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This is only true if you ground morality in objectivism and objective meaning, and require all useful conceptions of morality to fit that. What you have highlig

This is only true if you ground morality in objectivism and objective meaning, and require all useful conceptions of morality to fit that. What you have highlighted is that the meta-ethical view of objectivism is not compatible with determinism. Subjectivisms (both individualist and things like cultural relativism) and error theory are perfectly compatible with determinism. I personally ascribe to and argue for error theory which essentially leads to moral psychology actually dictating what ethics are. Based on that, it's quite easy to get to "murder is bad" via human traits like empathy and our social nature.

ntsplnkv2 6y ago
Ethics are already predetermined, though. There is no need for error theory or any moral or ethical theory in a predetermined world - none of it matters. Arguments for determinism always have these "answers" to morality, but the only convincing one is moral nihilism.
- adjkant 6y ago
  > Ethics are already predetermined, though. No argument here, but knowing them still seems useful to humans. So in relation to humans, those terms and ideas are 100% needed. You're taking moral nihilism and jumping straight to general nihilism without any steps. > Arguments for determinism always have these "answers" to morality, but the only convincing one is moral nihilism. Error theory is a form of moral nihilism - what are you exactly disagreeing with here? ------------------------------------------------------ The bigger question is where you go from that moral nihilism. There is nothing that says just because our formal definitions of morality are false that the entire world doesn't matter. I still care for my happiness and life. So do many others. We need both this idea and these further terms and ideas in order to be able to answer the questions we were originally attempting to answer with objective morality because those problems did not magically go away.
  - tsegratis 6y ago
    Thanks for your clear distinctions. But still I don't understand Caring about happiness and life, to the point they have value is objective Do you have any other way to distinguish between moral and general nihilism? -- surely such a thing would need to be objective But you make a good point in that if there is no objective morality, there may still be some other way to make a value statement. But how could such a thing give value to moral nihilism, and still maintain the nihilism?? To be honest, I don't understand these HN comments any better than the original article -- but I do greatly appreciate them for their importance
    - dkn775 6y ago
      For me I think that value arises in a nihilistic world when regardless of what individuals actually do, over time we move further into chaotic outcomes, or that things gradually get more harmonious (less conflict and negative externalities). The latter comes from the realization that some things (ie actions based only on gaining money/power/fame, knowingly taking advantage of people, needlessly killing, laziness, cheating for gain, not helping the poor, not forgiving people). This arises from nihilism because some believe that it can't be possible that nothing matters when these values are "beyond our earthly realm" in that it often requires seeing things on a more spiritual level, and thinking beyond immediate gratification. It is then that one may see nihilistic people as those feeding their temptations as these are often the easiest things to do (running vs. sitting and getting fat). So while one can think nothing matters, some may then see that indeed some actions "retard" not just ourselves but all, and others are a net benefit for society. Though believing that such actions are actually a net benefit may be considered "faith" because I can't know for sure. Just my thoughts.
      - tsegratis 6y ago
        Thanks @dkn775 Yeah, to accept nihilism seems very destructive. Ultimately, to me, like you; it seems to equate to accepting zero value for others and ourselves Yet life burns to exist. We are desperate to live and to have meaning. It is no proof, but every fiber of our being cries out for a value beyond zero > Though believing that such actions are actually a net benefit may be considered "faith" because I can't know for sure. Nice. Personally, and from personal experience, I would base "faith" on concrete facts, and this provides a safe foundation for logic, etc -- I think you can know for sure Thanks for sharing
  - dkn775 6y ago
    Do you have any collection of your thinking online? I also noticed that beyond nihilism is where I began to think about these ideas. The problem for me is the thoughts are so hard to condense. One benefit of this stuff you're talking about (determinism right?) Is I have gotten immense peace in my day to day actions by clearly being able to distinguish things which are good and bad for me to do, and accepting that I will be fine or not based on what I am doing. I can also forgive people easier and see that they were "just trying"
    - adjkant 6y ago
      See the end of this post: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23479194 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23479194 Nothing published yet but I have many smaller academic writings that are building the pieces of this, and currently have a master outline that basically looks like this: (1) Hard Determinism (2) Ethics/Morality under (1) (3) Social/Political Organization under (2) (4) Personal/Useful/Practical/Life Philosophy under (1)/(2)/(3) I started (1) when I was 18 and have many different forms at this point. Recently I have spent a good deal of time on (2) in the past couple years. (3) I have worked on independent of these ideas and am still linking up once I sure up and reflect on (2) more. (4) I'd argue is basically a WIP experiment of my own life since I was 17/18 and will be the last to be completed, probably not for a good deal of time. Basically if this is a checklist representative of how developed/ready these ideas are, (1) is done, (2) is 75% of the way there and my main focus currently, (3) is up next, and 4 requires all the others and of course much lived experience. As to when/how I want to publish, right now my plan is to have three forms for each - an accessible article (think 10-30 minute read), a short accessible book form that elaborates, and the formal philosophy for the academic/formal community to pick apart. Right now I essentially am working on the articles and planning to expand out. I'm not sure if I want to publish the articles without the books though, so it could be a long time. However, given that philosophy benefits from discussion and debate, I think there seems to be a good case for publishing the articles. I might try to stand up my website/blog I've been putting off forever once I finish two and start making progress on three. I'd really love to have all four articles published at the same time as a set though, so I might have to figure out a compromise there.
  - ntsplnkv2 6y ago
    Those ideas are not needed, they don't exist. Morality is just a chemical reaction in your brain, which differs from human to human - if the ideas are useful, that implies they can be changed by agency of choice, which in a predetermined world, doesn't exist. > Error theory is a form of moral nihilism - what are you exactly disagreeing with here? More the relativistic morality and psychological morality. > There is nothing that says just because our formal definitions of morality are false that the entire world doesn't matter. I still care for my happiness and life. Moral nihilism doesn't mean that they're false - it means moral truths don't exist, there is no right and wrong. You were predetermined to care for your happiness - but your happiness is already determined. There is nothing you can do to increase or decrease it, it will be what it will be based on the initial conditions. It seems, in general, that you need to cling to ethics as a way to convince your belief in determinism - to cover up for its deficiencies, you have to find a way to convince people that ethics still matter, despite continual argument that it doesn't.
    - adjkant 6y ago
      > Moral nihilism doesn't mean that they're false - it means moral truths don't exist, there is no right and wrong. You were predetermined to care for your happiness I agree 100%. However, you are mismatching objective moral truth with subjective moral truth. I am saying that once you realize the lack of objective moral truth/existence, all that is left is the subjective. Human nature then essentially requires it to become a collective subjective. Subjective preferences of all being essentially become the practical "morality". That's what I am referring to here, not the objective morality that does not and cannot logically exist. Morality is derived not from the physical world but from our own moral psychology. If we change humans in any way, we change morality. And thus morality is also different for every human. Traits like our social nature, empathy, and equal lack of inherent meaning then morph the problem into a collective/intertwined singular subjective morality based on the world state itself. > - but your happiness is already determined. There is nothing you can do to increase or decrease it, it will be what it will be based on the initial conditions. This is where you conflate determinism / free will with agency / choice, which are not the same thing. We do not have the ability to see our future choices and path, so we still have to "function" through it, even if it's a set path. And the questions we have to answer along the way are the reason we looked into morality in the first place, and are no less important or worth of time and effort. > It seems, in general, that you need to cling to ethics as a way to convince your belief in determinism - to cover up for its deficiencies, you have to find a way to convince people that ethics still matter, despite continual argument that it doesn't. You've got the wrong direction of how philosophy works - I started with determinism at the base, I'm simply asking what it leads to. You're only disagreeing with what comes after moral nihilism, but you've made no actual argument other than "no it's not that way". I'd truly love to understand more what your critique of my steps after is.
naasking 6y ago
> What you have highlighted is that the meta-ethical view of objectivism is not compatible with determinism. I don't see how that follows. Compatibilism is perfectly compatible with moral realism.
- adjkant 6y ago
  I should clarify, hard determinism.
  - naasking 6y ago
    Yes, hard determinism is very problematic, and this thread covers some of the reasons. I'm not sure every conception of moral realism is incompatible with hard determinism, but I haven't given it much thought as I don't see much redeeming value in hard determinism. As a hard determinist, you'll have to re-invent concepts of pseudo-moral blame in order to justify rehabilitation for those who break the law rather than simply changing the law itself to accomodate rule breakers, at which point you've just reinvented free will and called it something else. Moral error theory has problems of its own, so I don't think these all hang together very nicely.
    - adjkant 6y ago
      First, to answer your definitions ask in the other thread. "Practical" free will, as described by both of us: > When people say that free will exists, they're saying that there is coherent notion of control over one's actions > When humans say "free will", they are referring IMO in actuality to a real thing - a combination of many things, but basically agency + lack of prediction powers You added a very specific phrase outside of the definition though, with no justification: "that grounds moral responsibility". That both implicitly implies moral responsibility, and also claims that it is grounded by this particular definition of free will. I'd be interested in how you got to those conclusions. The "stricter/formal/whatever label you add here" version, that some try to argue for, including some compatibilists, goes more or less like this: > Humans have the power to change the state/future of the universe and the universe is not "set" in any way This feels a bit logically impossible to me, and it may also be something you don't agree with either, but it is still a definition that people use to mean free will, I have seen it way too often. However, the lack of this type of thing still has meaning is what I am trying to say. It is what leads to error theory for me, and then effectively what leads away from it. I wonder if that "away from" part might also solve some of your qualms with error theory. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- In terms of hard determinism, it seems to me you only listed off reasons that hard determinism doesn't sound easy, but made no argument against it itself. Just because an idea invalidates many ones that were previously popular does not make it any less true/false, nor does it prevent it from establishing new and helpful ideas on top of it, even if they do not really exist currently. > you'll have to re-invent concepts of pseudo-moral blame This is exactly where I think hard determinism has its value. There is no moral blame - hard determinism requires a morality without it, and that's okay. It simply is new because people have focused so hard on blame, but I think that "formal" definition of free will is useful to show precisely that blame is not in play. > at which point you've just reinvented free will and called it something else I do think much of this will happen, but the distinction between the definitions has consequences. I already argued about for blame, but I think there is much more to explore there. > Moral error theory has problems of its own, so I don't think these all hang together very nicely. Again, I'd love to hear the argument rather than a simple refutation, truly, in a non attacking or confrontational way. At this point I think the HN format is hurting more than it's helping, so if you're interested in talking more feel free to shoot me an email, @gmail.com. You seem well versed in this area and I've love to hear more details on your perspective and reasoning/principles.

ntsplnkv2 6y ago

Ethics are already predetermined, though. There is no need for error theory or any moral or ethical theory in a predetermined world - none of it matters. Arguments for determinism always have these "answers" to morality, but the only convincing one is moral nihilism.

adjkant 6y ago
> Ethics are already predetermined, though. No argument here, but knowing them still seems useful to humans. So in relation to humans, those terms and ideas are 100% needed. You're taking moral nihilism and jumping straight to general nihilism without any steps. > Arguments for determinism always have these "answers" to morality, but the only convincing one is moral nihilism. Error theory is a form of moral nihilism - what are you exactly disagreeing with here? ------------------------------------------------------ The bigger question is where you go from that moral nihilism. There is nothing that says just because our formal definitions of morality are false that the entire world doesn't matter. I still care for my happiness and life. So do many others. We need both this idea and these further terms and ideas in order to be able to answer the questions we were originally attempting to answer with objective morality because those problems did not magically go away.
- tsegratis 6y ago
  Thanks for your clear distinctions. But still I don't understand Caring about happiness and life, to the point they have value is objective Do you have any other way to distinguish between moral and general nihilism? -- surely such a thing would need to be objective But you make a good point in that if there is no objective morality, there may still be some other way to make a value statement. But how could such a thing give value to moral nihilism, and still maintain the nihilism?? To be honest, I don't understand these HN comments any better than the original article -- but I do greatly appreciate them for their importance
  - dkn775 6y ago
    For me I think that value arises in a nihilistic world when regardless of what individuals actually do, over time we move further into chaotic outcomes, or that things gradually get more harmonious (less conflict and negative externalities). The latter comes from the realization that some things (ie actions based only on gaining money/power/fame, knowingly taking advantage of people, needlessly killing, laziness, cheating for gain, not helping the poor, not forgiving people). This arises from nihilism because some believe that it can't be possible that nothing matters when these values are "beyond our earthly realm" in that it often requires seeing things on a more spiritual level, and thinking beyond immediate gratification. It is then that one may see nihilistic people as those feeding their temptations as these are often the easiest things to do (running vs. sitting and getting fat). So while one can think nothing matters, some may then see that indeed some actions "retard" not just ourselves but all, and others are a net benefit for society. Though believing that such actions are actually a net benefit may be considered "faith" because I can't know for sure. Just my thoughts.
    - tsegratis 6y ago
      Thanks @dkn775 Yeah, to accept nihilism seems very destructive. Ultimately, to me, like you; it seems to equate to accepting zero value for others and ourselves Yet life burns to exist. We are desperate to live and to have meaning. It is no proof, but every fiber of our being cries out for a value beyond zero > Though believing that such actions are actually a net benefit may be considered "faith" because I can't know for sure. Nice. Personally, and from personal experience, I would base "faith" on concrete facts, and this provides a safe foundation for logic, etc -- I think you can know for sure Thanks for sharing
- dkn775 6y ago
  Do you have any collection of your thinking online? I also noticed that beyond nihilism is where I began to think about these ideas. The problem for me is the thoughts are so hard to condense. One benefit of this stuff you're talking about (determinism right?) Is I have gotten immense peace in my day to day actions by clearly being able to distinguish things which are good and bad for me to do, and accepting that I will be fine or not based on what I am doing. I can also forgive people easier and see that they were "just trying"
  - adjkant 6y ago
    See the end of this post: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23479194 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23479194 Nothing published yet but I have many smaller academic writings that are building the pieces of this, and currently have a master outline that basically looks like this: (1) Hard Determinism (2) Ethics/Morality under (1) (3) Social/Political Organization under (2) (4) Personal/Useful/Practical/Life Philosophy under (1)/(2)/(3) I started (1) when I was 18 and have many different forms at this point. Recently I have spent a good deal of time on (2) in the past couple years. (3) I have worked on independent of these ideas and am still linking up once I sure up and reflect on (2) more. (4) I'd argue is basically a WIP experiment of my own life since I was 17/18 and will be the last to be completed, probably not for a good deal of time. Basically if this is a checklist representative of how developed/ready these ideas are, (1) is done, (2) is 75% of the way there and my main focus currently, (3) is up next, and 4 requires all the others and of course much lived experience. As to when/how I want to publish, right now my plan is to have three forms for each - an accessible article (think 10-30 minute read), a short accessible book form that elaborates, and the formal philosophy for the academic/formal community to pick apart. Right now I essentially am working on the articles and planning to expand out. I'm not sure if I want to publish the articles without the books though, so it could be a long time. However, given that philosophy benefits from discussion and debate, I think there seems to be a good case for publishing the articles. I might try to stand up my website/blog I've been putting off forever once I finish two and start making progress on three. I'd really love to have all four articles published at the same time as a set though, so I might have to figure out a compromise there.
- ntsplnkv2 6y ago
  Those ideas are not needed, they don't exist. Morality is just a chemical reaction in your brain, which differs from human to human - if the ideas are useful, that implies they can be changed by agency of choice, which in a predetermined world, doesn't exist. > Error theory is a form of moral nihilism - what are you exactly disagreeing with here? More the relativistic morality and psychological morality. > There is nothing that says just because our formal definitions of morality are false that the entire world doesn't matter. I still care for my happiness and life. Moral nihilism doesn't mean that they're false - it means moral truths don't exist, there is no right and wrong. You were predetermined to care for your happiness - but your happiness is already determined. There is nothing you can do to increase or decrease it, it will be what it will be based on the initial conditions. It seems, in general, that you need to cling to ethics as a way to convince your belief in determinism - to cover up for its deficiencies, you have to find a way to convince people that ethics still matter, despite continual argument that it doesn't.
  - adjkant 6y ago
    > Moral nihilism doesn't mean that they're false - it means moral truths don't exist, there is no right and wrong. You were predetermined to care for your happiness I agree 100%. However, you are mismatching objective moral truth with subjective moral truth. I am saying that once you realize the lack of objective moral truth/existence, all that is left is the subjective. Human nature then essentially requires it to become a collective subjective. Subjective preferences of all being essentially become the practical "morality". That's what I am referring to here, not the objective morality that does not and cannot logically exist. Morality is derived not from the physical world but from our own moral psychology. If we change humans in any way, we change morality. And thus morality is also different for every human. Traits like our social nature, empathy, and equal lack of inherent meaning then morph the problem into a collective/intertwined singular subjective morality based on the world state itself. > - but your happiness is already determined. There is nothing you can do to increase or decrease it, it will be what it will be based on the initial conditions. This is where you conflate determinism / free will with agency / choice, which are not the same thing. We do not have the ability to see our future choices and path, so we still have to "function" through it, even if it's a set path. And the questions we have to answer along the way are the reason we looked into morality in the first place, and are no less important or worth of time and effort. > It seems, in general, that you need to cling to ethics as a way to convince your belief in determinism - to cover up for its deficiencies, you have to find a way to convince people that ethics still matter, despite continual argument that it doesn't. You've got the wrong direction of how philosophy works - I started with determinism at the base, I'm simply asking what it leads to. You're only disagreeing with what comes after moral nihilism, but you've made no actual argument other than "no it's not that way". I'd truly love to understand more what your critique of my steps after is.

naasking 6y ago

> What you have highlighted is that the meta-ethical view of objectivism is not compatible with determinism. I don't see how that follows. Compatibilism is perfectly compatible with moral realism.

adjkant 6y ago
I should clarify, hard determinism.
- naasking 6y ago
  Yes, hard determinism is very problematic, and this thread covers some of the reasons. I'm not sure every conception of moral realism is incompatible with hard determinism, but I haven't given it much thought as I don't see much redeeming value in hard determinism. As a hard determinist, you'll have to re-invent concepts of pseudo-moral blame in order to justify rehabilitation for those who break the law rather than simply changing the law itself to accomodate rule breakers, at which point you've just reinvented free will and called it something else. Moral error theory has problems of its own, so I don't think these all hang together very nicely.
  - adjkant 6y ago
    First, to answer your definitions ask in the other thread. "Practical" free will, as described by both of us: > When people say that free will exists, they're saying that there is coherent notion of control over one's actions > When humans say "free will", they are referring IMO in actuality to a real thing - a combination of many things, but basically agency + lack of prediction powers You added a very specific phrase outside of the definition though, with no justification: "that grounds moral responsibility". That both implicitly implies moral responsibility, and also claims that it is grounded by this particular definition of free will. I'd be interested in how you got to those conclusions. The "stricter/formal/whatever label you add here" version, that some try to argue for, including some compatibilists, goes more or less like this: > Humans have the power to change the state/future of the universe and the universe is not "set" in any way This feels a bit logically impossible to me, and it may also be something you don't agree with either, but it is still a definition that people use to mean free will, I have seen it way too often. However, the lack of this type of thing still has meaning is what I am trying to say. It is what leads to error theory for me, and then effectively what leads away from it. I wonder if that "away from" part might also solve some of your qualms with error theory. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- In terms of hard determinism, it seems to me you only listed off reasons that hard determinism doesn't sound easy, but made no argument against it itself. Just because an idea invalidates many ones that were previously popular does not make it any less true/false, nor does it prevent it from establishing new and helpful ideas on top of it, even if they do not really exist currently. > you'll have to re-invent concepts of pseudo-moral blame This is exactly where I think hard determinism has its value. There is no moral blame - hard determinism requires a morality without it, and that's okay. It simply is new because people have focused so hard on blame, but I think that "formal" definition of free will is useful to show precisely that blame is not in play. > at which point you've just reinvented free will and called it something else I do think much of this will happen, but the distinction between the definitions has consequences. I already argued about for blame, but I think there is much more to explore there. > Moral error theory has problems of its own, so I don't think these all hang together very nicely. Again, I'd love to hear the argument rather than a simple refutation, truly, in a non attacking or confrontational way. At this point I think the HN format is hurting more than it's helping, so if you're interested in talking more feel free to shoot me an email, @gmail.com. You seem well versed in this area and I've love to hear more details on your perspective and reasoning/principles.