Sam Harris: Science can answer moral questions

[RuleBritannia]

Even if every single person on the planet considers something to immoral, that doesn't make it objective. Objectivism is mind independent, morals can only be subjective because they require a mind.

[Trolldor]

morality is objective.

Objective morality.

I get what you're saying. Maybe I should explain that I'm considering morality to be a cultural thing, made up of the interactions of the people in the society. I don't think morality could exist in an individual alone, who had had no contact from society. It's something we evolved within groups.

Then I would say that those attacks would be considered a fundamentally immoral act, within any culture capable of surviving. Of course in this case, it was between two cultures, as the cultures clashed - which is why, for millions of years, war has been considered perfectly acceptable - because the survival of rival cultures was not necessary . However, we are gradually becoming one global culture - and as a global culture we will not survive if we consider that kind of act to be morally acceptable.

So we can continue to consider survival to be a morally good thing - as we have for millions of years, allowing us to get here - or we can kill each other, and let another species have go.

[Disclaimer - if this is comes across like I think I know what I'm talking about, I want to make it clear that I don't. I'm just trying to get my thoughts down]

This human-centric idea of morality is the very reason why any concept of morality cannot be objective.

[PsychoSerenity]

Even if every single person on the planet considers something to immoral, that doesn't make it objective.

That's OK, but I don't think I've said anything like that.

Objectivism is mind independent, morals can only be subjective because they require a mind.

But as far as I can tell, (I realise I'm probably wrong here - I'm only arguing the point because I don't yet understand exactly where I'm going wrong) I have logically derived the fundamental basis of all sustainable moralities from the physical properties of the universe - making it no more subjective than logic or science.

This human-centric idea of morality is the very reason why any concept of morality cannot be objective.

OK, I'm getting confused, please explain why.

[Trolldor]

Why is human survival and human well being the standard for morality?

[siodine]

@Psychoserenity, the linked I posted will clear up your confusion.

[PsychoSerenity]

@Psychoserenity, the linked I posted will clear up your confusion.

Yeah thanks for that. I'm listening to it now.

[PsychoSerenity]

Why is human survival and human well being the standard for morality?

Because we are human. Our morality is the result of our human evolution. An alien species would have their own survival as the standard of their own morality. However, when the two cultures overlap, as in my globalisation example, only moralities that take into account mutual benefits of survival, would be sustainable - possibly? I don't know. I mean, in the same way as, as we now know, we need to look after our environment in order to survive. And for our best chance we should avoid eradicating anything that might be useful in the future - which includes almost everything.

This is all getting rather complicated and confusing.

I think I'm going to give up for today - but I'll look in tomorrow in case anyone has any more explanations that might make sense to me. Thanks for the help everyone!

[siodine]

Morality is a value judgement, the thought experiment in the link I posted explains this pretty well. I'll restate it for convenience:

A trolley is running out of control down a track. In its path are 5 people who have been tied to the track. Fortunately, you can flip a switch, which will lead the trolley down a different track to safety. Unfortunately, this will kill one random bystander, but ultimately saving 4 lives.

Now contrast that experiment with this one:

A trolley is running out of control down a track. In its path are 5 people who have been tied to the track. There is only one way to save these 5 people, and that is to push a bystander in front of the tracks. Also, you can be absolutely sure this will save the 5 people without reprocussion.

In the first experiment, what is the right thing to do? If you agree it's to save the lives of the 5 people by sacrificing one life, then you've chosen the greater good (5 lives versus 1).

Now, in the second experiment, you see the same dilemma but you're forced to directly kill someone to save 5 lives. Logically it's the same dilemma, but morally?

This is where value judgements come into play and where science is unable differentiate between what's more right.

[Trolldor]

An alien species would have their own survival as the standard of their own morality.

And yet there are examples of animals helping those of other species with no benefit to themselves.

[RuleBritannia]

An alien species would have their own survival as the standard of their own morality.

And yet there are examples of animals helping those of other species with no benefit to themselves.

Like humans.

[RuleBritannia]

Objectivism is mind independent, morals can only be subjective because they require a mind.

But as far as I can tell, (I realise I'm probably wrong here - I'm only arguing the point because I don't yet understand exactly where I'm going wrong) I have logically derived the fundamental basis of all sustainable moralities from the physical properties of the universe - making it no more subjective than logic or science.

Logic is the study of reasoning, and we reason based on the objective truths of the universe, those things are objective because they would be true even without a mind to say they are, the same goes for the scientific method. Gravity is an objective truth, because you don't need to believe in it or know of its existence, it just keeps on working, it was a truth long before we evolved to our present form, and it'll be true long after we're extinct.

Morals and ethics cannot be objective because are dependent on the mind. To say that morals are objective is to say that morals are not determined by people and what is right and wrong, just is, and humans have no free will over ethics. Which clearly isn't the case, you only have to look around the world to see it.

When you're thinking about whether morality is subjective or objective, don't think about things like murder because you'll trick yourself into thinking it's objective because we, as a social species, have evolved to work together and (generally) not kill each other, 99% of people will say murder is immoral. What you should think about are more ambiguous dilemmas, such as, is it morally right to kill and eat other animals? Or is it morally wrong to not give a homeless person charity?

[Trolldor]

Morals are objectively caused as everything in this universe has an objective basis. But what those morals are is not objectively determined. There are people out there who will main and kill on a whim, those who will target anyone but only with motivation, those who do so when pushed to extremes, and those who will not under any circumstance.

[RuleBritannia]

Morals are objectively caused as everything in this universe has an objective basis.

Wrong. Murder is not "objectively caused", murder does not exist without a mind, if there were no minds, there would be no murders. The second part is also wrong, not everything in the universe has an "objective basis", the fact that I find a painting beautiful is purely subjective, without my mind (or other minds), the painting cannot be beautiful or ugly, it's just a painting. A mind is required to make the judgement.

[Trolldor]

Morals are objectively caused as everything in this universe has an objective basis.

Wrong. Murder is not "objectively caused", murder does not exist without a mind, if there were no minds, there would be no murders. The second part is also wrong, not everything in the universe has an "objective basis", the fact that I find a painting beautiful is purely subjective, without my mind (or other minds), the painting cannot be beautiful or ugly, it's just a painting. A mind is required to make the judgement.

Murder is an abstract label, but taking a life is an objective act with objective causes. Subjective reasonings, yes, but objective causes. Physical motions and functions of the brain leading someone to deliberately take a life. Whether it is right or wrong is a subjective evaluation.

Secondly, the beauty you see in a painting does have an objective cause. It is how your brain responds to the stimuli. The painting is not objectively beautiful because that would necessitate that the painting itself causes the beauty, as opposed to your brain causing it. The brain is the origin of that beauty, natural objective processes. If the painting were the origin than anything looking at the painting would consider it beautiful which we know is not the case.

[JOZeldenrust]

Morals are objectively caused as everything in this universe has an objective basis.

Wrong. Murder is not "objectively caused", murder does not exist without a mind, if there were no minds, there would be no murders. The second part is also wrong, not everything in the universe has an "objective basis", the fact that I find a painting beautiful is purely subjective, without my mind (or other minds), the painting cannot be beautiful or ugly, it's just a painting. A mind is required to make the judgement.

You're on to something, but not quite correct.

The sequence of physical events that we call murder is a physical thing and has objective, physical causes. Conceptualizing it as a murder, or even as ending a life, isn't objective, and judging it as wrong certainly isn't. Likewise, without a mind to conceptualize it as a painting, it wouldn't be a painting but just a configuration of stuff.

I'm pretty sure the conceptualization and moral judgment are reducible to physical processes, so it should be possible to determine objectively what value judgement an individual has, but not to determine whether those judgments are "correct", as the events being judged don't have a moral value in and of themselves.