If 2 people (A and B) are identical (everything is identical) and A punches B for no reason, B is hurt and thinks, “A should not punch B”.

This is an ought statement that isn’t backed up by any fact and might be wrong. But B thinks, “A should not punch B”.

Now let’s say it had happened in reverse and B had punched A for no reason this is actually the identical scenario because I said the people are identical. So ApunchB=BpunchA.

If B thinks that ApunchB is wrong then B thinks that BpunchA is wrong. B might not think that BpunchA=ApunchB but that is like not believing 2+2=4. B might be wrong that ApunchB=wrong but if B thinks that ApunchB=wrong then BpunchA=wrong.

(I know the golden rule is in the bible but can be arrived at through logic).

This is the first basic building block that can be built upon starting with the belief that someone harming you against your will for no reason is wrong.

You can say what about someone who doesn’t think ApunchB is wrong (ie. they don’t think someone harming them is wrong, I think there is close to nobody that doesn’t think it is wrong for someone to harm them against their will.)

So am I saying this is morality because everybody agrees? No many people probably don’t even agree that morality is about experienced harm. But those people probably believe it is wrong for someone to just harm them because they feel like it.

So perhaps morality emerges from the knowledge of the experience of suffering and that each of us thinks and feels that it is wrong for someone to harm us against our will. This can then be built upon logically.

I wanted to explain why this isn’t an argument for any “I think” morality statement.

I’m oversimplifying to present the logic.

So person B says 1), “I think someone harming me against my will for no reason is wrong.” (Which in my previous comment shows = I think harming someone against their will for no reason is wrong).

B says 2), “I think wearing the color red is wrong. And I think it is right to punch someone wearing red.”

Person A loves wearing red and says statement 1) and then says statement:

3) “I think wearing the color blue is wrong. And I think it is right to punch someone wearing blue.” (Person B loves to wear blue).

1,2,3 have no reason or proof.

————If B doesn’t believe it has a reason/proof for 2 then the punching part of 2 is contradicted. so 1 and 2 are in contradiction now, and:

Either B believes that 1 is more important and then at least the punching or harming part of 2 is overridden, or,

If person B thinks 2 is more important than 1 (again without a reason), and person A thinks 3 is more important then 1 then this is the conclusion:

If you have a belief (like 2) that you feel supersedes 1), then other people’s beliefs that something supersedes 1 also supersedes your 1)* (your belief you shouldn’t be harmed). Because these situations are again equivalent.

(To clarify I am not saying 2 and 3 are equivalent I am saying:

If A and B believe that 1) has a value of e.g. 5 morality points/weight.

If A believes that 2) is 10 times more important than 1). And B believes that 3) is 10 times more important than 1) then they have the equivalent belief about the value. Abelief2=Bbelief3.)

E.g. if you believe you are right to kill someone for being gay because you believe it is more important than 1. Then you believe they are right to kill you for any reason if they believe it is more important than 1. If you don’t believe this then you don’t believe 2+2=4

So far all of 1,2,3 are unsupported statements of belief in order for this to not be the case (a religious person e.g. saying it is right to kill homosexuals has to prove 2) and that they don’t just believe 2).

————If B believes 2 is proven (e.g. believes the bible is proven to be literally true), if A believes that 3 is proven then we are back to equivalent. Killing someone for what you believe to be proven is equivalent to someone killing you for what they believe to be proven.

So the answer of logical morality emerging from thought is, “if I believe that it is wrong for someone to harm me against my will without reason/proof then it is wrong for me to harm someone etc.”

If I have a belief 2 where it is right for me to harm someone because of an unproven belief, then it is right for someone else to harm me because of an unproven belief. Are there people who feel it is right for others to harm them because of others’ unproven beliefs?

We can say this all hinges on the unproven belief that it is wrong for someone to harm me against my will for no reason but it can progress logically and consistently from there. If I start with the initial belief there is a god what logic can I use to determine morality from there?

If A believes that 2) is 10 times more important than 1). And B believes that 3) is 10 times more important than 1)

Oops sorry this is meant to be the other way around: B believes 2 is more important than 1, and A believes 3 is (accidentally flipped A and B) but you get my point.

I’d agree that morality would be objective if everyone were exactly identical. Beyond that.. I have no idea.

It is the beginning foundation.

A and B are no longer identical when they believe 2 and 3. But now their belief of the value of 2 and 3 is identical.

Let me give you an example of what thinking logically about your belief would be like:

I watched a tv episode where a single dad had a girlfriend over and cooked some type of vegetable homecooked meal for her and his 2 young daughters. When the daughters complained and said they wanted mac n cheese she said, “you are lucky, I always have to eat mac n cheese I wish someone would cook for me”. Her thinking:

1) “I am unlucky when I have to eat food I don’t like or want.” (mac n cheese because she doesn’t know how to homecook)

2) “The kids are lucky when they have to eat food they don’t like.” (homecooked veg).

Statement 1 is undefended but if she believes that then statement 2 contradicts statement 1. If she believes statement 1 then the kids are unlucky to eat food they don’t like. And nobody was identical.

This isn’t technically morality but I am giving an example of the structure.

Or maybe you can present a scenario where I can apply what I mean and you can see if it is logically sound?

I agree that them being identical is in the initial model. Things are considered effectively identical in models but are actually different but yes the identical assumption is present in the model.

Because e.g. lets say A and B are not identical. C imposes 10 suffering units on each against their will for no reason and both experience identical suffering (but A and B are not identical).

If A thinks it is wrong for C to impose that on A. Can A logically think it is not wrong for C to impose that on B.
Asuffering=Bsuffering, but because A/=B I guess it is possible.

While technically true I think it is functional to say we can recognize that C harming someone (anyone against their will for no reason) is the same as doing it to someone else for no reason. And if A thinks it is wrong to be harmed in this way it is functionally logical for A to think it is wrong to harm someone else in this way.

I think as with models what needs to be modeled correctly or identical is what is relevant. If we had 2 balls that were identical in size, material etc but one was red and one was blue they could be considered identical when looking at throwing them (e.g. if I have a blue golf ball it could be pretty identical to a white one wrt to golf).

What is relevant in this question is what A’s initial statement 1) is wrt.
A feels 1) is wrong as a reaction to the experience of suffering, in that way 2 people identically suffering are identical. (2 balls identically sailing through the air are identical for golf even if 1 is red and 1 is blue).

You can say but people don’t suffer the same amount, but suffering is what is relevant or being measured. E.g. if you knew a person who can’t feel any pain would pinching or even cutting their arm be as bad as doing it to someone who would feel a lot of pain?

Or to put it another way pinching someone that doesn’t feel pain is not an equivalent amount of suffering to someone who does.

Your use of the word “think” when applied to humans and his/her thoughts regarding what constitutes right or wrong behavior is loaded with variables, making is very difficult to apply distilled logic broadly. It’s also quite subjective.

In reality, morality is a psychological fiction, but an enormous part of how we perceive self. Delusional people that lack pedestrian level intelligent or emotional clarity have internal and external mechanisms reinforcing right from wrong behavior the same way intelligent and emotionally stable people do. The difference is self-awareness. However, even the most self-aware individuals do not abandon all pro-social behavior, normally because they have become accustom, enjoy, and therefore justify certain behavior. “Morality” is more or less malleable to them. This doesn’t make them bad people, just pickers and choosers, and depending on who they are, “good,” “bad,” or somewhere in the enormous grey area.

I don’t think any of this answers your question; just saying’ is all.

In reality, morality is a psychological fiction…

I think that is the important question though. Is morality just fiction, if morality is just a psychological fiction then anything is moral or immoral?

I am saying if all humans experience suffering and if all humans believe that it is wrong for someone to impose suffering on them (againstwillnoreason) then humans can create a logical functioning morality (not on the basis of internal and external reinforcing).

Even though this is just on the basis of an initial belief, is there any other example of something morality could be built on. If we take the initial belief of a god what functional morality can logically be built on this? Do what god says? We don’t know what god says.

I can’t think of any other moral code that could be logical. A human says eating a banana is wrong and another human says eating a grape is wrong and then what?

In another thread there’s a link to a video of William Lane Craig and Sam Harris debating objective morality. In the first twenty minutes of this video, William Lane Craig, in his opening statement, gives as clear and convincing an explanation of what it means for something to be objectively wrong (without God) as I’ve heard. If you listen to his explanation, you will come to one of two conclusions. Either you will decide he’s wrong, and that whatever you mean by objective is different from what he means by objective (and different from what I take objective to mean). Or you will realize that you’re mistaken about objective morality originating in thoughts/brain. I look forward to your reaction.

Edit: I see from your other post that you already watched the video, which is here. Do you agree with Craig’s description of objective wrong?

Jill commenting - 28 March 2012 12:10 PM

In reality, morality is a psychological fiction…

I think that is the important question though. Is morality just fiction, if morality is just a psychological fiction then anything is moral or immoral?

It’s a fiction in the sense that you’re imagining it to be, I suspect. Keep in mind that morality as it’s practiced in the real world does not necessarily favor one side or another. If I’m a cashier at a store, for instance, and a customer hands me more money than he thought he’d handed me, I can either keep the extra money or give it back to him. If I give the money back to him, I’ll not only be helping the customer, but I’ll be helping myself as well, since I might suffer from a guilty conscience after stealing. I might not know I’ll feel guilty later, but if I’ve been raised in a certain way, I’ll eventually realize that I probably will feel guilty after stealing, and I’ll avoid deliberate taking of money from others who it belongs to.

People do things that benefit others, but we first tend to be highly protective of our own feelings. Once we discover (if we do, that is) that feeling guilty can make it impossible to appreciate whatever gain we may have achieved in the process, we tend to act more honestly. Acting in ways you describe as being within proper morality commonly benefits the person doing the action at least as much as the person receiving the action.

Do you agree with Craig’s description of objective wrong?

What was WLC’s definition of objective wrong? What I recall WLC defines objective morality as, ‘not determined by what people think’.* He gives the example of the Nazis killing everyone except people that agree with them so now everyone thinks the holocaust is good.

Do I agree with this? I would say it is not really a definition. He has said what it is not. You could say it means that: what is good is good and what is bad is bad. This is the very minimum of what could be considered a definition imo because it is not a working definition. Can he apply it to anything? Can he give one example of why something is bad with reference to his definition.

If every human left alive was a nazi that believed it was good to kill Jews, but every human believed that it was bad for someone to kill them for their own beliefs then this is a contradiction. Once someone believes it is wrong for someone else to kill them for their beliefs then killing a Jewish person for being Jewish is killing them for their beliefs.

The Nazi feels it is wrong for the Nazi to be killed for their beliefs so the thing they are reacting to is being killed for their beliefs, then it is wrong to kill Jews for their beliefs as this is the same.

If the Nazi person doesn’t feel it is wrong for themselves to be killed for their belief then they are at least consistent.

In the example with the cash register lets say the cashier feels no guilt ever. If the cashier feels it is wrong for a different cashier to keep their money when they accidentally give too much then it is wrong for them to keep the money. If they think it is not wrong for the cashier to keep their mistaken money then it is not wrong for them to keep it.

I guess I am using objective not quite accurately (or I don’t mean absolute) I mean once a person has an unfounded belief that something is wrong for someone else to do to them then they can frame issues in a way that is objective, in that it is meant to remove who they are and who the other person is (i.e. if they are the cashier what is right? if the other person is the cashier what is right? and the answer should be consistent). Objective in that you apply the same standard.

But yes this is still individual and not absolute. Can anybody else point me to a model of morality that could be functional. Even if I accept WLC’s claim that morality comes from god we still cannot use this is any way because we don’t actually know what god says. And yes just because I haven’t found something better doesn’t make this true, I would just also like if anybody can point to something better.

Also not relevant but the study Harris mentioned in the debate where children as young as 3 think it is not okay to hit someone even if their teacher says it is okay, they probably don’t think this is wrong just because they will feel guilt, probably even asked of them in a puppet type scenario (is it okay for this puppet to hit this puppet they’ll probably say no even though they are not doing an action they are judging an action therefor guilt isn’t part of it.

*Please tell me if this isn’t the definition of his you meant and what is.

He also says “god is the greatest being and the highest good.” This doesn’t say why god defines good, the highest good might be something that existed independently of god and god formed and reached self existing the pinnacle of good (born on top of a mountain so to speak) but the objective scale existed pre-god. But he can say nothing existed before god, how do you know? Because god is defined as the creator of everything. If I put enough definitions into god why cant I make any argument for anything? God is the creator, the greatest in a non moral sense, the greatest in a moral sense, all powerful, nothing existed before god and god is infinite.

How can you have space without god, god is infinite.

How can you have time without god, god is all time.

Jill commenting - 28 March 2012 04:46 PM

Do you agree with Craig’s description of objective wrong?

What was WLC’s definition of objective wrong? What I recall WLC defines objective morality as, ‘not determined by what people think’.* He gives the example of the Nazis killing everyone except people that agree with them so now everyone thinks the holocaust is good.

Do I agree with this? I would say it is not really a definition. He has said what it is not. You could say it means that: what is good is good and what is bad is bad. This is the very minimum of what could be considered a definition imo because it is not a working definition. Can he apply it to anything? Can he give one example of why something is bad with reference to his definition.

Yes, that’s exactly right: he explained what objective morality isn’t: it isn’t determined by what people think. Objective claims are claims about reality, and reality exists independent of human perception. Do you agree with that? Does he need to say anything else to show that the concept of right and wrong—which depends on what people think—isn’t objective?

The boiling point of water is an objective fact. Water boils at the same temperature even if not everyone believes it boils at that temperature. It would boil at the same temperature even if no one believed it. If every, single person in the world believed water boiled at 50 degrees, would water boil at 50 degrees? Of course not. Because reality exists independent of human perception. So why would you make that exact claim about morality, that if everyone believed something was wrong then it would become “objectively” wrong?

The only reason people have trouble with this is because they want to justify that their beliefs are right and other peoples beliefs are wrong is not just their opinion.

Morality = the consensus of personal preferences of a group = moral relativism.