You are far more sensible than the majority of non-believers who insist that morality is objective, which for me is really trying to have your cake and eat it too.
Yes, if the moral universe were different and something that is evil were in fact good and required, then we should do it. But that’s kind of an unnecessary hypothetical.
Again, how? You have no objective moral law. How can you say what a person’s maximum well-being is. One can simply say that raping a girl provides her well-being and there is no way you can condemn his actions.
No, it isn’t relevant at all. If you were correct when quoting scripture, that would simply prove the Christian faith hypocritical. That wouldn’t mean that morality isn’t objective, only that the Christian faith wasn’t correct on what that objective morality was. Again, it is irrelevant to show any perceived hypocrisy in any religion, that doesn’t in any way disprove an objective morality.
Fair enough. Allow me to rephrase: “Doesn’t matter how many people think it is permissible, it is still evil. Personal opinions do not sway the moral value of any given act.” Do you agree that personal opinions can’t make something bad good or visa versa?
Sure, when I see an act being committed I can only go based off what I see. It is always possible that I could misjudge a person’s intention, etc when ruling an act immoral. But that doesn’t change the fact that there is objectivity in morality. As a matter of fact, it confirms it. I can only declare the actions of another immoral if I admit that there is an objective moral rule that was violated. Otherwise, I can never judge any human behavior to be wrong. Ever.
Clarification: the moral definition of murder is to deliberately kill an innocent person. So yes, if one were to murder Hitler such an act would be evil. If the person was insane, they may not be at fault for the act they committed, but the act in and of itself was still an evil act.So if an insane person for instance happened to murder Hitler during that time period, it is still an evil act? Or was it relative to everything else?
At best all one can do is make predictions and outcome expectations based on past experience and information. Though actual outcome can diverge from expected outcome. For example, there have been positives that have come out of the 3 Mile Island nuclear incident (in 1979 I think?) that could be said to contribute to well being and that trying to prevent the incident could interfere with those advantages coming about.
Oh yeah, absolutely. Saying that morality is objective in nature doesn’t mean that there aren’t subjective elements to morality as well.
Precisely! Morality concerns the motive, the means and the end.
Yes, killing in defense is reasonable. If a brigade of people rage into my city on horses with guns shooting people and setting our town on fire, it’s reasonable to kill them in defense - that benefits society. Killing Saddam Hussein benefits society. Obviously, you don’t question these things. What did you think I was trying to say?
Ah, the classic utilitarianism question. It’s funny I saw this brought up in a youtube video the other day. There is a problem with this scenario, because first, utilitarianism deals with ultimate happiness per person, not most life vs death. (You mention the benefit of life saved vs lost). Realistically, this situation of the one person giving the organs to the other five may provide more happiness to the five people and their relatives on this small scale, but not the large scale, given the implications that all of a sudden this suggests the other 6.8 billion people on Earth live in a world where life is not guaranteed, but rather can be taken away at any moment to help others on a small scale. The fear of this is no way to live life at all, so I argue the situation is irrelevant to your case and not realistic to what utilitarianism actually says. One must always make a case that a possible scenario provides the best outcome to all of society, and this case doesn’t. It makes a good attempt before getting shot down with the realization of the greater implications. The best decision must always be made, and unfortunately, an idea is often not evidenced enough and therefore will be more negative based on the fear of its unknown implications. As I stated before in this thread, simply making a positive effect is not good enough in itself (stealing $10 but then donating $100 immediately to charity…)
This situation confuses me - hopefully I understand you right. First, if you know there are five people down the hill, why can’t you tell them? (Perhaps they are workers on gps but you have no way of contact). If you divert the train to the other set of tracks, would a sixth person die? Or it would only be that one person, who you consider #6? If there is no way of contacting the people/lone person on either track, then you are given a real dichotomy with only two choices. Five dead vs one dead. Here the best option (without knowing other circumstances, such as perhaps the one person actually is the president) is to let the train divert killing one person rather than six. Even if you let “destiny” take it’s course and you do nothing, you still have the guilt of knowingly killing five people. Simply doing nothing is always an option (and therefore really is something). Now hopefully I understood your dichotomy correctly and the 6th person is alone?
I usually evaluate outcome and consequences separately from motives and intentions (though in the absence of one I might form expectations about the other). When there’s unintended negative consequences from an action motivated by a positive action then it may be a display of the limitation of one’s foresight. For example, say a person stops to let some one cross the road and that person is hit by another car while passing. Had the person not stopped to allow the other to cross then he or she would not have been in the road to be hit by the other car. But the driver’s ability to predict the actions of other cars is limited and imperfect so the driver isn’t aware that a life could have been saved by not allowing the person to cross.
Thank you Sharptiger, that does make it better for me to understand the original meaning.
Yes, I agree. It would obviously be unfair to evaluate the morality of a given act based on unforeseen effects. It sounds like you are using a method very similar to what the Catholic Church teaches, if not exactly the same.
Yes we are which makes it hard to imagine how morality is the result of social agreement. The experience of mankind is that when he gets together he does great evil not great good.
I think morality can seem to be subjective but is still objective. The reason it seems to be objective is because so often we dont think deeply about our moral statements. We say it is wrong to kill but that is not strictly the case. It is wrong to kill for the wrong reasons.
Does survival trump the prohibition of eating human flesh? I honestly dont know. I dont know what the Catholic Church’s position is on this and would be interested to know. We certainly have a strong moral duty to maintain our own lives. The first question is whether the prohibition of eating human flesh is absolute. If that is no then the question is under what circumstances. It might be OK to eat the flesh of the naturally deceased. There are actually cases of people being selected to be killed when starvation was occurring and this would seem more problematic.
If the circumstances are as you say and the person is not stealing the last food of another person or an adult stealing food from children then it is probably acceptable. But keep in mind morality is not just prohibitions. The question should also be, does the person with food have an obligation to feed someone who is without? And the answer to that is yes. So if a person is deliberately withholding food from someone in need then they are wrong before the person even takes the food.
Assaulting someone is not as prohibited as we commonly think. The police in order to enforce any law, no matter how trivial (such as selling lemonade without a permit), use force including hitting, beating, shocking with electricity and shooting. They can use this force aggressively.
I think the issue is that killing and taking that which is not your property are acceptable under some circumstances. But there are principles which are themselves very clear. It is wrong to kill someone who is not a threat to your life. It is wrong to take that which is not yours unless your life depends on it. The common thread is it is right to protect your own life and wrong to threaten, endanger or neglect another’s.
Objective morality means that the rules of behavior are the same for all person, at all times for the same set of circumstances.
I can provide three of each though they are not the most important things necessarily.
I would probably do the same as you. I do however think it is a restriction in a strict sense. I am not going to give them full knowledge but that which is appropriate for their age and circumstance.
True enough, which is why an objective morality cannot be just in the basis of what objective means. Due to variables that we either cannot foresee or see no other way to deal with the inlying issues.
I very well may be, though I can’t say with certainty since I am not familiar with it.
I’m not sure exactly what you mean here. But regarding the variables and our lack of foresight, that does not mean that morality is not objective. That means that we are imperfect creatures and that necessarily our actions can not be completely right ever. We always fall short. From a Christian perspective it as is Christ said that none are good, save God. Only God can be and is morally perfect.
A very important aspect of morality. This is moral knowledge which we can grow in. The law has this feature of creating rules for behavior as we learn about the world. To be negligent means you should have known better. Should of course is a moral word. Doing something dangerous without ill intent is still not morally right if you should have known better.