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All I strive to do here is help others to recognize the crucial distinction between facts and personal opinions.

For example, I was just watching a documentary on the Shoemaker-Levy comet. Carolyn Shoemaker and David Levy accummulated evidence enabling them to prognosticate with extraordinary precision the day that comet would collide with Jupiter. And Jupiter can at times be 575 million miles away from us!

Compare this with the utter lack of precision regarding the evidence used by ethicists in debating whether or not nations should allocate and spend billions of dollars for space exploration when there are so many more pressing problems right here on earth.

See the difference? The evidence collected by scientists allow them to make astounding calculations/predictions regarding either what is or is not true or what will or will not happen—calculations/predictions that are subject to rigorous peer review. And they will either be true or not true.

Yet there are folks who embrace or reject space exploration as a moral issue with just as much passion and sense of certainty.

They say what they think they mean and they mean what they think they say. Just like the scientists. But isn’t that rather…ironic?

Given, among other things, their track record to date?

Since we’ve been talking, you have claimed that the word of a flying pink elephant on a teapot from the Planet Z is an unimpeachable reason to kick someone in the face. You have argued that a bowl of diarhea is just as inviting as a tuna nicoise, or at least you can’t think of a reason why it wouldn’t be. You have also argued that a wrinkled haggard old woman is more beautiful than Natalie Portman. This is just a short list of the sort of positions you have found your view to committed you to.

You point to science. Scientific truths. Nobody would disagree, right? Wrong—just wrong. There are people who think the earth is flat, that the sun revolves around the earth, that aids is God’s punishment, that the world was created in 7 days. They have their reasons. But they’re not equally reasonable.

You are not the present King of France. The disagreements about whether aids is a result of punishment no more is a problem for science than is our disagreement about whether the dog ought not have been treated that way. It’s no objection to me that I have been accused of high treason by the present King of France.

Do not misunderstand me, I am prepared to treat the present King of France in his nice purple robe with the highest respect. I will give him a loyal servant—a woman in a white robe. I will set him up in secure quarters with the finest soft padding as decoration on the walls. His throne will have a thin well-used mattress on a steel frame that somewhat resembles a hospital bed. And we will be so kind as to strap him down lest he fall out of it, at nighttime.

You might find yourself in a car. Cars are like philosophical outlooks. They take you places. If your car takes you to the front lines of a plan to break-out the King and return him to his former status in the palace… well then, time to stop letting the car drive itself.

Monie - the basic confusion remains, and it is in your equivocation of the word “objective”. “Objective phenomenon” is the term we use to describe an empirical object/event - that which we accept as existing whether any given person thinks so or not. it’s the label we use when we mean that. But when we use the word “objective claim”, we mean that the claim is about such an object/event. Any claim is “subjective” in the sense that it is made by something with a mind. No matter what the subject matter of the claim is. In “objective phenomenon”, “objective” describes the phenomenon. In “objective claim”, “objective” does not describe the claim - it describes the subject matter of the claim.

Moral rules, moral judgments, moral claims - they are all claims. All are made by things with minds - they are not “independent” of minds - they are the product of minds.

I do not use the subjective/objective dichotomy - unless forced to, which in this case i am.

As you know, that is not what makes a claim subjective. Nor are all claims subjective because they are made by a subject. I believe I’ve told you before about the distinction betwixt “subjective” and “subject-dependent”.

I guess the distinction got lost. Here’s a claim…

1. “The tree is in the yard”. It is made by a thing with a mind. The truth or falsity of the claim is independent of a mind.
2. “Killing is morally wrong”. It is made by a thing with a mind. The truth or falsity of the claim is independent of a mind.

…I hope my position is clearer now than perhaps it must have been. Frankly, I don’t know why there’s such push back to being an objectivist. It’s not like we can’t still bicker about what’s right and wrong.

I can only allow others following this exchange to judge for themselves the extent to which Mo accurately reflects my point of view.

Here, in my view, you continue to equate reasons one might believe regarding Mary having or not having an abortion with the reasons one might believe regarding abortion being or not being moral.

If Mary did in fact have an abortion all the reasons in the world arguing she did not have one will not change this. Sure, you may well continue to believe she did not have one but there is ample empirical evidence “out in the world” to show that she did.

That in fact she did. If in fact she did.

But there are good reasons to argue that abortion is moral and good reasons to argue that abortion is immoral. Depending on your point of view.

And that has never changed.

All you can argue is that, maybe, perhaps, someday, science will be able to provide us with the only objective argument. But, as of now, science is not even able to argue definitively when the unborn become “human”.

Instead, like Harris, you create arguments the logic of which rests --sometimes more, sometimes less – on the assumptions you make regarding the meaning ascribed to the words used in the argument!

Again, the car metaphor I prefer is this one:

You are like the engineer who sets out to build the world’s fastest race car. You build the car and then, when folks stop by to see if in fact it is the world’s fastest race car, you bring them into the garage, gather them around the car and then proceed to read them the engineering manual.

Here we can just substitute “objective morality” for “world’s fastest race car”.

Same thing.

No shit! That’s a great metaphor!

Because someone would look at the car going fast… and say, “ppfffttt, I’ve seen faster” —and he would be the King of France in his purple robe accompanied by his servant the hospital maid.

But if I show them the science/engineering behind it… then I don’t fucking care what the King says.

Yup, you’re exactly right…

Yeah, Mo, and this is what you have failed to show.

Your Majesty,

What says you about the dog?

That’s pretty indisputable.

I have already weighed in about the dog.

I believe that Mo_ is unintentionally clouding the issue of objectivity and subjectivity, here. The first statement is made by a thing with a mind, but the truth of falsity of the claim is NOT independent of a mind. We decide what it is we are going to call a, “Tree,” or a, “Yard,” so the language itself is subjective. Anything linguistic is going to be subjective and is only useful where two subjects agree on meaning.

The only thing that objectively exists is the actual object that we are calling, “Tree,” in the actual area that we are calling a, “Yard,” that we call them, “Tree,” and, “Yard,” does not affect their material existence. We could theoretically say, “The Shrimp Scampi is in the Pot,” and if we agree that, “Shrimp Scampi,” refers to what we conceptualize, currently, as a, “Tree,” and that the, “Pot,” is what we conceptualize currently as, “Yard,” then the statement is no less correct. The language, again, is subjective. If I can get someone to agree with me that we will call the tree, “Shrimp Scampi,” and the yard, “Pot,” then the statement is still perfectly sensible.

That seems like nonsense, but when you were a kid, did you never play, “Code words,” with a friend of yours? I certainly know that I played such a game, and the way it worked is that if we didn’t want the adults to know what we were talking about (or other kids) we would make a statement that seemed to have absolutely nothing to do with what we were discussing, but we agreed on what the statements, “Really,” meant within certain contexts, making communication possible. “A rose by any other name,” I keep telling you guys.

Here’s an example:

“What’s up?”

“Nothing. I can’t wait for dinner, I should have ate the rest of my burger at school.”

“Didn’t you get enough lunch?”

“No. I’ve been hungry for awhile now. Are you staying for dinner?”

“No, my Mom’s making Meat Loaf, then I have to do homework. I’ll meet you at the park at 7:00 and we’ll shoot some hoops.”

“Cool. See you later.”

TRANSLATION:

“What’s up?”

“I’m out of cigarettes and I’ve been fiending for one. Nobody at school had any.”

“Nobody?”

“Nobody. I’ve been fiending for a cigarette for awhile now, do you have any?”

“Not that I can part with. I’m going to go buy some, but I have to do something else first. I’ll meet you at the park with them at 7:00.”

“I’ll have money for them. See you later.”

It’s a totally different conversation. That’s why we must agree on language, but the language, itself, is subjective. The first statement Mo_ makes abovce is also subjective, it’s based on an agreement of definitions. What is objective are the things, (Tree, Yard) being referenced, the references themselves (i.e. words) are not.

The truth or falsity of the second statement is certainly not independent of the mind, particularly when there are any number of minds that can come up with scenarios where they, subjectively, believe that killing is not morally wrong.

If you invoke the use of language, written or oral, the statement is subjective. Period.

Claiming to have seen a faster car does not in fact make the car faster. You have to take the car to the track and actually…race it?

Against other cars, for example.

And building a race car based on how you imagine it will perform “on paper” – as an engineering project – is certainly not how most scientists approach their own work. They tend to test these assumptions “out in the world”.

And that is because “out in the world” the conditions can vary considerably. Track conditions, weather conditions; the reliability of the interacting parts; the capabilities of the car “in traffic”; the car’s cornering capacity; the car’s susceptibility to breakdowns and pit stops.

Similarly, if every single pregnancy was eactly the same, it might be considerably easier to calculate one’s moral perspective if, perchance, it happened to become an unwanted pregnancy.

Major misunderstanding between us here. There is a distinction between “subjective” and “subject dependent”. Language depends on a subject who uses it (it is “subject dependent”). But the referents of our words are not thereby “subjective”.

According to your view: “There is a tree in the yard” is a subjective claim—and that’s a misuse of language. I’d call it a reductio. Same with your view that math is subjective. You just misunderstand the important distinction.

Here’s the example I use to demonstrate the distinction between “subjective” and “subject dependent”. Physical health. It takes a physical subject to have physical health. Physical health is “subject-dependent”. But physical health is not subjective. It matters not what your opinion is about calories… if you have too many of them, you will get fat. The same principles and distinction apply to language. Subjects use language, but the referents of our words are not thereby subjective.

Ultimately, your view commits you to saying that math and science are subjective—and that’s just a reductio ad absurdum against your view. It’s absurd.

What is said was “this sentence is made by a mind”. It doesn’t matter what was called what within the statement.
Then he said, “the truth of the statement is not a matter of the mind”. Again, it doesn’t matter what was labeled what within the statement. The actual claim is not up to the reader. If the reader decides that he meant something other than what he really meant, it doesn’t make the claim false, but merely misrepresented or misunderstood. The effectiveness of or flaws in the communication does not determine the match between the intention and the reality. The message being garbled does not change what was trying to be sent. It is the match between the intention and the reality that determines the truth.

In public, certain definitions are expected and if those definitions are changed, one might think that a lie has been told because a false sense of “objective language” is assumed. But the question is always the intention of the author, not the susceptibility of the language to be confused. In obvious cases, one can claim that a lie was told only because it is obvious that the word choices were really intended to mean as they were read. But again, it is always a question of what was intended, and that has nothing to do with the language or someone else’s chosen interpretation. Either the intention matches reality or it doesn’t.

You just proved my point. It is the intention that counts, not the language.

You seem to have an interesting way of standing on both sides of an argument during a single post.

That’s simply false. You do the science… you account for variations… you use the laws of nature… and it works. The only reasons scientists test anything, is to see if they have the actual science correct, if they’ve understood the variations, the complexities, etc. But if they work accurately on paper, and account for what they need to, and understand the relevant variables in play, then it will work in the world every single time.

You don’t need to fly to the moon in order to figure out how to fly to the moon. That’s just ridiculous.

So ultimately you understand now. Your metaphor is quite right. The question now is just how much you want to be the King of France. My own theories and philosophies have changed over the years. There is no reason why yours shouldn’t and you shouldn’t feel the least bit of anything wrong with toning down the relativism, even to a lesser degree of the same. Baby steps.

It would seem that you are right if we are to speak in good faith and with respect to general physical health. You would find very few people that disagree with the statement, “A five-hundred pound person is unhealthy.” However, such a person could view themselves as healthy and say, “But, I feel healthy.”

That’s beside the point. When you want to talk about an objective morality, then you’re going to be talking about an objectively correct moral decision, with exactitude. It would be like me asking you to point out a person who is in perfect physical health. You point at guy x, I say that guy x is a couple pounds underweight. You point at guy y, well, it turns out he has the beginning stages of liver failure and doesn’t know it.

When you discuss morality, you are not actually dicussing actions, you are discussing what you think of those actions. When you discuss physical health you are not discussing people, you are discussing what you think of those people.

Math is subjective because it is purely a human construct and is used predominantly to describe relationships. Math does not occur in nature, the relationships that Math describes occasionally do, but not Math itself. It’s basically the same thing with science, the basic goal of science is to try to determine what objectively exists, in terms of things and relationships, and to determine what is objectively true. We apply names to these things in the language of science. The chemical formula for Magnesium Hydroxide Mg(OH)2 is a human construct and is not a priori knowledge, that there is actual, physical Magnesium Hydroxide is, however, objective.

That doesn’t really work, because then we could claim that it was always our intention to speak the truth. That’s precisely why people must agree as to the meaning of the words, otherwise, the intention of the speaker does not matter and nobody would be able to ascertain the truth of the speaker’s statements.

I would argue that the effectiveness of or flaws in the communication are determinative of everything, which is precisely why language must be agreed upon. For instance, if I don’t have a, “Code names,” game with someone and they see that a tanker truck is crossing the intersection in front of me and that person yells, “Floor it!” when the actual intention, or what they wanted, was the equivalent of, “STOP!!!” then we’re probably going to die.

To that extent, how well we agree upon language or communicate can actually have a bearing upon reality itself. In the reality where you tell me to stop, we may live, in the reality where you yell at me to floor it, if I listen, we probably die.

The other problem with that is that we have to communicate well in order to communicate our intentions. I would argue that this is true to the extent that if we run around calling trees, “Glasses of root beer,” and nobody else is in on the, “Code name game,” they’re going to think that we’re crazy when we say we liked to climb glasses of root beer and drink trees when we were kids.

Depending on how poorly one does or does not communicate, the intentions behind a certain statement may never be known, and as such, are completely irrelevant to anything including the truth or falsity of the statement.

The intention can count for something, but only where the language is agreed upon. With, “Code words,” we have a pre-arranged agreement (just like we learn language from our parents, as children) that a certain phrase has a certain meaning. With something such as, “Code words,” to say that the language doesn’t count is an act of sheer folly. How could I play code words with someone who is not using language in the same way that I am? They would think that I was talking nonsense, or at a minimum, literally talking about having Meat Loaf for dinner, which has nothing to do with what I want to convey.

I guess I should also point out that intention is also subjective, which is precisely why we may misunderstand what another person’s intention is. If intention were objective, there would be far fewer misunderstandings, especially those that occur despite the fact we are using language the same way!

What? Why?

No, you are talking about actions.

No, wrong again. This isn’t about whether you like the person… it’s about physiology, biology… human health.

Stop right there. Did you forget the distinction I just made for you? Key point: If your position requires you to say that math is subjective (i.e., dependent on the opinions of people), then you need to reconsider your position. And you need to reconsider it fast.

I would say that for it to be objective, it first has to be physical, but we’ll ignore that for right now. Even if it did not have to be physical, the decision must be objectively correct, with exactitude, because an object is one thing. In other words, there could only be one, “Most moral,” decision if morality is objective. You could not have two, “Most moral,” decisions where the decisions are opposed to one another. We certainly may have different ideas of what makes the decision the, “Most moral,” one, though, and that’s what makes it subjective. We can not know that a moral decision we made is the best one, we can know when we have walked into a tree.

There certainly is an action to be discussed, but when we’re discussing morality, we’re talking about the meaning that the action had for us, individually. What action could have happened that would have been, “More moral,” or better, what action could have happened that would have been, “Less moral,” or worse. Furthermore, we often gauge the morality of actions to what we, individually, think we would do in the same situation. A moral disagreement is nothing more than a disagreement about how two people think things should be done, with the exception being that someone could admit to not acting within the confines of his/her own morality.

Moral discussions tend to go, “Deeper,” than the action, though. They go deeper than that which is merely objective. We get into morality when we try to decide what certain actions mean to us. The guy kicks his dog, one physical object interacts with another, that’s what happens, “On the surface,” which is to say objectively. However, there is a reason why the guy kicked his dog, there are emotions that seeing the kicking off the dog may or may not illicit from you, and you may or may not feel a certain way about the dog being kicked. When you get into considerations beyond the physical act itself you have gone beyond the objective and have entered into the subjective.

No, wrong again. This isn’t about whether you like the person… it’s about physiology, biology… human health.
[/quote]
I didn’t say anything about liking the person or not. I meant whether or not you think the person is healthy. I might know something about the person that you do not know, or, we may just look at a person and disagree, in general, as to whether or not the person is healthy.

Stop right there. Did you forget the distinction I just made for you? Key point: If your position requires you to say that math is subjective (i.e., dependent on the opinions of people), then you need to reconsider your position. And you need to reconsider it fast.
[/quote]
I’m going to try this again, because I like you. You cannot have Math without people and you cannot have Math without a language. You cannot have morality without people or a language. You can have a tree without people being present. You can have a dog without a person existing. The dog can piss on the tree whether or not a person is there. People are also objective in that they exist, physically. Math does not physically exist, some things that Math describes do.

The practically has nothing at all to do with the reality.
He didn’t claim that such was the best thing since peanut butter.
He merely stated the truth of it, not that any moron couldn’t screw it up.