Science and morality

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tonyrey

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Can science help us distinguish between right and wrong?
  1. Never
  2. Sometimes (If so when?)
  3. Always
 
I wanna know

I don’t feel safe with people who don’t wanna know

I don’t feel safe with people who tell me I don’t wanna know (i.e they don’t want me to know - a controlling attitude - e.g they feel I would show them up, or they think something has to be hidden like a colonial attitude to history)

True science - freed from power wielding and manipulative “technology” - is right, in itself.
 
It can give us information we need to be able to make decisions on what is right or wrong.

Give us an example, Bradski!

Well, OK. We can do studies to see if children brought up in single sex families are better or worse off than those with male and female parents. We can then use the results of those studies to make decisions based on facts rather than emotions.

We can do studies to investigate the validity of ID. We can then use the results to decide whether it should be taught in schools.

We can do lots of fun stuff like this. Whether something is right or wrong is a matter for reasonable people to decide using reasonable arguments. But we do need facts. And science can provide those in many cases.

Let’s hear it for science!
 
Speaking of acts in general: Only inasmuch as it helps to determine the details of what is going on with any of the 3 ingredients of a moral act.

Speaking of acts in particular: Only inasmuch as one is bound to seek such illumination as mentioned above.
 
tonyrey said:
Can science help us distinguish between right and wrong?
  1. Never
  2. Sometimes (If so when?)
  3. Always
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I wonder, why do you ask such elementary questions? This is not even philosophy 101.

As Bradski already explained, science is just an epistemological tool to gain knowledge about the objective reality - metaphysics. What we do with the knowledge belongs to the realm of ethics. But to separate ethics from reality is nonsensical.

Then we can posit a possible action based upon the knowledge of reality, and examine its hypothetical corollaries (epistemology again!). Based upon the result we can make a reasonable assumption if the act would be “right” or “wrong”, IF it would be carried out.
 
(As another jigsaw piece to all the above) morality (in the thread title) is how you live out your ethics.
 
Right and wrong are situational.

And when the situation involves aspect of physical being, science can bring knowledge to light, that will make the issues clearer.

ICXC NIKA
 
Solmyr said:
I wonder, why do you ask such elementary questions? This is not even philosophy 101.
Click to expand...
Really? Have you seen some of the threads in this subforum? And how incredibly rude of you. I will be reporting you for that.

I’ll have you know that this is actually a hot topic in the field of metaethics. It’s a great question.
As Bradski already explained, science is just an epistemological tool to gain knowledge about the objective reality - metaphysics. What we do with the knowledge belongs to the realm of ethics. But to separate ethics from reality is nonsensical.
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I don’t understand why you add the last sentence. You are very unclear.
Then we can posit a possible action based upon the knowledge of reality, and examine its hypothetical corollaries (epistemology again!). Based upon the result we can make a reasonable assumption if the act would be “right” or “wrong”, IF it would be carried out.
Click to expand...
Epistemology is a field of study, not an action.
 
How come whenever I say that I get shot down in flames…?
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I’ll state the obvious - you mean something different. Just a guess. I don’t have specific instances in mind.

For a human act to be morally good, every aspect of it must be good: object, intention, AND circumstance. There are instances where the circumstance actually changes the object, though.

I invite you to start a thread on this.
 
Also, for the record, there are MANY opinions on the OP’s question that differ WILDLY from what has been given in this thread so far. Like I said, it is a hot topic in the field of metaethics.
 
As a philosopher and as a scientist, no. That is not the purpose of science.

One can be a scientist and follow whatever religion or philosophy they please.** Nikola Tesla **believed science was to be used for the good of all humanity even at the ultimate cost of the scientist, **Thomas Edison **believed science existed for profit and self-advancement no matter what good it could do, and Joseph Mengele believed the only purpose of science was the acquisition of power and to judge all of humankind as worthy of life or not.
So it spans the moral spectrum quite broadly.

The purpose of science is to provide a method to analyze cause and effect.
“Why something does”, not “Why do something.”
It’s the how, he what, the where, the why, but never the why not.

That is the realm of philosophy and religion. Faith and reason. Choose as you will, but science will only ever be information to base such choices on, not a choice itself.
 
tonyrey said:
Can science help us distinguish between right and wrong?
  1. Never
  2. Sometimes (If so when?)
  3. Always
Click to expand...
My gut reaction, unless someone can give me a good reason to think otherwise, is that science can never help us to distinguish between right and wrong. That is a matter of wisdom, not science.

Science can help us with our moral choices so that we can choose from knowledge rather than ignorance. For example, the science of nutrition can help us distinguish between the right kind of food for our bodies and the wrong kind of food; but science cannot give us the ethical principle by which we ought to choose nourishing food rather than junk food.

“Thou shalt not kill” is not a moral principle that we get from science. But the principle works both ways. We should not kill others nor should we kill ourselves. Some people eat to live. Others live to eat, then soon enough die. All this is common sense insight, not science.
 
Science can be used to inform settling between right and wrong. But you can’t empirically judge ‘right’ or ‘wrong’.

For instance, I think I read Sam Harris (who I usually find to be terrible at philosophy) tried to suppose that which promotes human flourishing is good. Science can tell us what promotes human flourishing. But he’s still making a leap - that the good is human flourishing. Science doesn’t say that, nor can it say that.
 
Rhubarb said:
Science can be used to inform settling between right and wrong. But you can’t empirically judge ‘right’ or ‘wrong’.

For instance, I think I read Sam Harris (who I usually find to be terrible at philosophy) tried to suppose that which promotes human flourishing is good. Science can tell us what promotes human flourishing. But he’s still making a leap - that the good is human flourishing. Science doesn’t say that, nor can it say that.
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Does that mean it’s unscientific to say being in “good health” has something to do with being alive, not vomiting all the time, and being able to breathe and move without difficulty? Are we making a leap to assert such things?
 
tonyrey said:
Can science help us distinguish between right and wrong?
  1. Never
  2. Sometimes (If so when?)
  3. Always
Click to expand...
We are moral agents already when we do experimental or theoretical scientific research. If as a result of our investigations we find out that one of our actions as individuals or as societies produces harmful effects in the mid or long term, then those results can serve us as the basis and the motivation to modify our customs, that is to say, our morality. An action which had been considered morally indifferent or even good, can be acknowledged as evil when we come to know that it has certain negative effects. So, our scientific activity can help us sometimes distinguish between right and wrong when it reveals the mid or long term effects of our human activity.
 
Rhubarb said:
For instance, I think I read Sam Harris (who I usually find to be terrible at philosophy) tried to suppose that which promotes human flourishing is good. Science can tell us what promotes human flourishing. But he’s still making a leap - that the good is human flourishing. Science doesn’t say that, nor can it say that.
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If to flourish means to develop in a beneficial way, then why wouldn’t that be good? What would your definition be that would make it not good.
 
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