Yet more "stupid" questions

NancyLebovitz

This is a thread where people can ask questions that they would ordinarily feel embarrassed for not knowing the answer to. The previous thread is at close to 500 comments.

Objective morality in one (admiitedly rather long) sentence: For any moral dilemma, there is some particular decision you would make after a thousand years of collecting information, thinking, upgrading your intelligence, and reaching reflective equilibrium with all other possible moral dilemmas; this decision is the same for all humans, and is what we refer to when we say that an action is 'correct'.

I assume the same but instead of "all humans" the weaker "the people participating in this conversation".

0buybuydandavis13y

I don't think even that's a sufficient definition. It's that all observers (except psychos), no matter their own particular circumstances and characteristics, would assign approval/disapproval in exactly the same way.

8Kaj_Sotala13y

I find that claim to be very implausible: to name just one objection to it, it seems to assume that morality is essentially "logical" and based on rational thought, whereas in practice moral beliefs seem to be much more strongly derived from what the people around us believe in. And in general, the hypothesis that all moral beliefs will eventually converge seems to be picking out a very narrow region in the space of possible outcomes, whereas "beliefs will diverge" contains a much broader space. Do you personally believe in that claim?