I'm a plain language person, so what I'll be saying next may not be as precise in philosophical terminology as others might put it. — EricH

I'm also a plain language person, although I can engage in complex semantic discussion when required.

In this case, I do not think that leads anywhere, and you maybe straying farther and farther away from the plain language usage of the words truth, ought, reality at your peril.

For instance, imagine plain situations. Someone says "It's raining outside", you say "is that a fact?" they say "yes", so you ask "ah, but is that fact true?" and they say "yes" and you ask "ahhaaah, but ought we believe facts?", they respond "yes, don't be silly". From there, the conversation can go no where constructive in any normal situation.

To believe we can actually take apart the words "ought", "true", "facts", "belief" and arrive at a different conclusion (or interpretation of all the words so radically different that we no longer even know what we're talking about) other than, "yes, a person that values truth, ought to believe a fact if they have sufficient reason to believe that fact is true".

However, the state of affairs to them is neither true nor false. I’m saying that the state of affairs is part of the objective Truth, which is why a statement can be said to be true when it corresponds to It. — AJJ

As noted in my first response, "objective" in your argument makes it not true, under most definitions of objective. With definitions of objective that are fine, such as "unbiased", it doesn't add anything to say the truth is unbiased.

The statement is false because it doesn’t correspond to something that is true, i.e. part of the Truth. It would be true if the cat being on the mat was true, i.e part of the Truth. — AJJ

Wouldn't statements then be true because they correspond to something that is "true"?

If so, then true should refer to statements corresponding.

But if that's the case, it makes no sense of that second occurrence of true above, the one I put in quotation marks.

For me “true” can refer to statements and propositions that correspond to the objective Truth. It can also refer to things that are part of the objective Truth, i.e. facts.

All you’ve really been doing is asserting your own view of what a fact is, but the above is the perfectly reasonable definition I’ve been using.

If there is objective Truth, then things that are part of it are true and the OP argument goes ahead. If there is no objective Truth, then obviously there are no objective values.

Substitute the word “reality” for “Truth” if you like. In that case something that is false would be so because it is not part of “reality”. But “reality” there just refers to the objective Truth. — AJJ

We all agree that a proposition/statement about reality can be false. I'm not understanding what you mean when you say "something that is false". How can a "something" be false? Can you give an example?

If the cat is not sitting on the mat then it’s false that the cat is sitting on the mat. The “something” there is the state of affairs of the cat sitting on the mat.

If the cat is not sitting on the mat then it’s false that the cat is sitting on the mat. — AJJ

We agree.

The “something” there is the state of affairs of the cat sitting on the mat. — AJJ

I'm not getting this. If the cat is explicitly not sitting on the mat, then it cannot be the state of affairs that the cat is sitting on the mat. The state of affairs is that the cat is not sitting on the mat.

For me “true” can refer to statements and propositions that correspond to the objective Truth. It can also refer to things that are part of the objective Truth, i.e. facts. — AJJ

Again, your use of the word objective makes your, otherwise perfectly sensible in my view, argument simply not true.

The meaning of "objectivity" as you implied in your OP, and seems very much the writer's usage you are sourcing your argument, generally refers to scientific objectivity. "There is no objective ethic" is true when understood in the context of science. The fact that you can perform no experiment which would resolve the issue of "ought I to believe facts" is reason for extreme skepticism that it is an objective statement, in the scientific sense of objective.

"I ought to believe facts", I agree is true (and trivially so as you have been suggesting for most of the arguments you have been making), maybe "everyone ought to believe facts" whether they believe it or not, is also true. Your author, however, makes a mistake in concluding that this shows "an objective ethic exists"; which one should already be skeptical of because "objective" doesn't even appear in the argument (that you have presented anyway).

No scientific experiment can resolve "ought we to believe facts" so it's not objective in this scientific sense.

Not everyone needs to agree that "I ought to believe facts", they may disagree just for the heck of it without any justification or reasoning and simply deny any criticism of their position, and if they want they can go further and say "I ought to believe lies" and can then point to as neat an infinite regress as you provided in your OP of "I ought to be believe lies, and I ought to believe the lie that I ought to believe lies, and I ought to believe that lie, etc.". So it's not objective in the sense that everyone has to agree (nothing is; at best most people agree, it seems, for now).

In terms of logical structure, both argument are similar and you can not decide to believe "I ought to believe facts" simply because it leads to infinite regress as lies can also have infinite regress.

Other uses of "objective" are either purely ornamental, it adds a bit of prestige to say "objective truth" rather than just "truth", or have no functional meaning in your argument, such as "unbiased truth"; bias hasn't been an issue so there's no reason to specify the truth is unbiased.

So you can simply remove "objective" from your argument and have a "I ought to believe facts" and claim it's true. You'll probably have the same objections (but at least have a more refined position).

I'm not getting this. If the cat is explicitly not sitting on the mat, then it cannot be the state of affairs that the cat is sitting on the mat. The state of affairs is that the cat is not sitting on the mat. — EricH

I think if a state of affairs can be described as impossible then it can be described as false. Either way your describing something that isn’t true.

If I say “the cat was sitting on the circular square shaped mat” I’m describing “something” (a state of affairs) that is impossible and false.

By “objective” I mean existing independent of thought. I’ve been using it where I don’t absolutely need to when the other person has a different definition of “truth”.

If “I ought to believe lies” is a lie then that’s actually good for the OP argument. If it’s true then it’s a paradox, since you ought not to believe that you ought to believe lies, and you ought not to believe that, and so on. So my argument for why we should believe facts is still fine.

Actually, if “I ought to believe lies” is true then I don’t think it does lead to a paradox. It seems to me you just can’t justify it like you can with the truth.

By “objective” I mean existing independent of thought. I’ve been using it where I don’t absolutely need to when the other person has a different definition of “truth”. — AJJ

Out of curiosity, does the author use objective that way?

I've never encountered "objective truth" to mean independent from thought, usually "objective" is used precisely to refer to some thinking process, either individual or collective, that strives to arrive at a perspective of the truth (as in as close as possible). For instance, "I'm trying to be objective here", or "this is objective analysis" or "these scientists were objective", which is why I took such issue with it.

Also, if the "truth" refers to the "beliefs" (beliefs corresponding to facts corresponding to reality, or real states of affairs, or the case etc.) then there is no truth independent of thought.

The usual word in philosophy for reality independent of our thoughts about it, is "the noumena", which again comes from Kant referring to the "the thing in itself". We see phenomena in our minds that we infer arises from some noumena that gave rise to the phenomena (exactly how they are connected is very difficult to say).

For me “true” can refer to statements and propositions that correspond to the objective Truth. It can also refer to things that are part of the objective Truth, i.e. facts. — AJJ

The problem with this is that you're using "true" to refer to two completely different ideas, and you're expecting the different ideas to be clear via using a lower-case versus capital letter for the words. You'd have to always explain your usage there, though, because it's completely novel. No one is going to know what you're talking about if you don't explain it.

The way I'm using "fact" is a very mundane, standard way to use that term in the sciences, philosophy, etc.

Actually, if “I ought to believe lies” is true then I don’t think it does lead to a paradox. It seems to me you just can’t justify it like you can with the truth. — AJJ

Yes, was just writing that, just like with the truth, I just keep asserting the lie. You tell me that's a lie, I say "great, lies are what I ought to believe".

This degenerates quickly into the well known problem of denying the law of non-contradiction. I say "we should avoid contradiction", you say "no, we should contradict ourselves", I contradict you on that, you say "awesome, thanks".

Out of curiosity, does the author use objective that way? — boethius

I assume so. To my understanding that’s what term generally means in philosophy.

Also, if the "truth" refers to the "beliefs" (beliefs corresponding to facts corresponding to reality, or real states of affairs, or the case etc.) then there is no truth independent of thought.

The usual word in philosophy for reality independent of our thoughts about it, is "the noumena", which again comes from Kant referring to the "the thing in itself". We see phenomena in our minds that we infer arises from some noumena that gave rise to the phenomena. — boethius

“Truth” doesn’t refer to beliefs. That would make it subjective. Truth independent of thought is objective.

It seems to me that noumena is what I mean when I refer to objective reality.

Well unless you can explain how literally "not reading" is useful for reading comprehension, I'm unable to take much stock in your opinion on reading comprehension. — boethius

Your loss. <shrug>

The problem with this is that you're using "true" to refer to two completely different ideas, and you're expecting the different ideas to be clear via using a capital letter for one of the words. You'd have to always explain your usage there, though, because it's completely novel.

The way I'm using "fact" is a very mundane, standard way to use that term in the sciences, philosophy, etc. — Terrapin Station

It’s not novel. Perhaps start reading a little more widely. The way you use the word is poorly justified and tendentious.

It’s not novel. Perhaps start reading a little more widely. — AJJ

So give a couple examples of the distinction being used by others.

“Truth” doesn’t refer to beliefs. That would make it subjective. Truth independent of thought is objective. — AJJ

I agree that you can use the truth like this, if you define your terms carefully. But we usually, in common language and in most technical philosophy (since there's no reason to use words differently than normal without cause), use the truth to qualify beliefs as true or false (sometimes something else; the law-of-the-excluded middle is a rabbit whole). So "the Truth" really refers to just all true beliefs, which of course are true because they correspond to "reality" or "the case", or whatever the truth corresponds to.

Saying "this tree is true" doesn't really make much sense in the common usage of truth, whereas "this tree is real" makes sense. The typical philosopher would say "the phenomena of the tree is apparent to me, and I believe it's true that the tree really is there as we'd commonly say, but I also know there's some noumena of the tree beyond what I see and I can't access that noumena", or something similar (and I leave it completely open to what the typical philosopher would say "might be the noumena": pure matter, pure thought, etc.).

The author of the OP seems obviously to be using it that way. The OED’s first definition is one I’ve been using, which I’d say is a fair indication of its use.

You know that I'm asking you about a distinction signified by lower-case versus capital letters, right?

Oh right - well the OP author does that. Whether his use is novel or not I don’t know.

Scanning through the part of the book I can access online, it looks like he's using capital letters to allude to notions connected to God. I can't find anywhere that he is defining distinctions related to capitalization, but I'm just scanning through part of the book, so maybe I overlooked it or can't access that part.

The distinction between objective truth and the almost empty way that you’ve been using the word I thought was obvious.

It seems as if you're reading your own ideas into it, unless you can point to someplace where he (at least contextually) defines the distinction he's making based on capitalization. The passages I'm seeing all allude to religious ideas.

This has gotten far too inane. The distinction is obvious to me. But who knows, perhaps I’ve gotten it all wrong. That’ll do anyway.

I think if a state of affairs can be described as impossible then it can be described as false. Either way your describing something that isn’t true. — AJJ

It appears that you are using a different definition of state of affairs than others are. Here is Terrapin's:

Basically states of affairs are relations of existent things, as well as properties of existent things. Things exist, they have properties, and they are situated in certain (dynamic) ways with respect to other existent things. Those are states of affairs. — Terrapin Station

Given this definition, any state of affairs cannot be described as impossible because there ain't no such thing as an impossible state of affairs.

You can make statements/propositions about hypothetical states of affairs in ways that are contradictory and/or false.

Given this definition, any state of affairs cannot be described as impossible because there ain't no such thing as an impossible state of affairs. — EricH

Are you seeing that as controversial? If x is a state of affairs, then x isn't impossible. That seems fairly obvious, no?

You can make statements/propositions about hypothetical states of affairs in ways that are contradictory and/or false. — EricH

Sure, but then what we're describing isn't actually a state of affairs.

You have a fair point. But a hypothetical state of affairs then seems to me “something” that is necessarily not true, i.e. false.

Are you seeing that as controversial? If x is a state of affairs, then x isn't impossible. That seems fairly obvious, no? — Terrapin Station

Sure, but then what we're describing isn't actually a state of affairs — Terrapin Station

As far as I can tell we're in agreement on both points. However, my powers of persuasion are insufficient/inadequate when it comes to convincing AJJ of this.

Eh? I said in my last post that you had a fair point:

You have a fair point. But a hypothetical state of affairs then seems to me [an example of] “something” that is necessarily not true, i.e. false. — AJJ