience of living ... (from Frank Herbert)
The VALUE of life is the legacy we leave behind ..... (from observation)
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#16
RE: In Defense of a Non-Natural Moral Order
What most people bicker about, when they bicker about objectivity and subjectivity, is actually a reference theory.

Analytic and synthetic truth. True with respect to meaning, or true with respect to meaning -and- what’s out in the world.
I am the Infantry. I am my country’s strength in war, her deterrent in peace. I am the heart of the fight… wherever, whenever. I carry America’s faith and honor against her enemies. I am the Queen of Battle. I am what my country expects me to be, the best trained Soldier in the world. In the race for victory, I am swift, determined, and courageous, armed with a fierce will to win. Never will I fail my country’s trust. Always I fight on…through the foe, to the objective, to triumph overall. If necessary, I will fight to my death. By my steadfast courage, I have won more than 200 years of freedom. I yield not to weakness, to hunger, to cowardice, to fatigue, to superior odds, For I am mentally tough, physically strong, and morally straight. I forsake not, my country, my mission, my comrades, my sacred duty. I am relentless. I am always there, now and forever. I AM THE INFANTRY! FOLLOW ME!
Reply
#17
RE: In Defense of a Non-Natural Moral Order
(August 22, 2019 at 10:54 am)Acrobat Wrote:
(August 22, 2019 at 10:31 am)BrianSoddingBoru4 Wrote:

I'm addressing that commonality. Or what lays at the heart of that commonality. In other words I'm not arguing over moral epistemology, but moral ontology. 

I agree there is a commonality to morality that doesn't exist with other things that are classified as subjective, such as people's favorite color. People may disagree on what actions are considered just, for example, but they might all agree that justice is something that is morally good and injustice as immoral. I would prefer calling it a shared moral umbrella, because we may not share any commonality in its execution.
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#18
RE: In Defense of a Non-Natural Moral Order
This guy is a one trick poney isn't he?
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#19
RE: In Defense of a Non-Natural Moral Order
(August 22, 2019 at 11:23 am)DLJ Wrote: [quote='Acrobat' pid='1928336' dateline='1566482484']
/quote]

Do you want the long answer or the short answer?

The short version is the definition of morality:

An evolved, human governance / continuity management system.
This system is an evolved extension (in the cognitive domain) of the pre-human immune system, endocrine and limbic system architecture and requires an ethical baseline (requiring memory), emotion-based thresholds, event-detection (e.g. deception detectors; a conscience) and reasoning (hence consciousness). It is enabled / influenced by chemical inhibitors and inducers and social constraints and drivers.

A longer answer would include the interaction of the individual and the environment. It's the latter that gives the illusion of 'objective'.

If you want a complete answer, it would involve algorithms (how we get from sense data to ethics) and a tentative map of the above mentioned 'ethical baseline', which hints at an explanation for transcendence, holocausts etc. Lemme know if you're up for that level of detail.


I don't know if Acrobat is interested in hearing the long answer, but I am. I would like clarification because it isn't very clear to me what you're trying to describe. You seem to be describing a basic human brain structure (with the addition of the immune system which I'm curious to know the role it plays). But everything else, cognition, emotion, consciousness, memory, is not exclusive to morality.

I personally would like you to expound on your statement a little more.
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#20
RE: In Defense of a Non-Natural Moral Order
(August 22, 2019 at 1:00 pm)John 6IX Breezy Wrote:
(August 22, 2019 at 10:54 am)Acrobat Wrote: I'm addressing that commonality. Or what lays at the heart of that commonality. In other words I'm not arguing over moral epistemology, but moral ontology. 

I agree there is a commonality to morality that doesn't exist with other things that are classified as subjective, such as people's favorite color. People may disagree on what actions are considered just, for example, but they might all agree that justice is something that is morally good and injustice as immoral. I would prefer calling it a shared moral umbrella, because we may not share any commonality in its execution.

Of what use is a moral stricture that people don't recognize as such?

Boru
‘But it does me no injury for my neighbour to say there are twenty gods or no gods. It neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg.’ - Thomas Jefferson
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