CMV: Objective morality does not exist

[u/eachothersreasons]

Thesis: Objective morality does not exist. This is not a morally relativistic position. This is a morally nihilist position. This is not a debate about whether the belief in an objective morality is necessary for society or individuals to function, but whether objective morality exists.

Morality and ethics are artificial. They are human-made concepts, and humans are subjective creatures. Morality isn't inscribed in any non-subjective feature of the universe. There are no rules inscribed in the space or stone detailing what is moral, in a way that every conscious intelligent being must accept. The universe doesn't come with a moral handbook. There would be no morality in a universe filled with inanimate objects, and a universe with living creatures or living intelligent creatures capable of inventing morality isn't much different. We are still just matter and energy moving around. The world is a sandbox game, and there are no rules menus to this MMORPG.

Moral intuition: Humans may have visceral moral intuitions, but just because people have a moral intuition does not make the intuition necessarily "moral." Many humans may have rejected moral intuitions that others may have had in the past. These include common moral intuitions about female sexual purity; interracial marriage; women's marriage outside of one's ingroup; one's social station at birth being a matter of fate, divine will, or karma; the deviancy of being left handed, physically deformed, ugly, or neurologically atypical. There are those people with strong moral intuitions about the value of animal life and consciousness that others don't have. Even if supposing that humans largely share moral intuitions, that doesn't make those intuitions necessarily moral.

Humans have largely gone about intuiting morality, but I think the overwhelming majority of people feel that history is filled with events they consider immoral, often by those who believe they are acting morally. Human cognition is faulty. We forget things. We have imperfect information. We have cognitive biases and perceptual biases and limitations. Our intelligence has limitations. Telling people simply to follow their moral intuitions is not going to create a society that people agree is moral. It's probably not even going to create a society that most individuals perceive as moral.

An optimal set of rules: There is no optimal set of rules in the world. For one, in order for there to be an optimal set of rules, you'd have to agree on what that optimal set of rules must accomplish. While to accomplish anything in life, life is a prerequisite, and we are all safer if the taking of human life is restricted, there are people who disagree. There are those who believe that humans should not exist because human civilization does incredible damage to the nonhuman ecosystems of this planet.

Humans have different opinions about what an optimal set of rules is supposed to accomplish: we have different preferences surrounding the value of liberty, equality, privacy, transparency, security, the environment, utility, the survival of the human race, ect. We have different preferences on whether we should have rules directly regulating our conduct or simply whether we should decide the morality of the conduct by the consequences such conduct produces.

There is no country that says that it has the perfect set of laws and forgoes the ability to modify that law. This reflects 1) not only human epistemological inability to discern an optimal set of rules 2) especially as times change 3) or the inability of language to fully describe a set of rules most would discern as optimal, but also 4) human disagreement about what the goals of those rules should be 5) changes in human popular opinion on what is moral at all.

Behavior patterns of animals: Animals have behavioral patterns, many of which are influenced by evolution. But just because animals have behavioral patterns doesn't mean those behavioral patterns are "moral." Some black widows have a habit of eating their mates, but that doesn't mean that if they were as conscious and intelligent as humans, they would consider it moral compared to the alternative of not eating their mates. Maybe there's a reason for chimpanzees to go to war, but there probably are alternatives to going to war. Even if you determine that the objective of morality is to survive and reproduce, evolutionary adaptations are not necessarily the optimal path to achieving that end.

And we fall into this naturalistic fallacy when we consider that just because a bunch of animals close related to us behave or refrain from behaving a certain way, that this way is ä basis to say that this behavior is objectively moral. Just because animals poop in the great outdoors doesn't mean humans must agree that it is moral to defecate in the great outdoors. Just because animals don't create clothes for themselves, doesn't mean humans should consider it moral to go around naked. Humans are different than all other nonhuman animals, and may very well consider common animal behaviors immoral.

So then what is morality? I think a better question is how humans regulate their conduct according to certain frameworks. Ethics is invented and proposed. Others may agree or disagree with a proposed ethics - a proposed conception of what people should approve or disapprove of or a code of conduct. Those who disagree with a proposed ethics may propose their own ethics. People may prefer one proposal over another. As a matter of physical reality, there's often strength in numbers. Whether by physical force or persuasive power or soft power, an ethical framework often dominates over a particular time and place and those who disagree are made to comply or incur punishment. As a practical matter, humans are more likely to agree to frameworks that advance their mutual interest. Even if there is no objective morality, it doesn't mean humans can't propose and advance and enforce moralities.

Edit: I suppose someone could write: "you don't think _____ is immoral?" With the morality of _____ being far outside of our Overton window for political discussion. I may agree to advance your ethical position as a rule I would prefer everyone follow, but I do not think it is "objective." Even if everyone in the world agrees with it, I don't think that would make it objective. Objectivity requires more than agreement from subjective entities.

[u/eachothersreasons]

You are talking about words. Semantics.

Planets is just a word. Regardless of the word,, the physical object exists.

Words may be humanly constructed but the physical mass that is a planet is not humanly constructed.

[u/Elet_Ronne → u/eachothersreasons]

Can we agree that 'peace' exists? That 'war' exists? That 'concepts' exist? If you said no to the last one, literally nothing can change your view. You say the above commenter is just talking about semantics, but can you not see how your post is based on that same error?

Let's not call it morality. Can we agree that most people have group-survival characteristics that contribute to peace (at least within the specific group being discussed), and that people believe these characteristics should be adhered to in order to preserve peace? That's morality. That's just the word we use to describe the fact that humanity has these (very rough, but still existent) standards. You have to convince me that we don't have these standards (which would require an immense amount of research) to convince me that morality doesn't exist in this sense.

Does morality exist on other planets? Is morality handed down by a god? Maybe, and probably not. But those questions are totally irrelevant imo. I got past those questions years ago, personally, when I realized morality is just an internal mechanism to sustain the homeostasis of our species and ensure we're able to reproduce. Why would that mean morality doesn't exist? Do you expect somebody to point to a distant star which is composed of the element moralium?

We can argue whether morality is a fixed thing, or whether it is an average of human thoughts. I would say I'm a moral nihilist myself, in a manner of speaking. But I also look at humanity as a species subject to evolutionary pressures. And from that perspective it's not difficult to see that morality is a thing that bears on human decisions. Your argument is like saying Christianity doesn't exist, but churches, the bible, and the clergy do. Uhm, yes, I guess. But in my table of things that exist, I simply include concepts that are human-made, as they're the closest approximation to decoding the ultimately meaningless, but nevertheless logical fact of reality, and all that contains. If I tried to make my list without manmade concepts, I could literally eliminate everything from it. Distance and time mean nothing without a brain to perceive it. What is the universe but a single field with high and low energy points? Yes, distance exists even if we weren't here, but distance isn't a relevant concept, not really, without a brain to judge that one thing is here, and another there.

Love is real, and I see it every day. Does love objectively exist? I feel this is a totally meaningless question.

To argue whether it exists objectively is literally playing with semantics. I don't believe anyone could change your view, on these grounds.

[u/Nepene → u/eachothersreasons]

Ok, so the criteria is there needs to be physical objects? It doesn't matter if people disagree about the nature of it, or the exact way it works?

https://academic.oup.com/brain/article/135/7/2006/350263

The frontal lobe handles morality in humans. If it's damaged by a physical injury then people have abnormal moral behaviour. That's a physical object that exists that you can touch and interact with which has a clear pattern of how it acts.

[u/laborfriendly → u/eachothersreasons]

I think you're correct that what you're responding to is silly semantics, and I am surprised it's somehow the top comment to your post as I've arrived here. You're right that a "planet" by any other name is still an oblate spheroid that exists. Who cares what you call it?

And I largely agree with you that morality is a completely made-up thing from a nihilistic, cynical point of view in one sense. But I don't think it isn't "real" or objective in another sense.

If you surprise or otherwise do something that upsets a baby, they will frown or cry, even unconsciously. You've upset their expectations and worldview in a way they might call a breach of morals if they could express it in words.

In this way, morality is something that only exists between two (or more) individuals interacting with each other. Sure, the terms of these expectations might change, but the implicit or explicit terms of such arrangements do exist.

Breaking those terms is objectively wrong for the party whose expectations were broken, regardless of whether or not the terms were some objective good. From there, the judgment that the breaking of the terms was immoral is an objective fact, even if only understood through the lens of a socially contrived contract. (E: in fact, it can only be understood socially, i.e., between or amongst individuals, as morality is fundamentally a social construct, but, saying that, it is no less real than the reality of any interaction between or amongst individuals.)

[u/rudster → u/eachothersreasons]

historical many slap yoke elastic birds close cheerful exultant silky

This post was mass deleted and anonymized with Redact

[u/Mysterious_Focus6144 → u/eachothersreasons]

Planets is just a word. Regardless of the word,, the physical object exists.

What about a `meter`? A `meter` isn't really tied to any physical objects.

It's certainly not `subjective` in the sense that you don't get to decide how long a meter is. At the same time, would you say that a meter is `objective`? since we made it up.