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[Peter Holmes]

Holmes and Morton,

You seem to be off topic. Nothing you are now discussing seems to offer anything about "What could make morality objective?".
It seems to me that there can be no moral injunction which could possibly be universally understood or applicable.
Clearly what could make morality objective is the contain all moral judgement into a single entity or deity to which each human is forced to comply. This has been the rather dubious claim of the black-hooded monsters of the church since time immemorial.
When I see others claim moral objectivity all I see is a reflection of the horror of a universal church.

What? Our discussion has been smack-on-topic.

And the claim that, if moral rules came from a god (or any agent), then morality would be objective, is false. Objectivity is independence from opinion, and the opinions of a god, or any agent, can't not be opinions. If a god says 'this is morally wrong', that doesn't and can't make 'it' morally wrong - factually or objectively.

But I'm with you on the tyranny of religious institutions that falsely claim a god agrees with their moral opinions. That's the real wickedness of moral objectivism, and it's always been about power, social control and oppression.

[Terrapin Station]

What would "good" amount to where there's not a connotation of a positive valuation to it?

"good" logically cannot be valued as it is the valuing itself that is derived from the necessary ability to distinguish that it appropriates from "good".

The simple logic that something cannot give rise to itself would make it impossible to value "good" per se.

What you didn't answer is what good would amount to in your view.

[Terrapin Station]

A philosophically respectable moral theory must be universal and have a rational basis.

Why would a "philosophically respectable moral theory" have requirements that can not be met?

When I said morality "isn't about values," I meant it does not assume, or prescribe, any particular values. It does acknowledge, however, that people value various things and that their quality of life is largely determined by the extent to which those values are realized. It assumes that everyone desires to maximize his/her quality of life.

This sounds like you're talking exclusively about metaethics? Sticking to just a descriptive account of what morality is, how it works, etc.?

[Terrapin Station]

Agreed, value-judgements are subjective, by definition. But they can be, and usually are, perfectly rational.

Maybe you're using "rational" in a different way than I would? Otherwise I don't know how you'd be figuring that value judgments are rational.

The reciprocity essential for the existence of higher primate groups is there at the foundation of our morality.

So for example, re me being stumped at you thinking that values are rational, one has to care about (that is, value) the existence of "higher primate groups" to think that the existence of higher primate groups is better than the non-existence of higher primate groups. You'd have to claim something like "caring about continued existence is more rational" but I don't know how you'd get there. It doesn't seem to have anything to do with rationality. It seems to hinge on valuing existence.

particularly acts that adversely affect other moral agents, which reduce their welfare or prevent them from improving it.

(a) One has to value not adversely affecting other moral agents . . . there's not a rational way to get to "it's better to not adversely affect other moral agents" without valuing something at the start.

(b) what people consider to adversely affect them rather than 'improving' them is subjective and value-based, not rationally-based.

Whether an particular act does or does not have that effect is objectively determinable

Only per an individual, only once that individual shares their values, their desires.

[psyreporter]

"good" logically cannot be valued as it is the valuing itself that is derived from the necessary ability to distinguish that it appropriates from "good".

The simple logic that something cannot give rise to itself would make it impossible to value "good" per se.

What you didn't answer is what good would amount to in your view.

By the cited logic "good" cannot be valued as the valuing itself is essentially an appropriation of "good" and something cannot give rise to itself.

"good" must be real because otherwise valuing could not be possible.

[psyreporter]

So I think I understand what @arjand is getting at here (he/she will maybe correct me if I'm mistaken). When we talk about the 'good' of something, we're meaning more than just a temporary satisfaction of a desire or value - we're referring our sense of to an understood or imagined state of affairs that is good. In other words, there's a sense of the idea of 'good' that precedes the assignment of desire or value - it is the fixed idea or goal beyond the object itself.

The indicated "good" doesn't need to be sensible. It could be imply able. It is implied to be real but not visible in the empirical (sensible) reality. A living being could translate it to emotions and senses.

Our pursuit of specific goals may change and evolve over time, yet the idea of good is one that we understand that we may recognize when we find it, and may recognize it differently from one individual to the next, but that it is not good simply because we as an individual have chosen it and made the efforts to bring it about.

In my opinion, valuing by an individual is an appropriation of "good". The "good" is real but there is an aspect involved that, while it is not a pure mental opinion, is biased in such that it is relative to the individual only, whom cannot precede that what it derives the ability to value from. Thus, a desire, a will to survive, a strive to prevent pain etc, are much heavier than a mere mental opinion but it involves a relatively to an individual that cannot precede that from which it derives its ability to value, and whom thereby cannot define his/her values as a "fact" by the standards of empirical science.

I also think that as social beings, we all understand that any idea of the 'good' has an element of a quality that is common to all. The word functions in language similarly to the word 'true' in that we may disagree about what is or is not 'true', but our definition is such that it has an objective meaning to it. Things are not 'true' or 'good' merely because an individual 'assigns' that quality to them, but rather because they correspond to an idea of a truth or goodness that is shared with others. So in a roundabout way, I guess the bottom of my point is that say that although we all make judgments of what is good, just as we do of what is true, we can't make these judgments in isolation as individuals, but must make them as a shared understanding.

Your thoughts?

Yes, I would agree. It would be a task for philosophy to structurize a correct appropriation of "good" to evolve beyond religions and atheistic (dogmatic) empirical science.

[Sculptor1]

Holmes and Morton,

You seem to be off topic. Nothing you are now discussing seems to offer anything about "What could make morality objective?".
It seems to me that there can be no moral injunction which could possibly be universally understood or applicable.
Clearly what could make morality objective is the contain all moral judgement into a single entity or deity to which each human is forced to comply. This has been the rather dubious claim of the black-hooded monsters of the church since time immemorial.
When I see others claim moral objectivity all I see is a reflection of the horror of a universal church.

What? Our discussion has been smack-on-topic.

And the claim that, if moral rules came from a god (or any agent), then morality would be objective, is false. Objectivity is independence from opinion, and the opinions of a god, or any agent, can't not be opinions. If a god says 'this is morally wrong', that doesn't and can't make 'it' morally wrong - factually or objectively.

But I'm with you on the tyranny of religious institutions that falsely claim a god agrees with their moral opinions. That's the real wickedness of moral objectivism, and it's always been about power, social control and oppression.

And it is precisely this fact coupled with the fact that tyrannous religious in defining what god is precisely make my point which you disagree with. Definitively God has no opinion.

Aside from that there is simply NO prospect of morality being objective IN ANY SENSE.
In other words there is no prospect of morality being objective in no sense but nonsense.
Any attempt to make it so is nothing more or less than tyranny of opinion.

[Sculptor1]

Agreed, value-judgements are subjective, by definition. But they can be, and usually are, perfectly rational.

Maybe you're using "rational" in a different way than I would? Otherwise I don't know how you'd be figuring that value judgments are rational.

This is a no-brainer.
We are all perfectly capable of forming opinions rationally. It make little difference if such positions are objective or subjective as this does not bear upon their rationality.

By contrast it might be possible to state an objective fact but can be completely irrational to do so.

[GE Morton]

Very often we are. But those value judgments are subjective and have no rational basis. A philosophically respectable moral theory must be universal and have a rational basis.

Agreed, value-judgements are subjective, by definition. But they can be, and usually are, perfectly rational. It's their rationality that has resulted in social moral codes, often with universal scope, and often reinforced by law.

In response to your assertion, "When we say 'this action is morally good or bad, right or wrong', we're making a value-judgement," I said, "Very often we are." "Vernacular moralities" --- the moral precepts accepted and applied by most people --- are indeed often based on subjective values. They are absorbed unexamined through religious indoctrination, cultural conditioning, or simply reflect personal interests, preferences, emotional responses, i.e., personal values. And values are non-rational by definition.

Why identify subjectivity with irrationality? How strange

I don't. Those are different properties. Values are not irrational; they're non-rational (true of values assigned to "end goods." Values assigned to "means goods" can be rational). And because they are also subjective moral principles based on them cannot be universal.

And the very idea of a 'philosophically respectable moral theory' needs unpacking. What we need is an explanation or description of morality that makes rationally justified claims derived from sound arguments. If that's what you mean - I agree.

Yes, that is what I mean. It should be obvious that a morality based on values cannot possibly satisfy that criterion.

And I agree that description isn't prescription, in moral as in any other discourse. But the question 'what is morally right and wrong?' is central to both moral and ethical theory. And it goes beyond and deeper than a description of what people want and say about it.

Well, if so, then those depths need to be explored. But in my view, to say that some act was morally wrong merely means that it violates one or more theorems of a sound moral theory, the theorems of which impose duties or constraints on the actions of moral agents in a social setting.

My point is that value-judgements and facts are completely different things, so that nothing can make morality objective.

A moral judgment --- a rationally defensible one --- is not a value judgment. That mistake reveals why it is important not to confuse deontology with axiology. "That painting is not worth what Alfie paid or it" is a value judgment. "It was (morally) wrong for Alfie to beat his wife" is not. The latter asserts that Alfie's act violated a sound moral principle. That it did so is a matter of fact.

We do, of course, assign positive value to morally acceptable acts (they're "good") and negative value to unacceptable ones ("bad"). But that valuation has nothing to do with the soundness of the principles applied in judging those acts.

Morality is about what is morally right or wrong. Moral assertions, expressing moral judgements, contain words like 'right', 'wrong', 'good', 'bad', 'should' and 'ought'. But commands such as 'do not kill' aren't even declaratives, let alone moral declaratives. The morally significant (operative or functional) claim is 'it is wrong to kill'. 'Do and don't' commands - and, more important, simply obeying them, are morally insignificant, in the sense that the moral questions are taken as having been settled. (Of course, you're right about the practical consequences of different codes and rules.)

That is a verbal quibble. "One ought not kill" implies, "Do not kill." The declarative entails the imperative. But I agree that merely following a rule, any rule, blindly, without understanding its rationale, merits no moral praise.

[GE Morton]

A philosophically respectable moral theory must be universal and have a rational basis.

Why would a "philosophically respectable moral theory" have requirements that can not be met?

Oh, they can be met. But if they could not then morality would not be within the purview of philosophy.

This sounds like you're talking exclusively about metaethics? Sticking to just a descriptive account of what morality is, how it works, etc.?

Yes. Various metaethical questions need to be answered before ethics can be productively pursued.

[GE Morton]

(a) One has to value not adversely affecting other moral agents . . . there's not a rational way to get to "it's better to not adversely affect other moral agents" without valuing something at the start.

It is true that one must value something in order to perceive any need for moral principles. The entire aim of morality is to enhance the ability of moral agents to secure the things they value. But an agent need not value other agents in order to assent to those principles. He will assent because he perceives that compliance is in his own best interests.

(b) what people consider to adversely affect them rather than 'improving' them is subjective and value-based, not rationally-based.

Oh, no. A claim often asserted, but easily dismissed. Alfie owns a bicycle, for which he spent a month's pay. We know that Alfie values the bicycle, because he has invested time and effort to acquire it. That he has made that investment tells us that the bicycle contributes to his well-being. Then Bruno steals the bicycle. Given the above, Bruno has reduced Alfie's well-being. That latter proposition is objective, a "fact."

[psyreporter]

What you didn't answer is what good would amount to in your view.

The "good" that is indicated is empirically incomprehensible as it precedes the tangible reality. My argument is that "good" may be imply-ably comprehensible.

"good" cannot be assigned a value as valuing itself is derived from the necessary ability to distinguish, which is appropriated from "good". It means that "good" cannot amount to anything empirically. It precedes the senses.

[Terrapin Station]

What you didn't answer is what good would amount to in your view.

The "good" that is indicated is empirically incomprehensible as it precedes the tangible reality. My argument is that "good" may be imply-ably comprehensible.

What in the world are you talking about? So you're talking about something you're calling "good" that's incomprehensible?

[Terrapin Station]

(a) One has to value not adversely affecting other moral agents . . . there's not a rational way to get to "it's better to not adversely affect other moral agents" without valuing something at the start.

It is true that one must value something in order to perceive any need for moral principles. The entire aim of morality is to enhance the ability of moral agents to secure the things they value. But an agent need not value other agents in order to assent to those principles. He will assent because he perceives that compliance is in his own best interests.

?? The comment I wrote was in response to someone talking about other moral agents. I wasn't making an out-of-context generalization.It was a response to that specific comment.

(b) what people consider to adversely affect them rather than 'improving' them is subjective and value-based, not rationally-based.

Oh, no. A claim often asserted, but easily dismissed. Alfie owns a bicycle, for which he spent a month's pay. We know that Alfie values the bicycle, because he has invested time and effort to acquire it. That he has made that investment tells us that the bicycle contributes to his well-being. Then Bruno steals the bicycle. Given the above, Bruno has reduced Alfie's well-being. That latter proposition is objective, a "fact."
[/quote]

It's based on what Alfie values, which isn't objective.

[GE Morton]

It's based on what Alfie values, which isn't objective.

No it is not. It is based on the fact that Alfie values the bicycle.

This is a surprisingly hard point to get across.

We don't care what Alfie values or why he values it, which are indeed subjective. But we know that he does value certain things, and that those things contribute to his quality of life. Those are objective facts.