The Great Contradiction

[ruby sparks]

If I were to try to throw intuitive notions of free will a lifeline, or at least some apparent support, Angra, I could put my position (ie the one I am advancing because of my free will skepticism, not necessarily the one I am asserting to be necessarily true) on softer, weaker, or at least more complicated ground. And I will, because there are ways I believe it would not ultimately matter (if full determinism is true, and temporarily setting aside randomness).

Take 4 possible scenarios concerning an action. Let's use a harmful action, because I note your interesting and pertinent remarks about the confirmation bias we seem to have regarding highlighting when things 'go wrong' (I think it is true that personal/moral responsibility is more frequently allocated for this type of action, and there are interesting psych studies, some related to the free will debate, which seem to back this up):

1. The action was unintended.
2. The action was intended.
3. The action was intended and the harmful consequences were predicted.
4. The action was intended and the predicted consequences were felt by the doer (at the time of perceiving them) to be contrary to the doer's morality (and possibly even an approximately species-wide morality, to the extent that that pertains).

Clearly, there are differences there.

But, as I see it, under full determinism, the differences only relate to what I am going to call "the type or extent of malfunction* affecting the biological machine that performed the action". The machine itself can't ultimately, if it was fully determined to do any of the 4 and could not do otherwise in the circumstances, be held personally, morally responsible, or at least no more than would any other sophisticated machine such as a computer, a computer program or a robot (which I think is a very important caveat).

Let's even go further into 'your' territory and say that the harmful act was stealing. A compulsion that you have mentioned a few times is kleptomania. This again, if a factor, would only make a difference of the sort I just mentioned, one that would not ultimately matter (if we fully embrace full determinism and recognise that there is in fact no wiggle room for kleptomaniacs or anyone to do otherwise than what they do). With kleptomania, we would only be talking about an obvious or identifiable factor, one that is visible above (or possibly just below) the waterline the 'iceberg of determinants' is floating in.

I do realise how counter-intuitive all of the above might be. I am hoping that you will not rely heavily on intuitions when considering it. Perhaps just keep repeating to yourself, "if everything is fully determined, there is no wiggle room in that" over and over.

You might even take neuroscience more into account now that (a) there is no contradiction and (b) we can (I hope) agree that intuitions (and meanings or definitions based on them) are potentially unreliable in principle, but that may be asking too much of you.





* There may be some debate as to whether it's a 'malfunction' or just a 'function' or a 'feature', or even just, without a judgement (moral or otherwise) at least initially, merely the 'mechanical processes'.

 

[ruby sparks]

It still seems to me that there is something about 'fully determined' that you are not, er, fully taking into account. Fully determined in fact means fully determined, at every instant. No wiggle room, Angra.

Angra,

Afterthought:

I can imagine you sincerely denying the above in a way that you have before. Ok. It may be that you are in fact fully taking into account full determinism, it may just seem (incorrectly) to me that you might not actually be.

But one way that you could be fully taking it into account (if you are), and at the same time making neuroscience irrelevant, is by having an inadequate* definition (& related meaning) which only includes some (not all) determinants, and settling for that. Which, in a way, is fine. But I wish I'd understood that earlier, that you were, essentially, willing to adopt a colloquial, intuitive, folk-psychological, commonsense definition, because I more or less already knew (before starting to discuss with you) that both compatibilists and the legal profession already do that. If this is the case, can you just say, because you can have that definition if you want and we can stop discussing free will.

I thought we were going deeper, for example into the sorts of things, mostly but not entirely informed by recent science, that are now starting to exercise legal minds and lead them to question the traditional, longstanding, dare I say intuitive/folk-psychological/colloquial/commonsense bases for their justice systems.




*In case it is not clear to you what I mean by inadequate, let me put it this way:

Suppose I said to you that I define free will to be actions taken without compelling external forces, coercions or duress. End of.

What would you say to me? Surely you'd say, "you are not taking everything into account by only considering external determinants, what about internal obsessions and compulsions?"

Similarly, I am saying to you "you are not taking everything into account by only considering external determinants plus obsessions/compulsions etc, what about all the other internal determinants?"

 

[fromderinside]

.... what about all the other internal determinants?"

How many need be before they lose title 'determinant'?

- just

Show

being an

askin'

 

[ruby sparks]

.... what about all the other internal determinants?"

How many need be before they lose title 'determinant'?

- just

Show

being an

askin'

I'm not sure what you're asking, but it does sound potentially interesting.

But what I would say is that I don't know how many there would be in any one instance.

Perhaps they can't be individuated. Is that what you mean. I'm thinking they could, if we could count them.

 

[Angra Mainyu]

immorality (or permissibility, whichever it is) is a propery of McConnel's behavior

Ok.

Would you say deliciousness (or unpleasantness, whichever it is) is a property of anchovies? In other words is there a fact of the matter as to whether anchovies are delicious (or not).

If you disagree, on what basis do you make a distinction between moral evaluations and gustatory evaluations?.

I would say that in context, deliciousness-to-person-A is a property of anchovies, which the 'A' is speaker-relative. The difference is based on the use of language and ordinary human experience. I will adapt a previous post to anchovies:

Alice: Anchovies are delicious
Bob: Anchovies are disgusting.
Alice: Well, there is no objective fact of the matter. I like them. They are delicious to me.


That is a realistic exchange. It would be ordinary, and would very probably not continue with further debate. The differences in human gustatory taste are part of our ordinary experience, and people ordinarily respond to that by saying there is no fact of the matter, or no objective fact of the matter, or similar expressions. That is the default human position. If someone claimed that humans are generally in error and there is a fact of the matter, that would be an extraordinary claim, and correctly deemed very improbable unless there is good evidence/argumentation to back it up.


But now consider the following exchange (which, for example, might be the start of one of the ubiquitous fights in the Political Discussions forum, or a similar one):

Alice: McConnell's support for the confirmation of Kavanaugh was immoral behavior.
Bob: McConnell's support for the confirmation of Kavanaugh was not immoral behavior.

Readers would ordinarily and intuitively reckon that either Alice is making a false statement (deliberately or not), or else Bob is. In fact, one could expect that Alice and Bob (apart from insulting each other) would try to give arguments in support of your position, at least if they have the time and interest to get into a debate. It is implicit in that sort of conversation that there is a fact of the matter as to whether or not McConnell's behavior was immoral.

Here's a third example: color.

Alice: Bob crossed the street when the light was red.
Bob: The light was green.

Here too, readers would ordinarily and intuitively reckon that either Alice is making a false statement (deliberately or not), or else Bob is. Suppose the traffic light was red. Then redness was a property of the traffic light. Permissibility or impermissibility (immorality, moral wrongness, or whatever word one likes better) is a property of McConnell's behavior. Deliciousness-to-Alice and disgustingness-to-Bob are propeties of anchovies (well, ordinary anchovies, etc.; rotten anchovies would be after a point at least different matter).

Granted, you might further ask why I think the property of being impermissible, etc., exists at all. But for that matter, one might ask in the case of redness, or greenness, etc. I think we are justified in trusting human faculties in general - in fact, we would not be able to make assessments of anything or navigate our world without that. We can of course find that in specific cases, they fail, but we need evidence that they're failing before we dismiss them. The default and rational position is to trust them, as - again - without that we would not be able to make any kind of assessment (i.e., if we did not trust human faculties at all; we can use of course some of our faculties + further information to find that in some cases, some other faculties are failing).

In the moral case - as in all other cases - a moral error theory (and to a lesser extent, culture-relativism of the relevant kind, see Scenarios 3 and 2 in my discussion with ruby sparks) imply rejecting ordinary human faculties. That would require some good evidence. I have read arguments in support of those metaethical views, and I further thought about them. I think the evidence is not good enough. Some of them are just misguided because of a misunderstanding of the language. Others (namely arguments from apparent disagreement to miscommunication) would get the language right, but fail on the empirical evidence side.

 

[The AntiChris]

Alice: Anchovies are delicious
Bob: Anchovies are disgusting.
Alice: Well, there is no objective fact of the matter. I like them. They are delicious to me.


That is a realistic exchange.

You're right. However:

Alice: Anchovies are delicious
Bob: Anchovies are disgusting.
Alice: Well, you're wrong. They're delicious!

is not unrealistic.

Alice: McConnell's support for the confirmation of Kavanaugh was immoral behavior.
Bob: McConnell's support for the confirmation of Kavanaugh was not immoral behavior.

Readers would ordinarily and intuitively reckon that either Alice is making a false statement (deliberately or not), or else Bob is.

Many people might. Many others might say this is simply a difference of opinion.

I don't think it's quite as straightforward as you'd have us believe.

 

[ruby sparks]

I think we are justified in trusting human faculties in general - in fact, we would not be able to make assessments of anything or navigate our world without that.

It may well be the case that we (generally or often) navigate the world better by trusting our faculties (and/or our intuitions) than by not trusting them, but it doesn't make them true or accurate.

Example 1: we can navigate the world better by trusting, rather than not trusting, that the sun will rise every morning and descend every night, and taking this into account.

Furthermore, it is also worth noting that we may in fact navigate the world even better (than before) when inaccuracies of our faculties and intuitions are revealed. This could in fact be one of the most profound opportunities that our use of the scientific method has provided us with.

Example 2: we can navigate the world even better (than before) by realising that the sun does not, in fact, despite what it apparently/intuitively seems, rise in the morning and descend at night, and taking this into account.

Example 3: we can navigate the world even better (than before) by realising that lunatic behaviour is not, in fact, despite what it apparently/intuitively seems, caused by entities called demons, and taking this into account (in treatments for mental disorders).

Example 4: it was once said by some, and possibly felt by many, that we would not, as a species, navigate the world better if we lost a belief in god and also, separately, if we found out that we are descended from apes, but neither turned out to be the case.

I am deliberately using intuitive beliefs that people used to have in the past, and in the last case fears about letting go of them, in order to highlight the fact that the uncovering of the unreliability of intuitions is apparently an ongoing process, and so we should be careful not to assume that 'ours now' are necessarily reliable, merely because they feel robust, to us, now, nor indeed that they are currently functionally optimal just because they work at least quite well at present.

In any case, none of the above makes intuitions true or accurate. Which I hope should be important.

We can of course find that in specific cases, they fail, but we need evidence that they're failing before we dismiss them.

It is surely a matter of debate whether having strong retributive urges (which appears to go along with strong beliefs in free will) is not already an example of a failure.

The default and rational position is to trust them, as - again - without that we would not be able to make any kind of assessment (i.e., if we did not trust human faculties at all;......

Yes, but we might be able to make even better assessments by at least not only trusting our faculties and intuitions, or not trusting them so much.

...... we can use of course some of our faculties + further information to find that in some cases, some other faculties are failing)

Neuroscience is arguably only in its infancy, but it is already providing further information that is giving cause for doubts about the reliability of our faculties.

 

[Angra Mainyu]

Thanks. Sadly, I am still not wholly sure I understand (I think you are more fluent in logic than I am) but I will still try to give an answer. I prefer scenario 3. That said, scenario 1 (and 2) may be approximately correct, imo. I'm not sure that will make sense to you. I think I say it because while I think, and as I said before, that I am now inclined to agree that there is such a thing as species-wide morality (for certain things within its domain) it is merely common and perhaps endemic, but not 'in all cases', even for those things within its domain. So that as I am seeing it, two similar but not identical human brains can both be 'properly functioning' and still give different outputs after the same inputs.

Okay, so let me ask you a question. Consider the McConnell example (amended following your reply)


Alice: McConnell's vote for the confirmation of Kavanaugh was immoral.
Bob: McConnell's vote for the confirmation of Kavanaugh was not immoral.

While not necessary for this part of the argument, we may assume that both Alice and Bob are saying what they actually believe (i.e., they are being honest). Do you think that at least one of the statements is false, and the other true? Or something else?

I think that is broadly ok, imo, as regards colour. We can temporarily step around getting into what 'slight' might involve.

Ok.

I think you might have to say exactly what M did (when he supported K) that is supposed to have been either immoral or not, in other words, can you be as specific with that scenario as with the colour one? I think I need to see the equivalent of a red or a green.

I am talking about his support for the appointment. He supported the confirmation from the beginning. Then, after the accusations of rape and other sexual crimes, McConnell continued to support Kavanaugh for the Supreme Court. That involved of course voting in favor of the appointment. He also said that Democrats were trying to smear Kavanaugh, and called their tactics despicable. He also worked to have a vote on the confirmation. And so on.

One can make a moral assessment as to whether it was immoral of McConnell to support the nomination. But if you want a behavior that lasts for a shorter period, let's narrow it down to the vote itself (see amended scenario above in this post). In any event, I was not asking you to make that assessment, i.e., to say whether his behavior was immoral.

If if involves an unintended falsity, that might be one thing (and possibly not immoral).

If it involved M telling a lie, then I don't initially feel it is necessarily clear (yet) if there is a morally right or a morally wrong fact of the matter.

Suppose M lied, but for 'overall beneficial' reasons (eg M sincerely believed that K becoming a supreme court judge would be overall a good thing on balance, despite the thing M was lying about, and let's say M's assessment/beliefs were accurate).

Perhaps you did not have 'lying' in mind. Or if you did, we might now want to explore what I just said by going into more detail, possibly including what Alice or Bob knew of what was in M's mind.

I wasn't asking you to assess whether he acted immorally. Rather, my questions are:

1. Do you think that either Alice or Bob is mistaken?
2. Do you think that either Alice is making a true statement and Bob a false one, or Alice is making a false statement and Bob a true one?

I'm not asking you to assess which one of them is correct, by the way. But is it the case that at least one of them is not true? I say yes. What do you think?

 

[Angra Mainyu]

I said 'entities' because I meant to convey the latter, which we agree is false (as far as we know) and is at least now deemed false in modern courtrooms in most countries, as far as I know (there may be places it is still an allowable defence).

My only point was to try to illustrate that the statement seems to conform to your saying "What people usually mean is what gives meaning to the words. Meaning is given by usage" and perhaps illustrate that this may say nothing about truth or falsity. Now, you may not have intended that particular statement to say anything about truth or falsity, but I wanted to clarify, because I am trying to make the point that something is not necessarily the case just because we have a definition, and especially one that is only based on intuition, because an intuition can be incorrect.

I'm not sure I'm following you. Meaning is given indeed by usage. The meaning of the word 'demon' is given by usage. They used the word 'demon' to mean something like 'Biblical fallen angel'. They were mistaken in their assessment that lunatic behavior was caused by demons. But they were not mistaken about the meaning of the word 'demon'. Rather, they chose the meaning by speaking.
It would be a mistake to define 'demon:= motorcycle' and then say something like 'Those people were mistaken in their assessment that lunatic behavior is caused by demons, because lunatic behavior is not caused by motorcycles'. In order to assess their claim that lunatic behavior is caused by demons, we need to interpret the word 'demon' to mean what they meant by it (i.e., Biblical fallen angel). And then, we can properly assess that they were mistaken in their belief that lunatic behavior was caused by demons.

Thank you, but I didn't ask you to illustrate the intuitive/colloquial, I asked you something more, something trickier, why it should be what ultimately matters, factually or morally. I read all the above and merely thought, 'yes, that comports with the intuitive/colloquial understanding of free will, which could be incorrect". As such you are only appealing to our mutual intuitions and if I agreed with you, it would only show that we have the same intuitions.


You see, it could be (and I think it is the case) that despite our intuitions, being distracted by the prominent ad at the side of the road is in reality on a par with any and all of the other influences on the driver. Let's hypothetically say that one (for this driver) was that he had a gene which made him prone to violence, for example, and some set of circumstances beyond his control had led to that gene 'being strongly activated'. That is of course only one small factor and not of itself sufficient. There may have been 10,000 others to go along with it, or more, basically all the things which went to make up his brain state and added up to everything being fully determined, for him, at every instant.

It still seems to me that there is something about 'fully determined' that you are not, er, fully taking into account. Fully determined in fact means fully determined, at every instant. No wiggle room, Angra.

No, I am taking it into account. But you are not getting what I meant. Do you agree that when assessing whether acting of one's own free will is morally relevant, it would make no sense to redefine 'of one's free will' to mean, say, 'before 13.45 UTC'? Further, do you realize that when assessing the moral relevance of acting of one's own free will, one needs to take into consideration what the words commonly mean, otherwise one is assessing the moral relevance of something else?

Now, let us go back to the previous point. You said you agreed that I gave a good approximation to what people mean by 'of one's free will'. Now, in that sense of the expression, determinism (and that means full determism) is no obstacle to acting of one's own free will. Now, if you redefine 'of one's free will' to mean something else, then you are not talking about whether people act of their own free will anymore. You are talking about something else - what else? Whatever it is you chose to call 'free will'. But that only changes the subject.

So, that a prior intention that formed, for whatever multiple reasons (of which a hypothetical gene-activation may only be one possible example) in the mind of the driver who we say intended to knock down the pedestrian, is just something that itself was fully determined, and not something the driver could have freely willed to happen.

That's a mistake. The driver acted of his own free will. Remember, the expression 'of his own free will', which as a good approximation means something like.

As a good approximation, I'd say people are talking about making choices that are not externally coerced or internally compelled, also in the usual sense of those words, which include guns to the head and irresistible impulse a person is trying not to have (e.g., kleptomaniacs perhaps), but not causation, full or not.

Again, determinism does not affect whether the driver acted of his own free will, using 'of his own free will' in English.

Now, I might define 'of one's own free will' to mean 'with the support of demons', and then, reckon that no one ever acts of his own free will, because demons do not exist. But surely, something went wrong, right? What went wrong is that when I defined 'of one's own free will' to mean 'with the support of demons', I was no longer talking about whether people acted of their own free will, in English. I was talking about an entirely different matter that I just chose to call 'of one's own free will' because I like the way it sounds or for whatever reason I might have had.

People generally, including you and I, do not intuitively feel that every single thing they do, indeed every single thought they have at any instant, is in fact fully determined.

I don't know what such a feeling would be like. Generally, I have no feelings one way or another as far as I can tell (but then, I don't know what a feeling like that would be like).

But under full determinism, you and I and they would seem to be wrong.

No, I do not seem to be wrong. I do not have a belief one way or another. And I do not even know what a feeling like that could be like.

So much for human intuitions. That is the point.

Generally, we rely and should rely on our faculties - call them 'intuitions' or whatever. Otherwise, it would be impossible to make any assessments whatsoever, navigate our world, etc. Some of our intuitions might fail, and of course, we would need to rely on other, stronger intuitions - or whatever you call them - to make that assessment, in addition to empirical evidence. But in any event, here I do not see an example of a failing intuition. However, even if that were the case, there is no reason to suspect it would interfere with acting of one's own free will, given what it means.

That we might actually be fully-determined biological machines may in fact be literally counter-intuitive, as therefore may not having free will.

No, I do not see how it is counter-intuitive. But assume it is. The 'therefore' seems to be an error in reasoning. There appears to be no good reason to suspect that if we are determined (yes, that means 'fully', you do not need to add it; it is superfluous) biological machines, we do not act of our own free will, given that, to a good approximation, what it means to act of our own free will is:

As a good approximation, I'd say people are talking about making choices that are not externally coerced or internally compelled, also in the usual sense of those words, which include guns to the head and irresistible impulse a person is trying not to have (e.g., kleptomaniacs perhaps), but not causation, full or not.

Which is why I asked you why intuitions (which I hope we can agree can be incorrect) should be the things that ultimately matter, factually or morally.

When you are assessing whether some claim that demons do stuff is true, of course by 'demons' you need to understand what people mean by it. Otherwise, you are not assessing whether demons do that stuff. You are redefining the words, and changing the subject. The same for acting of one's free will. What matters is the usual meaning of the words, which is given by usage.

Now, as for why it matters morally, well, that is the intuition that nearly everyone has. That's the normal human intuition. Again, we accept and should accept our faculties unless we have specific reasons for rejecting them. Do you not agree that, say, if a human being burns other human beings alive for fun, that is morally wrong? That's what our moral intuition says. Do you think there is a good reason for rejecting it? Why reject our intuition that whether a person is under an external threat or internal compulsion in the usual sense of the words, then that matters from the perspective of whether their behavior was immoral, or how much?

 

[Angra Mainyu]

ruby sparks,

I think one of your examples might be helpful to make this point:

*In case it is not clear to you what I mean by inadequate, let me put it this way:

Suppose I said to you that I define free will to be actions taken without compelling external forces, coercions or duress. End of.

What would you say to me? Surely you'd say, "you are not taking everything into account by only considering external determinants, what about internal obsessions and compulsions?"

Similarly, I am saying to you "you are not taking everything into account by only considering external determinants plus obsessions/compulsions etc, what about all the other internal determinants?"

Yes, I would say something like that. I would say that because you should take into account internal compulsions (not sure what you mean by "obsessions"). But why should you? You should because that is part of the meaning of the expression 'of one's own free will', in English, i.e., in its colloquial, ordinary meaning.

No, your reply is not at all similar. I would respond that I'm speaking in English, so I need to go with the meaning of the words. The other things you talk about should not be included, because that is not part of the meaning of the words, in their colloquial sense, in English. When we assess whether demons cause lunatic behavior, we should only assess whether Biblical fallen angels (or whatever it is that the people making the claimed meant by 'demons') cause lunatic behavior. We should not add to the definition of the word 'demon' something like 'genetic predispositions + environmental triggers' and then say that demons do cause lunatic behavior.

 

[Angra Mainyu]

1. The action was unintended.
2. The action was intended.
3. The action was intended and the harmful consequences were predicted.
4. The action was intended and the predicted consequences were felt by the doer (at the time of perceiving them) to be contrary to the doer's morality (and possibly even an approximately species-wide morality, to the extent that that pertains).

Clearly, there are differences there.

But, as I see it, under full determinism, the differences only relate to what I am going to call "the type or extent of malfunction* affecting the biological machine that performed the action".

Well, that goes a little further. Not everything harmful is the result of a malfunction. But if it's immoral, you are on firmer grounds, though it's still a claim open to reasonable debate.

I do not see any problem any way.

The machine itself can't ultimately, if it was fully determined to do any of the 4 and could not do otherwise in the circumstances, be held personally, morally responsible, or at least no more than would any other sophisticated machine such as a computer, a computer program or a robot (which I think is a very important caveat).

Well, if the robot had a human-like sort of mind, I would find it guilty just as well, so we do not agree on the matter of free will.

I do realise how counter-intuitive all of the above might be. I am hoping that you will not rely heavily on intuitions when considering it. Perhaps just keep repeating to yourself, "if everything is fully determined, there is no wiggle room in that" over and over.

But we have no way but relying on intuitions. There is nothing else at all we can rely on. It is impossible to do otherwise. The only question is what intuition you use, and whether some are...not functioning properly.

More to the point: to make a moral assessment, I use my moral sense. What else? If you say that under full determinism, no one is responsible, what are you using? If not intuition, is it a philosophical theory? But if so, how would you assess it is true, if not by testing it against intuitions?
If you tell me that you use neuroscience, then I would tell you that that does not work. Apart from the intuitions involved in assessing that the claims about our brain are true (let us leave those intuitions aside), then how do you go about ascertaining whether, granting all of those facts about neuroscience, a brutal serial killer (see example) does not deserve to be punished for what he did?


And it is not that if he is fully determined, it follows that he does not deserve retribution. It does not follow: if you say it does follow, then you are making a claim of a deductive argument, and then I ask you for premises and a conclusion that validly follow from them. Now, I'm pretty sure that you cannot pull that off, but if you can, I would be persuaded and change my mind inmediately (I mean that; I just reckon that neither you nor anyone else can pull that off).

So, it does not follow that he does not deserve punishment. So, are you intuitively assessing, using your moral sense, that he does not deserve punishment?
If so, that's partially good because it's the way to go - assessing intuitively is the proper way -, but something is off with your intuition, or else your moral sense is okay, but you are giving it the wrong inputs (which may well be given the rest of our exchange (i.e., you are making some mistakes about the relevance of the meaning of the words, and things like that)).
On the other hand, if you're not using your moral sense to make an intuitive assessment that he does not deserve retribution for cutting up his victims and laughing at them as they die in pain and horror, then what is it that you are using?

 

[Angra Mainyu]

You're right. However:

Alice: Anchovies are delicious
Bob: Anchovies are disgusting.
Alice: Well, you're wrong. They're delicious!

is not unrealistic.

Not unrealistic about anchovies?
I do not know how frequent that would be, but okay. I would say it is not relevant, for the following reason: What is important is that people accept that in some ordinary cases, there is no fact of the matter. I'm not suggesting that people believe that in no cases, there is a fact of the matter. In fact, as I mentioned, there are species-wide facts about what tastes good or bad, as well as a considerable amount of individual variation (I gave the examples of the taste of rotten meat, rotten eggs and horse droppings, combined, or the test of fresh cat feces, or recently used toilet paper.). By 'species-wide' I do not mean every individual, but I mean every individual save for disease, or temporary impairment - generally something not working properly.
In your example, if it happened it would be probable that Alice believes that 'anchovies are delicious' is one of those species-wide facts, and further, she believes that Bob is saying that also one of those species-wide facts is that they are disgusting.

A potential reply:

Alice: Anchovies are delicious
Bob: Anchovies are disgusting.
Alice: Well, you're wrong. They're delicious!
Bob: I mean they are disgusting to me. And there is no fact of the matter.​

Here, it would not be normal for Alice to insist that Bob is mistaken about their being disgusting to him. But she might insist that there is a fact of the matter, and then they have a disagreement. I do not see a problem here. It would be more problematic if Alice said that there is always a fact of the matter, and that that were common. But it does not seem to be. People seem to generally accept that there are different tastes, without any sort of error or malfunctioning.

Many people might. Many others might say this is simply a difference of opinion.

I don't think it's quite as straightforward as you'd have us believe.

In a population of billions 1 in 10000 (for example) is many. But the point is that that is even today extremely rare, in actual exchanges. Now, people who accept some theory that holds that there are no moral facts might assert that when they are thinking about it, but it is rare for people to actually be consistent about it. Generally, human intuitions say there is a fact of the matter. To challenge them rationally, one would need evidence, arguments, etc.

 

[Angra Mainyu]

It may well be the case that we (generally or often) navigate the world better by trusting our faculties (and/or our intuitions) than by not trusting them, but it doesn't make them true or accurate.

I would make two points:

1. It is more than that. We always navigate the world trusting the vast majority of our intuitions, and we simply could not do it without that. If you are a scientists, you need to trust your eyes when you look at the results of the measurements. You need to trust your memory to use previous information in your work. And you need to make intuitive probabilistic assessments all the time, otherwise you would never find support for your theory, as there are infinitely many hypotheses compatible with observations. But you need them even to eat, drink water, or whatever.
Even when you reject one of your intuitions, you can only do so on the basis not only of empirical evidence and/or rational argumentation, but also trusting stronger intuitions. No way out.

2. If our intuitions were not generally reliable, then why would it be the case that we can use them to navigate our world? For example, remember my bear scenario. If we believe there is one bear in the cave and there is one bear, we will not go into the cave (or not without proper weapons, or something like that). If we believe there is no bear in the cave but there is one bear, then we are in trouble unless it's dead. In short, our intuitions (or faculties, or whatever one calls them) are generally reliable guides to truth. Sometimes they fail, but that's on a far bigger background of not failing.

Example 1: we can navigate the world better by trusting, rather than not trusting, that the sun will rise every morning and descend every night, and taking this into account.

Furthermore, it is also worth noting that we may in fact navigate the world even better (than before) when inaccuracies of our faculties and intuitions are revealed. This could in fact be one of the most profound opportunities that our use of the scientific method has provided us with.

Yes, and we generally relied of course on our faculties to realize that some of our faculties were under certain circumstances unreliable. Of course, we did not rely on those particular faculties we got to reject. But we generally were relying on our faculties. There is no way out, but it's okay because that's the proper way to do it. We generally rely on our faculties until we get evidence in particular against some of them - which we assess by other faculties, again relying on our faculties in general even when we reject some specific ones.

Example 2: we can navigate the world even better (than before) by realising that the sun does not, in fact, despite what it apparently/intuitively seems, rise in the morning and descend at night, and taking this into account.

Sure.

Example 3: we can navigate the world even better (than before) by realising that lunatic behaviour is not, in fact, despite what it apparently/intuitively seems, caused by entities called demons, and taking this into account (in treatments for mental disorders).

That one was not a case of normally functioning faculties. That was a case of malfunctioning due to religious indoctrination. It still goes on, even if generally dampened. But if you take a look at humans elsewhere, including those not affected by that particular religion, you will see that this is not a general human trait.

Example 4: it was once said by some, and possibly felt by many, that we would not, as a species, navigate the world better if we lost a belief in god and also, separately, if we found out that we are descended from apes, but neither turned out to be the case.

That is also a local mistaken, though it is still ongoing too.

I am deliberately using intuitive beliefs that people used to have in the past, and in the last case fears about letting go of them, in order to highlight the fact that the uncovering of the unreliability of intuitions is apparently an ongoing process, and so we should be careful not to assume that 'ours now' are necessarily reliable, merely because they feel robust, to us, now, nor indeed that they are currently functionally optimal just because they work at least quite well at present.

But you're mixing cases in which the faculties were functioning normally and pretty much everyone believed it (i.e., the Sun), and cases in which there was some local damage caused by religions. In any case, we also used our faculties to realize the Sun does not rise and descend. The people who believed it did - many still do - were not malfunctioning. They were making a correct assessment (at least in many, I'd say most cases) based on the limited information that they had. More information corrected the problem. The other problems are unfortunately more difficult to correct.

It is surely a matter of debate whether having strong retributive urges (which appears to go along with strong beliefs in free will) is not already an example of a failure.

In the sense that people debate it, sure. But not in the sense that there are good reasons to think so, I disagree.

Yes, but we might be able to make even better assessments by at least not only trusting our faculties and intuitions, or not trusting them so much.

In a general sense, that would be impossible (practically, not logically). What we can do is assess whether some of our faculties/intuitions are failing in some particular cases, but we only assess that by relying on other faculties - and indeed relying that they generally give the right verdict.

Neuroscience is arguably only in its infancy, but it is already providing further information that is giving cause for doubts about the reliability of our faculties.

Neuroscience cannot provide rational grounds for a general mistrust on our faculties, as one would need to accept that our faculties are generally reliable in order to do neuroscience in the first place. You need to accept that the results of the experiments are what you see. You need to trust that the experiments really happen and you do not have fake memories. And so on. What neuroscience can do - and sometimes does, as I understand - is to provide grounds to doubt that in some specific circumstances, some of our faculties are not reliable. That's good. And we will learn more. But there is a difference between neuroscience, and philosophical claims based on some interpretations of it, even when done by neuroscientists. That can be problematic.

 

[ruby sparks]

The other things you talk about should not be included, because that is not part of the meaning of the words, in their colloquial sense, in English.

As I said before, I wish I had understood earlier, but thank you for again clarifying, that you are content to rely on colloquial, common sense and/or intuitive understandings, definitions and meanings.

There are, of course, no potentially significant problems with that at all.

 

[ruby sparks]

But we have no way but relying on intuitions. There is nothing else at all we can rely on.

Hm. What definition of intuition are you using?

 

[ruby sparks]

I'm not asking you to assess which one of them is correct, by the way. But is it the case that at least one of them is not true? I say yes. What do you think?

I do not (yet) see that it is the case that at least one of them is not true, no.

 

[The AntiChris]

On gustatory evaluations:

What is important is that people accept that in some ordinary cases, there is no fact of the matter.

On moral evaluations:

Generally, human intuitions say there is a fact of the matter.

It seems the distinction you make is based on people's beliefs/intuitions.

If there really is a 'fact of the matter', shouldn't it be verifiable independently of what people reportedly believe/intuit?

If 'facts of the matter' are not verifiable in this way then why should we give credence to what people reportedly believe/intuit?

 

[ruby sparks]

[YOUTUBE]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=01qsJ-oZXVQ[/YOUTUBE]

 

[Angra Mainyu]

It seems the distinction you make is based on people's beliefs/intuitions.

In the way humans use the words, to be more precise (sorry if that wasn't sufficiently clear). This tells us something about the meaning of the words. It supports the hypothesis that when humans make assessments of gustatory taste, in many cases, they are not making claims about some property that is independent of each individual human, but rather, they are talking about themselves (or at most about themselves and a group of people with known similar preferences, or something like that; what they are saying depends on the context).

Then, there is no fact of the matter (independent of the specific human individual making the assessment, or a group at most) because people are just not talking about that - again, this is about many ordinary gustatory statements, but not about all.

So, when I said "What is important is that people accept that in some ordinary cases, there is no fact of the matter.", I used that as evidence of how people use the words - and so, of what the words mean.

In this regard, there is here an asymmetry between gustatory and moral statements:

When people generally talk understanding that there is no fact of the matter, it seems there is no way there could be a fact of the matter. It's not that human intuitions are infallible, but rather, that those intuitions inform the way in which humans use the words, and the meaning of the words is given by usage. As a result, whenever humans are not talking about things that are independent of the human making the assessment, but about themselves, there is no way there could be a fact of the matter, but at most, there might be widespread coincidence in personal assessments.

On the other hand, in the case of moral statements (and some gustatory statements; which ones depends on context, but a candidate would be fresh cat feces taste horrible), people's behavior indicates they do understand themselves to be talking about something about which there is a fact of the matter. So, they understand themselves to be talking about a property that is independent of the individual. Unlike the previous case, it is possible that they are mistaken and there is no such property. However, it is extremely improbable, at least on a prior probability assessment - as are all claims that reject ordinary human intuitions and state or imply an error theory.

Granted, sometimes human intuitions/faculties/whateveronecallsthem have been found to fail (of course, we need to use other human intuitions/faculties/etc. to see that, but that aside). But that required evidence. People who relied on their own faculties were being rational (even if mistaken), and it would not have been rational to dismiss them or seriously doubt them without specific evidence against them. In the vast majority of cases, of course, human faculties/intuitions/etc. were and are reliable guides to truth. Otherwise, we would be epistemically lost.

So, I am saying that that is the default rational position about morality. Is there evidence against it? Sure, but I think it's pretty weak. I used to think otherwise, long ago, but later I reckoned I was mistaken. The strongest piece of evidence against moral facts, as I see it, is an argument from apparent disagreement to miscommunication. But for a number of reasons, I reckon it is very weak. Others are even weaker, and even together, they do not make a dent. But I am willing to consider an argument if you want to bring one.

If there really is a 'fact of the matter', shouldn't it be verifiable independently of what people reportedly believe/intuit?

Generally no, at least not with current technology. But that seems to be a pretty ordinary event, when it comes to facts of the matter.

For example, consider the case of color. Is there a fact of the matter as to whether the traffic light is red or green (or neither)? It seems clearly so. But how would you go about verifying it? You might think of a machine that measures the wavelengths, and so on. Sure, that actually works. But there are two difficulties:

1. For the vast majority of time humans have been around, there was no such machine, and there was no way of verifying it independently of what people intuit. Yet, there were generally fact of the matter as to what colors ordinary objects were, just as there are facts of the matter now. Furthermore, people in the past had true justified beliefs that there were such facts of the matter.

2. Today, humans can make such machines, but in order to make such a machine, they need to rely on people's intuitions and reports. There is no other way, as the colors will not be found with a human color vision system to calibrate any (other) machine.

If 'facts of the matter' are not verifiable in this way then why should we give credence to what people reportedly believe/intuit?

Yes, indeed we ought to give very high credence to our intuitions/faculties/whateveronecallsthem unless we have specific evidence against one or more of them that is strong enough to show that they are not reliable.

As a matter of fact, we - i.e., humans - normally and rationally do give credence to our faculties, unless we have specific evidence (empirical, logical, any kind of evidence) against one or some of them. And it could not be any other way. We would not be able to do anything - including science, of course - without relying, in general, in our faculties. We need them. Now, we might not need all of them, and in fact, we in some cases should not rely on faculties when we have found them (using other, stronger intuitions) wanting. But we do need to find them wanting first. In other words, we need to see good evidence that a faculty is not reliable before we distrust it. Otherwise, it would be arbitrary to distrust intuition 1 but not intuition 2, where they are similarly strong. And we cannot distrust them all, or even most, or even more than a tiny fraction of them, without losing our ability to navigate our world, or even make rational assessments.

As an example, we regularly trust our senses. That includes sight, and color vision, but not only that. And we should trust them, except again when there is specific evidence in specific cases against one or more of them, and the evidence is good enough. Why would we not trust the moral sense? You might say it's because of such-and-such reason. Okay, then we could have a discussion if you like. That's cool, because we can and it's proper to test individual faculties, weigh the evidence against them, etc. What would not be proper is to fail to give our moral intuitions high credence without specific reasons against them. The fact that they may not be at this point independently verifiable is not a good reason to not trust them - lack of such verification is just an ordinary event when it comes to assessing facts of the matter.

 

[Angra Mainyu]

But we have no way but relying on intuitions. There is nothing else at all we can rely on.

Hm. What definition of intuition are you using?

I'm using it broadlyl. Call it 'faculties', if you like. But consider, for example, trusting our senses. Are our senses reliable? Sure, they are generally reliable. When humans do science, they trust their senses all the time. They need to trust them when they read the measurements of their instruments. They need to trust them not to bump into a door. And they need to trust their memories that the information about the experiments that are written in their notes/computer/whatever was in fact put there by them. Are our memories reliable? Yes, of course, they generally are.

This is what I'm getting at. You can find specific instances in which one of our senses is not reliable. You can find situations in which our memories aren't. That is all very salient, but those are the very, very few exceptions in an ocean or reliability. The very scientists who figure that in such-and-such cases one of our faculties (one of our senses, memory, whatever) is not reliable are relying generally on their faculties to make those assessments in the first place. And it could not be any other way. What would be a mistake would be not to realize that those cases of unreliability are (in terms of percentage) few exceptions, and even that in order to see those failures, we need to generally trust our faculties.

Perhaps, you have a narrow sense of 'intuition', but the general point is the same. We should not mistrust them without specific evidence against (one or some of) them. If you use 'intuition' in another way (e.g., excluding our memories, senses, etc.), I'd ask you to be more specific.