Valmorian

Yes, this is true, and I understand what you mean by it. The problem is, I'm not sure why you would go to any lengths to point this out. It's certainly not what is generally meant when one is proposing an objective moral system.

Norge

You wrote:

Which particular desire on my part, if I want to rape, is it thwarting?

It seems that a favorite of yours is to appeal to objectivity. But that's not the question, is it? What is being asked for is the reason WHY the sum total of desires is sufficient to ground morality. Why should this be the case? You have provided no answer.

Then you write:

"Determinism is quite compatible with a hypothetical "should" (what Immanual Kant called a hypothetical imperative) of the form "if you want X, you should do Y")"

Now we're cooking. Do you really mean that? Morality is that if you desire something, you "should" do it?

You wrote:

"It means that X has a desire that P, and P is true. "

But what does "P is true" supposed to mean? I have a desire to rape and that is objectively true. Now following from what you wrote above, "if you want X, you should do Y", I will go ahead and rape on your account.





Yes. Desires have value according to their capacity to fill other desires. The desire to rape thwarts other desires, so the desire to rape has negative value. It is morally bad. Those with this desire are evil.


I wrote:
quote:
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Originally posted by Norge
First, this is obviously not possible where different desires are mutually opposite. Woman: no to rape. Men: yes to rape.
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This is no different than when we, as an individual, have conflicting desires. We have a desire for chocolate cake. We have a desire not to get fat. They are in conflict. Yet, we are still able to make decisions. It is still possible to evaluate which action is best. The weighing of interpersonal desires is no different than the weighing of intrapersonal desires.

I think I said that already."

Yes, but it's not getting you anywhere, because this idea of a pot of desires into which we all put our little piece and you somehow then wish that we "should" act so that the sum total is positive is simply misconceived. First, why should I individually think of any but my own desires? Second, determinism doesn't account for an "oughtness" at all and third, it's very clear that morality often isn't about the fulfilment of desires at all. Self-sacrifice is performed ( a moral act) not to fulfill desires but from a belief in the value of others over self. This has nothing to do with fulfilling desires. The whole idea of basing morality on desires is so obviously wrong, I wonder how you came up with it. What do you think, for example of the concept of self-sacrifice, the giving up of my own desires for another, which is considered to be a morally good act? I'd be interested to know.

Finally, I wrote:
quote:
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Originally posted by Norge
Why should I act in any but my own self-interest?
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Another malformed question. The question is not whether you should act to fulfill your desires -- you will do so, just as everybody else does. The question is: what should those desires be?"

ME: But on your account, that is also a malformed question, because apparently my desires are determined. There is no "should" about my desires, they just are. And I act accordingly. Hence, when I desire to rape, I rape. You can't jump from what is to what should be in your view, but that is exactly what morality is all about, the idea of what we ought to do, something determinism cannot account for. You even betray yourself here Alonzo, by writing "what should those desires be?" You gave the game away there. Oops. Not possible under a deterministic framework. The reason you wrote "should" is because you instinctively feel as though some things "should" be, something determinism does not account for.

Alonzo Fyfe

Those of your victim (as well as those of other potential victims who then live in fear).

You will then answer, "But I said 'desires on MY part'", to which I respond that your desires are not the only desires in the universe relevant to making moral calculations.



I have answered it. I have said that it is a malformed question, like asking "Why is the sum of the interior angles of a right triangle equal to 180 degrees. Why should this be the case?"



Only if I was the only person in the universe. You snipped the part where I explained that morality is relative to all desires, not just mine. To determine if I morally should do something, it must not only be the case that I desire it, but that my desires are compatible with the fullfillment of the desires of others.

Thus, the wrongness of rape. It is not compatible with the fulfillment of the desires of others.



Well, we can start with Tarsky's theory of truth, "Snow is white" is true if and only if snow is white. P is any proposition. "Snow is white" is a proposition.


Actually, my "wish" about how we should act is not relevant in any of this. You will not find a proposition in anything that I write that involves importing any wish on my part.



What do you mean by "should?"

In the real world, the only "should" that makes sense relates states of affairs to desires. So, before one can answer what "should" be done one must identify the desires that are to be fulfilled.

If you are asking me why you "should" (relative to your own desires) do that which you morally should (relative to all desires), then you are asking a malformed question.

It is like asking, "why should the total of all the single-digit numbers in this column equal the total of all the numbers in this column?" Obvoiusly, it absurd to ask questions that assume that the sum of a subset of numbers equals the sum of the whole set.

If you are asking me for a proof of why the sum of a subset of numbers must always equal the sum of a set of numbers, I must disappoint you. No such proof exists. And I do not consider it to be an objection to what I write that I am not able to provide one.


This is a bare assertion on your part.

If you are talking about a categorical "oughtness" (the "oughtness" of a categorical imperative), then you are correct. Determinism does not account for it. Neither does indeterminism, because categorical oughtness does not exist to be accounted for under any system.

If you are talking about hypothetical "oughtness", then it is well accounted for. Hypothetical oughtness says "If X desires that P, and action C will bring about P, then X ought to do C."


It is true that morality is not about the fulfillment of the desires of the agent -- it also concerns the desires of others. But it is still the case that where morality is not concerned solely with the desires of the agent, it is still about desires.


Beliefs are motivationally neutral. They are merely data storage.

And a "belief in the value of others" is a belief that others stand in a relationship to certain desires so that those others fulfill desires generally.

Self-sacrifice is acting on other-regarding desires. A person who has a desire that their child is unharmed is motivated (to a degree proporitional to the desire) to make the proposition "my child is unharmed" true. This is an other-regarding desire because the object of the desire is not the self, but another. This desire may easily be strong enough to outweigh any and all self-regarding desires the agent may have.

Generally, because morality is concerned with all desires and not just those of the agent, other-regarding desires tend to have a rather high moral value. Yet, it is still the case that other-regarding desires obtain this high moral value precisely because of its ability to fulfill desires generally.


False. Desires are not only causes, they are also effects (determinism is not only about causes, but about effects). Because they are effects, they are legitimate objects of choice. Because they are legitimate objects of choice, then there are indeed relevant hypothetical-imperative "should" questions relevant to desires.


Actually, I disagree. Because what we do is determined by what we want, morality is primarily concerned with what we ought to want, and only secondarily concern with what we ought to do. And what we ought to do is that which a person with good desires would do.

As I mentioned before, I discuss this in more detail in Part VIII of my Ethics Without God series. It is, indeed, specifically concerned with this issue of free will and why determinism implies that morality is primarily concerned with the moral value of desires primarily, and acts only secondarily.

Norge

Alonzo,


My quote, followed by your response:

quote:
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Originally posted by Norge
Which particular desire on my part, if I want to rape, is it thwarting?
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Those of your victim (as well as those of other potential victims who then live in fear).

You will then answer, "But I said 'desires on MY part'", to which I respond that your desires are not the only desires in the universe relevant to making moral calculations.

To which I reply:

But if I'm an atheist, you haven't given me any good reasons why I should think of others before myself. I answer to myself alone, because I am simply an organism that is determined.

What you are assuming is that I "should" think of others before acting, but you can't use "should" because you're a determinist. You're going round in circles here. You're claiming to explain morality in terms of desires, but you can't do it without importing that word "should." At times you deny it, then you use it. You're not consistent. Eg. You write regarding Kant's views:

"Determinism is quite compatible with a hypothetical "should" (what Immanual Kant called a hypothetical imperative) of the form "if you want X, you should do Y") "

Are you saying this hypothetical is real or not? Which is it? Is it descriptive or prescriptive? You don't say.

One final thing:

You write:

quote:
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Originally posted by Norge
What is being asked for is the reason WHY the sum total of desires is sufficient to ground morality. Why should this be the case? You have provided no answer.
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I have answered it. I have said that it is a malformed question, like asking "Why is the sum of the interior angles of a right triangle equal to 180 degrees. Why should this be the case?"

You simply side-step the challenge of accounting for the reason and grounding for why we should act morally by stating that it is a malformed question. But it isn't, it's a perfectly good question.

Your answer, and I'm helping you here, isn't that the question is malformed but that the determinist doesn't recognize any moral imperative at all. Actions simply are, there is no "should." But this ends you up in a place where actions, all of them are simply conditioned and driven and free will is eliminated. In addition, actions are simply based on the idea of personal preferences. You simply betray yourself when you write such things as you should act to take account of other people's desires. This is simply inconsistent with determinism, because there is no "should." You should bite the bullet and argue, as DRFSeven does, that morality is really about personal preferences. At least that would be more honest, I think.

The problem with preference is that it doesn't account for morality at all! But that's for another day, Alonzo.

Oh, and when we reach the point where you evaluate the value of humans on how many desires they have, bells should be going off. One doesn't follow from the other. That should be perfectly obvious. Complexity doesn't lead to greater value.

tronvillain

Norge:
If one is not currently bothered or expect to be bothered in the future by the suffering of the woman one is raping or the child one is torturing and does not fear punishment from those it does bother, then there is no reason one should not do those things. I could not convince such a person to not go through with their act - I could only attempt them to prevent them from doing so. Oddly enough, this is exactly what happens in the real world.

This has essentially already been said, but I thought it bore repeating. Besides, where I go from here is probably somewhat different, since I do not believe that objective morality exists even in the seconds sense unless it is reduced so far as to be indistinguishable from subjective morality.

Wiploc

That would be a good point if I had taken an affirmative position. I try not to do that even though deep down in my gut I believe we're right and you're wrong. I try not to do that because I don't much understand this morality stuff. So I don't want to stick my neck out and get it chopped off. If I went around saying that atheist morality had a better logical foundation than religious morality, you would be fully within your rights to ask me to put up or shut up.

Since you do go around saying that religious morality has a better logical foundation than atheist morality, I feel perfectly justified in asking you to put up or shut up.

But I don't see you coming across with your secret logical basis for morality. You aren't going to produce, are you? It's not like I didn't ask you the question in a straightforward way. (In a dozen straightforward ways, for that matter.) You must know what I'm asking, but all you've given back so far is,

1. I'm going to Hell.

2. I hate god.

3. External morality is good --- for reasons which you decline to explain.

4. Some two-stepping gibberish about the basis of goodness.

5. The request that I go first by explaining what I don't even understand but which you have repeatedly claimed that you do understand.

So, I shall address your points in order:

1. I'm going to Hell.

Nuts to you too, and let's move on to the substantive issues.


2. I hate god.

If there were a good god, I could like him. If there were a bad god, I should dislike him. If you --- and here I'm not clear --- but if are referring to the SCG (Standard Christian God) then his behavior as described by Christians is worse than than of anyone who has ever lived. He's a really bad god. Anytime you say "Rape is bad and god is good," or "Torture is bad and god is good," you need to have your face rubbed in the contradiction.


3. External morality is good for reasons which you decline to explain.

And yet you say you can explain them. You say you understand a rational basis that we ought to obey external rules. What is it about external rules that gives them moral power? You don't say. Why don't you say? Just answer the question you put to others: Why ought we to comply with rules of the exterior variety?


4. Some two-stepping gibberish about the basis of goodness.

Don't tell me that I don't understand when you are the one who is two-stepping. Either god lives up to a standard other than himself, or he is the standard. Pick either one, or neither. But not both.


5. The request that I go first by explaining what I don't even understand but which you have repeatedly claimed that you do understand.

Here's the best I can do for you by way of self-disclosure. (But please remember that I'm not even claiming it makes sense. You are the one claiming to have a rational basis for morality.)

I used to want a universal morality. I wanted to be able to say, "This is wrong, in any culture, at any time, by any perpetrator, this is an unambiguously wrong thing." I used the Central Park Wilding as my example. (And look what a swamp that's turned into. )

So here's my personal epiphany. (I'm not saying it will work for you, or that it should work for you. All I'm saying is that when this lightbulb came on I quit looking for, lost the need for, an "objective" morality.) If you rape a woman, you will cause her to suffer. That's a reason not to rape. If you had another, additional, reason, it wouldn't be a stronger one. That is, if I say I'm against rape because Ralph is against it, and you say you are against rape because Jehovah is against it, we have not strengthened our cases.

In fact, we weaken our cases. Suppose I said, "I've got nothing against rape myself, but my friend Ralph forbids it. I don't rape because I believe that morality consists of complying with Ralph's rules. But beyond the fact that that it is a violation of Ralph's rules, I have nothing against rape." You'd think I was a dangerous sociopath, a broken person.

When you take the same line, I feel exactly the same way about you. Or I would if I believed you, which I don't. If you didn't really have something against rape, you wouldn't be holding it up as a standard of bad acts. That (using rape as a exemplar of badness) would be as baffling to you as if someone tried to justify religion by saying (to borrow from Alonzo) "If there were no god, there would be no reason to refrain from putting pepperoni on pizza."

Note too that, far from being persuasive, Christians cut a humorously ironical figure when they pretend to be pathologically amoral in the attempt to claim the moral high ground.


Stay on target, Red Leader. You can't say Jehovah isn't eccentric. You can't say he didn't do genocide. And you can't say you wouldn't direct epithets at anyone else who tortured people forever in Hellfire. So your choices here (if you really aspire to make logical moves) are to either say

1. I didn't mean the standard Christian god. I'm talking about some newfangled god. Or,

2. Abandon torture as your example of a bad act.

You cannot logically continue to say torture is bad while holding up a torturer as the standard of goodness.


Granted. I don't even understand the concepts.


Step one: God is the standard.


Cool, I'll imagine him to be somebody really nice.


Let's say Ralph was nice. Would that provide a moral imperative? I mean, I want to be nice, but I don't see how my niceness can be compelled by somebody else's niceness. Do you see my problem?

Take Mary. She was supposed to be without sin. (I know you aren't likely to believe that if you aren't Catholic, but you asked me to imagine a perfect god, so I can ask you to imagine a perfect Mary.) If Mary was perfectly good, and god didn't exist, then would Mary's goodness somehow compell us to be good?

If yes, how? And if not, then you have left something out of your proof.


You were going to give a reason for this, a logical justification for this being the standard against which we ought to be measured. We wait and wait, but we don't see the explanation.


So we're back to might-makes-right morality? Whoever can cause the most pain gets to make the rules? If not, then what are you trying to say?


If there were such a standard, why --- in what logical sense would we be bound by it?


This is your conclusion. If you use your conclusion as your premise, you get a circular argument.


Once again, what is your point? Where is your argument? You were the one claiming to have a logical argument.

If I say rape is bad because women don't like it, and you say rape is bad because women are made in the image of the guy who drowned almost all the women in the world, which of us has the better argument? I'll admit that my argument isn't compelling, but I don't see that you have even presented an argument.


If words have meaning, you are wrong. A value requires a valuer. For instance, sunsets can't be pretty unless there is someone who likes them. The beauty of a sunset is not intrinsic to the sunset, rather it is in the perception of the viewer.

You may be able to recast your argument using some word other than "value," but so far, you have not made your case.


Please leave off with the irrational insults. You were offering a logical justification for morality. You yourself would reject any popular vote basis, as well as any mass psychosis basis. Stick to the point.


I've never heard a coherent theistic explanation of morality. And I'm pretty comfortable with my own morals; I don't see any way I could "work hard" at them."


Worth a lot more to me. You were --- this has probably just slipped your mind --- going to give some other explanation of why they are valuable.


That's like saying sunsets would be beautiful even if nobody had eyes.


Unless you provide such a framework, nothing can fit in it.


And how does this give them value?


You going to give us that in English?


Step two: Something other that god is the standard of goodness, and god lives up to that standard.


And that definition is ...


We are still on step two: God is not the standard of goodness. (I also note that he's not omnipotent.) (As for your concept of "necessariness," let me quote Robert Frost. "The universe may be as great as they say, but it wouldn't be missed if it didn't exist.)

In any case, you were talking about a logical basis for morality. Only if you admit that you cannot deliver such a basis will I let you steer the conversation into the realm of Medieval arcana.


Hey, Kettle, this pot calls you black. All I want is a simple answer to the question you raised yourself. Either answer the question or admit you can't do it. There's no reason to be embarrassed that you can't do it; you won't be admitting to anything you haven't insulted us for.


You were claiming atheists do bad stuff, so I pointed out that Christians do bad stuff too. Surely that is fair. I agree that yours was a cheap shot, but there is no way mine could be cheaper.


That's MY point. You have undertaken to prove the opposite, not in this particular case, but in some cases at least. We're still waiting.


Your claim is that if they tortured people based on an outside rule, the torture would be justified. That's your claim. I want to know why you think that is true. You offered to explain; so explain.


You have yet to master the art of faking sincerity.
crc

Alonzo Fyfe

Norge:

My brother used to play a game where he would challenge people that they could not prove to him the most obvious of facts -- for example, that he was sitting at a table. His trick, whenever anybody would offer evidence, he would answer "you have not proved it, I still do not believe there is a table there."

He taught me that a proof does not consist in getting somebody else to admit that it is a proof. It consists of valid argument forms and true premises.

Your objections are based on several false premises. Of which, the most signfiicant seems "There is no 'should' within determinism."

I have already explained how this is false. "If you want to win the game, you should practice." or, "If you want to tape that TV show then you should get the VCR set up." These types of relationships (hypothetical shoulds) require determinism because the relationships they describe are causal. Without cause and effect, the should does not make sense.

Also, in every field of study, there are basic facts about which it makes no sense to ask "why?" or "Who gets to decide?" As in "Why gets to decide if E = MC^2?" or "Why does E = MC^2?".

Or, "Why does a triangle have to have three sides?"

Or, "Who gets to decide that Modus Ponens is a valid argument form?"

When one gets to one of these basic propositions, they are not answered by examining irrelevant questions like "Why?" and "Who gets to decide?" They are answered by the types of conclusions that they support.

The proposition that moral value is concerned with value relative to all desires regardless of who has them is one of these basic facts. It's verification comes from the fact that, without it, one gets absurd conclusions such as "rape is morally obligatory" or "owning slaves is a right."

No doubt, like my brother, you are going to return by saying that there is no should and that I have not yet answered the questions "Why?" and "Who gets to decide?"

The first statement will remain false no matter how many times you say it. The latter questions will remain irrelevant nonsense no matter how many times you ask them.

Alonzo Fyfe

Two reasons, mostly.

I find that when a person says that they are an "objectivist" people often take them to mean that there are intrinsic values, and assume that all of the arguments against intrinsic value theory apply to them.

When a person says that they are a "subjectivist" everybody assumes that they are an agent-subjectivist (with frequent lapses into assessor-subjectivism and back again as convenience dictates), and assumes that all of the arguments against individual-subjectivism apply to them.

I hold that the reason that this debate can never be resolved is because the arguments against BOTH views are perfectly sound. Yet, people think that they must choose one or the other. The subjectivist looks at the absurdity of "intrinsic values" and tries to defend subjectivism. The objectivist looks at the absurdity of saying that just about anything can be good simply by changing the agent's (or assessor's) attitude towards it and asserts that there must be something to this idea of intrinsic values.

The type of objectivism that I talk about gives us everything that an objectivist is looking for in a moral theory WITHOUT postulating the absurdity of intrinsic values, because all values are desire-dependent. It does so by holding that the desires of the agent or assessor are only an insignificantly small subset of the desires that are relevant to the evaluation. Thus, it yields a single right answer that is objectively knowable and the same for all persons, even though it is a desire-dependent and not an intrinsic value. Changing the agent's or assessor's attitude has an insignificantly small effect on the total value, because what matters is not only the rapist's desires (for example) but those of the victim and of all those in society caused to live in fear.

When asking why rape is wrong we need give no answer any more complicated than, "Because of the harm done to the victims of rape and even to those not raped but who are made to worry for their safety."

The rapist asks, "Why should I care about these other people?"

Well, there are only two ways to prevent a person from raping. The first is to give the individual internal constraints against rapes -- a set of desires and aversions whereby rape simply is not on the list of things to do. "Why should I not rape?" Because you have been brought up to be a good person with the appropriate desires and aversions and, thus, you do not WANT to.

If this fails, and the individual is not a good person, then the only other type of constraint that has any possibility of effect are external constraints. "Why should I not rape?" Because of what the rest of us will do to you when we catch you.

Many people incorrectly take the moral question to be this: Take a person (e.g., a rapist) who faces no internal or external constraints against rape, and convince him, by the power of words alone, not to rape. This is what "proving that rape is wrong" requires.

However, if a person faces no internal or external constraints against rape, then there is NOTHING that can be done, short of a 2x4 between the eyes or something similar (an external constraint that is already ruled out ex hypothesi) that will prevent him from committing rape. That is a fact.

[At which point the intrinsic-value theorist says, "Ha, then you admit that you cannot prove that rape is wrong, you pathetic piece of slime-ridden pond scum. Answer: If you can think of some way that truthful words alone can prevent a person facing no internal or external inhibitions against rape from committing rape, you are welcome to try. You will fail. To stop the rapist, you must use either an internal constraint (instill the appropriate desires and aversions) or an external constraint (threaten, and be willing to back up the threat, to make the person suffer). There is no third option.]

But the moral question does not concern what we can tell a person facing no internal or external constraints to keep him from doing evil. The moral question concerns which internal constraints we (all of us) have a reason to bring about in all people (including ourselves), and which external constraints we (all of us) have a reason to have all people (including ourselves) live under.

This is what I need to do to prove that rape is immoral. I need to prove that we (all of us) have reasons to institute internal inhibitions against rape. Which, clearly, we do. Those reasons come from the suffering of the victims and even the harm done to potential victims who must fear for their safety.

What makes the rapist evil is that he does not have the internal constraints against rape that we, all of us, have reasons to create in all people, including ourselves. Reasons that are grounded in all of our desires -- not just those of the agent or the assessor. Reasons that yield a single objective, right answer that does not change from individual to individual. But reasons that are in all cases very much desire-dependent (rather than intrinsic-value dependent).

Valmorian

This is really the only thing that matters when talking about objective morality.




However, we've already determined that the rapist DOES want to... so...




This is begging the question. You've already assumed that raping is inherently 'bad' by proposing that the person who desires to rape is 'not a good person'. From MY perspective, I would agree that they are a bad person, but I'm aware that this is purely a subjective evaluation on my part.




Nonsensical. This will not change the rapist's belief that rape is not wrong one iota. This isn't about preventing acts that our society has intersubjectively decided are undesirable, this is about objective morality.




I would say that this is the CORRECT evaluation of an objective moral code. That something is wrong regardless of the subject.




Agreed. This is why I reject objective morality as meaningless. There is simply the shared moral code our society has arrived upon through a variety of means. This doesn't mean that the moral code is objectively 'true', however.




None of this has any bearing whatsoever on whether rape is objectively wrong.

Substitute any other activity for rape and you will see that the answer doesn't change at all.




This is simply an assertion, and not even a valid one. You've already proposed one person (the rapist) who arguably has no reason to institute internal inhibitions against rape.

Don't fool yourself, this is simply the majority enforcing itself upon the minority.. *shrug*




And if a group of people don't care about this? What about them? Or what if the majority decided it's ok as long as it only happens to a subset of the population? Does that make it morally justified because the majority decides it is?




Nonsense. This is a bald-faced assertion for which you have not shown why ALL people must agree with.

Personally, I agree that most people do share a common moral code to some degree. This doesn't make that moral code 'correct' or 'true', however. It would be a simple appeal to popularity to claim that it does.

The reason DOES change from individual to individual, however, as there ARE rapists and murderers.

DRFseven

As several here have pointed out, objectivist moral theories are always going to have the problem that they have to establish how a behavior can be wrong or right, without recourse to the effects of the behavior. My dog is a good example of a moral objectivist; things are identified as bad simply because I say they are bad. In fact, my saying so is what MAKES them bad. "Bad" means "that behavior which is connected to the sound and tone of the word, bad." I refuse to tell him that "bad" is merely a judgement on my part because the last thing I need, when my tulips are being dug up, is a moral subjectivist dog!