When I tell them 'it is wrong to shoplift', I'm trying to say more than 'I feel the obligation not to shoplift so you should not do it'. The gap I am speaking about is moving from the moral experience to a true sentence which applies to others even if they don't have a moral experience with regards to the same issue. — shmik

It's the 'is/ought' problem again. What is the warrant for 'it is wrong' beyond subjective opinion? This is what religion and social mores used to underwrite, but now they've either been 'internalised', 'relativized' or 'subjectivised'.

I think it is quite permissible to believe that stealing anything whatever is wrong. It doesn't mean you have to perform a citizens arrest over someone shoplifting, but if I noticed it I think I would tell the shopkeeper.

Perhaps you are looking at the horizon, while I am looking at a bird, which is looking for grubs, and a cat which is looking at the bird with a view to lunch. Four very different views and significances. Each significance is a relation of a pov to a view. The horizon has no pov. — unenlightened

I was addressing this sentence.
"If your point of view is as real and as significant as my point of view, for all that I have no access to yours, then my obligation to you is equal to my obligation to myself."
If significance is always related to a pov, then there must be a pov in which these 2 other povs both share equal significance. If there is a cat looking at a bird and a bird looking at grubs - with you watching both. Then both the cat's and the birds povs can be equally significant to you. But they can't just be equally significant simpliciter.

When you stated that my point of view is just as significant as yours, it sounded like it was from the pov of the horizon (or the view from nowhere) which we agree does not exist. It could be that you meant that my pov is just a significant to me as your pov is to you, but that wouldn't really fit with your argument.

It's the 'is/ought' problem again. What is the warrant for 'it is wrong' beyond subjective opinion? This is what religion and social mores used to underwrite, but now they've either been 'internalised', 'relativized' or 'subjectivised'.

I think it is quite permissible to believe that stealing anything whatever is wrong. It doesn't mean you have to perform a citizens arrest over someone shoplifting, but if I noticed it I think I would tell the shopkeeper. — Wayfarer

The reason that I don't see it as the classic is/ought problem is to do with the conception of what morality is. If morality is part of your experience, in your caring and feeling of obligations towards others - then the is ought problem does not apply. I take it that this is how Un conceives of morality. My concern is with the transformation of this experiential morality into true sentences as I view it as a transformation into something different, rather than a way of expressing our experiential morality.

Is ought problem has a different starting point.

It is as if you are a limb that is numb to me, and I am a limb that is numb to you, and morality is the truth that if you damage a limb, you are damaging yourself, for all that you do not feel anything. — unenlightened

Because I don't actually feel your pain, I don't tend to care about it as much as my own, but this is merely a limitation of my senses - shortsightedness. Morality simply reminds me that you are sensitive too. — unenlightened

I haven't respondent to these aspects of your post because they don't really make sense to me. I see it a way you can choose to view others, definitely not natural for me to think like this.

Is ought problem has a different starting point. — shmik

I would have thought that this proposition:

The gap I am speaking about is moving from the moral experience to a true sentence which applies to others — shmik

is exactly the is/ought problem. The 'moral experience' is the subjective sense of 'what ought to be done', but you expect a 'true sentence' to be objective in a way that the 'moral experience' cannot be, because it's subjective.

In fact what you write above:

If morality is part of your experience — shmik

is, again, 'subjectivism' - that is, morality is effective because it's 'part of your experience', it is under-written by individual commitment. So, you will respect that, because it represents the right of an individual to hold a view - but at the same time, you don't believe it amounts to anything 'objectively true'.

My concern is with the transformation of this experiential morality into true sentences as I view it as a transformation into something different, rather than a way of expressing our experiential morality. — shmik

I think what you're actually asking for is an 'objective domain of values' - which is a perfectly reasonable thing to ask for - but in the context of a culture within which the traditional means of providing that, is absent.

is, again, 'subjectivism' - that is, morality is effective because it's 'part of your experience', it is under-written by individual commitment. So, you will respect that, because it represents the right of an individual to hold a view - but at the same time, you don't believe it amounts to anything 'objectively true'. — Wayfarer

Something like this. I think morality as commitment is also a bit of an abstraction. I don't think the morality as part of your experience is a set of rules, just the way you are compelled to act. Once we move from moral experience to moral sentences we drastically change what we are referring to.

I'm not trying to just present my own view of morality. This is in response to the argument that moral experiences (caring and feeling of obligation towards others) can be the basis of moral realism.

I think what you're actually asking for is an 'objective domain of values' - which is a perfectly reasonable thing to ask for - but in the context of a culture within which the traditional means of providing that, is absent — Wayfarer

Not really asking for it. There are plenty people that are moral realist that don't believe there is 'an objective domain of values' - sounds very platonic. I'm mostly interested in arguments for realism which don't require this 'objective domain' or something similar.

It's not really a question of is/ought. That's more a distinction between ethical significance (ought) and presence of states (is). What is at stake in shmik's argument is merely the ought. Ought the person in question shoplift? By shmik's given argument, the answer is objectively, "No." shmik' outright says it:

I feel the obligation not to shoplift so you should not do it — shmik

The person is obligated not to shoplift. shmik knows or feels this even if the other person feels otherwise. It is clearly an ought argument and "objective (true even if the other person doesn't realise it)" from its inception.

The gap shmik is talking about is between what you know and what suits other people. It's a conflict generated out of a conundrum of whether it's ethical to specify what thoughts, actions and way of life is right for other people, even if that conflicts with their experience.

How can shmik, who literally doesn't understand how shoplifting ought to happen, be the person who decrees that the shoplifter be forced into a abhorrent world (to them) where they cannot shoplift? What gives shmik the power to decree the shoplifter ought to suffer a world which doesn't fit with their principles?

For shmik, it's not a question of an is/ought conflict, but rather the way an ought destroys a way of life for someone else. shmik can't fully commit to the "objective ought" because they've realised it means someone else loses their ought, trapping such a person in an abhorrent world-- and this is defined by the binding presence of moral significance.

In other words, it's unbearable to think that someone else might actually be wrong about something. We can only get along if we're all equally right - at least in our own minds. Thus is born Political Correctness.

More like it's unbearable to think others will be harmed, caused to suffer or forced into an unbearable (to them) world by ethical significance.

It doesn't mean people don't think anyone else is wrong-- shmik clearly accuses the shoplifter of being wrong-- but makes them hesitant to proclaim governing abstractions of "moral truth."

For better and ill, it prevents abstractions of "moral turths" being mobilised against people. If the shop owner thinks like shmik, the shoplifter may walk out of the store without being harmed or restricted. To the shop owner, stealing a few products would merely be an option that ought to occur, rather than an action demanded.

No doubt a philosophy which undercuts ethics, which makes them optional (in direct contradiction with what ethics mean), but it's a decent foil for some of the excesses of ethical philosophy, where the demand is so strong that people start thinking they can force everyone to be ethically perfect.

I really enjoyed that post, though it's not entirely accurate.

I am very attracted to the idea of polytheism atleast in the way that Dreyfus interprets it. There are many ways to live, you can follow Aphrodites or Aries neither is more correct than the other. Monotheism represents a tyranny - only one way for all.
I don't have a problem with using force to make the world how you want it to be. Like forcibly preventing child torture. But it's the person who's the tyrant not the moral truth.
To keep with the polytheistic metaphors. People who follow different gods can war to impose their wills. You can do this without proclaiming yourself the follower of the one true God, without calling the other God a false god or a lie.

other words, it's unbearable to think that someone else might actually be wrong about something. We can only get along if we're all equally right - at least in our own minds. Thus is born Political Correctness. — Wayfarer

Haha I'm quite comfortable with saying you are completely wrong about this. Not sure where u pulled it from.

As if anyone on a philosophy forum is uncomfortable with others being wrong :)

What is a moral fact except something that is in accordance with or derived form a moral value?

Can anyone give me an example of a universal moral value such that the moral arguments we base upon them can be called objective fact?

We have common moral values, sometimes very common, but so far as I'm aware we do not yet have "universal" ones. For example:

"Torture is wrong" (a "moral truth" of some kind presented earlier in the thread).

What is this based on? Is it always true? I could paint a picture of a social world in which making a social agreement to abstain from ever torturing one another is mutually beneficial (by appealing to our common human desire to not be subjected to unnecessary pain), but does this statement hold true for all possible worlds?

Since I can construct a heavily weighted and plausible moral dilemma designed to force the use of torture, to which most people would begrudgingly submit, does that mean the moral fact that "torture is wrong" does not always hold true? Is it still a moral fact? Not really... While it is true for some or many situations, it is not true for all of them. That we as individuals, as groups, and as a society do not need to resort to torture, and have incentive not to, is a fact of our environment, and with it, is subject to change.

Most of us agreeing on the immorality of torture is not an existential given. It is an emergent strategy of mutual benefit and preservation based on shared shared values and shared objectives. Most of us want to live, most of us want to thrive, and most of us want to avoid torture. From these kinds of values we come up with what is basically a set of mutual behavioral restrictions (and obligations if the situation is dire) that when adhered to achieves and promotes desirable future outcomes.

The problems come when the environment and circumstances we find ourselves in change: sometimes they negate the possibility of more or mutually desirable outcomes; sometimes circumstances force us to directly contravene one desirable outcome in order to preserve an even more desirable outcome.

I do believe there is some truth-esque quality to some moral arguments, but to measure it requires accounting for variance first in shared values, and then variance in changing environments and circumstances which not only determine which strategies (morals) will effectively promote given values, but also determines which values can even be possibly achieved in the first place.

We can all get squarely and truly behind the idea of "it's immoral to torture innocent children" but we live in a world that too often - makes individuals push buttons which wind up torturing some children in the name of arresting the torture of other children- for me to accept the "Here's the supremely moral way of doing things" attribute to any moral claim. I'm always looking for the "Here's a better way for us to do things" claim because it actually makes sense in a thought out realist framework which acknowledges that moral cooperation is only possible in the degree to which our interests align (or are not opposed), and the degree to which we are physically/circumstantially capable of carrying out these cooperative strategies.

In some ways all moral facts are relativistic. They are relative to the shared values and desires of the concerned parties, and relative to constraints laid upon their possible cooperation by the circumstances and environment they are in. If one individual values freedom over security and another individual vice versa, there will be natural limitations on their possible degree of cooperation where those two values conflict. In a world where the severe reduction of "freedom" is required to maintain adequate security, "freedom" is not something that any moral system can actually offer (and survive for long...).

So the bad news is that we can only progress strategically and morally in the degree to which we agree on the fundamental objectives and outcomes of moral systems, but the good news is that we have a boat load of highly agreeable objectives, like staying alive for instance (need we even consider those who disagree?), and so really much or most of our moral arguments can be based on how we actually get down to achieving these highly agreeable ends. The great news is that we have things like logic and science which can really help us begin to sort out the hard truth of whether or not our up and coming moral strategies are actually effectual. Quite contrary to moral relativism, this broad approach of identifying common values, desires, and objectives upon which we can seat value, and realizing that constraints on what we are able to cooperate on and how well we can cooperate to achieve them stem from a changing environment, gives firm and persuasive bargaining ground on a moral frontier with clearly defined objectives and in a world where more and more actually effective cooperative strategies are becoming possible (thanks science!).

In short we can judge moral claims by how well they perform at actually achieving their stated ends, and while we haven't yet found any perfect moral claims, by building a better world and refining the moral claims we do have we might actually approach one.

If significance is always related to a pov, then there must be a pov in which these 2 other povs both share equal significance. — shmik

There is, it's my pov.

From the pov of an astronomer, the stars are each as big and bright as the sun (approx). He does not cease to feel the warmth of the sun, or start to feel the warmth of the stars, but he understands that it is so. It's all a matter of perspective.

The great news is that we have things like logic and science which can really help us begin to sort out the hard truth of whether or not our up and coming moral strategies are actually effectual — VagabondSpectre

I've been spending several weeks reading about emotion science and emotion in philosophy for an academic project. It still seems to me that 'Othello', in the Shakespeare or Verdi versions, is a more useful guide, for instance, to the moral implications of jealousy, than the science of it (which is astoundingly primitive). Euripides' 'Medea' still profoundly disturbs my sense of the rational and emotional, and I've seen it performed three times in my lifetime, in a way that works in the rationalist enterprise fails to do.

Science will need to clarify the most basic of terms before it can be much help, and maybe the odd philosopher will contribute to that. :)

Hard science and logic are not useful as a foundation of moral basics (not unless the will to live is somehow scientific), but they are highly useful for determining what works in effectively and accurately achieving the ends laid out by a given moral foundation. For example, punitive incarceration as a tool for promoting a crime free society is an act we justify by what is in the end a shared moral foundation based on our mutual desire to be free of crime, but perhaps incarceration for rehabilitation rather than crime deterrence would be much more effective at actually reducing overall crime rates. This is where logic, science and data collection can help us to enhance and improve the moral decisions we make in pursuit of achieving the fundamental goals, intent, and purpose of making those kinds of moral decisions in the first place.

When it comes to "jealousy" and it's moral implications (I.E: why experiencing jealousy might lead to immoral actions, or, jealousy as a source of continuous conflict in human groups), they are indeed rather complex. Science can describe why jealousy exists from an evolutionary behavioral perspective, it can describe the gist of the endocrinological/hormonal neural/neurochemical structures that house the physical mechanism which produces jealousy, and it can prescribe therapy or medication to reduce jealousy in individuals. Science can explain why jealousy is beneficial or harmful in a raw macro-sense within specific environments and social circumstances because it improves/hinders chances of surviving/thriving/reproducing, and science can also explain how or why it might be a necessary part of a healthy psyche because it drives self-improvement. I'm not so sure that jealousy is always our moral enemy.

When jealousy does become our enemy however, as it was for Othello, in a sense the thrust of evidence based science and logic in pursuit of truth and fact is antithetical to that instinctive bio-mechanical part of us which would see such emotions influence our decisions in ways that are to the detriment of ourselves and our own values. I would be hard pressed to scientifically illustrate the subtle and complex social ramifications of jealousy and revenge, but as I think Shakespeare would appreciate, seeing things from an unbiased perspective really does help us to sort out which kinds of actions, behaviors, and over-indulged emotions can be potentially harmful to ourselves and those around us (especially the ones we love apparently).

...in a sense the thrust of evidence based science and logic in pursuit of truth and fact is antithetical to that instinctive bio-mechanical part of us which would see such emotions influence our decisions in ways that are to the detriment of ourselves and our own values — VagabondSpectre

It's good to try and see things from an 'unbiased' perspective, I agree. I don't, however, in my heart, accept the opposition you propose in this phrasing. There is nothing 'good' or 'right' about the world of truth and fact, though they help if we're trying to understand goodness and rightness. For me it's emotions all the way down. Only emotions stand against emotions, both of them entwined with reasoning, in moral debates, where what is 'moral' is always in question, although all of us feel there is some sort of core to it (if only we could agree what the core consists of :) ). That's how it feels to me. But maybe this just reflects a lifetime of being an arty-fart; I've only taken philosophy seriously in the last five years, so my deeper opinions are grounded in my life experience.

Your sense of goodness and right/wrong being grounded in your life experience seems like another way of saying that the reality and facts of the world you are in have shaped and determined how you feel about said world and various aspects of it (in this case namely what you feel about actions which promote/prohibit desirable and undesirable states of affairs). The most common and basic moral values like life and well-being are presumably high in your hierarchy of values, and so on at least some level the emotional inclinations you feel toward various moral systems reflects how well those moral systems seem to perform at promoting those values in the world and environment you live in. As the facts of environment change, so too can the effectiveness of varying strategies.

The justification of our most basic human desires need not be an issue so long as we can more or less agree on a few major points like our mutual desire to live and thrive free of unnecessary suffering. The meat and potatoes of our moral discussions then get to be about how best to achieve and preserve these ends through strategies of mutual cooperation and compromise.The claims of moral realists flounder in a world in which can change and provide exception to their once universal moral facts, but for those who can more or less agree on basic values, the hard facts of the ramifications of our social strategies is an area where the clarity, depth, and accuracy of science and reason allows us to make reliable improvement.

I am very dubious about 'the trolley problem' because of its artificiality. I suppose as a classroom exercise it's useful for focussing the mind on the issues involved. But in real life, again, we're not generally going to face anything like that choice.
— Wayfarer

I imagine situations of that kind crop up during war. Do we bomb the munitions factory even though civilians are working there? Should we sacrifice a few to save more? — Michael

And in traffic. I once witnessed the following situation on a highway where traffic is at 110 km/h: Road workers have just driven onto the highway, stopped and began to set up the signs that traffic must slow down and the outer right lane on a two-lane road was to be closed (this is in a country where traffic takes place on the right lane). The workers were already walking on the entry lane and the outer right lane. A car came onto the road just right after the workers. The driver of that car had to decide whether to risk forcing themselves into the traffic on the left lane, or run over some workers. They chose to risk forcing themselves into the left lane. Fortunately, nobody got hurt, but many drivers blew their horns.

Again, this doesn't have much to do with anything, since I already said that moral fictionalism is not only a rational position to hold but also a comfortable position to hold. Like how you can play a game while understanding it's not actually reality. — darthbarracuda

The question is, how does one come to hold the position of moral fictionalism if one doesn't already hold it?