But Spider, these are the kinds of statements that you make that make absolutely no sense at all.

You claim that there is no concrete reason to justify our morality, it just exists.

And then you claim, "It is just further proof of the existence of moral absolutes."

But its no such thing.

Just because one person 'justified' the morality of killing someone, doesn't mean that everyone else will agree with them. In fact, it's extremely unlikely that everyone would.

So how does that constitute "further proof" of the existence of moral absolutes?

Also, even your use of the phrase "further proof" is already misleading because you haven't even shown any previous proof yet much less and "further proof".

And your example above isn't even a valid example because everyone most likely won't agree that the particular 'justification' was indeed just.

You were showing a particular example where in one culture it's acceptable to kill someone who has dishonored the family. But other cultures would not condone killing someone for such a petty thing.

So where is there any 'absolute' in that?

That's relative morals based on social conventions.

You're claiming to have shown 'proof' of some absolute sense of right and wrong, when in fact, you haven't shown any such thing.

You've demonstrated the exact opposite.

You've just proven that moral codes (and therefore a sense of right and wrong) are indeed relative to social conventions.

You've just proven your own hypothesis to be false.

If we can't have an absolute sense of what constitutes an 'innocent' then its absurd to suggest that basing morals on the concept of 'innocent' would be absolute.

You can't base morality on a "relative notion of innocence" and then claim that the morality is "absolute" because it's the concept of "innocence" that's relative.

You're just spinning around in circles here hoping that no one is clever enough to catch it.

Or maybe you can't even see it yourself? I don't know which. But your argument is circular with no "absolutes" at all.

Spider...

Perhaps you misunderstand me. I never said that you made such an argument. That is my argument, I want you to logically argue against it. You have given no objective basis, but are attempting to assert reason to believe in moral absolutes. I am claiming that that cannot be done without being objective about it. My argument is making an attempt to establish some form of grounds upon which the discussion can continue. Massage seems to me(sorry if I am mistaken) to be driving towards that goal as well.

Can moral action be wrong?

Can immoral action be right?

There must exist some objective element which can be referred to when establishing the moral value of an action.

What is that?

Spider wrote:

Finally, a trace of reason -- instead of a dogmatic rhetoric!

1. The premise: Right and wrong is instinctual (R&W)
Certainly, in at least a couple of the millenia (probably even longer!) Humanity's had a chance of distinquishing one from the other -- through reward and panishment, deeds and consequences..

2) we are just aware it's wrong...
The notion of R&W has become ingrained in the Human psychi!
*** because from the very early age (even in the prehistoric times -- MillionS of years(!) -- every human being has been brought up with notion of R&W (though, having grown up, some of them have often forsaked those notions...)

3. Seems like it (R&W) was put there by a person.
How does this conclusion follow from the previous points???

In other words, the experience of millions of years has been in vain (i.e. theStupid people need a word from Above)???

The problem with this statment is that it's stated as though it's an assertion of indisputable truth.

But there is no reason whatsoever to believe this is a true assertion.

If there were a true assertion we wouldn't have people arguing about absortion, and stem cell research, etc, etc, etc.

It's simply isn't a statement of truth. Very few cultures even agree on absolute concepts of right and wrong, much less individuals.

Where does anyone get off claiming that this is some sort of fact?

If there were any truth to this ideology then everyone would be in agreement with what is absolutely right and absolutely wrong.

There's no reason to believe that this is the case at all.

Not only is there no evidence to support it, but there is a whole entire human history of evidence that shows that it's totally and utterly false!

It's a totally bogus idea that doesn't hold a grain of truth.

Just to comment further on this, especially on the idea that it was "put there by a person":

If this 'person' was God and wanted everyone to worship only him then there would be no question that everyone who wasn't worshiping the propery God would know that they were doing the absolute wrong thing.

We know this isn't the case. Cultures all over the globe tend to worship the religions they were born into. Not based on some instinctual drive to worship one particular God.

In fact, many atheists don't even have a drive to seek any God of any kind.

So if we're looking for evidence, the evidence should be crystal clear that no such absolute morality or sense of right or wrong exists.

To claim otherwise is utter nonsense. It just doesn't fit into the historical behavior of humankind. It's totally unsupported by what we actually see happening historically.

The mere fact that you would assert such a thing shows me that you're not the slightest bit interested in any kind of "truth", all you can possibly be interested in is driving home your agenda even in the face of totally conflicting historical evidence.

I agree here. Proof requires objectivity. What needs to happen here, in my opinion at least, is the establishment of a measure by which we can objectively establish what constitutes right(moral), and wrong(immoral) actions.

I propose the harming of another through a voluntary and deliberate action.

I can think of no immoral action in which the action itself is obviously an accident, so the said action must be a deliberate one. This need not get into weighing a subjects responsibility, for that is another topic in and of itself. However, to assess the moral value of an action, we must weigh a deliberate action and the known consequences of that action, mustn't we?



Am I missing anything?

Honestly, James, you disappoint me:
Spider made 3 assertions...
And I REFUTED each one -- NOT RE-AFFIRMED THEM! ! !

YOU MUST'VE READ MY MESSAGE IN A HEIST...
************ At leat, you could've quoted MY message -- instead of what Spider's wrote... _(shame on you! )

Spider wrote:

"Right and wrong is instinctual, it's nothing I can point to. I can't say why it's wrong, we are just aware it's wrong. Kind of strange, like it was put there by a person"


hmmmm thats intresting. is God a person? off topic just woundering.
its funny that statment you just made about instinctual is almost the same argument i origanly made. (i modified mine once i realized instinct alone couldnt determine R and W)
wow, you just agreed with me!

I want to address the claim of instinctual morality.

When contemplating instinct, the factors by which things which are labeled as such should be considered. Instinctual things are innate and every human(normally developed) has them. The instinct to suckle. The instinct to vocalize. The instinct to open one's eyes and gaze upon the world. The instinct to think. The instinct to breathe. The instinct to etc...

Now unless this is incorrect, all of these things require no forethought. The personal sense of ought is established only after a world-view has begun and requires previous experience by which to measure against.

I hold that as at least common sense enough to rule out instinctual morality.

EDIT:

An addition to this would be an example which most people who have dealt with young children can relate to...

How many children naturally share their things? Further consider an only child. Sharing is considered by many, if not most, to be of moral value. If it were instinctual it would never need to be taught, would it?

The only thing I would suggest is that it would need to also include the idea that the person harmed was 'innocent'. Otherwise the harm could be justified as 'deserved'.

And we've already seen an example of this in the example of certain cultures that feel that if someone has 'dishonored' a family they 'deserve' to be killed.

So it seems to me that it's already been demonstrated that a judgement of 'innocence' is require, and that judgment is already known to be relative to social standards.

So it appears to me that we already have shown a sufficient counter example proving that the very concept of right and wrong cannot possibly be absolute.

Seem to me that we already have and END OF PROOF here with a crystal clear counter-example to the hypothesis that a sense of right and wrong could ever be absolute.

What more needs to be shown?

It's a done deal as far as I can see. Absolute right and wrong cannot exist because we have at least one example where a relative judgment of "innocence" must first be made.

If this were mathematics we'd be done. We've shown a counter-example. And that's sufficient as proof against the hypothesis.

Doesn't the term innocent require an existing moral code in order to be asserted as such? We cannot use a term which requires the prior existence of a moral code in order to define the parameters of it.

So that argument really need not be made.

Well, in that case then we're dead in the water with a totally circular situation. Which also results in the conclusion that no absolute right or wrong can exist.

So it's a lose-lose hypothesis no matter which way it's sliced.

This always happens when anything is attempted to be placed into absolute terms.

Everything is relative. There's never anything that can be pinned down. We all should know this by now.

If innocence or guilt must be established first, and innocence of guilt cannot be established until after a moral code has been established then this just demonstrates clearly how the whole thing is circularly dependent.

It is absolute in spider's mind, we know that for sure.

But to see things in such an absolute manner actually does onesself an injustice. Whoever taught the absoluteness has placed blinders to the individual minds ability to discern for itself.

I think it is rather simple...

Moral is a description given by a subject to an action which denotes a measure of acceptance - right, just, fair, good, etc.. Immoral would constitute the opposing. That acceptance, or lack thereof, completely depends upon exactly what that subject deems as acceptable. That 'measuring rod' is learned through experience alone. In other words, the action is measured through - and therefore moral value is determined by - the personal sense of ought.

This holds true in every example I have ever thought or witnessed being given, therefore, I hold that that is reason enough to establish the existence of moral relativism. Whereas, the existence of so many different personal senses of ought demands that there is no such a thing as a moral absolute.

Do not confuse a universal code with an absolute one. When one applies the same measure to another's actions as s/he would their own - should they be the same - then that constitutes a universal morality and refuses hypocrisy a foothold. It offers no support to the idea of an absolute(meaning always) right and wrong(morality).

I'm very dis-satisfied with these definitions in this context. I meant to put the focus on 'right and wrong' and not 'morality' - and say we go with the idea that 'murder is wrong' on the level of 'right and wrong' - well what does it mean, exactly? How can we articulate/explain/understand that claim in way that couldn't lead to Abra's semantic criticism?

But if we use this dictionary definition, it says "unlawfully" killing a person, which is an appeal to a social definition and not true 'right and wrong' - and one which doesn't work, because its provides the same escape clause the jihadist uses. All one has to do is pass a law saying its okay to kill certain people under certain circumstances, and suddenly the act is not 'murder'.

Maybe I'm making too much of that one word. Suppose we say 'murder' is simply 'killing an innocent'. It seems like no one meets definition (a) of innocent, except babies.

Truly, I wasn't meaning to pick an argument about semantics - but to explore what kind of concept for 'right and wrong' there might be which avoids silly semantic distractions.

-----------------------

I grant you that moralistic/whatever tendencies come from somewhere - and we can consider that they might derive from a universal 'right and wrong' - do we need to figure out what form that 'right and wrong' truly takes to discuss whether it exists? (Suppose the true 'right and wrong' is that ALL killing is wrong, and the idea that killing non-innocents is okay is simply the 'moralistic rationalization' of some people?)

I know what is right and wrong for me in almost absolute terms. That is about as close to an absolute form it can happen in. At a personal level for our personal selves. But most of my personal moral code was developed from others ideals. I have tried to be independent and think that I am orginal but sadly most of it has been done, said, thought, projected, acted out, etc... before...lol So I am as original as I can be considering...lol

Moral code which is what determines right and wrong in a society is created by people having reasonable conversations from observations they make and thoughts they have from those observations.

Without a moral code you have no right and wrong. It is all okay if there is no moral code to call it right or wrong.

We evolved to reason out things and we are still evolving to reason out things. That is why the moral codes have changed and changed and changed. Historically, rape, murder, etc... were moral in our societies at different levels. Sadly murder is still moral if the state does it, if it is in self defense or if we are at war.

There is no instinctual right and wrong. We are taught this right and wrong from those who teach us as we grow up and environmental influences. Babies have no concept of right and wrong.

I agree with your conclusion regarding absolute morality, however I feel the opposing argument needed to be better demonstrated.

When using the term innocent as a parameter, I would agree with the circular implications. It presupposes some part of the conclusion in the premise. However, not all terms which could establish parameters imply prior moral judgment. Those boundaries must not contain moral implications.

That is what needs to be framed, as it were.

Dragoness wrote...



Accurate. Concise. Fits every known account. Therefore... true!

Thanks Creative