The is/ought issue.

[ruby sparks]

By contrast, getting a nonmoral conclusion from a nonmoral premise is not necessarily invalid. A simple example:

P1. Everyone is prejudiced against prejudiced people.
P2. Jim is prejudiced against Bob.
C1. Therefore, Angela is prejudiced against Mary.

So the two types of argument (moral from nonmoral, and nonmoral from nonmoral) are not the same.

No, that is not the right conclusion.

Yes it is. Well, it's a valid conclusion, which is the point I was making. You couldn't say that about a moral conclusion from nonmoral premises. So the two types of argument are not the same. Getting a moral conclusion from nonmoral premises would be invalid and a fallacy.

 

[Angra Mainyu]

There definitely is a problem though, namely that getting a moral conclusion from nonmoral premises would not be valid, and would be a fallacy. There used to be a guy in here not that long ago who thought logic was very important in such matters. I wonder where he went?

Again, either that is not the case and there is no fallacy (see the 'rape for fun' example) , or this sort of fallacy is in general not a problem as it happens everywhere (not just with morality), and it is special pleading to attack only morality with it.

It is not special pleading. The two types of argument (moral from nonmoral and nonmoral from nonmoral) are not the same.

I wonder where that guy went to? Have you seen him? The one who thought logic was very important in such matters.

No, that is not true. I already explained why that is not a proper classification of arguments. I already explained the logic. I already gave examples.

 

[Angra Mainyu]

By contrast, getting a nonmoral conclusion from a nonmoral premise is not necessarily invalid. A simple example:

P1. Everyone is prejudiced against prejudiced people.
P2. Jim is prejudiced against Bob.
C1. Therefore, Angela is prejudiced against Mary.

So the two types of argument (moral from nonmoral, and nonmoral from nonmoral) are not the same.

No, that is not the right conclusion.

Yes it is.

But I already showed you that it is not, in this post. You simply insist, without argument. Tell me, where is the fallacy?


P1: Ordinary human faculties reckon that it is immoral for a human being to rape another just for fun.
P2: If ordinary human faculties reckon that A, then very probably A.
C: Very probably, it is immoral for a human being to rape another just for fun.

ETA: If you say that that has a moral premise (P1), then exactly the same happens with the illness case, the science case, etc. Again, it is special pleading to single out morality.

 

[ruby sparks]

Here's another nonmoral to nonmoral one:

P1. All men are mortal.
P2. Socrates is a man.
C1. Socrates is mortal.

Valid.

 

[ruby sparks]

But I already showed you that it is not, in this post. You simply insist, without argument. Tell me, where is the fallacy?

No, you didn't show me it is not valid. It is valid.

Where is what fallacy? I'm saying there's no fallacy.

 

[Angra Mainyu]

But I already showed you that it is not....

No, you didn't. It is valid.

Tell me, where is the fallacy?

Where is what fallacy?

I showed that the proper distinction is not between non-moral to moral and non-moral to non-moral. With that criterion, one might as well say that the proper distinction is between non-illness to non-illness and non-illness to illness. No, the proper distinction is between valid and invalid. Your example (with an implicit premise about Angela) is valid. But then again, that is not relevant, for the reasons I've been explaining.

 

[Angra Mainyu]

By contrast, getting a nonmoral conclusion from a nonmoral premise is not necessarily invalid. A simple example:

P1. Everyone is prejudiced against prejudiced people.
P2. Jim is prejudiced against Bob.
C1. Therefore, Angela is prejudiced against Mary.

So the two types of argument (moral from nonmoral, and nonmoral from nonmoral) are not the same.

Let me provide two parallels:

By contrast, getting a nonillness conclusion from a nonillness premise is not necessarily invalid. A simple example:

P1. Everyone is prejudiced against prejudiced people.
P2. Jim is prejudiced against Bob.
C1. Therefore, Angela is prejudiced against Mary.

So the two types of argument (illness from nonillness, and nonillness from nonillness) are not the same.​

By contrast, getting a noncolor conclusion from a noncolor premise is not necessarily invalid. A simple example:

P1. Everyone is prejudiced against prejudiced people.
P2. Jim is prejudiced against Bob.
C1. Therefore, Angela is prejudiced against Mary.

So the two types of argument (color from noncolor, and noncolor from noncolor) are not the same.​

 

[ruby sparks]

No, you didn't. It is valid.



Where is what fallacy?

I showed that the proper distinction is not between non-moral to moral and non-moral to non-moral.

You didn't show any such thing. The distinction between the two types of argument remains. They are not the same thing. They are different. And you should admit that there is an inherent problem with is/ought that is not a problem with your analogies.

The argument I offered is valid. A non-moral to moral argument would not be valid.

Where is what fallacy?

 

[Angra Mainyu]

No, you didn't. It is valid.



Where is what fallacy?

I showed that the proper distinction is not between non-moral to moral and non-moral to non-moral.

You didn't show any such thing.

The argument I offered is valid. A non-moral to moral argument would not be valid.

Where is what fallacy?

Fallacy?

No, the point is that it is not proper (rational, in this case) to divide arguments in two categories (moral from nonmoral, and nonmoral from nonmoral), and present this as a problem for the former. One might as well separate them in (color from noncolor, and noncolor from noncolor) or (illness from nonillness, and nonillness from nonillness), and so on. It's special pleading to attack morality in this particular manner. Furthermore, there is nothing special about (moral from nonmoral, and nonmoral from nonmoral) vs. (color from noncolor, and noncolor from noncolor) or (illness from nonillness, and nonillness from nonillness), when it comes to what follows from what.

 

[ruby sparks]

So the two types of argument (color from noncolor, and noncolor from noncolor) are not the same.[/indent]

I don't understand that. You haven't done a colour from non-colour argument to illustrate the difference.

In any case, colour is only an analogy. Not even a very good one. A contrived choice, to try to bolster your argument about morals.

 

[ruby sparks]

You didn't show any such thing.

The argument I offered is valid. A non-moral to moral argument would not be valid.

Where is what fallacy?

Fallacy?

No, the point is that it is not proper (rational, in this case) to divide arguments in two categories (moral from nonmoral, and nonmoral from nonmoral), and present this as a problem for the former. One might as well separate them in (color from noncolor, and noncolor from noncolor) or (illness from nonillness, and nonillness from nonillness), and so on. It's special pleading to attack morality in this particular manner. Furthermore, there is nothing special about (moral from nonmoral, and nonmoral from nonmoral) vs. (color from noncolor, and noncolor from noncolor) or (illness from nonillness, and nonillness from nonillness), when it comes to what follows from what.

What do you mean 'no'? You asked me where the fallacy was. Now a fallacy is not the point?

Are you, or are you not, going to admit that there is an inherent problem with getting a moral conclusion from nonmoral premises, namely that it is not valid and a fallacy, a formal fallacy in fact. You recently claimed that logic was very important in these matters, and now it has conveniently gone out the window.

This continued evasion is getting extremely boring.

 

[ruby sparks]

Your example (with an implicit premise about Angela) is valid.

Just tangentally on this, what do you mean by 'implicit premise about Angela'?

 

[Angra Mainyu]

What do you mean 'no'? You asked me where the fallacy was. Now a fallacy is not the point?

I was not claiming the argument you offered was a fallacy. What I claimed and argued - among other things - is that it is not proper to attack morality on grounds that you refuse to apply to color or illness or science even though they are in that particular regard not at all different from morality.

Are you, or are you not, going to admit that there is an inherent problem with getting a moral conclusion from nonmoral premises, namely that it is not valid and a fallacy, a formal fallacy in fact. You recently claimed that logic was very important in these matters, and now it has conveniently gone out the window.

This continued evasion is getting extremely boring.

Continued evasion? On your part you mean? By failing to actually address the points and repeating yours? I have repeatedly explained my position, but again:

1. There are arguments in which the premises are arguably non-moral and warranted, the conclusion is moral, but are valid. Example:

P1: Ordinary human faculties reckon that it is immoral for a human being to rape another just for fun.
P2: If ordinary human faculties reckon that A, then very probably A.
C: Very probably, it is immoral for a human being to rape another just for fun.

If that does not count as non-moral premises, fine then, it depends on what you count as such.

2. Moral assessments can also be made immediately and intuitively, without any kind of reasoning, and again no fallacy.

3. If the usual way in which we make moral assessments using nonmoral information does not contain any implicit premises as the argument above, then it is a fallacy, but if that is the case, then this fallacy is not something that happens with morality in particular, but with color, illness, science, and it is pretty much everywhere, inevitably even. So, if moral statements (and then, all of these other statements) are indeed fallacious, then clearly this is a sort of fallacy that it is not important to avoid, simply because it is not even possible to avoid it and learning almost anything about the world. Rather, this would be a fallacy that one makes all the time, and which is rational to make all the time - moreover, it would be irrational to fail to make it.

Now, I do think in general logic is important, and in particular, so is to avoid fallacies. But if it turns out that this particular kind of assessment is a fallacy, then clearly it is not always the case important to avoid fallacies, but rather, it is important to incur this particular fallacy all the time. And this is so even if one is a moral error theorist and rejects morality - this particular fallacy, if it is a fallacy at all, again is necessary to learn information about the world, perhaps for all of it or all of it except for immediate perceptions.

 

[Angra Mainyu]

Your example (with an implicit premise about Angela) is valid.

Just tangentally on this, what do you mean by 'implicit premise about Angela'?

You need the implicit premise that Angela is a person. Without that premise, Angela might be, say, a cat, and then the conclusion would not follow because 'Everyone' includes all persons, but not cats. But I misread your argument. I thought the conclusion said that Angela was prejudiced against Jim. As it is, it is invalid.

 

[Angra Mainyu]

By contrast, getting a nonmoral conclusion from a nonmoral premise is not necessarily invalid. A simple example:

P1. Everyone is prejudiced against prejudiced people.
P2. Jim is prejudiced against Bob.
C1. Therefore, Angela is prejudiced against Mary.

So the two types of argument (moral from nonmoral, and nonmoral from nonmoral) are not the same.

Let me provide two parallels:

By contrast, getting a nonillness conclusion from a nonillness premise is not necessarily invalid. A simple example:

P1. Everyone is prejudiced against prejudiced people.
P2. Jim is prejudiced against Bob.
C1. Therefore, Angela is prejudiced against Mary.

So the two types of argument (illness from nonillness, and nonillness from nonillness) are not the same.​

By contrast, getting a noncolor conclusion from a noncolor premise is not necessarily invalid. A simple example:

P1. Everyone is prejudiced against prejudiced people.
P2. Jim is prejudiced against Bob.
C1. Therefore, Angela is prejudiced against Mary.

So the two types of argument (color from noncolor, and noncolor from noncolor) are not the same.​

And of course, those are all invalid. Sorry, I misread your argument. I thought the conclusion was that Angela was prejudiced against Jim, because that is what I was expecting you to say (why would you make an invalid argument as an example of a valid one? Oh well). As it is, the argument you provide is invalid. Still, my parallels go through - just as invalid, but still relevant parallels.

 

[ruby sparks]

You need the implicit premise that Angela is a person. Without that premise, Angela might be, say, a cat, and then the conclusion would not follow because 'Everyone' includes all persons, but not cats.

Ok. They are all people.

But I misread your argument. I thought the conclusion said that Angela was prejudiced against Jim. As it is, it is invalid.

No, it isn't. It's valid. It may or may not be true, but that's a different issue.

 

[ruby sparks]

What do you mean 'no'? You asked me where the fallacy was. Now a fallacy is not the point?

I was not claiming the argument you offered was a fallacy. What I claimed and argued - among other things - is that it is not proper to attack morality on grounds that you refuse to apply to color or illness or science even though they are in that particular regard not at all different from morality.

Are you, or are you not, going to admit that there is an inherent problem with getting a moral conclusion from nonmoral premises, namely that it is not valid and a fallacy, a formal fallacy in fact. You recently claimed that logic was very important in these matters, and now it has conveniently gone out the window.

This continued evasion is getting extremely boring.

Continued evasion? On your part you mean? By failing to actually address the points and repeating yours? I have repeatedly explained my position, but again:

1. There are arguments in which the premises are arguably non-moral and warranted, the conclusion is moral, but are valid. Example:

P1: Ordinary human faculties reckon that it is immoral for a human being to rape another just for fun.
P2: If ordinary human faculties reckon that A, then very probably A.
C: Very probably, it is immoral for a human being to rape another just for fun.

If that does not count as non-moral premises, fine then, it depends on what you count as such.

2. Moral assessments can also be made immediately and intuitively, without any kind of reasoning, and again no fallacy.

3. If the usual way in which we make moral assessments using nonmoral information does not contain any implicit premises as the argument above, then it is a fallacy, but if that is the case, then this fallacy is not something that happens with morality in particular, but with color, illness, science, and it is pretty much everywhere, inevitably even. So, if moral statements (and then, all of these other statements) are indeed fallacious, then clearly this is a sort of fallacy that it is not important to avoid, simply because it is not even possible to avoid it and learning almost anything about the world. Rather, this would be a fallacy that one makes all the time, and which is rational to make all the time - moreover, it would be irrational to fail to make it.

Now, I do think in general logic is important, and in particular, so is to avoid fallacies. But if it turns out that this particular kind of assessment is a fallacy, then clearly it is not always the case important to avoid fallacies, but rather, it is important to incur this particular fallacy all the time. And this is so even if one is a moral error theorist and rejects morality - this particular fallacy, if it is a fallacy at all, again is necessary to learn information about the world, perhaps for all of it or all of it except for immediate perceptions.

We agree that getting a moral conclusion from nonmoral premises is a formal fallacy and not valid. Therefore we agree there is an inherent is/ought problem, surely an important one to someone like you who values logic highly, at least sometimes.

Whether something else, something different, is or isn't valid, is a fallacy, or is problematical in some other way, is another matter. You are de facto not comparing like with like (first, you are comparing nonmoral issues to moral ones, and second, your analogous phenomena arguably and apparently have mind-independent properties, whereas morality arguably and apparently doesn't) so the analogies and comparisons you are using ultimately fail by your own preferred standards.

In any case, and above and beyond all that, analogies can be very useful and illuminating, yes, but even if it (colour) were a good analogy (which imo it isn't, despite your unconvincing protestations) it's still not necessarily warranted (is a potential non-sequitur) to draw conclusions from any analogy regarding what you are comparing it to, which is what you have been doing ever since you started using the analogies in this forum.

You may even, possibly, be risking committing a fallacy by analogy, as with this typical example (not by you):

P1. Planets in a solar system orbit a star.
P2. Electrons in an atom orbit a nucleus, and electrons jump from orbit to orbit.
C1. Planets in a solar system jump from orbit to orbit.

In any case, I like analogies myself, but there are limits to them. As with planets and electrons, something might easily be true about colour and not about morality despite certain similarities between them, especially if they are different phenomena, which they are, so even setting logic aside, I'd still be a bit dubious, especially if I was a fan of logical thinking, about firmly concluding 'as with reasoning about colour, so with reasoning about morality'. In fact, it might itself even be a non-sequitur to say that.

Also, it is interesting that you can't yet see that the prejudice argument above is valid. I would say that points up one of the limitations of a non-logical, often intuitive system (eg the human brain) trying to do logic.

 

[Torin]

But since you raise this matter, for that matter, sound is not perceived like color either. You look at the event, but you do not hear the blood, just as you do not see the screams, and you neither hear nor see the wrongness, but you do perceive it, do you not? Sure, you say you have a "a feeling in me that results from my perceiving those facts". But do you perceive the facts? Is the color impression that you see not also perceived as "a feeling in" you, even if a different kind of feeling? Is the sound as you perceived it also not "a feeling in" you, even if distinct from both the perception of redness and that of moral wrongness?

But we have sensations (roughly, what David Hume called impressions) of colors and sounds. We don't have the same sorts of sensations for colors as we have for sounds, but we do have sensations for both. There's no sensation of wrongness.

None of this has to do with the response to the is/ought objection, though, but for now, how about this: instead of color, think illness. You can see all of the effects of, say, cancer on a human being. But where do you see the illness in cancer, or psychosis?

You don't!

Illness is an abstraction. It is formed from observation by a process of conceptual inference. It is then applied to concrete instances by a series of logical steps.

To be clear, I do not deny the validity of morality. I just think it's to do with reasoning rather than feelings or perceptions.

But let me go with an example.

Suppose that Bob accepts that there is very good evidence that any human with ordinary faculties would find that a human with the symptoms described as 'psychosis' is ill. On the basis of that, he reckons that psychosis is very probably an illness (maybe so probable that it's beyond a reasonable doubt). Bob rejects the idea that he is committing any fallacy in making that assessment.

Bob also accepts that there is very good evidence that any human with an ordinary moral sense would find the kidnappings, rapes and murders committed by Ted Bundy (as described here), very immoral. Now, when Alice uses that information as evidence that the actions in question were indeed very immoral and reckons that they very probably were, Bob objects and says that Alice is incurring the is/ought fallacy, because it does not follow from the premise that any human with an ordinary moral sense would find the kidnappings, rapes and murders committed by Ted Bundy (as described here), very immoral, that the actions were indeed very immoral.

One of my aims is to show that there is something wrong with Bob's objection, for the same reasons explained in my previous reply to ruby sparks.

Ok. I would say we have a concept of morality that applies to the actions of Ted Bundy, rather than a moral sense.

I don't think we have a moral sense, in the sense you seem to mean that.

But why would the moral assessment have to be inferred? You see the red blood, you hear the screams, you perceive the wrongness too, without resorting to any kind of reasoning: it is an immediate assessment, not something you reason your way to.

The moral assessment must be inferred because it isn't given in observation. I agree that the assessment is very rapid, but that is because as adults we have a certain fluency with the concept of morality - in simple and clear cases, that is.

Still, as I mentioned, if that does not convince you, how about illness? You do not see or hear the illness in a cancer patient, or in a psychotic patient, etc., right?

Correct, but it ought to be clear at this point that I regard illness as an abstraction from observation.

 

[Angra Mainyu]

You need the implicit premise that Angela is a person. Without that premise, Angela might be, say, a cat, and then the conclusion would not follow because 'Everyone' includes all persons, but not cats.

Ok. They are all people.

But I misread your argument. I thought the conclusion said that Angela was prejudiced against Jim. As it is, it is invalid.

No, it isn't. It's valid. It may or may not be true, but that's a different issue.

Yeah, okay, it's valid if they're all people. My bad, brain failure this morning. But that still makes no difference that is relevant in this context. You're only showing that there are valid arguments from nonmoral to nonmoral. But there are also valid arguments from noncolor to noncolor, from nonillness to nonillness, etc., and yet the parallels also do not give us proper classifications of arguments.

 

[Angra Mainyu]

But we have sensations (roughly, what David Hume called impressions) of colors and sounds. We don't have the same sorts of sensations for colors as we have for sounds, but we do have sensations for both. There's no sensation of wrongness.

Ok, so you seem to classify our mental experiences in sensations and non-sensations. That is a way of classifying them, but that classification is not relevant to the matter at hand, which is about what follows from what.
For instance, in the case of color, one the central examples I gave was not one in which there was any sensation:

Now suppose I do not see the ball. However, I observe that many humans who look at the ball tell me it's red. Assuming I can tell that they are being sincere (how I do that is not the issue), I also have justification to reckon that the ball is red, again with very, very high probability. Now suppose no humans look at the ball, but there is a robot with cameras for eyes and whose color vision is calibrated using the color vision of ordinary humans. The robot has been tested in thousands of experiments, and under ordinary conditions, it makes the color assessments humans ordinarily do. If I get conclusive information that the robot says the ball is red (again, ordinary light conditions), then I can use that to reckon that the ball is red.

I gave a similar example later:

Suppose that Bob accepts that there is very good evidence that any human with ordinary color vision would see this ball as red, under ordinary lighting conditions, and on the basis of that, he reckons that the ball is probably red. Bob rejects the idea that he is committing any fallacy in making that assessment.

In those cases, there is no color sensation, because the person can't see the object (sure, they can imagine the object and maybe form a sensation as a result, but they are imagining it using other information).

You don't!

Illness is an abstraction. It is formed from observation by a process of conceptual inference. It is then applied to concrete instances by a series of logical steps.

To be clear, I do not deny the validity of morality. I just think it's to do with reasoning rather than feelings or perceptions.

Long before there was language, animals were able to detect ill individuals. They may not have the abstract idea of an illness, but they can often tell when something or someone is ill. That proto-concept stays with humans. It is very probably hard-wired into the brains of many species, I think. It does not have to do with reasoning as far as I can tell.

As for reasoning, if by that you mean deductive reasoning, one will never get that a person is ill by a description of the symptoms that does not use the word 'ill' or synonyms. Similarly, one will never get that chimps and humans have a common ancestor from a description of the evidence. And so on. Now, one of my arguments is that it would not be reasonable to accept all of those assessments regardless, but then say that moral assessments that use information stated in non-moral terms incur a fallacy and for that reason are suspect and/or to be rejected.

The moral assessment must be inferred because it isn't given in observation. I agree that the assessment is very rapid, but that is because as adults we have a certain fluency with the concept of morality - in simple and clear cases, that is.

I think there might be a misunderstanding here. You mention "inferred" and I was thinking about some conscious process. Now I'm not sure whether you require conscious processing at all. If you don't, then my only objection would be that a proto-concept suffices. I reckon a chimp would make the assessment just as quickly, if he sees a behavior that she finds wrongful (or the close chimp equivalent). But we do not need to settle that to discuss the is/ought issue, so I just have two questions:

1. When you say it's inferred, do you mean it has to be conscious?
2. When you say it's inferred, do you mean it has to be a deduction?

Correct, but it ought to be clear at this point that I regard illness as an abstraction from observation.

Alright, we may or may not have some disagreement (depending on the issues above), but in this instance, let us stipulate for the sake of the argument that that is so, and then so is morality. In this context, the example in my previous post still works: Bob is not being rational in raising the is/ought issue against morality, but accepting the illness assessment, without there being any relevant difference between the cases in terms of what follows from what. .

Moreover, it's not only the case of illness. It happens all over the place (see examples in my other posts).