Any Nihilists here?

[FrustratedFool]

Interesting.

Is consistency objectively valuable for its utility?
I'm not sure I even understand the question. Does such-and-such provide a use for this-and-that? Yes. Is that use objective? I'm not sure. Is, for example, logic's usefulness an objective quality, in that it would be useful even if all agents didn't exist? Well, how then is it useful and to whom? It wouldn't be. So I'm leaning towards it being subjective here.
OK, provisionally I'm going to answer your question no. Value is subjective. Agents assign value to things. As to whether utility is subjective? Yes, but the process that leads to that utility is likely a valueless objective logical necessity. Maybe. At this point I'm lost.

But, consistently with my two previous posts, I'm saying consistency is subjectively valuable. In this case, to me. And seemingly to you. I'm glad to have remained consistent. I'm sure you appreciate it also.

I see no way in which morality is anything but entirely subjective, since moral values are assigned purely by persons and don't exist without agents. I utterly reject moral realism. I don't think I've been inconsistent (lol) in that.

[The Grand Nudger]

When moral theorists use the term "subjective" they mean to say that the quality/attribute/trait x lies solely in the eye of the beholder...that it's a quality of the subject... rather than the object.

So, for example. Boxes can hold things. I don't just think boxes can hold things, they really can. It's something about boxes that allows them to hold things, not something about me. Boxes can hold things regardless of whether I'm there, whether I know that, or whether I value boxes. Even if there were no people....and no boxes, the very concept of a box will describe that utility all the same. So, if you wanted to make the first box, you would find that this box...and any box....has the quality proposed for the set of box.

The statement boxes can hold things is as objectively true as any statement - it is not subjectively true. It tells us something about boxes, not about me.

[FrustratedFool]

Yes, exactly. But considering the holding of things to be valuable or have worth is a subjective assessment done by agents.

So consistency, taken as a logical law or something, is something that does X, in this case (at least what I was thinking about), X being a way of sorting propositions that avoids incoherence between them. This property might well be objective.

But whether that utility of avoiding incoherence is valuable is decided by an agent, and it seems to me can only be decided by an agent. This would be subjective.

Tying this back to moral realism, punching Bob causes harm to Bob (objectively), but deciding that this is immoral is an agential assessment (subjective).

[Angrboda]

Unless Bob is a masochist, performing a part of a contract, a prize fighter earning big money.....

[FrustratedFool]

Unless Bob is a masochist, performing a part of a contract, a prize fighter earning big money.....

Harm is a vague word. My bad. I was using it to mean something like 'cause this effect upon his physical body'.
If it makes it clearer, substitute the word 'harm' for 'causes him to bruise'.

[The Grand Nudger]

Yes, exactly.  But considering the holding of things to be valuable or have worth is a subjective assessment done by agents.

So consistency, taken as a logical law or something, is something that does X, in this case (at least what I was thinking about), X being a way of sorting propositions that avoids incoherence between them.  This property might well be objective.

But whether that utility of avoiding incoherence is valuable is decided by an agent, and it seems to me can only be decided by an agent.  This would be subjective.

Tying this back to moral realism, punching Bob causes harm to Bob (objectively), but deciding that this is immoral is an agential assessment (subjective).

Sure, subjects can apprehend things.  That in and of itself doesn't make that thing subjective.  Is the sun subjective because I apprehend it?  OFC not.  The sun is there whether I apprehend or consider it.  So too is a box and the utility of a box.  

I like harm based examples.  If harm is one of the things we're talking about when we discuss good and bad then punching bob is immoral regardless of what I, an agent, might decide.  I could conceivably decide that punching bob is not bad (lets say I really want to punch bob!) - but I would be plain and simply wrong.  

Calling anything that people do or see or conclude subjective just isn't workable.  It's not what moral theorists mean when they use the term at all. To say that punching bob is subjectively bad takes the focus off of the punch - and asserts that it is either just my opinion that punching people causes harm - it doesn't really, or that I'm not at all interested in the factual details of punching or of harm and I call it bad for some solely internal reason (or non reason).

Harm is a vague word.

So is health.

[Angrboda]

Unless Bob is a masochist, performing a part of a contract, a prize fighter earning big money.....

Harm is a vague word. My bad. I was using it to mean something like 'cause this effect upon his physical body'.
If it makes it clearer, substitute the word 'harm' for 'causes him to bruise'.

I've had this argument with Nudger before. He holds that harm is objective. I do not. And there talks broke down.

[The Grand Nudger]

I do, yeah, in the same way that I believe that a wall can be damaged. Whether it's made out of bricks, or Bobs face.

[FrustratedFool]

Sure, subjects can apprehend things.  That in and of itself doesn't make that thing subjective.  Is the sun subjective because I apprehend it?  OFC not.  The sun is there whether I apprehend or consider it.  So too is a box and the utility of a box.  

I like harm based examples.  If harm is one of the things we're talking about when we discuss good and bad then punching bob is immoral regardless of what I, an agent, might decide.  I could conceivably decide that punching bob is not bad (lets say I really want to punch bob!) - but I would be plain and simply wrong.  

Calling anything that people do or see or conclude subjective just isn't workable.  It's not what moral theorists mean when they use the term at all.

It's not the apprehension that makes something subjective. It's the fact that something can only be decided by an agent and has no mapping onto external reality. I apprehend the sun via the senses, and since the sun lies outside my brain it is objective. But I cannot apprehend moral truth via the senses, and there's no evidence of it existing in shared external reality. Comparing the sun to an ethical evaluation seems wildly disanalgous.

Harm is a poor word because of its ambiguity (much language smuggle in moral assessment), but in the sense of causes physical property X (see post above) it is not a moral statement. The morality has to be added onto it by an agent. Thus it is subjective.

[FrustratedFool]

I do, yeah, in the same way that I believe that a wall can be damaged. Whether it's made out of bricks, or Bobs face.

But what makes harm immoral?