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Re: Canada bans assault-style weapons after its worst ever mass murder
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Originally Posted by
midnightpulp
I still don't think you understand where I'm coming from. For morality and existential questions (i.e. meaning of life), everything about it is subjective and "emotional." My response to DMC works here:
Yes, "faith" can be a rational response to questions and events that science can't provide answers to, and what "works" for someone in this regard is subjective. For example, for a Christian who lost their child in a tragic accident, "faith" in the afterlife is a completely rational response to that situation since other answers won't be able to provide any kind of comfort and meaning, i.e. an atheist would likely respond to that person with something like, "Well, they're gone now, but try to remember the good times you had with your daughter. It'll get better." For some, that might be a satisfactory way with which to cope. For others, it isn't.
I really don't care if it's "mind candy" or "a coping mechanism." When we're dealing with subjective phenomena like this, outside of an empirical scientific framework, I judge rationality on not what is likely to be "objectively correct" (in this case, the parents will never see their child again), but what has the most efficacy in helping the situation. The most efficacy here, for these particular people, would be to believe in the afterlife, because the prospect of never seen a loved one again is too psychologically traumatizing. Believing in the afterlife is "pragmatic" in the William James's sense, and is thus a valid philosophical position.
No, it's not a rational response. It's an emotional response. Whether it works for that particular person or not, that's simply an utilitarian factor. The reality is that his/her child is dead and not coming back. That's rational. If that person has to lie to him/herself to feel better, that's a personal choice. It's still a lie though.
What might be 'effective' at any given time from a psychological/emotional standpoint is really irrelevant. It's not that science doesn't give you an answer in this situation, it just doesn't give you an answer the person likes to hear. Then, sure, we often engage in psychologically/emotionally palatable lies, sugar-coat reality to make it more digestible at that particular moment. I'm not going to tell you that's right or wrong, it depends on the person. We already know the rational answer, and that person will have to face it in the long run, regardless of the excuses that were made up along the way.
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Originally Posted by
midnightpulp
This makes no sense. I don't think you'd be too fond of another family believing wanton murder is morally fine. I know the point you're probably getting it is that nobody outside of you should impose moral standards on you and yours on with regard to things like homosexuality, pornography, abortion, and other "moral majority" concerns. But outside of those, yes, the government legislates morality all the time and you do live by someone else's moral standards. You can't murder, steal, rape, evade your taxes, commit libel, etc.
I have zero interest on what people believe. What people believe is none of my concern, until that belief either affects me personally or breaks the social contract we have. We don't prohibit murder in our society because of some moral standard (as a matter of fact, we have a quite a few exceptions to it, see: war, capital punishment, self-defense, etc), we do it because we agreed that society is better served if we don't act like a bunch of savages killing each other. That's part of historical societal evolution, and why morality systems that used to regulate that, like religion, have been dwindling in influence over time. We also agreed that having a Postal Service (something that has zero moral value) was also better for society, and so we penned it down too. We're societies of law, and one of the main reasons the US democracy has lasted as much as it has, is because we don't legislate morality.
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Originally Posted by
midnightpulp
And I'll repeat. The scientific method can't determine anything about the value of morality. Return to my Venn diagram example. Determining the "value" of "beliefs" is often hashed out through philosophical and religious debate, usually argued from arbitrary philosophical and religious frameworks, i.e. "How would the utilitarian position answer the dilemma of having to choose between saving a 30 year old and 80 year old?" or "How would Christianity answer the dilemma?" "Is one answer "better" than the other? Why?" This is why after 5000 years of religion and philosophy, we still can't come to a consensus on certain moral dilemmas, like the Trolley Problem. Science only deals with what is, not what ought to be. If you start appealing to science to influence moral decision making, you'll eventually commit the naturalistic fallacy.
And currently, there's no neat answer to the dilemma of reopening the economy at the cost of more lives vs. staying shut down, which saves life in the short term but could potentially lead to a greater loss of life from the fallout.
I just have a problem with the whole argument. Science will give you the data (you can make statistical analyses, which might not be 100% accurate, but they're likely better than nothing), and decisions are made by people. One hopes that decisions are made with information behind them, not by hunches, or faith.
And there are answers that simply do not exist at this point in time. That's perfectly fine, and there's nothing wrong with it. It's certainly better than a lie.
Morality itself is an abstract concept. It's like an opinion, everybody has one. You can expand morality to all sorts of realms... life, death, drugs, sex, The Last of US 2, etc... it changes over time as we change culturally and we evolve/devolve as a society. Sure, there's largely agreement on a number of things, like stealing is wrong, because anybody that has ever been robbed knows it sucks. And so as a society we know there are certain pillars of mutual self-respect and trust we need to have. And it's not because if you don't follow them bitchmade god is going to have you burn in hell for eternity (lolz).
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Originally Posted by
midnightpulp
Sure, if you're talking about discovering facts nature. But that's not what I'm talking about. I think I've been clear enough that what I'm talking about is moral and, for lack of a better term, existential value. Again, science can't "prove" to you what the correct choice is regarding a moral dilemma. Science can't tell you what the meaning of your life is. Religion or wild ideas like brain uploading have pragmatic value in providing psychological comfort in the face of mortality. There's nothing inherently "bad" about wishful thinking in this context. I'll refer back to James in his defining something as philosophically true if it "works" (and is thus "rational"). Note, we're talking about philosophically true and not empirically true.
Well, look. I'm not saying you're wrong when we enter the moral/opinion realm, because everybody is entitled to their opinion, no matter how wrong I think it is. I would just point out that you don't enter there to find answers. You enter there to find something to feel good about, or something you can talk your brain into so you can sleep at night. And that's a huge difference.
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Re: Canada bans assault-style weapons after its worst ever mass murder
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Originally Posted by
Blake
Ahh no. That's back to god of the gaps. It's a logical fallacy.
It's not. We've gone over this. I'm not talking about empirical facts or substituting faith for natural events science is yet to explain. I'm talking about faith being a rational response to moral and existential dilemmas that science, by its design, can't answer or provide "pragmatic" value for. I'm also talking about philosophically true in the pragmatic sense, i.e.
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James believed propositions become true over the long term through proving their utility in a person's specific situation.
Let's revisit the specific situation of parents losing their child tragically. The "scientific" answer of they're dead and you'll never see them again provides ZERO utility to that specific situation and is "untrue" relative to that situation. "Faith" in the afterlife is "true" because it provides utility with regard to psychological comfort which has "value." The parent's psychological comfort takes primacy over whether or not the afterlife is true. I don't think anyone who isn't a sociopath would tell a Christian parent, "Look, I know you're looking forward to seeing your child again in Heaven, but, I'm sorry, you're going to have to face the fact that there is no afterlife. It's all wishful thinking unsupported by science."
To step away from Christianity, I'm not going to try and disabuse a Transhumanist of his mind uploading or cryogenics fantasies (both are just as likely as the existence of an afterlife) if they provide comfort. Mortality and tragedy are tough pills to swallow, and a person could choose whatever coping mechanism they wish.
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Re: Canada bans assault-style weapons after its worst ever mass murder
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Originally Posted by
midnightpulp
Science can't tell you anything about what is the correct choice in that 30 year old or 80 year old dilemma.
See my previous post.
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Re: Canada bans assault-style weapons after its worst ever mass murder
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Originally Posted by
midnightpulp
Let's revisit the specific situation of parents losing their child tragically. The "scientific" answer of they're dead and you'll never see them again provides ZERO utility to that specific situation and is "untrue" relative to that situation. "Faith" in the afterlife is "true" because it provides utility with regard to psychological comfort which has "value." The parent's psychological comfort takes primacy over whether or not the afterlife is true. I don't think anyone who isn't a sociopath would tell a Christian parent, "Look, I know you're looking forward to seeing your child again in Heaven, but, I'm sorry, you're going to have to face the fact that there is no afterlife. It's all wishful thinking unsupported by science."
To step away from Christianity, I'm not going to try and disabuse a Transhumanist of his mind uploading or cryogenics fantasies (both are just as likely as the existence of an afterlife) if they provide comfort. Mortality and tragedy are tough pills to swallow, and a person could choose whatever coping mechanism they wish.
Frankly, mid, I can't think ONE case where when you have a rational answer, you would rather give some sugarcoated lie. Even in the example you bring up.
So the kid died... does the doctor tells the parents that "God borrowed your kid for a while, he'll be right back"... or does it tells them the kid is dead?
Even the "He's in a better place now" is bullshit. You and I know that. The parent knows that, and it's not what they want. And the ultimate is "thoughts and prayers"... yeah, that one is not bringing him back either.
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Re: Canada bans assault-style weapons after its worst ever mass murder
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Originally Posted by
midnightpulp
It's not. We've gone over this. I'm not talking about empirical facts or substituting faith for natural events science is yet to explain. I'm talking about faith being a rational response to moral and existential dilemmas that science, by its design, can't answer or provide "pragmatic" value for. I'm also talking about philosophically true in the pragmatic sense, i.e.
Dude that is literally text book god of the gaps.
Like Nono said, if you want/need to lie to comfort yourself or others, so be it. Just don't call it rational. It's really not.
How did this even become a conversation in this thread?
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Re: Canada bans assault-style weapons after its worst ever mass murder
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Originally Posted by
ElNono
No, it's not a rational response. It's an emotional response. Whether it works for that particular person or not, that's simply an utilitarian factor. The reality is that his/her child is dead and not coming back. That's rational. If that person has to lie to him/herself to feel better, that's a personal choice. It's still a lie though.
What might be 'effective' at any given time from a psychological/emotional standpoint is really irrelevant. It's not that science doesn't give you an answer in this situation, it just doesn't give you an answer the person likes to hear. Then, sure, we often engage in psychologically/emotionally palatable lies, sugar-coat reality to make it more digestible at that particular moment. I'm not going to tell you that's right or wrong, it depends on the person. We already know the rational answer, and that person will have to face it in the long run, regardless of the excuses that were made up along the way.
I disagree because my definition of rationality (and this is per pragmatic philosophy in a sense) isn't limited to what is empirically true and false, because empirical answers can't solve all problems depending on the specific situation. If it "works," it's rational. If belief in an afterlife "works" from keeping a gun out of a person's mouth who lost a loved one, it solved the problem, it "worked," and thus "true" in the pragmatic sense. James believed propositions become true over the long term through proving their utility in a person's specific situation. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pragmatic_theory_of_truth
"Truth" is a lot more multivariate than just what can be "proven" by science.
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I have zero interest on what people believe. What people believe is none of my concern, until that belief either affects me personally or breaks the social contract we have. We don't prohibit murder in our society because of some moral standard (as a matter of fact, we have a quite a few exceptions to it, see: war, capital punishment, self-defense, etc), we do it because we agreed that society is better served if we don't act like a bunch of savages killing each other. That's part of historical societal evolution, and why morality systems that used to regulate that, like religion, have been dwindling in influence over time. We also agreed that having a Postal Service (something that has zero moral value) was also better for society, and so we penned it down too. We're societies of law, and one of the main reasons the US democracy has lasted as much as it has, is because we don't legislate morality.
I don't buy this at all. Of course we prohibit murder out of moral standard. Why else would we do it? "Because society is better served." And what constitutes a "better served" society is moral argument, which in the case would be, "we think it's a morally good thing that people aren't just killed for no reason, because life is valuable." The simple definition of morality is determining what is right and wrong behavior. So yes, we do legislate morality because we believe murder and theft are "wrong" per what we want to achieve in society, which is overall human flourishing. We legislate morality in terms of sexual age of consent laws, bestiality, animal rights, and so on.
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I just have a problem with the whole argument. Science will give you the data (you can make statistical analyses, which might not be 100% accurate, but they're likely better than nothing), and decisions are made by people. One hopes that decisions are made with information behind them, not by hunches, or faith.
No amount of data in the world can tell you what the "right" decision is in determining the jail sentence length someone should receive for attempted murder. Tell me how that would work? In any event, what I'm saying is science can't define right or wrong. Sure, you can use science to gather information about a situation. Like if you're arguing if eating meat is immoral, you can use science to perhaps investigate how self-aware an animal is, and then argue we shouldn't eat animals proven to be self-aware, but science has nothing to say about the value of self-awareness. Self-awareness is something humans decided was valuable. Appealing to science "all the way down" would eventually lead you into the naturalistic fallacy.
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Morality itself is an abstract concept. It's like an opinion, everybody has one. You can expand morality to all sorts of realms... life, death, drugs, sex, The Last of US 2, etc... it changes over time as we change culturally and we evolve/devolve as a society. Sure, there's largely agreement on a number of things, like stealing is wrong, because anybody that has ever been robbed knows it sucks. And so as a society we know there are certain pillars of mutual self-respect and trust we need to have. And it's not because if you don't follow them bitchmade god is going to have you burn in hell for eternity (lolz).
This is a perfect example to return to pragmatic utility. What if the threat of burning in Hell acts as the only deterrent to someone from committing crimes? If someone told you, "Shit, man. I'd steal everything I could if I didn't get punished by going to Hell for it. Jail doesn't scare me." Would you really want to tell that individual Hell is a lie? Believe it or not, people like this exist. I find the simplistic valuing of "truth" over "lies," ironically enough, irrational in this sense when reality is a lot more complex and unpredictable that simple axioms like truth>lies aren't enough to solve every problem. Truth is good most of the time, but not all of the time.
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Well, look. I'm not saying you're wrong when we enter the moral/opinion realm, because everybody is entitled to their opinion, no matter how wrong I think it is. I would just point out that you don't enter there to find answers. You enter there to find something to feel good about, or something you can talk your brain so you can sleep at night. And that's a huge difference.
You can only enter the opinion realm to find answers to moral, philosophical, and existential questions. "What's the meaning of life?" This isn't a falsifiable concept, so science is irrelevant in trying to answer it.
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Re: Canada bans assault-style weapons after its worst ever mass murder
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Originally Posted by
Blake
Dude that is literally text book god of the gaps.
Like Nono said, if you want/need to lie to comfort yourself or others, so be it. Just don't call it rational. It's really not.
How did this even become a conversation in this thread?
It's not.
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"God of the gaps" is a theological perspective in which gaps in scientific knowledge are taken to be evidence or proof of God's existence. The term "gaps" was initially used by Christian theologians not to discredit theism but rather to point out the fallacy of relying on teleological arguments for God's existence.
I'm not talking about someone trying to prove the existence of God. I'm examining what utility belief in God has in specific situations. Please become more familiar with pragmatic philosophy. What is most "useful" is most "rational."
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By this, James meant that truth is a quality the value of which is confirmed by its effectiveness when applying concepts to actual practice (thus, "pragmatic").
F.C.S. Schiller, on the other hand, clearly asserted beliefs could pass into and out of truth on a situational basis. Schiller held that truth was relative to specific problems.
The specific problem in this case (parents losing child) is coping with grief. If belief in an afterlife solves that problem better than the "cold, hard truth" then the former is actually more "truthful" in the pragmatic sense.
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Re: Canada bans assault-style weapons after its worst ever mass murder
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Originally Posted by
ElNono
Frankly, mid, I can't think ONE case where when you have a rational answer, you would rather give some sugarcoated lie. Even in the example you bring up.
So the kid died... does the doctor tells the parents that "God borrowed your kid for a while, he'll be right back"... or does it tells them the kid is dead?
Even the "He's in a better place now" is bullshit. You and I know that. The parent knows that, and it's not what they want. And the ultimate is "thoughts and prayers"... yeah, that one is not bringing him back either.
Depending on the doctor's religious beliefs and if he knows the parents personally, he just might say your kid is in Heaven now. Beyond that, it's not a doctor's place to go beyond statement of the simple fact of telling the parents the child is dead (since he doesn't know their religious affiliation. You wouldn't to tell a Hindu your child is in Heaven, since they don't believe in that). What I'm talking about is say if the doctor, an atheist, heard the parents tell themselves, "It's okay. He's in Heaven now." No doctor in their right mind would say, "Actually, he's not. He's dead forever because science hasn't proven that an afterlife exists." You're telling me with a straight face you would tell the parents that if you were the doctor?
Now, is the doctor's silence "a lie?" Or is the fact that the doctor is withholding the "truth" from the parents ethically wrong? I don't think so. Even though I'm a non-believer, I wouldn't want any doctor trying to disabuse any of my believing loved ones in that situation of their faith. I might be tempted to knock his ass out. So yes, sugarcoated lies or withholding of the "truth" are the better options in many situations since they have more utility. Telling them the cold, hard truth has NO utility in that specific situation for those specific people.
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Re: Canada bans assault-style weapons after its worst ever mass murder
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Originally Posted by
ElNono
See my previous post.
Replied to it. And science still can't tell you anything about what the correct choice is.
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Re: Canada bans assault-style weapons after its worst ever mass murder
Anyhow, I think the issue here is that ElNono and Blake are defining rationality as process that leads someone to discovering what is "objectively" true, when, in the philosophical sense, rationality has many more dimensions that that. It's not simply a process that leads you to "facts." Philosopher/Sociologist Max Weber introduced a variety of ways to think rationality in his theory.
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The second type, Weber called Wertrational or value/belief-oriented. Here the action is undertaken for what one might call reasons intrinsic to the actor: some ethical, aesthetic, religious or other motives
The advantage in Weber's interpretation of rationality is that it avoids a value-laden assessment, say, that certain kinds of beliefs are irrational. Instead, Weber suggests that ground or motive can be given—for religious or affect reasons, for example—that may meet the criterion of explanation or justification even if it is not an explanation that fits the Zweckrational orientation of means and ends.
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Re: Canada bans assault-style weapons after its worst ever mass murder
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Originally Posted by
midnightpulp
I disagree because my definition of rationality (and this is per pragmatic philosophy in a sense) isn't limited to what is empirically true and false, because empirical answers can't solve all problems depending on the specific situation. If it "works," it's rational. If belief in an afterlife "works" from keeping a gun out of a person's mouth who lost a loved one, it solved the problem, it "worked," and thus "true" in the pragmatic sense.
James believed propositions become true over the long term through proving their utility in a person's specific situation. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pragmatic_theory_of_truth
"Truth" is a lot more multivariate than just what can be "proven" by science.
Well, then we're talking about two different things. First let me repeat Philosophy is not a science, and thus I have a hard time putting much value in it. "It works" is not rational. Rationalism stems from logic and reason. "It works" can also come from complete randomness, thus not match either of those premises.
Pragmatism, on the other hand, it's probably closer to what you're thinking about. They're not the same thing (although I am generally more often pragmatic than rational).
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Originally Posted by
midnightpulp
I don't buy this at all. Of course we prohibit murder out of moral standard. Why else would we do it? "Because society is better served." And what constitutes a "better served" society is moral argument, which in the case would be, "we think it's a morally good thing that people aren't just killed for no reason, because life is valuable." The simple definition of morality is determining what is right and wrong behavior. So yes, we do legislate morality because we believe murder and theft are "wrong" per what we want to achieve in society, which is overall human flourishing. We legislate morality in terms of sexual age of consent laws, bestiality, animal rights, and so on.
Nope. We do it because we have plenty of historical experience on societies built on individual moral whims (organized religion included), where people were killed all the time because of what they thought, said or some other trivial, ignorant distinction. We also have plenty historical experience in societies that were nothing but a bunch of savages, and as any society that evolves, we know we don't want to be those guys. Sure, I'll readily admit some of those rules overlap with judeo-christian moral values, but why didn't we grab the whole moral code then? Because that's not what we're doing here. I mean, if we were to be legislating morality, both conservatives and progressives would have a fucking field day. You don't want that, I don't want that. As far as what each one individually thinks it's true or false, there's really not much to discuss. People are free to do and think whatever, as far as I'm concerned, just like I said earlier, the only caveat is that it doesn't affect me personally or our social contract. That's why we come across decisions as to whether we should legalize weed, we end up with a proposition that people vote democratically, and then a law is made (or not). Now you could make the argument that's a heavily charged moral decision. It might be for those that think drugs are a moral issue. My concern, on the other hand, is entirely about safety (again, what could affect me and/our our social contract). So, again, we can't possibly go by what each individual's concept of morality is on any given topic. I would even argue morals are even worse than opinions. Opinions could be at least sustained somewhat with information, even if not complete to turn them into a fact. Morals are much more tilted towards traditionalism, faith, etc.
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Originally Posted by
midnightpulp
No amount of data in the world can tell you what the "right" decision is in determining the jail sentence length someone should receive for attempted murder. Tell me how that would work? In any event, what I'm saying is science can't define right or wrong. Sure, you can use science to gather information about a situation. Like if you're arguing if eating meat is immoral, you can use science to perhaps investigate how self-aware an animal is, and then argue we shouldn't eat animals proven to be self-aware, but science has nothing to say about the value of self-awareness. Self-awareness is something humans decided was valuable. Appealing to science "all the way down" would eventually lead you into the naturalistic fallacy.
Well, we do have sentencing guidelines, and we follow the law. Science can certainly give you hard information (like cost, health of the inmate, odds of successful reinsertion into society, all of the above, etc) so you can inform those laws when they're made or modified. Unfortunately, that's normally has not been the case, and thus we have a serious incarceration problem in this country. But to your point of right or wrong, science will only go so far as to determine what's fact and what's fiction, and sometimes it won't be able to, for the time being, and the answer will be "we don't know yet". What's the distinction? Well, when somebody claims the sun's color is green, we can certainly state they're not right. Now you could give me the argument that this person is color-blind and he sees the sun green, and thus he's "right". But this person and us, we don't live in two different universes. We know what the color of the sun is, regardless of how he perceives it. So when it comes to right or wrong at a personal level, my policy is, believe whatever you want. When you try to stretch that to everybody else, hold that horse.
Lastly, as I pointed out, sometimes science doesn't have an answer just yet. We're still looking to verify some answers from Einsten's theory of relativity, for example, as technology evolves. But sometimes answers can't be delayed (sentencing example above), so we then move to pragmatism. And frankly, unless it's somewhat informed by actual data, history or experience, it's mostly made up on the spot. I mean, you ask that same question you're asking science to 5 different people that are not lawyers or judges, and you're probably going to get 5 different answers. At that point, we're making shit up, with no rhyme or reason.
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Originally Posted by
midnightpulp
This is a perfect example to return to pragmatic utility. What if the threat of burning in Hell acts as the only deterrent to someone from committing crimes? If someone told you, "Shit, man. I'd steal everything I could if I didn't get punished by going to Hell for it. Jail doesn't scare me." Would you really want to tell that individual Hell is a lie? Believe it or not, people like this exist. I find the simplistic valuing of "truth" over "lies," ironically enough, irrational in this sense when reality is a lot more complex and unpredictable that simple axioms like truth>lies aren't enough to solve every problem. Truth is good most of the time, but not all of the time.
I admitted as much. I said religion has helped some troubled individuals through those utilitarian aspects. Psychology also helps some people and not some others. The problem is that those utilitarian 'goods' do not overcome the whole. It's much different if I told you that we're going to force everyone to be Christian and must have and practice Christian values because it helps the troubled guy here or there. So that's the problem. I am pragmatic in the sense that I readily admit there's some outliers that work for some people, and because it doesn't really affect me in any ways, I have no problem with it.
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Originally Posted by
midnightpulp
You can only enter the opinion realm to find answers to moral, philosophical, and existential questions. "What's the meaning of life?" This isn't a falsifiable concept, so science is irrelevant in trying to answer it.
Because it doesn't have an answer mid, not yet anyways. You know THAT is the actual answer. I wouldn't adventure just yet that's not falsifiable, like I said, we know very little about the mind itself right now.
All you can do right now is have some mind candy and think about abstract things to make you feel better. Again, sorry, might not be what you want to hear, but that's exactly what it is.
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Re: Canada bans assault-style weapons after its worst ever mass murder
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Originally Posted by
midnightpulp
Anyhow, I think the issue here is that
ElNono and
Blake are defining rationality as process that leads someone to discovering what is "objectively" true, when, in the philosophical sense, rationality has many more dimensions that that. It's not simply a process that leads you to "facts." Philosopher/Sociologist Max Weber introduced a variety of ways to think rationality in his theory.
Well, I enjoyed the conversation regardless. :toast
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Re: Canada bans assault-style weapons after its worst ever mass murder
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Originally Posted by
midnightpulp
See the epistemic Venn diagram again. Facts/Truth and Knowledge is the realm of the empirical. Ex. Empirical fact: People die. Knowledge: People can die at 30 or 80. Belief: "I believe if we had the choice, we should save the 30 year old over the 80 year old." There's nothing empirical about the last statement. It's a moral argument. You can't "prove" that statement is empirically correct. Moral arguments come from a philosophical or religious framework. Science can't tell us anything about what the correct choice here is. And trying to find out what the correct choice should be by making different arguments from any number of philosophical, political, economic, or religious positions is anything but an empirical process. It's an entirely subjective process, whereas science is a "view from nowhere" objective process in testing hypotheses to discover facts about nature.
Religion doesn't own morality and it doesn't limit itself to the philosophical realm.
There are central tenets shared by many religions, because they are the foundation of any successful society. As Hitchens said, a central commanding figure who insists that you be born sick then commands you by divine edict to be well else face eternal hellfire isn't even in line with morality, much less compatible with society. Creating a buffer of sycophant level "love" and sacrifice through the story of Jesus doesn't forgive the transgressions by the dictator supreme. Many religions are incompatible with ethics and morality yet somehow a large number of people have been convinced that morality itself is a product of religion.
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Re: Canada bans assault-style weapons after its worst ever mass murder
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Originally Posted by
ElNono
Well, then we're talking about two different things. First let me repeat Philosophy is not a science, and thus I have a hard time putting much value in it. "It works" is not rational. Rationalism stems from logic and reason. "It works" can also come from complete randomness, thus not match either of those premises.
Pragmatism, on the other hand, it's probably closer to what you're thinking about. They're not the same thing (although I am generally more often pragmatic than rational).
Logic and Reason doesn't always necessarily deal with "facts." Logic is an evaluative tool used to examine the validity of arguments within a propositional framework, i.e. All men are mortal, Socrates is a man, therefore Socrates is mortal. If we return to my Christian parents losing their child example, if the proposition is, "Christian parents are comforted by the fact their dead child is in Heaven, these parents are Christian, therefore they are comforted." This is what James was referring to by describing rationality based on its utility for a specific situation. I think you conflate rationality and empiricism. They're not the same thing.
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Empiricism: based on, concerned with, or verifiable by observation or experience rather than theory or pure logic.
This stands in contrast to the rationalist view under which reason or reflection alone is considered evidence for the truth or falsity of some propositions.[2]
I think this is the crux of our disagreement. You see rationality and empiricism as the same thing, when they are actually quite different (I'm not criticizing, it's an easy conflation to make). And maybe it's because you don't put much value in philosophy and don't like qualitative arguments, but when you rationally evaluate something, whether it be a political position or gun rights, you're engaging in philosophy, since you're employing rationality to make your arguments (and funny enough, this rationality can be considered irrational by your opponents). Science deals with the empirical. It's descriptive, not prescriptive.
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Nope. We do it because we have plenty of historical experience on societies built on individual moral whims (organized religion included), where people were killed all the time because of what they thought, said or some other trivial, ignorant distinction. We also have plenty historical experience in societies that were nothing but a bunch of savages, and as any society that evolves, we know we don't want to be those guys. Sure, I'll readily admit some of those rules overlap with judeo-christian moral values, but why didn't we grab the whole moral code then? Because that's not what we're doing here. I mean, if we were to be legislating morality, both conservatives and progressives would have a fucking field day. You don't want that, I don't want that. As far as what each one individually thinks it's true or false, there's really not much to discuss. People are free to do and think whatever, as far as I'm concerned, just like I said earlier, the only caveat is that it doesn't affect me personally or our social contract. That's why we come across decisions as to whether we should legalize weed, we end up with a proposition that people vote democratically, and then a law is made (or not). Now you could make the argument that's a heavily charged moral decision. It might be for those that think drugs are a moral issue. My concern, on the other hand, is entirely about safety (again, what could affect me and/our our social contract). So, again, we can't possibly go by what each individual's concept of morality is on any given topic. I would even argue morals are even worse than opinions. Opinions could be at least sustained somewhat with information, even if not complete to turn them into a fact. Morals are much more tilted towards traditionalism, faith, etc.
Morality, again, is simply defined as the distinction between right and wrong behavior. Morality can be described as an "opinion" about is right and wrong behavior. And right and wrong behavior can be decided by appealing to any number of frameworks. They can be religious, social, philosophical, and so on. We consider murder bad because we think life is valuable. Christianity considered murder bad for the exact same reasons. And yes, a social contract is a moral framework.* In our society, we value peace, freedom (as long as it doesn't violate another person's rights), happiness, and so on, and any action that is opposed to those principles is "immoral." So they do legislate morality. I'm puzzled why you think outlawing murder and rape isn't "legislating morality?" Again, what is morality? Distinction between good and bad behavior. That's it. We deem murder bad vs. the moral framework of our social contract. It seems like you're trying to redefine the definition of morality to suit your argument. Or you define it differently.
*
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In moral and political philosophy, the social contract is a theory or model...
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Well, we do have sentencing guidelines, and we follow the law. Science can certainly give you hard information (like cost, health of the inmate, odds of successful reinsertion into society, all of the above, etc) so you can inform those laws when they're made or modified. Unfortunately, that's normally has not been the case, and thus we have a serious incarceration problem in this country. But to your point of right or wrong, science will only go so far as to determine what's fact and what's fiction, and sometimes it won't be able to, for the time being, and the answer will be "we don't know yet". What's the distinction? Well, when somebody claims the sun's color is green, we can certainly state they're not right. Now you could give me the argument that this person is color-blind and he sees the sun green, and thus he's "right". But this person and us, we don't live in two different universes. We know what the color of the sun is, regardless of how he perceives it. So when it comes to right or wrong at a personal level, my policy is, believe whatever you want. When you try to stretch that to everybody else, hold that horse.
Lastly, as I pointed out, sometimes science doesn't have an answer just yet. We're still looking to verify some answers from Einsten's theory of relativity, for example, as technology evolves. But sometimes answers can't be delayed (sentencing example above), so we then move to pragmatism. And frankly, unless it's somewhat informed by actual data, history or experience, it's mostly made up on the spot. I mean, you ask that same question you're asking science to 5 different people that are not lawyers or judges, and you're probably going to get 5 different answers. At that point, we're making shit up, with no rhyme or reason.
No matter how much science "informs" someone of a situation, it can't make nor "prove" a value judgement. Making a sentencing guideline up on the spot vs. looking at past cases to suggest what the sentence might be are both equally arbitrary. What if I agree with the "made up on the spot" sentencing guideline? Or what if we polled society on their feelings of the made up on the spot sentencing guidelines vs. the traditional sentencing guidelines, and society is in favor of the former? Once again, we're in the "belief cluster" of the epistemic diagram, where we have to try and come to consensus solution through "argumentation." And once again, it will be arbitrary, because we're bound to not get a 100 percent complete consensus on the conclusions. Science isn't arbitrary. I can can't argue myself out of hitting the pavement when I jump from a tall building. If I deny gravity, I still hit that pavement. But I can argue for/against either sentencing guideline being more "valuable" or useful.
Morality isn't an empirical reality. It's an abstract one. Morality isn't "out there" in the universe in some physical form waiting to be tested and proven. It's something we have to arbitrarily create relative to what we value, and we're far from settling anything, as the constant political strife illustrates.
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I admitted as much. I said religion has helped some troubled individuals through those utilitarian aspects. Psychology also helps some people and not some others. The problem is that those utilitarian 'goods' do not overcome the whole. It's much different if I told you that we're going to force everyone to be Christian and must have and practice Christian values because it helps the troubled guy here or there. So that's the problem. I am pragmatic in the sense that I readily admit there's some outliers that work for some people, and because it doesn't really affect me in any ways, I have no problem with it.
No one is suggesting it should. Religion should be a personal matter when it comes to dealing with things like grief and meaning and personal morality (like homosexuality and abortion). We have the "government will make no respect toward any religion" and separation of Church and State for a reason. And to answer your question about why we didn't grab Christianity's entire moral code is because it's not wise to be absolute in anything and there's some Christian moral codes that we collectively deem unworkable, like we wouldn't punish someone for taking the Lord's name in vain. But that doesn't mean all Christian morality is unworkable. It actually has informed much of modern Western morality. Pagans and such were making sacrifices to the Gods before "Thou Shall Not Kill." And as I said to Blake earlier, Christianity was the first religion to place the sanctity of human life as central.
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If we turn to the roots of our western tradition, we find that in Greek and Roman times not all human life was regarded as inviolable and worthy of protection. Slaves and 'barbarians' did not have a full right to life and human sacrifices and gladiatorial combat were acceptable... Spartan Law required that deformed infants be put to death; for Plato, infanticide is one of the regular institutions of the ideal State; Aristotle regards abortion as a desirable option; and the Stoic philosopher Seneca writes unapologetically: "Unnatural progeny we destroy; we drown even children who at birth are weakly and abnormal... And whilst there were deviations from these views..., it is probably correct to say that such practices...were less proscribed in ancient times. Most historians of western morals agree that the rise of ...Christianity contributed greatly to the general feeling that human life is valuable and worthy of respect.[38]
If anything, I'd actually to see more "Jesus" inform morality in the economic space. If we acted like the supposed Christian nation we are, we wouldn't think too highly of cutthroat Capitalism.
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Because it doesn't have an answer mid, not yet anyways. You know THAT is the actual answer. I wouldn't adventure just yet that's not falsifiable, like I said, we know very little about the mind itself right now.
All you can do right now is have some mind candy and think about abstract things to make you feel better. Again, sorry, might not be what you want to hear, but that's exactly what it is.
If we're talking about rational vs. irrationality, this is a total irrational answer to me. How on Earth could science ever define the meaning of life? First of all, that's an intensely subjective determination. If someone says their meaning of life is to love their family, and another says their meaning of life is to be a great checkers player, how can science "prove" either is correct? How do you run an experiment to prove the comparative value of loving your family vs. playing checkers? "Value" doesn't exist "out there" in chemical or elemental form waiting to be discovered by science. You determine value. If you derive the most meaning in life from playing checkers, you're correct. Science can't disabuse you of that belief by showing you the proverbial Sun isn't green or the Earth isn't flat.
Now you might say, "Well, the experiment we could run would illustrate that a devoted parent and spouse would provide more net happiness in the world through his positive influence on his children (note: we can't empirically prove this), so therefore his meaning of life is more valuable." This would be a troubling position because it's nigh-fascist and could lead to "forcing" people to all becoming devoted parents and spouses in service of societal good or at the very least shaming people who aren't family men/women. This is the kind of thinking that lead to many 20th century horrors, with many people being deemed less "valuable" for their physical disabilities, race, lifestyle, etc.
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Re: Canada bans assault-style weapons after its worst ever mass murder
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Originally Posted by
DMC
Religion doesn't own morality and it doesn't limit itself to the philosophical realm.
There are central tenets shared by many religions, because they are the foundation of any successful society. As Hitchens said, a central commanding figure who insists that you be born sick then commands you by divine edict to be well else face eternal hellfire isn't even in line with morality, much less compatible with society. Creating a buffer of sycophant level "love" and sacrifice through the story of Jesus doesn't forgive the transgressions by the dictator supreme. Many religions are incompatible with ethics and morality yet somehow a large number of people have been convinced that morality itself is a product of religion.
I have no problems with criticizing religion. And you're doing what is intended epistemically and what I defined in that post. You're arguing and not trying to empirically prove anything. I'm arguing against this notion that you can prove what is morally good empirically. You can't. It's not falsifiable. We determine moral good by first agreeing on what we collectively want for humanity (and most seem to agree it's "human flourishing," and what human flourishing is can also be forever debated) and then arguing about how to best achieve that. Some might argue we best achieve that through adhering to Christianity or Utilitarianism or Effective Altruism or a mix of all three, etc, etc, etc, on and on and on for 5000+ years of religion and philosophy and on and on for another 5000+++++ years.
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Re: Canada bans assault-style weapons after its worst ever mass murder
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Originally Posted by
ElNono
Well, I enjoyed the conversation regardless. :toast
I enjoy these types of conservations. :toast. And most philosophical disagreements do stem from the participants not having the same definition of certain concepts. I wrote you another novel above, but you can have the last word (these discussions can be never ending). I'll leave you with this by a fellow Italian (philosopher) I've been reading for awhile.
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To begin with, if by “universal” we mean that morality is like the laws of physics, or like mathematical theorems, or perhaps like the laws of logic, then forget it. Setting aside interesting discussions on the nature of mathematics and logic and whether even their tenets are truly universal or not, morality isn’t even in the ballpark.
That's what I'm getting by saying morality isn't something you can discover "out there" through empirical investigation.
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Kant wanted to put moral philosophy on the same firm footing that Newton had provided for natural philosophy (what we today call science, though at the time it was mostly physics). And he thought he could do that by sheer force of reason. Rejecting — rightly — any divine inspiration on the matter, Kant arrived at what he thought was a universal logic of morality, his famous categorical imperative: “Act only according to that maxim whereby you can at the same time will that it should become a universal law.” Kantian deontology (i.e., duty-based ethics) has all sorts of specific problems, well known to philosophers, but the most fundamental one is that moral philosophy is nothing like physics. Or logic.
^That's my essential position. Morality is nothing like physics or even logic.
https://evolution-institute.org/is-t...rsal-morality/
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Re: Canada bans assault-style weapons after its worst ever mass murder
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Originally Posted by
midnightpulp
Yes, "faith" can be a rational response to questions and events that science can't provide answers to
No, not really.
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"we don't understand how fire works, and our science can't provide answers to it"
"I have faith it is vulcan, the god of fire"
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"we don't understand how lightning works, and our science can't provide answers to it"
"i have faith it is Zeus, the god of lightning"
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"we don't understand how disease works, and our science can't provide answers to it"
"we have faith it is invisible humors"
Just because we have not yet explained something, does not mean that we can fill in the gaps with invisible magic things.
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Re: Canada bans assault-style weapons after its worst ever mass murder
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Originally Posted by
midnightpulp
I have no problems with criticizing religion. And you're doing what is intended epistemically and what I defined in that post. You're arguing and not trying to empirically prove anything. I'm arguing against this notion that you can prove what is morally good empirically. You can't. It's not falsifiable. We determine moral good by first agreeing on what we collectively want for humanity (and most seem to agree it's "human flourishing," and what human flourishing is can also be forever debated) and then arguing about how to best achieve that. Some might argue we best achieve that through adhering to Christianity or Utilitarianism or Effective Altruism or a mix of all three, etc, etc, etc, on and on and on for 5000+ years of religion and philosophy and on and on for another 5000+++++ years.
If you define good quantitatively then it can be tied to empirical evidence. Example: It would be good if I had 200 dollars to pay my electricity bill.
I have 200 dollars
It's good that I have 200 dollars
If you define good based on how you feel about someone's actions, it's like taste - it can be described but not proven. Even if you taste the food I taste, you cannot prove or ever know we have the same response to it. We can, however, prove we ate the same food. Morality too is opinion based. Being as such, it's not based on fact even if facts do help shape it, and even if several people agree on the basic tenets of morality. We agree with what we collectively want for humanity based on rationality and empirical evidence. Killing freely is bad for society. This has be proven empirically. Do unto others as you'd have them do unto you - treat others how you want to be treated (therefore you stand a better chance of being treated well). Teaching that its morally wrong to murder serves to create a "better" society. In this sense, "better" means something different to different people however to each person it means something that serves their personal needs one way or another. The concept is to allow people to live and enjoy their lives because you want to live and enjoy yours. It can be shown empirically that cooperation can help achieve goals. We consider it good when we achieve a goal we have set, we get a feeling of accomplishment. I cannot prove to you that I get that feeling, but you probably get the same feeling so I don't need to prove it to you. We use this concept to teach our children to achieve goals. They achieve a goal, they feel good about it. They don't require proof that our feeling is the exact same as theirs - they experience it. That doesn't mean the feeling isn't a science based phenomena. Our morality can be whittled down to learned response and self preservation. That is science based as well. Sure, in the more nebulous viewpoint, I cannot prove or disprove we see the same colors, but it's not a problem we face to do so. Like morality, we learn what to like based on finite choices and associations. Those are science based concepts.
Religion is a tick behind the ear of philosophy. Because people have the ability and tendency to seek proof, the things that are not falsifiable can quite easily be shoved into the god box. Religion jumped on that and took ownership of it. This is why the god of the gaps concept continues along even today. Being non-falsifiable though doesn't give religion an out since religion makes a positive claim about the physical reality. Religion then has the burden of proof and because the concept is not falsifiable, it's really not worthy of much consideration.
Some might argue we best achieve everything by hastening the apocalypse. This is the problem with granting religion a philosophy degree - it is not satisfied with pondering "what if". Religion wants to tell us "what is". This is why religion is not a viable answer to philosophical questions. It sets itself up time and again for failure by crossing over into the scientific, falsifiable realm.
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Re: Canada bans assault-style weapons after its worst ever mass murder
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Originally Posted by
ElNono
Hard enough to pass them as it is. That's, however, a political problem, not necessarily a legal one.
The two aren't necessarily mutually exclusive since political people make the laws.
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Re: Canada bans assault-style weapons after its worst ever mass murder
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Originally Posted by
midnightpulp
. Of course we prohibit murder out of moral standard. Why else would we do it? "Because society is better served." And what constitutes a "better served" society is moral argument, which in the case would be, "we think it's a morally good thing that people aren't just killed for no reason, because life is valuable."
Even here we can apply logic and rationality to ethics.
We can observe all manner or social species, other than humans. We can observe that these species murder is rare. We can reach some tentative conclusions.
A society where murder is allowed under any case would simply disintegrate. A species that murders its members indiscriminately would simply cease to exist.
Not saying morals don't or can't exist, merely that morals can, and are, informed by objectively verifiable reality.
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Re: Canada bans assault-style weapons after its worst ever mass murder
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Originally Posted by
DMC
If you define good quantitatively then it can be tied to empirical evidence. Example: It would be good if I had 200 dollars to pay my electricity bill.
I have 200 dollars
It's good that I have 200 dollars
If you define good based on how you feel about someone's actions, it's like taste - it can be described but not proven. Even if you taste the food I taste, you cannot prove or ever know we have the same response to it. We can, however, prove we ate the same food. Morality too is opinion based. Being as such, it's not based on fact even if facts do help shape it, and even if several people agree on the basic tenets of morality. We agree with what we collectively want for humanity based on rationality and empirical evidence. Killing freely is bad for society. This has be proven empirically. Do unto others as you'd have them do unto you - treat others how you want to be treated (therefore you stand a better chance of being treated well). Teaching that its morally wrong to murder serves to create a "better" society. In this sense, "better" means something different to different people however to each person it means something that serves their personal needs one way or another. The concept is to allow people to live and enjoy their lives because you want to live and enjoy yours. It can be shown empirically that cooperation can help achieve goals. We consider it good when we achieve a goal we have set, we get a feeling of accomplishment. I cannot prove to you that I get that feeling, but you probably get the same feeling so I don't need to prove it to you. We use this concept to teach our children to achieve goals. They achieve a goal, they feel good about it. They don't require proof that our feeling is the exact same as theirs - they experience it. That doesn't mean the feeling isn't a science based phenomena. Our morality can be whittled down to learned response and self preservation. That is science based as well. Sure, in the more nebulous viewpoint, I cannot prove or disprove we see the same colors, but it's not a problem we face to do so. Like morality, we learn what to like based on finite choices and associations. Those are science based concepts.
Religion is a tick behind the ear of philosophy. Because people have the ability and tendency to seek proof, the things that are not falsifiable can quite easily be shoved into the god box. Religion jumped on that and took ownership of it. This is why the god of the gaps concept continues along even today. Being non-falsifiable though doesn't give religion an out since religion makes a positive claim about the physical reality. Religion then has the burden of proof and because the concept is not falsifiable, it's really not worthy of much consideration.
Some might argue we best achieve everything by hastening the apocalypse. This is the problem with granting religion a philosophy degree - it is not satisfied with pondering "what if". Religion wants to tell us "what is". This is why religion is not a viable answer to philosophical questions. It sets itself up time and again for failure by crossing over into the scientific, falsifiable realm.
Well put. I agree.
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Re: Canada bans assault-style weapons after its worst ever mass murder
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Originally Posted by
midnightpulp
Read the link. Scrolled to the bottom. "previous post" = "Morality is objective"
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“… morality (or most of it, anyway) is just as objectively true as science and mathematics. The key ingredient is the notion of harm.”
This is where we can be objective. Harm and pain, are readily verifiable. Add this plank to your conceptual framework, and you have a solid, non-faith basis on which to build a morality.
It is more logical, rational, and objective than I think you are positing.
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Re: Canada bans assault-style weapons after its worst ever mass murder
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Originally Posted by
RandomGuy
No, not really.
Just because we have not yet explained something, does not mean that we can fill in the gaps with invisible magic things.
Read the thread. I'm not talking about facts about nature discovered through empirical investigation. Trust me, I already know the God of Gaps argument backwards, forwards, up, and down. I wouldn't appeal to that if we were talking about unsolved "mysteries" in science. The questions that science can't answer concern morality, meaning, aesthetics, and the like. What we'd define as subjective phenomena. And whatever framework is used to answer those questions is just as valid in solving what William James called "specific situations." Or:
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F.C.S. Schiller, on the other hand, clearly asserted beliefs could pass into and out of truth on a situational basis. Schiller held that truth was relative to specific problems.
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Re: Canada bans assault-style weapons after its worst ever mass murder
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Originally Posted by
RandomGuy
Even here we can apply logic and rationality to ethics.
We can observe all manner or social species, other than humans. We can observe that these species murder is rare. We can reach some tentative conclusions.
A society where murder is allowed under any case would simply disintegrate. A species that murders its members indiscriminately would simply cease to exist.
Not saying morals don't or can't exist, merely that morals can, and are, informed by objectively verifiable reality.
Who places value on society? Human beings do. Science can't "prove" society is valuable and worth preserving one way or another. Science is a "view from nowhere." It's amoral. Human beings are the ones who decided that society was valuable. And, troublingly, there's philosophical movements that believe human society isn't valuable, like the voluntary human extinction movement and antinatalism philosophy. And guess what, neither side is "objectively right." There's no chemical or elemental fact "out there" in nature that can tell us human beings are valuable and worth preserving. Science can't make value judgements. We make them, and we make them in an arbitrary fashion.
"Informing" just describes the facts of something, it's doesn't "prescribe" an action. That's where belief comes in. And I'm not talking about religious belief, but belief about knowledge in the epistemic sense. I think this graph is helpful to clarify things.
https://jocellepgabriel.files.wordpr...istemology.jpg
You see how we transition away from objectivity (facts) into subjectivity (belief). In arguing whether human societies should allow murder and die out, this is how the debate between a humanist and antinatalist might unfold epistemically.
Humanist: Truth: Humans are capable of murder. Knowledge: Societies that murder each other die out. Belief: Human societies are a good thing, so we should prevent murder.
Antinatalist: Ditto, Ditto, Belief: Human societies are a bad thing, so we should allow murder to hasten their extinction to prevent future human generations from experiencing suffering (note: antinatalism feels there's more net suffering to human existence than happiness, ergo, it's immoral to allow human existence).
You see here how the same exact facts can lead to different beliefs? Neither belief is "factual." You can't "prove" either wrong. So how do we proceed? Through logical and rational argumentation (which aren't empirical exercises). I won't go into it, but antinatalism is rather easily logically refuted based on its proposition. Point is, I can't find some "immutable" fact of nature "out there" in the world that can disprove a philosophical position. There's no chemical compound that can "disprove" the premise of antinatalism or humanism.
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Re: Canada bans assault-style weapons after its worst ever mass murder
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Originally Posted by
midnightpulp
Read the thread. I'm not talking about facts about nature discovered through empirical investigation. Trust me, I already know the God of Gaps argument backwards, forwards, up, and down. I wouldn't appeal to that if we were talking about unsolved "mysteries" in science. The questions that science can't answer concern morality, meaning, aesthetics, and the like. What we'd define as subjective phenomena. And whatever framework is used to answer those questions is just as valid in solving what William James called "specific situations." Or:
Gotcha. Still reading, and there is a lot to unpack, sort of picking out things as I go. Sorry for the half-baked take then.
I agree with you here. Science just allows us to model the universe accurately in our minds.
What we do with that model.. is on us. :D
