Epistemological Bases For Morality

[Guest gssq]

This tactic is always annoying. He claims there's no secular basis for morality and tries to tear everything down.

 

I have pasted the chat log. Please comment, so I have some ideas of how to counter his epistemological nihilism the next time we chat.

 

 

 

 

Apologist: you certainly seem to assume its dominance, from your comments!

i suppose your pal's blog helps to prove the point...

 

i could talk about definitions of "conspiracy" and Eichmann in Jerusalem in connection with the Holocaust, but he doesn't seem to understand what i'm saying (or want to listen), so there might not be much point..

 

Me: if freedom is the dominant "ideology" I am proud that it's dominant and I embrace it

I don't know what other ideology you might have, but it can't be good

 

wth does Eichmann in Jerusalem have to do with anything

 

Apologist: i already knew that's what you actually think

you don't understand what is freedom, for starters. you confuse it with moral autonomy and mere undetermined free choice

 

Me: uhhh

and this is relevant - how?

what is freedom to you, then

 

Apologist: so i object to your identifying yourself with the position of "freedom". I am on the side of true freedom; true Freedom is on my side.

 

Me: for you, Freedom is Slavery

thus I am glad not to be "free" by your definition

 

Apologist: Freedom is becoming what you are meant to be. A bird is unfree when in a cage, because it's meant to fly

men are unfree when they're doing evil, because they're meant to do good

 

Me: do not impute teleological meaning to life

 

Apologist: and why not? : P

 

your life has no purpose

 

Me: well you've already assumed that things have to proceed a certain way

so there's no way to proceed

 

Apologist: no, i get there by inference to the best explanation : P

but, this is a digression

 

Me: is it better to have no purpose, or to have false purpose and be steeped in false consciousness?

 

Apologist: the idea that one has "no purpose" is itself false consciousness

you merely set up for yourself the fiction that your purpose is whatever you decide it to be.

 

so the nazis and you are on the same level, then

equally arbitrary, autonomously chosen "purposes"

equally free

 

as for dominance and ideologies

i don't care what's "dominant"

i don't care what other people say on their blogs

i don't care how many people you can muster on "your side"

i care about what's true and good

 

Me: the idea that people's purpose is what you define it to be is intellectual dishonesty

 

we are agreed then

 

the difference is that you assume anyone who doesn't share your views of humanity's purpose is deluded and unfree

I assume to charge that to claim on people's behalf that they are unfree because of your non-secular ideology is insulting to humanity as a whole

 

Apologist: like you don't

you certainly think i'm deluded and a slave

physician, heal thyself

 

nothing privileges your own say-so over Himmler's

 

Me: it is also a dominant fact that we should do good to our fellow men

 

you say promoting moral autonomy is not the same as promoting freedom

and that promoting moral autonomy is an "ideology"

 

that's one thing

the next step is to claim this is oppression

 

Apologist: of course.

it's so funny

you claim moral autonomy

but you turn around and use it to come back and affirm the same "slavish principles" that i believe

 

go and be a Nietzsche, if your autonomy is anything real or "great" to speak of

you secular liberals are all like that. can't get over the hangover of Christianity. : P

 

i think the Nazis are braver than you, when it comes to this autonomy business

they're actually using their "freedom" to do something new and different for a change

 

Me: just because we come to the same conclusions does not mean we come to them for the same reason

 

you may think it's wrong to kill people because you'll burn in hell

I think it's wrong to kill people because it's wrong to kill people

I hold that the act itself is wrong

not because some cosmic madman says so

 

christianity has no monopoly on goodness

hell, look at "demonic imitation"

the pagans were doing similar things for centuries

 

Apologist: you claim to be following a universal moral law. how then does this law come about? how do you know it's a law and not an arbitrary preference of yours?

where's your epistemological mode of access?

what's the ontological status of wrongness?

 

Me: and you claim to be following?

 

Apologist: either it is burnt into the fabric of the universe, or it is something that you or some other human being arbitrarily made up

if it is burnt into the fabric of the universe, then the universe is not purely naturalistic

 

Me: it's a social code most human beings came to agree to

 

Apologist: bah

conventionalist

slave

 

Me: we don't know exactly how the universe began

that doesn't mean the moment we realise this, everything collapses into nothingness

 

Apologist: so it's okay to break some conventions but not others?

 

Me: what conventions?

and you didn't answer my question about what you follow

 

Apologist: okay to break rules of musical composition in the interests of something new, but not to break your special set of rules?

that's an obviously inadequate ontology

me? human beings are created in the image of God, therefore they have value.

they're imbued with value by their creator, just as a composer imbues value in a piece of music

 

Me: breaking rules of musical composition, at most, brings into being an unpleasant piece of work

killing me results in real humans dying

surely even you can see the difference

 

or perhaps not

 

Apologist: you give me no reason to differentiate between a song and a human : P

 

you have no answer.

 

Me: this is pointless

basically your strategy is the same

epistemological nihilism

 

and then you claim to offer an arbitrary way to escape

and claim following other somewhat arbitrary, albeit more reasoned ways is flawed as well

therefore since they're all flawed yours is not inferior

 

this is like saying democracy sucks

so we should go back to tyranny

 

Apologist: no, not arbitrary. i give actual reasons that aren't founded on the moral arbitrariness of what i or some human being woke up some day and thought would be a good idea

i give reasons that have to do with nature, with being, with the fabric of the universe

you have nothing except contingency and the arbitrariness of "choice"

 

Me: it's what most human beings think are good ideas

"We Hold These Truths to be Self-Evident"

maybe you don't

 

Apologist: majoritarianism? : P what a good way of determining morals

funny, i thought you were the champion of rationality. now you seem to be advocating a kind of blind faith... : P

blind faith in the majority, blind faith in yourself... it's a question of who or what you make your God, in the end

 

Me: the whole of humanity minus you is a good criterion to found it on

 

Apologist: no, i've got a criterion to found it on, you don't

we hold these truths to be self-evident, that men are CREATED equal

in other words, that this equality of spirit is part of the created fabric of the universe

 

Me: if my criterion is because the sun rises in the east?

 

Apologist: the universe has moral content because it's created by a creator with a moral personality

but you think the universe is just a natural phenomenon of space, time, matter and energy

 

Me: therefore god is a ham sandwich

it makes as much sense

 

Apologist: there's no room for "equality" in such a place

in a world of space, time, matter and energy, "equality" is only a matter of physical properties and quantities. human beings can't be "equal" in a moral way in such a world, only equal numerically, or in terms of the number of fingers and toes they have (and not everybody at that)

 

you can't generate an "ought" from an "is" in a purely naturalistic universe.

naturalism rules out all such reasons

 

Me: you can't generate an ought from arbitrary fiat either

 

Apologist: i can generate an ought from a moral universe

and it's not arbitrary fiat. haven't you heard? "before Abraham was, I AM"

 

Me: those who define laws have no power to be judged by them

the very best your fudge commits us to is deism

 

Apologist: no i don't, but that opens a separate group of arguments

 

the moral law, if you were wondering, emanates from the unchanging character of the creator

 

if the moral law is to be non-arbitrary, it must emanate from an objective, unchanging, timeless, utterly consistent source. which my account has, and yours doesn't.

 

Me: well, since you like talking about Hitler so much, he claimed the hummingbird couldn't fly according to the Laws of Physics, but it did anyway

 

your account rules out an objective, unchanging, timeless, utterly consistent source by definition

 

Apologist: that source is also the only fully qualified judge, which my account takes cognizance of

 

no, it's right there

God the uncreated, moral Creator and the source of the moral law is in His unchanging character

the account is fully logically consistent.

it meets all the requirements for a proper morality of the sort both you and i want to affirm

 

Me: I could define a god into existence also

that wouldn't mean it existed

 

Apologist: not necessarily, but it would be strong evidence, given that you and i both want to affirm morality so strongly

 

Me: no

that arises from social constructs and evolutionary psychology

 

Apologist: this is the only adequate ontological account. you're rejecting a strong reasonable explanation and have nothing better to offer in its place

that is hardly rational : P

 

Me: I can logically conceive of a perfect island

doesn't mean that island has to exist

 

Apologist: no, but does morality exist?

 

Me: not in the way you conceive of it

 

Apologist: hahaha

and anyway, you can't actually conceive of a "perfect island", if you haven't yet realized : P

 

Me: Anselm could

 

Apologist: you can conceive of "perfect", and "island", but "perfect island" is meaningless

it's like asking what the taste of pink is

 

Me: and how doesn't this apply to imaginary beings?

especially when they define perfection

 

Apologist: Anselm's point is that you can conceive of "perfect"

not "perfect island"

because by definition, an island doesn't admit of standards of perfection, provided you meet the basic definitional requirement of a land mass completely surrounded by water : P

but you can talk about, say, a perfect line or a perfect circle

 

Me: everyone has a different conception of that

and gods?

 

Apologist: i haven't read Anselm, but i think you can talk about moral perfection, and that's a direct way to a non-imaginary God

but, whatever the substantive content is, the conception is there, and that's what matters : P

just like people might think of a perfect line of different lengths, but have the same formal idea of a perfect length. or a perfect circle of different radii

 

and that raises the question of the idea of "perfection" itself, divorced from particular objects of reference like lines or circles or morality

 

i *think* for Anselm that boils down to perfect Being

 

Me: everyone has a different conception of moral perfection

and this applies to gods - how?

 

I can conceive of a square circle

doesn't mean that it exists

 

Apologist: oh, what's the source of the idea of perfection? : P

no you can't, that's a meaningless phrase by definition

 

the Anselmian argument is basically empirical

we can't conceive of any idea that doesn't actually exist

 

Me: like a perfect, unchanging god who also interferes with the world?

 

the source of the idea of perfection is the human brain

 

hah!

imaginary numbers.

 

Apologist: no, imaginary numbers exist as ideas

there is a mathematical world of pure logic in which exist the perfect line/circle and imaginary numbers

 

Me: so does your god : P

 

Apologist: no, God's mind is the locus of the world of these ideas

it's another way of saying that the moral law emanates from his character

 

Me: that's a non-sequitur

 

Apologist: no, hardly : P

it makes pretty good sense if you're an empiricist

 

Me: I have to go read my textbook now

we shall see if you can define a god into existence next time

 

Apologist: hahaha. it's not "defining" into existence per se

like the argument from morality, it's an argument for the existence of the divine mind via inference to the best explanation

 

Me: sounds like dark matter

but no one says dark matter is god

 

Apologist: again, you probably won't have an alternative explanation : P

 

This conversation was a response to my mocking his claim that the Da Vinci code was a conspiracy to discredit Christianity, and that secular liberalism (including freedom of speech) is an "ideology" used to oppress non-secular liberals.

[StrawberrySundae]

I read a lot of it but it was a bit long, so if you got to this I apologize. Whenever I am debating a xian about how morals must come only from god, I usually bring up other cultures that have never heard of god, or reject the idea of god.

 

Native Americans certainly weren't xian, and many tribes were amazingly moral. They believed in equality between genders centuries before xians did. They treated their children with a great deal of respect, dignity, and kindness, none of this 'spare the rod spoil the child' nonsense. Just a few examples. My experience has been that people don't have anything to say when you bring this up and will deflect or change subjects.

 

Also, Tibetan monks. Don't think you can get more moral than that, they won't even kill bugs. No threat of hell for them to be good.

[Guest gssq]

Thanks for reading and replying

 

He is trying to argue that there's no secular basis for morality. I have a feeling he'll claim to have triumphed once I talk of other religions, since it means there's a non-naturalistic basis for morality (the exact source doesn't matter). He'll then say I am irrationally believing in theistic morality etc.

 

Also, I believe that you mean Jains who sweep the floor before them to get the bugs out. Buddhists at most are vegetarian.

 

Argh, why can't I edit my posts? I dislike double posting.

 

Ok, that was interesting. Auto-append.

[Guest gssq]

His basic argument:

 

"prove 1+1 = 2, or differentiation is useless

 

and you can't prove 1+1 = 2 since we may be brains in vats

therefore all maths is useless

yay"

[loves_learning]

I had a hard time following everything here...but may be able to offer up a bit of advice.

 

His claim that all morality is from God's mind is...well...ambiguous at best. He is so hell bent on getting you to prove it prove it prove it that he ignores proving it himself. The fact of the matter is that you can't. What he is saying may in fact be true, as is what you are saying may in fact be true. But, knowledge must be public and accessible to all people in order to prove anything, and one person cannot prove that a religious experience such as contact with the mind of god is true, because no one can affirm it.

 

What we can affirm through observation is that all of us here on this planet are human. That's it. We can observe patterns of what we call ethics and morality, but all of that has to be defined.

 

Read this book: "Category formation and the History of Religions" by Robert Baird.

[Guest gssq]

No, showing he's irrational or other people have no reason to believe his faith will not work. I could probably trip him up there (then again, he'll probably have some specious argument - apologetics is the art of making words mean what you want them to mean), but that's not the point.

 

He's using a different approach; his tactic is to undermine rationality by allegedly showing how it is irrational (or something like that). It's something like Descartes' argument - faith on a god is used as a cornerstone to build epistemology. But then such faith lets you claim anything you want (like people who aren't of your religious persuasion aren't "free").

 

Instead of addressing real issues he nitpicks at minor ones normal people don't care about. And because we can't be sure of what we take for granted, everything falls apart. Or something like that.

 

Well, the fabric of the universe still seems intact over here.

 

 

Can't find the book in my university library. Oh well. What does it say?