Is there such a thing as objective morality?

[Trolldor]

The problem is you haven't demonstrated any link between the two.

[Feral_Punctuation]

...

[hiyymer]

The one thing stopping me agreeing with the relativists is that suffering/happiness seem intrinsically morally bad and good respectively. It seems almost axiomatic (is that a word?). I'm sure there's something wrong with this idea, but I can't put my finger on it. Would you kindly put your finger on it?

What's martyrdom? What's self denial?

[Feral_Punctuation]

Do you really want my definitions?

[hiyymer]

The one thing stopping me agreeing with the relativists is that suffering/happiness seem intrinsically morally bad and good respectively. It seems almost axiomatic (is that a word?). I'm sure there's something wrong with this idea, but I can't put my finger on it. Would you kindly put your finger on it?

What's martyrdom? What's self denial?

To me morality is not what we want to happen, but what does happen. Have you ever noticed the propensity of moral discussions to get into a specific morally conflicted situation, and then it's what do you "think" is "right"? But it's not about thinking. It's about how you feel. And that's what morality is. Our implicit biological motivations are not homogeneous, unified, and harmonious. They bump into each other, and then we have the moral choice. An expectation of suffering or pleasure could surely weight the choice in one direction or the other, but each situation is different and each choice is ultimately irrational. The first thing that happens in our discussion is someone is going to say, well what about this circumstance or that circumstance - it makes a difference you know. Ethical rules are just projections of those felt responses from our biological regulation, since most people have very similar responses. Of course what their brain would actually do in that exact circumstance when the rubber hits the road might be another thing.

[PsychoSerenity]

OK, how about the actual reason for a value judgement. To make this clear - NOT the reasoning the mind goes through that makes it think it knows why it holds that judgement, - but the actual reason, that is probably best described through evolution, or as causality in the complex system of the universe, as a result of the laws of physics. Surely that has an objective answer?

I don't know what this means: "To make this clear - NOT the reasoning the mind goes through that makes it think it knows why it holds that judgement, - but the actual reason, that is probably best described through evolution, or as causality in the complex system of the universe, as a result of the laws of physics. Surely that has an objective answer?"

I don't know what the difference is between the actual reason and the reasoning the mind goes through.

I'm mean the actual physical cause that results in the judgement - people try to rationalise their judgements after the fact - but the actual cause is millions of influences throughout their lives. People may also rationalise their judgements in order to make future judgements more rational - but that just adds another influence to the millions of others, and doesn't necessarily overwrite them, when they come to make another judgement.

Assuming no dualism, our morality has come from the laws of physics, so there should be patterns in it. If we can say precisely why someone thinks something is right or wrong, does that not give us some insight into the the nature of morality? Throughout history there is progression of the moral zeitgeist, with increasing empathy, and violence becoming less and less acceptable. As a consistent repeatable result, surely that gives us some objective understanding?

And then when you look at the evolution of morality, partly as genetic and partly as a social structure which is then learned throughout the individuals social development, there are absolute limits on what can be held as morally right or wrong.
- For instance, a society cannot evolve a morality that allows the death-rate, as a result of murder, to come too close to the birthrate. That must have an objective effect, through an individuals social development, on their moral judgements. Even if it doesn't completely remove murder/psychopaths it does mean that the society as a whole must condemn those actions.

I'm still not sure either way - and I don't think what I'm describing is exactly morality anyway. But I'm not going to simply write it off as impossible. Maybe it's something obvious that we're all missing - or something that the human mind isn't intelligent enough to understand.

I don't think this statement is true: "there are absolute limits on what can be held as morally right or wrong."

And, society doesn't hold murder to be immoral because the death rate might approach the birth rate. People hold murder to be immoral because they place themselves in the shoes of the victim and find it fair that all humans similarly situated should be protected from deprivation of life (with various and sundry exceptions that differ from culture to culture).

Yes - but it's the result of evolution, so the society doesn't have to know that that is why they are doing it, in the same way people don't need to know about genetics to want to have sex. The reason people place themselves in the shoes of the victim, is because they've learned to do that from their society (and/or evolved it genetically), which teaches them that that's what they should do, because it's always taught them that, because if it hadn't always taught them that, their ancestors would have killed each other - and they wouldn't exist. Hence the absolute limit of what the society can condone. From chimps to humans, killing a member of the in group, is almost universally condemned by the group.

I also, at this point, want to refer you to the disclaimer in my sig, because it's particularly relevant here.

[Coito ergo sum]

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1bbvK8SIgMY&feature=sub[/youtube]

[Feck]

16 pages and the bloody answer is still NO.

[Pappa]

16 pages and the bloody answer is still NO.

I almost posted exactly that a couple of days ago.

[mistermack]

The answer is yes. Certain things are always wrong for anybody, at any time.
Example ; You should never fuck a dwarf with learning problems. It's not big, and it's not clever.

[Pappa]

The answer is yes. Certain things are always wrong for anybody, at any time.
Example ; You should never fuck a dwarf with learning problems. It's not big, and it's not clever.

How can that always be wrong for everybody? What about some aliens who think it's the most moral act possible?

Besides, even the example you gave wouldn't be frowned upon by all the world's cultures (and even if it were it still wouldn't be objective).

[Feral_Punctuation]

I think he was joking.

[leo-rcc]

The answer is yes. Certain things are always wrong for anybody, at any time.
Example ; You should never fuck a dwarf with learning problems. It's not big, and it's not clever.

How can that always be wrong for everybody? What about some aliens who think it's the most moral act possible?

Besides, even the example you gave wouldn't be frowned upon by all the world's cultures (and even if it were it still wouldn't be objective).

Not to mention the dwarves with learning problems that like having sex.