The Future of Moral Science

[Tommy Jeppesen]

...

Yes, you can arbitrarily define any goal. But as I said above, first biology gives us a certain goal that we carry a torch for willy-nilly, and then ethics and morality (guided by spiritual experience) build on that, branch out beyond that initial seed and take it to its ultimate logical conclusion. Morality evolves, freedom (as Dennett felicitously put it) evolves.

...

What do you mean by spiritual experience?

BTW I learned to understand your thinking by asking more questions and that allows me to consider my own thinking, so I do learn in some sense from your answer.

 

[Meed]

Why do we have to be "morally opposed to slavery" why not just "opposed to slavery"?

We don't have to be. That's why a qualifier is being used. One could be morally opposed to slavery or one could be opposed to slavery on purely pragmatic grounds without believing that there is anything immoral/unjust about it in principle. The latter wouldn't really be relevant to the topic of the thread.

 

[angrysoba]

We don't have to be. That's why a qualifier is being used. One could be morally opposed to slavery or one could be opposed to slavery on purely pragmatic grounds without believing that there is anything immoral/unjust about it in principle. The latter wouldn't really be relevant to the topic of the thread.

Yes, Adam Smith made an argument against slavery on economic grounds, assuming that it was inefficient to own slaves.

I sometimes think that a lot of utilitarian arguments amount to something similar to this. For example, we have seen some people arguing that corporal punishment is not a good idea because it is ineffective. Other people argue that torture is wrong because it only ever results in bad information. Still others say that gay marriage and adoption is acceptable because it doesn't lead to their children having a higher likelihood of becoming gay themselves.

All of these things may indeed be open to empirical enquiry (in principle if not always in practice), but they hardly sound like "moral" arguments so much as practical problems.

But it is for those advocates of a science of morality to explain how to demonstrate that these are moral and not simply practical questions and that normative morality can derive from science.

So far I have not seen any coherent argument.

 

[angrysoba]

Yet again you limit Harris’ argument to pure science when he has specifically said that “no branch of science can derive its judgments solely from scientific descriptions of the world” as has been quoted before but you deliberately, it seems, choose to ignore.

Science derives its judgements from inferences drawn from the established facts of the natural world and the evolved instincts of social species, such as us, who are a part of this natural world.

This looks like a contradiction to me. The first quote suggests, as we have told you, that you cannot have a normative morality derived purely from science. Instead you need to form a moral axiom such as "you ought to maximize the well-being of conscious creatures" and from there determine how science can go about that. If you concede that then your evaluative premise is philosophical - end of story. If, on the other hand, you want to prove that this evaluative premise is derived from science then you have to prove it.

It seems the second quote contradicts Harris, or is at least inadequate for deriving a scientific morality. Yes, it derives judgements from the natural world, nobody denies this. But the evaluative premise in the argument is not derived from the natural world but is based on a conceptual argument: i.e philosophy.

Please answer my question: Is rape wrong. Why?

I think it is wrong, but I don't have to demonstrate that. You are the one making a big claim that we can derive morality from science so I would like an argument that demonstrates this.

 

[Tassman]

Addressed to cornsail:

Yes, Adam Smith made an argument against slavery on economic grounds, assuming that it was inefficient to own slaves.

I sometimes think that a lot of utilitarian arguments amount to something similar to this. For example, we have seen some people arguing that corporal punishment is not a good idea because it is ineffective. Other people argue that torture is wrong because it only ever results in bad information. Still others say that gay marriage and adoption is acceptable because it doesn't lead to their children having a higher likelihood of becoming gay themselves.

All of these things may indeed be open to empirical enquiry (in principle if not always in practice), but they hardly sound like "moral" arguments so much as practical problems.
But it is for those advocates of a science of morality to explain how to demonstrate that these are moral and not simply practical questions and that normative morality can derive from science.

But that’s all morality is, i.e. a practical code of conduct arising from a particular culture, philosophy, religion etc. Or do you consider “morality” is to be deduced from a standard set of principles you believe to be universal. Why would you believe this?

So far I have not seen any coherent argument.

And we have not seen one from you.

 

[Tassman]

This looks like a contradiction to me. The first quote suggests, as we have told you, that you cannot have a normative morality derived purely from science. Instead you need to form a moral axiom such as "you ought to maximize the well-being of conscious creatures" and from there determine how science can go about that. If you concede that then your evaluative premise is philosophical - end of story. If, on the other hand, you want to prove that this evaluative premise is derived from science then you have to prove it.

It seems the second quote contradicts Harris, or is at least inadequate for deriving a scientific morality. Yes, it derives judgements from the natural world, nobody denies this. But the evaluative premise in the argument is not derived from the natural world but is based on a conceptual argument: i.e philosophy.

While one cannot validity deduce a nominative argument from established scientific facts we can and do made valid inferences all the time based upon them. As for the second quote, such inferences can only be drawn from scientific facts because philosophy has no means of establishing a true premise from which to deduce a sound argument – as vividly, if unwittingly, demonstrated by Aristotle. Nearly every argument and conclusion he arrived at about physical science was wrong and misguided.

I think it is wrong, but I don't have to demonstrate that.

But you do have to demonstrate that. I don’t accept the unilateral role you've taken upon yourself to define this debate. A discussion is an exchange of ideas not a one-sided inquisition. So, again: Why do you think rape is wrong?

You are the one making a big claim that we can derive morality from science so I would like an argument that demonstrates this.

My position all along has not been so doctrinaire, as you well know. That said we do in fact derive morality from scientific facts, if not via deductive reasoning. But then, no discipline can do this, although you erroneously seem to think philosophy can. See above.

 

[Tommy Jeppesen]

Tassman, are these case scientific facts?

A group people can observe that I have written this:
"You, Tassman, are 9 feet tall."
Is it a scientific fact, that I wrote: "You, Tassman, are 9 feet tall."?
Is it a scientific fact, that you, Tassman, are 9 feet tall?

We can observe that you, Tassman, claim that ethics is to maximize the well-being of humans.
Is it a scientific fact, that you claim that "ethics is to maximize the well-being of humans."?
Is it a scientific fact, that ethics is to maximize the well-being of humans?

 

[angrysoba]

But that’s all morality is, i.e. a practical code of conduct arising from a particular culture, philosophy, religion etc. Or do you consider “morality” is to be deduced from a standard set of principles you believe to be universal. Why would you believe this?
.

No, this is yet another false dichotomy from you. An argument that Culture X says P is morally right, therefore P is morally right is fallacious. But it does not follow that the only alternative is universal morality. That's your belief anyway, backed up, so you say, by science yet never demonstrated.

 

[Tommy Jeppesen]

Hi Tassman

More

A is B and not C.
A is C and not B.

With logic we can know that at least one of them is false, but we can't know if the other is true. It means you can't with logic establish that one of them is true, only that one of them is false. You need another methodology to establish if any of them are true.

So:
Rape is right and not wrong.
Rape is wrong and not right.
How do you know, which one is true and a scientific fact?

 

[marplots]

So although there might be one best path (or several equal paths) to any given goal, I don't see that there would be one best path to a single best morality, without arbtrarily defining the goal and therefore morality. But maybe that's the point.

[pedant] Or no path at all. [/pedant]

 

[marplots]

n/a, I don't think time is the sort of thing that has a topology. You could say there's a best path (or bunch of closely-related best paths) from one particular specifiable state to some other specifiable state in the future, though.

My point about time was to show that the properties of a dimension decide the available paths and there may be no choice whatsoever.

"Best" implies two things:
1) A choice between options
2) An evaluation and ranking

Both of these require knowledge which may be unavailable to us. So, for example, in a situation where a path cannot be duplicated, how are to ever judge better or best? The experiment cannot be run.

That latter objection doesn't attack your logic, it merely points out the pragmatics of trying to bind reality to the logic offered up.

 

[angrysoba]

But that’s all morality is, i.e. a practical code of conduct arising from a particular culture, philosophy, religion etc.

Also, the conflation between practical problems and moral problems is ridiculous.

Surely if I want to boil an egg or screw in a lightbulb I can follow a particular method. This hardly means that there are moral ways of doing either thing.

 

[angrysoba]

While one cannot validity deduce a nominative argument from established scientific facts we can and do made valid inferences all the time based upon them.

Say again?! Are you conceding the argument by stealth? You were asked if science can be used to make normative moral arguments. You said "potentially yes". I say "no". Here it seems you are now saying no, but that it can do something that nobody disputes.

As for the second quote, such inferences can only be drawn from scientific facts because philosophy has no means of establishing a true premise from which to deduce a sound argument – as vividly, if unwittingly, demonstrated by Aristotle. Nearly every argument and conclusion he arrived at about physical science was wrong and misguided.

I don't know which of Aristotle's conclusions you are talking about, but it is pretty silly to bring him up in the first place as he was working 2500 years ago when doing science was very different. I hope you are not suggesting that because Aristotle is now known as a philosopher and because he tried to do science that it shows how stooopid philosophers are when it comes to science.

But you do have to demonstrate that. I don’t accept the unilateral role you've taken upon yourself to define this debate. A discussion is an exchange of ideas not a one-sided inquisition. So, again: Why do you think rape is wrong?

I don't have to demonstrate anything like that. However, I can tell you what could be argued:

Maybe it is wrong to cause unnecessary suffering (not a scientifically verifiable proposition but it is one that you may agree with)

Maybe it is wrong to use somebody for your own ends without considering their preferences (not a scientifically verifiable proposition but it is one that you may agree with)

Maybe someone who rapes is someone who has a bad character (not a scientifically verifiable proposition but it is one that you may agree with)

But you have to begin with some kind of similar baseline before you can explain why rape is immoral. Saying that it is not good for social cohesion is reducing it to a practical issue without regard for the rape victim, is arguably selfish, and is furthermore on very shaky empirical grounds given that a lot of cultures, including western cultures have been extremely tolerant of rape until extremely recently.

My position all along has not been so doctrinaire, as you well know. That said we do in fact derive morality from scientific facts, if not via deductive reasoning. But then, no discipline can do this, although you erroneously seem to think philosophy can. See above.

This is a very confusing pair of sentences. Can you explain them?

 

[gurugeorge]

What do you mean by spiritual experience?

BTW I learned to understand your thinking by asking more questions and that allows me to consider my own thinking, so I do learn in some sense from your answer.

That's the glory of conversation!

By spiritual experience, I mean more or less the same as Sam Harris. I have a similar sort of trajectory to him, in being a rationalist since I can remember (e.g. totally rejected the Catholicism I was born into by 12), but I also happen to have had non-dual mystical experiences when I was a child, so I've always felt, like Harris, that there most very definitely is a very important and precious baby in the disgusting bathwater of religion.

In more detail: it is possible to see and understand directly the absence of the self that we normally have a vague, fuzzy idea that we are (the thing we have a subjective feeling of that's behind the eyes that we vaguely suppose "owns" our body and our experiences, more or less). When that happens, a corollary is that the distinction between self and other is understood to be somewhat arbitrary. That being the case, there's a kind of unconditional love that arises for the whole, and one feels a deep sense of kinship with the universe (again, a simple reflection of the truth - stardust and all that).

I believe it's this type of experience (and not the usual suspects canvassed by rationalists, e.g. in Dennett's great book on the origins of religion) that's at the root of religion, and therefore also at the root of the "nice" side of religion (the compassion, kindness, morality, etc.). The conceptual explication of this sort of thing in religion also resonates with most peoples' experience (I think nearly everyone has some experiences in life that give them a hint of the non-dual experience - e.g. walking/camping in nature, flow state in sport, profound romantic love, etc.). Again this is the source of the perennial nature of religion.

The other factors (which Dennett outlines) do also have effect, but I think they are vastly overestimated, and this cause underestimated, by rationalists.

So it's this that's the root cause that gradually pushes us beyond the small, family/tribal circle of regard that biology alone gives us.

 

[gurugeorge]

That latter objection doesn't attack your logic, it merely points out the pragmatics of trying to bind reality to the logic offered up.

Oh that I agree with, I've never said it's easy. What I do say, though, is that this is what we are actually doing (i.e. trying to "home in" on ideal structures of social rules - which have their own internal logic, internal necessity - in possibility space, based on an understanding of our nature, the nature of the world, and in the context of a fuzzy over-arching goal of several human well-being).

And I think this is the intuition behind the concept of Natural Law (/Morality), and that it also fits in with the evol psych angle (although that only gets us a certain way - the rest of the way comes from spiritual experience, as I've explicated in the post above).

 

[Pup]

Also, the conflation between practical problems and moral problems is ridiculous.

Surely if I want to boil an egg or screw in a lightbulb I can follow a particular method. This hardly means that there are moral ways of doing either thing.

The little moral puzzles about who to toss out of the life boat or whether to throw the train switch could easily be made into practical problems in the same way as other word problems about how many apples are remaining after taking three.

We know the goal of the apple problems because it's openly stated: how many apples are left?

What makes the other problems moral ones is that each person is left to decide what the goal is, even if they agree that murder is bad, for example: is it murder if I don't interfere or can murder be passive as well?

If the goal were stated in the question: Only deliberate actions can be classified as murder and you are to minimize murder; would you throw the switch? then the moral questions would become purely practical ones.

I don't see that moral questons aren't practical ones, except the disagreement is generally over things like the question above, or what moral tenet is the strongest: Mercy or justice? Self-preservation or self-sacrifice? Once that is established, the answer can be approached in as practical a way as the best way to screw in a lightbulb.

Edited to add: I can see the next point. The actual moral question isn't what to do practically speaking, it's the issue itself over whether mercy or justice is best, for example. Yet this gets back to the axioms that need to be established for any moral framework. I don't think there's any way to say whether mercy or justice is best, for example, without establishing the answer as an axiom itself--justice is always best--or establishing another axiom--a productive society is best, and a person who is forgiven and allowed to return to society will add to its productivity--or--a fair society is best, so a person who has committed a crime must be given his allotted punishment. Or any combination that affects such decisions. So all moral argument in that sense comes from people's competing axioms, and there's no way those can be reconciled with argument or evidence; they just are. All that's left to decide, from a scientific, evidence-based point of view, is how the axioms best apply to the practical problem at hand.

 

[Kevin_Lowe]

So you think that rape can be right?

What part of "neither right nor wrong" is giving you trouble?

If I said that a rock was neither fish nor fowl, would you say "So you think that a rock can be a fish?".

 

[Tassman]

Hi Tassman

More

A is B and not C.
A is C and not B.

With logic we can know that at least one of them is false, but we can't know if the other is true. It means you can't with logic establish that one of them is true, only that one of them is false. You need another methodology to establish if any of them are true.

So:
Rape is right and not wrong.
Rape is wrong and not right.
How do you know, which one is true and a scientific fact?

Is it a scientific fact that the sun will rise tomorrow? NO! Science cannot prove that the sun must rise tomorrow, but it can and does infer from observation and induction that it is overwhelmingly probable that the sun will rise tomorrow.

Similarly, science cannot prove right and wrong behaviour either (neither can philosophy; it lacks the means to establish a true premise or axiom upon which to deduce an argument.) But science can infer via observation and induction how and why humans behave the way they do and thus establish a reasonable moral axiom from which to establish rules of right and wrong behaviour congruent with our known, evolved instincts .

Also, the conflation between practical problems and moral problems is ridiculous.

Surely if I want to boil an egg or screw in a lightbulb I can follow a particular method. This hardly means that there are moral ways of doing either thing.

See Pup’s #356 excellent response, which encapsulates my view.

 

[Tassman]

Say again?! Are you conceding the argument by stealth? You were asked if science can be used to make normative moral arguments. You said "potentially yes". I say "no". Here it seems you are now saying no, but that it can do something that nobody disputes.

Science has never claimed it can do more than make predictions about nature based upon observations and multiple testing, which can be later either validated or rejected. But science is potentially in a stronger position to make normative moral arguments than philosophical argumentation because it can test its premises whereas philosophy can’t. Just ask Aristotle.

I don't know which of Aristotle's conclusions you are talking about, but it is pretty silly to bring him up in the first place as he was working 2500 years ago when doing science was very different. I hope you are not suggesting that because Aristotle is now known as a philosopher and because he tried to do science that it shows how stooopid philosophers are when it comes to science.

It shows the necessity for a true premise in order to arrive at true conclusion. Aristotle did not have the means to do this and nor do modern philosophers. Only science has the methodology to test its premises. Hence philosophy can never be more than a tool of science, albeit a useful one.

I don't have to demonstrate anything like that. However, I can tell you what could be argued:

Maybe it is wrong to cause unnecessary suffering (not a scientifically verifiable proposition but it is one that you may agree with)

Maybe it is wrong to use somebody for your own ends without considering their preferences (not a scientifically verifiable proposition but it is one that you may agree with)

Maybe someone who rapes is someone who has a bad character (not a scientifically verifiable proposition but it is one that you may agree with)

But you have to begin with some kind of similar baseline before you can explain why rape is immoral. Saying that it is not good for social cohesion is reducing it to a practical issue without regard for the rape victim, is arguably selfish, and is furthermore on very shaky empirical grounds given that a lot of cultures, including western cultures have been extremely tolerant of rape until extremely recently.

What IS a scientifically verifiable proposition (as you have previously agreed) is the fact that science has established humans to be a social species and, as such, require social cohesion in order to survive. Thus we can infer from this that rape is demonstrably harmful to the social fabric. Hence rape is wrong.

Historically the definitions of ‘rape’ have varied e.g. whether having forced intercourse with one’s wife is “rape” (as we tend to see it today) or merely a husband claiming his conjugal rights (as it was seen previously) OR whether raping and pillaging rival tribes is OK (as per Moses) or not OK (as we think today, unless you're a Muslim fanatic). But as a general rule one can reasonably say that rape per se is wrong.

This is a very confusing pair of sentences. Can you explain them?

See above.

What part of "neither right nor wrong" is giving you trouble?

If I said that a rock was neither fish nor fowl, would you say "So you think that a rock can be a fish?".

No, I would say that comparing sentient, decision-making primates such as us with rocks and fish to be an even more puerile attempt at mockery than one expects - even from you.

 

[epepke]

The little moral puzzles about who to toss out of the life boat or whether to throw the train switch could easily be made into practical problems in the same way as other word problems about how many apples are remaining after taking three.

We know the goal of the apple problems because it's openly stated: how many apples are left?

The little moral puzzles give me a problem, which is different in nature from what I have currently described but is generally about the same issue.

Take that trolley problem, where the trolley is going to carry a bunch of people into the chasm, and you can throw a switch to divert the train and run over a guy on the tracks, and you don't have enough time to warn the guy. I had a lot of problems with this, and then I described the problem to my girlfriend, and she said one I hadn't thought of: "How do you know the switch is working?" Which, of course, you don't. And how do you know you can throw a switch? Because you've seen it in old movies? What if you get it half-way, and the train crashed on the guy and it also falls off, and everybody dies? You're told specifically that you don't have much time. So how do you have time to do your precious moral reasoning? How do you know anything about how you would actually behave in such a situation with no training and adrenaline pumping?

Of course, I know what they are getting at. They want people to think about the difference between direct action and lack of action and all that happy hoohah. But the situation is so contrived that it seems useless.

What makes the other problems moral ones is that each person is left to decide what the goal is, even if they agree that murder is bad, for example: is it murder if I don't interfere or can murder be passive as well?

If the goal were stated in the question: Only deliberate actions can be classified as murder and you are to minimize murder; would you throw the switch? then the moral questions would become purely practical ones.

That would be some refinement.

It would, however, be quite interesting to see what people would actually do when presented with a compelling simulation, such as in a realistic video game. You could also tweak the parameters. Change the amount of screaming by the people on the trolley. Change their ages, genders, or skin colors. Make the guy on the tracks drunk or in a natty 3-piece suit. Tweak the "uncanny valley" aspect.

This might gives some information on how this morality stuff actually works in brains as opposed to what people wearing tweed jackets imagine and assume about how it works.

But I'm pretty sure that a lot of people who argue about morality would be disturbed by what was learned, and there would be more sputtering.

Edited to add: I can see the next point. The actual moral question isn't what to do practically speaking, it's the issue itself over whether mercy or justice is best, for example. Yet this gets back to the axioms that need to be established for any moral framework. I don't think there's any way to say whether mercy or justice is best, for example, without establishing the answer as an axiom itself--justice is always best--or establishing another axiom--a productive society is best, and a person who is forgiven and allowed to return to society will add to its productivity--or--a fair society is best, so a person who has committed a crime must be given his allotted punishment. Or any combination that affects such decisions. So all moral argument in that sense comes from people's competing axioms, and there's no way those can be reconciled with argument or evidence; they just are. All that's left to decide, from a scientific, evidence-based point of view, is how the axioms best apply to the practical problem at hand.

This is the presumption: that morality is a framework (the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy defines it as a code) that has axioms. Or even that morality works by moral reasoning.

What if it doesn't? What if morality is like the (pick a number out of a hat) 98% of all brain processes that don't work like that? What if it's like facial recognition or understanding sounds or smiling at a cute puppy?

What if all this stuff about morality isn't about morality at all but about people's folk models of reality? What if it turns out to be just as plain inaccurate as Cartesian rationalism, Chomsky's approach to grammar, classical categorization, psychoanalysis, and just about everything else that people have traditionally said when they felt compelled to come up with a plausible-sounding explanation for how brains work?