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[Serious] Moral Obligations toward Possible Worlds
#21
RE: Moral Obligations toward Possible Worlds
(May 6, 2021 at 6:40 pm)tackattack Wrote: I can see a tie from the moral landscape of the individual to the moral landscape of the society. If you have a moral obligation to the society you’re in and the societies aims to perpetuate that society and its goals, then you would be tied morally to said outcomes. Slavers from slave times were morally tied to propagating slavery until a societal shift moved that target. It is this agreed moral tie to societal goals that feeds definitions of reparations, norms and “the ultimate good”

//2 cents

Societies set those obligations, it's just that not all groups/individuals find them acceptable.
I don't have an anger problem, I have an idiot problem.
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#22
RE: Moral Obligations toward Possible Worlds
I don't know whether moral truths themselves are dependent upon intuition, but determining whether something is morally true or not seems to rest only on intuitions.  Some people will suggest that such and such maxim is obviously objectively true, but it always resolves into it being obviously true to them, but not to everybody else.  So if there is a moral obligation towards future generations, we don't have a reliably rational way of determining that.  It's possible that the majority of people might find that it agrees with their intuitions, but is a majority enough to conclude that something is probably true?  At one time a majority thought there was nothing wrong with slavery.  Our morals appear to inescapably rest upon intuition, and intuition is a guide of questionable value.
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#23
RE: Moral Obligations toward Possible Worlds
Its certainly difficult to figure out what objective responsibilities we possess toward some unknown future generation. We don't have alot of objective data about those future generations.

Still when we say that one time we thought there was nothing wrong with slavery - that's not entirely true. There's never been a time in which slavery existed that there weren't people who thought it was good -and- people who thought it was bad. It's never been the universal assumption that human bondage is good. It's rarely ever been the case that human bondage was thought to be good for anyone other than others. Romans kept slaves, but commonly didn't think that romans should be slaves. Slaveholders rarely imagine themselves to be equivalent to their property.

I'm not vouching for he truth of the intuition, or of the thing that could very well be pure intuition and also untrue - just pointing out that accuracy in our framing of moral issues could provide clarity in our conclusions about our moral conclusions.
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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#24
RE: Moral Obligations toward Possible Worlds
(May 6, 2021 at 9:45 pm)The Grand Nudger Wrote: Its certainly difficult to figure out what objective responsibilities we possess toward some unknown future generation.  We don't have alot of objective data about those future generations.

Still when we say that one time we thought there was nothing wrong with slavery - that's not entirely true.  There's never been a time in which slavery existed that there weren't people who thought it was good -and- people who thought it was bad.  It's never been the universal assumption that human bondage is good.  It's rarely ever been the case that human bondage was thought to be good for anyone other than others.  Romans kept slaves, but commonly didn't think that romans should be slaves. Slaveholders rarely imagine themselves to be equivalent to their property.

I'm not vouching for he truth of the intuition, or of the thing that could very well be pure intuition and also untrue - just pointing out that accuracy in our framing of moral issues could provide clarity in our conclusions about our moral conclusions.

Quibble noted. And I said a majority, not everyone. The majority of Romans had no problem enslaving non-Romans. That is no longer the case. American slavers didn't endorse slavery for whites. That doesn't mean nothing changed. Your quibble falls apart under inspection.
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#25
RE: Moral Obligations toward Possible Worlds
I think that you're being hasty. Sure, things change, but the thing that's changed in this instance isn't whether or not people think slavery is bad - even slavers think slavery is bad. It's the distribution of people who hold to a view, and the extent of moral exclusions or justifications to the otherwise immoral (even by their own standards) in that view. Consider the views presented by confederate leadership and northern sympathizers alike. That slavery was a necessary evil. Necessary to the instruction of the black race, necessary to the function of society. There's moral agreement here, with anti slavery positions. The position qualifies evil.

Are you sure that there's no way to determine that other than intuition? Are you sure that moral disagreement is what you think it is, and means what you think it does? Using something other than intuition to determine that....? I suspect that you are using something more than intuition - even if you get it wrong. Quibble noted? It's not a workable objection imo, but if it were..then our quibble is grounds to apply it. There's no way for us to determine whether or not any one thing or another that we persistently disagree about is true or false other than intuition. If I say a tree is blue and you say it's green...the world may never know.

Our moral responsibilities with respect to some future generation may be true and obvious and rationally arrived at..and, even so, people will still disagree or fail to see as much or qualify whatever amount of evil we intend to do with justifying caveats. That, to me, suggests a far more elaborate process than the expression of intuitive thoughts. I think that we probably both hold a similar view bout human morality in practice - but I don't think that I could call it anything less than a rationalization. That's probably an effect of my having picked a lane, ofc. Between the notion that we can't get it right or wrong, and the notion that we can and we get it wrong alot - I think it's the latter. I absofuckinglutely believe that intuition is the culprit behind getting it wrong when and how we do a good amount of those times. Intuitions about personhood and shared humanity and economic necessity misinformed a great many people in the south, even as they saw the foundation of their own revulsion towards bondage as being as obvious as it has always been and still remains. They weren't wrong or even being irrational about morality, if we're being super accurate, they were wrong and irrational about other people - and that either facilitates or makes that specific moral failure inevitable.

I think the same thing happens with the abortion issue. Neither side of this is having a moral disagreement over babykilling or our responsibilities to our fellow man in present or in future. We may intuitively believe as much, though, and that intuition in spite of all very obvious evidence to the contrary will effect our consciously rational or rationalized conclusions in the same way. Garbage in, garbage out.
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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#26
RE: Moral Obligations toward Possible Worlds
(May 7, 2021 at 6:35 am)The Grand Nudger Wrote: I think that you're being hasty.  Sure, things change, but the thing that's changed in this instance isn't whether or not people think slavery is bad - even slavers think slavery is bad.  It's the distribution of people who hold to a view, and the extent of moral exclusions or justifications to the otherwise immoral (even by their own standards) in that view.  Consider the views presented by confederate leadership and northern sympathizers alike.  That slavery was a necessary evil.  Necessary to the instruction of the black race, necessary to the function of society.  There's moral agreement here, with anti slavery positions.  The position qualifies evil.

People may have thought that slavery was bad in the sense of undesirable, but that's not the same thing as holding that it's immoral. Subjecting our children to pain, whether in getting healthcare or being disciplined, is a necessary evil. That doesn't make it immoral. The evil here being figurative. Having studied ancient slavery a bit, there's little in the record about it being immoral. And the slavers in the American south defended it as moral. Regardless, if you don't like that example, we can pick another. Homosexuality's morality in the U.S. was once viewed very differently. The morality of sex outside marriage. And the morality of masturbation. There's no shortage of examples of the base fact that intuitions about morality differ and change over time.

(May 7, 2021 at 6:35 am)The Grand Nudger Wrote: Our moral responsibilities with respect to some future generation may be true and obvious and rationally arrived at..and, even so, people will still disagree or fail to see as much or qualify whatever amount of evil we intend to do with justifying caveats.  That, to me, suggests a far more elaborate process than the expression of intuitive thoughts.  I think that we probably both hold a similar view bout human morality in practice - but I don't think that I could call it anything less than a rationalization.  That's probably an effect of my having picked a lane, ofc.  Between the notion that we can't get it right or wrong, and the notion that we can and we get it wrong alot - I think it's the latter.  I absofuckinglutely believe that intuition is the culprit behind getting it wrong when and how we do a good amount of those times.  Intuitions about personhood and shared humanity and economic necessity misinformed a great many people in the south, even as they saw the foundation of their own revulsion towards bondage as being as obvious as it has always been and still remains.  They weren't wrong or even being irrational about morality, if we're being super accurate, they were wrong and irrational about other people - and that either facilitates or makes that specific moral failure inevitable.

That's nice that you can imagine such things, but until you demonstrate an objectively rational foundation, your fantasies are impotent.

Our getting it wrong is only meaningful if there is a way of getting it right. Until you find that, all this talk about sources of error is just idle.

And you've disregarded my initial statement about morality that I said that I don't know if morals are purely intuitive. It doesn't matter. Our knowledge of morals is solely intuitive. At the end of the day, morals appear to reduce to just the consensus of people's intuitions. If you feel otherwise, then you need to produce that something else.


(May 7, 2021 at 6:35 am)The Grand Nudger Wrote: I think the same thing happens with the abortion issue.  Neither side of this is having a moral disagreement over babykilling or our responsibilities to our fellow man in present or in future.  We may intuitively believe as much, though, and that intuition in spite of all very obvious evidence to the contrary will effect our consciously rational or rationalized conclusions in the same way.  Garbage in, garbage out.

You're continuing to babble about 'might be'. Give me something that is, or quit wasting your breath. If you had a rational foundation, the epistemological problems could be resolved. It isn't epistemology that's standing in your way.
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#27
RE: Moral Obligations toward Possible Worlds
I just lost an edit to my previous post, but let me see if I can recreate it.

Several points:

1) The fact that people can commit errors of moral reasoning doesn't in any sense imply that there is a truth underneath the errors. The errors could rest on a solid foundation or no foundation at all. You need to talk about what's true, not what's false.

2) Nudger and I have discussed this before. His suggestion was that unnecessary harm was immoral. At which point I asked him to objectively define harm, and he substituted damage. Unfortunately this doesn't work as there is damage that is not harm. I damage my toenails by cutting them, and my hair likewise by cutting it, but there has never been any harm resulting. The problem is that harm is a specific type of damage. It's damage with something extra. And I believe that something extra is personal preference or value. Nobody cares that the lamb is eaten by the lion, so the damage to the lamb has no moral significance. People do care if you eat them because they value staying alive, and that creates the concept of harm. As I pointed out to Nudger last time, there are some people who would like to be dead, so killing them isn't harm.

3) I have a friend who is a consequentialist and would assert like Nudger has that harm is objective. I also know people that agree with me that harm is a subjective measure. These disagreements are common and are well known, so anybody that's telling you it's definitely objective is likely blowing smoke up your ass. And even people who agree that harm is objective can't agree on some basics. Consequentialists like my friend assert that the morality of an act depends only on the actual consequences, and intentions are irrelevant. So, in his view, someone who accidentally kills someone has acted worse than someone who tries to kill someone but fails. Others argue the reverse. At the end of the day, one thing is clear. People who are arguing the point are arguing a point of view, not some readily recognizable true fact. And mere points of view won't feed the bulldog.
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#28
RE: Moral Obligations toward Possible Worlds
(May 7, 2021 at 11:26 am)Angrboda Wrote: I just lost an edit to my previous post, but let me see if I can recreate it.

Several points:

1) The fact that people can commit errors of moral reasoning doesn't in any sense imply that there is a truth underneath the errors.  The errors could rest on a solid foundation or no foundation at all.  You need to talk about what's true, not what's false.
Moral failure and moral disagreement also fail to imply that we aren't reasoning.  That we're left adrift with only our intuition to guide us.

Quote:2) Nudger and I have discussed this before.  His suggestion was that unnecessary harm was immoral.  At which point I asked him to objectively define harm, and he substituted damage.  Unfortunately this doesn't work as there is damage that is not harm.  I damage my toenails by cutting them, and my hair likewise by cutting it, but there has never been any harm resulting.  The problem is that harm is a specific type of damage.  It's damage with something extra.  And I believe that something extra is personal preference or value.  Nobody cares that the lamb is eaten by the lion, so the damage to the lamb has no moral significance.  People do care if you eat them because they value staying alive, and that creates the concept of harm.  As I pointed out to Nudger last time, there are some people who would like to be dead, so killing them isn't harm.  
Here again I think that there are probably great objections to harm based moral systems, but whether cutting your toe nails is meaningful or relevant damage to moral systems probably isn't one of them.  I personally don't see the difference between necessary harm and harm - myself..it''s just something I like to include as it's a common notion.

I'd call doing bad for a good reason - doing bad.  

Quote:3)   I have a friend who is a consequentialist and would assert like Nudger has that harm is objective.  I also know people that agree with me that harm is a subjective measure.  These disagreements are common and are well known, so anybody that's telling you it's definitely objective is likely blowing smoke up your ass.  And even people who agree that harm is objective can't agree on some basics.  Consequentialists like my friend assert that the morality of an act depends only on the actual consequences, and intentions are irrelevant.  So, in his view, someone who accidentally kills someone has acted worse than someone who tries to kill someone but fails.  Others argue the reverse.  At the end of the day, one thing is clear.  People who are arguing the point are arguing a point of view, not some readily recognizable true fact.  And mere points of view won't feed the bulldog.
People who argue that 2 and 2 is 4 are also arguing a point of view.  One which isn't readily obvious to a great many small versions of ourselves.  Moral disagreement does not imply or prove moral subjectivity.  There will be moral disagreements regardless of whether there are or aren't any moral facts of any matter. No matter how many examples of moral disagreement we care to dredge up, the objection will always be a formal logical fallacy.

That being said, the consequentialist above isn't described as having any disagreement with moral objectivity.
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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#29
RE: Moral Obligations toward Possible Worlds
(May 7, 2021 at 1:47 pm)The Grand Nudger Wrote:
(May 7, 2021 at 11:26 am)Angrboda Wrote: I just lost an edit to my previous post, but let me see if I can recreate it.

Several points:

1) The fact that people can commit errors of moral reasoning doesn't in any sense imply that there is a truth underneath the errors.  The errors could rest on a solid foundation or no foundation at all.  You need to talk about what's true, not what's false.
Moral failure and moral disagreement also fail to imply that we aren't reasoning.  That we're left adrift with only our intuition to guide us.

Since I'm not making this argument, this is just a strawman.


(May 7, 2021 at 1:47 pm)The Grand Nudger Wrote:
(May 7, 2021 at 11:26 am)Angrboda Wrote: 2) Nudger and I have discussed this before.  His suggestion was that unnecessary harm was immoral.  At which point I asked him to objectively define harm, and he substituted damage.  Unfortunately this doesn't work as there is damage that is not harm.  I damage my toenails by cutting them, and my hair likewise by cutting it, but there has never been any harm resulting.  The problem is that harm is a specific type of damage.  It's damage with something extra.  And I believe that something extra is personal preference or value.  Nobody cares that the lamb is eaten by the lion, so the damage to the lamb has no moral significance.  People do care if you eat them because they value staying alive, and that creates the concept of harm.  As I pointed out to Nudger last time, there are some people who would like to be dead, so killing them isn't harm.  
Here again I think that there are probably great objections to harm based moral systems, but whether cutting your toe nails is meaningful or relevant damage to moral systems probably isn't one of them.  I personally don't see the difference between necessary harm and harm - myself..it''s just something I like to include as it's a common notion.

I'd call doing bad for a good reason - doing bad.  

That's nice. Few parents are going to agree with you that getting their kids vaccinated is evil. You just seem to have some weird beliefs. The rest isn't an intelligible objection, so you'll have to try again, in English, if you want any such thoughts considered.


(May 7, 2021 at 1:47 pm)The Grand Nudger Wrote:
(May 7, 2021 at 11:26 am)Angrboda Wrote: 3)   I have a friend who is a consequentialist and would assert like Nudger has that harm is objective.  I also know people that agree with me that harm is a subjective measure.  These disagreements are common and are well known, so anybody that's telling you it's definitely objective is likely blowing smoke up your ass.  And even people who agree that harm is objective can't agree on some basics.  Consequentialists like my friend assert that the morality of an act depends only on the actual consequences, and intentions are irrelevant.  So, in his view, someone who accidentally kills someone has acted worse than someone who tries to kill someone but fails.  Others argue the reverse.  At the end of the day, one thing is clear.  People who are arguing the point are arguing a point of view, not some readily recognizable true fact.  And mere points of view won't feed the bulldog.
People who argue that 2 and 2 is 4 are also arguing a point of view.  One which isn't readily obvious to a great many small versions of ourselves.  Moral disagreement does not imply or prove moral subjectivity.  There will be moral disagreements regardless of whether there are or aren't any moral facts of any matter.  No matter how many examples of moral disagreement we care to dredge up, the objection will always be a formal logical fallacy.

It wasn't intended to argue that case. What it was intended to do was provide an inductive argument against believing in arguments for objective morals that are predicated upon subjective assessments as opposed to facts and logic which can be examined. You haven't offered any reason for believing that you possess a rational and objective foundation for ethics. That justifies my skepticism as to your actually having one. This isn't about whether morals are objective or not, a question that I'm happy to remain agnostic about. Again, you're attacking a strawman. What I am not agnostic about is any one person's subjective assessment of the matter being reliable in the absence of a demonstrably sound argument. I'm also skeptical as to the claim that we have other means to interrogate moral questions aside from intuition. I haven't really elaborated on that aspect. I'm too busy clearing away your nonsensical fluff.

Again, deliver some evidence of a rational foundation for morals or don't. I'm not gonna waste a lot of time debating what might be. Monkeys might fly out of my butt. I'm not gonna wait breathlessly for it to happen.



If you want to peek at what I am arguing, consider Munchausen's Trilemma. Words or concepts can acquire their meaning in one of three ways. First, defined in terms of themselves, either directly, or indirectly, through a circular path. Second, a word can rest upon an infinite regression of sub-definitions, which rest upon more sub-definitions, ad infinitum. What's generally concluded is that both of these paths are vacuous. The words don't in any real sense end with a definition. The third leg of the trilemma is that definitions, concepts or whatever terminate in an indisputably basic fact. Basic facts are known through apprehension, or intuitively. You can't define what would constitute a basic fact, as that would lead to another iteration of the trilemma. So the challenge for those who would argue that morals have an objective foundation is to confront an equivalent trilemma for morals and show either that there is a fourth option that hasn't been acknowledged, or that there are basic, indisputable beliefs about morals that are objectively true. Failing to do either is just wasting my time.
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#30
RE: Moral Obligations toward Possible Worlds
You've explicitly and repeatedly made such an argument, laying out examples of moral disagreements, and then declaring that is it thus clear that we're arguing opinions or intuitions rather than facts.

I can't recall having ever imagined that vaccinating my kids was evil - but I'm sure that I could come up with some scenario where it could be or would be and then I and some other person could argue over the morality of vaccinating our kids...and none of that argument would suggest or imply that either of us weren't being consciously rational, or that there could be no true fact to bicker over. The rational foundations of morality are, at least in the view I hold, the same rational foundations applied to any other rational or rationalized things. I talk about moral things and conceive of moral things in the same way that I talk about the color of a thing, and statements about the color of a thing. There's never been any question as to whether or not moral systems can have rational foundations. Or that we can employ reason. It's an open question whether or not any given rational moral system is the Right™ system, ofc.

I tend to assume that none of them are. That no single claim to moral foundations will accurately and fully express whatever amount of objectivity we might find in any moral proposition. There's alot to describe, and some of those actual facts could be in actual competition with each other. We'd argue about them. We'd disagree. It may be a fact that abortion is bad, and it may be a concurrent fact that outlawing abortion is bad, for example. It may be a fact that we have responibilities to others, and in either case, we are going to fail one set of responsibilities by necessity of satisfying the other.
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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