MonDie

Iggy, you said you define morality as "the tendency to value others in order to benefit the group." If this were true, then any action performed to benefit the group would, by definition, be a moral action. However, this doesn't imply that people should do things that benefit the group. My red light analogy might be the simplest example of what we're talking about. L2 turns red when L1 turns red, L3 turns red when L2 turns red, etc. This is a factual claim about causation. If somebody says that L3 ought to turn red (not a factual claim), then they are implying that, via causation, all lights leading to L3 ought to turn red. If you want to argue to them that L2 needn't turn red, you can argue that L2 turning red won't lead to L3 turning red. However, as long as their idea that L3 ought to turn red is the basis for everything that ought to occur, you cannot argue for or against it. This is because an underlying ought like "L3 ought to turn red" cannot be derived from the knowledge of causation. This becomes clearer when you imagine a world without any living beings. A lifeless world still has causation, but it doesn't have oughts. If those lights were the only things in existence, we could say that the causation is real, but the oughts are non-existant. It is sentient beings that imagine a world with oughts. One could argue something like, "It is unnatural for certain living beings to imagine certain oughts," but that is going to be a tough argument. "Benefiting the group" is like L3 turning red, and everything that must be done in order to benefit the group is like the turning of a prior light red, which should lead to L3 turning red.

I guess I was using the word "verify" wrongly. Claim: 2+3=5 Put two apples next to three apples. If you have five apples total, your math hasn't been falsified. Claim: An object moving in an ellipse with an extreme eccentricity can come near to the foci of the ellipse. Observe a comet's path. Better yet, make a precise drawing. These are quite scientific methods of testing mathematical claims. The only difference I notice is that they aren't claims about objects or systems with very specific properties (e.g. the qualifications for being considered a living organism). Rather, they are claims about objects or systems with a single property (e.g. shape or amount), which are quite abundant (e.g. a comet's orbit works just as well as a precise drawing). How so? What does it mean that mathematics is a "formal science"? I don't get the "formal" part because numbers are no less formal than words, and they both refer to real things. How do you define morality? How can you come to a conclusion about what should and shouldn't be done without also concluding that what shouldn't be done is bad and what should be done is good? I think should nots, shoulds, goods, and bads are all derived from value judgments, and you cannot make a value judgment from which a should could be derived, but a good or bad couldn't be derived. For most possible situations, you would be right about this. We could just say you're right for all practical purposes. However, this is a philosophical argument, and my point is about a broader logic that applies to a diverse category of situations. I know the term "meme," but I don't know what you mean.

Outcomes are a mix of reasons and chance. Some outcomes are more probable for certain reasons, and I listed examples of reasons in the first part of my previous post. When I gave an example of how history might have gone differently, I didn't assume that that alternative reality was just as likely as this one. Actually, things probably turned out this way because they were more likely to turn out this way for some reason(s), but that isn't necessarily the case. This is why people need to provide evidence for their reasons. I am now going to switch from the word reasons to explanations, but it's still the same concept. You provide an explanation for the way reality is now, but I haven't seen any evidence that puts that explanation above others. From what I understand, your explanation for the common belief in a god is that people have a tendency to think in such a way that they unsuccessfully try to describe some particular thing that isn't a god, and they inaccurately describe it as a god. However, if you don't provide evidence for this, it's an example of "begging the question." Maybe you believe that what you think of when you think of god must be based on something real, but you cannot assume that the correct explanation is that everyone thinks like you do. However, if that is what you believe (that what you think of when you think of a god must be based on something real), I think I can relate to it.

EDITED LATER: I understand what you are saying, and I can't argue against it. I haven't learned about thermodynamics much yet, but why must the law be about what is not rather than what is? For example, maybe it could say "all motion machines are non-perpetual." That sounds like it could be verifiable. Of course, we cannot go to every part of the universe and test the law in every place, but we can test it enough that we see it as a law. Also, after some thought, I realized that the formal sciences do concern reality. For example, we could say that mathematics is the science of amounts, and amounts are part of reality. This applies as long as we can verify the maths with physical representations. I'm not sure if we could say that logic is the science of reasons, but there could potentially be a science of reasons. If reasons are real, we can test them using experiments. For example, light #2 turns red when light #1 turns red, and #3 turns red when #2 turns red. Therefore, hypothetically, #3 should turn red when #1 turns red. Reasons are real and verifiable. I did assert that, but it was probably a bad use of English. Rather, they aren't judgments about what reality is objectively, they are judgments about what reality is subjectively. Empiricism only applies to what reality is objectively. But you are still leaving the definitions of "right" and "wrong" up to individuals rather than objective reality. Who is to decide that what is "injurious to humanity" is part of what is "bad"? I would generally agree, but what of a person that is killing everyone else in order to save the members of the blood-line they belong to? By the way, you can type instead of making a series of dashes to separate portions of a post, like so. EDITED: The idea of not being able to derive an "ought" from an "is" got me wondering. When I was considering how the formal sciences relatate to reality, I tried to relate "oughts" to reasons. For example, if #3 ought to turn red, #1 ought to turn red (see first part of post). But where does the ought come from? Amounts exist, reasons exist, and oughts exist too. Question: What makes something ought to happen? Answer: A living being does. Oughts must be dependent on life. Matter, energy, amounts, and reasons would exist in a universe without life, but oughts would not. Our oughts were probably somewhat conditioned by evolution because we usually only give oughts to events that will affect living beings. Most people don't have moral concerns about what might happen after the disappearance of all life because it wouldn't affect us. Someone could think that the universe ought to collapse into a black hole, but they probably wouldn't. Our oughts are usually more along the lines of, "That apple ought to be ripe and nutritious." This leaves two perspectives. Oughts come from either the mind or evolution. One could argue that evolution determines what oughts are correct. However, if we set out to discover the correct oughts on this basis, we will probably conclude that everyone's oughts are in conflict. On the other hand, I don't know how someone arguing that oughts are from the mind could argue against oughts that are not based on any underlying reasoning (e.g. "#1 should turn red." "#1 turning red doesn't mean #3 will turn red." "I know, but #1 should turn red. My daddy says so.")

Who else? What about the other apes that are losing their habitats to human greed?

I.e. If religions have common beliefs that haven't been refuted, those beliefs must be true. Did I understand it as you did? 1 I think this is an example of "begging the question." The religions might have common beliefs because of cultural diffusion (basically, the spreading of ideas from one culture to another), or because religions with such beliefs lasted significantly longer than other religions, or because humans have built-in tendencies toward certain thoughts, 2 or any combination thereof. There is also the factor of chance. Post hoc analyses don't need to have explanations. Post hoc analysis involves looking for any random pattern and attributing that pattern to something other than chance. The problem is that somebody will inevitably find some sort of pattern if they are just looking for any pattern at all, and that pattern doesn't need to be due to anything more than chance. So, there is no reason to think that, if the different religions happened to have a different belief in common, people wouldn't be pointing to that belief instead. 1 So, alternatively, and purely by chance, history might have caused you to be here now saying, "All the major religions say that dead relatives can visit you in your dreams, so it must be true!" This thread might have had a title along the lines of, "People who believe dead relatives visit them in their dreams are broken."

I forgot that I could put "youtube" and "UrA-8rTxXf0" into Google to follow your broken link from the thread you linked to. I already watched the one I posted above, but I'll watch this one too. I should also continue reading that thread. EDIT: From what I've heard, Sam Harris's argument against the is/ought rebuttal is that we can all agree on certain values. This wouldn't apply to sociopaths, but it would be interesting to see if cured sociopaths claim to enjoy life more after being cured, or if people becoming sociopaths feel good about it. EDIT: He mentions well-being a lot. Maybe a good argument would be that all people enlist morals for the sake of their well-being, so well-being would actually be what determines morals and would run deeper than morality. Therefore, a morality that doesn't serve well-being in actuality could be considered a morality that is broken, perhaps as the result of bad reasoning and not just the willy-nilly "I believe!" However, a barrier is that some people might claim to deny their well-being for their god's sake because they would think it is selfish to value their own well-being. EDIT: However, if morality serves the well-being of the believer, how can anyone justify sacrificing their life for a greater cause in any circumstance?

I had not. I found this longer video of Sam Harris speaking, so I think I'll watch this one because your post on that thread said he has more details. I'm not going to lie, the 23 minute TED speech seemed to be mostly hot air.

Heterosexual interactions can be pretty funny too.

My previous post was somewhat incorrect because formal science claims are not about the nature of reality, but they are still verifiable. However, I think the values underlying all morals are subjective. As for Iggy, I think he should try to prove that a moral belief is objectively correct because I haven't been able to do it.

"there is no such thing as true goodness and true badness in reality." You said it, not me. Judgments about what is good or bad aren't judgments about the nature of reality, so they cannot be right or wrong. Because there is no right or wrong answer, the good vs bad believers aren't broken. On the other hand, God either does exist or doesn't exist, so one answer is wrong and the other is right. EDIT: Think about it this way. An apple can taste good or bad to different people because the taste of the apple isn't actually part of the apple, it's part of the consumer's brain. As long as we accept that the taste is part of our brain and not objectively real, we aren't broken. However, that doesn't mean we are broken if we eat an apple because we think it tastes good. I have to stop typing now because of holiday matters!

The claims are different because "Is murder good or bad?" does not have a correct answer. "Is God real or fake?" does have a correct answer even if that answer is beyond what we can know. Imagine two people watching a nature program on the television. One person might say, "This program is bad because it isn't entertaining." The other person says, "This program is good because it's informative." The questions of whether the program is entertaining or informative might have right or wrong answers, but the question of whether the program is good or bad does not have a right or wrong answer because the criteria for goodness or badness is subjective. I agree that "bad" needs to be defined, but anybody can define "bad" however they want to. If someone believes, "It is good for humanity to thrive," then your argument for the badness of murder will be valid to them. If someone thinks, "It is good to kill people because the human race should go extinct (i.e. humanity thriving is bad)," then your argument for the badness of murder won't apply to them. Of course, you could argue that they shouldn't think the human race should go extinct, but you would need to rely on another one of their beliefs. For example, "You don't take your own life because you make people smile and think people smiling is good. Therefore, how can you think the human race should go extinct if it means that no more people will smile?" Ultimately, value judgments lay the foundations for all ethical arguments, and value judgments are subjective.

I think you will see my refutation's relation to the the main topic once I explain it more clearly. The claim, "Murder is bad," is not a claim about objective reality, it's just an evaluation of something that's objectively real. The claim, "God is real," is a claim about objectively reality. That's why they're different kinds of beliefs. We might categorize one as a "value claim" and the other as a "reality claim." Therefore, claiming "Murder is bad" doesn't necessarily make someone as broken as someone claiming "God is real."

My first EDIT to my last post was a concession of a fatal flaw in my argument, which I've now clarified in that post.

Moral codes perform functions, and facts tell us how to make moral codes perform better. These moral codes are upheld by people who need to interact, but cannot successfully interact without rules. However, most people say that we should follow the moral code even when we don't benefit from doing so. How could someone do that unless they are guided by a belief in the innate value of the moral code? EDIT: I think I spotted a flaw in my argument. EDIT: Maybe the difference lies in value judgments having nothing to do with what is real. It wasn't until I articulated that last sentence that I realized I was talking about a value judgment concerning what is known to be, not a judgment about what is.

I didn't see that you responded to the original version of my post. I decided to think about it more before proposing a challenge. I wonder which version of my post got the green mark. There is someone that is always watching what you do. That person is you. You don't need God to be watching you because you are capable of thinking. In addition, it's technically not altruism if they are only acting altruistically to appease an enforcer of some rules, real or imaginary. The real problem arises from what I explained earlier and will explain again. Both belief in god and belief in moral codes lack evidence, but moral codes seem to be exempt from the requirement of evidence. However, if there are some beliefs in gods that are exempt from the requirement of evidence, how can we say that such believers are any less broken than those who believe in moral codes? I am hoping Prometheus can support my argument by explaining the reasoning behind this statement:

I think the emotional effect of guilt is the only good replacement for logically indefensible moral codes. I'll try to find some scientific information on emotion and guilt, although I doubt there's much.

I bolded the statement I am directly responding to. This makes things interesting. If faith in god's existence falls into the category of "Evidence Does Not Apply," then faith in god is in the same category as faith in moral codes. I don't think anybody here is going to argue that faith in moral codes makes a person broken.

Give it up. Nobody empathizes with tissue cells. Even if it's physically the same as real meat? What if scientists invent it and start saying it's revolutionary because it's produced much more efficiently than live cows? Then would you eat the green eggs and ham?

There might be other factors too, such as biologically-linked predispositions towards certain beliefs, although such explanations might suggest that these irrational beliefs are actually psychological defenses for biologically determined preferences. Such alternative explanations for beliefs justify my emphasis on the requirement of scientific evidence for a psychological intertwine-ment of faith in god and faith in kindness. Said "emphasis" was edited into my post in bold text, like this. EDIT: Yes! Yes! That's it! A theist would like for us to think that theism promotes kindness, but it isn't that simple!

I thought of another modification: a religious person's faith in the rightness of kindness? Religions usually do teach that kindness is right, although I doubt many teach that kindness is always right, especially when it comes to members of out-groups, a.k.a. "sinners," "heathens," "paganists," etc. Anyway, I think that is still faith because one cannot logically prove that kindness is right. Typically, the rightness of kindness is enforced by social interaction, but it might also be enforced by faith to a certain degree. This throws a curve ball to the idea that stronger religiosity always causes greater potential for irrational evil. If somebody has very strong faith in kindness being right, they might not turn evil at the say so of a religious leader who they have comparably less faith in. Their faith in the rightness of kindness might even be psychologically intertwined with their faith in the existence of their god, although I wouldn't accept this without scientific evidence. Am I just not thinking as critically today? This sounds like an argument a theist would make!

Whoops, double post.

Even if we couldn't think of counterarguments or better explanations, those examples of evidence wouldn't say much. Religious gods are usually complex. Even the idea of a god itself is complex because it has multiple characteristics, and it becomes more complicated when you add in more characteristics. Such complex ideas would hardly be supported even if someone could prove something like prayer healing or the logical necessity of an ultimate creation event, EDIT: and it's even debatable whether that could be considered supporting evidence at all. I would continue promoting the search for natural explanations/knowledge because that is the progressive route. To make matters worse, religious hypotheses aren't supported by the evidence when they're examined scientifically.

I'm still reading the thread, but the argument I was reading didn't seem to be going toward what I am about to say. Of course, if humans made this argument after they were enslaved, it would be clear that they were only arguing for their own benefit. However, we could argue that humans should change their view even before they're enslaved because of their ability to feel empathy. Humans have the intelligence to think about things that aren't happening, but might happen, which is displacement (linguistics). Mafio's hypothetical story is meant to invoke empathic feelings for enslaved animals through our ability to grasp displacement. If an argument would conclude that empathy for other genera is natural for humans or was adaptive for humans, it would be a good argument from the psychological or evolutionary perspective. Such an argument would probably rely on the functionality of the social nature of humans. If an argue would conclude that a popular belief about empathy can be logically extrapolated to this issue, that would also be a good argument. Such an argument would probably rely on the more common belief that pets should not be abused.