No, It hasn't been answered. The only answer you provided was that you can't provide an answer. Nobody has accounted for anything.

Putin said: "Are any of the moral objectivists ever going to produce an account of why moral standardsgh are so varied across time & space, or are we going to get nothing but complaints about scientific and natural selection based explanations because they don't comport with your preconceived narratives, all while whining about 'biased' scientists? I guess by "biased" you mean not sufficiently dismissive of any adaptive explanation."

Indeed. Moral standards being varied across time and space *are predicted* by ideas of natural selection of memes... On the other hand, those that propose that God gave us absolute moral standards can only suggest that moral standards being different across time and space to be due to other - additional - factors (such as God changing his mind between the OT and NT). i.e. their model is more complicated and their complications have no evidence to support them.

gregoire said: "putin, that question has already been answered - language, psychology, politics, social custom, etc."

I haven't seen an answer... unless you call general vague hand waving about divine inspiration being an answer.

Also I would like to ask - are there objective aesthetic values too? Presumably every matter of taste has some kind of objective standard based on 'divine inspiration'. God didn't like figs or meat from camels (which is particularly obnoxious to people living in harsh climates who depend on camel meat for survival), I guess that's an objective aesthetic value, right?

putin, that is because you don't like the answer. you say, "define your concept in the following terms" - the very terms you use to reject said concept. every time the answer "the terms you asking for are irrelevant to the concept in the first place," you poohpooh that you don't like the answer.

an illustrative metaphor is color. some cultures do not distinguish black and blue. others do not distinguish green and blue. nevertheless, all cultures are describing the same thing. the terms people use to describe what they come to know may vary and sometimes dramatically. there will of course be variety in descriptions of things that people know, even if the object of description is the same.

another example can be found on the individual level. ask two people to observe some scene. because each person has his own set of psychological commitments, each will notice, recollect and report a different version.

this really isn't that hard to grasp. moral universalism is described here as structurally empty, and so of course when it is filled in by all the various moral codes or commandments, there will be differences. that is because, again, a moral universal is explicitly something that captures the totality of circumstances, yet we can only communicate things partially - you can only communicate a part of that broader universal. this is a very standard and well known philosophic problem. you say, 'nobody has accounted for anything' but 'an account' of something is by definition a finite account, a limited set, an enumeration of a partial, *particular* thing. you are really asking for us to resolve this deadlock, but when we turn back and say, no, it IS a deadlock, how about YOU resolve it, you say we aren't engaging. in fact, you are simply not addressing the knotty core which is at the center of this debate. instead, you just bang your shoe on the table.

@fulhamish,
One other thing... you posted a while back in this thread about Dawkin's idea of memes being somehow proven invalid because of the theorizing by a writer in the Journal of Memetics and the failure of the journal as he predicted. This is Cherry Picking at its best. Not to mention that it is ironic for you to use the exaggerated report of the death of the meme as somehow proof that memes don't exist... being that you need the idea of memes to even supply the (circular) logic you employ in this case. i.e. If a meme doesn't exist, how can it die? ...and how does its death prove anything about its adaptive utility if such adaptive utility doesn't exist in the world of ideas?

Besides, even if the writers "terms" he had proposed were appropriate and reasonable... just as the death of democracy in the Roman Republic did not spell the end of democracy forever (nor did it prove democracy as inferior), the death of a journal on memes - or even the death of the idea of memes for some period of time, does not necessarily mean that the idea is invalid.

Did you know that the steam engine was first conceived of in Ancient Greece? And that a primitive steam engine was built by Hero of Alexandria? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aeolipile
No one built another (and the concept was largely lost) for another 1500 years. Was the idea proven invalid by its failure to take off in Ancient Greece? I think not.

Continental drift was first proposed over 400 years ago (by a cartographer noticing the good fit between the new world continents and Africa and Europe)... again proposed and some evidence laid out a century ago by a geologist... and it still didn't take off until the late 1960s when considerably more evidence was brought to bear.

going another route, we could use godel's theorem again to say that morality is objective and total, if you'd like. that theorem shows us a set of information will either be incomplete, or internally inconsistent. so, we can go both ways on this. we can say, morality is objective and complete *as communicated* in the various moral and cultural traditions, but therefore it is incomplete. alternatively, we can say, morality is objective but incomplete, and thus we have yet to get to the further terms which would resolve the contradictions that you point out. fwiw i'm more just throwing this out there, because it is similar to the arguments i am making, and i don't stand by this statement as anything other than a playful metaphor.

But your analogy fails. Differences are not simply a matter of two cultures describing the same color as blue & green. Cultures are describing different ideas entirely. Norms are completely at logger heads in a form of dialectical battle both internally and between cultures. This isn't simply a matter of translation difficulties.

""the terms you asking for are irrelevant to the concept in the first place," you poohpooh that you don't like the answer. "

No, I criticize the fact that you define terms in ways that nobody else uses, and not only that but you won't even bother to define the terms that you are using. We cannot even communicate if you're unwilling to do this. It has nothing to do with me not liking the answer, because you haven't bothered to provide one because you insist we cannot communicate.

"moral universalism is described here as structurally empty"

Yes it is hard to grasp because this phrase is meaningless to me. What do you mean 'structurally empty'? Or do you insist philosophical discussions have to be as opaque and wordy as possible?

@gregoire,
I follow much of what you're saying and agree that taking an a full account of an infinite is in a sense impossible. But - certainly, should such an infinite set of universal morals exist, one would expect that, at the least, its components would not directly contradict each other. One can appreciate that there is an infinite quantity of numbers... but one does not find that 2+2=4 sometimes and that sometimes it equals 5. Of course one can simply say (as you appear to) that such a contradiction is an illusion because we are finite beings and thus incapable of seeing the deeper truth that pervades both 2+2=4 and 2+2=5... but that simply is a kind of special pleading.

Further, one can have an infinite set, but still be able to deduce some basic properties - which we could then be sure that all members of that set would have... Do you suggest any basic properties that these moral codes would all have - being that they are subsets of the larger universal code?

"we can say, morality is objective and complete *as communicated* in the various moral and cultural traditions, but therefore it is incomplete"

And how are to understand that this theorem was actually meant to be applied to human beings? It was meant to be applied to consistent systems. The whole issue is that human minds are not consistent, they are not machines.

Seems like theists have to complexify very simple codes of social behavior. I don't see why they're making this so complicated. Codes exist because they aid in overall survivability of the particular society they govern. Harsher codes exist in harsh climates. Liberal codes exist in climates which are immune from certain pressures. It is no coincidence that liberal democracy and voluntary militaries began to flourish in the islands of Great Britain, while the centrally located land masses of Germany were subjected to conscription and more absolutist monarchies. Hierarchical codes exist in agricultural, land tenure communities where hierarchy is possible. Egalitarian codes exist in pastoralist communities where land ownership didn't really exist.

'fwiw i'm more just throwing this out there, because it is similar to the arguments i am making, and i don't stand by this statement as anything other than a playful metaphor.'

i really can't see how you don't stand by your statement, you've used Gödel's incompleteness theorem several times in your arguement, thus you must agree with it's logic and applicability in this debate.

Hence you have demonstrated that by Gödel's theorem, Universal morality is either incomplete OR self-contradictory. Either of which are fine, if you're happy living in a world where some things are definitely Good, others are definitely Evil, and still others are definitely not covered by definition.

Or in the alternative view that some things are merely Good and Evil depending on what point of view you are taking (or perhaps which rules you read first... - here it doesn't matter that another rule contradicts because once i found an answer I stopped looking at the rules...)

Neither is particularly problematic for me, but then I don't associate the concept of a perfect God with morality...

putin, it’s not necessarily true that different culture’s moral codes are describing different ideas entirely. for example, one religion may mandate multiple wives, and another may forbid it. both are nevertheless communicating the importance of forming a family unit, whether for propogation of mankind, or compansionship, or the appropriate rearing of the next generation – that there is some family and marriage ideal. one religion may forbid homosexuality, another may celebrate same sex rituals. both are communicating the importance of the sexual connection, which is again, an ideal. that importance of family, or sexual connection, is the thing we can’t really pin down with a single statement, the kind you are looking for when you think of a universal moral.

and while you may say that i am being overly general or something along those lines, that is because you are already predisposed against me and you do not even seem to try to comprehend where i am coming from on this. where i am coming from is that a universal moral is something that resonates, something that our faculties of perception cannot lock in, but which we can catch glimpses of.

when we catch those glimpses, whether in a moment of inspiration or revelation or whatnot, yes, people try to capture them, write them down, and share them – and that is precisely where the political or social conditions come in, where psychological commitments define that elusive vision in concrete language. it is at this point of trying to capture that which cannot really be fully articulated, where things get skewed – but that is how it goes with anything, that is just a feature process of perception, the particular stain we each have individually which colors our understanding of our experience – even concrete and factual occurances. that is how you can get different and even contradictory iterations of what i am saying is this universal thing.

now you may say that i am defining terms in ways that nobody else uses, but that is really an inappropriate criticism. everyone uses terms at least slightly differently, and my approach to this is rather in the mainstream, drawn from debates in the antiquities over Idealism, kant’s critique and the subsequent emergence of 19th century german idealism, as well as the concepts of literary and philosophic romanticism. it is an approach which directly draws on marx’s marxism, and then onward from there to many varieties of 20th century cultural engagements, including linguistic criticism, psychoanalysis, modernism, deconstruction and post modernism, and yes, atonal music and nonrepresentational art. and of particular relevance to the terminology i am using is the world’ foremost communist, mr. zizek, so i would hope that there is some common background for this discussion through his works. to be clear i am not saying that any one of these will draw the conclusions in the same terms that i am but that these discussions all relate to and draw on one another and far from communicating in terms that nobody is using, it is a pretty mainstream definition of universalism that i am using, in this discussion.

and further, i am *not* insisting we cannot communicate, far from it. i am saying that, that many people have argued over this very topic throughout the ages and that your position vs. my position is a very longstanding impasse. that is because your framework has limitations which prevent it from discounting my framework, and my framework cannot be communicated in your terms for related reasons – reasons which are an actual intellectual quandary.

for example, consider this notion of structurally empty. that means a universal category is a like an actual thing, and it has a resonance, and we can partially point to it, we can kind of feel it out, but we cannot fill that structural space with some firm statement like “this is what it is.” that is because, when you say, “this thing is X,” X is a component, it is partial, situated, specific, and contextual to the conditions under which that particular property X can be named. whereas, a universal cannot be some partial thing because by definition it is the all of a matter, it is, like the universe itself, *infinite* - if you could say “the ALL of something is X” it is no longer the all of it, but just another component. i can imagine your objection, “well of course we can say the all of something is X, it is just this, an ant is an ant (or maybe…A=A…nvm that) – but you must realize that is not really the whole picture. you can say, an ant has these biological conditions, or even a specific ant is right over there in a measurable point in space and time…but ultimately there is much more. It’s going to sound ridiculous but it is part of the picture – why is the ant what it is? what is the experience of an ant? etc., questions which may sound ridiculous, because you will say, well we have hard sciences to measure and understand material properties – but once again, these are an incomplete picture – which is why there is no theory of everything.

and putin, with respect to godel, i am again only playfully thinking out loud in this application (whereas i certainly stand behind my use of godel to argue that hard sciences, rationality, evidence, logic, etc., have internal limitations to their application and operation in discourse. but as i am thinking out loud, godel himself comments on the applicability of this logic to other systems beyond the direct content of his proof. feel free to read up on that…certainly, if you are saying, “these moral codes are contradictory,” you can clearly apply formal logic to evaluate the moral codes as systems and the contracictory terms can be assigned formal units of meaning. if that weren’t so, formal logic itself would be suspect which i am sure you agree is a bridge too far.

orthaic, my earlier references to godel’s theorems were much more narrowly tailored. I certainly feel comfortable saying that godel’s theorems mean that an evidence-based or logic-based approach is structurally limited from being either complete (so that there are things which can be, that cannot be demonstrated by evidence or expressed) OR that it is possible that these can capture everything in existence in logical terms or by way of material proof, but then the result is internally incoherent. i think this is a strong indict of a strictly materialist worldview, and one which is in line with kant’s arguments on the same subject.

in the case of actually applying the theorems to evaluate whether such a thing as “universal morality” exists, i am sort of thinking out loud and somewhat lightheartedly. yes, you are right, you can be lead to the point which is effectively a relativist conclusion (at least in practice, as the conceptual framework is universalist). but there is another conclusion one can draw at this same point i am speaking from – one taken up by zizek. and that is precisely the absolutist impulse – for example, zizek, from my understanding, reaches this point and says, “thus, we cannot wait for the right conditions or information or consciousness of the masses – the very fact of this uncertainty means we should directly impose this universal morality as a political mandate.” zizek praises stalin, not for the murderous effect, but for the political will to directly realize this vision. for obvious reasons i am not comfortable with that conclusion, but then again, it seems like this is a classic dialectic of liberality and absolutism. each are, as i see it, universalist.

dexter, perhaps another thought on this simple addition question is what is being counted. 2 apples and 2 apples is four applies, a nice treat. 2 semiautomatics and 2 semiautomatics is four semiautomatics, a small militia. i hope you can see how this is relevant, that the existence of a universal set can be approached by differing orienations and to different ends – bounty in the former, plunder in the latter.

as for basic properties that these moral codes have, i would back up a bit and say that the infinite set itself is this unversal morality, which rather than being precisely name-able, in fact resonates. your mystics, your prophets will feel the energy or see the vision, as it were, and then the basic property of this universal morality is that people sense it and then try to formalize it as a moral code. the moral code, i am saying, is not the moral universality, it is derivative of it, it is generated by it.

"there is another conclusion one can draw at this same point i am speaking from – one taken up by zizek. and that is precisely the absolutist impulse"

You can tell me that Zizek came to another conclusion, and even what the conclusion was, but if you fail to tell me how he came to it i'm not even close to being informed, I've no idea how you jumped from point A about the incompleteness of a system of formal systems, to something Zizek said...

Please actually make the arguement instead of merely telling me that it exists.

i have described it throughout this thread, i think it's only fair to me that my arguments are cumulative such that i don't need to repeat previously articulated statements again.

zizek's point is that, we don't have perfect guarantee over our knowledge, we cannot be absolutely certain in empirical, or more precisely materialist terms, of the conditions necessary for communism (i'm summarizing here - the idea of the historical inevitability of communism as a scientific proposition, which is what marx said it was, an inevitability one can materially determine by a dialectical analysis of history). thus, to make a political stance is always going to be an absolutist proposition as it is cast against a background of uncertainty and there is no truly conceptually coherent case for that proposition. thus, you take a forceful action, you directly impose your vision of society - that is what he says is the genuine ethical, political act.

in contrast, i make what i hope is a more gentle and amenable claim. the limits of our ability to rely on reason, logic, evidence, etc., mean that we cannot discount the supernatural, the universal, the divine, revelatory truths. while the limits of our capacity to know things through our usual formats do not *require* these truths, they open up a gap in our ability to comprehend ourselves and our world, and one may take a leap across that gap.

again, zizek says, we can use that gap to be far more forceful. in a way, it is similar to the bush administration, in their view that "we create reality."

"for example, one religion may mandate multiple wives, and another may forbid it. both are nevertheless communicating the importance of forming a family unit, whether for propogation of mankind, or compansionship, or the appropriate rearing of the next generation – that there is some family and marriage ideal."

To claim that a society that sanctions polygamy vs a sanction that thinks it is immoral share the same moral values is to render 'sharing the same moral values' meaningless. I get that you're trying to stretch definitions and meanings to be so broad that your argument of universalism cannot possibly be undermined, so it is sufficient for you that two societies concern themselves at all with the question of marriage and you'll take that to mean they have the same values.

"that is because you are already predisposed against me and you do not even seem to try to comprehend where i am coming from on this. where i am coming from is that a universal moral is something that resonates, something that our faculties of perception cannot lock in, but which we can catch glimpses of. "

No, I am not predisposed against you. You're the one who began with the nasty personal attacks. You're just looking for any excuse not to be held accountable for your assertions. So the excuse now is that I'm just not listening to you, when actually I've been quite patient despite the opaque language you use, and your tendency to be condescending rather than enlightening about your own position. You do not provide any information as to how we know we're catching glimpses when we're catching glimpses, but then again you have over and over again avoided any question of epistemology. It sounds like a verbose version of the pornography argument "I know it when I see it". Ironic that a moral universalist argument relies on subjective revelation as a basis of support.

"that is how you can get different and even contradictory iterations of what i am saying is this universal thing."

I still am at a loss as to how you can claim there is universalism at all. Your whole scheme is very complicated. I guess the only way to rescue universalism is to describe this very complicated "it's there but there are terrible mistranslations and miscommunications", based on nothing except this idea of subjective revelation of moral universals. If we cannot even communicate, for example, the idea that the golden rule is a universal value, and this communication is made difficult due to language, culture & psychology, then what is the point of even claiming there is moral universalism? It seems that even if moral universalism somehow existed as some entity to be discovered out there, in practice it is irrelevant. It's much like the Deist argument that oh yes god exists, he just doesn't do anything and doesn't particularly care about the universe so it looks like he doesn't. Well then what is the point of saying a god exists?

" everyone uses terms at least slightly differently"

Not fundamentally differently. Once again you're pretending as if the miscommunication is you describing something as blue and me green, when really you're describing something as an ant and I'm describing it as an elephant. There's this tendency of philosophy students to hide behind opaque language and talk past people instead of actually engage. It's not helpful and not enlightening.

"i am using is the world’ foremost communist, mr. zizek, so i would hope that there is some common background for this discussion through his works."

Zizek is the world's foremost charlatan. No serious communist considers him to be anything more than than an opportunist seeking attention. In actual practice Zizek's political positions are more in line with rightwingers here than my own. But he does have a knack for speaking in a very disorganized way and moving from topic to topic, so I suppose you two have that in common.

"which prevent it from discounting my framework, and my framework cannot be communicated in your terms for related reasons"

Then why do you reject the claim that we cannot communicate? If we're at such a 200 year impasse because of communication difficulties, then why do you insist we can still communicate?

"for example, consider this notion of structurally empty. that means a universal category is a like an actual thing, and it has a resonance, and we can partially point to it, we can kind of feel it out, but we cannot fill that structural space with some firm statement like “this is what it is.”

The basic question which I keep asking and which no answer is provided is: How do you know that a universal category exists *at all* considering we cannot comprehend them as universals? Maybe people are just deluding themselves to thinking some moral universal exists when it doesn't, since functionally and practically it doesn't anyway.

"but ultimately there is much more."

*How* *Do* *You* *Know* *That*!!!!

You are claiming to know things you have no basis to claiming to know. Why are you so enlightened about the existence of these universals and I am not? What is your method of knowing this secret information?

BTW, one of the main reasons why I think Zizek being the "world's foremost communist" is a big joke is because he spent the years when socialism existed pushing for its overthrow. He was a leader of the anti-communist opposition in Slovenia, and is *still* a member of the very political party that completely privatized the economy there, including stealing many people's bank accounts via the Bank of Slovenia privatization. But when communism existed he could be a relevant rebel getting attention by being an anti-communist, and now that the socialist states have largely been overthrown he can only be an incendiary attention-getter by claiming to be a "Maoist" or whatever the heck he claims now. In actual practice he gives no aid to any movement anywhere. Actually as I said before he does lend his support to a movement, the Slovene neoliberals.

Putin33 said: "Ironic that a moral universalist argument relies on subjective revelation as a basis of support."

And isn't that all too commonly the way it is? If one relies on objective evidence they inevitably must conclude that there is no support for a universalist view... And so a universalist must depend on subjective revelation because that's the only thing they have. Indeed, they'll even talk up such revelation as if it is a higher, more sure, more pure way of Knowing.

Putin33 also said:
"I still am at a loss as to how you can claim there is universalism at all. Your whole scheme is very complicated. I guess the only way to rescue universalism is to describe this very complicated "it's there but there are terrible mistranslations and miscommunications", based on nothing except this idea of subjective revelation of moral universals. If we cannot even communicate, for example, the idea that the golden rule is a universal value, and this communication is made difficult due to language, culture & psychology, then what is the point of even claiming there is moral universalism? It seems that even if moral universalism somehow existed as some entity to be discovered out there, in practice it is irrelevant. It's much like the Deist argument that oh yes god exists, he just doesn't do anything and doesn't particularly care about the universe so it looks like he doesn't. Well then what is the point of saying a god exists?"

+1 for that.

gregoire said:
"as for basic properties that these moral codes have, i would back up a bit and say that the infinite set itself is this unversal morality, which rather than being precisely name-able, in fact resonates. your mystics, your prophets will feel the energy or see the vision, as it were, and then the basic property of this universal morality is that people sense it and then try to formalize it as a moral code. the moral code, i am saying, is not the moral universality, it is derivative of it, it is generated by it."

"resonates" "mystics" and "prophets" "feel the energy" "see the vision"
Sounds sort of Ouija board-ish, to me.

But beyond that... if this is nothing more than a vague sense or a resonation then isn't just kind of like saying it felt good... or it hit a sweet spot... or it was a hunger... or it was attractive... <---Each of these being states that are readily causable and wholly associated with the release of hormones, the connection with behaviors and environmental/social situations of import... things that are emotive simply because living things like to thrive and these things are connected to thriving ...and are subjective simply because of the differences in strategies of how to thrive (think back to cattle vs. penguin example) and personal habits and such (that may not have adaptive value - but are simply unique variations in individuals). Now granted I'm waving my arms around on this... but I am anchored in regards to the natural selection end of things... where I'm hypothesizing is in regards to beauty (and similar claimed universals). i.e. I can reasonably plug these emotions into connections associated with living things liking what they like because they wish to thrive and things like a delicious fruit, a sunny day, and a healthy mate, are just right up that alley. I'm assuming that you find such connections either insufficient or lacking in poetry and perfection - and thus connect it to an ideal that is otherwise completely unobserved and mysterious.

I'm rambling a bit here... but I guess I can end with a question --> What, if anything, makes your "energy" any different than an emotion - a powerful intoxicating emotion?

Talking about energies without defining what it is your are actually describing... you might as well be a Scientologist talking about "clearing" or a yoga practitioner talking about "chakras" or a homeopathy practitioner talking "perfectly diluted" solutions having somehow water that has "memory". Mumbo jumbo.

One has to remember that the placebo effect is strong... and that painkilling can be dramatic simply because expect it to be and essentially order our body to make it so. Similarly with hypnosis. However, such effects are easily explained by reactions in the body and mind and don't require magic or outside forces to make it happen. The fact that some experience seemingly transcendent emotional experiences when meditating or climbing a mountain or making love or appreciating a beautiful piece of music - is, I would argue, sufficiently explained by chemical reactions in the body encouraged by instinctual and socialized motivations to be attracted to and enjoy things that are good for one's well being and to be similarly turned-off by things that are bad for one's well being. To conclude that it is more than that, is, I believe, currently unsupported. (And this is not to downplay such experiences - they are still breathtaking and moving... just internal).

while it is unlikely that I can turn to this fully until Monday, I make one note now. This is not some two hundred year problem, between a strident materialism and opaque idealism. It goes is a discussion thousands of years in the make. And as to whether my opinion really empowers radically subjective whims rather than more broadly agreeable truths, i refer to the words of plato - "those who seek the absolute and eternal and immutable may be said to have real knowledge and not mere opinion." keep in mind that for Plato, only these universal ideals are substantially real.

Plato wrote clearly. I wish modern philosophy types would follow his example. All I want is an answer as to how you know there are universal morals.

How many times do I have to say its taken on faith? I must have stated that at least a half a dozen times already. What you mean to ask is not how, but why

Fine then, why? And why should anybody be persuaded by faith-based assertions of moral universalism?

I'm not saying you should be persuaded - I am saying you can't discount it from a materialist perspective. the question asked was, are they relative or universal - and I articulated the underlying concepts of universalism. I'm saying, there is a space for universalism, and here is how it functions. I am not saying you have to accept my perspective.

"Plato wrote clearly..."
Lol. I don't want to offend anyone, but 99% of the time when I someone quotes Plato or Kant or Hume etc it is nearly always followed by total bullshit (or at least what sounds like bullshit to my uneducated ears).
The biggest load of crap is when people try to deny causation or induction or knowledge itself as a way of somehow proving their crackpot ideas.
But then again what I do know? Its all in good fun :-)

typo... what do I know?

One question, and please excuse me if this has already been covered: what do we mean by "universal morals" - is it morals where all human beings agree. For example if all human beings agreed that infanticide was okay - would that be universal. Or do we mean an external arbiter who is absolutely right? Or reason itself?

"I don't want to offend anyone, but 99% of the time when I someone quotes Plato or Kant or Hume etc it is nearly always followed by total bullshit (or at least what sounds like bullshit to my uneducated ears).
The biggest load of crap is when people try to deny causation or induction or knowledge itself as a way of somehow proving their crackpot ideas."

+1 Spyman