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lukeprog comments on What is Metaethics? - Less Wrong
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wedrifid is correct.
Another way to grok the distinction: Imagine that you were testifying at a murder trial, and somebody asked if you if you had killed your mother with a lawnmower. You reply "Lawnmower!" with a disgusted tone.
Now, the prosecutor asks, "Do you mean to claim that lawnmower is X, or that the thought of killing somebody with a lawnmower is disgusting?"
And you could rightly reply, "It may be the case that I believe that lawnmower is X, or that the thought of killing somebody with a lawnmower is disgusting, but I have claimed no such things merely by saying 'Lawnmower!'"
You're speaking of claims in language; I'm speaking of brain function.
Functionally, I have observed that the emotions behind such statements are an integral portion of the "belief", and that verbal descriptions of belief such as "murder is bad" or "you shouldn't murder" are attempts to explain or justify the feeling. (In practice, the things I work with are less morally relevant than murder, but the process is the same.)
(See also your note that people continue to justify their judgments on the basis of confabulated consequences even when the situation has been specifically constructed to remove them as a consideration.)