I would never deny the reality that “Mary had an abortion” if in fact Mary had an abortion.
But you want to insist that either “Mary’s abortion is moral” or “Mary’s abortion is immoral” is an expression of reality too.
Which one? Well, it’s hard to say for now, you note, because abortion as a “normative issue” is complex.
I don’t necessarily disagree with this. Someday it may well be established “scientifically” that it is in fact one or the other. In reality.
You’ve always got me there and then. Just not here and now.
But each individual dasein lives in a particular world and views it from a particular point of view. And while you can demonstrate that “in reality” John abused Rex, you can’t demonstrate that this abuse is necessarily wrong—no matter how many people insist it is.
All John need do is embrace “self-gratification” as a philosophy of life and then hate dogs.
Instead, you need a transcending point of view in order to include normative values in the mix with things that are “in reality” true for all of us.
Or so it seems to me.
You say:
But this is only bullshit because you tell me it is. Because you believe it is. You haven’t proven it however. Not beyond that. Not scientifically. At least I recognize that others are able to point to my belief that it is not bullshit as “true” only because I believe it is not bullshit.
And someone claiming here and now to be the King of France [the France] is patently absurd. And that is because “in reality” there is no king of France here and now. Is there?
But a God creating the world literally in 7 days takes us to discussions about the existence of existence itself. And who among us has a fucking clue as to how that all began. Here, even science is dealing with things it doesn’t even know it doesn’t even know yet.
In my view, you cannot tolerate living in a world without an objective morality. As Peter Singer suggested of Derek Parfit:
Parfit’s real interest is in combating subjectivism and nihilism. Unless he can show that objectivism is true, he believes, nothing matters.
Well, of course, nihilism or no, things matter to us. But some folks – psychologically – seem compelled to embrace the idea that they must matter. And they include in this a belief that their own moral values must matter because they are true “in reality”. And then they go around and around in a circle.
But in a world that is essentially meaningless and absurd – a world that ends for each of us one by one in oblivion – what does it really mean to speak of things – of anything really – that must matter? Nothing matters to you when “you” are dust.
But, truly: A part of me would love to be convinced otherwise. So, please, by all means, don’t ever stop trying to.