So you think that I think that I am wrong to say that moral statements are used to say what ought be the case, because you think that this excludes statements about what is good, because... you think that saying what is good is not the same as saying what we ought to do? — Banno

I recognise the distinction between an "is" statement and an "ought" statement. The meanings are not identical. Nor does the one logically imply the other.

What's the problem? You think otherwise for some reason?

Odd, it seems, if we agree that kicking puppies is wrong, that so much energy was expended in demanding evidence... — Banno

Are you serious? To my knowledge, no one has demanded evidence that kicking puppies is wrong. That's far too simplistic or too uncharitable an interpretation of what's being demanded. Put some more effort in, and you might get it right. Also, maybe try to understand that people go by different interpretations, and that that isn't always explicit. I think that that would help.

Hu? — Banno

Your conclusion is simply about kicking puppies and stuff like that being not good. Yes? Well, that doesn't do anything for all of us who agree that it's not good, which is all of us besides moral nihilists (who deny good and bad) and sickos (who disagree because they'd say that it's good).

We disagree over other issues, like the issue of how moral statements should be interpreted.

Yep. That's rather the point of the example. — Banno

Okay. But you realise that that's a very small target? It won't apply to most of us here. I for one am neither a moral nihilist nor a sicko. Kicking puppies is wrong. The only issue for me is how that's interpreted and so on.

Well, first I'm not arguing for an objective morality. I'm saying the objective/subjective distinction is a non-starter.

And second, I have presented evidence, but for some reason you don't appear to recognise it. Here is the broken pup. Here, the crying child. These are consequences of the pup being kicked; and these are not good. Therefore kicking the pup is also not good. — Banno

Do you realise that only a moral nihilist and sickos would deny that conclusion, and for two very different reasons. I don't recall you mentioning moral nihilism once, and I doubt that any of us here are sickos regarding kicking puppies. You've instead been talking a lot about moral subjectivism, but the typical moral subjectivist wouldn't deny that. Even the typical non-cognitivist wouldn't deny that, they'd just interpret "not good" differently, in a way that means it isn't truth-apt. And even the typical moral nihilist doesn't really judge stuff like that any differently, they're just in denial about right and wrong - they would also probably just word it differently.

Were you aware that Terrapin Station thinks otherwise? — Banno

I'm aware that our positions are quite similar, but that he may well be a noncognitivist, as you suggest. I however am not. I'm familiar with the emotivist line of argument which says that moral statements are not truth-apt, because they're emotional expressions like "Yay!" and "Boo!", and that "Yay!" and "Boo!" aren't truth-apt. I don't agree with that argument, although I agree that emotion has an important relationship with morality and our linguistic expressions in relation to morality, and that they are kind of like "Yay!" and "Boo!", but not enough like them to warrant the conclusion that moral statements aren't truth-apt.

It's misleading to refer to such statements as statements of preference, or worse, statements of mere preference. They're moral statements, or statements of moral judgement, so that's what I'll call them. It's clear that they're about moral matters from the subject matter, like kicking puppies. We already went over this ages ago, and you didn't really have an answer.

If your tactic is to just define away your opposition through moral universalism, then I find that trivial. There's nothing stopping me from doing that to you, only through moral relativism instead.

And yes, we agree that moral statements are truth-apt.

A moral statement says what the speaker prefers for everyone.

Would you agree with this? — Banno

I for one don't agree with that. That's the position known as moral universalism. I don't agree with that, since in some cases I think that that would be the wrong interpretation. You can exclude these cases where that would be the wrong interpretation, and thereby render them inapplicable, with your notion of what makes a statement a moral statement. But that would then mean that I don't agree with your notion of what makes a statement a moral statement. It seems obvious that these are not merely statements, but moral statements, by virtue of the subject matter.

Let's try this. Moral statements have a truth value. Subjectivist theories deny this. Therefore subjectivist theories are wrong. — Banno

Not all of them deny that. There are both cognitivist (moral statements are truth-apt) and non-cognitivist (moral statements aren't truth-apt) subjectivist theories. Mine is the former.

Really?

So just to be clear, you do think that moral statements are about what we ought do? — Banno

Are you trying to be funny? I made the point that moral statements include statements in a moral context about what we ought or ought not do, as well as what is moral or immoral. I also made the further point that I reject the link that you're drawing between the two, whether that link be that the one means the other, or that the one logically implies the other, or both.

So... you do not think that morality is about what we ought do?

Odd. — Banno

Wow. Talk about taking what I said out of context.

Perhaps you might reconsider what is being said, then. — Banno

Sure. I followed your discussion with Michael to some extent, and I more or less agreed with him. Then came the part where you said that a moral statement is one that says what ought to be the case. I reject that as incomplete, as it erroneously excludes statements that say what is good, which are obviously moral statements. You say that they're not excluded, because you say something along the lines that to say the one is to say the other, and/or that the one logically implies the other. That's what I reject. And I explicitly rejected it ages ago when you brought it up before. So your criticism of moral subjectivism isn't simply criticism of moral subjectivism, it's criticism of moral subjectivism which relies on something that a moral subjectivist need not accept by virtue of being a moral subjectivist. Really, it's not about moral subjectivism at all, it's about your own separate claim. Which should go some way to explaining why I said what I did in relation to what you said.

How's that?

This still stands, I think. — Banno

It never stood to begin with.

That works....interpret the meaning of it. You said you could conceive an unconceivable object. I’ve been wondering ever since how I would do that. It might be so simple I just looked right over the top of it....dunno. — Mww

Okay. First of all, I can see why the statement might appear on the surface to be contradictory: conceived-unconceived. But I don't think that it actually is a contradiction if interpreted properly.

I'm saying that I can conceive of a hypothetical scenario whereby there exists an unconceived object. That scenario is not this scenario (where I exist, and I'm talking to you, and thinking about stuff, and so on) nor any other scenario. What's outside of the hypothetical scenario is not applicable. I'm not in it. No one is. If no one exists, then no one can conceive of the object. And there you have it. There's your unconceived object. Demonstrably we can think about this. We're thinking about it now. What's the problem?

The confusion in thinking that there's a contradiction seems to stem from some odd way of thinking about it where you're thinking about me and what I'm doing, instead of the hypothetical scenario. It's like looking at the finger instead of the moon.

The problems of philosophy are deep problems. They've been argued about for millenia. I appreciate that you're actually trying to engage with them, but you're making it difficult. You're starting from an attitude of common-sense realism - there's no point disputing that, because it is self-evident. Then you're saying 'so why shouldn't I simply maintain that view?' It's very close to a chip on the shoulder, ameliorated by the fact that I think you have a genuine interest in the question, almost in spite of yourself.

I referred to Kant, because my view is that in terms of the subject of philosophy, Kant's 'Critique of Pure Reason' is the key book of the age. Yes, it's difficult, contentious, and the cause of many arguments, but it's a hard problem, and Kant's analysis of it is pivotal - even now, even after all the subsequent discoveries (and contrary to what a lot of people here think).

The article I linked to makes a point about 'the role of the observer' in physics. Now I bring that up for a very specific reason. Common-sense realism would generally like to leave the whole issue of the role of the observer out of the picture. As far as common-sense realism is concerned, the world simply is the way it is, whether anyone's there or not. But 20th century physics encountered problems which throws that whole assumption into question. That was the 'observer problem' or 'the measurement problem', which is still an open question.

Now I don't want to steer the thread in that direction, either, other than to observe that it is a very profound issue which has baffled very many great minds. At the very least, I think an attitude of bafflement, rather than complacency, is a better place to be, for a philosopher. I think we ought not to have the sense that the world isn't a mystery (sorry for the double negative). The philosopher's task is to 'wonder at what most think ordinary'. Not 'to wonder why anyone would do that'. — Wayfarer

I am both willing and interested to go over this, in our own words, in a step-by-step manner. But you say so much and go too fast for me.

Here's what I suggest. Pick a relatively simple starting point. Share a few thoughts, but nothing too lengthy or complex. Ask a question, or maybe two, but not too many all at once. Then we see how we get on.

Maybe for once, try something new, something a little different. Maybe try out the style of myself, or Terrapin Station, or Banno, instead of your usual style. Short and sweet, step-by-step.

Is there another way to say “I can conceive an unconceived object”? — Mww

Huh? Sorry, but you've lost me again. I'm not sure what you want. Do you want me to clarify how I would interpret the meaning of that?

Kantian idealism isn’t the idealism of Berkeley or Descartes, but it is a necessary dualism which retains a strictly mental, re: subjectivist idealism, parameter, annexed directly with an empirical realism. Which was the foundation of my comments on the experiment. I’m sure you’re aware of all that. — Mww

Yes, I understand that it's not the idealism of Berkeley or Descartes. Whether or not it's a "necessary dualism" is open to debate. We could go into further detail about that if you want to. You lead the way. But can we not jump right into the deep end like Wayfarer has just done? I much prefer your general style of reply. You're usually quite succinct and logical. That's something I can work with.

Schopenhauer's defence of Kant on this score was twofold. First, the objector has not understood to the very bottom the Kantian demonstration that time is one of the forms of our sensibility. The earth, say, as it was before there was life, is a field of empirical enquiry in which we have come to know a great deal; its reality is no more being denied than is the reality of perceived objects in the same room.

The point is, the whole of the empirical world in space and time is the creation of our understanding, which apprehends all the objects of empirical knowledge within it as being in some part of that space and at some part of that time: and this is as true of the earth before there was life as it is of the pen I am now holding a few inches in front of my face and seeing slightly out of focus as it moves across the paper.

This, incidentally, illustrates a difficulty in the way of understanding which transcendental idealism has permanently to contend with: the assumptions of 'the inborn realism which arises from the original disposition of the intellect' enter unawares into the way in which the statements of transcendental idealism are understood.

Such realistic assumptions so pervade our normal use of concepts that the claims of transcendental idealism disclose their own non-absurdity only after difficult consideration, whereas criticisms of them at first appear cogent which on examination are seen to rest on confusion. We have to raise almost impossibly deep levels of presupposition in our own thinking and imagination to the level of self-consciousness before we are able to achieve a critical awareness of all our realistic assumptions, and thus achieve an understanding of transcendental idealism which is untainted by them.

Bryan Magee Schopenhauer's Philosophy, Pp 106-107 — Wayfarer

Less words would have been better, and your own words, and taking one thing at a time, instead of paragraph after paragraph of text. Slow down, please.

Do you want an exchange, or do you want to quote lengthy passages from books at me?

Now, reading only the first paragraph, it suggests that, for a Kantian, time is one of the forms of our sensibility. Now, I'm not a Kantian, and it has been a long time since I've looked into stuff like this. So, a) I'm not going to have as a premise that time is one of the forms of our sensibility, b) I'm not even sure what that means, c) I don't know enough about the demonstration referenced, and d) I am seeking more of a simplified discussion, starting from easier, basic stuff, in plain language, and then building from there. I don't really want to just jump straight into Kant, with all of his complicated arguments and philosophical jargon.

I have some layman's idea that this is basically about time being subjective, although people might get funny if you call it that.

As I said, you're basically using the same argument as Johnson against Berkeley. — Wayfarer

That's a really bad reply. It doesn't even try to explain anything or take onboard what I said in reply to you the first time you said that.

Right - but this is an exercise in philosophy, and philosophy questions what we normally take for granted. Whereas, you're arguing on the basis of its very taken-for-grantedness - 'why should I not take the reality of 'the rock' (world, universe, whatever) for granted?' And there is no answer to that, other than to say that questioning the taken-for-granted nature of common experience is what philosophy does. — Wayfarer

That's more words than you needed. You could have just said, "I'm not going to bother to engage your argument. I'm instead simply going to accuse you of taking things for granted and ignore most of what you've actually said".

That the car is moving at 30mph is a judgement. — Metaphysician Undercover

Oh dear. We fundamentally disagree on so much. I predicted from the very beginning that I would keep discovering this from just one or two sentences into each reply of yours. It feels kind of like an infinite regress of fundamental disagreements, and we just get deeper or kind of go around in circles.

It feels kind of like if, say, I took that one sentence above - the very first sentence of your last reply - and, say, asked what a car is, you'd say something which is way different to what I'd say. To me, your answers are as absurd as saying that a car is a type of fruit or something. It's like we're from two different planets or speak two different languages which only look similar on the surface. Your world seems crazy to me.

Try in various ways to explain how alternatives make sense to me, via various ways of characterizing, detailing what I'm talking about, what properties I'm referring to/how those properties can obtain, what it amounts to for them to obtain, etc. — Terrapin Station

Okay, how can I help you without committing what I consider to be a category error? If I can't, then we're stuck, aren't we?

I'm finding it difficult. I'm not even sure where to begin. Do you understand what it means to for something to be the the case? Do we share that basic understanding, despite our differences? It's a fact that there are planets, if there are planets. Yes? And do we both share an understanding of what it means for there to be planets? We're both realists here, right? So it means something along the lines that there are objects fitting the description of a planet out there in space, and the realist would say that this would be the case even if we were all dead.

What next? What else can I say without implicitly committing a category error? For that reason, I can't talk about location, and talk of properties in this context doesn't seem to make sense either.

The issue you're dealing with is your innate realism. Yours is the so-called 'argumentum ad lapidium' used by Johnson against Berkeley, who said of Berkeley's idealist arguments, 'I refute it thus!' whilst kicking a stone. — Wayfarer

Um, no. Not quite. In fact, that's a pretty absurd comparison. He simply kicked a rock, whereas I presented a logical argument in the form of a reduction to the absurd. Well, I didn't present the argument in full straight away, but that's at least where the opening post is leading.

They both involved a rock, of course, but you'd still have a long way to go to justify your comparison.

If you want to know my reasoning behind a part of my argument, then just make that request to me.

What you're not allowing for, is that the very notion of 'existence' is what is at issue.

From a naive realist viewpoint, of course the Universe is populated with all manner of things that nobody has ever seen yet. The alternative appears absurd, not to say monstrously egotistical.

But the question you're dealing with is the question of the nature of knowledge itself. How do we know about stones (and quasars and the rest) ? Why, it's through a combination of the reception of sensory data, with our reasoning capacity. That is the very substance of knowledge itself. We are sensory and intellectual beings, and our knowledge is derived from the combination of those capacities - capacities which are themselves dependent on the abilities of the knowing subject - the very factor which the so-called 'objective sciences' always want to leave out. — Wayfarer

You're talking about empiricism, right? You're not the first person to bring that up. TheMadFool brought it up before you, and I gave reason to doubt taking empiricism to such extremes, because of the logical consequences. Again, this is where my reduction to the absurd is relevant. If we assume empiricism is required for all knowledge, including that regarding what would happen if such-and-such, then where does that lead? I've argued that it leads somewhere which, even if not absurd in the strict logical sense, is absurd in that it ends up committed to strongly counterintuitive claims which can't be explained well, or perhaps even at all. Like stuff about rocks, and all of the other things like rocks, and in fact the world itself. What about the world before we existed? How plausible is it that there was no world before us, and would be no world after us? Or if you're a Kantian, then there are similiar questions, like why silence is justified instead of going with the best explanation. How does that compare with what realism has to say?

Now the Kantian form of idealism argues that in some fundamental respect, knowledge of anything whatever is inextricably bound up with the apparatus of the understanding. Even those things which apparently, and empirically, exist independently of us, are only known to us, by virtue of the organs of knowledge and the capacity of reason, about which Kant says — Wayfarer

It's arguable whether Kantian idealism is even idealism. It has some things in common with both idealism and realism. Parts of it are fundamentally realist.

Anyway, moving on.

The transcendental idealist...can be an empirical realist, hence, as he is called, a dualist, i.e., he can concede the existence of matter without going beyond mere self-consciousness and assuming something more than the certainty of representations in me, hence the cogito ergo sum. For because he allows this matter and even its inner possibility to be valid only for appearance– which, separated from our sensibility, is nothing –matter for him is only a species of representations (intuition), which are call 'external', not as if they related to objects that are external in themselves but because they relate perceptions to space, where all things are external to one another, but that space itself is in us.' (CPR A370)

Now, lest you dismiss this all as philosophical claptrap, do take the time to peruse this article which asks a very similar question to that posed in the OP, as considered through the perspective of the hardest of hard sciences, to whit, physics. And it is precisely this issue which has been thrown into sharp relief by the so-called 'observer problem' in physics. — Wayfarer

Sorry, but I'm not going to read the article, although I'm sure that it's interesting and of relevance, and I don't mind adding it to my "to do" list, amongst a whole bunch of other things of more immediate concern. But I would rather engage in discussion with you directly, and at present, than to delay engagement in order to read some article that you've linked to. I can read stuff like that in my own time, and whenever I feel like it. There's loads of material out there on this topic.

I gave a point earlier in response to this - again, in reply to TheMadFool. What is it exactly that you're talking about here? I am talking about a rock. Say, this rock I'm holding in my hand right now. I'm then reasoning about what would happen to it. To begin with, are you talking about the same thing as me? The rock?

Yes, i believe you. And i would even argue that it is obligatory when following the logic of idealism for the idealist to accept any realist claims to the contrary of allegedly "conceiving of an unconceived object", as contradictory as that might sound. For the idealist can always interpret the realist's statements in a way that satisfies idealistic logic.

For example, when a realist is asked to explain himself, he might say "When I say that I am conceiving of an unconceived object, I have this particular image in mind". All that the idealist can say in response is "I wish you wouldn't name that experience "unconceived"!" — sime

Okay, but then that's kind of trivial, at least in a sense, isn't it? Because they're not engaging the argument, or rather the claim, on its own terms.

Soundness of reason is merely a reference to linguistic convention, and has no significance beyond convention. — sime

What the heck does that mean? And why? :chin:

Take any example of unreasonable behaviour. Once the behaviour is understood, the unreasonableness disappears. Of course, we might not like a person's behaviour even when we understand it. — sime

No, I don't think so. It doesn't disappear, it's just explained. Why would it disappear? And what do you even mean by that? That it would cease to be unreasonable? But why would it?

I think you did not question yourself enough. You refused to restate your points or expand on them. — Echarmion

When and for what reason, though? That's very important. You're suggesting that that indicates that I didn't question myself enough, but there are a multitude of other explanations for that. So why your explanation over others? Maybe I refused because I thought that people weren't engaging fairly, like I thought about Terrapin, or for the wrong purpose, like I thought about Michael, or maybe I refused out of exasperation of not getting through despite trying, as with Metaphysician Undercover. Those reasons don't strike me as unreasonable. What strikes me as unreasonable is not having any such rules and limits for engaging with people.

You also assumed any criticism or request for clarification was made in bad faith, or from an incomplete understanding of your argument. — Echarmion

Maybe I did think that at times, but they weren't necessarily assumptions as opposed to reasonable beliefs. And I think that I'm often quite careful with my wording. For example, I might say that I suspect such-and-such. A suspicion isn't an assumption or an accusation. It's just an expression of what I have an inkling might be the case. But sure, I don't deny that I'm not always that careful, and I'm less likely to be careful like that if you've become an exasperation for me.

Restating or explaining your position is often a learning experience, as you have to actually understand your argument to explain it. If you simply refuse to deal with any criticism that does not precisely fit into some narrow window you defined, you come across as not really interested in discussion, and more in feeling superior. — Echarmion

You have to be strict with some people, though. Don't you agree? It's very important to stay on topic and on point. That approach isn't guaranteed to work, of course. But I also have to consider the effort that I'm putting in each time. When you put the effort in, you expect results, and if you keep putting in the effort, but you don't get results, then that's when eventually it begins to justify cutting things short or trying to really get them to focus on this one thing that they just keep on seeming to neglect.

And in so doing you moved to a preference instead of an imperative.
— Banno

Do moral subjectivists claim that moral statements are imperatives? If not then this critique on the internal consistency of moral subjectivism doesn't work in principle. — Michael

This looks like the same kind of error that creativesoul kept reverting to. He kept reverting to an interpretation that is not accepted under moral relativism, and then reasoning on from that point to draw logical consequences which, taken as a whole, are completely irrelevant because he is just begging the question to begin with.

It's kind of funny that I've been having this same problem simultaneously with two different people in two different discussions.

You derived the conclusion that the subjectivist cannot claim their view to be true from the premise that two contradictory views can both be right if subjectivism is true. I just replaced the word “goodness” with “the taste of liquorice“ (and removed “moral” from “moral view”). — Michael

Indeed. It's the same logical form in both cases. That he says that there's no contradiction with the one, but there is with the other, means that he is being inconsistent.

Moreover, it should be obvious that there is no contradiction in either case, because within each case, the one and the other are clearly not identical.

The statement "It's good for me" is obviously not identical to "It's bad for him". There's obviously no contradiction there. And it's the same for "It tastes good for me" and "It tastes bad for him".

Well, there was a point there, but it did not strike home. As I recall it, folk were suggesting that one difference between subjective and objective beliefs was that objective beliefs had evidence, while subjective beliefs were expressions of opinion; or some such.

Now just to be clear, my view is that the objective/subjective distinction is misguided. My aim is not to show that moral judgements are objective, nor that empirical judgments are subjective.

We were comparing judging a cup to be blue - presumably an objective quality - with judging kicking a pup to be bad - presumably a subjective quality.

In both cases, evidence is available; in both cases, an opinion is required.

I think it clear that this way of distinguishing objective and subjective beliefs falls to my examples. You might think otherwise. — Banno

My point was that your analogy was inappropriate if it was meant to suggest a) that the two situations are judged in the same way, and b) that the two situations have the same kind or strength of evidence.

Maybe you didn't mean to suggest that. But one thing's for sure: you haven't shown otherwise. It's because of these differences that I end up concluding that moral objectivism is unwarranted, whilst moral subjectivism is, so they're pretty important differences.

No, it's a natural and pragmatic standard. It's hard to get much useful work done when people keep randomly dropping in to pop you off and take your stuff. — Andrew M

What? I don't understand why you think that it's natural, or rather, if you think that it's natural, why your analogy was with something obviously artificial, namely monetary value.

Not all conceptions of goodness can account for that which exists prior to our conceptions. — creativesoul

Like what? What do you mean? Give an example. Rocks existed prior to our conceptions, but they don't seem relevant in this context.

Goodness, on my view, does not requires our awareness of it. — creativesoul

For what purpose? To exist, you mean? So what's goodness, then? What kind of thing is it? It's a concept, right? What would your claim even mean? It's far too vague for me to make much sense of or see the supposed relevance.

Reason is a skill that can be taught. But it is a skill precisely because we are all unreasonable. It's an ideal that we can aspire to and follow, but we can never just be reasonable -- even to get by in our day-to-day lives we must rely upon heuristics and fallacious reasoning, things which we have developed on the basis of how it satisfies our needs and desires rather than on the basis that it satisfies the criterions of reason.

That's why science and philosophy are hard to do. We are intentionally breaking our habits to obtain a different outcome. — Moliere

I didn't mean in terms of absolutes, I meant in general, or in a specific respect. We can be reasonable or unreasonable in the sense I meant.

Is it possible that there are some people who try to be reasonable, but are inescapably unreasonable, at least in some respect?
— S
No, but it is possible that generally reasonable people may adhere to a belief.

How should one treat such people?
— S
Argument is a waste of time when confronted with belief. — Galuchat

Please explain. To be clear, in response to my first question, I would like a reason why not. (I don't doubt what you say is possible). And in response to my second question, I'd like an elaboration.

Mods should put a pin to the top of this forum with a list of fallacies and biases and prompt people to keep them in mind. — Christoffer

That's the best suggestion I've heard for this place in a long time. :100:

But you know that, doncha? Were you just letting off steam? — Amity

:grin:

Maybe this forum needs a scoring system? Don't know how that would look like, but if someone is writing proper posts, answers with respect to the argument and keep their fallacies down you could invisibly "like" their post. Even if that post is against your point, most people in here know when they get proper feedback/counterargument and when they get a nutcase on their tail.

With that, those with a higher score shows as "respected member" or "quality member" or something. I guess we could make a whole argument-discussion out of such a system, but it would help distinguish between those who time after time just rant nonsense and those who come here for a proper philosophical discussion. — Christoffer

I prefer it without the point scoring system. And one problem I see with wanting it to be a reflection of reasonableness is that I doubt that that would show with someone who is reasonable but who is also pretty blunt or sarcastic or whatever, things that can get on people's nerves. There was that comparison of Socrates with a gadfly, and if Athens had a point scoring system, I doubt that that gadfly would have fared too well under it, not that he'd care a great deal. He had higher priorities.

The skill is not using reason, which everyone with working mental faculties is capable of. The skill is questioning yourself and your biases.

In light of your recent behaviour in your thread on idealism, perhaps a little self-reflection might be helpful. — Echarmion

Spit it out, then. What exactly are you suggesting? You think that I indicated bias and did not question myself enough? Or something else? Please clarify and elaborate. One of the upshots with me is that you don't have to worry about refraining from making a relevant criticism or having to sugarcoat it. I assure you, I can handle it.

My prediction is that some people will use this discussion as another opportunity to disapprove of my tone, instead of talking about the topic of being unreasonable. But I could be wrong.

I'm not unaware that in creating this discussion, some people could effectively view that as me painting a large target on my chest. Fire away! (But try to be reasonable).

I guess we must all deal with the situation of being thought of as an unreasonable person by at least a few people. Perhaps only because unreasonable people unreasonably think others are being unreasonable. — Judaka

But surely you agree that reasonable people reasonably think others are being unreasonable. So no, what you say above isn't the only explanation for this situation.

It's a confusing situation that should be handled with care or humour. — Judaka

Does your "handled with care" rule out straightforwardly pointing things like this out? Or perhaps only to those who we think can handle the criticism? The rest we must refrain from such criticism or sugarcoat it so that it's easier to swallow? The priority is people's feelings over speaking the truth straightforwardly?

I don't see how this is relevant. A number printed by a machine is not a measurement. A number needs to be interpreted according to standards before it's a measurement. That's why speedometers need to be properly calibrated. The speedometer reading might be frozen at 30 mph for all eternity, it's really irrelevant to the question of whether an hour is actually being measured. — Metaphysician Undercover

Ironically, all of that is irrelevant, and this is going exactly as I predicted. Okay, then by your definition, they don't have a measurement. So what? I don't care if you want to speak dumb. You'd have to make an additional argument that I should speak dumb. Importantly, this still doesn't mean that the car wouldn't be travelling at 30mph in an easterly direction, that the windshield wouldn't have an area of 1.5m2, and that an hour hadn't passed. And your point about a faulty speedometer obviously violates the thought experiment. You think I meant a faulty speedometer? No. Don't assume a faulty speedometer. Assume a working speedometer.

The windshield was measured, and therefore has a measurement. But what I am asserting is nonsense is the supposed hour of time which passes with no one to measure that hour. The clock doesn't measure the hour, for the same reason I explained with the speedometer above. The clock will show some numbers, but those numbers are meaningless without interpretation. — Metaphysician Undercover

Okay, but you still have the gigantic problem of explaining innumerable things in nature of various sizes, for example in terms of height in metres, which have yet to be measured. It's like you don't even understand the purpose of measurement. The purpose of measurement is to find out what specifications something is. The problem here is your frequent misuse of a term such as "determine". No, not determine, find out. The specifications are predetermined, otherwise there would be nothing to find out, and that obviously wouldn't make any sense. They're objective. It's already of a particular size, say, a specific height in metres. We only measure it to find out the specifics.

The rest of your post completely misses the point yet again, because you fail to realise that you're begging the question by assuming premises I don't accept, and then drawing conclusions from these premises. The problem with that is your premises, and what you're doing in relation to them. It has zero effect on my argument. If you want to validly argue against me, then you cannot beg the question. If you want to be unreasonable, then please continue doing what you're doing.

You do this with such frequency, it's as though you're a robot who has been programmed to behave in this way, even when it is explained and strongly discouraged. Please try your hardest to understand the error in doing that, and that it only wastes both of our time.

The only objective absurdity I can think of is a logical contradiction and neither realism nor idealism have any contradictions.

How is idealism more absurd than realism? — TheMadFool

Because it leads to rocks which suddenly cease to exist the very nanosecond that we all would. Because it can't plausibly explain the world, because it can't explain the world before and after we existed. Did rocks and everything else like them just suddenly spring into existence the very nanosecond that we did?

Do you find that convincing? Or, like me, do you find it way more convincing that that there's something wrong with the premises which lead us here?

I already said that in my view it's not conceivable. That you think it is doesn't help me. — Terrapin Station

How would you help the sheep-and-blue-field guy?

Yup. You're all three mistaken. — creativesoul

Typical. Some people just don't learn. :lol:

Let me know when you find a way out of the pickle? Yes? Do you remember where you ended up contradicting yourself if you gave an answer? I'll remind you...

"X is moral relative to A" is false if A does not believe that X is moral and true if A believes that X is moral.

And...

A's belief can be false.

How is that possible if the truth of "X is moral" is relative to A's belief? — creativesoul

This is a straw man. I have not said or accepted:

"X is moral relative to A" is false if A does not believe that X is moral and true if A believes that X is moral.

or

A's belief can be false.

However, I did say that "X is moral relative to A" is false if X is not moral relative to A. (Which is obviously true).

and

Moral statements are truth-apt, and some of them are false. (Or beliefs if you prefer. What we're talking about didn't seem to matter).

For example, "X is immoral", is false or at least unwarranted if interpreted as per moral objectivism.

And, "X is immoral", is false relative to my standard of moral judgement, if my standard of judgement doesn't entail that X is immoral.

You have great difficulty with statements like the latter. You try to demonstrate a contradiction, but you do so fallaciously by misinterpreting the statement or failing to understand what a contradiction is.