This argument just keeps going, and going, and going...
Joe Marier | 01.30.03 - 1:58 pm | #

Yes Joe, caught between the anti-human nature of the logical conclusions of their premises, and horrifying prospect of their deeds being judged by their maker, they struggle heroically to claim every good that God provides His rational creatures without having to own up to any responsibility to Him. Quite a show, isn't it?
John Hearn | 01.30.03 - 2:13 pm | #

I wait in anticipation of Andy's non-answer to your post. Speaking of non-answers, where has Jody been during all of this?
S.F. | 01.30.03 - 3:03 pm | #

Why, "rights" come from the opposite direction of "lefts!"

Sorry--feeling flippant. Dealing with middle schoolers takes its toll some days.
Heather Price | 01.30.03 - 3:19 pm | #

Mark Shea:

Question: Conscience and reason are, on the atheist's showing, products of mindless forces at work on our biology, just as appetite or sexuality are products of mindless forces (allegedly). We are, according to the atheist, free to artificially thwart our appetites and sexuality and I think our atheist friends would argue that there's nothing wrong with that, no? Why are we not then guiltless if we thwart conscience and reason too?

Because an act that violates what is moral, by which I mean our sense of how we ought to behave, is, by definition, a wrongful act.

If you tell me we are evolutionarily "programmed" to obey conscience I answer that we are evolutionarily programmed to reproduce. Yet somehow it is morally neutral to practice contraception of the reproductive system (allegedly) but "wrong" to practice contraception of conscience and reason when they get in the way of what we want.

Well, your conscience and reason may suggest to you that contraception is wrong, although I doubt it, but mine don't. Just because human beings have an instinct to reproduce, that obviously doesn't mean that taking measures to prevent reproduction is immoral. Even the Catholic Church accepts this.

Second question: why do you think the idea of a "spirit" is baseless superstition ....

There's no evidence for it.

... yet you subscribe to the existence of odorless, colorless, massless "rights"?

I don't think rights exist in an objective sense. They exist only as concepts or ideas, like God or the Tooth Fairy.

Where do "rights" come from?

The human mind.


Jon Peters | 01.30.03 - 3:24 pm | #

Jon,

Why don't you be honest like the Existentialists and simply state that it is your choice to hold the moral views that you hold and that everyone else is likewise responsible for whatever morals that they choose. If there is no objective standard for human behavior, what other choice do you have? If your moral system happens to include the demand that others not violate your personal code, you can admonish them that they have offended you, but then they have the perfect right to laugh in your face and tell you to mind your own business.

John Hearn | 01.30.03 - 3:39 pm | #

"I don't think rights exist in an objective sense. They exist only as concepts or ideas, like God or the Tooth Fairy."

How comforting for the rest of us. Every time I hear stuff like this, I have to wonder what kind of society would be built if the craftors of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence were athiests. Rights existing only in the abstract really makes the Bill of Rights a useless exercise, making it a Bill of Suggestions. I see it all the time in judicial interpretation - an inability or unwillingness to determine the outside limits of a regulation or law inevitibly turns into an unwillingness to see any distinction between a core and perpihery to law in general. A classic blunder that has caused a lot of grief for many desperate for guidance in legal matters (after all, it helps to know what is legal and illegal - an abstract right or rule doesn't give you much guidance when your choice is jail or freedom).

As an answer of where rights originate - from the human mind... I don't think that answers anything. Because to an athiest, EVERYTHING comes from the human mind. It's a distinction without a difference. What makes rights coming from the human mind and better than sinister thoughts that originate from the human mind?

Dan Gulfer | 01.30.03 - 3:57 pm | #

Jon:

I'm beginning to think you don't get my point. I'm not asking what you think of the morality of contraception. I'm asking why you think we "should" pay attention to conscience and reason since they are just as much a product of molecular motion as a hiccup or a yawn.
Mark Shea | Homepage | 01.30.03 - 4:02 pm | #

John Hearn:

Why don't you be honest like the Existentialists and simply state that it is your choice to hold the moral views that you hold and that everyone else is likewise responsible for whatever morals that they choose.

Because, to the extent that I understand the position you're trying to describe above, I don't share it.
Jon Peters | 01.30.03 - 4:03 pm | #

Because an act that violates what is moral, by which I mean our sense of how we ought to behave, is, by definition, a wrongful act.

So the Hitler Jungen programmed to gas Jews is doing right if he thinks it's right because his "sense of how we ought to behave" is trumps?

If "rights don't exist in an objective sense" or "exist as God and the Tooth Faith exist" aren't you really saying, "I have no rights"?
Mark Shea | Homepage | 01.30.03 - 4:07 pm | #

Dan Gulfer:

Rights existing only in the abstract really makes the Bill of Rights a useless exercise, making it a Bill of Suggestions.

Huh? The Bill of Rights is a legally enforceable, and enforced, document. I don't know why you think it's useless.

As an answer of where rights originate - from the human mind... I don't think that answers anything. Because to an athiest, EVERYTHING comes from the human mind.

No it doesn't. Atheism is not the same thing as solipsism or idealism.

What makes rights coming from the human mind and better than sinister thoughts that originate from the human mind?

The fact that they are considered "better."

Jon Peters | 01.30.03 - 4:09 pm | #

Mark Shea:

I'm not asking what you think of the morality of contraception. I'm asking why you think we "should" pay attention to conscience and reason since they are just as much a product of molecular motion as a hiccup or a yawn.

Because we believe that what they tell us is moral or true.
Jon Peters | 01.30.03 - 4:13 pm | #

Jon,

It’s easy to tell when you can't answer something, because you don't! The shorter and more flip you replies, the more anyone can see that the question has struck home. By whatever mysterious method you determine these sorts of things; don't you think that this is just a bit dishonest?

John Hearn | 01.30.03 - 4:15 pm | #

Mark Shea:

So the Hitler Jungen programmed to gas Jews is doing right if he thinks it's right because his "sense of how we ought to behave" is trumps?

He may be doing what he believes is right. He's not doing what I believe is right. But if by "programmed" you mean "brainwashed," or in some other way rendered incapable of moral judgment on the matter, then it wouldn't be a moral choice at all.

If "rights don't exist in an objective sense" or "exist as God and the Tooth Faith exist" aren't you really saying, "I have no rights"?

Not relly. I'm saying that you "have" rights in the sense that they are attributed to you, like, say, a sense of humor, but that you don't "have" rights in the sense of some objective trait or characteristic, like, say, a biological organ.

Jon Peters | 01.30.03 - 4:23 pm | #

Fine. Strike "programmed". The Hitler Jungen has a deep sense that gassing Jews is right and freely chooses to gas them. So is he right since his "sense of what is right" approves his act? Why or why not?

So "rights" exist as God exists and if Jon believes in them he is not delusional. But if I believe in God, who exists as rights exist, I am delusional. So delusional, in fact, that Jon must jump on to multiple blogs to evangelize people away from this delusion.

Curious.
Mark Shea | Homepage | 01.30.03 - 4:32 pm | #

Mark Shea:

The Hitler Jungen has a deep sense that gassing Jews is right and freely chooses to gas them. So is he right since his "sense of what is right" approves his act? Why or why not?

We've been over this. He may be doing what he believes to be right. He's not doing what I (or, I presume, you) believe to be right. If by "is right", you mean right in an objective sense, right in a sense that is independent of mind, then as I have already explained at some length, I deny that we know that objective morality exists.

So "rights" exist as God exists and if Jon believes in them he is not delusional.

Yes.

But if I believe in God, who exists as rights exist, I am delusional.

If you believe that God exists in an objective sense, then I think your belief is unjustified and probably wrong. I don't think it means you're delusional.

Jon Peters | 01.30.03 - 4:42 pm | #

Can someone tell me what the physical dimensions of a right are? What about an idea? What electrical and/or chemical structure does a particular right or idea have? If only we knew, we could develop the proper drug or machine to make Jon agree with us and everywun elz tu. :^)

One another thing that is curious... A theist can argue to the existence of God from his sensible effects in the universe. Likewise, don't scientists reason to the existence of non-sensible atomic and sub-atomic realities based on their effects as observed in experimentation? What about positing reality in four dimensions to explain certain observed gravitational phenomena? It seems that one who simultaneously affirms modern scientific theories and disaffirms the existence of God on the ground that he's non-sensible is being inconsistent.
Blake Butterworth | 01.30.03 - 5:04 pm | #

Jon writes, in response to Mark:
"We've been over this. He may be doing what he believes to be right. He's not doing what I (or, I presume, you) believe to be right. If by "is right", you mean right in an objective sense, right in a sense that is independent of mind, then as I have already explained at some length, I deny that we know that objective morality exists."

No, we haven't been over this. You keep repeating the same circular argument: Morality is what our moral sense says it is. How do we know we can trust our moral sense? Because, by definition, our moral sense dictates what is moral.

And the question everyone keeps asking is this. How do we KNOW this definition is true? How do we know that what you're calling our "moral sense" is actually telling us what's moral?

You say, because it tells us how we ought to behave. An "ought" implies obligation, rightness. Yet in the same breath, you deny that we can know whether our moral sentiments are actually right. So it's quite possible the moral sense is telling us what is immoral, and it only feels moral.

This is all very nice when you apply it to the other person, the Hitlerjunge with a different moral sense from yours. But how can you possibly apply it to yourself? By your own argument, it is impossible for you to KNOW whether any action you propose is right or wrong. What seems terribly right to you, you must acknowledge, may in fact be terribly wrong. Since I assume you wish to do what is right and avoid doing what is wrong, I can't see how you can possibly will to do anything. Unless you imagine that your actions are the product of uncontrollable impersonal forces, carrying you along like a runaway car in which you can only look from the window, but which you can never steer.
R.W. | 01.30.03 - 5:14 pm | #

Folks, please do not feed the troll.

It is obvious by now that Jon Peters thinks that he is the measure of all things, and that his appeals to "truth", "rights", "morality", and every other metaphysical concept are self-evidently correct and bound to carry the day despite lacking any justification outside his own opinion. He has decided the unexamined life good enough.

Like the intellectual stooges who were shocked to see their embrace of Stalin rewarded with bullets against a wall, Jon will someday bleat in vain about his inherent dignity as his progeny has him put down for being too much trouble to feed.

Might as well argue with a wall.
Craig | Homepage | 01.30.03 - 5:17 pm | #

Blake:

There is scientific evidence for quantum mechanics and other natural phenomena that seem to be inconsistent with our intuition and ordinary experiences. There isn't scientific evidence for the existence of God.
Jon Peters | 01.30.03 - 5:18 pm | #

If truth is not objective, then right and wrong is a matter of sentiment or opinion. Jon has no grounds to say that the Nazis did anything wrong except for the fact that they offended his particular sensibilities. If these sensibilities (i.e., instincts of right and wrong) are derived from evolutionary forces, which we all share in common (lending them an air of objectivity), then as Mark says we can surely thwart them just as we do other instincts or sensibilities (e.g., reproduction with contraception). In other words, there is still no reason to say that murder, for example, is wrong even though it offends the sensibilities of some. Murder, lying, cheating, stealing though felt to be wrong can often be adventageous. As Sartre said, if God doesn't exist all things are possible. Logically this leads to much of the moral views espoused in modern philosophy like "the will to power," "might makes right," utilitarianism, etc.
Blake Butterworth | 01.30.03 - 5:24 pm | #

R.W.:

You keep repeating the same circular argument: Morality is what our moral sense says it is.

Huh? How is that circular?

How do we know we can trust our moral sense?

We don’t, if by “know we can trust” you mean “know that our moral sense is consistent with objective morality.”

And the question everyone keeps asking is this. How do we KNOW this definition is true? How do we know that what you're calling our "moral sense" is actually telling us what's moral?

We don’t, if by “what’s moral” you mean objective morality.

You say, because it tells us how we ought to behave.

No, I don’t say that. I deny that we know that there is such a thing as objective morality at all. I deny the premise of your question.

An "ought" implies obligation, rightness.

Yes.

Yet in the same breath, you deny that we can know whether our moral sentiments are actually right.

Yes, if by “actually right” you mean right in an objective moral sense. I don’t you know why you think that that belief is inconsistent with the belief that “ought implies obligation, rightness.”

So it's quite possible the moral sense is telling us what is immoral, and it only feels moral.

Yes. Is this not clear to you yet? I’ve only said it about a hundred times already. We don’t know that what our moral sense tells us is consistent with objective morality, or even if there is such a thing as objective morality.

This is all very nice when you apply it to the other person, the Hitlerjunge with a different moral sense from yours. But how can you possibly apply it to yourself? By your own argument, it is impossible for you to KNOW whether any action you propose is right or wrong.

That’s right.

What seems terribly right to you, you must acknowledge, may in fact be terribly wrong.

Yes. All moral claims rest on unprovable premises.

Since I assume you wish to do what is right and avoid doing what is wrong, I can't see how you can possibly will to do anything.

I don’t know why you can’t see that. I do (or, at least, try to do) what I believe I ought to do. I do what seems to me the right thing to do. Don’t you?


Jon Peters | 01.30.03 - 5:31 pm | #

Blake:

If truth is not objective, then right and wrong is a matter of sentiment or opinion.

I do believe in objective truth. I believe that it is objectively true that the planet Jupiter exists, for example. I don't believe in objective moral truth.

Jon has no grounds to say that the Nazis did anything wrong except for the fact that they offended his particular sensibilities.

Ultimately, yes. Neither does anyone else. If you dispute this, show me your proof that what the Nazis did was wrong.

If these sensibilities (i.e., instincts of right and wrong) are derived from evolutionary forces, which we all share in common (lending them an air of objectivity), then as Mark says we can surely thwart them just as we do other instincts or sensibilities (e.g., reproduction with contraception).

Yes.

In other words, there is still no reason to say that murder, for example, is wrong even though it offends the sensibilities of some.

No. We say murder is wrong because we believe it to be wrong. But we don't know that it's wrong in an objective sense. All moral claims rest on unprovable premises.

Jon Peters | 01.30.03 - 5:38 pm | #

And "unprovable" means "unreal"?
Mark Shea | Homepage | 01.30.03 - 5:45 pm | #

Good point, Mark. Godel's Theorem explicitly acknowledges the existence of unprovable formal systems that are nonetheless correct.
Craig | Homepage | 01.30.03 - 5:46 pm | #

Mark Shea:

And "unprovable" means "unreal"?

No, it means "incapable of being proven." If we cannot prove that something exists, we cannot know that it exists.
Jon Peters | 01.30.03 - 5:54 pm | #

Jon,

Moral relativism can not create a sound basis for social order. Saying the Nazis were wrong because they basically offended certain sensibilities isn't going to be acceptable to most people. Most are going to say they were wrong because it was objectively evil to commit genocide. If you don't accept this, I'd say you are in the minority. Most people today may be moral relativists by custom, but not because they've drawn out all of its logical consequences. If you want an argument for objectivity, then I'd say read Aristotle or Aquinas, for example. For a popular introduction, read C. Rice's "50 Questions on the Natural Law."
Blake Butterworth | 01.30.03 - 6:06 pm | #

So you aren't certain God is unreal?
Mark Shea | Homepage | 01.30.03 - 6:17 pm | #

Blake:

Moral relativism can not create a sound basis for social order. Saying the Nazis were wrong because they basically offended certain sensibilities isn't going to be acceptable to most people. Most are going to say they were wrong because it was objectively evil to commit genocide.

What is true and what "most people say" are obviously not necessarily the same thing.

Most people today may be moral relativists by custom,

But you just claimed that moral relativism cannot create a sound basis for social order. Now you say that most people today are moral relativists. Are you expecting an imminent collapse of the social order?

... not because they've drawn out all of its logical consequences.

I think a rational and scientific examination of the issue inevitably leads to "moral relativism." I've been asking for a proof of a moral claim for several days now, and no one has been able to provide one.
Jon Peters | 01.30.03 - 6:22 pm | #

Mark Shea:

So you aren't certain God is unreal?

No.
Jon Peters | 01.30.03 - 6:23 pm | #

No, you're not certain?
Mark Shea | Homepage | 01.30.03 - 6:34 pm | #

There is a different way to express the argument that a nonbeliever might make, which is to say that from his point of view, what you postulate to be objective truth appears to be in fact subjective. Within Christendom alone, there are hundreds of churches and sects proffering what they each believe to be objective truth. Other religions offer their own conceptions of objective truth, many of which may differ markedly from a Christian view. Nonreligious belief systems, such as Marxism, can be seen as setting forths purported objective truths as well. And yes, the atheist position that there is no God (as opposed to a purely agnostic view) is also an attempt to offer an objective truth.

So, from the non-believer's point of view, you have no basis on which to assert that your moral beliefs reflect something "objective." Rather, they must in the end rest on faith.
Tom T. | 01.30.03 - 6:42 pm | #

Mark Shea:

No, you're not certain?

Right. I'm not certain that God is unreal. I'm not certain that Santa Claus is unreal, either.
Jon Peters | 01.30.03 - 6:43 pm | #

As a follow up to my last post, my point was to show that Jon's view is internally inconsistent and absurd, not to prove the grounds for an objective morality (which he would deny anyway). Aristotle and Aquinas both said that it is basically stupid to argue with someone who denies his principles. Objective morality is ultimately going to rest on certain self-evident principles and presuppose certain metaphysical doctrines. So the best one can do is show the absurdity of a position like Jon's, namely that all things go in his worldview. There are no grounds for right or wrong. If there is a moral consensus, it can always change. Murder, genocide, theft, rape, lying, etc. are acceptable if some person or society comes to accept them as such. If morality is somehow an evolved instinct, as Mark points out it can still be thwarted in that same worldview (just as the reproductive or nutritive instincts can be thwarted). This again shows that morality has no objective ground. Jon accepts this, so it is pointless to argue. But he cannot live his view consistently. I.e., he obviously obeys the rules of an arbitrary morality. In Nazi Germany, for example, there would be no need to do so when it comes to killing Jews, for example.
Blake Butterworth | 01.30.03 - 6:43 pm | #

I don't mean to insult or denigrate faith, by the way. It is faith, after all, and not scientific proof, that forms the relationship between God and man. I just mean to point out that it won't be convincing to a non-believer.
Tom T. | 01.30.03 - 6:45 pm | #

Tom T:

There is a different way to express the argument that a nonbeliever might make, which is to say that from his point of view, what you postulate to be objective truth appears to be in fact subjective. Within Christendom alone, there are hundreds of churches and sects proffering what they each believe to be objective truth. Other religions offer their own conceptions of objective truth, many of which may differ markedly from a Christian view. Nonreligious belief systems, such as Marxism, can be seen as setting forths purported objective truths as well.

Yes. Exactly.

And yes, the atheist position that there is no God (as opposed to a purely agnostic view) is also an attempt to offer an objective truth.

Yes, if you take "atheism" to mean the assertion that there is no God, rather than in the broader sense of "non-theism," which may encompass a variety of degrees of skepticism or disbelief regarding the existence of God.
Jon Peters | 01.30.03 - 6:49 pm | #

Yes precisely. Our society is starting to lost or has lost its moral bearings founded on the Judeo-Christian ethic. As such, it will fall apart eventually if it continues on the same track. Moral relativism provides no basis for social order. How can we ultimately say something is wrong? Because of opinion?!?
Blake Butterworth | 01.30.03 - 6:51 pm | #

Tom,
The whole point is that Marxism, materialistic atheism and/or scientism are all ground in ever-changing matter. How can there be a sound basis for morality, objectivity or eternal truths in a ever-changing world of things which pass away?

The Christian, Platonist or Aristotelian, for example, don't have that problem because they don't de facto exclude the existence of immaterial, eternal, non-changing reality in which objective morality and ultimately all truth must be based.

In short, you can't have it both ways.
Blake Butterworth | 01.30.03 - 6:55 pm | #

Blake:

As a follow up to my last post, my point was to show that Jon's view is internally inconsistent and absurd,

What do you claim is internally inconsistent about it?

So the best one can do is show the absurdity of a position like Jon's, namely that all things go in his worldview.

In my worldview, all things do not go.

There are no grounds for right or wrong.

Yes, there are. Conscience and reason.

If morality is somehow an evolved instinct, as Mark points out it can still be thwarted in that same worldview (just as the reproductive or nutritive instincts can be thwarted). This again shows that morality has no objective ground.

Yes.

Jon accepts this, so it is pointless to argue.

Why don't you accept it? Because you don't like it? That's not a valid reason for thinking it is not true.
Jon Peters | 01.30.03 - 6:55 pm | #

Blake:

Yes precisely. Our society is starting to lost or has lost its moral bearings founded on the Judeo-Christian ethic. As such, it will fall apart eventually if it continues on the same track.

I see no evidence of that. Can you cite any?

Jon Peters | 01.30.03 - 6:57 pm | #

40 million abortions would be a good start.
Blake Butterworth | 01.30.03 - 6:59 pm | #

Blake:

The whole point is that Marxism, materialistic atheism and/or scientism are all ground in ever-changing matter. How can there be a sound basis for morality, objectivity or eternal truths in a ever-changing world of things which pass away?

What makes you think there is such a thing as "eternal truth?"
Jon Peters | 01.30.03 - 7:00 pm | #

On your previous post, Jon, it is absurd to condemn someone to death or imprison them for life because they disagree with your opinion of what you think is right. You can do it but it is arbitrary. To someone who is intellectually honest, however, that would be unacceptable.
Blake Butterworth | 01.30.03 - 7:01 pm | #

Blake:

40 million abortions would be a good start.

Huh? How is that evidence that our society is "falling apart?"
Jon Peters | 01.30.03 - 7:02 pm | #

Blake:

On your previous post, Jon, it is absurd to condemn someone to death or imprison them for life because they disagree with your opinion of what you think is right.

Perhaps, but I wouldn't support condemning someone to death or imprisoning them for life because they disagreed with my opinion about anything. I believe in the right to freedom of thought and speech.
Jon Peters | 01.30.03 - 7:05 pm | #

Well, Jon does not really seem to be a non-believer completely. From what I gather, he is only going to believe what can be proven. Because he is not convinced that God has been proven, and because obviously, he cannot prove God does not exist, he seems to be more of an agnostic.

Likewise, I would assume, to be consistent, when he says objective moral truth does not exist because it can't be proven empirically, he also cannot rationally deny its existence because it cannot be disproven either.

Which makes me ask why he gives a rat's ass (sorry Mark, hope that does not violate your blogging etiquette) about abortion one way or the other - why he thinks the Church's teaching on family planning is "evil." There can be no evil. All he can really say is he doesn't like it. Whether five of nine SCOTUS judges say an embryo is a person, or say its not, he really can't say they are wrong or right. That is just their "opinion". He can't justifiably complain about prolifer's stacking the court to overturn Roe, or getting an amendment passed recognizing personhood from conception to natural death. So Jon, its been nice knowing ya, thanks for the laughs, but you have convincingly proven your irrelevance to any future discussions regarding morality.
C. Matt | 01.30.03 - 7:08 pm | #

But I thought murder was wrong in your worldview. If it is, then shouldn't the person be put in jail? But then you'd be condemning him to incarceration for a mere opinion. On the other hand, ff murder isn't really wrong or deserving of incarceration in your opinion, then is it good for the social order to have murderers, rapists, thieves, etc. running around on the loose?
Blake Butterworth | 01.30.03 - 7:17 pm | #

"Why don't you accept it? Because you don't like it? That's not a valid reason for thinking it is not true."

You've convinced me. I henceforth renounce any belief in objective morality. I'll make my own rules for now. And I will now take up the morality of "might makes right." Taking what I can when I can, I will selfishly thwart the will of others that get in my way.

I will also convince everyone I meet to do this, like Jon is doing here. Hopefully, when millions of people agree that they can divine moral rules based on whatever they think, society will descend into chaos (which in my choice of morality is a good thing). In the meantime, I will become a free-rider on the morals of society, using it to my advantage that others are constrained by rules they believe they cannot violate.

Jon has convinced me. Murder is good because I want it to be good. In fact, I'm beyond him now - because he's a free-rider, disregarding the idea of objective morality but adopting most of the moral teachings of religion anyway. If he were really as free-thinking as he claims, he'd do exactly the opposite of various religious teachings and become a master terrorist.

(sarcasm rant off)

Dan Gulfer | 01.30.03 - 7:18 pm | #

C. Matt:

I usually refer to myself as an atheist. Sometimes, as an agnostic or skeptic. It depends in part on what kind of "God" you're talking about. I don't think it makes much sense to obsess over these words. They're all somewhat vague and ambiguous.

Likewise, I would assume, to be consistent, when he says objective moral truth does not exist because it can't be proven empirically,

I have not said that. I have said, repeatedly, that we don't know whether objective morality exists, and that even if it does exist, we don't know whether our own moral sense is consistent with it.

Which makes me ask why he gives a rat's ass (sorry Mark, hope that does not violate your blogging etiquette) about abortion one way or the other - why he thinks the Church's teaching on family planning is "evil."

Because my moral sense tells me so.

Whether five of nine SCOTUS judges say an embryo is a person, or say its not, he really can't say they are wrong or right.

Right. No one can. No know knows whether there is a definition of "person" other than the one we choose ourselves.

He can't justifiably complain about prolifer's stacking the court to overturn Roe, or getting an amendment passed recognizing personhood from conception to natural death.

Of course I can justifiably complain. I justifiably complain because I consider abortion to be a fundamental right.
Jon Peters | 01.30.03 - 7:20 pm | #

Blake:

But I thought murder was wrong in your worldview.

It is.

If it is, then shouldn't the person be put in jail?

If he committed murder, yes.

But then you'd be condemning him to incarceration for a mere opinion.

No, I'd be condemning him to incarceration for murder. Do you really see no distinction between belief and behavior?
Jon Peters | 01.30.03 - 7:23 pm | #

Jon:

The circular argument was everything from the colon to the end of the paragraph. It was not just the first statement. I'm not even sure a single statement can be circular; it can be tautological, but it can't form a circular argument, unless there's some kind of implicit premise or assertion hidden within it. Anyway, I appeal to the jury. Is Jon's argument circular or not?

Next. I wrote that you claimed "[the moral sense] tells us how we ought to behave." You denied this in no uncertain terms: "No, I don’t say that." Well, let's review. You defined "moral" as "our sense of how we ought to behave." And you've said our moral sentiments come from our moral sense. So our moral sense is telling us how we ought to behave, no? What am I missing? Have I misrepresented your position?

R.W. | 01.30.03 - 7:24 pm | #

Blake wrote: "Yes precisely. Our society is starting to lost or has lost its moral bearings founded on the Judeo-Christian ethic. As such, it will fall apart eventually if it continues on the same track.

Jon responded:
"I see no evidence of that. Can you cite any?"

Let's see . . . rampant divorce, child abuse, suicide, child pornography, children killing their parents, . . . need I go on? (Perhaps Jon was joking? I can be a bit dense at times.)

Of course, all these things have always been around, but now they seem to be out of control, and others things that were once considered practically unmentionable (prostitution, marital infidelity, infanticide, pornography, any and all types of sexual deviancy) are quickly becoming "no big deal." Not to mention a general coarseness in our society which basically accepts merciless revenge, foul language, lying, greed, lust, etc. without much comment, unless it "hurts somebody."

Maybe someone out there thinks that this is "no big deal" or even good, but it certainly fits the bill of the destruction of the Judeo-Christian ethic.
Sam Schmitt | 01.30.03 - 7:25 pm | #

That is no argument. You are condemning someone for a groundless belief. It would be no different than someone condemning me for eating a peanut butter and jelly sandwich because his groundless "moral sense" tells him to do so. That's BS.
Blake Butterworth | 01.30.03 - 7:26 pm | #

Craig writes:
"Good point, Mark. Godel's Theorem explicitly acknowledges the existence of unprovable formal systems that are nonetheless correct."

That isn't quite right. Godel's Theorem demonstrates that with any formal system of logical deduction at all (as long as it is two-valued and capable of representing multiplication), there exist well formed formula ("true" statements only if "true" and "false" are ontic signs assigned to the logic values of the formal system) that cannot be deduced using the logic of the formal system.

But as Wittgenstein pointed out, you can't discursively deduce anything without making some unproven assumptions first. So an unprincipled skeptic like Jon can reject anything at all, and then in nominalist fashion deny that that rejection has any of the consequences that it in fact objectively has. This sort of rhetoric results in statements like "that depends on what you mean by 'green'" in terse form, without stating fully "if you mean X then you are right, whereas if you mean Y you are not". By avoiding as many commitments as possible, and by embracing the nominalist notion that he can construct the consequences of his own view as he wishes (rather than those consequences being objective and independent of what he wills), Mr. Peters can play the strong skeptic game for all eternity while convincing himself, and no one else, that the consequences of embracing that view can be avoided. (C.S. Lewis fans might recognize the battle cry, "The Dwarves are for the Dwarves!").

In the end it is all self refuting mental masturbation, though.

On Tom T's comment that the relationship between God and man rests on faith I completely agree, but we should be careful not to confuse that with the knowledge of God's existence, which is in fact (like moral and physical knowledge) available to human reason.

Thomas | 01.30.03 - 7:27 pm | #

Jon, suppose your and my moral sense disagree on some issue. Let's choose the death penalty. We'll say I'm against it, you're for it. We'll also assume that we each have a strong desire to convince the other that our position is right.

Is this possible? How? If you believe it is, I'd like a description of the "mechanism," if you will, the means by which one of us can change the other's opinion.
R.W. | 01.30.03 - 8:31 pm | #

Thanks, Thomas. First principles are inescapable.
R.W. | 01.30.03 - 8:32 pm | #

R.W.:

The circular argument was everything from the colon to the end of the paragraph. It was not just the first statement.

I don't have the patience to try and figure out what you're referring to. Please quote the statement(s) you consider to constitute the circular argument, in context, and explain why you think they're circular (or tautological or whatever).

Next. I wrote that you claimed "[the moral sense] tells us how we ought to behave." You denied this in no uncertain terms: "No, I don’t say that."

No, I don't think I did.

Well, let's review. You defined "moral" as "our sense of how we ought to behave."

Yes.

And you've said our moral sentiments come from our moral sense.

I haven't used the term "moral sentiments" at all. I've said that we have moral intuitions or instincts. We combine those with reason and experience to form our moral sense. But the term "moral sense" might also be used to refer to the intuitions themselves.

So our moral sense is telling us how we ought to behave, no?

Yes.
Jon Peters | 01.30.03 - 8:32 pm | #

Sam Scmitt:

Let's see . . . rampant divorce, child abuse, suicide, child pornography, children killing their parents, . . . need I go on?

If you expect to show that our society is "falling apart," yes. Our society has always had a lot of social problems, but most socioeconomic indicators seem to be improving. Crime is down. Life expectancy is up. Infant mortality is down. Income and wealth are up. Education is up. Racial inequality is down. Gender inequality is down. Domestic abuse is down. How are all these positive changes consistent with your claim that our society is "falling apart?"

As for the things you list, I don't know whether the rates of child abuse, suicide, child porn, or children killing parents have increased or not. I suspect that there was much more child abuse in the past than there is now, but that most of it was unreported. Today, teachers, neighbors and relatives are more sensitive to child abuse than they were in the past, so I think it's more likely to be discovered when it does occur. I also don't know why you think an increase in the divorce rate is necessarily a bad thing.

(prostitution, marital infidelity, infanticide, pornography, any and all types of sexual deviancy)

Again, I don't know whether the rate of infanticide has increased. I don't consider pornography or prostitution to be social problems, and I don't know whether there is more in the past than there is now. Sex outside of marriage is a private matter. And I think that increasing social and legal equality for gay people is a great social improvement. Again, I see no indication that our society is "falling apart." Show me your evidence that it is.
Jon Peters | 01.30.03 - 8:47 pm | #

Blake:

That is no argument. You are condemning someone for a groundless belief.

I'm not condemning anyone for a belief, groundless or otherwise. As I told you, I believe in freedom of thought and freedom of speech.
Jon Peters | 01.30.03 - 8:50 pm | #

R.W.:

Jon, suppose your and my moral sense disagree on some issue. Let's choose the death penalty. We'll say I'm against it, you're for it. We'll also assume that we each have a strong desire to convince the other that our position is right.

Is this possible?

Yes, of course. Public opinion on the death penalty is always changing.

How?

Through argument, knowledge, and experience. I might show you evidence that the death penalty deters crime. You might show me evidence that innocent people have been executed. You might witness a gruesome murder that so enrages you that you become a death penalty advocate. I might see a movie like Dead Man Walking that increases my sympathy and compassion even for murderers. That kind of thing. Isn't all this obvious?
Jon Peters | 01.30.03 - 8:58 pm | #

Thomas:

the knowledge of God's existence, which is in fact (like moral and physical knowledge) available to human reason.

How is "knowledge of God's existence ... available to human reason?" By what method of inquiry can such knowledge be rationally acquired?
Jon Peters | 01.30.03 - 9:03 pm | #

R.W.:

Try this: The Biological Basis of Morality
Jon Peters | 01.30.03 - 9:06 pm | #

Jon writes:
"Through argument, knowledge, and experience. I might show you evidence that the death penalty deters crime. You might show me evidence that innocent people have been executed. You might witness a gruesome murder that so enrages you that you become a death penalty advocate. I might see a movie like Dead Man Walking that increases my sympathy and compassion even for murderers. That kind of thing. Isn't all this obvious?"


The preceding examples presume certain common beliefs:
a) that crime should be deterred;
b) that the innocent should not be executed;
c) that certain people, capable of unspeakably heinous acts, are too dangerous to be permitted to live;
c) that sympathy and compassion should be heeded.

What is the source (origin, cause) of these beliefs?



R.W. | 01.30.03 - 9:16 pm | #

RE: Biological Basis of Morality

As I've said before, our biology can assist (or hinder) us in our moral decision-making. Our nature gives us promptings, urges, feelings, dispositions, and so forth. These can be developed in various ways by our culture; they can also be shaped by experience. But we cannot know whether these "instincts" or "intuitions" are moral without referring them to ends. That requires reason (and the Christian scheme of things adds revelation). Some of our morality may be "in" our biology, but it cannot be grounded in biology.
R.W. | 01.30.03 - 9:24 pm | #

Re: Biological Basis of Morality

Oh, BTW, do you, who refuse to believe morality can be empirical, consider it the least bit ironic that you linked to an article by Edward O. Wilson, an *empiricist*?
R.W. | 01.30.03 - 9:30 pm | #

R.W.:

What is the source (origin, cause) of these beliefs?

My moral sense.

Jon Peters | 01.30.03 - 9:32 pm | #

R.W.:

As I've said before, our biology can assist (or hinder) us in our moral decision-making. Our nature gives us promptings, urges, feelings, dispositions, and so forth. These can be developed in various ways by our culture; they can also be shaped by experience.

Yes.

But we cannot know whether these "instincts" or "intuitions" are moral without referring them to ends.

If they are intuitions about how we ought to behave, then they are moral intuitions, by definition. As I've said, we don't know whether they are consistent with objective morality, if there even is such a thing.

That requires reason (and the Christian scheme of things adds revelation). Some of our morality may be "in" our biology,

It's a product of our biology and our environment.

... but it cannot be grounded in biology.

Why not? And what is it grounded in, if not our biology? How do you know?

Jon Peters | 01.30.03 - 9:38 pm | #

R.W.:

Oh, BTW, do you, who refuse to believe morality can be empirical

Huh? That's the exact opposite of what I've been saying. It's as if you haven't understood anything I've been saying. I've been arguing for an empirical account of morality--an account based on evolution, biology, instinct, reason and environment-- and others have been arguing for a transcendent one--an account based on claims about God and objective moral truth.
Jon Peters | 01.30.03 - 9:46 pm | #

"How is "knowledge of God's existence ... available to human reason?" By what method of inquiry can such knowledge be rationally acquired?"

if(HONESTINQUIRY) {
print ACQUINAS[FIVEWAYS];
} else {
throw SPAWNOFSATANEXCEPTION
}
Thomas | 01.30.03 - 10:33 pm | #

I'm not condemning anyone for a belief, groundless or otherwise. As I told you, I believe in freedom of thought and freedom of speech.

So then what are you doing, congratulating him? Have no opinion? Or are you just arbitraily putting him in prison? Why put him in jail for a heinous crime, why not for eating a piece of cheese? Maybe someone else's moral "sense" tells him all cheese eaters should go to jail. How is it that any society can agree on the moral status of a human action, other than to state that it is mere coincidence one is right and another wrong?
Blake Butterworth | 01.30.03 - 10:42 pm | #

1. Everything that is caused is caused by something else.
2. Something -- call it A -- is caused.
3. Therefore, A is caused by something else -- call it B -- that causes.

4. That cause, B, either (a) is caused or (b) is not caused.
5. If 4b is the case, then there is some uncaused cause, namely B.
6. If 4a is the case, then B is caused by something else -- call it C -- that causes.
7. If 4a is the case, then one either (a) proceeds to infinity since C is caused and so on ad infinitum or (b) reaches some uncaused cause.
8. But one cannot proceed to infinity in causes and things caused.
9. Therefore, if 4a is the case, then one must reach some uncaused cause.

10. Therefore, there must be some primary uncaused cause which is God.

Blake Butterworth | 01.30.03 - 10:46 pm | #

Proof of 1. Everything that is caused is caused by something else

The strongest argument Aquinas offers for this premise relies on the notions of potency and actuality. Something in a state of potency means that it has a capacity or aptitude to be in another state. For example, someone who is currently sitting is potentially standing, or a pot which is actually cold is potentially hot. Something in a state of actuality, on the other hand, is already in a state of fulfillment or realization. The pot is potentially hot, but once placed upon a burner becomes actually hot.

With this understanding in mind, Aquinas says that nothing can be simultaneously in act and in potency with respect to the same thing. For example, it is impossible that a pan be both hot and cold (i.e., non-hot) at the same time. It is always actually one and potentially the other. To deny this would be the equivalent of saying that the pan is both hot and cold in the same respect which is a contradiction. The same holds true for motion. A thing which is moved is in a state of potency insofar as it is moved, whereas a thing which is moving is in a state of actuality insofar as it is moving. Nothing, therefore, can be mover and moved with respect to one and the same motion.

Proof of 8: One cannot proceed to infinity in causes and things caused

In any order of causes and things caused, the first cause is the cause of the intermediary which may be one or many and which, in turn, is the cause of the thing ultimately caused. So if the first cause is removed in the series, then so is the intermediary and that which is caused since the intermediary only causes instrumentally by means of the first. But if there is an infinite regress in causes and things caused, there will be no first cause since an infinite series has no beginning. Thus there will be no intermediary and ultimately nothing caused. But this is false since we know through experience that causation does exist in the universe. Therefore, there must be a first cause which is itself uncaused in any given series of causes and things caused.

One might object that given an infinitely old universe, there could be an infinite series of movers and things moved. For example, there could be a temporally infinite regress in fathers begetting sons. St. Thomas is not referring, however, to a temporally infinite regress in his argument since he acknowledges that they could exist in theory. To understand what he means by an infinity of movers and things moved, the distinction between a per accidens series and a per se series must be considered. The example above is one of a per accidens series because the father is directly the cause of his son and only incidentally so of his grandsons -- i.e., his "moving" or causing only directly causes his son. This may be contrasted with a per se series in which the first mover is required for the motion of everything else moved. A stick which moves a stone, for example, only does so by virtue of the hand which moves the stick. When Aquinas refers to a series of movers and things moved which ultimately has its source in God, he is speaking of a per se series which must have a first mover.

Argument based on Book I, Chapter 13 of St. Thomas' Summa Contra Gentiles
and "Aquinas's Parasitic Argument" by Scott MacDonald

Blake Butterworth | 01.30.03 - 10:54 pm | #

When I said:
"Oh, BTW, do you, who refuse to believe morality can be empirical..."

Jon replied:
"Huh? That's the exact opposite of what I've been saying. It's as if you haven't understood anything I've been saying. I've been arguing for an empirical account of morality...."

Okay, fine. I guess I'm just not a very good reader. I was thinking of your discussion yesterday with Thomas, where you defied him to produce empirical proof for a moral claim. I assumed you meant to be taken at your word when you wrote the following yesterday, 1/29, at 4:15 pm, in the comments box to the piece Mark posted titled "Globs of chemicals," etc.

"Since I do not believe the moral claims (such as "murder is evil") can be proven at all, I obviously don't believe that empirical claims can be proven "in the same sense" as moral ones. Empirical claims can be proven by evidence."

Let me explain how I parsed this.

A. Moral claims cannot be proven by any means.

B. Empirical claims can be proven by evidence.

C. Therefore, moral claims are not empirical.

Once again, I appeal to the jury. Did I misread Jon -- or did he just change ground?

Either way, I'm done here. Y'all have fun, I sure have. But right now my moral sense, whom I've nicknamed Diotima, is telling me I could much better maximize my utils learning a little more music theory than going another round--around and around--with a son of Russell. Keep after the truth, Jon, "by which no man was ever harmed."
R.W. | 01.31.03 - 12:41 am | #

You people really need to get away from your computers for a while and GET A LIFE!
Biff | 01.31.03 - 12:45 am | #

Blake:

So then what are you doing, ...

Putting him in prison for committing the crime of murder.
Jon Peters | 01.31.03 - 4:44 pm | #

Blake:

1. Everything that is caused is caused by something else.
2. Something -- call it A -- is caused.
3. Therefore, A is caused by something else -- call it B -- that causes.
4. That cause, B, either (a) is caused or (b) is not caused.
5. If 4b is the case, then there is some uncaused cause, namely B.
6. If 4a is the case, then B is caused by something else -- call it C -- that causes.
7. If 4a is the case, then one either (a) proceeds to infinity since C is caused and so on ad infinitum or (b) reaches some uncaused cause.
8. But one cannot proceed to infinity in causes and things caused.
9. Therefore, if 4a is the case, then one must reach some uncaused cause.
10. Therefore, there must be some primary uncaused cause which is God.

Your argument is flawed. Claims 8 and 10 are false. Claim 8 is false because there may be an infinite regress of causes, and claim 10 is false because an uncaused First Cause it may be something other than God.
Jon Peters | 01.31.03 - 4:50 pm | #

R.W.:

Okay, fine. I guess I'm just not a very good reader.

Apparently not. Thomas asserted that moral claims--such as "murder is wrong"--can be proved empirically. That is different from my (and Wilson's) assertion that our moral sense has an empirical basis. You have conflated two different meanings of "morality," Thomas's meaning of "objective moral truths" and my meaning of "beliefs about how one ought to behave." I thought the distinction was clear, but I guess not.

I'm still waiting for Thomas's empirical proof that "murder is wrong" is true.


Jon Peters | 01.31.03 - 4:57 pm | #

I'm still waiting for Thomas's empirical proof that "murder is wrong" is true.

I suppose we could perform this experiment with Mr. Peters as subject in order to find out... hmmm, maybe I'm not so sure of my moral perceptions anymore...
Thomas | 01.31.03 - 5:23 pm | #

Thomas:

Similarly, we could gather a group of dispassionate observers into a room and perform a murder. The observers would use their moral sense to determine if the murder was in fact a moral wrong. An observer with a damaged or handicapped moral sense might not observe the murder to be wrong, but all of the observers with properly functionaing moral sense would agree that the murder was in fact wrong.

How do you know that "all of the observers with properly functionaing moral sense would agree that the murder was in fact wrong?" How do you know that some or all of them wouldn't agree that the murder was in fact NOT wrong?
Jon Peters | 01.31.03 - 6:55 pm | #

Jon:
It's not a conflation of two meanings of moral, it's an attempt to keep the two separate.

There is the one sense of moral, namely how people believe they ought to behave. It is purely descriptive. It accounts not for why people believe they ought to behave a certain way; it merely records that they do believe that they ought to behave a certain way. It is "empirical" only to the extent that we can go out on a survey, inquire of people their moral beliefs, and summarize them on a pie chart.

But, ultimately, that is not the only meaning of "moral" that moral philosophers are concerned with. They wish to understand the prescriptive basis of morality--the grounds or justification for moral beliefs. Their interest is not just in the fact that people have moral beliefs, but the rationale for them, and the means of judging between competing moral claims. In short, they wish to know what makes a moral claim true or false. You have denied such knowledge can be known and questioned whether it even can exist. Both positions are operationally equivalent to an explicit denial that such knowledge exists.

Now, moral philosophers are not stupid. They haven't attempted to understand morality in this second sense because they're a bunch of morons who can't see their hands in front of their faces, or because religion had put out their sight. They've done it because they recognize something important. They understand that without a ground for morality, moral knowledge of the first kind may not be moral at all. It may be immoral. It may not be anything at all.

Every time someone has attempted to pin you down on morality in this second sense, you have either ducked the question or denied its relevance. In that case, the word "moral" is meaningless, although you seem to think adding "by definition" can solve the problem for you. You may as well define your arms to be wings and fly to the moon. And you also may as well change every instance of the word "moral" in your posts to "amoral" or "immoral"--for all we know.

And I don't think E.O. Wilson would agree with any of this. Yes, he believes moral knowledge can be obtained empirically. Yes, he is not a "transcendentalist" (according to his own claim.) Yes, he is a "moral relativist," too--though if you'll read my posts you'll see I'm a kind of one too, since I refer all morality to ends. But note, if you would, that E.O. Wilson also refers morality to an end, which you do not. To wit:

"From the consilient perspective of the natural sciences, they are no more than principles of the social contract hardened into rules and dictates -- the behavioral codes that members of a society fervently wish others to follow and are themselves willing to accept for the common good."

Get it? He just introduced the common good. It's possible that, like you, he makes no claim that the common good is actually good, ergo a suitable norm for defining morality. But it sure looks like he means it to be a good, along with things like social cohesion and the perpetuation of the species. If I may be flippant, his position is that of "nothing succeeds like success" or perhaps "biology knows best."

Which is also where his problem lies. How do we know that the common good is good in itself? Again, if Wilson says it "really" isn't, but we're just genetically or culturally programmed to think it is, then his ethics is bound to collapse as surely as yours. If, on the other hand, he thinks it really is good, then he's fallen right back into the transcendentalist camp. He has to explain *why* the common good is good in itself. A moment's thought will show this question can't be sent back down to the lower court of sociobiology.

Wilson should have taken the cautionary examples he names more seriously. G. E. Moore and John Rawls, both professional philosophers (unlike Wilson, a biologist), both secular, both living when evolutionary theory enjoyed general acceptance among intellectuals--they both found the transcendentalist position unavoidable. They weren't the first; they certainly won't be the last. I hope you do not tarry long from their company.

R.W. | 01.31.03 - 8:21 pm | #

R.W.:

There is the one sense of moral, namely how people believe they ought to behave. It is purely descriptive. It accounts not for why people believe they ought to behave a certain way; it merely records that they do believe that they ought to behave a certain way. It is "empirical" only to the extent that we can go out on a survey, inquire of people their moral beliefs, and summarize them on a pie chart.

No. The empirical investigation of morality in this descriptive sense is not just an investigation of what moral beliefs people hold but of WHY they hold those beliefs. That’s the whole theme of Wilson’s article. The scientific field known as evolutionary psychology is a particularly important part of this empirical investigation into the causes of our moral beliefs.

Every time someone has attempted to pin you down on morality in this second sense, you have either ducked the question or denied its relevance.

No I haven’t. I have said, over and over again, that we don’t know that morality exists in that second sense at all. The only sense in which we know morality to “exist” is in the descriptive, subjective sense that you referred to above. We don’t know that there is any such thing as “objective” morality at all.

Get it? He just introduced the common good.

Yes. So what? Beliefs about the common good are typically part of a person’s moral sense, his sense of how he ought to behave. And?


Jon Peters | 01.31.03 - 9:24 pm | #

Jon wrote, responding to Blake's example about a murderer:
"Putting him in prison for committing the crime of murder."

Why? Let's suppose the murderer believes he was truly justified in killing. You have already acknowledged that, as far as anyone knows, his morality may be right and yours wrong, objectively speaking. What gives you, Jon Peters, the right to put him in prison? Why are you "imposing your morality" on someone else?


R.W. | 01.31.03 - 9:27 pm | #

R.W.:

It's possible that, like you, he makes no claim that the common good is actually good, …

Right. He doesn’t. He’s an empiricist, not (to use his terminology) a transcendentalist.

Which is also where his problem lies. How do we know that the common good is good in itself?

We don't, if by “good in itself” you mean good in an objective sense. We only know that promoting the common good seems to us (most of us, anyway) something that we ought to do.

Again, if Wilson says it "really" isn't, but we're just genetically or culturally programmed to think it is, ...

He’s saying that our moral behavior is ultimately a product of our genes and environment, shaped by evolution.

… then his ethics is bound to collapse as surely as yours.

Huh? Why? You really don’t seem to understand. What I am saying, what Wilson is saying, what a consensus of cognitive scientists and philosophers of mind say, is that our moral sense—our sense of how we ought to behave—is an aspect of our mind. Our mind is a product of our brain at work. And our brain is a biological organ, shaped by evolution. Whether “morality” exists in any sense beyond this subjective one, no one knows.

Jon Peters | 01.31.03 - 9:29 pm | #

Jon, you wrote:
"No. The empirical investigation of morality in this descriptive sense is not just an investigation of what moral beliefs people hold but of WHY they hold those beliefs. That’s the whole theme of Wilson’s article. The scientific field known as evolutionary psychology is a particularly important part of this empirical investigation into the causes of our moral beliefs."

Same difference. In the death penalty example, I asked you about the "whys," the justifications (what I've also been calling ends). You said it was part of the same standard package that goes into our "moral sense."

R.W. | 01.31.03 - 9:31 pm | #

Oh, re: my last message, if it wasn't clear, the "why" I had in mind was the ground of that moral belief--the objective standard or norm.

I can't convince you such a norm is necessary. You can't convince me it is irrelevant. Third time's a charm: this time, I really am calling it quits. Thanks for the stimulating conversation.
R.W. | 01.31.03 - 9:38 pm | #

R.W.:

Why?

Because that seems to me the right thing to do, the moral thing to do, the just thing to do. I've answered this question in various forms about ten times now. Is it still not clear to you?

Let's suppose the murderer believes he was truly justified in killing. You have already acknowledged that, as far as anyone knows, his morality may be right and yours wrong, objectively speaking.

Yes.

What gives you, Jon Peters, the right to put him in prison?

I, personally, don't have that right. The state may justly deprive him of his freedom in accordance with a law that reflects the will of the people. I support that law because it reflects my sense of what is just.

Why are you "imposing your morality" on someone else?

Because I believe such imposition is necessary for a just society. I'm not an anarchist.


Jon Peters | 01.31.03 - 9:43 pm | #

If you still don't get this, let's try a different tack. Suppose that there is such a thing as objective moral truth. The question then becomes, how do we determine what this objective moral truth is? How do we determine whether, say, abortion is moral or immoral? The answer is that we can't. Some people claim that abortion is objectively immoral and other people claim that it isn't, but neither can prove that their claim is correct, can they? Thomas's "experiment" is no answer because he just assumes that the answer he agrees with is the correct answer. So his answer is just as subjective and unprovable as anyone else's.
Jon Peters | 01.31.03 - 9:45 pm | #

Jon:

Your argument is flawed. Claims 8 and 10 are false. Claim 8 is false because there may be an infinite regress of causes, and claim 10 is false because an uncaused First Cause it may be something other than God.

I don't deny your objection to 10 because more would have to be drawn out from the proof. I'm not claiming to have proven God as understood in the Christian sense, only the existence of a first uncaused principle of everything else that is caused.

Premise 8 stands, however, until you can explain how there can be a simultaneous infinite regress in a series of causes. It is impossible to traverse a series backwards from effect to first cause if tbat series is actually infinite. There can be no first cause because there is always another cause prior. But it is precisely by means of the first cause that all the intermediaries and finally the effect are caused.

Blake Butterworth | 01.31.03 - 9:46 pm | #

R.W.:

Oh, re: my last message, if it wasn't clear, the "why" I had in mind was the ground of that moral belief--the objective standard or norm.

The "ground" of our moral beliefs, for the umpteenth time, is our biology and our environment. These aren't "norms;" they are aspects of the natural world.

Jon Peters | 01.31.03 - 9:48 pm | #

Blake:

Premise 8 stands, however,

No, it's wrong.

until you can explain how there can be a simultaneous infinite regress in a series of causes.

I don't know what "simultaneous" infinite regress is supposed to mean. I don't know why you can't understand the idea of an infinite series of causes. A was caused by B; B was caused by C; C was caused by D; D was caused by.... and so on ad infinitum. There is no "first cause" because the series continues indefinitely.

It is impossible to traverse a series backwards from effect to first cause if tbat series is actually infinite.

Of course. But your premise 8 doesn't refer to first cause. Your premise 8 is:

"8. But one cannot proceed to infinity in causes and things caused."

That claim is false. There may be an infinite regress of causes.
Jon Peters | 01.31.03 - 9:56 pm | #

No because you are understand an infinite series as being temporal only, which it may be. This is a per accidens infinite series. I.e., A causes B which causes C and so on, but A is not directly the cause of C, only incidentally. In a per se series of causes, A causes B which causes C, but B only causes because A is acting on B at the same time. Without A, B cannot cause C, etc. I've already made this distinction above. So I grant that there can theoretically be an infinite temporal series of causes given an infinitely old universe. Aristotle held that the universe always existed and accepted that possibility, but he was talking about that when he spoke of a first uncaused cause.
Blake Butterworth | 01.31.03 - 10:04 pm | #

Jon states:
"Suppose that there is such a thing as objective moral truth. The question then becomes, how do we determine what this objective moral truth is? How do we determine whether, say, abortion is moral or immoral? The answer is that we can't."

Question: How do you know that this is true? How can you be so sure? It's not worth the try? (Is the thought that torturing innocent people for fun and profit wrong just a vague hunch?) And if we can't determine whether it's moral or not, it *could* be immoral. This being the case, isn't the burden of proof on those who say that it's OK?

There does seem to be some things that Mr. Peters is sure of - it's wrong to force other people to believe in God, to force people not to have abortions, etc., so maybe there are objective moral norms?

At any rate, it's fascinating that according to Mr. Peters it's right to do something "Because that seems to me the right thing to do, the moral thing to do, the just thing to do. I've answered this question in various forms about ten times now. Is it still not clear to you?" Wow, it "seemed right" to Hitler to gas the Jews, or for Stalin to extermine millions of his own people, so who's to say otherwise? In Hitler's case at least, plenty of "society" went along with it. Mr. Peters uses words like "just" and "right" and "moral" but they really have no meaning at all. That is, they mean what Jon Peters thinks they mean, or would like them to mean; what he prefers or likes. Not that that's a bad thing for the most part, as I trust him when he says he's not an anarcist. Still, it reminds me of the response Betrand Russell (the famous British atheist) reportedly gave when someone asked him the real reason we fought Hitler. "We just didn't like him" was the only answer he could give. Sorry, folks, there's not good enough.

Sam Schmitt | 01.31.03 - 10:13 pm | #

Sorry, folks, the last line should read "*that's* not good enough."
Sam Schmitt | 01.31.03 - 10:15 pm | #

"I don't know why you can't understand the idea of an infinite series of causes. A was caused by B; B was caused by C; C was caused by D; D was caused by.... and so on ad infinitum. There is no "first cause" because the series continues indefinitely."

I can understand the idea of an infinite series of cause all right - it's the reality I have a problem with.

Let's say that the series goes on infinitely, that is, backwards without end (or you could say, without beginning). If it has no end, then there is no first cause. If there is no first cause, then none of the other causes could exist, could they? In other words, saying that there is not first cause is logically the same as saying: "A was caused by B; B was caused by C; C was caused by D" and then saying "And D has no cause." Period. Thank you very much, the show's over. If someone objects and says, "But what's causing D?" You simply respond "I don't understand why there has to be a cause for D." Then your opponent will respond "Then D is a cuase that is itself not caused by anything else - it must be an uncaused cause - which is what God is, as a matter of fact."

Put another way, talking about infinity doesn't solve anything for the atheist/agnostic; in fact it's self-defeating. If cause means anything at all, everything must have a cause, everything, that is, except God. Otherwise, saying that anything has a cause makes no sense.

Reminds me of yet another Bertrand Russell tidbit. He made the same argument using a chandelier the chain holding it up as an example. He said, "Why does there have to be a ceiling to hold up the chain? Why can't the chain be of an infinite length?" (I'm paraphrasing what I remember him saying.) Saying that the chain is of an infinite length is to say that there's nothing holding up the chandelier. And if there's nothing holding up the chandelier, it should fall to the floor - otherwise the notion of cause is meaningless, as I said above. But wouldn't ya know it, it doesn't fall to the floor.
So making the chain "longer" doesn't solve anything.

I quote Russell not because I think he's not smart - on the contrary, he's acknowledged as one of the most brilliant mathematicians of the 20th century. But if these the best arguments he can come up with . . .

By the way, the infinite regress is not a matter of time, as it cannot be proven that the world has not always existed, i.e. it cannot be proven that it had a beginning in time (at least that is what Aristotle argues and the Catholic Church has never disputed it). The infinite regress we're talking about here is one of priority, since a cause and its effect, e.g. a fire and the thing it caused to be burned, can come into being at the same time.


Sam Schmitt | 01.31.03 - 10:40 pm | #

Sorry on my last post I meant to say Aristotle *wasn't* talking about an infinite temporal regress when he spoke of a first uncaused cause.
Blake Butterworth | 01.31.03 - 10:59 pm | #

Sam,

Given an infinitely old universe, one could say that A was caused by B, B by C, C by D and so on. For A to exist it only matters that at one point B existed and caused A. B, C and D could no longer exist even though A still does. In this way, one could argue given infinite time that this mode of causation has been going on from the present backwards infinitely in time.

Aristotle held that the universe had no beginning in time due to the nature of his understanding of time. Aquinas agrees with him, except that on the authority of Revelation, he held the universe started in time by a unique first moment. Nevertheless Aquinas said that it was more difficult to prove the existence of a first uncaused cause given an infinitely old universe than it was a universe started in time. So he didn't dispute the point.

Both recognized the existence of an infinite temporal regress (at least in theory), but weren't speaking of one in regard to the first uncaused cause. Rather they were speaking about a simultaneous series of causes in which the effect (and any intermediaries prior to it) were dependent upon the causality of the first at any given time they were causing or being caused.
Blake Butterworth | 01.31.03 - 11:27 pm | #

I should state that for them all forms of efficient causality were such that they required a first uncaused cause at any moment of time.

Sorry if I'm not explaining this as clearly as I should be. I haven't thought about it in a while and am a little rusty. :^)
Blake Butterworth | 01.31.03 - 11:31 pm | #

"You really don’t seem to understand. What I am saying, what Wilson is saying, what a consensus of cognitive scientists and philosophers of mind say, is that our moral sense—our sense of how we ought to behave—is an aspect of our mind. Our mind is a product of our brain at work. And our brain is a biological organ, shaped by evolution. Whether “morality” exists in any sense beyond this subjective one, no one knows."

Mr. Peters concedes that a color sense exists. He concedes that a moral sense exists. He views both as products of evolution, but their origins are beside the point.

So we have a sense of color, of shape, of solidity, of texture, of logic, of morality. For some reason Mr. Peters thinks we should assign epistemic value as legitimate evidence to some of these natural faculties, but not to others. He has not explained why we should believe our color sense (or our perception of shape, or solidity, or of mathematical truth) on the one hand but not our sense of morality on the other. His exclusion of our moral sense is arbitrary; he has provided no grounds for treating the information from our moral sense as objectively invalid while at the same time treating the information from our other faculties as valid.

Thomas | 02.01.03 - 12:22 am | #

You guys are amazing. I'm convinced! You've changed my life! Where do I sign up?
What a waste of time.
Clowns!
Bob | 02.01.03 - 1:30 am | #

Blake,

You state,
"Given an infinitely old universe, one could say that A was caused by B, B by C, C by D and so on. For A to exist it only matters that at one point B existed and caused A. B, C and D could no longer exist even though A still does. In this way, one could argue given infinite time that this mode of causation has been going on from the present backwards infinitely in time."

I agree with what you say, that if an infinitely old universe exists, then it's possible to say that there's an infinite regress of causes in time, since there's "enough time" to take care of them. But if you're speaking of an infintie regress of causes in terms of priority instead of in time, positing an infinite series of these will not negate the necessity of a first mover. I take your
"simultaneous series of causes" (i.e. considering causes simply in terms of dependence of one thing upon another, and not in terms of time) to be the same as my "causes in terms of priority" (awkward terminology, I know).

I wrote my response before I could see your 9:59 posting, which says it more clearly. And you thought *you* were rusty on all this.
Anonymous | 02.01.03 - 10:17 am | #

What can I say, Jon. You've grown on me. Here I go one more time.

The fact that a statement cannont be empirically verified does not mean it is not true. This doesn't mean we just believe anything, but it does mean we can't look to empirical verification as the sole arbiter of truth. As Thomas pointed out (very well, I thought), citing Wittgenstein, "you can't discursively deduce anything without making some unproven assumptions first." These unproven assumptions are what I have been calling first principles. Your stance is positivism. Positivism cannot allow first principles, since they cannot be verified. This is a serious and well-known difficulty with positivism.

Positivism isn't totally useless. I take from it the useful principle that any statement that can be empirically verified, should be. I assume you believe this statement is true, but you will note it cannot be empirically verified. So why is it true?

Let me summarize once more, as simply as I can, the objection that I, and apparently others, have with your moral philosophy.

1. We have a moral sense, a product of evolution and the environment. It delivers moral intuitions and instincts, which may be expressed verbally as precepts and analyzed rationally. For simplicity's sake I will assume these precepts do not contradict and can be easily ordered in a hierarchy if they do.

2. This moral sense does not produce "moral knowledge" in the traditional sense; that is, we cannot be sure these moral precepts are actually right or wrong. However, they do express how we think or feel we ought to behave.

3. As humans, we have some degree of freedom in choosing how to act. It is possible for us to act contrary to a given moral precept that applies to a certain situation.

4. How do we choose whether to obey or disobey this given moral precept? What standard or reference do we apply to make this choice?

You have said that knowledge of such a standard, if it exists, cannot be known. So we are left with two means of resolving this paradox.

5a. The first is to deny 3. We do not have any freedom of the will. Our decisions are constrained. Any hesitation to abide by a moral precept is really just the working of our moral sense at a deeper level. The sense that our conscious selves are making decisions is an illusion.

That's a possible reply, but you won't be able to convince many people that it is true.

5b. The other option is to assume that the moral sense can always be trusted. Although we do not know whether it delivers true moral knowledge, we may assume that it does.

But that leads us to another paradox. Two people may have differing moral senses that produce contradictory moral precepts for identical situations. Both cannot be true. I have no grounds for assuming my moral sense is properly functioning and the other person's isn't.


That's it in a nutshell.

R.W. | 02.01.03 - 11:26 am | #

R.W. writes:
"5b. The other option is to assume that the moral sense can always be trusted. Although we do not know whether it delivers true moral knowledge, we may assume that it does.

But that leads us to another paradox. Two people may have differing moral senses that produce contradictory moral precepts for identical situations. Both cannot be true. I have no grounds for assuming my moral sense is properly functioning and the other person's isn't."

We don't have to assume that our moral faculties are always right any more than we have to assume that our visual faculties are always right, or our mathematical faculties. In fact the experience of being wrong in what one sees or thinks is quite common. It is true that in all domains we often have vivid and impossible to deny experiences, sometimes we have more vague experiences, and sometimes we suffer from illusion. But that is true for ALL of our faculties, not just our moral faculty. The separation of our moral faculty into its own epistemic domain, as somehow less epistemically valid than our other faculties, is completely arbitrary.

Thomas | 02.01.03 - 4:19 pm | #

I'll concede that, Thomas. I was generalizing for the sake of the argument. It is possible to tell if one's visual faculty is defective by comparing one's eyes to those of a healthy person, or by some kind of vision test. It is possible to tell if one's thinking has gone astray by analyzing it logically. In these cases and many like it, it is possibe to refer something to a standard. Jon, however, denies that there is any way to tell that a person who thinks murder or rape is moral has a defective moral sense. I tried to show that this position leads to some paradoxes. Whether I did so correctly or not, remains to be seen.
R.W. | 02.01.03 - 5:33 pm | #

In case I didn't make it clear, Thomas, I was addressing the case of a person who is in doubt about the promptings of his moral sense. I believe there are ways to validate it, as I assume you do, too. I haven't seen any evidence that Jon does, and I tried to argue that such a position leads either to determinism or a paradox. Agreed? Yes? No?
R.W. | 02.01.03 - 5:38 pm | #

Got it R.W., mea culpa on missing that it was for the sake of argument.
Thomas | 02.01.03 - 8:03 pm | #

Sam said, writing yesterday at 10:08 pm (q.v. for details):

"Mr. Peters uses words like "just" and "right" and "moral" but they really have no meaning at all."

Exactly, and I'm glad you see this as well. Jon has a purely *psychological* definition of right, moral, and just. A person believes that something is right, and that's what "right" means. Something seems just to him, and that's what "just" means. "Moral" defines how he feels he ought to behave. Whether he truly ought to behave so is a question which he considers meaningless. In terms of the classic dilemma of moral philosophy, he's redefined the "is-ought" problem by saying the "ought" coincides with the "is." But he hasn't given any justification for this, and as I tried to point out in a previous post, such a position leads to contradictions.

A word stripped of a real definition is like a car that has run out of gas on the road. It'll coast for a while, but not for long. A person like Jon, educated in a Western liberal democracy, will have Western liberal democratic values. But if an ethics like his were to become dominant, good bye values. For as Joseph K. said (The Trial), "It makes lying a universal principle."* The proof is left as an exercise to the reader.

-----
*This doesn't mean I'm saying you're a liar, Jon, you're a much better man than that.
R.W. | 02.01.03 - 11:51 pm | #

Blake:

No because you are understand an infinite series as being temporal only, which it may be. This is a per accidens infinite series. I.e., A causes B which causes C and so on, but A is not directly the cause of C, only incidentally. In a per se series of causes, A causes B which causes C, but B only causes because A is acting on B at the same time. Without A, B cannot cause C, etc. I've already made this distinction above.

So what? It's irrelevant.

So I grant that there can theoretically be an infinite temporal series of causes given an infinitely old universe.

Well then. So your premise 8 is false, isn't it?
Jon Peters | 02.03.03 - 3:57 pm | #

Thomas:

Mr. Peters concedes that a color sense exists. He concedes that a moral sense exists. He views both as products of evolution, but their origins are beside the point.

Huh? Irrelevent to what?

So we have a sense of color, of shape, of solidity, of texture, of logic, of morality. For some reason Mr. Peters thinks we should assign epistemic value as legitimate evidence to some of these natural faculties, but not to others.

Our senses of color and shape are a product of sensory perceptions of physical phenomena. They can be tested and verified empirically. Our moral sense is not a matter of sensory perception and cannot be verified empirically. You keep ignoring this fundamental difference.

He has not explained why we should believe our color sense (or our perception of shape, or solidity, or of mathematical truth) on the one hand but not our sense of morality on the other.

We can test our sensory perceptions empirically. We cannot test our moral sense empirically. That is why.
Jon Peters | 02.03.03 - 4:03 pm | #

R.W.:

The fact that a statement cannont be empirically verified does not mean it is not true. This doesn't mean we just believe anything, but it does mean we can't look to empirical verification as the sole arbiter of truth. As Thomas pointed out (very well, I thought), citing Wittgenstein, "you can't discursively deduce anything without making some unproven assumptions first." These unproven assumptions are what I have been calling first principles.

So you now agree with me that moral claims cannot be proved. And it only took 100 posts!

What unproven assumptions are you making regarding your own moral claims?

1. We have a moral sense, a product of evolution and the environment. It delivers moral intuitions and instincts, which may be expressed verbally as precepts and analyzed rationally. For simplicity's sake I will assume these precepts do not contradict and can be easily ordered in a hierarchy if they do. 2. This moral sense does not produce "moral knowledge" in the traditional sense; that is, we cannot be sure these moral precepts are actually right or wrong. However, they do express how we think or feel we ought to behave. 3. As humans, we have some degree of freedom in choosing how to act. It is possible for us to act contrary to a given moral precept that applies to a certain situation.

Yes.

4. How do we choose whether to obey or disobey this given moral precept? What standard or reference do we apply to make this choice? You have said that knowledge of such a standard, if it exists, cannot be known.

No I haven’t. Obviously, people use all sorts of different standards.

Two people may have differing moral senses that produce contradictory moral precepts for identical situations. Both cannot be true. I have no grounds for assuming my moral sense is properly functioning and the other person's isn't.

Exactly. So on what basis do you assert that your moral claims are true or correct in an objective sense and that moral claims made by other people that contradict yours are false or incorrect?

Jon Peters | 02.03.03 - 4:12 pm | #

Thomas:

We don't have to assume that our moral faculties are always right any more than we have to assume that our visual faculties are always right, or our mathematical faculties. In fact the experience of being wrong in what one sees or thinks is quite common. It is true that in all domains we often have vivid and impossible to deny experiences, sometimes we have more vague experiences, and sometimes we suffer from illusion.

Right. So how do you know your moral claims are not based on an illusion? How do you know that your moral claims are true or correct? How do you know that it is true that murder is wrong? You don't know, do you?

The separation of our moral faculty into its own epistemic domain, as somehow less epistemically valid than our other faculties, is completely arbitrary.

Nonsense. Empirical claims are based on the evidence of our senses and can be verified using the methods of science. Moral claims cannot be. That is the fundamental difference that you keep ignoring.


Jon Peters | 02.03.03 - 4:20 pm | #

R.W.:

It is possible to tell if one's visual faculty is defective by comparing one's eyes to those of a healthy person, or by some kind of vision test. It is possible to tell if one's thinking has gone astray by analyzing it logically. In these cases and many like it, it is possibe to refer something to a standard.

Exactly.

Jon, however, denies that there is any way to tell that a person who thinks murder or rape is moral has a defective moral sense.

Yes. If you dispute this, explain how we may distinguish between a functioning moral sense and a defective one.

I tried to show that this position leads to some paradoxes.

What "paradoxes?"
Jon Peters | 02.03.03 - 4:23 pm | #

R.W.:

In case I didn't make it clear, Thomas, I was addressing the case of a person who is in doubt about the promptings of his moral sense. I believe there are ways to validate it, as I assume you do, too.

What ways? Explain how our moral sense can be "validated?"
Jon Peters | 02.03.03 - 4:25 pm | #

R.W.:

Exactly, and I'm glad you see this as well. Jon has a purely *psychological* definition of right, moral, and just. A person believes that something is right, and that's what "right" means. Something seems just to him, and that's what "just" means. "Moral" defines how he feels he ought to behave. Whether he truly ought to behave so is a question which he considers meaningless.

No, I haven't said it is "meaningless." I have said that it is unanswerable. We don't know whether there is any such thing as objective moral truth. I wish you'd stop attributing to me positions I have not expressed.

In terms of the classic dilemma of moral philosophy, he's redefined the "is-ought" problem by saying the "ought" coincides with the "is." But he hasn't given any justification for this,

Yes, I have. The justification is that we don't know whether there are objective moral truths, and even if they do exist, we don't know what they are.

...and as I tried to point out in a previous post, such a position leads to contradictions.

What "contradictions?" You haven't described any contradictions.
Jon Peters | 02.03.03 - 4:30 pm | #

Me:
He has not explained why we should believe our color sense (or our perception of shape, or solidity, or of mathematical truth) on the one hand but not our sense of morality on the other.

Mr. Peters:
We can test our sensory perceptions empirically. We cannot test our moral sense empirically. That is why.

In every case we can test our own sense against publicly known good cases. Mr. Peters is right that there is some inherent logical (though not epistemic) circularity to this; a circularity that applies to color sense or mathematical sense every bit as much as to moral sense. That is why solipsism is unfalsifiable; but it is also empty and can make no positive assertions about anything objective, since it comprehensively denies the objective.

Mr. Peters invokes "the methods of science" as if it were a magical incantation that demonstrates the epistemic difference between a color blindness test, a test of one's sense of mathematical truth, and a moral blindness test. But since he is the one making a positive claim that one of the three is subjective and circular while the other two are epistemically objective, the burden of proof is his. Magical incantations invoking "the methods of science" do not constitute having met that burden.

Thomas | 02.03.03 - 10:20 pm | #

Thomas:

In every case we can test our own sense against publicly known good cases.

Really? The “publicly known good case” is that abortion ought to be legal. Therefore, according to you, this proves that legal abortion is moral. I think the absurdity of this argument is obvious.

You a circularity that applies to color sense or mathematical sense every bit as much as to moral sense.

Nonsense. Empirical claims can be tested using the methods of science. Moral claims cannot be. That is the fundamental difference that you keep ignoring.

Mr. Peters invokes "the methods of science" as if it were a magical incantation that demonstrates the epistemic difference between a color blindness test, a test of one's sense of mathematical truth, and a moral blindness test.

That’s exactly what the methods of science can do. We can prove using the methods of science that the planet Jupiter exists. You cannot prove using any method that “murder is wrong” is true. If you dispute this, show me your proof—empirical or otherwise—that “murder is wrong” is true. Please do not just repeat your previous silly claim that we know that murder is wrong because most people believe it is. By that standard, the claim “slavery is moral” was true in the 18th century.

Jon Peters | 02.03.03 - 11:01 pm | #

We can prove using the methods of science that the planet Jupiter exists.

And I can deny this "proof" with every bit as much epistemic legitimacy -- or not, depending on whether one wants to be an antirealist skeptic or a realist -- as Mr. Peters can deny the manifest fact that murder is wrong. Mr. Peters thinks that a planet called Jupiter exists. But can he show us proof that Jupiter exists? Just because most people believe it does? By that standard, the claim "the earth is flat" was true in the 14th century.


Thomas | 02.04.03 - 1:29 am | #

I'm back....

Jon wrote:
"No, I haven't said it is 'meaningless.'"

Not with that explicit word, but operationally your position is that the question is meaningless -- since you believe it cannot be answered, since you doubt it has an affirmative answer, and you appear to believe that we can live without needing it answered. Operationally, then, meaningless.

Re: unproven assumptions, which here we're taking to mean unverifiable empirically.

I really should have said "unprovable," but so be it. Anyway, the unprovable assumption for me does not refer to a standard of objective morality. It goes far deeper into things like the nature of being and God. (Which I sketched very cursorily, some 85 posts back. :^) )
For an illustration of one such unprovable assumption, I'll repeat my previous example. "Claims which can be empirically verified, should be empirically verified." Is this true? Why? How do we empirically verify it?

Re: contradictions.
As explained above. The two outcomes are either determinism, or the dilemma of believing one's moral sense is both moral and immoral.

Re: the "is-ought" problem, Jon writes:
"Yes, I have. The justification is that we don't know whether there are objective moral truths, and even if they do exist, we don't know what they are."

I may be wrong about a great many things, on moral matters and others. But the fact that you can write this paragraph plainly suggests to me that you do not understand the problem. A quick search on Google turned up this webpage(*) which should give you an introduction to the topic. Mill's error with the word "pleasurable" exactly parallels the error in your use of the words "right," "just," and "moral." I haven't used the word equivocation yet, since in common usage it implies intention to deceive, but its logical meaning was the idea behind my "two senses of the word moral" post back eons ago.

* http://web.utk.edu/~nolt/courses...435/ Oughtis.htm -- Just the first several paragraphs. If anyone knows of a better link, please post it; this was the best I could find in five minutes. (Is anyone else even still following this thread? :^) )
R.W. | 02.04.03 - 3:24 am | #

(oops -- that was supposed to be "Mill's error with the word 'desirable'....")
R.W. | 02.04.03 - 11:28 am | #

Me:
In every case we can test our own sense against publicly known good cases.

Mr. Peters:
Really? The “publicly known good case” is that abortion ought to be legal. Therefore, according to you, this proves that legal abortion is moral. I think the absurdity of this argument is obvious.

Invoking a controversial case doesn't help Mr. Peters' position. Quantum mechanics was controversial for quite some time, and big bang cosmology and superstring theory still are controversial. The existence of controversial cases does not demonstrate an epistemic difference between moral truth and physical truth: quite the contrary, it is another thing that they have in common.

Thomas | 02.04.03 - 12:03 pm | #

Thomas:

And I can deny this "proof" with every bit as much epistemic legitimacy

No you can't. Do you really believe there's no meaningful difference between, say, the existence of the planet Jupiter and the existence of the Tooth Fairy?

Mr. Peters can deny the manifest fact that murder is wrong.

How do you know it's a "fact" that murder is wrong? I keep asking and you keep evading the question.

Mr. Peters thinks that a planet called Jupiter exists. But can he show us proof that Jupiter exists?

Yes. The science of astronomy, for example, has proved that the planet Jupiter exists.
Jon Peters | 02.04.03 - 12:48 pm | #

Mr. Peters:
Do you really believe there's no meaningful difference between, say, the existence of the planet Jupiter and the existence of the Tooth Fairy?

I've never said anything remotely like that. Show me where I have. You can't do that, can you?

Yes. The science of astronomy, for example, has proved that the planet Jupiter exists.

So just because a bunch of scientists have told you that Jupiter exists you believe them? I thought you said that you could prove that Jupiter exists. You can't do that, can you?


Thomas | 02.04.03 - 12:54 pm | #

R.W.:

Not with that explicit word, but operationally your position is that the question is meaningless -- since you believe it cannot be answered,

No. Believing that a question cannot be answered is not the same thing as believing it is meaningless.

I really should have said "unprovable," but so be it. Anyway, the unprovable assumption for me does not refer to a standard of objective morality. It goes far deeper into things like the nature of being and God.

So what is this unprovable assumption? How does it support the assertion that moral claims can be proved? Give me an example of a “proof” of a moral claim using this assumption.

As explained above. The two outcomes are either determinism, or the dilemma of believing one's moral sense is both moral and immoral.

Huh? The two outcomes of what? You don’t even seem to understand what “determinism” means. The alternative to determinism is randomness. Some events are caused. The rest are uncaused. What other possibility is there?


Jon Peters | 02.04.03 - 12:56 pm | #

Thomas:

Invoking a controversial case doesn't help Mr. Peters' position.

Of course it does. You just asserted that moral claims are proved by majority opinion. You seem to think that if most people believe that murder is wrong, that "proves" that murder is wrong. As I said, by that silly argument, you have "proved" that legal abortion is moral, since a majority of people support it.
Jon Peters | 02.04.03 - 12:58 pm | #

Thomas:

I've never said anything remotely like that.

Yes you have.

Show me where I have.

You said: "And I can deny this "proof" with every bit as much epistemic legitimacy." Make up your mind: do you claim that there is no meaningful epistemomological difference between empirical claims and other kinds of claim, or don't you?

And I'm still waiting for you to prove that "murder is wrong" is true, or to prove any other moral claim. Where is this proof? Present it.

So just because a bunch of scientists have told you that Jupiter exists you believe them?

No, I believe it because it has been verified empirically.
Jon Peters | 02.04.03 - 1:04 pm | #

Mr. Peters writes:
You said: "And I can deny this "proof" with every bit as much epistemic legitimacy." Make up your mind: do you claim that there is no meaningful epistemomological difference between empirical claims and other kinds of claim, or don't you?

You claimed that I said that there was no epistemic difference between belief in the tooth fairy and belief in the planet Jupiter. Show me where I said that. You can't do that, can you?

No, I believe it because it has been verified empirically.

You think that it has been verified empirically. But you can't prove that, can you?

Thomas | 02.04.03 - 1:27 pm | #

Thomas:

You claimed that I said that there was no epistemic difference between belief in the tooth fairy and belief in the planet Jupiter.

I just did. You denied that there is any legitimate epistemological difference between empirical claims and other kinds of claim. Therefore, you must believe that there is no difference between the existence of Jupiter and the existence of the Tooth Fairy. That's what makes your position so absurd.

And I'm still waiting for you to prove that "murder is wrong" is true.
Jon Peters | 02.04.03 - 1:36 pm | #

Mr. Peters:
I just did.

No, you didn't. You claimed that I said that belief in the tooth fairy is epistemically equivalent to belief in the planet Jupiter. Show me where I said that. You can't do that, can you?

Thomas | 02.04.03 - 1:40 pm | #

Thomas:

You claimed that I said that belief in the tooth fairy is epistemically equivalent to belief in the planet Jupiter. Show me where I said that.

I just quoted your exact words.
Jon Peters | 02.04.03 - 2:41 pm | #

Thomas:

I'm still waiting for you to prove that "murder is wrong" is true.

Jon Peters | 02.04.03 - 2:41 pm | #

Mr. Peters:
I just quoted your exact words.

You didn't quote me saying that belief in the tooth fairy is epistemically equivalent to belief in Jupiter, because I never said that. You can't find a quote becaues there isn't one to find, is there?

Thomas | 02.04.03 - 3:07 pm | #

Thomas:

You didn't quote me saying that belief in the tooth fairy is epistemically equivalent to belief in Jupiter, because I never said that.

I quoted you as denying that there is any legitimate epistemological difference between empirical proof and other kinds of "proof." This necessarily means that you believe that empirical claims such as "Jupiter exists" are epistemologically equivalent to religious or supernatural claims such as "the Tooth Fairy exists."

Still waiting for your "proof" that the moral claim "murder is wrong" is true. Where is it? You can't provide any such proof, can you?
Jon Peters | 02.04.03 - 4:30 pm | #

Mr. Peters:
I quoted you as denying that there is any legitimate epistemological difference between empirical proof and other kinds of "proof."

No, you didn't.

This necessarily means that you believe that empirical claims such as "Jupiter exists" are epistemologically equivalent to religious or supernatural claims such as "the Tooth Fairy exists."

You claim that this follows, but you can't prove that it follows even if I had made the initial claim that you incorrectly said I made, can you?

Thomas | 02.04.03 - 4:44 pm | #

Thomas:

No, you didn't.

Yes, I did.

You claim that this follows, but you can't prove that it follows even if I had made the initial claim that you incorrectly said I made, can you?

The logical implication is self evident. If you believe that empirical claims are epistemologically equivalent to non-empirical claims, as you said, then you must believe that "Jupiter exists" is epistemologically equivalent to "the Tooth Fairy exists."
Jon Peters | 02.04.03 - 7:22 pm | #

Mr. Peters says:
The logical implication is self evident.

If I had somwhere made the self-contradictory claim that all claims of all sorts have equal epistemic weight then you might be able to say this. But its really just bluster, because you can't show where I said anything like that, can you?

If you believe that empirical claims are epistemologically equivalent to non-empirical claims, as you said, ...

The basic problem is that I never said that. That is why you can't show where I said that, isn't it?

Thomas | 02.04.03 - 7:34 pm | #

Thomas:

If I had somwhere made the self-contradictory claim that all claims of all sorts have equal epistemic weight then you might be able to say this.

You have made it repeatedly. You made it at the very start of this discussion when you claimed that there is no epistemological difference between empirical claims and moral claims. In fact you claimed, hilariously, that moral claims are empirical claims. Basically, you just seem totally confused.
Jon Peters | 02.04.03 - 8:41 pm | #

Jon, Jon, Jon.
The charge of "meaningless" was predicated on all three reasons I stated, all three taken together, not on any one of them singly.

The opposite of determinism in moral philosophy is not randomness. It is voluntarism.

I see you ignored the example I gave you of a non-verifiable, necessary, unprovable assumption and just repeated more of your canards.

You have made no reply to the website I sent you to, which basically summarizes in a few paragraphs what I and others have more than patiently attempted to explain to you.

Jon, all of us find these matters a challenge, but you simply do not understand the fundamentals of moral philosophy. You latch onto a single word or sentence in a person's argument, and without understanding it, fire off a stock response. It's getting to be like dealing with the early experimental AI program Eliza. If you are a troll, and you're getting your jollies off of this debate, I'm done amusing you. If you're serious, and I hope you are, please do yourself a favor and enroll in a course on moral philosophy.

This debate is over. Period.
R.W. | 02.04.03 - 8:42 pm | #

Me:
If I had somwhere made the self-contradictory claim that all claims of all sorts have equal epistemic weight then you might be able to say this.

Mr. Peters:
You have made it repeatedly.

If I had made that claim repeatedly you would be able to quote it rather than attributing your own construction to me, wouldn't you?
But you can't, can you?

I guess I'll go have a beer with R.W. and laugh about the silly little atheist who grovels at the feet of a scientific positivism he doesn't understand. Bye!


Thomas | 02.04.03 - 8:57 pm | #

Thomas, you are on! I'll even pay for the first round!
R.W. | 02.04.03 - 9:08 pm | #