What could make morality objective?

[Veritas Aequitas]

I suggest we need to clarify the use of the words belief and fact. And I apologise for contributing to the confusion. I wrote the following:

'...the fact that we have a moral belief/standard doesn't make that belief a fact - which is what [moral objectivists] insist is the case.'

What we call a fact is a feature of reality that is or was the case. And a factual assertion - typically a linguistic expression - says that a feature of reality is or was the case - which is why it may be (classically) true or false.

By contrast, what we call a belief is the acceptance or agreement that something is or was (or will be) the case, or that a factual assertion is true or false. So, though it need not be, it can be confusing to call a belief true or false, because acceptance and rejection (belief and disbelief) have no truth-value.

So - to untangle what I wrote.

1 It can be a fact that we have a moral belief, such as that X is morally wrong. So the factual assertion 'we believe X is morally wrong' can be true or false. If we do believe it, then the assertion is true, because it asserts a feature of reality that is the case - that we believe something is the case.

2 But the moral assertion 'X is morally wrong' is separate and independent from the factual assertion 'we believe X is morally wrong', just as the factual assertion 'water is H2O' is separate and independent from the factual assertion 'we believe water is H2O'.

3 So. The fact that we believe X is the case does not make it a fact that X is the case. If X is the case, then our belief or disbelief that X is the case is irrelevant. For example, that (one city called) Paris is the capital of France is a fact - a feature of reality that is the case.

4 Moral objectivists claim that an assertion such as 'homosexuality is morally wrong' asserts a fact - a feature of reality that just is the case, regardless of anyone's belief - so that the assertion 'homosexuality is morally wrong' has a (classical) truth-value: true.

5 So, to rewrite: The fact that we have a moral belief does not mean that what we believe is indeed the case. (And I reckon that should be acceptable for everyone - objectivists as well as subjectivists.)

I have already explained a 'million' times your 'what is fact' is grounded on an illusion.
PH's What is Fact is Illusory
viewtopic.php?f=8&t=39577

Then you relied upon an illusion to refute what others claimed as what real facts are.

Why are you so insistent on the truism 'a belief [the unproven] cannot be a fact [the proven]'? or oxymoron 'a belief can be a fact'.

When moral agents [moral objectivists] claim there are objective moral facts, they are not claiming moral beliefs are facts [your sort of illusory facts].
Where moral objectivists claim there are objective moral facts, they are relying on their intuition [based on experiences and evidences] but are unable to provide the proper proofs to justify their claim.
What they claimed as objective moral facts are not in line with your 'what is fact' which is illusory.

As I had argued,
There are Two Senses of 'What is Fact'
viewtopic.php?f=8&t=39587
1. The human independent facts [yours which is illusory] re philosophical realism
2. The FSR-FSK-ed objective facts.

While most of the moral objectivists moral claims are intuitive with bare arguments, they are actually FSR-FSK based with a range of degrees of objectivity.
I have provided argument that moral objective facts are tenable based on the FSK basis.

What is Moral Objectivity?
viewtopic.php?f=8&t=30707

There are Objective Moral Facts
viewtopic.php?f=8&t=35002

What you need to understand is you as with the majority are driven by an evolutionary default to cling to a dogmatic fundamentalistic ideology of human independent external world and reality. It is fundamentally a psychological issue, not an epistemological one.
Hume: The Independent External World is a Fabrication
viewtopic.php?t=40791

[Peter Holmes]

Where moral objectivists claim there are objective moral facts, they are relying on their intuition [based on experiences and evidences] but are unable to provide the proper proofs to justify their claim.

An objective moral fact is nothing more than, or different from, a moral fact. Objective and factual are virtually synonyms. (There's no such thing as a subjective fact. Contradiction in terms.)

What?! Now you admit it! Objectivists know intuitively that there are moral facts - but can't prove it. So what 'experiences and evidences' do they have that they can't share? (What codswallop.)

What you need to understand is you as with the majority are driven by an evolutionary default to cling to a dogmatic fundamentalistic ideology of human independent external world and reality. It is fundamentally a psychological issue, not an epistemological one.
Hume: The Independent External World is a Fabrication
viewtopic.php?t=40791

What you need to understand is that empiricist skepticism - that Hume accepted and Kant tried fruitlessly to reconcile with rationalism - derives from a fundamental conceptual mistake. The dogmatic, fundamentalist ideology is yours - and it's been plaguing philosophy for centuries.

Please answer these questions.

1 To what is the so-called external world supposedly external?

2 If there is just 'the world' - of which humans are a part - what reason is there to call the whole thing a fabrication? And who fabricated it?

[Veritas Aequitas]

Where moral objectivists claim there are objective moral facts, they are relying on their intuition [based on experiences and evidences] but are unable to provide the proper proofs to justify their claim.

An objective moral fact is nothing more than, or different from, a moral fact. Objective and factual are virtually synonyms. (There's no such thing as a subjective fact. Contradiction in terms.)

Yes, 'objective' and 'factual' are synonymous.
I have argued
There are Two Senses of 'What is Fact'
viewtopic.php?f=8&t=39587
There are Two Senses of 'Objectivity'
viewtopic.php?f=8&t=39326

Your sense of 'objective' and 'factual' is grounded on an illusion.

Yes, there are no subjective fact, which would be an oxymoron,'
but there are intersubjective facts as conditioned upon a specific human based FSK. A FSK by definition [collective not individuals] dictates FSK-ed objectivity.

Here is what is a FSK-ed Fact:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fact

A fact is a true datum about one or more aspects of a circumstance.[1]
Standard reference works are often used to check facts.
Scientific facts are verified by repeatable careful observation or measurement by experiments or other means.

For example,
"This sentence contains words." accurately describes a linguistic [FSK] fact, and
"The sun is a star" accurately describes an astronomical [FSK] fact. Further,
"Abraham Lincoln was the 16th President of the United States" and "Abraham Lincoln was assassinated" both accurately describe historical [FSK] facts.

Generally speaking, facts are independent of belief and of knowledge and opinion.

What is fact can NEVER standalone by themselves [independent of the human conditions], what is fact must always be qualified to their respective human-based Framework and System of Realization [FSR] and Knowledge [FSK].

Can you explain and demonstrate how a fact can be a standalone thing without being conditioned [not dependent] upon the human conditions and its respective FSR-FSK?

What?! Now you admit it! Objectivists know intuitively that there are moral facts - but can't prove it. So what 'experiences and evidences' do they have that they can't share? (What codswallop.)

My point is, objective moral facts are represented as moral elements supported physical neural moral algorithms in the brain and body that subliminally drive them to be moral.
They cannot consciously perceive it nor able to reason about it, but felt them intuitively.

What you need to understand is you as with the majority are driven by an evolutionary default to cling to a dogmatic fundamentalistic ideology of human independent external world and reality. It is fundamentally a psychological issue, not an epistemological one.
Hume: The Independent External World is a Fabrication
viewtopic.php?t=40791

What you need to understand is that empiricist skepticism - that Hume accepted and Kant tried fruitlessly to reconcile with rationalism - derives from a fundamental conceptual mistake. The dogmatic, fundamentalist ideology is yours - and it's been plaguing philosophy for centuries.

You are totally off on this.
Explain what you meant by 'a fundamental conceptual mistake'.

The point is when philosophical realists insist upon real things that are independent of the human conditions, they faced loads of contradictions, antinomies and paradoxes which are illusions.
The most effective way to resolve this is via skepticism supported with rationality and critical thinking which is promoted by Kant.

Please answer these questions.

1 To what is the so-called external world supposedly external?

2 If there is just 'the world' - of which humans are a part - what reason is there to call the whole thing a fabrication? And who fabricated it?

The whole of reality is continuous and not comprised of absolutely discrete independent standalone things as claimed by philosophical realists [human independence].

It is only an evolutionary default that humans and organisms of the like which has a sense-of-externality that generate the dualism between humans and what is external to itself [the external world].
This instinct or sense-of-externalness is critical to facilitate survival, but it should be insisted upon as a fundamentalistic ideology like what you are doing.

Thus the so-called external world is supposedly 'external' to the extent that it is only in the relative sense of externalness and not in an absolute sense of externalness [as re your ideology of absolute externalness].

The so-called externalness is a 'fabrication' when that 'externalness' is clasped dogmatically and fundamentalistic ideology as an absolutely independent externalness without compromise. This is based on a primal and proto- instinct and impulse.

The so-called externalness is realistic [not fabricated] if it is taken as a relative sense of externalness that is conditioned upon the human conditions.
This is a complex view that need mature reflection as in;

Reality: Emergence & Realization Prior to Perceiving, Knowing & Describing
viewtopic.php?f=8&t=40145

What is Emergence & Realization
viewtopic.php?t=40721

VA: Knowledge & Descriptions CANNOT Produce Facts
viewtopic.php?f=8&t=39925 Apr 10, 2023

Perceiving, Knowing & Describing a Thing Not Related to Existence of the Thing
viewtopic.php?t=40715

Can you address every point I raised above?

[Age]

Where moral objectivists claim there are objective moral facts, they are relying on their intuition [based on experiences and evidences] but are unable to provide the proper proofs to justify their claim.

An objective moral fact is nothing more than, or different from, a moral fact. Objective and factual are virtually synonyms. (There's no such thing as a subjective fact. Contradiction in terms.)

Yes, 'objective' and 'factual' are synonymous.
I have argued

This one STILL thinks or BELIEVES that BECAUSE 'it' has 'argued' for some 'thing', then 'that thing' MUST BE 'objectively true', 'factually true', 'absolutely true, and/or 'absolutely, objectively factually true'.

How MANY TIMES do 'you' have to be REMINDED "veritas aequitas" that JUST BECAUSE 'you' 'argue' for some 'thing', then 'this' in and of itself does NOT make what 'you' 'argued' for even 'remotely true', let alone ACTUALLY 'true' AT ALL.

'Arguments', OF COURSE, can be UNSOUND and/or INVALID. Which, so far, from what I have OBSERVED ALL of 'yours' appear to be.

There are Two Senses of 'What is Fact'
viewtopic.php?f=8&t=39587
There are Two Senses of 'Objectivity'
viewtopic.php?f=8&t=39326

Your sense of 'objective' and 'factual' is grounded on an illusion.

Yes, there are no subjective fact, which would be an oxymoron,'
but there are intersubjective facts as conditioned upon a specific human based FSK. A FSK by definition [collective not individuals] dictates FSK-ed objectivity.

Here is what is a FSK-ed Fact:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fact

A fact is a true datum about one or more aspects of a circumstance.[1]
Standard reference works are often used to check facts.
Scientific facts are verified by repeatable careful observation or measurement by experiments or other means.

For example,
"This sentence contains words." accurately describes a linguistic [FSK] fact, and
"The sun is a star" accurately describes an astronomical [FSK] fact. Further,
"Abraham Lincoln was the 16th President of the United States" and "Abraham Lincoln was assassinated" both accurately describe historical [FSK] facts.

Generally speaking, facts are independent of belief and of knowledge and opinion.

What is fact can NEVER standalone by themselves [independent of the human conditions], what is fact must always be qualified to their respective human-based Framework and System of Realization [FSR] and Knowledge [FSK].

Can you explain and demonstrate how a fact can be a standalone thing without being conditioned [not dependent] upon the human conditions and its respective FSR-FSK?

What?! Now you admit it! Objectivists know intuitively that there are moral facts - but can't prove it. So what 'experiences and evidences' do they have that they can't share? (What codswallop.)

My point is, objective moral facts are represented as moral elements supported physical neural moral algorithms in the brain and body that subliminally drive them to be moral.
They cannot consciously perceive it nor able to reason about it, but felt them intuitively.

What you need to understand is you as with the majority are driven by an evolutionary default to cling to a dogmatic fundamentalistic ideology of human independent external world and reality. It is fundamentally a psychological issue, not an epistemological one.
Hume: The Independent External World is a Fabrication
viewtopic.php?t=40791

What you need to understand is that empiricist skepticism - that Hume accepted and Kant tried fruitlessly to reconcile with rationalism - derives from a fundamental conceptual mistake. The dogmatic, fundamentalist ideology is yours - and it's been plaguing philosophy for centuries.

You are totally off on this.
Explain what you meant by 'a fundamental conceptual mistake'.

The point is when philosophical realists insist upon real things that are independent of the human conditions, they faced loads of contradictions, antinomies and paradoxes which are illusions.
The most effective way to resolve this is via skepticism supported with rationality and critical thinking which is promoted by Kant.

Please answer these questions.

1 To what is the so-called external world supposedly external?

2 If there is just 'the world' - of which humans are a part - what reason is there to call the whole thing a fabrication? And who fabricated it?

The whole of reality is continuous and not comprised of absolutely discrete independent standalone things as claimed by philosophical realists [human independence].

It is only an evolutionary default that humans and organisms of the like which has a sense-of-externality that generate the dualism between humans and what is external to itself [the external world].
This instinct or sense-of-externalness is critical to facilitate survival, but it should be insisted upon as a fundamentalistic ideology like what you are doing.

Thus the so-called external world is supposedly 'external' to the extent that it is only in the relative sense of externalness and not in an absolute sense of externalness [as re your ideology of absolute externalness].

The so-called externalness is a 'fabrication' when that 'externalness' is clasped dogmatically and fundamentalistic ideology as an absolutely independent externalness without compromise. This is based on a primal and proto- instinct and impulse.

The so-called externalness is realistic [not fabricated] if it is taken as a relative sense of externalness that is conditioned upon the human conditions.
This is a complex view that need mature reflection as in;

Reality: Emergence & Realization Prior to Perceiving, Knowing & Describing
viewtopic.php?f=8&t=40145

What is Emergence & Realization
viewtopic.php?t=40721

VA: Knowledge & Descriptions CANNOT Produce Facts
viewtopic.php?f=8&t=39925 Apr 10, 2023

Perceiving, Knowing & Describing a Thing Not Related to Existence of the Thing
viewtopic.php?t=40715

Can you address every point I raised above?

[Peter Holmes]

Where moral objectivists claim there are objective moral facts, they are relying on their intuition [based on experiences and evidences] but are unable to provide the proper proofs to justify their claim.

An objective moral fact is nothing more than, or different from, a moral fact. Objective and factual are virtually synonyms. (There's no such thing as a subjective fact. Contradiction in terms.)

Yes, 'objective' and 'factual' are synonymous.

In which case, don't use the expression objective fact, because it's redundant.

Yes, there are no subjective fact, which would be an oxymoron,'
but there are intersubjective facts as conditioned upon a specific human based FSK. A FSK by definition [collective not individuals] dictates FSK-ed objectivity.

Intersubjectivity is just shared subjectivity. So you're saying that there are only subjective facts. And that is to mistake how we may arrive at a conclusion - by consensus - with the nature of the conclusion.

And, to repeat, your quoted explanation of what a fact is contradicts your claim, as follows:

Generally speaking, facts are independent of belief and of knowledge and opinion.

Please pay attention. This means that facts are 'independent of the human conditions'.

What?! Now you admit it! Objectivists know intuitively that there are moral facts - but can't prove it. So what 'experiences and evidences' do they have that they can't share? (What codswallop.)

My point is, objective moral facts are represented as moral elements supported physical neural moral algorithms in the brain and body that subliminally drive them to be moral.
They cannot consciously perceive it nor able to reason about it, but felt them intuitively.

This is a major shift in your argument. You say there are 'moral facts' in human nature, but that we know them only by intuition. So much for 'nearly scientific' moral knowledge.

What you need to understand is you as with the majority are driven by an evolutionary default to cling to a dogmatic fundamentalistic ideology of human independent external world and reality. It is fundamentally a psychological issue, not an epistemological one.
Hume: The Independent External World is a Fabrication
viewtopic.php?t=40791

What you need to understand is that empiricist skepticism - that Hume accepted and Kant tried fruitlessly to reconcile with rationalism - derives from a fundamental conceptual mistake. The dogmatic, fundamentalist ideology is yours - and it's been plaguing philosophy for centuries.

You are totally off on this.
Explain what you meant by 'a fundamental conceptual mistake'.

Here's how it happened.

1 Empiricists argued that knowledge comes from experience - usually defined as sense-impressions.
2 Experience is necessarily first-person, because no one can have another person's experience.
3 Therefore, knowledge can only ever be what an individual has, and the 'external world' - external to the individual - can only ever be a hypothesis. Its existence or nature can never be 'proved'. And that's the supposed 'scandal' that Kant tried to overcome.

The point is when philosophical realists insist upon real things that are independent of the human conditions, they faced loads of contradictions, antinomies and paradoxes which are illusions.
The most effective way to resolve this is via skepticism supported with rationality and critical thinking which is promoted by Kant.

Please answer these questions.

1 To what is the so-called external world supposedly external?

2 If there is just 'the world' - of which humans are a part - what reason is there to call the whole thing a fabrication? And who fabricated it?

The whole of reality is continuous and not comprised of absolutely discrete independent standalone things as claimed by philosophical realists [human independence].

1 This is a realist claim. You're saying that reality is ' this kind of continuous thing'.
2 In what way is a rock 'continuous' with me? Because we both consist of energy? Or quantum events? What does 'absolutely discrete, independent [and] standalone' mean?

[iambiguous]

My point is, objective moral facts are represented as moral elements supported physical neural moral algorithms in the brain and body that subliminally drive them to be moral.
They cannot consciously perceive it nor able to reason about it, but felt them intuitively.

My own point, however, is that it is one thing to speak of "moral facts" theoretically up in the philosophical clouds, and another thing altogether to speak of them in regard to things like abortion or human sexuality or Ukraine or the Gaza Strip.

For those here who do embrace moral facts intellectually, note some of them in regard to these conflagrations.

"Intuition:
1] the ability to understand something immediately, without the need for conscious reasoning.
2] a thing that one knows or considers likely from instinctive feeling rather than conscious reasoning."

As for intuition, what is that but yet another subjective manifestation of dasein.

Really, what does it mean to grasp/feel the moral parameters of abortion, human sexuality, Ukraine and the war between Hamas and Israel "immediately"? Or "instinctively"?

What is intuition but something that genetically/biologically we all come into this world able to experience. It revolves around the complex intertwining of thoughts and feelings rooted in genes and memes rooted in turn to more primitive components of the human brain. A brain able to react to the world around it consciously, subconsciously and unconsciously. In some respects autonomously [in a free will world] but in other respects autonomically.

The bottom line [mine] is this: that in regard to things like abortion and human sexuality and Ukraine and the war between Hamas and Israel, some intuitively embrace one reaction while others intuitively embrace another, conflicting reaction.


Okay, VA, which one would a truly serious, technically proficient philosopher embrace...deontologically?

[Veritas Aequitas]

An objective moral fact is nothing more than, or different from, a moral fact. Objective and factual are virtually synonyms. (There's no such thing as a subjective fact. Contradiction in terms.)

Yes, 'objective' and 'factual' are synonymous.

In which case, don't use the expression objective fact, because it's redundant.

There are nuances to the above use of my 'objective moral fact'.
'Objective' relates to the processes of the whole of the FSR-FSK, while 'fact' is more the resultant and outputs of the FSR-FSK.
So it is critical for me to use 'objective fact' to give greater clarity to these elements.

Yes, there are no subjective fact, which would be an oxymoron,'
but there are intersubjective facts as conditioned upon a specific human based FSK. A FSK by definition [collective not individuals] dictates FSK-ed objectivity.

Intersubjectivity is just shared subjectivity. So you're saying that there are only subjective facts. And that is to mistake how we may arrive at a conclusion - by consensus - with the nature of the conclusion.

What is objectivity is grounded on shared-subjectivity.
It is not only on consensus of the conclusion.
That scientific facts are objectivity is grounded on a human-based scientific Framework and System [comprising principles, scientific methods and all other pertinent conditions].
It is because the FSK is human-based that there is intersubjectivity within all members of the scientific FSK.
In addition there is the FSR which is intersubjective that enables emergences and realization of reality that precedes the FSK.

And, to repeat, your quoted explanation of what a fact is contradicts your claim, as follows:

Generally speaking, facts are independent of belief and of knowledge and opinion.

You missed my critical point,
Facts are independent of belief and of knowledge and opinion of an individual subject or a loose group of people,
but facts are not independent from a collective-of-subjects within a human based FSK; facts are thus, intersubjectivity, NOT absolutely independent of human conditions are you are claiming.

This is a major shift in your argument. You say there are 'moral facts' in human nature, but that we know them only by intuition. So much for 'nearly scientific' moral knowledge.

Where did "I" claim moral facts are only known by intuition?
Re intuition, I was referring to people like Henry who relied on basic intuition in claiming there are moral facts.

In my case, what is objective moral facts are verified and justified via a human-nased morality-proper-FSK whose major inputs [data] are from the scientific FSK.

You are totally off on this.
Explain what you meant by 'a fundamental conceptual mistake'.

Here's how it happened.

1 Empiricists argued that knowledge comes from experience - usually defined as sense-impressions.
2 Experience is necessarily first-person, because no one can have another person's experience.
3 Therefore, knowledge can only ever be what an individual has, and the 'external world' - external to the individual - can only ever be a hypothesis. Its existence or nature can never be 'proved'. And that's the supposed 'scandal' that Kant tried to overcome.

How is that 'fundamental conceptual mistake'.

Note despite the above, you are claiming there is some thing existing [not as in substance theory] that is beyond what is realized and experienced [not perceived] as real that is a feature of reality independent of the human conditions.
Since experience is basically real and all you have, there is no way you can prove anything as real that exists beyond realization and experience.

Can you counter that?

The point is when philosophical realists insist upon real things that are independent of the human conditions, they faced loads of contradictions, antinomies and paradoxes which are illusions.
The most effective way to resolve this is via skepticism supported with rationality and critical thinking which is promoted by Kant.

The whole of reality is continuous and not comprised of absolutely discrete independent standalone things as claimed by philosophical realists [human independence].

1 This is a realist claim. You're saying that reality is ' this kind of continuous thing'.
2 In what way is a rock 'continuous' with me? Because we both consist of energy? Or quantum events? What does 'absolutely discrete, independent [and] standalone' mean?

A philosophical realist claim things are absolute independent of the human conditions, as such, things has to be discrete and independent from the human conditions.

First, reality is all-there-is and each part is intricately part and parcel of the whole.
e.g. the spokes of a wheel are in one perspective 'separate parts' but they cannot be absolutely independent in the perspective of the whole wheel.

From the common sense perspective, things are discrete and separate from one another including from humans and between humans.
But from a higher perspective of reality as a whole, these 'discrete' parts are actually continuous within the whole of reality.

In your case, you are adopting the common sense of reality as an ideology, i.e. philosophical realism - things are absolutely discrete and separate from one another including from humans and between humans.

That is what your 'what is fact' is, i.e. a fact is a feature of reality, that is just-is, being-so, that is/are the case, states of affairs that are independent of the human conditions, opinions, beliefs, judgment and descriptions.

I do believe in the common sense perspective of independence of things [common sense realism] but I don't adopt it an uncompromisable absolute fundamentalistic ideology [as philosophical realism] like you do.
However, I believe this common sense perspective [very limited and problematic] when viewed from a higher perspective, it is grounded upon subjectivity, i.e. intersubjectivity.

[henry quirk]

there isn't a rule, or a law, out there in the universe that's going to back me up.

Exactly. Your natural rights -- your exclusive moral claim to your life, liberty, and property -- isn't out there.

Well the universe wouldn't intervene, would it? so that suggests it is amoral; it doesn't care.

Exactly. Morality, and your means to recognize it, assert it, defend it, isn't out there.

That fire is inside you, part of you.

[henry quirk]

Henry and IC have to tell God to change his mind about something before they can do so.

Really? Where is He? I'd like a word.

[Harbal]

there isn't a rule, or a law, out there in the universe that's going to back me up.

Exactly. Your natural rights -- your exclusive moral claim to your life, liberty, and property -- isn't out there.

Well the universe wouldn't intervene, would it? so that suggests it is amoral; it doesn't care.

Exactly. Morality, and your means to recognize it, assert it, defend it, isn't out there.

That fire is inside you, part of you.

Okay, henry, I can go along with that, when you put it that way.

[henry quirk]

You : If our aggregated cultural opinion is that it's morally right to promote individual dignity and sovereignty - and morally wrong to diminish them - then that is our moral standard.

Me: As a moral subjectivist that's your take. And as a moral subjectivist if our aggregated cultural opinion is that it's morally right to enslave a portion of the population to service another portion - and morally wrong to oppose this slavery or the standard (race, economic status, genetic fitness, take your pick) by which one man is free and another is not - then that is our moral standard, yes?

Yes. But the fact that we have a moral belief/standard doesn't make that belief a fact - which is what you, as a moral objectivist - insist is the case.

What I insist, as a moral objectivist, is if our aggregated cultural opinion is that it's morally right to enslave a portion of the population to service another portion - and morally wrong to oppose this slavery or the standard (race, economic status, genetic fitness, take your pick) by which one man is free and another is not - then this moral standard isn't moral at all. it fails to recognize natural rights, not only of the slaved, but also those who benefit from slavery. All men are reduced to meat, with one preferred and another denigrated today (and what of tomorrow?) The subjectivist can make no appeal to an overarching right or wrong. He can only kludge together sumthin' utilitarian or practical. Man is meat and if today we respect him, tomorrow as need calls, we'll use him.

Until very recently in human history, such things as slavery, the subjugation of women and the persecution of homosexuals were considered morally acceptable - not morally wrong.

Not among the slaves, subjugated and persecuted it wasn't. Not among the slavers and subjugators and persecutors I'm bettin'. There was and is a whole whack of othering going on. That's the lesson of history. It's not that slavery, subjugation, and persecution of persons was ever acceptable; it's that far too many found and find a way to make the other man, the woman, the child a not-person.

But our collective moral standard has changed - though slowly and not in the least uniformly.

No. The recognition of personhood and natural rights has spread. A standard didn't change: we're just becoming more aligned with The Standard. More are recognizing, more are respecting, that which is.

It's moral objectivists who believe there can be no moral development - because there are moral facts which have nothing to do with opinion - who feel justified in opposing moral development. 'There are moral facts, and I happen to know what they are'.

There is no moral development. Morality doesn't evolve. It was wrong to slave, to rape to murder, to steal, to defraud a thousand years ago and it's no more or less wrong today.

Arrogance and egotism disguised as indignant virtue.

If it makes me arrogant and egotistical to believe you or flash or harbal or iambiguous have a natural, exclusive, moral claim to your own lives, liberties, and properties, and no claim at all on the lives, liberties, and properties of others, then so be it.

[iambiguous]

Facts are independent of belief and of knowledge and opinion of an individual subject or a loose group of people, but facts are not independent from a collective-of-subjects within a human based FSK; facts are thus, intersubjectivity, NOT absolutely independent of human conditions are you are claiming.

This, of course, is a classic example of Mr. Truth and Justice encompassing moral philosophy technically. As long as he/she can keep the discussion revolving almost entirely around his or her daunting deductions up in the theoretical clouds, the world of actual moral conflagrations can be largely ignored.

What facts independent of what beliefs and knowledge and opinions? Regarding what particular moral conflagrations?

[iambiguous]

there isn't a rule, or a law, out there in the universe that's going to back me up.

Exactly. Your natural rights -- your exclusive moral claim to your life, liberty, and property -- isn't out there.

Okay, but the Deist God is "out there" somewhere. And I'm still confused regarding how henry connects the dots between his intuitive qua logical assumptions about life, liberty and property and how his God wired his brain -- installed the "fire" in him -- to think of them as he does.

Naturally? Is it natural to follow "the dictates of Reason and Nature" because God intended mere mortals to follow them to a particular set of political prejudices.

Henry quirk's very own "arrogant, autocratic and authoritarian" political dogmas?

[henry quirk]

Okay, but the Deist God is "out there" somewhere.

Yep.

And I'm still confused regarding how henry connects the dots between his intuitive qua logical assumptions about life, liberty and property and how his God wired his brain -- installed the "fire" in him -- to think of them as he does.

Only cuz you're a necessitarian and and amoralist. You will admit no possibility man is a free will, that morality is real, and that mebbe Reality is sumthin' other than happenstance.

As you like.

[iambiguous]

Okay, but the Deist God is "out there" somewhere.

Yep.

Unless, of course, it is one of these...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_r ... traditions

...Gods instead. Or -- gasp! -- No God at all?!

Here, you can borrow this...

"...any number of wrong answers, held by any number of wrong-thinking people, would not tell us that there was no right answer."

...from Mr. Cant.

Only "in your head" "here and now" your answer is the right one. And with no actual Scripture to fall back on, you can pretty much believe what you want about the Deist God.

And I'm still confused regarding how henry connects the dots between his intuitive qua logical assumptions about life, liberty and property and how his God wired his brain -- installed the "fire" in him -- to think of them as he does.

Only cuz you're a necessitarian and and amoralist. You will admit no possibility man is a free will, that morality is real, and that mebbe Reality is sumthin' other than happenstance.

As you like.

Absolutely shameless!!

Over and over again I maintain that I do not exclude myself from my own "rooted existentially in dasein" point of view. How on Earth would I know if we have free will or if we have access to objective morality? Let alone going back to a definitive understanding of how and why the human condition fits into the existence of existence itself.

I make my arguments here, here...

viewtopic.php?t=34247
viewtopic.php?t=34271
viewtopic.php?t=34319
viewtopic.php?t=34285

And here, there...

https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/viewtop ... 1&t=176529
https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/viewtop ... 1&t=194382

In my head, "here and now" they seem reasonble to me. But then...

...there have been any number of situations in my past where my thinking and my emotions were shifting dramatically and thus up to a point out of sync. When I first became a devout Christian. When I became a Marxist and an atheist. When I flirted with the Unitarian Church and with Objectivism. When I shifted from Lenin to Trotsky. When I abandoned Marxism and became a Democratic Socialist and then a Social Democrat. When I discovered existentialism and deconstruction and semiotics and abandoned objectivism altogether. When I became moral nihilist. When I began to crumble into an increasingly more fragmented "I" in the is/ought world.

Will there be further "shifts"? Maybe. Given new experiences, new relationships and access to new information and knowledge, sure, another one might unfold.

Only the same is true for you, as well, in my view. For everyone here. It's just that with some FFOs, they are so utterly dependent psychologically on sustaining their own comforting and consoling One True Path, it's not very likely at all.