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TheAncientGeek comments on Why didn't people (apparently?) understand the metaethics sequence? - Less Wrong Discussion
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Comments (229)
Indeed you haven't, because they are not analogous. Morality is about guiding action in the world, not passively registering the state of the world. It doesn't tell you what the melting point of aluminum is, it tells you whether what you are about to do is the right thing.
And if you think it is such levitation is unnecessary, then progress is equally possible on both fronts.
Science isn't just about passively registering the state of the world, either.
Alice: "Science has a set of norms or guides-to-action called the scientific method. These have truth-values which are objective in the sense of not being a matter of individual whim"
Bob: "I don't believe you! What experiments do you perform to measure these truth-values, what equipment do you use?"
Charlie: "I don;'t believe you! You sound like you believe in some immaterial ScientificMethod object for these statements to correspond to!".
....welcome to my world.
Dave: Behaving as though objective scientific facts exist has made it possible for me to talk to people all over the world, for the people I care about to be warm in the winter, cool in the summer, have potable water to drink and plenty of food to eat, and routinely survive incidents that would have killed us in pre-scientific cultures, and more generally has alleviated an enormous amount of potential suffering and enabled an enormous amount of value-satisfaction.
I am therefore content to continue behaving as though objective scientific facts exist.
If, hypothetically, it turned out that objective scientific facts didn't exist, but that behaving as though they do nevertheless reliably provided these benefits, I'd continue to endorse behaving as though they do. In that hypothetical scenario you and Alice and Bob and Charlie are free to go on talking about truth-values but I don't see why I should join you. Why should anyone care about truth in that hypothetical scenario?
Similarly, if behaving as though objective moral facts exist has some benefit, then I might be convinced to behave as though objective moral facts exist. But if it's just more talking about truth-values divorced from even theoretical benefits... well, you're free to do that if you wish, but I don't see why I should join you.
I can construct a very similar argument for Christianity (or for most any religion, actually).
Usefulness of beliefs and verity of beliefs are not orthogonal but are not 100% correlated either.
That's surprising, but if you can, please do. If behaving as though the beliefs of Christianity are objective facts reliably and differentially provides benefits on a par with the kinds of scientific beliefs we're discussing here, I am equally willing to endorse behaving as though the beliefs of Christianity are objective facts.
Sure, I agree.
The argument wouldn't involve running hot water in your house, but would involve things like social cohesion, shared values, psychological satisfaction, etc.
Think about meme evolution and selection criteria. Religion is a very powerful meme that was strongly selected for. It certainly provided benefits for societies and individuals.
Edith: A lot of good stuff, then?
Fred: Those facts didn't fall off a tree, they were arrived at by following a true..right..effective..call it what you will...set of methods.
Edith: You care about science because it leads to things that are good. Morality does too.
Edith: you don't already? How do you stay out of jail?
Edith: If there are no moral facts, then the good things you like are not really good at all.
I'm not sure what you mean to express by that word.
A lot of stuff I value, certainly.
Yes, that's true. And?
Great! Wonderful! I'll happily endorse morality on the grounds of its reliable observable benefits, then, and we can drop all this irrelevant talk about "objective moral facts".
Same as everyone else... by following laws when I might be arrested for violating them. I would do all of that even if there were no objective moral facts. Indeed, I've been known to avoid getting arrested under laws that, if they did reflect objective moral facts, would seem to imply mutually exclusive sets of objective moral facts.
Perhaps. So what? Why should I care? What difference does it make, in that scenario?
For example, I prefer people not suffering to people suffering... that's a value of mine. If it turns out that there really are objective moral facts that are independent of my values, and that people suffering actually is objectively preferable to people not-suffering, and my values are simply objectively wrong... why should I care?
And there is a way of guides-to-action to be objectively right (etc) that has nothing to with reflecting facts or predicting experience. Thus removing the "morality doesn't help me predict experience" objection.
You have presupposed that there are Good Things (benefits) in that comment, and in your previous comment about science. You are already attaching truth values to propositions about what is good or not, I don't have to argue you into that.
"Jail is bad" has the truth-value True?
Why are you avoiding jail if its badness is not a fact?
Because you care about good things, benefits and so on. You are already caring about them, so I don't have to argue you into it.
Do you update your other opinions if they turn out to be false?
You are treating my statements about what I value as assertions about Good Things.
If you consider those equivalent, then great... you are already treating Good as a fact about what we value, and I don't have to argue you into that.
If you don't consider them equivalent (which I suspect) then interpreting the former as a statement about the latter is at best confused, and more likely dishonest.
I value staying out of jail.
Is there anything in your question I haven't agreed to by saying that?
If not, great. I will go on talking about what I value, and if you insist on talking about the truth-values of moral claims I will understand you as referring to what you value.
If so, what?
Because I value staying out of jail. (Which in turn derives from other values of mine.)
As above; if this is an honest and coherent response, then great, we agree that "good things" simply refers to what we value.
Sure, there are areas in which I endorse doing this.
So, you ask, shouldn't I endorse updating false moral beliefs as well?
Sure, if I anticipate observable benefits to having true moral beliefs, as I do to having true beliefs in those other areas in which I have opinions. But I don't anticipate such benefits.
Another area where I don't anticipate such benefits, and where I am similarly skeptical that the label "true beliefs" refers to anything or is worth talking about, is aesthetics. For example, sure, maybe my preference for blue over red is false, and a true aesthetic belief is that "red is more aesthetic than blue" is true. But... so what? Should I start preferring red over blue on that basis? Why on Earth would I do that?
(But Dave, you value having accurate beliefs in other areas! Why not aesthetics?)
I am not sure what that means. Is the "we" individual-by-individual or collective?
And where did you get the idea that Objective metaethics means giving up on values?
How does that differ from "jail is bad-for-me"?
If I thought that he truth-values of moral claims refers only to what I value, I wouldn't be making much of a pitch for objectivism, would I?
Whatever that means?
What explains the difference?
But that isn't the function of moral beliefs: their function is to guide action. You have admitted that your behaviour is guided by jail-avoidance.
You seem to be interested in the meta-level question of objective aesthetics. Why is that?
I think that's a separate discussion, and I don't think spinning it off will be productive. Feel free to replace "we" with "I" if that's clearer. If it's still not clear what I mean, I'm content to let it drop there.
I'm not sure what "giving up on values" means.
Beats me. Perhaps it doesn't.
No, you wouldn't.
Yes.
Whether concerning myself with the truth-values of the propositions expressed by opinions reliably provides observable and differential benefits.
I agree that beliefs guide action (this is not just true of moral beliefs).
If the sole function of moral beliefs is to guide action without reference to expected observable benefits, I don't see why I should prefer "true" moral beliefs (whatever that means) to "false" ones (whatever that means).
Yes. Which sure sounds like a benefit to me.
I don't seem that way to myself, actually. I bring it up as another example of an area where some people assert there are objective truths and falsehoods, but where I see no reason to posit any such thing...positing the existence of individual aesthetic values seems quite adequate to explain my observations.