Was it our intellectually piercing dialectic, or were they just bored with what they were doing?

Our conversation became so spectacular, that they couldn’t help themselves but join in (;

the goodness or badness of the will is a direct reflection on the worthiness of being content with one’s subjective condition, which is commonly called being happy, which is itself the prime condition for moral integrity

I understand that you are claiming that being worthy of happiness is directly related to having a good will; but I am asking what makes a will good?

The one willing an act in defiance of his principles would post hoc evaluate his will as bad, earning himself the title of immoral.

But what, under your view, makes those principles right? Someone, surely, can will in accordance with their principles, thereby gaining at least a shallow sense of happiness, without willing in accordance with what is right.

No. I don't think you are following. I don't accept there are objective goods (your term). Society engages in an ongoing conversation about a 'code of conduct' and who counts as a citizen - this evolves and is subject to changes over time. Hence gay people are now citizens (in the West), whereas some years ago they were criminals.

1. Then, you are a moral anti-realist; and no one should take your view seriously; because all you are saying is that what is right or wrong is stance-dependent. So if, e.g., I want to do something you consider wrong, or others consider wrong, then there is absolutely no fact-of-the-matter that makes me wrong: I am just as right as you are (objectively speaking).

2. One can accept that there are objective goods AND that society is a power-related structure. The idea that some people are exhalted as heroes and those very same people criminals by others just highlights that humans are creating laws; and does not negate the fact that humans should be creating laws which abide by facticity. Under your view, those laws are non-factual; because there are no moral facts.

Our conversation became so spectacular, that they couldn’t help themselves — Bob Ross

Exactly the way I see it. Which makes….you know….two of us.

I am asking what makes a will good? — Bob Ross

I’m a fan of metaphysical reductionism, that is, reduce propositions to the lowest form of principles which suffice to ground the conceptions represented in the propositions, and, justify the relation of those conceptions to each other. Which is fine, but comes with the inherent danger of reducing beyond such justifications, often into relations irrational on the one hand and not even possible on the other, from the propositions themselves. The proverbial transcendental illusion, the only way out of which, is just don’t reduce further than needed.

And this is what happens when asking what makes a will good. If whatever makes the will good, can be represented as merely some necessary presupposition, it doesn’t matter what specifically is the case. It is enough to comprehend with apodeitic certainty that it is possible for there to be a root of what good is, hence it is non-contradictory, hence possibly true, the will just is the case. This is where it is proper for the common understanding to rest assured.

After having desolved the question of what makes a will good, it remains to be determined at least the conditions by which the possibility of its being good in itself, is given, which is the domain of the philosopher of metaphysics. These conditions are evidenced, and the case that there is such a thing as a will that is good in itself obtains, by the relevant activities of humanity in general, evil being the exception to the rule.

It is impossible to determine what it is exactly that makes the will good, for the simple reason it is impossible to determine exactly what the will is, which makes any scientific use of the principle of cause and effect in its empirical form useless. Best the metaphysician can do, is attribute certain rational constructs to the idea of a will, sufficient to explain man’s relevant activities, then speculate on the more parsimonious, the most logical, method by which those constructs originate, from which, as it so happens, arises Kantian transcendental logic.

That logic, then, while saying nothing about what makes a will good, is quite specific in a purely speculative fashion, with respect to the principles enabling the will to be that which is directly that faculty responsible for making the man a good man, by his proper use of it, and to whom is attributed moral agency.

The transcendental necessary presupposition: there is no good, in, of and for itself, other than the good will.
The form of transcendental principles: maxims, imperatives.
The transcendental logic’s original constructs: freedom, and autonomy.
————-

Right has nothing to do with good, but only with a good, or the good.

Anyway….food for thought. Or confusion. Take your pick.

Then, you are a moral anti-realist; and no one should take your view seriously; because all you are saying is that what is right or wrong is stance-dependent. So if, e.g., I want to do something you consider wrong, or others consider wrong, then there is absolutely no fact-of-the-matter that makes me wrong: I am just as right as you are (objectively speaking). — Bob Ross

That seems a rather limited way of interpreting my point. I did not say anything goes. I said humans come to agreements about what morality is and follow this right down to crafting legislation. For the most part, I am comfortable to live in a world with a code of conduct and one that provides consequences for those how step outside it.

Morality doesn't have to involve moral facts to provide social cohesion. predictability and harm minimisation. It's pragmatic and evolving.

Collectively we arrive at right and wrong through an intersubjective agreement. In other words cultures arrive at values, from a myriad sources. And we know there will always be outliers. We know that the idea for who counts is a full citizen has varied over time, as culture and values change. In the West, slavery is no longer acceptable, but it is acceptable to exploit and underpay workers to keep the rich person's housework and maintenance done. We no longer criminalise and imprison gay people or trans people. Although some elements of society seem to want to punish them again. Our agreements are not necessarily permanent.

For me this seems to be an ongoing conversation. There are no facts we can access about values, just agreements made about what we value together and what conduct we will accept. It's imperfect but I see nothing wrong with this. We don't need 'true' or objective morality to build a useful system.

One can accept that there are objective goods AND that society is a power-related structure. The idea that some people are exalted as heroes and those very same people criminals by others just highlights that humans are creating laws; and does not negate the fact that humans should be creating laws which abide by facticity. Under your view, those laws are non-factual; because there are no moral facts. — Bob Ross

Who mentioned power-related structures? Or heroes? I agree that the laws are non-factual. But I do not see this as a limitation, as you do. I don't go looking for absolute truth or foundational guarantees in the world because I am not convinced such things exist.

We don't need 'true' or objective morality to build a useful system.

To whom? To the slaves? To the masters?

According to you, it isn't actually wrong, e.g., to own slaves. All society is doing, is deciding that they don't like it anymore.

Who mentioned power-related structures?

That is what you are referring to without realizing it:

Collectively we arrive at right and wrong through an intersubjective agreement. In other words cultures arrive at values, from a myriad sources. And we know there will always be outliers. We know that the idea for who counts is a full citizen has varied over time, as culture and values change. In the West, slavery is no longer acceptable, but it is acceptable to exploit and underpay workers to keep the rich person's housework and maintenance done. We no longer criminalise and imprison gay people or trans people. Although some elements of society seem to want to punish them again. Our agreements are not necessarily permanent.

What you are noting is correct, insofar as it outlines how human social structures work, which are inherently power-structures, but the problem is that you gutted out the part where we are actually developing better social structures because they are ethically superior to previous ones. According to you, there is no true moral progress: apparently, abolishing slavery wasn't objectively better.

There are no facts we can access about values

We are talking about moral judgments, not value judgments.

I don't go looking for absolute truth or foundational guarantees in the world because I am not convinced such things exist.

I don't either.

Nothing about this explained why the will is good, am I missing something? You went from the will can be good to saying it cannot be determined what makes a will good. Again, I want to know why you believe that a will is good in any sense whatsoever. Why, e.g., can a habit not be good or bad?

E.g., I believe a will is good if it is virtuous; because objective goods are internal to the Teleological structure of the thing in question, morality pertains to the Teleological structure of agency, and so a good person will be any person which is fulfilling the Teleology of a person in a manner where they have excellences of habit which allow them to do so in the most ideal manner. A will, then, is good IFF it is comprised, habitually and deeply psychologically, of those excellences that allow them to realize and preserve those internal, objective goods. Viz., I can achieve the internal goods to being a human, which revolve around eudaimonia (as the chief good), IFF I have a will which habituates towards what allows me to do what a human was designed to do.

I would like some sort of elaboration, if possible, analogously, of what you saying makes the will good. If the answer is that we cannot say, then you have no reason to believe that a will can be good.

If the answer is that we cannot say, then you have no reason to believe that a will can be good. — Bob Ross

I addressed that very concern: the evidence that humanity in general determines good acts, is sufficient reason to think the will as good. I only said there is no scientific cause/effect evidence for the will itself, which is to say there is objective or empirical knowledge of it.

We don't need 'true' or objective morality to build a useful system.

To whom? To the slaves? To the masters? — Bob Ross

Depends on the society. Obviously in 1830's America, to the masters. But the conversation changed. There's a general thrust in the West for egalitarianism and greater solidarity. We all seem to agree with this except when we don't, when perhaps it involves people of colour, Muslims, or women or trans folk, we might not consider solidarity relevant and call any consideration of such people 'woke'.

We mostly all know how this works.

What you are noting is correct, insofar as it outlines how human social structures work, which are inherently power-structures, but the problem is that you gutted out the part where we are actually developing better social structures because they are ethically superior to previous ones. — Bob Ross

Only subject to certain purposes and values, right? I might share with you ideals of emancipatory humanism and by this frame we might both consider human rights imperative. Great.

But we all need to agree that this is the best way to achieve human flourishing or wellbeing or whatever you consider your foundational value to be. In choosing this, you are not being objective, nor is there agreement about what constitutes flourishing/wellbeing.

Now there might be some argument to suggest that if you decide that preventing suffering is your foundational goal that Marxism might be the best approach, or Islam. But of course no one agrees on this, hence the problem. Are there objective ways to reach a goal once you have arbitrarily chosen one? Perhaps. Is this what you are arguing for?

I obviously belong to a cultural tradition and have, like most humans, evolved as part of a social species - so for this reason nurturing, tribal identification, caring for others, collaboration, protecting the weak, is hard wired in me and most of us (unless, perhaps you grow up in a war zone). But even this is provisional and contingent.