His argument is valid because, whether he realises it or not, its based upon some assumed values. If you value everyone equally then his argument is pretty good (outside of the faults I already mentioned). However, if you dont have that value then his argument simply doesnt apply to you. Values are perspective based, and so the conclusions of moral arguments are aswell. This is true whether or not he personally thinks of his argument this way, I dont know his position nor care.

To preface, I agree with the fundamental idea that if you believe that everyone is equally valuable, then to spend *needlessly* on you or your loved ones is immoral, if the money could be better spent elsewhere.

I should also say that I am an ethical egoist, I do not believe everyone is equally morally valuable and so his conclusions dont apply to me. One must remember that all the arguments presented come from a ulititarian foundation and so only apply to that moral framework.

However, heres 2 arguments that allow one to spend money on themselves whilst still being a utilitarian.

Bigger moral choices

The more you invest in yourself, the more you have the ability to make wider and more consequential moral choices. For example, you could choose to not buy meat yourself because you are against animal suffering, but that changes nothing. True change can only come about through the progression of society as a whole, ie. creating meat that doesn't involve the suffering of an animal or outlawing meat eating.

If one has good reason to think that they are capable enough to make good moral choices on such large scales, then it is moral to build up a position capable of committing to such choices.

Progression

If one doesn't invest in entertainment, children, career, business, or any other long term interest of theirs, then while they are "more efficient" at saving lives in the present; they give up the progression that could allow more lives to be saved in the future, and they essentially commit to a world of no improvement in quality of life.

Sure, you could save a large swath of people by simply donating all your money away. However, investing in an education that will allow one to create better technology or ideas by which to solve global issues, will save even more lives in the long term.

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Well the whole point of the article is to show that you (and I) are indeed responsible for things happening very far away. Or at least these are crimes by omission, or complicity. — LFranc

I saw this point you made and wanted to clarify something to you. Just because we are responsible for the misfortune of others (either by omission or not), does not make such an action immoral. The issue you are facing is one of presuming equal value to all individuals. If one values themselves above others, then clearly the arguments dont apply.

Where does it do that? — Count Timothy von Icarus

Electrons, chairs, tables, humans, donkeys. These are words. His argument is that by saying such words, one is referencing universals. His entire argument is that its contradictory to not believe in such universals and yet refer to them when making an argument against them. Hence, one saying "All chairs are quite different" is contradictory.

If you have a different interpretation of his argument then please present it, but I think your response here is merely semantics surrounding "word".

Presumably it has something to do with them since you're able to refer to them with words right here. — Count Timothy von Icarus

You took this statement out of its context within an argument. Language has nothing to do with universals because its purpose is communication, not metaphysical truth. Communication is flawed and based upon prediction by others, it cannot be 100% precise and so cannot refer to a universal, just as one is unable to describe colour to the blind. There are limitations to language.

I am not sure how this is supposed to be taken. If there is "no truth in language," am I supposed to take it that nothing you have just expressed (in language) is true? — Count Timothy von Icarus

Again, this is semantics. When I am referencing truth, I am describing the non-static and arbitrary nature of signs and definitions. If I define X as Y, it doesn't mean it is the "true" definition, in fact there is no such thing. Language is entirely relational, you can swap out anything and it doesn't become "false" for doing so. Hence, any term such as "chair" will never be able to have a single agreed upon definition. Everyone will have a different conception of how X is defined.

Someone is able to refer to the concept of a chair knowing this, that they are referring to a broadly understood but vague notion, which can nevertheless illicit the idea they wish to impose on other minds.

If I make up the world ishblaqwer and say it refers to dressers that have been painted green is this now an English word? Is it a Chinese word? Can I make up new Chinese words even though I don't speak Chinese? — Count Timothy von Icarus

This is entirely semantic. The simplist answer is that it doesnt matter to my argument or the broader question of nominalism.

His argument against H.G.Wells is that if you can refer to the concept of chairs, well then clearly there is some non-arbitrary similarity between them all, and thus the idea there is no category of chair is ludicrous.

However, this fails because language is based upon prediction. We cannot read each others minds and so the transfer of ideas and thus what words mean, will be different between everyone. If you asked everyone to classify a set of objects into chairs and not chairs, there would be disagreements precisely for this reason. "chair" has no single definition and so refering to it is not referring to a universal.

He presumes language refers to universals, when it doesnt, in fact it cannot.

If you can make up a definition for it, is it arbitrary? Does it not exist in relation to other words, which refer to things in the world? — Lionino

If a definition has no particular reason to apply to a word, then by definition its arbitrary. Practicality of language does not negate its arbitrary nature.

Also, be careful not to make a circular argument for universals. If there are no universals then there are no "things" in the world, but simply the world exists and we recieve information from it. These "things" are simply patterns our minds have formed and structured their understanding of the world on.

The quoted argument assumes that all words are universals, which is a ludicrous idea. Language has nothing to do with univerals. There is no truth in language; anyone can make a word and an arbitrary definition for it.

Language is also not an adequate system for universals to exist in. Uttering "chair" will not confer the same image in all minds. An idea cannot be perfectly transmitted because it requires language, which requires itself and so forth. Language comes about because humans have brains capable of prediction. Through such prediction we can allow the adequate but not perfect transmission of ideas.

Jacques Derrida introduced the concept of deconstruction, which is an interesting idea opposing these ideas if your interested and havent heard about it.

Im not versed in logic at all but I'll give my thoughts.

If A is defined specifically (ie. no coin flipping or randomness involved in its definition) and we're assuming "implies" means "neccesitates" and not "can lead to", then it is contradictory.

If B and not B are different, then if A neccesary leads to one, it cannot lead to the other definitionally.

Ofc, if not B and B are the same, then theres no contradiction; and if A can be unspecific then it can lead to both (flipping a coin can get heads or not heads).

Thats a pretty big simplfication of my reasoning. I think fundamentally theres a flaw with your epistomology if you're trying to get me to prove a negative.

Alas, your free to leave at any time but I hope you'll think my ideas over. Goodbye.

I responded to your question in my 2nd and 3rd paragraph. Im not sure why you think I havent responded.

Free will is not just the ability to make choices. If thats how you define it then even computers have free will, as choices are made by machines all the time, we program them to do so via algorithms or even with AI models we cant understand.

The ability to choose is will. *Free* will is the ability to choose without influence from any other thing. However, the problem you face is that such a process is impossible. The form and function of an entity which can choose is dependent upon factors it did not decide. Computers can make choices, but they did not program themselves, they have no choice but to do as they decide from their very nature.

Now we are not programmed, but our existence is nevertheless influenced by factors outside of our control, since we did not bring ourselves into existence. Our personality, preferences, economic environment, social environment, and health, are factors we do not decide and yet are the foundation of our choices. Hence, while we have will, it is not free. A person who shoplifts chooses to steal, but they did not choose to want to steal.

If you are coming to ethics with a collectivist mindset then you most likely have different issues you think ethics concerns. However, anything outside of individual action is quite meaningless to me. I don't care about some social harmony, that has nothing to do with the issues I think ethics should be concerned with, aka action and values.

In regards to the difference between moral and aesthetic values, there are people who define them different, I don't disagree. However, anyone can make a differentiation between any two ideas they like, but it doesn't make that differentiation substantive towards any end. Differentiation exists precisely to treat two concepts separately, however you need more than just different definitions to achieve this. Instead you have to apply an argument for how their difference is cause for the separate treatment. I don't know how you want me to explain that there is no difference, the burden is on you to suggest it. I cannot prove a negative.

If your distinction is purely semantic and leads to no difference in regards to ethics, then it doesn't exist to me and the conversation is pointless. You have to make an argument substantiating the difference (which is not just defining it, otherwise I'll just go "I disagree" and we're on equal ground in regards to rationality).

I'm not going to be providing any papers, you didn't ask me to prove any specific claim so anything I give you will seem random and you cant convince people by throwing random papers at them. If you want to gain an understanding, look into the predictive coding model in neuroscience (which seems to most plausible explanation to me) or provide a model which is backed by scientists which doesn't have indirect realism as its base to counter my belief. This is a discussion, not a lecture.

Also to be clearer, indirect realism doesn't necessary mean no mind-independent objects exist, but that we don't experience them directly. Aka, indirect realism isn't incompatible with moral or aesthetic realism. I don't know your position on whether morals are mind independent or not, but I thought I should make that clear.

Im making no claim about the existence of other beings, but about perspective. I believe the universe exists outside of yourself, however you only have access to your interpretation of the universe, and your perspective. This idea is called indirect realism, has been confirmed in neuroscience in how the human brain operates, and so is currently the scientific concensus in regards to perception.

For example, platos forms would be an idea against this viewpoint, but generally those ideas are quite old and lack evidence.

I completely disagree.

First I have to state my belief that all values are equivalent, there is no difference between a moral or aesthetic value. From the dislike of murder to the love of orange juice, these concern the same type of preference known as a value.

As such, all actions are driven by values, you cannot be devoid of them by the very nature of your existence. Morals do not matter to collectives as collectives do not exist, only individuals exist, and only individuals act.

Im not sure what you mean by natural conditions. However, I will attempt to flesh out my belief further.

All labels are an attempt to categorise the world into discrete units. However, the world has no such units. This isnt an exaggeration. From states, to chairs, to electrons, these categories do not exist outside of our minds, regardless of there being something outside of our minds we can interpret as having the same effects as these labelled objects.

Morals and Aesthetics consist of categories of "good" and "bad", except there is no such thing. All values are fundamentally subjective, just as all other categories.

Theres a nice quote by nietzsche stating this:

"Against that positivism which stops before phenomena, saying "there are only facts," I should say: no, it is precisely facts that do not exist, only interpretations..." - Friedrich Nietzsche

In regards to objective or collective morals, none. In regards to individual action, everything.

All actions are committed by indviduals. There is no such thing as a "collective" outside of the individuals that compose it. Remove the individuals and the collective vanishs. As such, I dont care about such a pointless goal as "collective realisation". I have my values and you have yours, imagining a universe where we can act according to some doctrine and magically have all our values fuffilled is childish. There are tradeoffs in life, sometimes you have to hurt others to benefit yourself. Therefore, any doctrine must neccesarily designate some peoples values as more important than others. However, those who are left out have no reason to follow it or not create their own doctrines in turn.

In terms of what we can accomplish? We can create a framework for individuals to build a system that guides their action by designating what is within the realm of ethics.

Just because Im a moral anti-realist does not mean I have no values. I have values that I will defend equally as a moral realists will defend theres. However, the moral realist's view of morality is simply untrue and can only lead to bad decisions or deluded action based on some emotion of righteousness or disgust. As long as humans can come together under similar values, egoism will exist to act as a framework for the construction of a doctrine promoting values that truely match with their goals, not surface level emotionalism.

Experience is valued on a scale of preference. There is no reduction to principles but instead value is imbued within each experience by the individual, not by some rational process but simply by a product of their being.

There is no precise "measurement" but instead a process of thought that one undergoes to commit to action that benefits them. There is no defined process of thought because this will change between each individual depending on their values.

An experience that is stable and works for an individual across a longer timescale is valued higher than others. What Im suggesting is not that we act on impulse but that we reject the values of others. If you believe that suggesting the individual should do what they value most instead of following the values of others is a simple statement, then you already partly agree with the foundation of what I believe in. However, regardless of its simplicity, this doesnt change its opposition to common moralities held today.

I suppose that your caught up on the word "guide". Ethics exists to guide the action of the individual, it concerns the creation of psychotechnologies that lead to preferred experiences. However, Im not offering any psychotechnologies here, since those are incredibly individual pursuits due to the individual nature of value. I cannot tell you how to best achieve a goal that I do not hold and have never thought about. The only claim Im making here is that ethics surrounds the individual, their value, and their action. However, I can create a model of ethics that can give some insights into what concerns it. Or to be a bit more neutral, Im questioning the relation of value and action and where that leads, and Im calling this ethics.

Egoism cannot give specific advice to people, since everyone holds seperate values. However, egoism can be used as a model to further the creation of ones own advice, and defines what ethics is actually about.

Also, your criticism was a bit vague so idk if your suggesting guiding action is impossible due to moral realism or what not. If thats the case then the above wont really matter to your argument and I'll need to provide something else in response.

Morality/Ethics is the study of the relationship between an agents values and actions. This is probably the most simplistic definition I can give.

Decision-Making:
When an agent makes a decision, they reflect upon values and act accordingly, so that these values are actualised through action.

Ethical Lifestyle:
Ethics does surround all actions taken by an agent within the world. However I dont understand the relation to "community, nation, or ideology" that is presented.

Morality:
I'm not sure what you mean by "universal will" here.

Conscience:
To me this appears to just be someones emotional connection to particular values and action. This to me is irrelevent in ethical thinking and simply serves as a hinderence to rationality.

what is the relationship between morality taken in this context and punishment? — kudos

This question is too vague to answer. What do you mean by "relationship"? The state is not an agent but a collection of agents, it does not have values nor actions. However the morality of the agents that compose it can be reflected in the state and thus in the justice system.

Can an individual ever be guided by conscience that is not correct? — kudos

If your definition is equivalent to my understanding, then a conscience is simply an emotion, its not a suitable guide for action. Impulses will lead to actions that will negatively affect your long term wellbeing. Nobody wants to exercise, but everyone wants to be healthy.

Morals refer to a good and a bad, and these are in no manner the exclusive product of our own imagining, they are also real — kudos

I'm not sure what you mean by "real". Our values are simply preferences, and any claim into the "objectivity" of morality (whatever that means) has always failed since its an unfalsifiable claim. Just like all other unfalsifiable claims, it must be assumed to be false. At the very least it requires a definition of "objectivity" that can be examined.

Someone can freely do evil disguised as morality — kudos

I'm a moral anti-realist, so any conception of good or evil outside of preferences is simply someone trying to push their values upon another.

Ethical egoism is a normative position stating that the values one should hold should be their own, not of others. It can also be seen as an individualistic perspective in ethics, allowing us to reach some conclusions about morality that others frameworks dont allow.

Universal moralities are purely hypothetical by nature, and cannot function without a bias towards some set of predetermined values.

We are born with value imbedded into our experiences. From the beauty of a desolate environment in rain to the misery of a sharp electric pain in ones spine, these experiences we live through do not require any justification to estimate their moral value, but that value exists via our very perception of them.

Moral philosophers make the mistake of attempting to intellectualise the concept of value, when in reality they merely create rationalisations which justify their own value judgements of certain experiences. In such a way, these intellectual creations exist purely to coerce others into joining their judgements, using the common psychological need of humans to have the approval of others.

A reaction to this would be ethical egoism, the ethical framework I follow. It declares that we ought to act according to our values, not the value judgements of others. In this way it seems similar to the idea of personal morality you hold. I think the most important part of using it as a framework is its declaration that morality concerns an individuals action and nothing else. Social contempt is nothing more than the natural inclination towards disgust. The Emerson quote works quite well with this framework.

However, these social forces fail when someone who does not care for such judgements of others comes along. Nietzsche might refer to the idealised version of this type of person as the Ubermensch, someone who creates their own values. It is abnormal psychology which creates this person. However, this seems very different to the idea of value presented in the 2nd quote, which seems to suggests an uncaring attitude towards "great" and "small", which seems to just be a description of the average human who has little ambition.

I don't think ethical discussion is negative, in fact I think poetic "wisdom" will always be an unsavoury replacement if we do not choose to delve deep into idea to understand them analytically. Just because value judgements cannot be objectively determined, does not mean we cannot find knowledge within such ethical frameworks acknowledging this truth.

There exists an issue with language that I think needs addressing to tackle the question of collective action. Scoring a goal is considered both an individual action and a collective result. You can say Person X scored their team a goal, and that the team scored a goal. Hence, to specify, we should simply mark the state of a scored goal and be concerned with the actions that lead to that state.

Nobody Acts Alone

The state of a scored goal is the product of many peoples actions, but I'd argue its a product of quite literally everyone. The universe is a closed system, any interaction affects it and so contributes to its final state. The chained effect of all choices created the state of a scored goal. However, I then think the concept of collective action is meaningless, since all action would then be considered collective.

Perspective Creates Cause and Effect

Individual action however, has the special quality of perspective that I've mentioned, it is completely seperated from other actions. Each individuals action is only theres to make, its the only chanagable factor and so is the only existant "cause", with the "effect" merely being the experiences that procede it. This doesnt mean I deny the concept of cooperativity but that I posit the choices of others can never be anything but determined from your perspective.

I've already kind of gone over these points in the previous post, I dont think its substantial to refer to multiple individual actions to suggest collective actions exist in any meaningfull way. To be meaningful, they must affect ethical decision making, otherwise the concept exists purely to designate a distinction that has no effect and so is irrelevent.

All Actions are Bodily Actions

I think so far your argument against bodily actions is the most substantial you've made against me since it attacks the concept of individual action that my ethic relies on.

I argued why social justification doesn't make sense as an argument in regards to ethics already in my final response to Leontiskos. TLDR: Social justifications are seperate to moral justifications, it seemingly ignores deceit as a factor.

However, even assuming truth, its clear that the experience created by the pumping action kills people via poisoning of the well. The "poisoning of the well" is the label given to that bodily action to refer to it, so the distinction makes no sense.

In building a model, one should simplify as much as possible. Here, you suggest the idea of non-bodily actions, but if these can simply be described through bodily actions then they do not exist outside of name.

If the term "scoring a goal" can be broken down into the individual bodily actions that compose it, then "scoring a goal" does not exist outside of a need to succictly convey the information of such and its associations to another individual. That it to say that its a product of language, but does not have any moral relevent within itself.

Questions:

1. Is there a difference between "scoring a goal" and the bodily actions that compose it?
2. If there is a difference, is that difference morally relevent, does that difference change any moral decision one should make?

I'll also remind you that my concern with ethics surrounds the choice of individuals, not some observation or description that changes nothing. Ethics exists to guide action so anything that does not do so is irrelevent.

Valued Experience isn't Principled

I dont like the suggestion that "One should act to maximise one's experience" is a principle since it's quite a semantic statement that doesn't get to the substance of what I was suggesting. I am very tuned against semantic arguments because they are by far the most prevelent thought killers in philosophy.

The reason this isn't a principle is because its not a rule, but a definiton. Maximising ones experience is to improve said experience according to some set of values. To ought to do something is to do so because it has increased value. Hence, you ought to maximise your experience, by definition, since it would improve said experience according to your values. It's like if I was to say "One wants to listen to songs that one enjoys", this isn't a principle, its definitional.

The reason I say this is to suggest that all value exists from the individual. Ethics is a psychotechnology for guiding action, I think most other ideas of ethics consists of useless semantic debate or "I disagree!" type discussions and so I dont care for it.

My Background

My background is just the development of my own ethical ideas over time, trying to expand some thought into ethical egoism which others havent seem to done. I dont have particular respect for any professional authority on philosophy. I think ideas should argue for themselves and derive from unique thought, not uniform education.

Sorry for the late response.

I believe that there is no ethically relevent distinction between omission and commission. "ethically relevent", meaning that such a distinction should be a factor in ones decision making. I'd like to present two hypotheticals to present an intuitive case for my belief.

Hypothetical 1

You are walking along a path in the woods with a group of 6 strangers and reach a cliff face, when suddenly the cliff collapses and they all fall. Each person falls a seperate distance, requiring a different amount of time to climb down and rescue them. You determine that there is a limited amount of time before each individual will lose their grip and fall to certain death. After some thinking you determine a method to save 5 people, but you wont have enough time to get to the last.

What should you do?

Well, if you do not act then all 6 individuals would die, therefore saving the 5 does not cause anyones death. I'm sure most people who would not pull the lever, would save the 5 in this situation.

Hypothetical 2

Lets imagine a seperate scenario where the same events take place. However, this time there exists a 7th person who is behind you and is the partner of that 1 person. You know that if you do not act then the 1 will be saved by the man and less time will exist to save others, resulting in 2 people dying instead. You know that the cliff is too unstable for both you and the other man to save people at the same time.

Assume for the sake of both hypotheticals that you and the 7th man are both pro rock climbers and are sure in your judgements of the situation. Im sure there are better ways of presenting this idea than I am doing so here, but the underlying moral dillema is equivalent.

Argument

This situation is now functionally equivalent to the trolley problem. Choosing to do nothing will cause 4 people to be saved, while acting will allow 5 people to be saved. If reduced down to remove the overlapping individuals then its killing 1 to save 2. However, the only difference is the existance of an individual who intends to act in such a way that it would cause more deaths. So lets make a similar situation with this new found knowledge.

Assume you are a politician and you have the ability to make a decision that will improve the world, whatever that means to you. However, you have a rival who intends to improve the world in a different way you view as less impactful, resulting in more unnecessary deaths but saving lives you would have not saved. According to your ethical theory, you are morally obliged to allow this individual to gain power and make this choice.

You are completely capable of just responding "yeah, so what?". The only argument I am making here is that this is the logical extension of your actions if you choose to act in the 1st scenario and not act in the 2nd.

Potential Objection

I assume a potentital rebuttel to this would be for people to say that we should still save the 5 since we aren't the cause of their death still, we just dont allow a scenario where they are saved to exist. This to me seems like another distinction is need of definition and explanation of moral revelence. If ones action can lead to someones death who would otherwise not have died, then how can that action not be considered a "cause"?

Clarification of my thoughts and the extent of this idea

I believe this to be a clear conclusion that the morality being expressed is self-defeating, as someone else need just come along and oppose it. If you do not act in the trolley problem, but you allow another to act in your stead, then your entire thought process is meaningless since its preferred result did not come into effect via your action. And if you did oppose someone then I would consider that act to be immoral as it would be causing more deaths than would happen without your input.

To be clear, I dont care for the distinction of "cause" or "effect" myself, Im asking people to justify their own definition and the relevence of "causing death" between the trolley problem and this scenario. I believe actions lead to different experiences, the process and interaction between different agents or objects that leads to such is irrelevent. You cannot zone in on any "cause" and "effect" outside of the action and experiences themselves.

Ethics is fundamentally concerned with the movement between different experiences. Now in this topic we must talk about death, so that word loses so meaning. Therefore I'll simply refer to different consequences, results, the world as the way it is, etc. as differing "states".

There is no rational foundation for evaluating states independently of other states, which means giving states moral value within themselves. We can easily construct an infinite number of hypothetical states we could be in, and have a spectrum of preference between them. Since there is no border to such a spectrum we can infinitely improve or degrade a state, and so there is no state to designate as a center for good or bad. Hence, we can only provide the basis of value for a state when it's in relation to another.

This means the initial question is in need of being specified since death cannot be bad independently. So the question should transform to "Is the transition from life to death, negative?". If you didnt mean this then please feel free to correct me.

The reason I specify this is to compare it to a similar but completely seperate question.

"Is the state of existence preferable to someone who does not exist?"

The answer here is clearly no, at least if you believe in subjective values. There is no being and so there are no values to judge whether existence would be preferable. This answer is preferable towards anti-natalists, as there is no moral reason to bring a being into existence, for the sake of that being. (This doesnt mean theres no moral reason at all though, and I myself am not an anti-natalist).

However, a person who is currently alive has a set of values, and so when they die, while they no longer exist, we can use those values to suggest that the action that lead to their death was bad.

If someone wishes to continue existing, and yet dies, it means the state has transitioned to one less preferable. Hence, according to that persons values, it is bad.

However, if someone wishes to stop existing, and dies, it means the state has transistioned to one more preferable. Hence, according to that persons values, it is good.

You cannot judge the concept of death within itself as bad if value is subjective. If you believe value to be objective then you must create an argument to prove that. However, what is clearly true is that death means no improvement of state, eternally. Suffering is not an argument for death because it can be outweighed with a potential gain in wellbeing, a point anti-natalists seem to not find any value in.

I've made my posts perfect and you've barely responded to them. It's clear to anyone sensible that you read the first line I wrote and responded before even understanding my argument and why I said this discussion is about ethics and not law.

You clearly have no interest in an actual discussion and your being hostile now, bye.

I don't believe I have a responsibility to help others. I am an ethical egoist. If you dont understand what that means then read up on it or read what I've written and use some inference.

Just read what I wrote. You havent justified why the distinction has weight. Aka, why it has influence over ones actions.

I am an ethical egoist, I believe an action is good if it supports my self-interest. I value my own entertainment above people I have no connection to.

No, and such a question proves you havent read my response.

The discussion is about ethics, not legality. Clearly you cannot force everyone to give all their money to charity as the economy would collapse, but this isn't an argument for such a distinction in ethics but one in law.

A distinction made in one domain does not neccesarily transfer to another. Anyone can create a distinction between 2 concepts, but it doesnt give that distinction any true weight in terms of action, what we're concerned about in ethics.

If you merely believe in the distinction but believe it holds no weight in your decision making then its meaningless. If you believe it does hold weight then it must be justified with an argument.

Our individual action is the only factor we get to influence, hence this is the sole cause. Any cause outside of us is essentially already determined since we cant influence it, so referring to it as a cause is meaningless since it cannot change and so isn't relevent to the situation. What matters is your potential actions and the assumed effects of those actions. In this scenario being to pull a lever and let 1 die, or not pull the lever and let 5 die.

Time doesn't allow for no action to take place, to stand still, to watch, to walk away, to continue breathing, or continue standing; these are all actions, and any suggestion otherwise must argue why we make such a strange distinction and define what it means to not act.

Yes, you are morally responsible for the money you spend on your entertainment which you could use to fund malaria nets and save lives, to suggest otherwise is (for a lack of a better term) cope. If you dont give to them regardless, then you simply dont value their lives over your entertainment, which I think is fine as an egoist, but if you're not an egoist then you need to justify that.

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To formalise, this appears to be your argument:

P1: No distinction between killing and letting die would mean we are morally responsible for many situations where people require help.
P2: We are not responsible for situations where people require help.
C: There is a distinction between killing and letting die.

I disagree with premise 2, it must be justified.
(I also disagree with premise 1 since we dont neccesarily have to value the lives of others, but its not that interesting of a line since its based on subjective value).

The answer is clearly to pull the lever, if you value all humans equally.

The idea of killing vs letting die is a silly distinction, the value of our actions can only derive from their consequences.

The idea that a doctor can kill 1 to save 5 is a completely different situation since it is not an isolated insident. People would stop going to the doctors, our medical institution would lose all trust and collapse, and more people will thus die. People who can only see moral choices through actions themselves and not the consequences of such actions, do not understand long term effects.

Scoring a goal is the result of many simulatenous and cooperative individual actions.

Do you agree that people only have control over their own actions, the way they choose to interact with the world? If so then clearly the world outside of oneself appears to be already determined, with ones action the only changeable factor. This is the property of perspective that I believe many people seem to ignore in regards to ethics.

If you seperate the scoring of a goal into its individual actions and actors, then you can clearly deduce that your individual action was neccesary for that result to exist. As I have suggested that ones action is the only chanagable factor from ones perspective, the scoring of that goal was indeed caused by only you, as not acting would cause the cessation of that goals existence.

An action can be incredibly small and have a huge effect. An effect so large you can refer to it as being more than its parts. But even so, that remains simply a description of the magnitude of the result, and has no bearing on the action itself. Collective action is meaningless. Everyone affects the world, so the final result is a world affected by all.

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We do not have access to the world in its pure form, if that even makes sense as a concept. But we have access to our experience of the world, our conception and interpretation of it that our brain turns into qualia and thought.

Since we are able to change the course of the world, aka our experience of it, a question arises. "How should the world be?" which translates into "What experience is good?" and more broadly "How should I act to maximise my experience?"

This question is the one I care about and the one I define ethics as being the study of. Its also an innately egoist project, disregarding the question of how others should act as meaningless and implenting the concept of perspective into ethics. Unegoistic moral debates have gone on for thousands of years without end, I consider it a silly proposition and so I do not care about the questions it poses, this is why I suggest we may simply have different definitions and thus questions.

In regards to virtue ethics, I dont think it commits to anything but semantic meanignlessness through words such as "character", "virtue", "vice", etc. But I also do not have much experience with it due to its lack of popularity in modern times. My post is more directed against deontological thought, as myself I am a consequentialist.

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A principle is not simply a consistency. Being consistent is simply being true to your values, set to a specific plan or goal. An example of a principle would be "Murder is immoral", its an undeniable rule that one must follow. The issue with this being you can create an equally consistent and logical anti-principle which suggests, "Murder is moral". All independent principles have equal rational basis.

Principles are purely intellectual and so can fail from such basic reversals. However, experience justifies itself. Pain is not intellectual, it is negative within itself, and so cannot be reversed. This is the point of my original post, a far cry from the points you are discussing here.

We agree that ethics is concerned with action, however this means it is individualististic. You refer to cooperative actions that require multiple individuals but these can always be broken down into their individual parts, and us as individual beings have no control over the actions of other beings. To refer to this as a cooperative "action" is meaningless, since it's simply multiple actions from seperate people. There are cooperative effects, but no cooperative actions.

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Again, ethics is about how we relate to others — Banno

Part of sociology is the study of human social behaviour, if your definition of ethics refers to how people relate to eachother, then that's just sociology.

There is a difference between considering what you prefer and considering what others prefer. There is a difference between "I will only drink orange juice!" and "You will only drink orange juice!". — Banno

Your view of ethics seems to be about forcing principles upon others. If my initial argument is entirely about how we should have unprincipled ethics, and you define ethics through principle, then thats clearly a semantic issue.

Sometimes "just a semantic difference" means "I hadn't considered that". — Banno

You seem to be getting slightly hostile towards me here and since you're not engaging with my original point but bringing up semantics, I wont be responding anymore.

I think its just a semantic difference then. My idea of the term ethics is formed through how I concieve others using it, which is essentially describribing ethics as answering the question: "how should I act?". Common ethical topics such as the trolley problem, abortion, euthanasia, slaughter houses, etc. seem to suggest this to me.

Of course definitions are just definitions, you can define a term however you like, but I think if ethics only exists in regards to other people then its simply an aspect of sociology, it seems to already have a field which looks into those types of questions.

Premise 3 does not accurately portray moral subjectivism. Moral subjectivists have moral preferences, not beliefs. Morality concerns these preferences, not a true or false proposition about reality. The claim of a subjectivist lies in the belief that moral propositions are neither true nor false, the terms themselves do not apply as they do not refer directly to reality.

People can also take issue with the concept of "true" or "false" being applied to reality in the first place, as it implies the idea that abstract objects can exist in a way which subjectivists are typically against.

[Perhaps there are sub-categories of subjectivist/anti-realism types, some say neither true nor false, some say all false, all true, whatever. Its all the same general idea to me, with only a semantic distinction.]

I dont believe there is a difference fundamentally between aesthetics and ethics, as in the preference for orange juice is equivalent to a serial killers preference for murder, theres no distinction just preferences. After all, why would there be a difference, that just seems like emotion.

I am looking at value-action systems and I define those as ethics, actions made to maximise some set of constraints, and Im making the claim here that those constraints shouldnt include principles since they are contradictory by their very nature.

Because actions can only be commited by individuals, ethics must fundamentally be centered around the individual.

Do you simply dislike the term I am using? If so theres no need to argue further since it would just be semantics. If theres a true claim though, such as objective morality (which you could be hinting at idk) then please elaborate.

They entirely could construct their values to match their individual benefit, this is called ethical egoism and its the ethical philosophy I follow and advocate. However, this view doesnt assume values are some concrete thing in the world, but are simply a manifestation of preferences, I tried to describe in the 2nd paragraph of my original post.

Im not sure what you define as morality, but I've described what I define it is in many of my comments. If our definitions disagree then we're simply having seperate conversations with a joint term.

A flaw in your reasoning is that it involves other people. Functionally, morality is individualistic since action happens on the level of individuals, not collectives. If you mean to define morality as regarding the interplay between people then it is irrelevent to the idea I am presenting here, one of maximising values via actions.

Humans are social creatures, we hold a level of cooperation for eachother. However, this also means we hold standards of eachother which creates the neccesity of "justification" when someone commits an action which goes against said standards. If it does not sate their values then they have an impulse and their own selfish justification to punish us. Although I'm speaking generally, this psychology wont apply to all humans.

However, this isnt morality, its a result of cooperation. If you hid the jews in nazi germany then you'd be punished because you have gone against their "collective" value. Any justification you muster must neccesarily be one of principle because it must apply to values other than yours, aka the "collective" value.

Simply saying you did something because "I was bored", "I was lazy", "I was in pain", are not convincing arguments since they only affect your values and not the values of those you are trying to convince. Hence, its entirely predictable that anyone with a basic theory of mind will not say selfish justifications and thus will provide collective justifications which easily become principles.

We only justify acts as a means of social cooperation, not one of maximising value via actions. To ourselves we justify acts with their intended results. We study so that we can get better grades, we run so we can make it to the bus stop, not out of some principle to always reach the bus or always achieve academic success but from the experiences those actions will lead to. Principles do not exist within us before our rationalisations of action.

"I ate the cookie because I wanted to".

Under that definition I think the base idea's we're presenting are similar. I personally use the word "experience" as it gets across an idea that we have a consciousness that values things as a prequisite to our existence. Ideas must be justified whereas base experience justifies itself. Pain requires no justification to be negative, its negative via our experience of it. Ofc one must remember this isnt an advocation of objective ethics, peoples base experiences will differ, hence ethical egoism arises.

I think any values we hold are preferences of equivalent type. Prefering rock music and prefering no murder are fundamentally the same process in terms of how they affect action, which is what morality is about. While they differ in terms of emotional importance and how much we value them, that just places them at different levels in the hierrachy.

Why do you think the term preference is unfit for some moral considerations?

I think thats merely redefining principle. If someone can steal and improve their already good life then to do so in a way that allows them to avoid punishment must be a good for them. An improvement of experience is always good, regardless of method. The only case where it wouldnt be good is if you had an emotional reaction to the concept of stealing and felt bad afterwards in a way that would taint the gain.

I'm not sure I understand what you're trying to say with choosing to like something over another or the idea of a choice not being true.

Morality can only be defined in relation to a certain set of values. You could do any action and if is in accordance with your values then it is moral by definition.

I also dont understand your second paragraph and your reference to legal systems and principle.

I do not think psychology or social factors are irrelevent to ethics but that for the purpose of my specific argument I think construing it as a model is more relevent. I am assuming here that we have values as just a product of our being, regardless of the particulars of how they arise, which is where I believe those factors would be more relevent.

To express the paragraph you quoted with some more context: I think that there is no such things as "values" outside of the experience we value. When we say "I prefer the taste of orange juice to apple juice", I think that can be translated to "I prefer an experience involving the taste of organge juice to apple juice".

There are infinite hypothetical experiences and we arrange these into hierrachies, aka we value them in relation to eachother. To state again, this isnt a psychological statement about how people view morality but a way of construing a basic idea that we have preferences for different experiences.