whether there is an empirical means of evaluating these moral values. There is much work in a variety of areas such as psychology, behavioral economics and so on that do look at the empirical basis beliefs and desires empirically, you have yet to show what is special that you define away the possibility of doing so here when it comes to morals?  Until then the default is to say these are approachable in the same fashion.

Certainly, moral values can be evaluated in terms of their ultimate and proximate causation just like any other belief or desire. Such evaluation is descriptive, though, not nomrative. We may have certain universal moral principles based on our evolutionary psychology, but that doesn’t mean these are values we should have. I’m happy to investigate their origins at a variety of levels, and I don’t see how this conflicts with the basic point of relativism, which is the denial of the positions I mentioned previously.

Moral values can also be evaluated in terms of their practical effects, the actions they generate. I do not disagree with this, and in fact my approach to making judgements about specific moral values is one based on their effects. Now, as I said, there is ultimately some subjectivity in this, so I would still not consider the outcome truly objective. If, for example, I say that a principle of reciprocity leads to the least violence and suffering and the greatest hamrony and cooperativity for a group of people, I can evaluate the truth of this relationship empirically and support and actively promote this principle if it proves to lead to these outcomes. The premise that the outcomes are desirable is still subjective and relative to the extent that it is dependant on the same factors as any other belief and desire, so it is not objective in itself. The reason I don’t succumb to radical relativism is that I don’t care! In another context, for example, I accept the likely deterinistic nature of all my actions, but I am a compatibilist in that I believe my sense of choice and the practical implications of assuming I am capable of free choice is enough for me. I have all the free will I want or need regardless of whether in some theoretical sense I am a robot. Likewise in this context, I accept that all my thoughts and beliefs are contingent on factors that make them relative, not objective or absolute, but that doesn’t make them any less real to me

I see the value of relativism being the recognition that our own beliefs depend on factors that may not reflect what is true, real, or best in the actual world, so our beliefs may be wrong. I see the danger of moral realism being that we can locate our moral ideas outside of relative, contingent causal chains and then argue that they are perfect and immutable, which leads to unhealthy dogmatism. I prefer relativism based on my own, realtive beliefs that it is the less dangerous approach to moral reasoning. I acknowledge that it can be carried to extremes, but I don’t think it necessarily needs to be. Xenos paradox, solipsism, and other such cases are nonsensical extreme versions of ideas that may in themselves be sound, and it seems reasonable to avoid these extremes without throwing out what is true and useful about the underlying idea.

As for your position, I’m not saying that it is a religious or Platonic form orf realism. You’ve denied this and I accept that. And if you agree with the type and specific examples of causal factors behind moral beliefs that I refer to, then I might even call it a variant of relativism. Sure, I am using this in a non-standard way, but you scheme is also non-standard and we have both gone to great pains to explain what we mean, so I think the usage is fair. If you see evaluating moral principles in terms of their effects as “objective” despite the subjectivity of the evaluation criteria, I’m happy to go along. I would call such an evaluation relative or subjective on technical grounds, but I don’t really care about the label since I don’t think it’s critical to the goal. As for the specifics of you model, I’m still not convinced that you’re not simply broadening the definition of “desire” to encompass an causal factor behind a moral belief, whbich might leave out important distinctions, but again I’m willing to go along with your terminology as you expand the model. I think where we parted ways was with your Nazi/hidden child example, which you felt was potently explanatory and demolished competing models, and I felt was fairly incomplete.

OK I will take this further now based on assuming that you Brennen, would ask me how could the desire-fulllment model work to produce moral facts. I am certainly finding that these discussion are helping clarify my thoughts and arguments. So here goes:

A statement of a moral fact (however well estimated and provisional) is the description of a specific situation where the principle actor’s actions and motives are under question, and where the actual act and motives can be compared to alternates in terms of desire-fulfillment.

For an example lets go back to a simplification of the example I recently used. 

“A murderous husband asks you the location of his wife, you know the location, you can tell the truth or not at no cost to yourself, and you lie (or not) and have a justification for your actual act.”

These are the basic facts:

1. A murderous husband - it is a given here that that this is a morally wrong intent - this is not under debate in this situation
2. You know the location of the wife - that is you could optionally lie or not
3. There is no direct adverse consequences of lying.
4. You did or did not lie
5. You provide a motive/justification for basic fact 4 - its is accepted that its veracity is not questioned here

The ethically natural facts (from which moral facts are derived/reduced to are):
i. If you tell the truth then the wife’s desires are or tend to be thwarted (whatever they are and whether the husband actually murders her - hence the “tend to")
ii. If you lie then then wife’s desires are or tend to be fulfilled (the husband might still murder her but you have not helped indeed hindered the husband in completing that goal)
iii. The motives that lead to either i or ii derive the appropriate desire-fulfillment./thwarting consequences.
These are the relevant ethically natural facts.

Let us fill out the details for a specific situation.
* Instance of Basic fact 4A: You tell the truth
* Instance of Basic 5A. The motives are to follow the moral norms of your culture, in this case a form of moral absolutism whose “laws” include “do not murder”, “do no lie” and affect only the direct actions of an actor. Since you are not directly murdering anyone and not breaking that law, you are directly telling the truth and not breaking that law either. hence 4A. It is agreed that you performed the culturally morally right act.

Therefore the ethically natural facts are
* (i) is true, (ii) is false, therefore (iii) the actual motives are desire-thwarting

Empirical conclusion that following the cultural moral laws in this situation leads to more desire thwarting than desire fulfillment.The is all entirely descriptive.

Now maybe that is far as I want to go now with respect to moral facts and maybe this is less than the impression I gave before.

I want the facts that can be used for moral reasoning and judgement, where the issue of prescriptions come up and so on. These are the facts that are required and they are obviously not culturally dependent. So as an ethical naturalist and moral realist, these are the type of moral facts that can be empirically realistically obtained.

So whether one agrees or not with something like minimisng desire-thwarting as a prescriptive model, the above type of descriptive facts are unaltered, and these are the ethically natural facts required to apply the that prescriptive model.

Just to note we cross posted, I have not read the rest of yuor post yet and not have replied to it in the post that followed it. Out now, will reply later.

This was your post that started:

mckenzievmd - 15 April 2008 02:50 PM

whether there is an empirical means of evaluating these moral values.

OK now I a have a few momentso answer your last post.

mckenzievmd - 15 April 2008 02:50 PM

Certainly, moral values can be evaluated in terms of their ultimate and proximate causation just like any other belief or desire. Such evaluation is descriptive, though, not nomrative.

Note that I am looking at reductions, not causations, as any ethical naturalist would.  Well this is the argument I developed in the cross-post. There I was separating out the descriptive and prescriptive components, only focusing there on the descriptive ones. What I was trying to achieve there was not to “prove” my model but just to show what the facts were that it requires and that these facts are objective and empirical. Previously some, maybe or maybe not including you (I can’t remember), had denied that I could establish such non-moral facts.
Q1: Do you accept that such an analysis can be performed? (In general other ethical naturalistic theories would look for different empirical features for their own entailments. That is what I assume Doug would do but it is unclear to me if he has developed his ideas to such a sufficient degree. )

mckenzievmd - 15 April 2008 02:50 PM

We may have certain universal moral principles based on our evolutionary psychology, but that doesn’t mean these are values we should have. I’m happy to investigate their origins at a variety of levels, and I don’t see how this conflicts with the basic point of relativism, which is the denial of the positions I mentioned previously.

Your “universal moral principles based on evolutionary psychology” maybe misses the point of what I am saying, I think. My examples cog psy etc. were not to show how moral values could be derived but just to illustrate that one cannot rule out as a matter of principle that human beliefs and desires and their effects cannot be examined empirically.

BTW As for denying the positions you have previously mentioned, as I recall, the “the religious and platonic ones” you do not need moral relativism to that so, and even if it were the only way to do this this still is not justification for moral relativism. (This is the same as, again I hope my memory is correct, a justification for moral relativism being it is more tolerant of other views, which is question begging since that that is a value in itself).

mckenzievmd - 15 April 2008 02:50 PM

Moral values can also be evaluated in terms of their practical effects, the actions they generate. I do not disagree with this, and in fact my approach to making judgements about specific moral values is one based on their effects.

My cross posted example was designed to show just that, descriptively and obviously emphasizing an empirical factors, that I have argued before and will again but not right now, for my version of ethical naturalism. So we agree at least on this and the dispute is over what judgement can be made over these non-moral facts or affects of moral values as in the example.

mckenzievmd - 15 April 2008 02:50 PM

Now, as I said, there is ultimately some subjectivity in this, so I would still not consider the outcome truly objective. If, for example, I say that a principle of reciprocity leads to the least violence and suffering and the greatest hamrony and cooperativity for a group of people, I can evaluate the truth of this relationship empirically and support and actively promote this principle if it proves to lead to these outcomes. The premise that the outcomes are desirable is still subjective and relative to the extent that it is dependant on the same factors as any other belief and desire, so it is not objective in itself.

I understand what you are saying. It is up to me to show that at least my version of ethical naturalism does not have that subjectivity you just indicated above. I will attempt to do this once it is clear that you agree I can obtain the non-moral facts that I require.

mckenzievmd - 15 April 2008 02:50 PM

The reason I don’t succumb to radical relativism is that I don’t care! In another context, for example, I accept the likely deterinistic nature of all my actions, but I am a compatibilist in that I believe my sense of choice and the practical implications of assuming I am capable of free choice is enough for me. I have all the free will I want or need regardless of whether in some theoretical sense I am a robot. Likewise in this context, I accept that all my thoughts and beliefs are contingent on factors that make them relative, not objective or absolute, but that doesn’t make them any less real to me.

My approach works with either with a deterministic or compatibalistic version of free will. And please not do not confuse relativistic facts with facts - obviously the former is a sub-set of the latter, but rather in the sense that we both grant the cultural moral values as, let us say, “data”, the difference being you derive the moral facts from this data, whereas I determine, as in my example, the effect this data has, in terms of other non-moral facts. 

mckenzievmd - 15 April 2008 02:50 PM

I see the value of relativism being the recognition that our own beliefs depend on factors that may not reflect what is true, real, or best in the actual world, so our beliefs may be wrong.

Again you do not need relativism to show this, plain ordinary science shows this all the time. Either moral relativism is objectively true or not, justifying it in terms of its value is question begging again! I notice you keep on using these emotive arguments to justify your moral relativism. Even as I agree with your sentiments, these are not a justification of oral relativism. that approach is the cart leading the horse! 

mckenzievmd - 15 April 2008 02:50 PM

I see the danger of moral realism being that we can locate our moral ideas outside of relative, contingent causal chains and then argue that they are perfect and immutable, which leads to unhealthy dogmatism.

Whilst I do not think any of your fears necessarily follow, even if they did this is not an objective justification to deny for moral relativism. Again this is question begging.

mckenzievmd - 15 April 2008 02:50 PM

I prefer relativism based on my own, realtive beliefs that it is the less dangerous approach to moral reasoning.

As to whether it is less dangerous than alternatives this is outside the scope of this thread, but I am unconvinced that that is the case. You should live in the UK and see the disastrous emprical results of New Labour’s multiculturalism policies

mckenzievmd - 15 April 2008 02:50 PM

As for your position, I’m not saying that it is a religious or Platonic form orf realism. You’ve denied this and I accept that. And if you agree with the type and specific examples of causal factors behind moral beliefs that I refer to, then I might even call it a variant of relativism.

There is fundamental difference between reductionism and relativism. My position is the former yours is the latter.

mckenzievmd - 15 April 2008 02:50 PM

Sure, I am using this in a non-standard way, but you scheme is also non-standard and we have both gone to great pains to explain what we mean, so I think the usage is fair.

Agreed with the provisos noted above.

mckenzievmd - 15 April 2008 02:50 PM

If you see evaluating moral principles in terms of their effects as “objective” despite the subjectivity of the evaluation criteria, I’m happy to go along.

No I dispute that the evaluation criteria are subjective and I have not yet made the argument is to why this because i have had to deal with, to date, objections - good and bad - prior to getting to this point. I have made assertions yes, so you know my position. Once we are clear on the descriptive aspects then I can make an argument without getting further side tracked.

mckenzievmd - 15 April 2008 02:50 PM

I would call such an evaluation relative or subjective on technical grounds, but I don’t really care about the label since I don’t think it’s critical to the goal. As for the specifics of you model, I’m still not convinced that you’re not simply broadening the definition of “desire” to encompass an causal factor behind a moral belief, whbich might leave out important distinctions, but again I’m willing to go along with your terminology as you expand the model. I think where we parted ways was with your Nazi/hidden child example, which you felt was potently explanatory and demolished competing models, and I felt was fairly incomplete.

That example was incomplete and I aborted and represented it in a simpler fashion emphasizing only the descriptive elements. Lets us proceed, to the degree we need to, from that example:-

Assuming you get the example we could extend it so that we could say that under
Culture A: Lying is morally wrong in this situation, truth telling is morally right
Culture B: Telling the truth is morally wrong in this situation, lygin is morally right
Culture C: Lying or truth telling are morally permitted
(there are other variations but this is sufficient here)

Situation 1: he Lied
Situation 2: he told the truth

A Moral Relativistic analysis - producing relative moral facts:-
A.1 is morally wrong
A.2 is morally right
B.1 is morally right
B.2 is morally wrong
C.1 is morally permissible
C.2 is morally permissible

An ethically naturalistic analysis, emphasizing only the desire non-moral descriptive facts for now:
1 decreases or tends to decrease desire thwarting
2 increases or tends to increase desire thwarting
A increases or tends to increase desire thwarting
B decreases or tends to decrease desire thwarting
C fails to prevent increasing desire thwarting

If this makes sense and is acceptable then I proceed to the heart of the challenge. If not we need to discuss it further.

faithlessgod - 16 April 2008 12:40 AM

OK I will take this further now based on assuming that you Brennen, would ask me how could the desire-fulllment model work to produce moral facts. I am certainly finding that these discussion are helping clarify my thoughts and arguments. So here goes:

A statement of a moral fact (however well estimated and provisional) is the description of a specific situation where the principle actor’s actions and motives are under question, and where the actual act and motives can be compared to alternates in terms of desire-fulfillment.

That definition, so far as I can tell, is completely compatible with moral relativism or even the denial of morals, unless we take “motives are under question” as an implicit admission that some particular moral framework undergirds the description.  But that’s a bit of a stretch, for I can’t see why amoral folks would deny the existence of motives while even questioning motives from time to time.

What moral claim might be said to be true on the basis of this definition?

For an example lets go back to a simplification of the example I recently used. 

“A murderous husband asks you the location of his wife, you know the location, you can tell the truth or not at no cost to yourself, and you lie (or not) and have a justification for your actual act.”

These are the basic facts:

1. A murderous husband - it is a given here that that this is a morally wrong intent - this is not under debate in this situation

That will certainly help when it comes to identifying the fact that murderous intent is wrong.

2. You know the location of the wife - that is you could optionally lie or not
3. There is no direct adverse consequences of lying.
4. You did or did not lie
5. You provide a motive/justification for basic fact 4 - its is accepted that its veracity is not questioned here

The ethically natural facts (from which moral facts are derived/reduced to are):
i. If you tell the truth then the wife’s desires are or tend to be thwarted (whatever they are and whether the husband actually murders her - hence the “tend to")
ii. If you lie then then wife’s desires are or tend to be fulfilled (the husband might still murder her but you have not helped indeed hindered the husband in completing that goal)
iii. The motives that lead to either i or ii derive the appropriate desire-fulfillment./thwarting consequences.
These are the relevant ethically natural facts.

Let us fill out the details for a specific situation.
* Instance of Basic fact 4A: You tell the truth
* Instance of Basic 5A. The motives are to follow the moral norms of your culture, in this case a form of moral absolutism whose “laws” include “do not murder”, “do no lie” and affect only the direct actions of an actor. Since you are not directly murdering anyone and not breaking that law, you are directly telling the truth and not breaking that law either. hence 4A. It is agreed that you performed the culturally morally right act.

Therefore the ethically natural facts are
* (i) is true, (ii) is false, therefore (iii) the actual motives are desire-thwarting

Empirical conclusion that following the cultural moral laws in this situation leads to more desire thwarting than desire fulfillment.The is all entirely descriptive.

Now maybe that is far as I want to go now with respect to moral facts and maybe this is less than the impression I gave before.

No kidding.

I want the facts that can be used for moral reasoning and judgement, where the issue of prescriptions come up and so on. These are the facts that are required and they are obviously not culturally dependent. So as an ethical naturalist and moral realist, these are the type of moral facts that can be empirically realistically obtained.

So whether one agrees or not with something like minimisng desire-thwarting as a prescriptive model, the above type of descriptive facts are unaltered, and these are the ethically natural facts required to apply the that prescriptive model.

Seems to me that you’ve got nothing approaching the identification of a true moral prescription via your method without the axiomatic murderous intent is wrong.

Edit to add:
Perhaps this illustrates that what faithless had in mind with “conditionals” was a statement along the lines of “if X thinks that Y is a wrong action then X should not do Y"--which I think could pass for either subjective or relative morality without a pretty good set of elaborations.

faithlessgod - 16 April 2008 04:57 AM

Your “universal moral principles based on evolutionary psychology” maybe misses the point of what I am saying, I think. My examples cog psy etc. were not to show how moral values could be derived but just to illustrate that one cannot rule out as a matter of principle that human beliefs and desires and their effects cannot be examined empirically.

Not sure why that point had to be made ...

BTW As for denying the positions you have previously mentioned, as I recall, the “the religious and platonic ones” you do not need moral relativism to that so, and even if it were the only way to do this this still is not justification for moral relativism. (This is the same as, again I hope my memory is correct, a justification for moral relativism being it is more tolerant of other views, which is question begging since that that is a value in itself).

Tolerance and intolerance of other positions are themselves values, sure.  But the consistent moral relativist recognizes that his view is not the “correct” view, and realizes that views that he might potentially not tolerate are no less correct than his own view(s).
It is inconsistent with a belief in moral relativism to think that one’s moral views are right ("X is right") or that the views of another are wrong (I expect that was Dr. McKenzie’s point).

Perhaps Dr. McKenzie errs in expecting that moral relativists would live their relativism consistently. 

mckenzievmd - 15 April 2008 02:50 PM

Now, as I said, there is ultimately some subjectivity in this, so I would still not consider the outcome truly objective. If, for example, I say that a principle of reciprocity leads to the least violence and suffering and the greatest hamrony and cooperativity for a group of people, I can evaluate the truth of this relationship empirically and support and actively promote this principle if it proves to lead to these outcomes. The premise that the outcomes are desirable is still subjective and relative to the extent that it is depend(e)nt on the same factors as any other belief and desire, so it is not objective in itself.

I understand what you are saying. It is up to me to show that at least my version of ethical naturalism does not have that subjectivity you just indicated above. I will attempt to do this once it is clear that you agree I can obtain the non-moral facts that I require.

Does that amount to a sort of pledge to attempt a jump over the is/ought divide?

mckenzievmd - 15 April 2008 02:50 PM

I see the value of relativism being the recognition that our own beliefs depend on factors that may not reflect what is true, real, or best in the actual world, so our beliefs may be wrong.

Again you do not need relativism to show this, plain ordinary science shows this all the time. Either moral relativism is objectively true or not, justifying it in terms of its value is question begging again! I notice you keep on using these emotive arguments to justify your moral relativism. Even as I agree with your sentiments, these are not a justification of (m)oral relativism. that approach is the cart leading the horse! 

That’s a fair point.

Well there have been no responses to my last post fora couple of days, maybe everyone is busy or just not interested, I dunno. Anyway lets sum where I think we are.

“Are there moral facts, a debate of moral realism”

There are two realist positions to take over this question

1. Traditional moral objectivity - various versions of this - where there are moral facts and these are independent of any agent’s nature, beliefs and desires. There are various versions of this but to date, whilst I have been involved, I have seen no meta-ethical argument to show that this is objectively true.

2. Ethical naturalism - myself and Doug - moral facts are reducible to non-moral facts. Depending on the version, (a) there are such suitable non-moral facts (whether they can actually be determined by us or not in certain situations is not an objection to the existence of these facts), (b) these are objectively sufficient to derive the moral facts. It is on this latter point that I was awaiting interest to make an argument for my version of ethical naturalism. If there is no interest then there is no point doing so.

Arguably non-realist is

3.Moral relativism - Brennan and Baffledking - there are no moral facts in the realist sense but there is a class of relative moral facts - relative to cultural moral values. I agree that this is possible but consider this trivial and does not answer the question at hand. Secondly I have seen no meta-ethical argument to show that moral relativism is objectively true - that is, this is all there is to morality. The arguments I have seen are either emotive but invalid justifications (I agree with the sentiments but that is beside the point plus I am unconvinced that moral relativism even delivers on these sentiments) or straw man objections to other approaches e.g. trying to make ethical naturalism into a form of classical moral objectivism such as moral absolutism - given that an ethical naturalist is not making a meta-ethical argument to defend such traditional moral objectivism this is a straw man.

Definitely non-realist positions are:

4. Moral subjectivity there are no moral facts except subjectively. Possibly Brennan was also arguing for this, given his stance on “only beliefs and desires” but maybe not. Anyway no-one else arguing for this position here at the moment

5. Non-cognitivism there are no moral facts only emotive or expressive opinions. Again no-one else arguing for this position here at the moment

6. Moral nihilism even non-cognitivism is false and there are no moral facts. Again no-one else arguing for this position here at the moment

Does this about sum this up, does anyone want to continue or not?

faithlessgod - 17 April 2008 11:47 PM

Well there have been no responses to my last post fora couple of days,

Meh.  You relativist. 

maybe everyone is busy or just not interested, I dunno. Anyway lets sum where I think we are.

“Are there moral facts, a debate of moral realism”

There are two realist positions to take over this question

1. Traditional moral objectivity - various versions of this - where there are moral facts and these are independent of any agent’s nature, beliefs and desires. There are various versions of this but to date, whilst I have been involved, I have seen no meta-ethical argument to show that this is objectively true.

Hmmm.  Independent of any agent’s nature?  I haven’t heard that one before.  Could it be an ad hoc response to the view I presented to you earlier in the thread?  Why wouldn’t a morality grounded in an agent’s nature be objective?  Is an agent’s nature not objective and independent of an agent’s subjective impression (as when one’s impression of one’s self is different from the reality)?

2. Ethical naturalism - myself and Doug - moral facts are reducible to non-moral facts. Depending on the version, (a) there are such suitable non-moral facts (whether they can actually be determined by us or not in certain situations is not an objection to the existence of these facts), (b) these are objectively sufficient to derive the moral facts. It is on this latter point that I was awaiting interest to make an argument for my version of ethical naturalism. If there is no interest then there is no point doing so.

Well, there arguably is a point in doing so.  For one thing, you’d have achieved something notable (as far as I can tell) by having crossed the is/ought divide.

Second, you’d be making good (albeit belatedly) on your claim earlier in the thread. 

Bryan:
If you’re serious about the topic, start by offering your own description of a moral fact (it might serve as a model for the rest of us who end up hopelessly avoiding your challenge).  At that point I’ll be happy to subject your model to the same types of tests you offered for mine and you can demonstrate your good faith by addressing them.

faithlessgod:
I have already offered one and you know that too.
http://www.centerforinquiry.net/forums/viewreply/36314/

Since no-one has responded to my last post yet, and maybe I am premature still I will start two threads. The first is started and that is to deal with what I think are false objections to the enterprise of the science of ethics.

faithless,

Sorry, but as always there’s a lot of content to your posts, and I have been short of time to respond.

2. Ethical naturalism - myself and Doug - moral facts are reducible to non-moral facts. Depending on the version, (a) there are such suitable non-moral facts (whether they can actually be determined by us or not in certain situations is not an objection to the existence of these facts), (b) these are objectively sufficient to derive the moral facts. It is on this latter point that I was awaiting interest to make an argument for my version of ethical naturalism. If there is no interest then there is no point doing so.

Well, I might agree that moral facts are reducible to non-moral facts, in the sense that the derive from all the causal factors I’ve mentioned before. But I see this as descriptive of how moral reasoning works, not a moral system in and of itself. If you mean to say that moral rules can be reliably derived by reasoning from non-moral facts (by which I suppose you mean desires as you’ve talked about them), well I’m not convinced. I think you can derive moral principles in this way, I’m just not sure they have any greater claim to legitimacy than moral facts derived in any other way.

3.Moral relativism - Brennan and Baffledking - there are no moral facts in the realist sense but there is a class of relative moral facts - relative to cultural moral values. I agree that this is possible but consider this trivial and does not answer the question at hand. Secondly I have seen no meta-ethical argument to show that moral relativism is objectively true - that is, this is all there is to morality. The arguments I have seen are either emotive but invalid justifications (I agree with the sentiments but that is beside the point plus I am unconvinced that moral relativism even delivers on these sentiments) or straw man objections to other approaches e.g. trying to make ethical naturalism into a form of classical moral objectivism such as moral absolutism - given that an ethical naturalist is not making a meta-ethical argument to defend such traditional moral objectivism this is a straw man.

This is where I don’t really know how to respond. The principles of moral relativism, both as OI have arfgued for it and as it is traditionally understood, are pretty straightforward, so how you can simply say they are trivial and not relevant to the questions of how moral reasoning works I really don’t understand. As for showing that moral relativism is objectively true, well that would be missing the whole point, now wouldn’t it? I’ve tried to show how it explains the processes by which people come to their moral conclusions, and why it suggests these may not have the objective validity people imbue them with, but proving objectively that all values are subjective is illgical. You are the one hung up on the notion that one can and should “prove” one’s values to be objectively true. If I consider that imposisble, then I’m not going to waste time trying.

*Back from the dead....

It seems that instead of absolutism/traditional objectivism the debate has turned to relativism vs. a kind of moral naturalism.  A problem I see at the outset is that relativism does not necessarily rule out naturalism (as far as I know) and mckensievmd has already highlighted that (Bryan too I think.) Moral beliefs and subjective values probably do derive from natural facts about human biology and psychology as well as facts about the physical world and are not wholly arbitrary; there may be a finite set of meta-values that evolution has given us over time that determine all other values which would be nothing more than expressions of the greater meta-values.  For example, perhaps a meta-value might look something like the statement “pleasure is good; pain is bad” and all humans (really all creatures with a nervous system) follow this natural law.  An expression of this meta-value might be something like “friends are better than enemies.” However, if we grant this supposition then we have to concede two points: 1) morality is not limited to humans but to a wide range of life forms and 2) all behaviour must be congruent and consistent with this law, that is, if it really is a law then it would be impossible to behave in any way contradictory to this law just as it is impossible to behave in any way that is not in accord with the law of gravity.  So, even acts such as self-mutilation and suicide would have to be in some way compatible with the above principal.  I am willing to accept this view however, it should be recognized that this easily becomes a kind of moral nihilism since we are basically using science to explain away moral behaviour - personally, I have no problem with that - ethics is a better term in my opinion anyways, but are we all really ready to do deny the de facto existence of morals?  Furthermore, since this view admits that morals stem from evolution and evolution is a transformative process, that is, is not static but constantly changing, then it seems a moral view that allows for adaptation and change is necessary. It seems any objective theories would contradict this fact and that relativism is the best available answer.

mckenzievmd - 20 April 2008 08:02 AM

Well, I might agree that moral facts are reducible to non-moral facts, in the sense that the derive from all the causal factors I’ve mentioned before.

No this is not ethical naturalism. I am not trying to redefine your moral relativism, I know perfectly well what it is.  I expect you to at least understand what is being presented here and to argue against that.

mckenzievmd - 20 April 2008 08:02 AM

But I see this as descriptive of how moral reasoning works, not a moral system in and of itself.

No I am not presenting a model of moral reasoning nor a moral system, only a theory of moral value as moral fact is being presented here, which is of course descriptive. (I would argue that moral reasoning is based on moral facts, no the other way around.)

mckenzievmd - 20 April 2008 08:02 AM

If you mean to say that moral rules can be reliably derived by reasoning from non-moral facts (by which I suppose you mean desires as you’ve talked about them), well I’m not convinced.

Of course none of us is convinced by the other’s position, I am looking for convincing arguments. You have not presented anything that is a candidate for convincing argument, I have.

mckenzievmd - 20 April 2008 08:02 AM

I think you can derive moral principles in this way, I’m just not sure they have any greater claim to legitimacy than moral facts derived in any other way.

I am the only one who has presented an objective model of value.  That is the criteria of legitimacy in this debate. You have given no such legitimacy for your model, nor do you feel the need (see below). On what basis do you make such a demand of me that you cannot and do not want meet yourself?

mckenzievmd - 20 April 2008 08:02 AM

This is where I don’t really know how to respond. The principles of moral relativism, both as I have argued for it and as it is traditionally understood, are pretty straightforward, so how you can simply say they are trivial and not relevant to the questions of how moral reasoning works I really don’t understand.

The data are not under dispute (relative moral facts). Still they are insufficient to conclude with normative relativism is all there is. Where is your met-ethical objective argument that this is all the morality is?

mckenzievmd - 20 April 2008 08:02 AM

As for showing that moral relativism is objectively true, well that would be missing the whole point, now wouldn’t it?

No you are missing the point. If you do not accept the need to show the meta-ethical relativism is objectively true then you have cannot use that point to criticize other approaches.  In that case why can I not ignore it as a fiction?

mckenzievmd - 20 April 2008 08:02 AM

I’ve tried to show how it explains the processes by which people come to their moral conclusions, and why it suggests these may not have the objective validity people imbue them with, but proving objectively that all values are subjective is illgical.

How people reason is not the debate here nor is what they think they do, that is not in dispute here. This could be relevant if you were making an argument for meta-ethical relativism, but it seems you are not. The challenge here is of meta-ethical argument, where we all objectivists.

mckenzievmd - 20 April 2008 08:02 AM

You are the one hung up on the notion that one can and should “prove” one’s values to be objectively true.

That is the whole purpose of this thread - it is a meta-ethical debate over moral realism. However do not confuse this with showing meta-ethical relativism as true. surely that is what you need to at least attempt to do, in order to argue against any other position. Anyway I will no longer not try to “prove” it to you , since no-one else feels the need to do more than assert their position, I will from now on asserted it only and that is that. (Until I can meet anyway who actually wants a real debate on these topics such as Doug who has wisely kept out of this recently )

mckenzievmd - 20 April 2008 08:02 AM

If I consider that imposisble, then I’m not going to waste time trying.

Then you offer no argument is to why moral relativism is true. Until then there is no reason for me to believe that it is,

I have presented an objective, empirical, provisional and refutable model. I am willing to debate with others who can present their own refutable views. It seems that you are not interested in presenting your own refutable views. So why should I do more than present it here?

Welcome back Baffeldking

baffledking - 20 April 2008 04:39 PM

A problem I see at the outset is that relativism does not necessarily rule out naturalism (as far as I know) and mckensievmd has already highlighted that (Bryan too I think.)

This makes no sense since this looks like you are making a meta-ethical argument for moral relativism that somehow includes ethical naturalism, but these are distinctively and contrary approaches (with the caveat that IMHO some ethically naturally based utilitarian theories are actually morally relative. That is not my approach obviously).  Alternatives are that you now arguing as a generic relativist or making an argument from within moral relativism.  Surely the latter is not relevant here (it is not meta-ethics), if the former how can you justify this?

baffledking - 20 April 2008 04:39 PM

Moral beliefs and subjective values probably do derive from natural facts about human biology and psychology as well as facts about the physical world and are not wholly arbitrary;

The challenge here is to find objective values, so the above is not relevant here, I think.

baffledking - 20 April 2008 04:39 PM

there may be a finite set of meta-values that evolution has given us over time that determine all other values which would be nothing more than expressions of the greater meta-values.

Hmm, from subjective value you can derive meta-values, surely these are still subjective?

baffledking - 20 April 2008 04:39 PM

For example, perhaps a meta-value might look something like the statement “pleasure is good; pain is bad” and all humans (really all creatures with a nervous system) follow this natural law.

I do not see how such things as natural laws can exist, there is no objective support for this? Now since you are a moral relativist you surely hold there is not objective support for such laws too? So who are you arguing against? This looks like a straw man w.r.t me.

baffledking - 20 April 2008 04:39 PM

An expression of this meta-value might be something like “friends are better than enemies.” However, if we grant this supposition then we have to concede two points: 1) morality is not limited to humans but to a wide range of life forms and 2) all behaviour must be congruent and consistent with this law, that is, if it really is a law then it would be impossible to behave in any way contradictory to this law just as it is impossible to behave in any way that is not in accord with the law of gravity.  So, even acts such as self-mutilation and suicide would have to be in some way compatible with the above principal.

Exactly, such “natural laws” even if they did exist would not be moral.

baffledking - 20 April 2008 04:39 PM

I am willing to accept this view however, it should be recognized that this easily becomes a kind of moral nihilism since we are basically using science to explain away moral behaviour - personally, I have no problem with that - ethics is a better term in my opinion anyways, but are we all really ready to do deny the de facto existence of morals?

Well I am not willing to accept this view and have seen no evidence that it is correct anyway.

baffledking - 20 April 2008 04:39 PM

Furthermore, since this view admits that morals stem from evolution and evolution is a transformative process, that is, is not static but constantly changing, then it seems a moral view that allows for adaptation and change is necessary. It seems any objective theories would contradict this fact and that relativism is the best available answer.

Huh? Your conclusion is a non-sequitur. Since both Doug and I