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OK. But on my objective understanding of principles, this is how we identify facts. I'll give you my answers later but I want to give others a chance first. It may be that when I give my answers you won't agree with them at all. This is more about an exercise in thinking than it is about getting the right answer.Personally, I'm not granting you that one just yet. We may agree in principle that some things are good or bad for us, but does that then rise to the level of being a fact beyond our own subjective opinions? Ehhhhh
Still nothing.
But there is a source that is not just an opinion. That's what this exercise is all about. Facts are not matters of opinion.Without a source for morality there are no moral standards, only peoples opinions.
No, I'm asking what facts give rise to the need for such a concept as morality.I thought you were asking us to define "oughtness" in terms of some other concept. I gather that's not what you intended to discuss after all.
That's why I defined it. A concept that identifies a primary, conceptually irreducible, fundamental fact. for example the axiom of existence. Existence is an axiomatic concept. It includes everything that exists. So it identifies a fundamental fact. Existence can't be defined in terms of more fundamental concepts because there are none. Therefore it is irreducible. You can only define it by pointing to it. It is a primary fact because it is implicit in all knowledge. That's what I mean by an axiom. Mathematical axioms are not fundamental to all knowledge nor are they conceptually irreducible.I'm talking about "axiom" in the sense that it's used in formal logic and mathematics. I don't know what the colloquial sense of the word is.
Actually it's an exercise in a certain method of thinking. It's not a discussion about what is moral but about the issues one would need to know in order to reach the concept of morality. I think people are trying to make this harder than it has to be. I've tried to give hints, not to lead anyone to a conclusion but it's just that people are not understanding the questions. As I said this way of thinking is totally foreign to 99 percent of people so it's understandable that they would have difficulty answering. I'm not down on anybody for not knowing. These are deep issues that most people never consider. I know I didn't at one time. It's OK. This should be fun. It is for me.I feel like we've moved from "Let's discuss philosophy" to "Guess what the answer is" to "Guess what the question is", so I'll bow out for a while. I yield the floor to @Bradskii . Maybe I'll buy the next round.
I find that a very powerful tool to get to the heart of any issue is to ask: What perceptually self-evident facts of reality give rise to the need for a certain concept or idea. So I'd like to ask everyone what facts of reality give rise to the need for morality. I use the word perceptually self-evident because I'm interested in getting to the heart of the issue. I want to reduce the idea to its foundation and the foundation of any knowledge is perception. So what facts available in direct perception give rise to the need for morality.
I'm defining morality as a set of principles to guide one's actions in the pursuit of a good life. why do we need such a concept in the first place?
I think I'd start with our inner intuitions that "morally right" and "morally wrong" are meaningful categories -- that the word "ought" means something. Figuring out which actions are morally right and morally wrong can be a challenge, of course, and ethicists come up with various theories to use as heuristics. But the category itself -- moral rightness/wrongness -- is a deep intuition most humans have. To deny that category is to deny a strong inner intuition, and I don't want to do that without a very good reason.
That's it. You nailed it. Life is conditional. We face the alternative of existence vs. non-existence like all living things. If we didn't face that choice, and for us it's a choice, then nothing could harm us or be bad for us. The need for a code of values arises from this fact. Now there's one more reduction to get to an axiom. Why is man's life conditional? I don't mean who made it that way but I mean what fact gives rise to the need for this concept of the conditionality of life. The next answer is a brute fact.It's crucial to human life as in without it we die? Or without it we live but can't be happy?
Something else?
That's it. You nailed it. Life is conditional. We face the alternative of existence vs. non-existence like all living things. If we didn't face that choice, and for us it's a choice, then nothing could harm us or be bad for us.
Yeah, we do have a flight or fight reflex. sometimes there's no time to think and your reflex saves you. Isn't that part of the brain called the lizard brain. I think it is. I don't think you could choose to keep your hand in a fire either and I defy anyone not to run when being charged by a Grizzly (speaking from personal experience here). But that's not what I'm talking about when I say we choose to live. Life is an ongoing process that has to be undertaken volitionally. A plant acts automatically to further it's life. It can't choose not to sprout, put down roots, grow leaves to collect sunlight and reproduce. Man doesn' t have automatic actions like that. But the two you pointed out are some of the ones that are like the actions of a plant, automatic and out of your control. But man can't live long term by reflex. There's no reflex that can cause you to make clothes, tools, shelter, etc, or at least no reflex will give you the knowledge needed to make these things. Farming is one of the best examples I can think of. There's no instinct or reflex for farming. You have to learn all sorts of things in order to farm. What do plants need to grow. what are the ideal conditions to produce abundant fruit. What causes a plant to grow in a certain spot. What nutrients are needed. How much water is too little. This requires thinking which has to be done by choice. Your need to think in order to live is baked into your nature as man. that's why Aristotle defined man as the rational animal. He didn't mean that all men act rationally all the time but rather man is the animal that survives by thinking. That's a huge hint regarding the last why question.I don't think it's reasonable to say, for example, that we have a choice to keep our hand in the flames. Or not to struggle for breath if drowning. The instinct for self preservation is the most basic and overriding of all instincts. So to that extent, unless we are suicidal or sacrificing ourselves from some perceived greater good, we have no choice. So that which harms us is bad. That which keeps us from harm is good.
Yeah, we do have a flight or fight reflex. sometimes there's no time to think and your reflex saves you. Isn't that part of the brain called the lizard brain. I think it is. I don't think you could choose to keep your hand in a fire either and I defy anyone not to run when being charged by a Grizzly (speaking from personal experience here). But that's not what I'm talking about when I say we choose to live. Life is an ongoing process that has to be undertaken volitionally. A plant acts automatically to further it's life. It can't choose not to sprout, put down roots, grow leaves to collect sunlight and reproduce. Man doesn' t have automatic actions like that. But the two you pointed out are some of the ones that are like the actions of a plant, automatic and out of your control. But man can't live long term by reflex. There's no reflex that can cause you to make clothes, tools, shelter, etc, or at least no reflex will give you the knowledge needed to make these things. Farming is one of the best examples I can think of. There's no instinct or reflex for farming. You have to learn all sorts of things in order to farm. What do plants need to grow. what are the ideal conditions to produce abundant fruit. What causes a plant to grow in a certain spot. What nutrients are needed. How much water is too little. This requires thinking which has to be done by choice. Your need to think in order to live is baked into your nature as man. that's why Aristotle defined man as the rational animal. He didn't mean that all men act rationally all the time but rather man is the animal that survives by thinking. That's a huge hint regarding the last why question.
I find that a very powerful tool to get to the heart of any issue is to ask: What perceptually self-evident facts of reality give rise to the need for a certain concept or idea. So I'd like to ask everyone what facts of reality give rise to the need for morality.
Yeah, it did. It's still ongoing. I don't know that they think. I mean form concepts. But you're right, we do, and to a vastly greater degree than the other animals if they do at all. I mean dogs and certain other animals can recognize themselves in a mirror and Elephants can find the bones of their dead. Chimpanzees use sticks as tools. But that is not their main mode of survival. They live at the perceptual level of consciousness. When a drought comes and there is no food they parish. They don't invent farming. you couldn't live like a dolphin, Bradskii. Nor could you live like an Eagle or an Earth Worm. Your life has different requirements because of your nature as a rational animal. And I guess I've just given the answer to the last why question. You face the alternative of existence vs. non-existence because it is part of your nature or identity. Identity is the axiomatic concept at the base of Morality.But that happened gradually. It evolved. Thinking is common to all animals. We just do it better than the rest. It's a matter of degree only.
Man has to choose his actions and he has no automatic knowledge of what is good for him and bad for him, therefore he needs a set of values to guide his actions and choices, which choices and actions determine if he lives or dies. These are the facts that give rise to the need for a concept such as "morality".
We do have a source. It's the concept of 'do no harm'. But your opinion on what harm actually constitutes might well differ from mine. That's applicable whatever the source.
But there is a source that is not just an opinion. That's what this exercise is all about. Facts are not matters of opinion.
But the sin nature of man doesn't make morality necessary in and of itself, evolution does that by making moral behavior a beneficial survival trait.
That is merely your cultural conditioning to the remnants of Christian morality.
Sorry. I'm not buying this argument. I refuse to define someone else's life for them. I don't know what this makes Johnny/Jenny but I'm far more concerned with Johnny/Jenny's character than I am with their sexual categorization. Sexual categorization may be a big thing to you, but it ain't nothing to me.
Johnny's health and well-being, and his ultimate future happiness, is a very big thing to me. (It should be a big thing to anyone that has a heart.)
Allowing Johnny to do something that will most certainly harm his future life instead of improving it is not love and kindness, but absolute foolish cruelty.
As with gravity, there are some things that are truth (and reality), not a matter of personal feelings.
A white man is not a black man, no matter what he thinks and feels.
A man is not a dog, no matter what he thinks and feels.
And a boy is not a girl, no matter what he thinks and feels.
It's an incredibly sad sickness, and should be dealt with as such.
That's true love and care. The opposite is both foolish and cruel.
I find that a very powerful tool to get to the heart of any issue is to ask: What perceptually self-evident facts of reality give rise to the need for a certain concept or idea. So I'd like to ask everyone what facts of reality give rise to the need for morality. I use the word perceptually self-evident because I'm interested in getting to the heart of the issue. I want to reduce the idea to its foundation and the foundation of any knowledge is perception. So what facts available in direct perception give rise to the need for morality.
I'm defining morality as a set of principles to guide one's actions in the pursuit of a good life. why do we need such a concept in the first place?
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