New Thread: Rehashing Socrates

[Ben_JS]

@von Rivers

I understand what you are saying. You are saying that the ultimate goals/ends of people are for them to choose, and they are not written in the stars, or molecules, or commandments. You think that this is where subjectivity enters. The things you do to further any given goal can be objective, but the goal itself is subjective—at the whim of any person.

I am too.

@von Rivers

Here’s something for you to think about…

Suppose someone comes along who says, “My goal is to make my life as miserable as possible”. That’s the end point of his morality. Is it coherent? I don’t see how it is coherent, just by the meaning of the term ‘miserable’----anymore than if their goal was, “My goal is to fail at my goals”.

Morality doesn’t require that it’s coherent to someone. It’s the mechanism for discerning right and wrong in regards to an objective. If it’s not coherent to you, then you’ve no reason to embrace it.

A state of well being is also subjective, especially psychological health. Which values ought one be adjusted to? How about a morality that aims to increase the well being of pedophiles, rapists, murderers and dangerous criminals in general without interfering with their values. Is that coherent? By your standard, this morality is objective. Or is it only objective if everyone conforms to your value set on what one ought care about?

@von Rivers

Suppose someone comes along who says, “My goal is to kill as many people as possible, and everyone I care about”. That’s their end point of morality. Coherent? No, I think not----simply because you know, (by the kind of creature that they are), that that will make them miserable. A goal that makes you miserable is an incoherent goal.

Let’s say this person is insane, and doesn’t care about others. The only happiness they feel in life, is killing others, apart from that, their existence is endless torment, ostracization and depravity. Their morality says, killing is good. Why ought they follow another’s morality if it will only bring them pain?

@von Rivers

What you are implying, when you say that morality is subjective, is that nobody has to answer to anyone about why they act as they do----because how they ought to act is only beholden to their opinion. But there are all kinds of goals someone can choose, like above, that you don’t want to say that about, and that are self-contradictory when you do.

There’s many circumstances where goal orientated moralities do not contradict themselves. Your own morality of well being, is a goal, and is subjective, because one must first value physical health. Let’s say a person is dying of a terminal illness, and for every day they continue to live, they suffer. What value has continued physical health to them? Do you say it’s good for them to stay alive, when they’ve lived a satisfying life by their own standards, are ready to die, and want to do it with dignity without slowly enduring the breakdown of their body? What of a soldier who’s to become a prisoner of war, and be tortured to death. Is physical health good for them? Is it right that they should continue to live, with what they’re about to endure?

Your morality says, yes. Is that coherent?