Banden

Davis wrote:
Not finding a single human society that agreed or disagreed with any moral law doesn’t prove (or falsify) it as a moral truth. A moral truth cannot be verified or falsified like a scientific law.

Yes, even though I agree with you, I will still put the other side:  would not a universal principle be a good candidate for a moral fa…[Read more]

Davis wrote:
Not finding a single human society that agreed or disagreed with any moral law doesn’t prove (or falsify) it as a moral truth. A moral truth cannot be verified or falsified like a scientific law.

Use your eyes to read the words I have written, about 20 times:

For the 19th time, I agree with you. I’m just putting a point of view tha…

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Unseen wrote:
Any further “studies” would be superfluous and gratuitous. It’s been established factually that different societies have different moral codes. I’m not the one making an extraordinary claim here. “Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.”

That’s a simplistic cop-out.

there absolutely must be some factual, eternal, ob…

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Simon Paynton wrote:

Unseen wrote:
No. To assert as much is the logical fallacy called “composition.”

How can you assert, therefore, that there are no universal morals? How would you design a study to show that there are or are not? I would do it the same way the people in the study did, using a representative sample of the world’s socie…

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I would do it the same way the people in the study did, using a representative sample of the world’s societies.

That wouldn’t PROVE anything. That would just be anthropological documentation of human behaviour. Not finding a single human society that agreed or disagreed with any moral law doesn’t prove (or falsify) it as a moral truth. A moral t…[Read more]

Unseen wrote:
No. To assert as much is the logical fallacy called “composition.”

How can you assert, therefore, that there are no universal morals?  How would you design a study to show that there are or are not?  I would do it the same way the people in the study did, using a representative sample of the world’s societies.  I would have a longer…[Read more]

Simon Paynton wrote:
So, if the cultures are representative of the whole world, are these universal morals?

a) That’s a pretty big “if.”

b) No. To assert as much is the logical fallacy called “composition.”

I think Davis has suggest you background yourself a bit in moral philosophy. I agree. Arguing with you about this is basically like…[Read more]

I agree with you about “moral facts” such as “murder is wrong”: I think they don’t exist, too.

They are, if true, simply factual observations about the particular cultures they studied.

So, if the cultures are representative of the whole world, are these universal morals?

Simon Paynton wrote:

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

I think there are a number of possible categories of “moral facts”.

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Davis wrote:
That is not what ethics and metha ethics are “supposed” to be about.

Ethics is about something: what is it about?  Morality?  If so, then it makes sense to study morality itself.

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

I think there are a number of possible categories of “moral facts”.

1. facts about morality;
2. the idea “murder is wrong” is said by some people to be a fact;
3. the fact, “if I murder someone then I am breaking the norm that says murder is wro…

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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.