An attempt in layman's language to explain the metaethics sequence in a single post.

Bound_up

Okay. By saying "If they have failed to grasp that morality is obligatory, have they understood it at all? They might continue caring more about eggnog, of course. That is beside the point... morality means what you should care about, not what you happen to do."

it seems you have not understood the idea. Were there any parts of the the post that seemed unclear that you think I might make clearer?

Because the whole point is that to say something is moral = you should do it = it is valued according to the morality equation.

For an Elf to agree something is moral is also to agree that they should do it. When I say they agree it's moral and don't care, that also means they agree they should do it and don't care.

Something being Christmas Spiritey = you Spiritould do it. Humans might agree that something is Christmas Spirit-ey, and agree that they spiritould do it, they just don't care about what they spiritould do, they only care about what they should do.

moral is to Christmas spiritey what "should" is to (make up a word like) "spiritould"

Obligatory is just a kind of "should." Elves agree that some things are obligatory, and don't care, they care about what's ochristmastory.

Likewise, to say that today's morality equation is the "best" is to say that today's morality equation is the equation which is most like today's morality equation. Tautology.

Best = most good, and good = valued by the morality equation.

it seems you have not understood the idea. Were there any parts of the the post that seemed unclear that you think I might make clearer?

Almost everything. You explain morality by putting forward one theory. Under those circumstances, most people would expect to see some critique of other theories, and explanation of why your theory is the One True Theory. You don't do the first, and it is not clear that you are even trying to do the second.

Because the whole point is that to say something is moral = you should do it = it is valued according to the mora

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0entirelyuseless10y

I think it is perfectly obvious that this usage of "should" and so on is wrong. A paperclipper believes that it should make paperclips, and it means exactly the same thing by "should" that I do when I say I should not murder. And when I say it is obvious, I mean it is obvious in the same way that it is obvious that you are using the word "hat" wrong if you use it for a coat.

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An attempt in layman's language to explain the metaethics sequence in a single post.

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An attempt in layman's language to explain the metaethics sequence in a single post.

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