Boris Johnson's Philosophy fun-time. Part:1

[Boris Johnson]

Edit, after really screwing the dog the first time. I've changed this OP and thus hopefully make the discussion more focused

Anyway, thought I'd start a series of threads in philosophy, on actual philosophical topics which hopefully anyone can participate in, as, well, the philosophy forum so far on PCF has been a little bit stale (no offence intended, its just debating anarchist principles only has so much broad appeal).


To wit, I intend to start this with a topic I think everyone should have some sort of opinion on:

Specifically I want to kick off the debate between morality being on the one hand Subjective (that is, morality consists only in the moral opinions of human beings, it is mind dependent) vs. Objective (certain things are true of morality regardless of the total opinions of all humans alive today e.g. everyone may be wrong, it may even be the case that certain things would be true of morality if there were no human beings).

And because I don't want to scupper this by just ranting, I'm going set the trend of BJPFT's by simply presenting a framing question after a brief explanation (which has just happened, yo!) and present a simple but not complete version of my opinion.

Caveat 1- I am arguing from a materialist standpoint
Caveat 2- I am not presuming free will
Caveat 3- Let's leave rationality aside for now.

Ok.

Lets do it.

Given the above 'vs' for this week being contingent on 'well it depends on what your talking about' allow me to start with the question: You have a moral entity that has committed no wrongs, is it morally blameless to kill this entity?

That's just a question to focus debate. The broader topic I want to address here, is that from an explanatory standpoint. The apparently obvious conclusion that morals are simply subjective, does explain moral disagreement across people, times and cultures. But does not, explain apparent moral agreement. For if morals have no basis outside of the mind or culture they are conceived in. how can explain, how, under their own lights there can be apparent agreement over matters such as the innate revulsion at certain patterns of behaviour e.g. unprovoked aggression. Or certain 'moral phenomenon' e.g. betrayal.

What I want to suggest on the other hand, though, I cannot offer a full positive thesis. That if morality were in some respect 'linked' to the fact we are social animals and some how certain moral outlooks are 'selected for'. Then there may in fact be some ground to consider morality in some important way as objective.

So that's what I would like to discuss, though it appears obvious to many on consideration that morals are subjective. Does this as an explanatory hypothesis for the nature of morality really explain morality as a phenomenon the best.

If it does not, what is morality?

If it in fact does, how can apparent moral agreement be explained?

-importantly here, under their own lights refers to a persons epistemic or cultural outlook.



Now, in the words of the great philosopher Mario "lessa go!"

[The Dharma Bum]

It's mind dependent, therefore I prefer consequentialism as an ethical theory.

It would depend wholly on what the consequences of murdering and not murdering the child would be.

[The Dharma Bum]

Also when deciding whether or not it is ok to kill someone what makes "innocence" such an overriding concern? Simple, it's our cultural paradigm. This viewpoint is not universal which shows morals/ethics are completely subjective.

[Boris Johnson]

[The Dharma Bum]

[The Comrade]

to assume a sort of objective morality is to assume a set of base premises, whatever they may be. why is murder wrong? one must assume life is _______ . why is theft wrong? one must assume private property is ______.

it makes it nearly impossible to say there are NATURAL AND INNATE morals in us. I should state that by morals i mean normative assertions. x IS wrong. y IS right. that does not mean we don't have a sort of... primitive ethics? but to rely on that would be unacceptable. not only is it nearly impossible to isolate that ethics due to culture bias (and the APA seems against raising children like wild animals in isolation to study them. can't figure out why) but even if one could they would be forever in flux depending on the relationship of an individual to his environment and an individual to his peers. what i mean is that lots of food=more egalitarian less food=might makes right(and who gets to eat). it's casting a very wide net as opposed to spearing a specific fish(to use a stupid idiom).

that said, there are ethics and morals we can REASON to be the best. this is where the two main groups come into play; utilitarianism and deontology. various issues always come down to which of these is better suited and the result is that both tend to be required otherwise you get all cocked up with different, outlier scenarios. the problem comes in that the two are pretty mutually exclusive so there is no perfect mixture of these two philosophies. the result is this kind of ad hoc ethics that has no structural justification (like rigid utilitarianism, or whatever system you like).


i think there are very basic morals we can derive are bad though using a strictly "this is obviously not good cause bad things happen as a result" assuming bad is some inherent human response.

SO! we generally would view murder as bad, i think at least because when viewing someone as truly innocent of any possible conflict with another, the murder of that individual would generally revolt a normal person (possibly culturally based but it's worked out so far so why change?). on top of that one can deduce from the actions of those close to the murdered individual that it's not cupcakes and rainbows to kill someone.

[Boris Johnson]

[Boris Johnson]

[The Dharma Bum]

[The Dharma Bum]

I seem to remember you considering Objectivism to be a flawed philosophy BoJo. What changed your mind?