Eliezer_Yudkowsky comments on Empirical claims, preference claims, and attitude claims - Less Wrong

5 Post author: John_Maxwell_IV 15 November 2012 07:41PM

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Comment author: Eliezer_Yudkowsky 15 November 2012 09:28:36AM 1 point [-]

Yep. My standard go-to on nearest mainstream metaethical philosophy to LW is Frank Jackson's analytic descriptivism / moral functionalism.

Comment author: lukeprog 15 November 2012 12:34:25PM 6 points [-]

For the curious...

BerryPick6's summary of Walter-Sinnott Armstrong's moral views — "Most of our Moral judgments and intuitions are much better explained by natural selection, evolutionary psychology and other natural processes than by an appeal to some ontological beings/facts/laws" — concerns what mainstream philosophy calls "evolutionary debunking arguments" (the classic paper here is Street 2006, but the point had been made less thoroughly many times before by both scientists and philosophers).

I should clarify, though, that evolutionary debunking arguments aren't the focus of Jackson's metaethical work, though as a naturalist Jackson assumes the basics of evolutionary biology and psychology and their implications for the origins of our moral attitudes.

The purpose of Jackson's analytic descriptivism is, rather, to explain why something that feels kinda like moral realism can still be true despite the universe's lack of spooky intrinsic normativity. Analytic descriptivism is one of several approaches for grounding (moral) normative properties in natural, descriptive properties. (Other well-known approaches to this include Railton's and, less well-developed, Foot's.)

For more, see my April 2011 blog post on Jackson's theory. The best explanation of Jackson's theory is, still, Miller (2003). Luckily, the next edition of Miller's excellent book should be available early next year.

Comment author: BerryPick6 15 November 2012 12:49:47PM 1 point [-]

The best explanation of Jackson's theory is, still, Miller (2003). Luckily, the next edition of Miller's excellent book should be available early next year.

It is without a doubt one of the most helpful and informative books I've ever read and I strongly recommend it to anyone with any interest at all in Metaethics.

I had no idea it was being updated, any specific word on what new content will be in it?