Moral epistemology and moral ontology

[Xant]

You do not ask that question.

[Xant]

This thread is now more relevant than it ever was.

[pogosan]

[Xant]

So Hitler was just breaking some social norms, nothing to it?

[Tibe]

Quite possible one day the majority will think that.

[Xant]

So I suppose you think that "fairness" is also just an abstract notion with no basis in anything, a mere social construct?

[Tibe]

Eh what now?...I didnt read everything in here.

Ofcourse fairness has a basis. It adapts, (in its general mind)learning from past events. Just like everything else in a society.

[pogosan]

[Xant]

No, it doesn't "adapt." It refers to a concept that doesn't change. If three people bake a cake, all doing equally much, in no human society will it be considered fair to give Billy two thirds of the cake. Now, in the past, or in the future.

The notion that morals are just a social construct is absurd. Does a blank slate human have a preference for other people suffering or for other people not suffering? Does he prefer for babies to die or for babies to live? Would Gandhi take a pill that makes him want to murder?

[Christo]

Would Gandhi take a pill that makes him want to murder?

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[Kalam]

The question you have to ask, Xant, is...does reality care?

[Tibe]

No, it doesn't "adapt." It refers to a concept that doesn't change. If three people bake a cake, all doing equally much, in no human society will it be considered fair to give Billy two thirds of the cake. Now, in the past, or in the future.

What. Are you deliberatetly trying to get me hooked on replying to your stuff? Ofcourse it was. In the past, the concept was that if Billy was a son of a highborn, he had the legimate right to have 2 thirds of the pie if he wants, even if the bakers got nothing in return for it. And the baker thought that the only part about this being unfair was that he wasnt born a highborn.  "I give you pies I worked for so long, you dont burn my house down". Fair enough m8.

[Christo]

You are indeed hooked on replying to his stuff.

[Xant]

The question you have to ask, Xant, is...does reality care?

Do I care if reality cares? The answer is no.

What. Are you deliberatetly trying to get me hooked on replying to your stuff? Ofcourse it was. In the past, the concept was that if Billy was a son of a highborn, he had the legimate right to have 2 thirds of the pie if he wants, even if the bakers got nothing in return for it. And the baker thought that the only part about this being unfair was that he wasnt born a highborn.  "I give you pies I worked for so long, you dont burn my house down". Fair enough m8.

Why are you inserting these "what-ifs" into the question when they were never there? If it was not stated that Billy is a highborn, then he is not. I didn't think I'd need ten thousand disclaimers, but here it is, then: assume that the three are of the same status, they have all done as much, there are no special circumstances, that the three are for all intents and purposes equal.

[Kafein]

The universe doesn't care. Morality is only a human construct that we can't even get straight ourselves as soon as a situation starts becoming a little bit complicated. And ultimately it doesn't even matter in human affairs. What matters is what people do and how people react to what other people do, and the core foundations of that have been established through thousands of years of cultural and biological evolution. What we get looks like objective morality because successful evolution in that area is very convergent.