It makes something which is fundamentally human and tries to make it mechanical. Morality is a matter of human values. — T Clark

One reason why the Papacy rejected Martin Luther's epistemic defense at his trial, in which he wanted to review the arguments mechanically, "through scripture and reason", is because the Papacy very much prefers the system of a living magisterium:

The magisterium of the Roman Catholic Church is the church's authority or office to give authentic interpretation of the Word of God, "whether in its written form or in the form of Tradition." According to the 1992 Catechism of the Catholic Church, the task of interpretation is vested uniquely in the Pope and the bishops. Bishops, teaching in communion with the Roman Pontiff, are to be respected by all as witnesses to divine and Catholic truth.

Tradition and Living Magisterium

Is all revealed truth consigned to Holy Scripture? or can it, must it, be admitted that Christ gave to His Apostles to be transmitted to His Church, that the Apostles received either from the very lips of Jesus or from inspiration or Revelation, Divine instructions which they transmitted to the Church and which were not committed to the inspired writings?

The Church in Rome received secrets, orally transmitted, outside the Bible. That is why the Bible is not sufficient as a source. Mechanically deriving conclusions through scripture and reason is therefore not permissible. The Church must have the opportunity to override the scripture when it suits her.

Between Catholics and the Christian sects of the East there are not the same fundamental differences, since both sides admit the Divine institution and Divine authority of the Church with the more or less living and explicit sense of its infallibility and indefectibility and its other teaching prerogatives, but there are contentions concerning the bearers of the authority, the organic unity of the teaching body, the infallibility of the pope, and the existence and nature of dogmatic development in the transmission of revealed truth.

It is not permitted onto the believers to question the principle that the Papacy is always right, even when it is not. The Papacy is infallible and "indefectible".

If the believers detect a contradiction in a Papacy's teaching, even by using mechanical means, the believers must believe both the Papal teaching as well as its very opposite. Furthermore, since the ability to engage in politicking, and also selling indulgencies, is badly damaged by any requirement of consistency, the believers must not use mechanical means to detect inconsistencies, as such would be considered inhumane.

And the best approaches seem to be in and through reason. — tim wood

There's no way to do moral foundations via reason. That's not to say that no one believes there is, but they have incorrect beliefs.

denial of the possibility of any standard — tim wood

Standards are subjective, and then they can be conventionally agreed upon. Neither gives us any sort of normative facts. And going by convention is an argumentum ad populum.

Here is an expression of a personal view and two claims. Any argument? — tim wood

Re the personal view, an argument doesn't do any good, of course. Re the other claims, it's a matter of there being zero empirical evidence for there being any extramental normative values, any extramental moral stances, etc.

You get from an ought to an is via a hypothetical syllogism. — tim wood

No, you don't, and I've already explained this to you here at least twice in the past. You can state preconditions/prerequisites for something, but those aren't oughts. People typcially just assume "You ought to do/achieve what you desire," but that's not at all a fact.

You can state preconditions/prerequisites for something, but those aren't oughts. People typcially just assume "You ought to do/achieve what you desire," but that's not at all a fact. — Terrapin Station

And I've been over this more than twice. Per Mortimer Adler: If you do X, then you can get Y. If you want Y, then you ought to do X.

But I find your arguments reductionist past animal to the insect. And just above, we have the (un)common sense of the matter from T Clark:

It makes something which is fundamentally human and tries to make it mechanical. Morality is a matter of human values. To the extent those values are universal, I guess you could say they're "absolute." But to the extent they are cultural and personal, they are not. — T Clark

If you're prepared to argue that there are no values that are universal - and demonstrate it - then I'll concede and leave you be. My argument (of course) is that there are, and that in themselves they give rise to new values. For example: mother's love leads to well-being leads, eventually, to the value of public education.

You can certainly point out that I'm moving from "universal" to "absolute" to something like a fact ("fact" your word; I cannot recall using it myself), but our topic falls under humanities, not physics. In short, I'm persuaded that you've bought some basic underlying presuppositions and they've got you rather than you've got them, and that you would benefit by attempting to make them explicit and subjecting them to your own criticism. I say attempt because such program is never easy.

. If you want Y, then you ought to do X. — tim wood

Per what? You ought to pursue or achieve what you want per what?

If you do X, then you can get Y. If you want Y, then you ought to do X. — tim wood

If it is the case that if I go to X-the bakery then I can get Y-apple pie, then if I want Y-apple pie, then I ought to (go to) X-the bakery. This connection of is and ought from Adler, but no doubt not original with him.

Repeating the idea doesn't actually answer this question: "You ought to pursue or achieve what you want per what?"

Per whatever it is that makes you want to pursue or achieve - that which distniguishes the living from the inert, I suppose. I don't think I'm understanding your question. The problem I was answering was getting from an ought to an is. You seem to have something else in mind. Maybe that there is no "ought"? I will agree that no pick-and-shovel man ever unearthed an ought - that there is no such thing as an ought....

So let's say that Joe wants to take a walk, but he thinks, "I ought not take a walk. I ought not do what I want." And let's say this is simply a foundational view for him. It's not based on mitigating circumstances or anything like that.

Is Joe wrong? What would make him wrong?

And let's say this is simply a foundational view for him. It's not based on mitigating circumstances or anything like that. — Terrapin Station

I read this as taking reason/motivation/cause out of consideration. Hard to make sense where there is none.
Now, I can think of lot of reasons to take a walk, and I can think of lots of reasons that I ought not to take that walk. And it comes to to reasons.

And your question:

Is Joe wrong? What would make him wrong? — Terrapin Station

To be wrong, you have to be wrong about something. In as much as you've barred reason(s), there appears to be nothing for Joe to be wrong about. Or he may just be ambivalent - but that's a psychological problem, and thereby a reason, so we have to rule that out.

Question and answer is a good way to go, imo. But is it going the way you want at the moment?

And I've been over this more than twice. Per Mortimer Adler: If you do X, then you can get Y. If you want Y, then you ought to do X. — tim wood

Sure, but that's not morals, that's practical.

If you're prepared to argue that there are no values that are universal - and demonstrate it - then I'll concede and leave you be. — tim wood

I think it's more like there are no morals that are objective. We have no way to determine if suicide, in general, is immoral, or when it is. We can move from our desires or values to what kind of society we want and then see what practical steps lead to this. But there is absolutely no universal moral related to suicide, let alone objective ones. I support this by pointing out that we have disagreement on suicide in this thread, though it's barely fleshed out, it's there. I support that there no objective values or, perhaps more cautiously, none we have access to, since we have no way to measure their correctness. We can certainly evaluate them consequentially, but the evaluation with include value judgments that we must then demonstrate are correct, always coming to new values or the same ones with no way to get away from our desires or ideas aobut what much be objectively valuable.

If the is--"I want to take a walk" implies an ought--"I ought to take a walk," then Joe is wrong because he's missing an implication, no?

But I find your arguments reductionist past animal to the insect. — tim wood

Insects don't have empathy, as far as I can tell. Humans do. Humans are social mammals. So we take into account emotional effects on ourselves and others and given our potential range of thinking, imagining and our training in noting possible pain in others, this can create all sorts of subtle caring about, preventing pain, getting upset at things that cause people pain. I don't think insects have this. None of this means there are universal morals let alone objective ones.

IOW Terrapin, for example might never ever come to believe in objective morals or universal ones. However this does not mean he is like insects. He still can be a social mammaly and given this his actions behavior and values will likely be influenced not only by vastly more complex understanding than insects have, but will also be influenced by empathy.

I think it's more like there are no morals that are objective. — Coben

I'm going to refer to T Clark's post again.

It makes something which is fundamentally human and tries to make it mechanical. Morality is a matter of human values. To the extent those values are universal, I guess you could say they're "absolute." But to the extent they are cultural and personal, they are not. — T Clark

The insight - one insight - I find in it lies in the usage of "universal" and "absolute." This usage, I suspect, is not in your usual understanding. As I read your post, it seems to me that you're arguing that there is no "Euclid's Elements" of morality/ethics; that is, no axiomatic theoretical development. And thus nor you nor I nor anyone else can argue morality/ethics more geometrico. But this is not a complete picture; and if taken as a complete picture, then a false picture.

It's as if you sought an external criteriological standard from logic or science, built on the model of and consistent with their structures, and not finding one, suppose there is none, that none is possible. And this is the error. If there is one, any, universally held value, then the whole field comes into view. It's then your business to show that there is not a single one. And this is not achieved by exhibiting a human being who happens not to hold any particular values; prisons, mental hospitals, and legislatures are filled with such people.

Rather you have to show there is none at all. And the counter is easy: such things are not found; they are established - no doubt out of primordial experience recognized as such. Above I referenced mother's love leading by steps to understanding, valuing, establishing as moral, public education (for example). "We hold these truths to be self-evident...". You can deny these, and the enumerated rights that follow from them. You can deny them. And you can deny that the angles in a Euclidean triangle sum to 180 degrees. If you do, no geometrician will pay you any mind. If you deny morality/ethics, no ethicist will pay you any mind. In the former case you're not so foolish. But you do seem just that foolish in the latter. I can only suppose that is because you have confused the nature of geometry with morality/ethics..

One reason why the Papacy rejected Martin Luther's epistemic defense at his trial, in which he wanted to review the arguments mechanically, "through scripture and reason", is because the Papacy very much prefers the system of a living magisterium: — alcontali

Are you making the case that a more rational approach to morality is less corruptible? I don't necessarily disagree with that, although I don't think it changes the basic nature of morality.

If the --"I want to take a walk" implies an ought--"I ought to take a walk," — Terrapin Station

. It doesn't; why would you think it does? You've left out the if-then. And you've simplified my example from X and Y to just Y. Makes a difference.

If I get some benefit from going for a walk, and if the benefit is one that I ought to have, then I ought to go for that walk.

But why not just state what you have to say and let me fire away at it?

Re the other claims, it's a matter of there being zero empirical evidence for there being any extramental normative values, any extramental moral stances, etc. — Terrapin Station

Really? You don't think there are genetic or biological factors in human behavior, including how we treat other people, e.g. mothers and fathers protecting their children? I am skeptical about ideas of sociobiology, but that doesn't mean I don't see any biological contribution.

IOW Terrapin, for example might never ever come to believe in objective morals or universal ones. However this does not mean he is like insects. He still can be a social mammaly and given this his actions behavior and values will likely be influenced not only by vastly more complex understanding than insects have, but will also be influenced by empathy. — Coben

Fair enough, I was harsh in reference to Terrapin, and he was too much a gentleman to reprove me. But keep in mind his is a radical criticism: that there is no such thing as, and that such a thing does not exist. Whatever, then, of the insect that does apply, if anything, he creates himself - I merely name it for what it is.

None of this means there are universal morals let alone objective ones. — Coben

None of this is about that at all! But since you have made the claim, and anyone can make any claim, then make your case, because Hitchen's guillotine (razor) awaits.

if the benefit is one that I ought to have, — tim wood

What would make it the case that you ought to have some benefit?

You don't think there are genetic or biological factors in human behavior, including how we treat other people, e.g. mothers and fathers protecting their children? — T Clark

As an extramental normative? No. There's zero evidence of that. Are you keeping in mind that "normative" doesn't refer to statistical norms per se, but shoulds or oughts?

What would make it the case that you ought to have some benefit? — Terrapin Station

Cardio-vascular fitness? Simple exercise? The lady who gets naked in her window every night at seven o'clock? The ice cream store at the other end?

It seems to me you're playing amphiboly/equivocation with "ought." Please don't, if you are. If you would like to define it, be my guest.

As an extramental normative? No. There's zero evidence of that. Are you keeping in mind that "normative" doesn't refer to statistical norms per se, but shoulds or oughts? — Terrapin Station

Thank you! No extramental normatives. That is, normatives not being non-mental, aren't. Nice and clear. If I cannot ding a shovel against it, it isn't. Hmm. Three plus five? That cannot mean anything at all. And truth, love, justice, the American way? A tissue of fantasy - not even that! They simply are meaningless. Just ask Terrapin.

Cardio-vascular fitness? Simple exercise? The lady who gets naked in her window every night at seven o'clock? The ice cream store at the other end? — tim wood

Right, so what makes it the case that you ought to have any of those things?

It's a simple question.

Right, so what makes it the case that you ought to have any of those things? It's a simple question. — Terrapin Station

"What makes it the case that I ought to have"? There is no what. You keep leaving out the if-then, or you really do not understand it. What point you're trying to make?

If it's that I am the author of my own particular wants, sure. But so what? I am also the author in my own person of my proposition that 2+2=4, and that under the right criteria, that it's even correct. Or that the ten commandments makes a certain amount of sense.

I suspect that you're going to argue that because I'm author, that's the only way that thing exists - is that it?

Are you making the case that a more rational approach to morality is less corruptible? I don't necessarily disagree with that, although I don't think it changes the basic nature of morality. — T Clark

Well, it's not that axiomatic theology cannot be done, or even that it would not work:

Principles of Islamic jurisprudence, also known as Uṣūl al-fiqh (Arabic: أصول الفقه‎, lit. roots of fiqh), are traditional methodological principles used in Islamic jurisprudence (fiqh) for deriving the rulings of Islamic law (sharia). This interpretive apparatus is brought together under the rubric of ijtihad, which refers to a jurist's exertion in an attempt to arrive at a ruling on a particular question.

According to the majority Usuli view, it is legitimate to seek general principles by induction, in order to provide for cases not expressly provided for. This process is known as ijtihad, and the intellect is recognised as a source of law. It differs from the Sunni qiyas in that it does not simply extend existing laws on a test of factual resemblance: it is necessary to formulate a general principle that can be rationally supported.

In both Rabbinical Judaism and in Islam, axiomatic theology, "through scripture and reason", is perfectly accepted. Therefore, Martin Luther was only advocating what is actually self-evident. It is the proposition of an infallible and "indefectible" Papacy that has turned out to be unsustainable.

Furthermore, concerning the oral secrets that the Church would have received and which would be the source of its legitimacy and origin of its power. For the sake of the argument, I am even willing to accept that these secrets could possibly exist. In early Christianity, under the persecutions of the Roman empire, the Church actually was a secret society. Therefore, the idea of orally transmitted secrets is not that far-fetched. However, I also believe that society-wide morality is not well served when keeping essential rules a secret. Furthermore, as far as I am concerned, justifying from these hidden secret teachings, the sale of indulgencies, was clearly one bridge too far.

On the whole, I side with Martin Luther's argument in favour of axiomatic morality, which is a principle that has clearly been elaborated successfully in Rabbinical-orthodox Judaism and Islam, and of which the very nature has substantially better guarantees against corruption and depravity. In that sense, axiomatic theology effectively preserves the basic nature of sound morality.

Are you making the case that a more rational approach to morality is less corruptible? — T Clark

From the altercation between the Church and Martin Luther, the impression emerges that the Church is fundamentally an occult society that occasionally uses a book, i.e. the Bible. However, from its deepest secrets the Church very well knows that its book is an arsenal replete of deceptive arguments.

So, we may probably somehow conclude that the Vatican Secret Archives contain these secrets, and that they utterly discredit and disparage the Bible.

So, yes, we had better use an approach to morality that is more rational than that. Again, there are good reasons to believe that Rabbinical-orthodox Judaism and Islam offer exactly such alternatives.

The insight - one insight - I find in it lies in the usage of "universal" and "absolute." This usage, I suspect, is not in your usual understanding. As I read your post, it seems to me that you're arguing that there is no "Euclid's Elements" of morality/ethics; that is, no axiomatic theoretical development. And thus nor you nor I nor anyone else can argue morality/ethics more geometrico. — tim wood

Even with geometry there is non-euclidian geometry, and, in fact the latter has turned out to be useful in describing reality in science. So even what seems utterly clear and objective is actually not universal in geometry.

It's as if you sought an external criteriological standard from logic or science, — tim wood

God would potentially be another one.

But when dealing with 'objective' there is no reason we cannot come up with a standard and even try to make it universal, but that trying would not simply be an appeal to reason, it would also be an appeal to value certain states more than others. An emotional appeal.

If there is one, any, universally held value, then the whole field comes into view. — tim wood

I don't think so. Because if have one that is something like 'Don't unnecessarily cause people to suffer' the word necessarily carries with it the potential for a wide range of other values. And that's with a kind of consequentialist value. IOW even if eveyrone on earth is a consequentialist, which they are not, they are still going to potentially think that axiom is true, but apply differing ideas around necessarily. And since they include deontologists, we will have people who will not even evaluate using the same processes, let alone coming from the same axiom. They will be disturbed by having an adverb, for example. Or by evaluating in terms of pain.

You can deny these, and the enumerated rights that follow from them. You can deny them. And you can deny that the angles in a Euclidean triangle sum to 180 degrees. If you do, no geometrician will pay you any mind. — tim wood

Fortunately, as I pointed out above, people ignored precisely that conclusion and found useful math that also, even, applies to the real world. Hyperbolic geometry is more effective, for example in three dimensions, and in specific situations, like when working with the surface of a sphere, like he world. Euclidian is more useful when dealing very locally and especially in two dimensions. But beyond that it seems that Einsteing found that hyperbolic genometry is the case at relatavistic levels of scale, where space is actually curved.

I can only suppose that is because you have confused the nature of geometry with morality/ethics.. — tim wood

Well, nowhere have you shown that the analogy is a good one. But assuming it is a good one, it fails.

Fair enough, I was harsh in reference to Terrapin, — tim wood

It wasn't the harshness, which I took as aimed at the idea, not at him. It was the conclusion. Even if we do not think there are objective or universal values, this need not lead to insect like relations. In fact morals have often led to insectlike behavior, because they have often been used to justify not feeling empathy for people. And because even with being able to say these values are he ones that can be demonstrated to be the right one's objectively, one need not be like an insect, since one has facutlies and tendencies that insects do not have.

None of this is about that at all! But since you have made the claim, and anyone can make any claim, then make your case, because Hitchen's guillotine (razor) awaits. — tim wood

I was claiming that your argument did not lead to the conclusion you were making.

If it is the case that if I go to X-the bakery then I can get Y-apple pie, then if I want Y-apple pie, then I ought to (go to) X-the bakery. — tim wood

You're claiming that this is an implication, that it's a fact that it's a implication.

I'm asking you what makes it a fact that if you want Y, you ought to (go to) X. You can get apple pie by going to the bakery, sure. But what makes it the case that if you want apple pie (which you have to go to the bakery to get, let's say), then you ought to get apple pie (you ought to go to the bakery)?

Or to make that shorter, what makes it the case that if you want something, you ought to achieve it? That's essentially what's being asserted here--that people ought to do what they want, that they ought to achieve/obtain their desires. Well, is that a fact? What is it a fact of? Where does it obtain?

As I said, if it's really an implication that if you want x you ought to get/achieve x (or you ought to do y which achieves x), then when Joe says, "I want apple pie. I can get apple pie by going to the bakery. Therefore I ought to avoid the bakery (because I ought to avoid what I want)," Joe should be saying something not just odd or very unusual, Joe should be saying something incorrect. What makes it incorrect?

Joe's certainty not saying something impossible to understand. Joe has desires, he has things that he wants, but for whatever reason, Joe also feels that he should not achieve his desires/should not obtain the things he wants. (Maybe Joe has this ingrained in him as some sense of deprivational duty, or maybe he's an ascetic, etc.--the reason doesn't matter, really, even if there's no reason aside from it just being the way he feels.) If it's claimed that it's really an implication that "If S wants y, then S should achieve/obtain/do y (perhaps by achieving/obtaining/doing x, which is necessary for y)" then it would have to be the case that Joe is incorrect.

Fortunately, as I pointed out above, people ignored precisely that conclusion and found useful math that also, even, applies to the real world. Hyperbolic geometry is more effective, for example — Coben

Understood and agreed, on matters of the application of non-Euclidean geometry. But just here is a good example of where this entire discussion on morality goes off the rails. Nowhere did I adduce non-Euclidean geometry. I did mention Euclidean geometry, and troubled to specify it as "Euclidean," in an attempt to make a point about kinds of arguments/proofs. And like a yearling hound you took off following the wrong trail.

Now, to try the argument another way, I read your posts as saying that, in effect, there is no such thing as an absolute morality, in the sense of there being a set of rules - Euclid-like - by which we can order ourselves, our thoughts, and our behaviours and actions; that we may consult and even master so that once and for all, all questions on all such matters are always already resolved or resolvable. And, because there is not such a thing, then therefore there is no thing like it in any way, and the whole matter devolves to personal opinion.

Actually, there is a parallel to this in mathematics: around 1920 a German mathematician named David Hilbert posted a program that included demonstrating that, "1, all of mathematics follows from a correctly chosen finite system of axioms; and 2, that some such axiom system is provably consistent through some means such as the epsilon calculus" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Hilbert). Which program of course Kurt Godel blew up in 1931. The point here being that the failure to "regularize" mathematics did not cause mathematics to revert to being whatever anyone "felt" like it should be as a matter of personal opinion. 2+2 was, and is, still 4.

And morality is like that. I agree with the proposition that morality/ethics will forever resist a final axiomatization. But as with mathematics, that in no way means that morality/ethics becomes free-floating and entirely arbitrary. Because morality/ethics is not mathematics, however, lots of folks who in my opinion are deeply confused hold fast to a belief that they are in their own persons and notions final arbiters of what is, or is not, moral/ethical. Imo this confusion comes out of and is based in their ultimate ability - their so-called freedom - to choose their own behaviour. Having made wrong choices, how easy it is to deny the grounds that it was a wrong choice in the first place! And instead of repenting in sackcloth and ashes some error of judgment or choice, instead celebrate it as something either in itself valuable or as a demonstration of something valuable, in the process elevating a personal mistake into both an outrage and attack on morality itself.

Let's try a simple experiment. I am going to assume that you could conceive of and write down some action that you think intolerable, some twisted thought from a corner of your mind so deep and disturbing that even to think about it is itself disturbing - I'm pretty sure most of us have such corners, and that most of us take some care to stay away from them, places where daytime nightmares lurk. Anyway, you're not taxed with having explicitly such thought or writing it down, only with acknowledging that you could - we all could. Could you now reasonably will, with respect to the action of that thought, that no one should ever do it? -And in that hothouse of your fervid imagination there flowers a nascent morality.

Humanity has done this. It has had its horrors at every level, in idea and actuality, and in recovery says, "Never again!" That the "again" happens is no failure of the morality so much as a failure of persons. And it does not do to confuse the failure of persons with any failure of morality.

There really is right and wrong, good and bad. Morality/ethics is the attempt to identify which is which. That it has fuzzy or blurred edges is not destructive of the main, any more than in mathematics. You just have to be a mature enough thinker, and for these purposes being an adult is usually although not always enough of a qualification, to acknowledge there is such a thing, and that it is not to be denied or rationalized away.

But what makes it the case that if you want apple pie (which you have to go to the bakery to get, let's say), then you ought to get apple pie (you ought to go to the bakery)?
Or to make that shorter, what makes it the case that if you want something, you ought to achieve it? — Terrapin Station

It seems to me you're playing amphiboly/equivocation with "ought." Please don't, if you are. If you would like to define it, be my guest. — tim wood

The ought refers to the intrinsic efficacy of going to and getting from the bakery - the machinery of it. You're going from if Joe wants Y, and the means for getting it are X, then if he wants Y he ought to do X, to If Joe wants, then he ought. You're changing the basis of the predication from means to substance. That is, you are destructively re-reading the thing as something that it isn't.

How about quit playing around and get to your point. If you need to define a term, go ahead.