Brian Iverson

All of these were innovations over and above the abilities of the other great apes.

That doesn’t make them moral truths. And it was only with a proper analysis of ethics that we actually “learn” anything about ethics. What do you know about your own morality if you don’t think about it and truly analyse it? You’re simply a smarter ape. Not a…[Read more]

After all, ethics and metaethics are supposed to be talking about a real thing: what is that thing?

No Simon. That is not what ethics and metha ethics are “supposed” to be about. That’s what you think it is, almost certainly due to your lack of familiarity with ethics in general.

If “moral facts” exist, then they are facts about morality, not facts of morality.

We are left with the ability to enforce what we believe is right for our place and our time. Is what we choose to enforce really right? We can’t have that. (Want a fact about morality? There’s one.)

I have never seen a moral “principle” that was universal across…[Read more]

Reg the Fronkey Farmer wrote:
I may have a full version in my PDF collection so I will search for it and email it to you.

If you have a .pdf copy of the Westermarck, I would be interested to see it.

Karuna wrote:
Point being that things which are human constructs do appear real to people & they can be very useful.

People’s moral convictions appear real to them, as if they are “true”.  I think this objectivity is an illusion.

It’s obvious that there is a common morality … But what do you have to presuppose it’s existence?

The pressure to t…[Read more]

Humans only started rationalising and codifying moral systems 10,000 years ago and they only started doing so in an analytical and comprehensive way 2,500 years ago.

But actual human morality, whether or not it was rationalised and codified, must have begun around 2 million years ago when we hit the savannah and we were required to begin…[Read more]

So yeah then Simon. It’s dubious to assume there is moral truth. It’s only possible within a moral system.

And even if the universe set us up to have moral systems (it didn’t by the way) that doesn’t suddenly generate moral truth. Humans only started rationalising and codifying moral systems 10,000 years ago and they only started doing so in an…[Read more]

You could say that It’s useful to have morality. Also we all experience morality every day. It’s one of the things which keeps societies stable. Mackie is asking an ontological question about moral facts.

In my opinion he’s not saying that there are no  human morals.

For example take the human construct of money. Say an American dollar. It…[Read more]

What we have at the moment is facts (biological and physical) leading to a predictable morality.  So, moral realism has a point in my opinion, in that it has its roots in reality.

I read some stuff by JL Mackie, about this. The question he puts  is if moral facts do exist. That if they are real, if they exist independent of human minds? What are they like?

For example we know that gravity exists as a fact in the physical world.

Even if there were no minds the fact and properties of gravitational force would still be…[Read more]

I don’t know, I agree with you that there is no moral system out there in the universe waiting for us to discover it.  On the other hand, the universe sets up conditions for human beings such that they moral system we have is inevitable and predictable.

Please tell me what kind of falsifiable test would demonstrate that lying is wrong. I don’t want an argument for what is the most praiseworthy moral system or how we should act. How can you falsify “lying is wrong” outside of a modal system Simon?

You’re right, already the idea seems inconsistent.  “Human race” means the entire family tree.  Chimpanzees and parakeets have their own more primitive versions of morality, but the principles would be recognisable by humans.

Simon Paynton wrote:
I think the idea is, there’s an entire moral system that exists independently of the human race.

Does “human race” mean anything different from homo sapiens? If so, it applies to chimpanzees as well as parakeets and alien beings?

Wow! Tell us more.

@regthefronkeyfarmer – Westermarck

I have a paper on “Finnish philosophers” that talks about Westermarck, I’ll give it another look.  I’ve encountered him in talking about anthropology.

Unseen wrote:
anything that’s true outside any moral system

I think the idea is, there’s an entire moral system that exists independently of the human race.  That would presumably be the idea of universal human ethics.  Universal human ethics can be shown to have evolved through cooperation with interdependence (and patriarchy), along with the…[Read more]

Simon Paynton wrote:

Simon Paynton wrote:
Isn’t “moral truth” something that is “true” no matter what?  So that would make it true outside of any one moral system.

That pretty much sums up the problem. Yes, you described moral truth accurately, but I suspect anything that’s true outside any moral system is a tautology or stipulatio…[Read more]

Simon,

For a few dollars on Kindle, you might like this book.

It may be a little incomplete but it is worth a read, or a least as a reference.

I may have a full version in my PDF collection so I will search for it and email it to you.

…..Not outside of them, unless they are theologians. It is an extremely important distinction.

I completely agree. The distinction is however lost on many that venture unarmed in debates such as this. People like Hobbes and Descartes rescued philosophy from its forced marriage to theology. Kant destroyed the “proofs” for God, such as the Summa…[Read more]

Isn’t “moral truth” something that is “true” no matter what?  So that would make it true outside of any one moral system.  For example, some philosophers say that morality has evolved “to track moral truths”.  I think this is nonsense.  I find it strange that philosophers devote so much time to meta-ethics (studying the study of ethics) rather tha…[Read more]