Is morality objective or subjective?

[Immanuel Can]

Does the fact that there are passages in the Bible which seem morally repugnant to many modern ears not tell us that human beings have an innate sense of right and wrong ourselves, independent of any God?

Does the fact that women in our modern society slaughter more babies every year than Hitler ever did make you think we're great moral touchstones? It doesn't seem to be "repugnant to modern ears," nor does euthanasia, nor pornography, nor warfare, nor sex slavery...before you offer moderns as good exemplars, maybe you should take a closer look. It seems, rather, that not enough is "repugnant to modern ears."

Well genocide and drowning just about everyone on Earth aren't exactly any better than abortion and sex slavery.

Are you all shook up over the ante-diluvians, Gary? I wouldn't waste your tears: I think they have enough water already.

If you were to read about that, you'd find out why that was unavoidable. As the Bible says, "Then the Lord saw that the wickedness of mankind was great on the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of their hearts was only evil continually." So what it tells us is that God is just. Man's evil does not get free rein. Eventually, accountability comes. And that's something we should all take to heart.

[Gary Childress]

Does the fact that women in our modern society slaughter more babies every year than Hitler ever did make you think we're great moral touchstones? It doesn't seem to be "repugnant to modern ears," nor does euthanasia, nor pornography, nor warfare, nor sex slavery...before you offer moderns as good exemplars, maybe you should take a closer look. It seems, rather, that not enough is "repugnant to modern ears."

Well genocide and drowning just about everyone on Earth aren't exactly any better than abortion and sex slavery.

Are you all shook up over the ante-diluvians, Gary? I wouldn't waste your tears: I think they have enough water already.

If you were to read about that, you'd find out why that was unavoidable. As the Bible says, "Then the Lord saw that the wickedness of mankind was great on the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of their hearts was only evil continually." So what it tells us is that God is just. Man's evil does not get free rein. Eventually, accountability comes. And that's something we should all take to heart.

"They deserved it," eh?

[Immanuel Can]

Well genocide and drowning just about everyone on Earth aren't exactly any better than abortion and sex slavery.

Are you all shook up over the ante-diluvians, Gary? I wouldn't waste your tears: I think they have enough water already.

If you were to read about that, you'd find out why that was unavoidable. As the Bible says, "Then the Lord saw that the wickedness of mankind was great on the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of their hearts was only evil continually." So what it tells us is that God is just. Man's evil does not get free rein. Eventually, accountability comes. And that's something we should all take to heart.

"They deserved it," eh?

Certainly. In the end, we all get what we deserve. That's what justice really is: it's when you get just what you've earned.

That's why the Bible says, "The wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life, through Jesus Christ our Lord." You can take the mercy, or you can take the judgment. Either way, we get exactly what we asked for.

[Gary Childress]

Are you all shook up over the ante-diluvians, Gary? I wouldn't waste your tears: I think they have enough water already.

If you were to read about that, you'd find out why that was unavoidable. As the Bible says, "Then the Lord saw that the wickedness of mankind was great on the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of their hearts was only evil continually." So what it tells us is that God is just. Man's evil does not get free rein. Eventually, accountability comes. And that's something we should all take to heart.

"They deserved it," eh?

Certainly. In the end, we all get what we deserve. That's what justice really is: it's when you get just what you've earned.

That's why the Bible says, "The wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life, through Jesus Christ our Lord." You can take the mercy, or you can take the judgment. Either way, we get exactly what we asked for.

OK. I'll take the mercy then. Sounds good. Thanks.

[Immanuel Can]

"They deserved it," eh?

Certainly. In the end, we all get what we deserve. That's what justice really is: it's when you get just what you've earned.

That's why the Bible says, "The wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life, through Jesus Christ our Lord." You can take the mercy, or you can take the judgment. Either way, we get exactly what we asked for.

OK. I'll take the mercy then. Sounds good. Thanks.

Good choice. I hope you mean it. On the other hand, if you think you can just say it, and that it comes without any responsibilities or change of life...well, you won't find it does. So you'll have to be willing to count the cost, and make your decision accordingly.

[Gary Childress]

Certainly. In the end, we all get what we deserve. That's what justice really is: it's when you get just what you've earned.

That's why the Bible says, "The wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life, through Jesus Christ our Lord." You can take the mercy, or you can take the judgment. Either way, we get exactly what we asked for.

OK. I'll take the mercy then. Sounds good. Thanks.

Good choice. I hope you mean it. On the other hand, if you think you can just say it, and that it comes without any responsibilities or change of life...well, you won't find it does. So you'll have to be willing to count the cost, and make your decision accordingly.

Well, if the choice is eternal torment or else mercy, what choice do I really have? It's like asking a person if they'd like to be hit with a baseball bat or not hit with a baseball bat. I've had the torment thing before in life and it kind of sucks.

[Will Bouwman]

Are you all shook up over the ante-diluvians, Gary? I wouldn't waste your tears: I think they have enough water already.

Do you really think that your God killing almost the entire human race is material for a joke?

...the Bible says, "The wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life, through Jesus Christ our Lord."

Jesus Christ was a bit late for the antediluvians.

[Harbal]

That's not going to work. The "intention" and the actual "consequences" are notoriously sometimes different. It's like the old Kant-Mill controversy: Kant thinks motivations are everything, and Mill says only the consequences are determinative of morality, and they arrive at opposite moral judgments relative to the same actions.

It's not a question of its working.

It is, because your answer doesn't "work" as a logical statement. Consequences and intention are very different and sometimes even oppositional touchstones for working out what is moral.

Intentions are always about producing consequences. If you make a moral decision (a decision that has moral implications), the moral desirability of the anticipated consequences is an intrinsic part of your decision making process. If you talked a woman out of having an abortion, and then both she and her baby died during childbirth, because of some unforeseen complications, would that make your decision to dissuade her from having the abortion a morally bad decision? I would say not, or at least not from your point of view, because your decision was made on the grounds of what you believed to be morally right in respect to your anticipated outcome.

If a decision is made on what are considered to be

By whom? Who establishes what "good moral grounds" are?

You, me, the man next door, God; whoever is involved in making the decision.

...those who considered it to have been made on good moral grounds would regard it as a morally good decision, even if the consequences turned out to be disastrous.

So now you're going with intentions, and rejecting consequentialism.

No, I'm not changing anything. Even you, when you make a moral decision based on "objective moral truth" cannot guarantee that the consequences will be what you intended.

I don't think we are any kind of "specially exalted" creature, and I do think we are just another kind of beast. I do think human beings are a special case, but that is only because I am a member of the species. I believe our sense of morality and our capacity for caring about the welfare of one another is a product of human evolution; it enables us to much more successfully function as a social species.

Think of what an odd view that is: that a reflective creature such as we are would say to himself, "Well, what I'm going to do might damage my prospects of achievement or survival, and it probably will doom my community in some way, but I'm just fine with it because I think the species will be benefitted thereby." Does that really sound to you like the thinking anybody does?

That's not what I meant at all, and I'm pretty sure you know that.

But the larger point is this: what makes species surival a moral imperative? The Tasmanian tiger and the dodo bird went extinct. If we are just accidental animals, such as they were, then why should the rules be different for us?

Species survival is a moral imperative to a lot of people, but I am talking about it in the context of its being an evolutionary imperative. Giving human beings a capacity for moral feelings is just one of the ways that natural selection has followed that imperative.

Think of conscience like the fire alarm you have in your house. Sometimes it goes off for a good reason, such as an actual fire. Sometimes it goes off when you just burnt some toast, or when the battery malfunctioned. But a smart homeowner checks anyway. Conscience is useful, but it's far from a perfect instructor as to what right and wrong are: it needs to be informed by revelation and reason, so as to detect when it is going right, and when it is going wrong.

Reason can only help with morality once you have a moral framework to which you can refer. What you call "revelation" is just something that was written down a long time ago, and that you have chosen to accept as some kind of truth. I can't say if your decision to do that was an emotional or rational decision, I can only say it was a strange one. But your moral point of reference is written down in a book, and you use your rational faculties to determine whether your moral decisions and actions align with it. That seems to be what morality is to you, but it is very much not what morality is to me.

I can make a rational judgement to check that my behaviour is in tune with my moral principles; however, I didn't accumulate those principles by means of any rational process, but, rather, by an emotional one. I'm not trying to make a case for how effective or desirable that state of affairs is, I am just trying to explain my concept of what morality is.

Exactly, people see moral issues differently, and that is precisely what makes morality subjective.

No, it only makes some people wrong.

But it only makes them wrong is someone else's opinion.

What it cannot show is that contradictory choices are both moral.

But it can do that, because morality is relative, not absolute.

It cannot be both moral and immoral to murder somebody.

As its being wrong is part of the definition of "murder", I daresay you are correct in that.

In every case, it's either a moral death or an immoral one. And that doesn't depend on how psychotic the murder is, or how he "feels" about what he did.

That point of view may well demonstrate good religion, but not good philosophy.


You've said things about objectively morality, but you still have given no reason to think that such a thing could possibly exist. What you have is something along the lines of an unproven theory.

[Belinda]

It's not a question of its working.

It is, because your answer doesn't "work" as a logical statement. Consequences and intention are very different and sometimes even oppositional touchstones for working out what is moral.

Intentions are always about producing consequences. If you make a moral decision (a decision that has moral implications), the moral desirability of the anticipated consequences is an intrinsic part of your decision making process. If you talked a woman out of having an abortion, and then both she and her baby died during childbirth, because of some unforeseen complications, would that make your decision to dissuade her from having the abortion a morally bad decision? I would say not, or at least not from your point of view, because your decision was made on the grounds of what you believed to be morally right in respect to your anticipated outcome.

If a decision is made on what are considered to be

By whom? Who establishes what "good moral grounds" are?

You, me, the man next door, God; whoever is involved in making the decision.

...those who considered it to have been made on good moral grounds would regard it as a morally good decision, even if the consequences turned out to be disastrous.

So now you're going with intentions, and rejecting consequentialism.

No, I'm not changing anything. Even you, when you make a moral decision based on "objective moral truth" cannot guarantee that the consequences will be what you intended.

I don't think we are any kind of "specially exalted" creature, and I do think we are just another kind of beast. I do think human beings are a special case, but that is only because I am a member of the species. I believe our sense of morality and our capacity for caring about the welfare of one another is a product of human evolution; it enables us to much more successfully function as a social species.

Think of what an odd view that is: that a reflective creature such as we are would say to himself, "Well, what I'm going to do might damage my prospects of achievement or survival, and it probably will doom my community in some way, but I'm just fine with it because I think the species will be benefitted thereby." Does that really sound to you like the thinking anybody does?

That's not what I meant at all, and I'm pretty sure you know that.

But the larger point is this: what makes species surival a moral imperative? The Tasmanian tiger and the dodo bird went extinct. If we are just accidental animals, such as they were, then why should the rules be different for us?

Species survival is a moral imperative to a lot of people, but I am talking about it in the context of its being an evolutionary imperative. Giving human beings a capacity for moral feelings is just one of the ways that natural selection has followed that imperative.

Think of conscience like the fire alarm you have in your house. Sometimes it goes off for a good reason, such as an actual fire. Sometimes it goes off when you just burnt some toast, or when the battery malfunctioned. But a smart homeowner checks anyway. Conscience is useful, but it's far from a perfect instructor as to what right and wrong are: it needs to be informed by revelation and reason, so as to detect when it is going right, and when it is going wrong.

Reason can only help with morality once you have a moral framework to which you can refer. What you call "revelation" is just something that was written down a long time ago, and that you have chosen to accept as some kind of truth. I can't say if your decision to do that was an emotional or rational decision, I can only say it was a strange one. But your moral point of reference is written down in a book, and you use your rational faculties to determine whether your moral decisions and actions align with it. That seems to be what morality is to you, but it is very much not what morality is to me.

I can make a rational judgement to check that my behaviour is in tune with my moral principles; however, I didn't accumulate those principles by means of any rational process, but, rather, by an emotional one. I'm not trying to make a case for how effective or desirable that state of affairs is, I am just trying to explain my concept of what morality is.

Exactly, people see moral issues differently, and that is precisely what makes morality subjective.

No, it only makes some people wrong.

But it only makes them wrong is someone else's opinion.

What it cannot show is that contradictory choices are both moral.

But it can do that, because morality is relative, not absolute.

It cannot be both moral and immoral to murder somebody.

As its being wrong is part of the definition of "murder", I daresay you are correct in that.

In every case, it's either a moral death or an immoral one. And that doesn't depend on how psychotic the murder is, or how he "feels" about what he did.

That point of view may well demonstrate good religion, but not good philosophy.


You've said things about objectively morality, but you still have given no reason to think that such a thing could possibly exist. What you have is something along the lines of an unproven theory.

Morals pertain to responsibility.I mean that a socialist politician uses the utilitarian principle more than does a normal private individual whose responsibility is to himself, her child, and to beings he loves generally, such as domestic animals.

IC's God is a character in a book that IC has been taught to revere to the letter as an icon of all that is good true and beautiful. The trouble with the IC type view is that this icon they call God is known by the medieval interpretation which is no longer fit for purposes of good ,truth, and beauty.

Jesus of Nazareth was a ' moderniser ' but unfortunately Jesus's reputation has been tainted by miracles and politics, a reputation which some poets and others have tried to rectify in the name of truth good, and beauty. Fortunately Jesus was a man not a god and therefore his life may be adapted to assist any world view. that adheres to goodness as The Golden Rule.

[Harbal]

Morals pertain to responsibility.I mean that a socialist politician uses the utilitarian principle more than does a normal private individual whose responsibility is to himself, her child, and to beings he loves generally, such as domestic animals.

IC's God is a character in a book that IC has been taught to revere to the letter as an icon of all that is good true and beautiful. The trouble with the IC type view is that this icon they call God is known by the medieval interpretation which is no longer fit for purposes of good ,truth, and beauty.

Jesus of Nazareth was a ' moderniser ' but unfortunately Jesus's reputation has been tainted by miracles and politics, a reputation which some poets and others have tried to rectify in the name of truth good, and beauty. Fortunately Jesus was a man not a god and therefore his life may be adapted to assist any world view. that adheres to goodness as The Golden Rule.

Your appearances are too few and far between, these days, Belinda. We don't see nearly enough of you.

[Immanuel Can]

OK. I'll take the mercy then. Sounds good. Thanks.

Good choice. I hope you mean it. On the other hand, if you think you can just say it, and that it comes without any responsibilities or change of life...well, you won't find it does. So you'll have to be willing to count the cost, and make your decision accordingly.

Well, if the choice is eternal torment or else mercy, what choice do I really have? It's like asking a person if they'd like to be hit with a baseball bat or not hit with a baseball bat. I've had the torment thing before in life and it kind of sucks.

And yet, not everybody has your common sense. Some would rather go for an eternity without God, on speculation that will work out better...or that maybe the eternal pit of black oblivion would be a better option.

People think odd things, sometimes.

As Jesus said, "If anyone wants to come after Me, he must deny himself, take up his cross, and follow Me. For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake and the gospel’s will save it. For what does it benefit a person to gain the whole world, and forfeit his soul?"

[Immanuel Can]

Are you all shook up over the ante-diluvians, Gary? I wouldn't waste your tears: I think they have enough water already.

Do you really think that your God killing almost the entire human race is material for a joke?

Given who they were, it's cause for celebration. Would we really want unrelenting wickedness to be turned loose on the Earth perpetually? And could a good God allow that?

...the Bible says, "The wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life, through Jesus Christ our Lord."

Jesus Christ was a bit late for the antediluvians.

That's the thing about God: He's not bound by time. He knows who will and won't respond to His free offer of salvation. He can see the end of things from the beginning. You can be quite sure that if the ante-diluvians would ever have responded to God's offer of mercy, they, too, would have been saved.

And then there's Noah. Noah was saved, as was his family. He was saved by believing God, when everybody else would not. Perhaps you forgot that part of the story, Will. You can be quite sure that if the ante-diluvians were judged, they were judged rightly. But Noah was not. They were past any point of repentance or faith. He made the better choice.

[Immanuel Can]

It's not a question of its working.

It is, because your answer doesn't "work" as a logical statement. Consequences and intention are very different and sometimes even oppositional touchstones for working out what is moral.

Intentions are always about producing consequences.

Yes, they are: but often, what was intended notoriously does not issue in the expected consequence.

If you make a moral decision (a decision that has moral implications), the moral desirability of the anticipated consequences is an intrinsic part of your decision making process.

A part? Yes, of course. But if it's the major consideration, then that's Consequentialism. And Consequentialism holds that intentions are secondary to consequences, so if a person intended evil and, as so often happens, failed to get the negative result he aimed at, he still did a morally-right thing...even if he was acting on a deadly hatred for his neighbour.

If you talked a woman out of having an abortion, and then both she and her baby died during childbirth, because of some unforeseen complications, would that make your decision to dissuade her from having the abortion a morally bad decision? I would say not,...

Wait...now you're a Deontologist? Deontologists believe the motive is everything and the outcome can't be foreseen. So now you're arguing the opposite?

Do you see the problem there? Consequentialism would say I did the wrong thing. Deontology would say I did the right thing. So now, we need a meta-system, something "above" both Deontology and Consequentialism, to tell us whether what I did was moral or not.

If a decision is made on what are considered to be

By whom? Who establishes what "good moral grounds" are?

You, me, the man next door, God; whoever is involved in making the decision.

That's no good, unless you want to accept that Hitler, Stalin and Mao are just as morally reliable as you and I are.

...those who considered it to have been made on good moral grounds would regard it as a morally good decision, even if the consequences turned out to be disastrous.

So now you're going with intentions, and rejecting consequentialism.

No, I'm not changing anything. Even you, when you make a moral decision based on "objective moral truth" cannot guarantee that the consequences will be what you intended.

That's a Deontological argument. You are rejecting Consequentialism, then?

I don't think we are any kind of "specially exalted" creature, and I do think we are just another kind of beast. I do think human beings are a special case, but that is only because I am a member of the species.

Today's Lefties call that "speciesism," and damn it as as great sin as racism. They're nuts, of course...but they do have this much of a point: it's that if we are beasts, then there's no longer a reason to think of ourselves as better than or exempt from the natural laws governing beasts. And that leads to all kinds of absurdities and paradoxes, of course; so you might want to find a better reason to regard human beings as a "special case" than that you're just pulling for your own team.

I believe our sense of morality and our capacity for caring about the welfare of one another is a product of human evolution; it enables us to much more successfully function as a social species.

Except it often doesn't. People understand "caring" in different ways, and even when they don't, they often find that being "caring" ends up costing them something of serious value. A straightforward Social Darwinism would instruct them to seek out their own interests, and if they survive, they survive by survival-of-the-fittest; and if they die, they deserved to die by survival-of-the-fittest, and it's survival-of-the-fittest that promotes evolution and the ultimate good of the race, not some absurd attempt to manage outcomes (which, as you note, we cannot successfully do, anyway) in the interests of the "species" instead of ourselves.

Species survival is a moral imperative to a lot of people, but I am talking about it in the context of its being an evolutionary imperative.

Evolution has no "imperatives." It causes things to live, and it kills things...often whole species. If you think Evolution loves you, or loves the human race, and makes it imperative for them to win at the game of Evolution, then you'll have to explain why you think that.

Reason can only help with morality once you have a moral framework to which you can refer.

Now you've got it. That's why it's not reason alone that's necessary. You need the moral framework within which it can reason. Reason itself is a neutral property like mathematics: it is indifferent to content, and can be used for all kinds of content. So the substantive content upon which reason will be premises has to come before reason can do any work.

What you call "revelation" is just something that was written down a long time ago, and that you have chosen to accept as some kind of truth.

Do you have a better method for God to reveal the essential framework to mankind? If you do, I'd be interested in hearing what you think it should have been.

I can make a rational judgement to check that my behaviour is in tune with my moral principles; however, I didn't accumulate those principles by means of any rational process, but, rather, by an emotional one. I'm not trying to make a case for how effective or desirable that state of affairs is, I am just trying to explain my concept of what morality is.

I get that. But now you've made twinges the ultimate and final moral authority. If your emotions or feelings tell you something, then that becomes your "moral" premise. However, as you know, feelings are very treacherous little things. They change not only between people, but within you, all the time. So your moral framework is currently set on a foundation of sand. You cannot safely even trust it yourself, let alone structure an argument, a moral position, a judicial result, a social system, or anything else on it.

But it only makes them wrong is someone else's opinion.

And some opinions are right, and some are wrong.

But it can do that, because morality is relative, not absolute.

No, because as Aristotle so precisely pointed out, it is not possible for two equal and opposite claims to be true at the same time, in the same way. So it cannot be both moral and immoral to murder your baby.

As its being wrong is part of the definition of "murder", I daresay you are correct in that.

Say, "deliberately kill," then.

That point of view may well demonstrate good religion, but not good philosophy.

It's very good philosophy, too. Because Emotivism is not a sound basis for morality...and that's a generally-recognized truism among moral philosophers today. I don't think any real thinker since Hume has really made any case for Emotivism, and Hume's case was a kind of rearguard action to keep his is-ought from tipping over into Nihilism...a feint on which Nietzsche called him, actually.

You've said things about objectively morality, but you still have given no reason to think that such a thing could possibly exist. What you have is something along the lines of an unproven theory.

I have said a great deal more than Subjectivism has to offer. I have pointed out that IF God exists, then morality can be made intelligible and rational. IF God did not exist, it could not. That's a great deal more than nothing. At the very least, it lets us rule out Subjectivism. And then we face the choice Hume tried to avoid by recourse to Emotivism -- the choice between faith and Nihilism.

Those are the only rational choices there actually are. Subjectivism just doesn't work.

[Harbal]

By whom? Who establishes what "good moral grounds" are?

You, me, the man next door, God; whoever is involved in making the decision.

That's no good, unless you want to accept that Hitler, Stalin and Mao are just as morally reliable as you and I are.

"Morally reliable" seems a strange term; I'm not quite sure what it could mean. The fact that those people might have a moral position does not mean I have to accept it; especially if it conflicts with mine. I don't know about Mao, but I doubt that Stalin even had a sense of morality; his conduct certainly suggested he did not.

No, I'm not changing anything. Even you, when you make a moral decision based on "objective moral truth" cannot guarantee that the consequences will be what you intended.

That's a Deontological argument. You are rejecting Consequentialism, then?

I have no idea what you are talking about, but I assume it is one of your notorious diversion tactics.

Reason can only help with morality once you have a moral framework to which you can refer.

Now you've got it. That's why it's not reason alone that's necessary. You need the moral framework within which it can reason. Reason itself is a neutral property like mathematics: it is indifferent to content, and can be used for all kinds of content. So the substantive content upon which reason will be premises has to come before reason can do any work.

We both have such a framework; it's just that we have acquired them in different ways, and you are under the misconception that yours is founded on some sort of objective truth.

What you call "revelation" is just something that was written down a long time ago, and that you have chosen to accept as some kind of truth.

Do you have a better method for God to reveal the essential framework to mankind? If you do, I'd be interested in hearing what you think it should have been.

What reason would I have for devising a method for an imaginary being to express his wishes?

But it only makes them wrong is someone else's opinion.

And some opinions are right, and some are wrong.

Moral opinions can only be right or wrong in relation to other moral opinions.

But it can do that, because morality is relative, not absolute.

No, because as Aristotle so precisely pointed out, it is not possible for two equal and opposite claims to be true at the same time, in the same way. So it cannot be both moral and immoral to murder your baby.

What if I claim blue is preferable to red, and you claim red is better? what do you think Aristotle would say to that? As for the moral implications of murdering your baby, I suppose it would depend on its colour.

That point of view may well demonstrate good religion, but not good philosophy.

It's very good philosophy, too.

You said: "In every case, it's either a moral death or an immoral one. And that doesn't depend on how psychotic the murder is, or how he "feels" about what he did."

There's quite a bit to think about there, and thinking you can deal with it with a simple blanket response is not remotely in keeping with any principles of philosophy.

You've said things about objectively morality, but you still have given no reason to think that such a thing could possibly exist. What you have is something along the lines of an unproven theory.

I have said a great deal more than Subjectivism has to offer.

I am not defending "subjectivism", or its ability to offer any particular thing, I am merely asserting it's existence. It is a fact that people do have their own subjective opinions about moral issues, so no reasonable person could deny that there is such a thing as subjective morality; whether you think it is any good for anything is a different matter.

As we already know beyond any doubt that there is such a thing as subjective morality, the thread title should really be asking if there is also such a thing as objective morality. My answer to that is, of course there isn't, it is an impossibility, I think it could even be said to be a contradiction in terms. However, if the true spirit of philosophy is to be adhered to, one must always allow for the possibility of being wrong, so I am leaving myself open to that possibility, but you have so far given me not the slightest reason to think I even might be wrong.

I have pointed out that IF God exists, then morality can be made intelligible and rational.

Well I know of no actual sign of God's existence, bit if he did exist, why would I think that morality depended on him?

IF God did not exist, it could not. That's a great deal more than nothing.

But only if you value a groundless assertion a great deal more than nothing.

At the very least, it lets us rule out Subjectivism.

No it doesn't. It would just mean that there were two systems of morality in operation.

And then we face the choice Hume tried to avoid by recourse to Emotivism -- the choice between faith and Nihilism.

I don't envy you that choice; I certainly wouldn't like to be faced with it.

Those are the only rational choices there actually are. Subjectivism just doesn't work.

It works for me, and many others, it would seem.

[Immanuel Can]

You, me, the man next door, God; whoever is involved in making the decision.

That's no good, unless you want to accept that Hitler, Stalin and Mao are just as morally reliable as you and I are.

"Morally reliable" seems a strange term; I'm not quite sure what it could mean.

Oh, it's very simple: I only mean that you would have to think that those three were just as "good" (whatever you take that term to mean) at knowing and acting in ways that are "moral" as anybody else is.

The fact that those people might have a moral position does not mean I have to accept it; especially if it conflicts with mine.

No: but Subjectivism means you have no basis at all for speaking against it. You can say, "I don't like it," but that's not much to say, and certainly doesn't rally others to help you prevent whatever devilry such types are up to, or to explain why a good person should oppose them.

I don't know about Mao, but I doubt that Stalin even had a sense of morality; his conduct certainly suggested he did not.

That's a very irrational statement for any Subjectivist to make, though. He would have to think that whatever Stalin did was justified entirely by whatever sense of the thing Stalin had. If Stalin was happy, the Subjectivist would have to say, then he was also as close to "right" as anything can come.

So much for Emotivism.

No, I'm not changing anything. Even you, when you make a moral decision based on "objective moral truth" cannot guarantee that the consequences will be what you intended.

That's a Deontological argument. You are rejecting Consequentialism, then?

I have no idea what you are talking about, but I assume it is one of your notorious diversion tactics.

It's not. Deontology is based on the believe that intentions define the moral value of an action, and Consequentialism means believing the action is justified by whatever outcome it has.

If you'll forgive me, these are basic terms in ethics. I'm honestly surprised you haven't come across them. But I certainly was not trying any "diversion." I was right on point.

Reason can only help with morality once you have a moral framework to which you can refer.

Now you've got it. That's why it's not reason alone that's necessary. You need the moral framework within which it can reason. Reason itself is a neutral property like mathematics: it is indifferent to content, and can be used for all kinds of content. So the substantive content upon which reason will be premises has to come before reason can do any work.

We both have such a framework; it's just that we have acquired them in different ways, and you are under the misconception that yours is founded on some sort of objective truth.

You don't actually have a framework. You've got emotion. That's nothing. It can change every day after a good dinner.

What you call "revelation" is just something that was written down a long time ago, and that you have chosen to accept as some kind of truth.

Do you have a better method for God to reveal the essential framework to mankind? If you do, I'd be interested in hearing what you think it should have been.

What reason would I have for devising a method for an imaginary being to express his wishes?

Well, since you criticized God's methodology, I was assuming you had some better idea. And since you don't, I don't think you can judge whether or not God used the most expeditious and appropriate method. So it sort of ruins your criticism.

But it only makes them wrong is someone else's opinion.

And some opinions are right, and some are wrong.

Moral opinions can only be right or wrong in relation to other moral opinions.

Well, then, Stalin wasn't wrong. In relation to the opinions of Hitler and Mao, and of all of the lackeys he led, he was right. Is that your position?

But it can do that, because morality is relative, not absolute.

No, because as Aristotle so precisely pointed out, it is not possible for two equal and opposite claims to be true at the same time, in the same way. So it cannot be both moral and immoral to murder your baby.

What if I claim blue is preferable to red, and you claim red is better?

That's not a factual or moral judgment. It's aesthetic. And the rules are quite different for aesthetics. Aesthetics are about taste, not facts or moral values.

That point of view may well demonstrate good religion, but not good philosophy.

It's very good philosophy, too.

You said: "In every case, it's either a moral death or an immoral one. And that doesn't depend on how psychotic the murder is, or how he "feels" about what he did."
There's quite a bit to think about there, and thinking you can deal with it with a simple blanket response is not remotely in keeping with any principles of philosophy.

Illuminate me. What more do you think needs to be said than that?

It is a fact that people do have their own subjective opinions about moral issues, so no reasonable person could deny that there is such a thing as subjective morality; whether you think it is any good for anything is a different matter.

Ah. A key distinction.
There is such thing as "subjective moralizing," meaning the action of pretending some things are actually good or evil. Subjectivists do that all the time. But there's no "subjective morality," by definition: because anything entirely subjective has no defining features at all, other than that it fails to correspond to anything objective.

As we already know beyond any doubt that there is such a thing as subjective morality,...

We actually know the opposite: there's no such thing as a subjective morality, though Subjectivists attempt to moralize all the time.

In other words, it's not unusual for human beings to behave irrationally and inconsistently. Moral Subjectivists do just that. But philosophers think it's their job to find such inconsistencies and point them out. That's what we're doing here.

I have pointed out that IF God exists, then morality can be made intelligible and rational.

Well I know of no actual sign of God's existence, bit if he did exist, why would I think that morality depended on him?

I would have to, obviously: as the Creator of all things, there could be no source higher.

At the very least, it lets us rule out Subjectivism.

No it doesn't. It would just mean that there were two systems of morality in operation.

Only one that is actually a "morality." The other is merely an emotion, a twinge. We don't know what its status would be, but since it denies any relation to objectivity, we have to take it at its word, that it has none.

And then we face the choice Hume tried to avoid by recourse to Emotivism -- the choice between faith and Nihilism.

I don't envy you that choice; I certainly wouldn't like to be faced with it.

It's the human choice. Nobody escapes it. But some do try to deny it. Subjectivism is man trying to get away from the consequences of his own folly and God-hatred, and to declare his moral autonomy. He gets his goal only by the expedient of being totally irrational.