My 'Truth' or 'YOUR 'truth'?

[torridon]

Oh dear I fear your argument is going to go circular.
Where do people get their moral standard from.
Secondly it sounds as if there are genes for morality. Empathy etc.
In what way then do we decide our morality if that is the case.

That is why morality is subjective.  We develop a sense of moral conscience just as we develop a sense of balance or a sense of direction, and like all aspects of mind, they in turn derive from genetics and the individual's particular personal development trajectory.  Thus every human has his own unique sense of right and wrong just as surely as he has his own personal sense of humour. No two individuals are alike, not even identical twins.

[BeRational]

Where does that leave rules then. Surely chaos is maximal change?

As humans we don't want maximal change, we want rules that help us to survive when we live in large groups.

Morality is the evolved system of behaviour that assists that.

If morality is objective as YOU suggest, why do they change in populations over time?

If they are objective, you must have some standard to compare them to.

Where is this standard, and how is it that YOU know them and it appears no one else on here does.

Is slavery morally correct or not?

Please answer yes or no, then show how you arrived at this OBJECTIVE value.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

Their biology.

And when has biology been subjective?

[Sassy]

Their biology.

If that were true we would still be back in the earliest stages of man.

Our morality is as individual as our fingerprints...we choose it.

[BeRational]

If that were true we would still be back in the earliest stages of man.

Our morality is as individual as our fingerprints...we choose it.

So you agree it is not objective then?

[Walt Zingmatilder]

As humans we don't want maximal change, we want rules that help us to survive when we live in large groups.

Morality is the evolved system of behaviour that assists that.

If morality is objective as YOU suggest, why do they change in populations over time?

If they are objective, you must have some standard to compare them to.

Where is this standard, and how is it that YOU know them and it appears no one else on here does.

Is slavery morally correct or not?

Please answer yes or no, then show how you arrived at this OBJECTIVE value.

And when has evolution been subjective?

[bluehillside Retd.]

And when has biology been subjective?

He's busy just a trollin'
All the live long day
He's busy just a trollin'
And he'll never go away

Humour, art, music...all are emergent properties of our biological selves, and they seem to function perfectly well on a mix of consensus and changing opinions with no plaintive appeal to objective standards for any of them. What I wonder does Trollboy think makes morality so special that he needs to assert into existence only its objectivity?

[Rhiannon]

He believes that there is no morality without God, and that God's morality is absolute.

[bluehillside Retd.]

Rhi,

He believes that there is no morality without God, and that God's morality is absolute.

Quite. The irony that will be lost on him is that he wrongly accused Some of circular reasoning (yet another term we'll have to add to the ever-growing list of "words Trollboy uses but misunderstands") yet a prefect example of circular reasoning is his: "Objective morality exists because God made it so; because there's objective morality, therefore God". And round and round he goes...

[Walt Zingmatilder]

He believes that there is no morality without God, and that God's morality is absolute.

I do but the atheist objective moralists don't.....so therefore you have made a pretty poor attack on objective morality...........but of course mono states,er,Hillside has appeared so we can expect his little wizards to make arse clenching argumentii  ad evokium William Craig Latium. Ha ha.

[BeRational]

I do but the atheist objective moralists don't.....so therefore you have made a pretty poor attack on objective morality...........but of course mono states,er,Hillside has appeared so we can expect his little wizards to make arse clenching argumentii  ad evokium William Craig Latium. Ha ha.

Is homosexuality objectively right or wrong?

Show your method for deriving the answer.

If you cannot then stop saying morality is objective.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

He's busy just a trollin'
All the live long day
He's busy just a trollin'
And he'll never go away

Humour, art, music...all are emergent properties of our biological selves, and they seem to function perfectly well on a mix of consensus and changing opinions with no plaintive appeal to objective standards for any of them. What I wonder does Trollboy think makes morality so special that he needs to assert into existence only its objectivity?

Music is governed by physics and maths Hillside and art by the fives senses.
These operate within and across physical spectra. Morality is just a question of ought and ought not.It is markedly different from the analogies you use.

[wigginhall]

Some Kind of Stranger wrote:

You are guilty not of an appeal to consequences but a false dichotomy too. You are saying that if it isn't objective, it doesn't matter and every course of action is equal. Whereas, in fact, for very practical reasons, it matters a lot to people and to the survival of societies.

This is a good point.  I've noticed, trawling around for articles on morality, that this kind of black and white thinking is common amongst theists.   For example: either morality is objective or arbitrary.

This is incorrect, since, as many have said on this thread, human beings consult their interests in making moral choices.   Those interests are not arbitrary.

I suppose they are trying to say that only theists are moral, and anyone else is without morality, again, obviously untrue.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

Is homosexuality objectively right or wrong?

Show your method for deriving the answer.

If you cannot then stop saying morality is objective.

Is biology subjective?
Is evolution subjective?

[Walt Zingmatilder]

Some Kind of Stranger wrote:

This is a good point.  I've noticed, trawling around for articles on morality, that this kind of black and white thinking is common amongst theists.   For example: either morality is objective or arbitrary.

This is incorrect, since, as many have said on this thread, human beings consult their interests in making moral choices.   Those interests are not arbitrary.

I suppose they are trying to say that only theists are moral, and anyone else is without morality, again, obviously untrue.

Argument by evoking theists.
Theists believe this so it must be wrong.........or as Monostatos ........aka Hillside would have it.......argument by evoking WLC..

[BeRational]

Is biology subjective?
Is evolution subjective?

Irrelevant and not under discussion.

Can you answer the question or not?

It seems not?

[torridon]

And when has biology been subjective?

Of course your biology is subjective.  My body is personally mine and yours is personally yours.  Each body is unique, each mind is unique and is the ephemeral subjective aspect of the body.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

Is homosexuality objectively right or wrong?

Show your method for deriving the answer.

If you cannot then stop saying morality is objective.

What do you mean by right or wrong?

[Gordon]

Again, what is the engine for changing the rules to make them more moral?

People, and what they think, and how they think alongside the changing background within which we live our lives.

If it is external influences then where does thateave personal subjectivity.

As a considered response.

In fact it would seem that personal subjectivity is a source of immorality!

Yep - just as it is also the source of what we might term morality.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

Of course your biology is subjective.  My body is personally mine and yours is personally yours.  Each body is unique, each mind is unique and is the ephemeral subjective aspect of the body.

Mine?yours? Didn't you argue that the self was an illusion?

[torridon]

If that were true we would still be back in the earliest stages of man.

Our morality is as individual as our fingerprints...we choose it.

I don't think we choose it.  Choice in this context is an illusion. You can choose to adopt a certain position, but you cannot really choose the contents of your conscience. If you think eating animal flesh is wrong, you cannot choose to think it is OK.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

People, and what they think, and how they think alongside the changing background within which we live our lives.

As a considered response.

Yep - just as it is also the source of what we might term morality.

People, and what they think, and how they think alongside the changing background within which we live our lives.

As a considered response.

Yep - just as it is also the source of what we might term morality.

I see people change because people change........and so it goes.

[Rhiannon]

I don't think we choose it.  Choice in this context is an illusion. You can choose to adopt a certain position, but you cannot really choose the contents of your conscience. If you think eating animal flesh is wrong, you cannot choose to think it is OK.

Agree completely. We might want x to be ok, but if we don't feel it in our gut we can't make it so.

[torridon]

Mine?yours? Didn't you argue that the self was an illusion?

Yes, indeed, grasshopper, illusory in the sense that we have a feeling of self as if it were a thing with a separate ontology to the body, hence dualism, and so forth. That does not deny the subjectivity of a body, rather it is emergent ephemeral phenomenon of its subjectivity, amongst other things.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

Of course your biology is subjective.  My body is personally mine and yours is personally yours.  Each body is unique, each mind is unique and is the ephemeral subjective aspect of the body.

I don't think biologists would agree with you.
By your logic all science is subjective since all atoms are in different positions as are there sub atomic particles.