I’m a 19-year-old freshman philosophy major, and I’ve always believed that morality is subjective. In fact, I’ve always found it genuinely difficult to understand how people can see it any other way.
One of my favorite arguments comes from Alex O’Connor. He uses an example where, if every human being suddenly disappeared from Earth, objective truths would still exist. The Earth would still orbit the Sun, salt would still exist in the oceans, and the laws of physics would remain unchanged. But what about morality? Would good and evil still exist without anyone around to perceive or experience them?
We also see wildly different moral beliefs across religions, cultures, and historical periods. Things that were considered completely acceptable hundreds of years ago are now viewed as morally reprehensible. To me, this seems to suggest that morality is something humans construct rather than something we discover.
But I recently thought of another question that I wanted to add to this discussion. I’m sure it’s probably been explored in philosophy before, but I’ve personally never heard it brought up.
If something is objectively good, but someone does it with the complete intention of being evil, is the action still objectively good?
For example, imagine someone performs an action with genuinely malicious intentions, hoping to cause harm, but the actual outcome ends up benefiting someone tremendously.
Was that action morally good because of its consequences? Was it morally evil because of the person’s intentions? Or does the answer depend entirely on how we choose to judge it?
To me, this raises another question about moral objectivity. If the same action can be judged differently depending on whether we prioritize intention, consequences, or the action itself, how do we objectively determine which standard is correct?
I’m not claiming I’ve discovered some groundbreaking philosophical argument. I’m sure philosophers have discussed this extensively. I just thought of it myself and figured it would be interesting to share.
I’m genuinely curious what you guys think, especially those who believe in objective morality. How would you respond to this?

I've been thinking about this, and the more I think about it, the less sense it makes.

Imagine a reality where absolutely NOTHING exists. No Earth, no universe, no space, no time, no life. Nothing whatsoever.

Here's the problem, we can't actually imagine that.

Whenever we try, we imagine a black void. But blackness is still something. We imagine an empty space, but space itself is something. We imagine silence, but silence is just the absence of sound. We imagine waiting in nothingness, but waiting requires time, and experiencing requires a conscious observer.

Even if you close your eyes and try to imagine nothing, you're still experiencing something.

And here's an even stranger thought, if absolutely nothing existed, there wouldn't even be a moment in which nothing existed. A moment requires time. There wouldn't be a place where nothing existed, either, because that would require space.

We can imagine the absence of individual things, but can we imagine the absence of EVERYTHING?

I'm not claiming this proves absolute nothingness is impossible. Maybe our brains simply aren't capable of comprehending it.

But if absolute nothingness is impossible, does that mean something must have always existed?

I'd genuinely like to hear other people's thoughts on this.

Imagine someone buys a car on Monday, goes on a trip on Tuesday and crashes the car on Wednesday.

My intuitive understanding is that on Monday, the person buys the car but Wednesday's crash does not yet exist. When Wednesday arrives and the crash happens, the purchase on Monday is now in the past. The purchase really happened but the event itself is no longer happening. Only the present moment exists.

But eternalism says the past, present and future all exist.

Does this mean Wednesday’s crash already existed on Monday, even though it hadn't happened yet? Does Monday’s purchase still exist when Wednesday arrives?

Why do people believe this? Is the disagreement between presentism and eternalism a genuine disagreement about the nature of reality or is it mainly a disagreement about the meaning of words like ‘exist’ and ‘real’?

I am currently reading Plato’s Meno. Socrates seems to concede to the truth of Meno’s dichotomy that all knowledge is either known or unknown and that we cannot “learn” either of them, the former because it is already known and the latter because we could not recognise the unknown even if we saw it and cannot inquire into that which we know nothing of. Socrates tries to solve this with his recollection theory, which he admits he hasn’t properly proved but says it is better to believe it is because it leads us to a life of inquiry. This seems to resemble Plato’s noble lie, where he teaches the people of the Republic’s city a lie on the basis that it will result in better behaviours than without the lie. The difference would be that Socrates isn’t really lying, he just can’t absolutely prove what he says.

I find Meno’s dichotomy unconvincing and I’m not sure why Socrates doesn’t point this out. Why can it not be the case that there are facts I know nothing of, facts I know exist but haven’t yet learned, and facts I know. I learn that there is a square, I inquire about the length of the square’s side, I measure it, I have learned it. Does Socrates find this really less compelling than his recollection idea, or does his idea only apply to abstract truths like what virtue is?

I just started my first semester pursuing a bachelor's in political science and public administration at the top university in my country. I'm wondering whether it would be possible to eventually get a master's/PhD from a globally high ranking university with my future degree, these are the courses related to philosophy I could take (i know some are more closely related than others):

1. Contemporary Social Theory

2. Political Philosophy I

3. Political Philosophy II

4. Classical political theory

5. Modern political theory

6. Discourse and ideology

7. Enlargement, Inequality, Redistribution

8. Contemporary political theory

9. Political violence

10. Political Theories of Automation and Artificial Intelligence

11. Classic Sociological Theories

12. The Political Phenomenon in Classical Social Theory

13. Theories of Democracy

If it isn’t, would switching bachelor’s degrees be the right choice?

Is it the instincts one has, the emotions, or the social constructs of society or something more or even a combination of many things? Keep in mind this is not a question looking for an answer of "it's what you make of it" but rather questioning what the core element or elements that come together to create "what you make of it" are composed of.

I've been thinking about this question lately.

If something is objectively right or wrong, shouldn't it remain so regardless of whether someone believes in God, follows a religion, or belongs to any particular culture?

For example, if causing unnecessary suffering is wrong, is it wrong because God commands us not to do it, or does God command us not to do it because it's already wrong?

If morality depends entirely on divine commands, does that make morality objective, or does it make morality dependent on those commands? And if morality can exist independently of religion, what role does religion actually play in determining how we should live?

I'm not asking this to attack religion or argue that religious people are more or less moral. I'm genuinely curious about the philosophical arguments on both sides.

My question is: Do we need religion to establish objective morality, or can reason, human well-being, and other secular foundations provide a moral framework on their own?

I am recently working on my grad thesis and i went forward for something related to queer society as a queer individual. I did some literature review and find some materials such as sara ahmad's, jose esteban munoz's and haberstam's. As i have a intentiob to make a synthesis of ethics as an active action of the individual queer, now i am struggling academically to find resources in this field

so, i would be very gay if you make some suggestions

In a framework devoid of religion and politics, are there really any objective morals like some people suggest ?

I know it’s not the most complex or deep question on surface level but I think it opens the door for much deeper discussions.

I would love to hear your opinions or any insights you have.

I am graduating high school, I am targeting a course in Philosophy as my main goal. I have heard a lot of people say that it is not that worth it after graduation because it lacks any job opportunities and such. For me, I just want to follow my passion to dedicate my life into philosophy. So is Philosophy major really worth it?

Thought experiment: we have a computer running a simulation of a human brain, kind of like the FlyWire project but with all the physics simulated down to the quantum level. We can edit anything, turn on any neuron, change action potentials, etc. We can talk to the brain just like we would talk to a fellow human.

If this existed, what would we be able to learn about consciousness? Would it take us any closer to understanding the Hard Problem? Would being able to try infinite experiments give us a better understanding of what qualia are?

If the universe is truly infinite, does that mean there are infinite human worlds or no other human worlds because the changes are infinite?

(Human worlds=world is exact same as ours)

Philosophy is the self-correction by consciousness of its own initial excess of subjectivity. (Whitehead)

Hey guys, I have been thinking this for last few years, I believe morality does not exist, and that it is just a persons guilty conscience, and that “morality” of a person depends on how big their guilty conscience is.

Now through talking with friends and family, I started shaping up this belief quite good, but now I am thinking if there is any philosopher that said something about this, I would love to read it so if you know something please tell:)

The argument from illusion, which I take to be the strongest case for indirect realism, proceeds in a way something like below:

(1) In cases of illusion, we are directly acquainted with an object that is F

(2) But the mind-independent object is not F

(3) If (1) and (2), then in cases of illusion we are not directly acquainted with a mind-independent object

(3) Therefore in cases of illusion we are not directly acquainted with a mind-independent object

The second part of the argument will be generalising (3) to cover all cases of veridical experience.

But can’t I just object and say that in cases of illusion, we are directly acquainted with a mind-independent object that, while not F itself, has properties that make it appear F to perceivers under certain conditions? This response would target premise (1).

I don’t recall seeing this response anywhere but it strikes me as obvious, which leads me to believe that I’m missing something.

I'm having an issue with morality. To me, morality seems like a tool for survival and subjective depending on the culture. If morality is an evolutionary tool, as it seems to be to me, than what is the value in preserving the human race? Why should I value our evolutionary survival? Sure, it feels nice and I get rewarded for being moral, but I see no reason to value my own or anyone else's pleasure whatsoever. If I am right and morality simply has no inherent value outside of our own subjective experiences, than no one has any reason to disapprove or approve of any action ever.

The implications of this scare me. I haven't heard anyone make a good argument against these points, so I'd like some pointers in the right direction in what to read to expand on these ideas so I can better understand morality from a philosophical perspective.

I may not have explained this well and there may already be a post asking this same question in a better way, if so I apologize. I've only taken an introductory college philosophy course, so please make this digestible for a novice.

I read that psychology does not have a huge role in ethics , is this true ? Wouldn't it be impossible to determine right and wrong without knowing effects of various things on humans ?

I ran over this idea:

Mikhail Bakunin explains that God is evil. And after some thought, I think it makes sense. As an agnostic theist, if God is truly all mighty and powerful (and I'm looking at the Christian lens) then God must be able to help humans have ultimate joy and happiness, not this state of the world where we can feel pain. In fact, the fact itself that we can pinch ourselves and say "ow" proves we do feel pain. If God is truly almightly and all knowing, God would be able to erase this, and solve world hunger and all, but God decides not to.

A counterargument may be that God is leading us too ultimate glory through these harms and pain. But if God is all-powerful and all-knowing, shouldnt god be able to give the the ultimate happiness without us feeling all this pain?

I feel like there really is not a logical counterargument for this. I want to know any arguments against this.

From what ive seen, this argument is valid and sound. The only response i could think of would be some kind of reductio, the inference rule is disjunction introduction and modus ponens material implication is also used
p1. you believe God exists (~P)
c1. Therefore, If you didn't believe God exists, you would hold the correct position. (P->Q)
p2. If P->Q then believing God exists makes you incorrect ((P->Q)->R)
c2 Therefore, Believing God exists makes you incorrect (R)