Is morality objective or subjective?

[FlashDangerpants]

All ideas including both 'facts' and moral tenets, are human creations.

There's what something is made of, and there's what it actually does, and over and over again people are only looking at the first of those aspects and then insinuating that two artifacts constructed from the same stuff (the mental for instance) are somehow equivalent.

"facts" might be human creations, but they don't do the same thing as "beliefs", so being constructs of mind or whatever doesn't make them the same.

Facts are exclusive, if one person states as fact that all moral truths derive from some principle of self-ownership, and another states as fact that all moral truths derive from a god-given principle, either one of these people must be wrong, or both of them are wrong, it is strictly senseless to suggest that they are both right.

If Henry believes that all moral stuff emanates from a principle of self-ownership, and Emmanuel believes that all good things are donated by god, that's fine, they can both believe their thing no problem.

This is because FACT AND BELIEF DO DIFFERENT STUFF and what they are made out of has no bearing on that. Anal beads and toothbrushes are also made out of similar substances, but I don't recommend assuming an equivalent function on that basis.

There is substance in what you wrote. The substance is in your meaning not in the electronic traces of your keyboard activity.

I submit that there is no essence of anything , and the meaning of anything is what it does relative to its environment.

The difference between facts and beliefs applies to social truth, not absolute truth

I'm sorry, but I just don't understand any of the religious talk in this conversation, this isn't for effect, it is genuinely all lost on me. I don't know what 'God as absolute truth' means. But I can predict that no argument predicated on beliefs about God are going to resolve any question related to facts and I'm therefore unsure why we keep going down this road.

Is that social and absolute truths bit another religion thing? It seems like an artifical division. There is a difference of type and of function between beliefs and facts.

There is a strategic error of argument structure being made here. When you want to move an object (such as a moral asserion) from the category of belief into that of fact, you need to upgrade the object somehow to meet the standards of what we meaningfully refer to as facts (which includes a mechanism for resolving contradictory claims, something that belief doesn't need). This move to downgrade the target category instead such that "social fact" is nothing but shared beliefs just results in an inevitable paradox because that argument cannot be true.

[Age]

If 'morality' is discerning between what is actually right from wrong or good from bad behavior, then like ALL human knowledge 'morality' can be BOTH objective AND subjective.

'Objective' is related to (collective/ALL) KNOWING or just Facts, which obviously could NOT be refuted by ANY one.

'Subjective' is related to (personal/individual) THINKING or just opinions, which obviously could be refuted by ANY one.

Now, obviously EVERY thought or view that is said or written down comes from a human being and the thinking within that one, and therefore is subjective, to that one. However, ANY thought could be an actual Fact, which is KNOWN to be absolutely or irrefutably True, and therefore is objective.

To look at and see things, from the objective viewpoint, and thus also KNOW what is being seen is a Fact, is just KNOWING that absolutely EVERY one could and would see the EXACT SAME thing. Once one has a thought, a view, which EVERY one could agree with and accept, then that one KNOWS they have thee actual objective or absolute Truth of things. That is; A Fact.

EVERY other thought are just personal or subjective views or in other words opinions. Let us not forget that some opinions can be absolutely or irrefutably True, Right, Accurate, and Correct - A Fact.

Now, to distinguish between what is morally objective from what is morally subjective is just gain a view about what is a right or wrong behavior, which you KNOW that absolutely EVERY one could agree with and accept.

This, by the way, is an extremely VERY SIMPLE and VERY EASY thing to do, that is; once you learn, and KNOW, HOW.

There are countless subjective moral views but there is only One objective moral view.

Discover what thee One is, then 'the world' can and will become a much better place for EVERY one to live in.

[bahman]

What is objective for example? Your nature. Is beating someone is bad? It depends on your nature.

[Age]

What objective for example? Your nature. Is beating someone is bad? It depends on your nature.

Are you asking ANY one in particular here?

[Belinda]

There's what something is made of, and there's what it actually does, and over and over again people are only looking at the first of those aspects and then insinuating that two artifacts constructed from the same stuff (the mental for instance) are somehow equivalent.

"facts" might be human creations, but they don't do the same thing as "beliefs", so being constructs of mind or whatever doesn't make them the same.

Facts are exclusive, if one person states as fact that all moral truths derive from some principle of self-ownership, and another states as fact that all moral truths derive from a god-given principle, either one of these people must be wrong, or both of them are wrong, it is strictly senseless to suggest that they are both right.

If Henry believes that all moral stuff emanates from a principle of self-ownership, and Emmanuel believes that all good things are donated by god, that's fine, they can both believe their thing no problem.

This is because FACT AND BELIEF DO DIFFERENT STUFF and what they are made out of has no bearing on that. Anal beads and toothbrushes are also made out of similar substances, but I don't recommend assuming an equivalent function on that basis.

There is substance in what you wrote. The substance is in your meaning not in the electronic traces of your keyboard activity.

I submit that there is no essence of anything , and the meaning of anything is what it does relative to its environment.

The difference between facts and beliefs applies to social truth, not absolute truth

I'm sorry, but I just don't understand any of the religious talk in this conversation, this isn't for effect, it is genuinely all lost on me. I don't know what 'God as absolute truth' means. But I can predict that no argument predicated on beliefs about God are going to resolve any question related to facts and I'm therefore unsure why we keep going down this road.

Is that social and absolute truths bit another religion thing? It seems like an artifical division. There is a difference of type and of function between beliefs and facts.

There is a strategic error of argument structure being made here. When you want to move an object (such as a moral asserion) from the category of belief into that of fact, you need to upgrade the object somehow to meet the standards of what we meaningfully refer to as facts (which includes a mechanism for resolving contradictory claims, something that belief doesn't need). This move to downgrade the target category instead such that "social fact" is nothing but shared beliefs just results in an inevitable paradox because that argument cannot be true.

Social truth is made up of truths society accepts as true. Social truth is truth relative to the state of knowledge and wisdom of society. Slavery is wrong is a social truth. Murder is wrong is a social truth. Absolute truth is not knowable because nobody is omniscient or able to think beyond intersubjectivity and relative values.

Sometimes we might feel we have chanced upon absolute truth when we see something very beautiful or very good.

[Age]

There is substance in what you wrote. The substance is in your meaning not in the electronic traces of your keyboard activity.

I submit that there is no essence of anything , and the meaning of anything is what it does relative to its environment.

The difference between facts and beliefs applies to social truth, not absolute truth

I'm sorry, but I just don't understand any of the religious talk in this conversation, this isn't for effect, it is genuinely all lost on me. I don't know what 'God as absolute truth' means. But I can predict that no argument predicated on beliefs about God are going to resolve any question related to facts and I'm therefore unsure why we keep going down this road.

Is that social and absolute truths bit another religion thing? It seems like an artifical division. There is a difference of type and of function between beliefs and facts.

There is a strategic error of argument structure being made here. When you want to move an object (such as a moral asserion) from the category of belief into that of fact, you need to upgrade the object somehow to meet the standards of what we meaningfully refer to as facts (which includes a mechanism for resolving contradictory claims, something that belief doesn't need). This move to downgrade the target category instead such that "social fact" is nothing but shared beliefs just results in an inevitable paradox because that argument cannot be true.

Social truth is made up of truths society accepts as true. Social truth is truth relative to the state of knowledge and wisdom of society. Slavery is wrong is a social truth.

BUT, in some societies 'slavery' is all right. Or, what one society calls 'slavery' another does not, and so the latter society makes 'slavery' an all right behavior.

Murder is wrong is a social truth.

BUT, in some societies murder is actually sort out, "argued" for, and legalized.

Absolute truth is not knowable because nobody is omniscient or able to think beyond intersubjectivity and relative values.

BUT, 'absolute truth' is NOT defined that way, by EVERY one.

ALSO, thinking beyond 'inter-subjectivity' and/or relative values is possible. One just needs to learn how to be able to do it, before they can.

Sometimes we might feel we have chanced upon absolute truth when we see something very beautiful or very good.

WHY would ANY one even begin to think that 'absolute truth' has absolutely ANY thing to do with, perceived, beauty or good?

[FlashDangerpants]

There is substance in what you wrote. The substance is in your meaning not in the electronic traces of your keyboard activity.

I submit that there is no essence of anything , and the meaning of anything is what it does relative to its environment.

The difference between facts and beliefs applies to social truth, not absolute truth

I'm sorry, but I just don't understand any of the religious talk in this conversation, this isn't for effect, it is genuinely all lost on me. I don't know what 'God as absolute truth' means. But I can predict that no argument predicated on beliefs about God are going to resolve any question related to facts and I'm therefore unsure why we keep going down this road.

Is that social and absolute truths bit another religion thing? It seems like an artifical division. There is a difference of type and of function between beliefs and facts.

There is a strategic error of argument structure being made here. When you want to move an object (such as a moral asserion) from the category of belief into that of fact, you need to upgrade the object somehow to meet the standards of what we meaningfully refer to as facts (which includes a mechanism for resolving contradictory claims, something that belief doesn't need). This move to downgrade the target category instead such that "social fact" is nothing but shared beliefs just results in an inevitable paradox because that argument cannot be true.

Social truth is made up of truths society accepts as true. Social truth is truth relative to the state of knowledge and wisdom of society. Slavery is wrong is a social truth. Murder is wrong is a social truth. Absolute truth is not knowable because nobody is omniscient or able to think beyond intersubjectivity and relative values.

Sometimes we might feel we have chanced upon absolute truth when we see something very beautiful or very good.

Ok... and what is this "absolute truth" thing supposed to be? What am I supposed to make of a truth that you experience when you see a very nice flower which is more true than the truth you might experience when you know the correct answer to a question?

Which sort of truth are these fact things that are verified through observation, you know like "chlorophyll converts light energy to chemical energy". Is there perhaps some sort of difference of category between that and things which are just opinions that everybody shares?

And what of those other fact things that are true by defintion such as "If Bobby is a batchelor then Bobby has no wife"?

[bahman]

What is objective for example? Your nature. Is beating someone is bad? It depends on your nature.

Are you asking ANY one in particular here?

No. I am making an argument and asking everybody.

[Age]

What is objective for example? Your nature. Is beating someone is bad? It depends on your nature.

Are you asking ANY one in particular here?

No. I am making an argument and asking everybody.

Okay.

But what exactly is your, so called, "argument" here?

'Arguments' usually, and maybe always, consist of premises and conclusions. You have neither here.

What I see are two questions, asked by you, and are they your own two answers to your own two questions?

By the way, thee actual answers to your two questions here are NOT what you wrote.

[Veritas Aequitas]

Social truth is made up of truths society accepts as true. Social truth is truth relative to the state of knowledge and wisdom of society. Slavery is wrong is a social truth. Murder is wrong is a social truth. Absolute truth is not knowable because nobody is omniscient or able to think beyond intersubjectivity and relative values.

Sometimes we might feel we have chanced upon absolute truth when we see something very beautiful or very good.

Generally all social, moral, empirical truths and the likes are inevitably linked to the human conditions.

However there are no Absolute Truths with a capital "A" and "T" independent of human conditions, i.e. the thing-in-itself.

Nevertheless there are higher and more complex truths than general truths, e.g. as you stated when one chanced upon something very beautiful or very good that culminate with a state of 'awe'. Actually this can be done strategically by preparing the necessary conditions [meditation, drugs, self-development exercises, naturally] and exposing one to the situation.

Generally when one interacts with reality, it is inevitable as an average person, to view things in parts and connected-parts but not as a greater whole per-se.
However when one encounters something beautiful or 'perfect' in a prepared state, the brain is able realize the fullness-of-the-whole and thus triggering an awe [that triggers the pleasure neural correlates] beyond intellectual explanation.

[FlashDangerpants]

So much mystical woo is making its way into this discussion. There's a religion sub for you fools to talk about yourt rituals for experiencing higher truths by use of the more magical variety of muchroom.

[Peter Holmes]

So much mystical woo is making its way into this discussion. There's a religion sub for you fools to talk about yourt rituals for experiencing higher truths by use of the more magical variety of muchroom.

Yep. The retreat into mysticism is all that's left when you've lost the rational argument - but can't afford to change your mind. Moral objectivism, like theism and other kinds of supernaturalism, is a faith.

[Belinda]

So much mystical woo is making its way into this discussion. There's a religion sub for you fools to talk about yourt rituals for experiencing higher truths by use of the more magical variety of muchroom.

It's unreasonable to deny that someone has subjective experiences. Subjective experiences are experiences to which access is limited to the experiencer.

I never tried magic mushrooms, but I have felt something of what a good artist or poet feels because I enjoyed his work of art.
It is odd that FlashDangerpants recognises and endorses reason and unreason in some material yet does not seem to recognise the affective potential of it.

BTW, what you call "mystical" is not a "higher " truth; it's an alternative perception to the common sense perception. Any evaluation of alternative perceptions is as subjective as any other evaluation.

[Belinda]

So much mystical woo is making its way into this discussion. There's a religion sub for you fools to talk about yourt rituals for experiencing higher truths by use of the more magical variety of muchroom.

It's unreasonable to deny that someone has subjective experiences. Subjective experiences are experiences to which access is limited to the experiencer.

I never tried magic mushrooms, but I have felt something of what a good artist or poet feels because I enjoyed his work of art.
It is odd that FlashDangerpants recognises and endorses reason and unreason in some material yet does not seem to recognise the affective potential of it.

BTW, what you call "mystical" is not a "higher " truth; it's an alternative perception to the common sense perception. Any evaluation of alternative perceptions is as subjective as any other evaluation.

[FlashDangerpants]

So much mystical woo is making its way into this discussion. There's a religion sub for you fools to talk about yourt rituals for experiencing higher truths by use of the more magical variety of muchroom.

It's unreasonable to deny that someone has subjective experiences.

What are you talking about Belinda?