existential skeptic
“Find me a right-of-mind person who agrees and if there exists none, then that is one aspect of objective morality.”
This is an example of the ‘democratic theory of truth.’ If we all believe it, it must be true. There is a problem in your criteria because if you did find a person who agreed, you would declare him to be outside the population of people you’d say are “right-of-mind,” thereby circularly justifying your claim. You’re saying that “A person that agrees with Richard Hanley is not in his right mind because someone would have to be not right-of-mind to agree with such a claim.”
A more fundamental problem with this assertion is that democratic theories of morality and epistemology are wholly subjective and the polar opposite of objective. Objective morality could exist (or not exist) even though no one believes in it. Objective morality might fail to exist even if we all believe in it (and most of us do, because it is evolutionarily adaptive to believe in such things).
“Remember back when the world was flat? Reality is far bigger than our meager senses can perceive accurately.”
It is science, not faith, that proved this notion wrong. Thank you for reinforcing my argument. In fact, it was naïve anthropocentric and geocentric biased faith that produced this notion in the first place. (Much like the anthropocentric notion that we alone have free will, and that humans are the only beings deserving of moral consideration).
“It is appropriate that through (religiously unspecified) faith (although clearly, the author is closely tied with the judao-christian faith) a scholar must believe what he/or she wants to do in research is not of "selfish ambition or van conceit," (Philippians 2:3) but of righteousness, based off of the premise that, "the righteous will live by faith."
Abstracts to (without parentheses):
It is appropriate that through faith, a scholar must believe what he/or she wants to do in research is (not of "selfish ambition or van conceit," but of righteousness,) based off of the premise that, "the righteous will live by faith."
So basically, through faith, someone believes that the righteous will live by faith. Argumentation, anyone?
The responder defines faith for us, but never says why faith based on a particular book should be trusted any more than say, my earlier post (or the work of someone like Richard Hanley).
“relative to our perception of self, we do have free will which can function with that of divine will. These aspects of will can coexist on different iterations of consciousness.”
“our perception of self” ?? whose perception? Who is to say that the ‘self’ exists? A critical look at the common perception of the self can be provided by Kant and Buddha.
Consciousness? Show me where it is, and what makes it different from non-consciousness such that it can participate in ontological spectrums that are distinctly separate from non-conscious ones.
It seems that the responder’s response to my argument against the coexistence of agent free will and theological free will essentially boils down to… “no, you’re wrong, because I believe it is so, and so do a lot of other people.” At this point I might do us all a favor by giving a reality check: just because you quote someone famous or lovable, the quote does not necessarily reflect a true statement.
The reference to the earlier post invites me to criticize said post for confusing epistemic justification with moral justification. Even if there could be a logical fallacy in the ‘no absolute truth’ perspective, that fallacy cannot be extended to the argument against absolute morality because each is a qualitatively different matter. Scientists can (and do) explain the illusion of objective morality by materialist, non-theological means. It brings me to my concluding point.
Belief in objective morality requires that one be a dualist. This means that in order to believe in objective morality, you must first believe that there is something that exists outside the physical entities of which we are composed and with which we interact. This outside constituent of existence is where we would find ideals such as morality, truth, etc. These cannot be found in the realm of physically measurable entities because those entities are the ones which are governed by deterministic physical laws (if one believes that these physical components are all that there is in the universe, then he would be a materialist). Determinism precludes free will, which precludes moral responsibility (determinism is not necessary, but sufficient for precluding moral responsibility). Something non-physical must enter the system in order for there to be any hope for objective morality. Science does not deal with the non-physical because it can be neither measured (proven) nor disproved. Science deals with things that can be reduced to physical constituents (such as the biological basis for apparently non-physical things such as emotions and thoughts). Objective morality thus cannot enter the arena of scientific investigation. Subjective morality (or what might more appropriately be called ‘adaptive behavior motivation’) is instead the motivation for “moral” decisions in science and in social interaction.
This is an example of the ‘democratic theory of truth.’ If we all believe it, it must be true. There is a problem in your criteria because if you did find a person who agreed, you would declare him to be outside the population of people you’d say are “right-of-mind,” thereby circularly justifying your claim. You’re saying that “A person that agrees with Richard Hanley is not in his right mind because someone would have to be not right-of-mind to agree with such a claim.”
A more fundamental problem with this assertion is that democratic theories of morality and epistemology are wholly subjective and the polar opposite of objective. Objective morality could exist (or not exist) even though no one believes in it. Objective morality might fail to exist even if we all believe in it (and most of us do, because it is evolutionarily adaptive to believe in such things).
“Remember back when the world was flat? Reality is far bigger than our meager senses can perceive accurately.”
It is science, not faith, that proved this notion wrong. Thank you for reinforcing my argument. In fact, it was naïve anthropocentric and geocentric biased faith that produced this notion in the first place. (Much like the anthropocentric notion that we alone have free will, and that humans are the only beings deserving of moral consideration).
“It is appropriate that through (religiously unspecified) faith (although clearly, the author is closely tied with the judao-christian faith) a scholar must believe what he/or she wants to do in research is not of "selfish ambition or van conceit," (Philippians 2:3) but of righteousness, based off of the premise that, "the righteous will live by faith."
Abstracts to (without parentheses):
It is appropriate that through faith, a scholar must believe what he/or she wants to do in research is (not of "selfish ambition or van conceit," but of righteousness,) based off of the premise that, "the righteous will live by faith."
So basically, through faith, someone believes that the righteous will live by faith. Argumentation, anyone?
The responder defines faith for us, but never says why faith based on a particular book should be trusted any more than say, my earlier post (or the work of someone like Richard Hanley).
“relative to our perception of self, we do have free will which can function with that of divine will. These aspects of will can coexist on different iterations of consciousness.”
“our perception of self” ?? whose perception? Who is to say that the ‘self’ exists? A critical look at the common perception of the self can be provided by Kant and Buddha.
Consciousness? Show me where it is, and what makes it different from non-consciousness such that it can participate in ontological spectrums that are distinctly separate from non-conscious ones.
It seems that the responder’s response to my argument against the coexistence of agent free will and theological free will essentially boils down to… “no, you’re wrong, because I believe it is so, and so do a lot of other people.” At this point I might do us all a favor by giving a reality check: just because you quote someone famous or lovable, the quote does not necessarily reflect a true statement.
The reference to the earlier post invites me to criticize said post for confusing epistemic justification with moral justification. Even if there could be a logical fallacy in the ‘no absolute truth’ perspective, that fallacy cannot be extended to the argument against absolute morality because each is a qualitatively different matter. Scientists can (and do) explain the illusion of objective morality by materialist, non-theological means. It brings me to my concluding point.
Belief in objective morality requires that one be a dualist. This means that in order to believe in objective morality, you must first believe that there is something that exists outside the physical entities of which we are composed and with which we interact. This outside constituent of existence is where we would find ideals such as morality, truth, etc. These cannot be found in the realm of physically measurable entities because those entities are the ones which are governed by deterministic physical laws (if one believes that these physical components are all that there is in the universe, then he would be a materialist). Determinism precludes free will, which precludes moral responsibility (determinism is not necessary, but sufficient for precluding moral responsibility). Something non-physical must enter the system in order for there to be any hope for objective morality. Science does not deal with the non-physical because it can be neither measured (proven) nor disproved. Science deals with things that can be reduced to physical constituents (such as the biological basis for apparently non-physical things such as emotions and thoughts). Objective morality thus cannot enter the arena of scientific investigation. Subjective morality (or what might more appropriately be called ‘adaptive behavior motivation’) is instead the motivation for “moral” decisions in science and in social interaction.
posted by ffpaladin at 12:19 PM
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