Is morality objective or subjective?

[Age]

Is the question identical with its meaning; or can this question mean something different from what you think or believe it means?

Did you want me to answer your question when you did not answer mine?

Maybe. Why not?

The Universe never began.

Why do you presume or believe that It did?

Because it has an age, Age.

If this is what you want to believe is true, then this is perfectly fine with me, but have you got any actual proof at all for your belief here?

If yes, then will you provide it?

If no, then why not?

Also, are you willing to explain to the audience here how the whole Universe, Itself, could come from absolutely nothing at all, or are you one of those types of human beings who just believe that some male gendered thing created It all, and all by its own self?

That's what having an age means. Time since it began.

Then, the Universe does not have 'age', because the Universe never began.

you are missing the whole point here, once more.

No, I am not.

Okay.

But, if I asked you, 'What is the 'whole point' here?' Then would you answer me?

[Immanuel Can]

If you know that there is no coercion from God, then Theistic Determinism is dead, of course.

Something is getting lost in translation because determinism doesn't equal coercion where I'm from. If I wind my watch, I know enough about clockwork that if I were to examine each component, I could tell you exactly how my intervention would unwind. People would think me mad if I said there was any coercion involved.

Well, it depends on what one understands from the word "coercion." If one supposes that "coercion" is only something that can be done by a human agent, then obviously there's no "coercion" involved in Determinism, since nobody supposes that human beings can arrange a Deterministic world. But if, in "coercion," we include forces of all kinds, such forces as would replace or vacate the significance of human will, then yes, Determinism would be inherently "coercive." So it's a bit of a semantic argument, not a conceptual difference.

When I use the word "coercion," all I'm signifying is the belief that an external force (we could say it's God, or material causality, or even quantum mechanics) is supposed to be the real, ultimate, final explanation for what human beings do. In fact, anything other than the explanation that we are essentially-free agents, who make our personal decisions among the various options available to us, is an explanation involving "coercion."

..."know" and "make" remain very different verbs, and the case for Determinism cannot be made from that angle without equivocating them.

Once again: that is not the issue. It is a marvel of cognitive dissonance that you can believe both that God knows everything that we will do and that we are free to do other than what God knows we will do...

I can see you've never thought about it. But it's really obvious. Even in the human case, "know" and "make" are experienced very, very differently.

There's no missing that point, really, and no "cognitive dissonance" in that. Again, just try to create the logical syllogism that would support the view that you're advancing. You won't be able to do it without equivocating the middle term, I believe -- and if you can do it, I'd sure like to see it.

You're a smart guy: you know what a syllogism is, I'm sure. Why not have a try, and just see if you can do it? You don't even have to show me your work, if you don't want to. But I'd consider it a favour, if you did.

[Peter Holmes]

So. IC's team's god supposedly created and creates everything, including humans. And IC's team's god knows everything that will happen. So IC's team's god knows that quite a few of the human beings it supposedly creates will supposedly end up roasting in hell for all eternity, maybe just for the 'sin' of not believing in IC's team's god.

Never mind free will. The nastiness of this ridiculous story screams - as does the nasty complacency of the dupes who believe this nasty story. What sort of moral imbecile could worship this god?

Perhaps they're the moral imbeciles who believe their god knows every evil act that will occur - every example of innocent and unjust suffering - and does nothing to stop it - but still worship this monstrous idol, and call it the source of all goodness.

[Skepdick]

So. IC's team's god supposedly created and creates everything, including humans. And IC's team's god knows everything that will happen. So IC's team's god knows that quite a few of the human beings it supposedly creates will supposedly end up roasting in hell for all eternity, maybe just for the 'sin' of not believing in IC's team's god.

Never mind free will. The nastiness of this ridiculous story screams - as does the nasty complacency of the dupes who believe this nasty story. What sort of moral imbecile could worship this god?

Do you also blame water for being thirsty when you refuse to drink?

[Peter Holmes]

If I have the power to prevent an immoral/wicked/evil act, and I don't prevent it, then I am immoral/wicked/evil. And, of course, moral objectivists agree.

But IC's team believes its god has that power - but worships it as the source of all goodness. Moral conclusion?

Good job IC's team's god is an invention, like all the others invented by our ancestors. But the necessary abandonment of moral conscience belief in such a fiction requires is disturbing. Think of the damage.

[Immanuel Can]

If I have the power to prevent an immoral/wicked/evil act, and I don't prevent it, then I am immoral/wicked/evil. And, of course, moral objectivists agree.

But IC's team believes its god has that power - but worships it as the source of all goodness. Moral conclusion?

You'd better include more data, I would say.

First, you'd have to know that the right solution for God to adopt would be to prevent all evil/wickedness/immorality from happening, before it could happen. That is, you'd have to know that a world with no evil in it was, in every way, preferable to one in which people had the option to act wickedly. So I must ask...on what basis do you assume that?

Secondly, you'd have to have an objective moral standpoint from which to judge God's actions. That is, there'd have to be a morality higher than God Himself, so as to be capable of passing an objective judgment upon Him, and you'd have to be the one having access to it. Do you now believe that there IS an objective moral standard, one higher than God Himself, and that Peter Holmes has access to it?

Absent those two conditions, not only is your "moral conclusion" not conclusive; it's not actually "moral" either, since there's no objective morality.

You can take them one at a time, if you like...

[Will Bouwman]

When I use the word "coercion," all I'm signifying is the belief that an external force (we could say it's God, or material causality, or even quantum mechanics) is supposed to be the real, ultimate, final explanation for what human beings do. In fact, anything other than the explanation that we are essentially-free agents, who make our personal decisions among the various options available to us, is an explanation involving "coercion."

That being so, when God created this world in which he knew everything that you would ever do, he threw in a bucket of coercion, because you are going to do exactly what he knows you are going to do.

...no "cognitive dissonance" in that.

The thing with cognitive dissonance is that those afflicted are in denial.

[Immanuel Can]

When I use the word "coercion," all I'm signifying is the belief that an external force (we could say it's God, or material causality, or even quantum mechanics) is supposed to be the real, ultimate, final explanation for what human beings do. In fact, anything other than the explanation that we are essentially-free agents, who make our personal decisions among the various options available to us, is an explanation involving "coercion."

That being so, when God created this world in which he knew everything that you would ever do, he threw in a bucket of coercion, because you are going to do exactly what he knows you are going to do.

But again, what I "know" doesn't "coerce," because it doesn't "make" anything.

What was the last thing you made happen simply by knowing about it?

I'm curious: have you tried generating the syllogism? You'll find you can't, I think. And if so, that should alert you to a hidden fault in the reasoning you're currently employing on this question.

[Harbal]

When I use the word "coercion," all I'm signifying is the belief that an external force (we could say it's God, or material causality, or even quantum mechanics) is supposed to be the real, ultimate, final explanation for what human beings do. In fact, anything other than the explanation that we are essentially-free agents, who make our personal decisions among the various options available to us, is an explanation involving "coercion."

That being so, when God created this world in which he knew everything that you would ever do, he threw in a bucket of coercion, because you are going to do exactly what he knows you are going to do.

But again, what I "know" doesn't "coerce," because it doesn't "make" anything.

What was the last thing you made happen simply by knowing about it?

I'm curious: have you tried generating the syllogism? You'll find you can't, I think. And if so, that should alert you to a hidden fault in the reasoning you're currently employing on this question.

Sorry to butt into your conversation, but not sorry enough to stop me from doing it. When God first created everything and set it all in motion, did he incorporate into his creation the potential for chance and randomness? If he didn't, then he must be responsible for everything that happens, and for everything every individual ever does, because nothing could have ever been other than what it is. If he did, then how could he possibly know what is going to happen? It is logically impossible for something to be both subject to chance and certainty, isn't it?

[Immanuel Can]

Sorry to butt into your conversation, but not sorry enough to stop me from doing it.

Go ahead.

When God first created everything and set it all in motion, did he incorporate into his creation the potential for chance and randomness?

Not "randomness," per se. Volition. That is, he created beings that could choose freely to do His will, or to do that which is actually contrary to what He would will for them. That's established very clearly from Genesis on forward...mankind is an entity that can choose "good" or "evil," and "knows" them both.

If he didn't, then he must be responsible for everything that happens, and for everything every individual ever does, because nothing could have ever been other than what it is. If he did, then how could he possibly know what is going to happen?

Again, you can check: it's impossible to make sense of that argument, actually. Unless you're more skilled than I am at creating syllogisms, you can't suddenly convert the verb "to know" into the verb "to make [happen]." They're totally separate actions.

And you know they are. In your own life experience, knowing never makes things happen. It simply is a matter of awareness, not of the movement of mechanics. Knowing how to bake a cake never baked one.

So to get the kind of argument you want, you'd need to assume some untrue things. You'd need, first of all, the belief that the only way things operate in the universe is deterministically. Then you could deduce that God set the wheels in motion, and since after that there was nothing but the wheels turning, the universe is fatalistically predetermined.

But of course, the problem with that is that you've started by assuming the conclusion you needed in order to make the argument, not by demonstrating it in any way. And that first premise is (shall we say) very likely to be totally false -- for the very good reason that you do not experience reality as deterministic, nor do you live and act as if it's deterministic. So if we are to believe that Determinism is true, the full burden of proving it surely rests on the person who says, "I know you feel and act as if Determinism is totally false, as has every other person in human history, but I assure you it's true." We have every justification to ask for his reasons and his demonstration that we should start believing something so counterintuitive and experientially falsified.

However, if you and I can "change our minds" and believe him -- rather than, say, being merely mechanically-predetermined to do so, like dutiful little robots -- then we have just proved him wrong, not right. According to his theory, we have responded to our own biomechanics, not to the persuasive value of his argument itself; and so his argument hasn't achieved the force of truth, but merely accidentally ended up on the winning side of our biomechanics.

The upshot is that the argument for Determinism is one that there appears to be no way to win: for to win it, genuinely, by making a true argument rather than a false one, is essentially to lose the argument by showing, instead, two free individuals making their own rational choices. And according to Determinism, that ought to be impossible. Any such phenomenon as two people making a "free choice" ought to be nothing more than an odd delusion produced by the action of the biomechanics, not the product of a good argument on the minds of free individuals.

[Peter Holmes]

If I have the power to prevent an immoral/wicked/evil act, and I don't prevent it, then I am immoral/wicked/evil. And, of course, moral objectivists agree.

But IC's team believes its god has that power - but worships it as the source of all goodness. Moral conclusion?

You'd better include more data, I would say.

First, you'd have to know that the right solution for God to adopt would be to prevent all evil/wickedness/immorality from happening, before it could happen. That is, you'd have to know that a world with no evil in it was, in every way, preferable to one in which people had the option to act wickedly. So I must ask...on what basis do you assume that?

Secondly, you'd have to have an objective moral standpoint from which to judge God's actions. That is, there'd have to be a morality higher than God Himself, so as to be capable of passing an objective judgment upon Him, and you'd have to be the one having access to it. Do you now believe that there IS an objective moral standard, one higher than God Himself, and that Peter Holmes has access to it?

Absent those two conditions, not only is your "moral conclusion" not conclusive; it's not actually "moral" either, since there's no objective morality.

You can take them one at a time, if you like...

1 As usual, you peddle a false dichotomy: morality - judgement about moral rightness and wrongness - is either objective or foundationless, irrational, incoherent, self-regarding, and so on. And that's not so, how ever often you repeat it. These are two sides of the same counterfeit coin.

2 I notice you don't try to defend the wickedness of a god who, with foreknowledge of every evil act, and the power to prevent it, fails to do so. An inconvenient truth that must be ignored at all costs.

3 I believe 'that a world with no evil in it [would be], in every way, preferable to one in which people had the option to act wickedly'. But I don't claim to know that, because that's the whole issue here: whether what's morally right and wrong is a matter of knowledge.

4 I'd like to know if you believe it too - if, in your moral opinion, 'a world with no evil in it [would be], in every way, preferable to one in which people had the option to act wickedly'. And if not, why not? Do you think the undeserved suffering of some, for example, is a price worth paying for the blessing of free will for the wicked?

5 Your second question is fatuous. No, I don't think there is any higher moral authority, such as me, whose moral opinion trumps anyone else's. That's the moral atrocity you believe in. And the irony is that theistic moral objectivism is in fact moral subjectivism pretending not to be.

[Harbal]

When God first created everything and set it all in motion, did he incorporate into his creation the potential for chance and randomness?

Not "randomness," per se. Volition. That is, he created beings that could choose freely to do His will, or to do that which is actually contrary to what He would will for them. That's established very clearly from Genesis on forward...mankind is an entity that can choose "good" or "evil," and "knows" them both.

Why do you only refer to the choice between "good" and "evil"; do we not also have the freedom to choose between things like having a hot dog or a hamburger?

If he didn't, then he must be responsible for everything that happens, and for everything every individual ever does, because nothing could have ever been other than what it is. If he did, then how could he possibly know what is going to happen?

Again, you can check: it's impossible to make sense of that argument, actually. Unless you're more skilled than I am at creating syllogisms, you can't suddenly convert the verb "to know" into the verb "to make [happen]." They're totally separate actions.

And you know they are. In your own life experience, knowing never makes things happen. It simply is a matter of awareness, not of the movement of mechanics. Knowing how to bake a cake never baked one.

So to get the kind of argument you want, you'd need to assume some untrue things. You'd need, first of all, the belief that the only way things operate in the universe is deterministically. Then you could deduce that God set the wheels in motion, and since after that there was nothing but the wheels turning, the universe is fatalistically predetermined.

But of course, the problem with that is that you've started by assuming the conclusion you needed in order to make the argument, not by demonstrating it in any way. And that first premise is (shall we say) very likely to be totally false -- for the very good reason that you do not experience reality as deterministic, nor do you live and act as if it's deterministic. So if we are to believe that Determinism is true, the full burden of proving it surely rests on the person who says, "I know you feel and act as if Determinism is totally false, as has every other person in human history, but I assure you it's true." We have every justification to ask for his reasons and his demonstration that we should start believing something so counterintuitive and experientially falsified.

However, if you and I can "change our minds" and believe him -- rather than, say, being merely mechanically-predetermined to do so, like dutiful little robots -- then we have just proved him wrong, not right. According to his theory, we have responded to our own biomechanics, not to the persuasive value of his argument itself; and so his argument hasn't achieved the force of truth, but merely accidentally ended up on the winning side of our biomechanics.

The upshot is that the argument for Determinism is one that there appears to be no way to win: for to win it, genuinely, by making a true argument rather than a false one, is essentially to lose the argument by showing, instead, two free individuals making their own rational choices. And according to Determinism, that ought to be impossible. Any such phenomenon as two people making a "free choice" ought to be nothing more than an odd delusion produced by the action of the biomechanics, not the product of a good argument on the minds of free individuals.

I can't unpick all that; it's beyond me, I fear. I'm not making an argument for determinism, or otherwise, I really don't know to what degree the universe is deterministic. I am just making the point that in order to know exactly what is going to happen beforehand -and I don't mean to predict what is going to happen, but actually know- then the universe would have to be completely deterministic; I can see no logical way of avoiding that conclusion. You say the universe is not deterministic, but if that is the case, God cannot know the outcome of what has not yet been determined; that would be logically impossible.

[Peter Holmes]

To repeat. IC's theistic moral objectivism amounts to the following valid syllogism. (IC likes syllogisms.)

P1 If my team's god says X is morally right/wrong, then (it's a fact that) X is morally right/wrong.
P2 My team's god says X is morally right/wrong.
C Therefore, (it's a fact that) X is morally right/wrong.

Now, for any agent, this is unsound, or not shown to be sound. For any monarch, emperor, priest, pope, guru - or anyone else - this claim would be dismissed summarily in any rational moral discussion.

So it's a special pleading fallacy for 'my team's god'.

Theistic moral objectivism is profoundly irrational - and morally bankrupt, to boot.

[Immanuel Can]

If I have the power to prevent an immoral/wicked/evil act, and I don't prevent it, then I am immoral/wicked/evil. And, of course, moral objectivists agree.

But IC's team believes its god has that power - but worships it as the source of all goodness. Moral conclusion?

You'd better include more data, I would say.

First, you'd have to know that the right solution for God to adopt would be to prevent all evil/wickedness/immorality from happening, before it could happen. That is, you'd have to know that a world with no evil in it was, in every way, preferable to one in which people had the option to act wickedly. So I must ask...on what basis do you assume that?

Secondly, you'd have to have an objective moral standpoint from which to judge God's actions. That is, there'd have to be a morality higher than God Himself, so as to be capable of passing an objective judgment upon Him, and you'd have to be the one having access to it. Do you now believe that there IS an objective moral standard, one higher than God Himself, and that Peter Holmes has access to it?

Absent those two conditions, not only is your "moral conclusion" not conclusive; it's not actually "moral" either, since there's no objective morality.

You can take them one at a time, if you like...

1 As usual, you peddle a false dichotomy: morality - judgement about moral rightness and wrongness - is either objective or foundationless, irrational, incoherent, self-regarding, and so on. And that's not so, how ever often you repeat it. These are two sides of the same counterfeit coin.

Hey, sometimes the truth hurts. But it's absolutely right.

"Subjective" means "only Peter has to think it." Nobody else ever has to agree. But in point of fact, it doesn't even mean that Peter HAS to agree with it...he could choose otherwise in the next five seconds, and subjective morality would have nothing to say about it, if he did.

So yeah, that's how it is.

2 I notice you don't try to defend the wickedness of a god...

Wait..."wickedness"? How does a subjectivist get to insist that somebody else's behaviour, far less God's, is "wicked?"

You see? You don't even believe what you say.

3 I believe 'that a world with no evil in it [would be], in every way, preferable to one in which people had the option to act wickedly'. But I don't claim to know that,

Right! But if so, what are you complaining about? You don't know that God hasn't done what amounts to the best possible thing...

4 I'd like to know if you believe it too - if, in your moral opinion, 'a world with no evil in it [would be], in every way, preferable to one in which people had the option to act wickedly'.

It would depend on a correct cost-benefit analysis, wouldn't it? And who is positioned to give the right cost-benefit analysis? Only God.

However, I can certainly see some huge benefits to a universe in which some evil is allowed to exist temporarily...free will, personhood, choice, individuality, autonomy, relationship, love, mercy, charity...of course, these things would only be possible in such a world that was devoid of any alternatives. That might well be a price worth paying. You'd certainly have to make the case that it wasn't.

Do you think the undeserved suffering of some, for example, is a price worth paying for the blessing of free will for the wicked?

Reverse the question: do you think the blessing of everyone having free will is a price worth paying for some temporary suffering being allowed, especially if such suffering is eventually compensated and removed? That's how the right question should be framed.

It seems to me that's quite plausible. Depending on the right cost-benefit analysis by an ominiscient Observer, it might be, as Leibniz said, "the best of all possible worlds."

No, I don't think there is any higher moral authority, such as me, whose moral opinion trumps anyone else's.

That wasn't my question: it was whether there was an objective moral standard one might employ to judge God. But obviously, if Peter Holmes is the one proposing to do that, as he is, then he would also have to think that he had access to that higher and objective moral standard.

I think you don't, too. So now we do agree on something.

[Immanuel Can]

To repeat. IC's theistic moral objectivism amounts to the following valid syllogism. (IC likes syllogisms.)

P1 If my team's god says X is morally right/wrong, then (it's a fact that) X is morally right/wrong.
P2 My team's god says X is morally right/wrong.
C Therefore, (it's a fact that) X is morally right/wrong.

Let's fix that.

P1 If God says X is morally right/wrong, then (it's a fact that) X is morally right/wrong.
P2 God says X is morally right/wrong.
C Therefore, (it's a fact that) X is morally right/wrong.[/quote]

So far, so good. The "team" bit is irrelevant.

So it's a special pleading fallacy for 'my team's god'.

Well, since you put the "team" bit in, you created the fallacy yourself. It's nothing I ever said.

Theistic moral objectivism is profoundly irrational - and morally bankrupt, to boot.

This is your funniest statement: it amounts to saying that TMO is objectively bad. But you don't believe in moral objectivism, so all you can mean is, "Peter doesn't like TMO." But subjectivism allows also that even Peter could change his mind anytime at all. So it means...nothing.