I appeal to rational principles to over rule the feelings, and decide what I ought and ought not do, based on these principles. — Metaphysician Undercover

I think this is special pleading. Take a simple conflict. I like ice-cream, but it makes me fat. Which is rational, liking ice-cream or not liking fat? I say neither.

I cannot say that I ought to do what the feeling inclines me to do, as you seem to imply. — Metaphysician Undercover

You don't realize that I'm not in the field of morals or ethics. I'm not recommending anything. I'm explaining what moral emotions are and how they work. I mean, psychology.
There can be a contradiction between a moral feeling and a rational judgment. It is the obsessive leitmotif of Dostoevsky's novels and the center of Hume's ethics. Dostoevsky was an irrationalist. Therefore, he gave absolute primacy to the feeling of Love (with a capital letter). Hume was an Enlightened one, but he was aware of the importance of sympathy for morality. The same with Spinoza. Both believed that morality is based on reason, but without moral emotion there can be no impulse to do good. Therefore we can say that they called for a synthesis between them. If they split up, both of them could be wrong.

I don't need to say that I agree with them. Reason alone can be directed in the wrong direction. Selfishness, for example. Moral emotion alone can be stupidly applied. A synthesis is necessary. Finding the right synthesis is not easy, but it is necessary.

But there is also the feeling that what I am doing is wrong, which may happen in a direct or non-reflective way, as you yourself will later acknowledge. — David Mo

I do not believe there is such a feeling. That's the root of our difference. People definitely talk as if there is, "I get the feeling that this is the wrong thing to do", but I do not believe there is any such feeling.

I have never actually experienced such a feeling. I might get an uneasy feeling, an uncomfortable feeling, and associate this feeling with the judgement that the action is wrong, but I do not believe I've ever really had a feeling that what I am doing is wrong. It's always a thought that what I am doing is wrong, not a feeling.

If, in psychology they assume that there is such a feeling, then I think this is wrong. I can suppose that it is possible that you and other people have had such a feeling, but I have not, but when I do, I see that this is illogical, and so I dismiss this as people not properly describing their feelings. So I really do not believe that such a feeling is possible and I will explain why. The word "wrong" refers to a concept with an opposing term "right". And anytime we use a word to describe a particular situation, this requires a conscious judgement that the situation fulfills the requirements of using that word. So when I say "that's a house", "that's a car", "the colour of that thing is red", or "that action is wrong", I've made a conscious judgement concerning the thing.

Feelings do not come with words attached to them, such that we can take the word and say that this is the feeling. It takes a judgement to say what type of feeling any feeling is. But the judgement that such and such is wrong, or such and such is right, is a very special type of judgement. There is no real model to indicate what right and wrong looks like, to aid us in making such a judgement, so we might just assume that we "feel" what right and wrong are like. This is what you, and unenlightened as well, seem to be claiming that we just "feel" the difference between right and wrong. But I think that this is clearly a mistaken assumption. In reality we must judge the difference between right and wrong, by reference to some principles, as I explained above.

When did I say such a thing? The conciousness of something does not need to be reflexive. Although it often is. I'm aware that I'm being watched, without having to reflect on it. — David Mo

This is another example of your mistaken attitude. This is a description, "I'm being watched". You are claiming that you are aware that the situation fulfils the requirements of "I'm being watched" without reflecting on the situation. Can you see how this is impossible? In order for you, or any person to apply these words to the situation, it is necessary that you reflect on the situation and make that judgement. Even if your claim is that there is a situation which fulfills the requirements of the judgement "I'm being watched", and this situation exists independently of that judgement, how would you propose that a person might recognize oneself to be in that situation, without reflecting on it? What you are arguing is simply, and blatantly, illogical and impossible. You are claiming that recognition occurs without reflection. So you are assigning to "feeling" what can only be accomplished by a conscious judgement, and that is simply a mistaken premise.

I think this is special pleading. Take a simple conflict. I like ice-cream, but it makes me fat. Which is rational, liking ice-cream or not liking fat? I say neither. — unenlightened

Why would you say "neither" when the answer is clearly both? Both, "I like ice cream", and "I do not like fat", are conscious, rational judgements. You can see that these two contradict each other, because ice cream contains a lot of fat. But distinct rational judgements often contradict each other, due to lack of knowledge (not knowing that ice cream has fat), or simple sloppiness in the acceptance of principles or premises. So in this case you can know that ice cream contains fat, and also know that you like ice cream, therefore knowingly make contradictory statements, while each statement is itself based in a rational judgement. However, I might accuse you of being irrational, and if we analyze the two statements we might find enough ambiguity in the use of the word "like", to account for the appearance of irrationality. Then I'd recant, saying you're not really irrational, you're only using "like" in different ways.

You don't realize that I'm not in the field of morals or ethics. I'm not recommending anything. I'm explaining what moral emotions are and how they work. I mean, psychology. — David Mo

And I am explaining to you why your concept of "moral emotions" is incoherent, irrational, and unintelligible. You would need to somehow clear up, and get beyond the fundamental contradictions which you have displayed to me, in order to explain moral emotions to me. However, the problem seems to be very deeply seated, inherent within your perspective, and your desire is simply to assume that "moral emotions" makes sense, and proceed from there.

Both believed that morality is based on reason, but without moral emotion there can be no impulse to do good. — David Mo

Do you not see the contradiction here? If morality is truly based on reason, then it is contradictory to say that it is emotion which gives us the impulse to do good. What is missing here is the separation of what unenlightened called "passion" from morality, which involves the distinction between bad and good. When we allow that "passion", as the motivator for action, is something separate from the faculty which judges bad and good (like the Platonic tripartite psyche), then the emotion which gives us the impulse to act, are independent from any judgement of bad or good. In the Platonic description, emotion or "passion", is simply the inclination or urge to act, and it can be directed toward either bad or good. So in the Platonic description, the person of power, ability, capacity, in a position to act, might be directed towards either good or bad.

That might serve to exemplify what I find as the deficiency in your concept of "moral emotion". Emotions are just the urge to act, independent of any judgement of bad or good. So an emotion cannot be "moral", because it has no regard for good or bad. The urge to act must be directed in order that the action go toward something good rather than bad. This implies a necessary separation between "moral" and "emotion", as "moral" is applied to that faculty which directs the emotions. And emotions themselves have no dependence on bad or good, they are properly independent of such judgements.
Therefore when we say that a feeling, or emotion gives a person the urge to act, we have no principle whereby we might say that this urge is toward something good or bad.

I might get an uneasy feeling, an uncomfortable feeling, and associate this feeling with the judgement that the action is wrong, but I do not believe I've ever really had a feeling that what I am doing is wrong. — Metaphysician Undercover

And anytime we use a word to describe a particular situation, this requires a conscious judgement that the situation fulfills the requirements of using that word. So when I say "that's a house", "that's a car", "the colour of that thing is red", or "that action is wrong" — Metaphysician Undercover

Are you saying that until you think "This is a house" you don't have the perception of a house? Your life must be hard. You should see a specialist.

Joking aside, when you perceive anything you get a complex of intuitions and mental constructs without having to reflect on them. Only people with brain damage dissociate (sensations from) forms and (perceptions of) things. Similarly, when I experience a feeling of discomfort it is intentional: that is, it has a specific sense. For example, fear is very different from guilt. They have different causes and effects. A further analysis is verbal, of course. "This is a panic attack" is a reflexive verbal act. It is even possible that this analysis is wrong. I can believe that I hate a woman even though a further analysis may show that my feeling was really a frustrated love. It is wrong because it doesn't reflects the very feeling. What means that the feeling exists before and without the reflective analysis.

I don't think you don't have differentiated feelings. When a feeling is associated with some characteristics (of fear or guilt) - as you said - it is because they are in the very same feeling. You don't need to say "I had a panic attack" to have had a panic attack. You can rest assured: you don't need a specialist. You just need to think better about what you're saying.

If morality is truly based on reason, then it is contradictory to say that it is emotion which gives us the impulse to do good. — Metaphysician Undercover

I don't see any contradiction. It's one thing to know and another to want. The person who says "I know very well that I shouldn't eat chocolate, but I can't resist" is expressing that difference. On the other hand, Hume showed that you cannot rationally prove that you should do something. Reason can show the consequences of drinking chocolate, but not that you should prefer to refrain from eating chocolate than to face the consequences. There is no contradiction in preferring a short and intense life to a long but insipid one.

Therefore, if you want to live a moral life you will have to base it on moral emotions. It will be based on reason, to the extent that it can rely on them. Reason must know how to use the emotions that suit it in order to reject those that do not. Without this reason is morally useless. Beautiful, but useless. Pure idealism.

Don't give me platonisms. Plato was very intelligent and wrote very well, but his idea of the Ideal Good seems to me to be pure illusion.

In my opinion, reason and moral emotion are a tandem. If one stops pedaling, we're not going anywhere.

I don't think you don't have differentiated feelings. When a feeling is associated with some characteristics (of fear or guilt) - as you said - it is because they are in the very same feeling. You don't need to say "I had a panic attack" to have had a panic attack. You can rest assured: you don't need a specialist. You just need to think better about what you're saying. — David Mo

You don't seem to grasp your error, so I'll explain it to you in another way, as a category mistake. Let's assume that we can apprehend feelings like pain and pleasure, directly, as pain or pleasure, without any reflection. We know that it's pain, or that it's pleasure simply from the feeling, it's enjoyable, or unpleasant. Despite the fact that one might say it "feels good", or it "feels bad", this is not "good
" and "bad" in the moral sense. To say that it feels good, therefore it is good in the moral sense of "good", is a category error, because moral goods are determined by rational judgements, not by feelings. The category of pleasure and pain is distinct from the category of good and bad. One is a type of feeling, the other a type of rational judgement. Maintaining this distinction is what allows us to say that some pleasures are not good, and some pains are good. To conflate these categories is a category mistake.

don't see any contradiction. It's one thing to know and another to want. The person who says "I know very well that I shouldn't eat chocolate, but I can't resist" is expressing that difference. — David Mo

The contradiction is in saying that morality is based in reason, yet emotion gives us the impulse to do good. If emotion gave us the impulse to do good, then we would not need reason for morality, we could just follow our emotions, and therefore do good. Morality would not be based in reason it would be based in emotions.

You might say the person knows better than to eat the chocolate, but eats it anyway, therefore the feeling is the motivator, the driving force. But the issue is the person who succeeds in resisting the temptation. What about when the person resists eating the chocolate and eats the salad instead? Because there are two distinctly opposing outcomes from the same feeling, the urge to eat the chocolate, we cannot say that it is the urge itself, which causes the good outcome. This is why the driving force, the motivator, the "passion", what we call the "feeling", in this case we could name it simply as "hunger", is apprehended as independent from the moral good. That passion, inclination to act, urge, or feeling, may be directed towards either bad or good, but there is no good nor bad inherent within that feeling. The urge toward a particular end, to eat the chocolate, would be what is called an apparent good, like when something feels good, but that is not the moral good. There's a difference in category between things which appear as good, because they feel good, and things which are morally good.

Don't give me platonisms. Plato was very intelligent and wrote very well, but his idea of the Ideal Good seems to me to be pure illusion. — David Mo

Plato has produced the most comprehensive moral philosophy ever, and Christian ethics are based in it. Christian ethics, which tell us to be guided by eternal truths of the intellect, rather than bodily feelings, are responsible for leading the western world through the scientific revolution into the modern era. So it's foolish to dismiss Plato's work as pure illusion, it would be better described as visionary.

We know that it's pain, or that it's pleasure simply from the feeling, — Metaphysician Undercover

You have a feeling of shame or guilt. This is the psychological fact. After that you can think about what you've had and categorize it as shame or guilt. What you called "knowing" is the latter. Obviously you need to think about it to know what it is. But to be X and to think what X can be are different actions.

Feeling good is not doing good. Feeling that I'm doing good for someone is not the same as feeling good about hurting someone. The first is empathy; the second is sadism. They are different things with different implications. So what?

The contradiction is in saying that morality is based in reason, yet emotion gives us the impulse to do good. If emotion gave us the impulse to do good, then we would not need reason for morality, we could just follow our emotions, and therefore do good. Morality would not be based in reason it would be based in emotions. — Metaphysician Undercover

I have already answered this. There are two bases of morality: reason and emotion. I used the metaphor of a tandem.

For example, Spinoza: passions are stronger than reason. So reason needs to ally with them and reinforce the passions that aim at rational or moral ends.

You can disagree but you can't say that this is a contradictory theory.

Hume says that reason tells me that if I eat too much chocolate it will raise my blood sugar level. But I can answer that I prefer a shorter and more pleasant life to a tasteless long life. Reason can't say anything against a radical hedonistic choice. Listen, I've already written this for you. Did you read it?

Christian ethics, which tell us to be guided by eternal truths of the intellect, — Metaphysician Undercover

According the Fathers of the Church, intellect is a servant of faith. We're not getting into theologies now, I hope.

You have a feeling of shame or guilt. This is the psychological fact. After that you can think about what you've had and categorize it as shame or guilt. What you called "knowing" is the latter. Obviously you need to think about it to know what it is. But to be X and to think what X can be are different actions. — David Mo

OK, so here's the problem. A feeling comes without any judgement of good or bad. It has not been categorized. Then the feeling must be judged as good or bad in relation to the current situation. The same type of feeling might be judged as good in some situations and bad in others. That is the nature of a "feeling". But your supposed feeling of "guilt" already has that judgement built into it, it's always has the same categorization in relation to good or bad. Therefore "guilt" cannot be a feeling.

There are two bases of morality: reason and emotion. — David Mo

This is unacceptable. Having two distinct bases, as you propose would lead to inconsistency and contradiction of principles, therefore indecisiveness, and the inability to decide moral questions.

You can disagree but you can't say that this is a contradictory theory. — David Mo

In the sense that it supports contradictory principles, such as the ones you've expressed, it is a contradictory theory. Why do you think that a theory which allows contradictory principles to be true ought not be called what it is, a contradictory theory?

But your supposed feeling of "guilt" already has that judgement built into i — Metaphysician Undercover

I didn't say that feeling includes a judgment. Feeling is the perception of have injured someone. Just as empathy does not include the judgment of feeling what another feels. But it is felt. You see the color red before you are thinking that this color is different from blue. The same is true for moral emotions. May or may not be accompanied for judgments about them.

This is unacceptable. Having two distinct bases, as you propose would lead to inconsistency and contradiction of principles, — Metaphysician Undercover

I don't see why. My understanding of what is good can be supported by the feeling of empathy and result in an action that my reason recognizes as good. Where do you see contradiction? On the contrary, it is obvious that some feelings and reason may coincide. It has been said since Socrates, if not before.

Feeling is the perception of have injured someone. — David Mo

That's better called a memory. It's not what people would normally call a feeling.

I don't see why. My understanding of what is good can be supported by the feeling of empathy and result in an action that my reason recognizes as good. Where do you see contradiction? — David Mo

I already explained all this. Just because there are times when an action urged by a feeling is consistent with reason, this doesn't mean that it is always the case. When it is not the case, as is common, then there is contradiction. So, having both emotion and reason as the basis for morality allows for contradiction. Simply put, the two statements "morality is based in reason", and "morality is based in emotion" are contradictory.

To resolve the contradiction we might say, as I suggested, that emotion and reason are two distinct aspects of morality. Emotion gives us the urge to act, while reason gives us the capacity to judge what is the appropriate act. But if we separate these two like this, to allow that emotion is part of morality, we ought not confuse what each part gives us. So a feeling, such as your proposed feeling of "guilt", cannot give us the urge to do a good act. A feeling can only give us the urge to act, and reason must determine what is the good act when that feeling occurs. As I told you numerous times already, when a person recognizes oneself as being guilty (what you call the feeling of guilt), the person might choose either good or bad actions in relation to the feeling. And the same is true for all feelings.

That's better called a memory. — Metaphysician Undercover

I am not speaking of the past, but present. Red perception is not a memory.

the person might choose either good or bad actions in relation to the feeling — Metaphysician Undercover

Who is denying that?

Reason alone can be directed in the wrong direction. Selfishness, for example. Moral emotion alone can be stupidly applied. — David Mo

am not speaking of the past, but present. Red perception is not a memory. — David Mo

You said, the perception of having injured someone. And you also said something about having to see red before you can judge that it is different from blue. What you are referring to are memories.