Absolute Morality...again.

That IS silly, really really really silly. Just word tripping.Let me try again. When we "search" for a moral judgment in any given moral dilemma -- we or a jury or a judge or an ethicist or whoever -- unlike when we search for Atlantis or gold from lead -- we FIND one, it just may not be the perfect one, the one that arrives at THE fairest decision, the one that covers all the bases, all the aspects, is free of all biases, etc etc etc. But since we do find one in our pursuit of the fairest, truest, best one, that implies that there is always a best one, and that implies that there is an absolute morality behind it all -- a morality that we would recognize if we had all the facts and were absolutely free of bias. I dunno, seems pretty straight to me. There may be a flaw in it, but all the objections so far are just silly misrepresentations so the flaw is far from evident if there is one.

Consequently then it must be asked, what would the best set of moral standards do? Asking you what the best means? What is best?

It would tell us how best to live, what is always the wisest, fairest, most honest way of dealing with our fellow man, the actions that promote the best interests of all concerned, etc etc etc. The usual. Nothing new.The fact that there are disagreements about this does not mean that morality is relative, it means that some ideas are right and some wrong.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

Consequently though that implies instant transmission of known situations does it not? Because to make that form of a decision assumes that the situation that you are making a decisionin is static and will remain static until all necessary information can be ferretted out and discussed. So while a decision will have been moral when the situation arose, it becomes less then moral because by the time the decision implementation occurs the situation has then changed, yes? Yet when you say some ideas are right and some are wrong, is there not only supposed to be 1 idea, 1 true decision. And one would also say tht there is a sliding scale between right and wrong in which actions are seen as more moral the further into right and appropriate you go and less the further into wrong you go?

And they all lived happily ever after.It's a fairy tale idea. The real world is filled with different, often conflicting, goals. What's best for one is not what's best for another. There is no absolute best.

Having absolute standards doesn't mean they are applied by some kind of flat formula. Of course every case has to be judged individually.

But that doesn't solve the problem. It doesn't even address the problem."Best" is relative to goals. Different people have different goals. You only have to look at politics to see this. Conservatives, socialists, liberals, libetarians -- there you have 4 different groups, with 4 very different ideas as to what should be the goals of a society. And that doesn't even mention the rather different goals of other cultures (American indians, or Australian Aborigines, or Fijians). There is no absolute way of deciding what is best, because there is no absolute best.

I'd have to assume that when there are conflicting goals, one of the goals (or parts of different goals) are against the moral standard and thus "wrong".Can you think of an example where all goals would be judged "morally right" and still there would be a conflict? Off the cuff I can't think of a "pure case" where the situation isn't tainted by some circumstance that involves "moral wrong".

No, "best" is not relative to indivudal goals, best is relative to what's the fairest judgment of a situation, the best action or outcome of a particular situation for all concerned.Somebody's "goal" could be to murder somebody who is getting in the way of a financial goal or a promotion or something like that. How relativistic are you going to be about that one?And as Ben says -- or at least is asking -- all those goals you list can't all be right. We may not be able to arrive at a consensus about it, but there must be only one right action on every social issue, only we don't have all the facts and we aren't omniscient or unbiased.It's very hard to think of good examples.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

Faith, message 218 awaits your attention.

Do you know how to link to a message? That's the polite thing to do. If you don't, here's how. Message 218 Check "peek" for the method.No, you hadn't committed an ad hominem attack, but asking me a personal question about my personal attitude is an ad hominem method and I am refusing to answer such questions ever again. Not playing that game. Deal with the issues, not the person. None of your business what I think or feel about anything at all ever. I argue what I consider to be objective facts, not my subjective feelings. Deal with it.{edit: Oh, and if you're honest, you must admit that such a question contains an implicit accusation which requires a personal statement from me either to exonerate myself of your charge or convict myself. VERY VERY foul play. Nasty business there. Argue the issues.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

Please don't insult both our intelligences. You know the question was not a personal one. Also, you chose to tackle my assumption (being fully aware of its content) and then when you were forced to admit your position you bailed out. Not necessarily a "personal" statement, but aside from that you are right. It's called socratic enquiry!Socratic method - Wikipedia It certainly isn't foul play. You boxed yourself in with your OWN statements. I think you are aware of this.In any case your failure to answer leads me to draw the conclusion that you do after all hold the view that absolute morality conforms to your worldview.

Accuse accuse accuse. That was the whole point of your question and you are going to make sure you get every drop of accusation you can get out of it whether I answer it or not. Your question is nothing but a holier-than-thou bit of bullying. Socratic inquiry doesn't investigate personal attitudes or turn an intellectual discussion into a moral indictment or character assassination. Why should I have to prove anything to you? Deal with the issues, not the person.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

The issue at hand was "do those whole belive in absolute morals assume that it fits their worldview?"You said I was wrong to make such an assumtion (drawing on your OWN experience) and I, in response, asked some very broad questions. What's the problem?Face it Faith, you just didn't like where your OWN statements lead you.

No matter how hard you try, I simply don't seem to get it. Let me think a bit further about this (my brain is in pain, lol, certainly in a foreign language...)One thing I could point out is that you use "...that implies that there is always a best one." Does that deliberately exclude the possibility that there could be 2 (or more) decisions that are BOTH most correct? Or only 'both indistinguishably correct' (such that humans are merely unable to make the distinction)? And again: is there a meaningful difference between the last two statements?I also object somewhat to your use of the word "we FIND one". I would argue we MAKE/DEVICE one. Or if you like that more: we decide autonymously at which point we stop searching (that is: we may "find" a number of different judgements, and then decide on our own which one we consider). And we do, in the end, because having "a" decision is better, ultimately, than waiting for an imaginary "optimal" moral judgement to suddenly reveal itself. We simply have no other choice, since the "optimal" moral judegement, if it exists, may be unknowable. There even isn't any way to know definitely that our final judgement IS the optimal one.Also, to get back to "since we do find a moral decision in our pursuit of the fairest, truest, best one, that implies that there is always a best one". That sounds so utterly bizarre! I would think that what we find exactly (i.e. does it turn out that everyone always finds more or less the same moral decision, or does it turn out that it can considerable vary according to person/culture/situation) makes a difference for the reasoning. But it seems it doesn't?? Like doing "a" test, only to disregard the outcome completely and hold onto a preconceived idea anyway. Doesn't that make the whole statement pretty... meaningless?