tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16594468.post1106481229258109683..comments2023-10-24T04:29:23.693-06:00Comments on Atheist Ethicist: Objectivity, Science, and MoralityAlonzo Fyfehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05687777216426347054noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16594468.post-72480553263175037962011-04-28T06:37:36.887-06:002011-04-28T06:37:36.887-06:00Jesse D
Here is what Harris gets right. He puts t...<b>Jesse D</b><br /><br />Here is what Harris gets right. He puts two images side-by-side; one of a mother playing happily with a child, and one of a mother wailing over her dead child, and says how absurd it is to deny that there is a fact here that scientists can study.<br /><br />Okay . . . this is right.<br /><br />The next question is, "What is this fact that we are looking at?"<br /><br />He says it is the well-being of conscious creatures.<br /><br />I say he is mistaken.<br /><br />His well-being of conscious creatures claim is classic utilitarianism - a thesis that moral philosophers considered 200 years ago and has rejected.<br /><br />Harris substantially ignores 200 years of moral philosophy in order to present this thesis. And his critics rightly claim, "What are you talking about? We have 200 years of moral philosophy explaining why THAT option doesn't work."<br /><br />There are two responses to this.<br /><br />One is that there are no facts about value - because all attempts to present value-facts have continued to fail.<br /><br />The other is that there are value-facts, but they are not what Harris says they are.<br /><br />I go with the second option.<br /><br />This is where I disagree with HarrisAlonzo Fyfehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05687777216426347054noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16594468.post-58834015272891818942011-04-27T23:28:06.794-06:002011-04-27T23:28:06.794-06:00I do think most people come to realize that so cal...I do think most people come to realize that so called 'evolutionary ethics' are quite unsatisfactory for many reasons (a consequence of equating "natural" with "moral").<br /><br />But that is not how I understand the "science of morality". Those terms have been used by a few thinkers (most recently, Sam Harris) to mean something more like a utilitarianism that has been humbled and grounded by science. <br /><br />Mr. Fyfe, I hope you read Harris' "The Moral Landscape" and address his thesis more fully than those Ted.com comments. Or at least check out the relevant wikipedia articles, because your arguments for desirism often synchronize almost word for word with the case Harris seems to be trying to make.<br /><br />If there are differences, they are nuanced indeed, and at least one reader is not seeing them.<br /><br />The only time you guys might diverge could be when we go deeper into "units of good" for your ethical systems, and yet even then, you each still seem to make many similar caveats (e.g. Precise "units" of what we have called 'good' are difficult to compare; Science, especially neuroscience, will tell us more about what we are really saying we value, because it will tell us about the minds that must value those things; A person's intentions and desires are a great, albeit fuzzy in practice, way to guide moral decisions; etc)Jessehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15283678096642021038noreply@blogger.com