Tyler Disney’s blog

I wrote a paper for my ethics class yesterday.  The assignment was to present >= 3 arguments for the membership of the intrinsic moral community--that is, all things due moral consideration by virtue of what they are.  The first argument was for all and only rational beings, the second for all and only sentient beings, and the third was up to me to either support one of the previous two arguments or come up with my own.  Well, one things led to another, and I wound up going a couple hundred words over the limit to argue that even if a moral community does exist, it's impossible for us to have any knowledge about it.  Actually, thats what I wanted to conclude--I ran out of time and had to settle for "we have no evidence that any intrinsic moral community exists."  Just a couple more premises and I would have had it, but I had to sprint across campus as it was to get it in on time. 

My two most fundamental premises were these: 1) Only the material world exists (although I probably could have gone with "we can only have knowledge about the material world") and 2) If the truth or falsity of an observation explains why the observation was made then the event described by the observation actually occurred.  And if the truth or falsity of an observation doesn't explain why the observation was made then there isn't any evidence that the event described by the observation actually occurred (which doesn't mean that it didn't happen).  I picked up the second premise from a selection written by Gilbert Harman, and it intrigued and confused me, so I decided what better way to grok something than (then?) to write a paper about it?  Not sure I really understand it any better, to be honest.  I'm still having a problem with the premise "the truth value of moral observations don't explain why the observation was made," especially with the way I've set up some of my other definitions and premises.  I really wish I'd had more time to flesh this out--I wrote the vast majority of it in the mechatronics lab 2 hours before it was due.

1) Only the material world exists

     2) Define perception as a series of physical processes by which information concerning the material world is stored in the brain

     3) Nothing exists that humans cannot perceive

     4) Humans can theoretically experience the entire world, via perceptions.

     5) Define stimuli as any physical entity that affects sensory organs

     6) What humans call “Forms” or “Concepts” are structures of the brain associated with and created by patterns of stimuli that appear similar to each other

    7) Definition: morality is a concept in our minds 

     8) Definition: objective moral value is moral value that exists independent of our minds; it is a real entity that exists in the real world

     9) If morality is stimulated by objective moral value, then we must be able to perceive objective moral value

     10) Definition of an observation: an observation is a statement that has some truth-value about a stimulus. 

     11) If the truth of the observation explains why the observation was made, the stimulus as described by the observation actually occurred.

     12) If the truth of the observation does not explain why the observation was made, there is no evidence that the stimulus as described by the observation occurred. 

      13) If there is no evidence that a stimulus as described by an observation occurs, there is no evidence that a stimulus as described by an observation was perceived.

     14) Define moral observation: a moral observation is a statement that has some truth-value regarding an objective moral stimulus. 

     15) The truth value of moral observations do no explain why the observation was made.

     16) There is no evidence that objective moral value can be perceived.

      17) There is no evidence that objective moral value exists

      18) The intrinsic moral community is composed of all those things that are due intrinsic moral consideration

      19) There is no evidence that an intrinsic moral community exists

     20) There is no evidence that any being can be a part of the intrinsic moral community

Here's an excerpt by Harman: "In considering whether moral principles can help explain observations, it is therefore important to note an ambiguity in the word "observation."  You see the children set the cat on fire and immediately think,"That's wrong."  In one sense, your observations that what the children are doing is wrong.  In another sense, your observation is your thinking that thought.  Moral observations might explain observations in the first sense but not in the second sense.  Certain moral principles might help to explain why it was wrong of the children to set the cat on fire, but moral principles seem to be of no help in explaining your thinking that that is wrong.  In the first sense of "observation", moral principles can be tested by observing "that this act is wrong is evidence that causing unnecessary suffering is wrong."  But in the second sense of "observation," moral principles cannot clearly be tested by observation, since they do not appear to help explain observations in this second sense of "observation."  Moral Principles do not seem to help explain your observing what you observe."

Earlier he uses the example of a scientist who sees the vapor trail of a proton in a cloud chamber and observes "there goes a proton."  If his statement is true, then a proton was there, and caused a trail through the vapor, and light reflected off the trail and bounced into the scientist's retina's and the info went to his brain and he thus said "there goes a proton."  The truth of the observation explained why the observation was made.  If his observation could be equally well explained by his psychological state without the assumption of the existence of a proton, then the observation would not have been evidence for the existence of that proton.  So how does one sense morality?  And how is the truth value tested?  What stops two different people from seeing the same thing and reaching different moral observations?  Is it really "objective moral value" that caused the moral observation to be made?  It seems that moral observations can be equally well explained by the psychological state and moral sensibility of the observer.

Fun fact of the day: my roommate's dog puked in my room today, then started chowing down on it immediately (didn't want it to get cold, I presume).  mm mm good. 

I joined this site so I could join the group Dandelion Sublime, because I thought (and still do!) that it was a neat idea.  Then someone mentioned Kant's Critique of Pure Reason and I ran in the opposite direction as fast as I could and haven't looked back until today.  I haven't actually ever attempted the Critique--his Prolegomena to any future Metaphysics, and the horror stories and excerpts I've encountered, were enough for me.   I'm actually going to be revisiting Kant in a few weeks in my ethics class; apparently I'll be formerly educated on how the categorical imperative works.  My professor refused to tell us which ethical theory he personally believes in until after our paper is turned in, but I have the sneaking suspicion it has something to do with a German guy who thought Rube Goldberg's drawings were an artistic metaphor for elegant and concise sentence structure.

So why am I composing this message?  Well, for starters, screwing around on the internet is my modus operandi for completing homework, and boy have I got a lot of that.  Also...all the cool kids are doing it, thus so shall I.  With any luck this will be the last post as well as the first, and no one will ever read any of it.

But WAIT!!  Hold everything!!  I can't claim to be a real bonafide Web 2.0 user until I fill in one last detail!

IMG_0059