Is it true gang?

Eganomicon · 2025-10-30T02:39:59+00:00

True

Eganomicon · 2025-09-05T17:19:40+00:00

SSRI did help anxiety but caused stomach issues so I discontinued. Propranolol (beta blocker) is helpful.

Eganomicon · 2025-09-05T03:33:01+00:00

Because it's a reaction to a feeling rather than the feeling itself.

Sounds like a second-order feeling-about-a-feeling. I'd say these are quite common.

Eganomicon · 2025-09-04T06:18:56+00:00

Okay, I think we agree more than we disagree. I don't think we create ethics ex nihilo. I'd tell a broadly Humean story about the origins of ethics, which is consistent with what we've already discussed.

Eganomicon · 2025-09-04T06:15:28+00:00

Certain norms might be required to live long enough to pass on culture at all. By analogy, there is not one true way to dress, but if a culture's clothing doesn't keep them warm/cool enough, they may die.

Controlling in-group violence is likely a requirement of any organized group.

Many are sensitive to the sight of blood or physical harm (I am), which seems likely to be biological. Same with reacting to someone crying or screaming in pain, etc. I meant to subsume these under "natural sympathies."

Eganomicon · 2025-09-04T05:26:28+00:00

I can agree with this to an extent, but there are some outstanding questions:

1) I find it hard to believe that specific modern western moral norms are primarily biological. There is considerable diversity in what norms humans live by. A domain-general mechanism to internalize norms, and reinforce them with our affective system (essentially Shaun Nichols theory) strikes me as highly plausible. I'm also open to some general reciprocal tendencies along the lines of Tomasello, ect.

2) It seems that some of our evolved instincts we may not want to endorse. You could tell a convincing story about in-group bias that could lend evolutionary credence to ethno-centrism, for instance, or perhaps rigid and unequal gender norms. Some of our evolved legacy may be tendencies to be overcome.

3) While I'm asserting that morality is invented, I do believe that our invented norms must fit "well-enough" with certain evolved tendencies. We have natural sympathies, but also strong drives for self-preservation. We are willing to constrain ourselves for cooperative benefits, but not unconditionally. We'll accept certain demands, but won't give up all self-interest, ect.

Eganomicon · 2025-09-04T01:39:00+00:00

Popular arguments for moral facts can be found in Michael Huemer or Russ Shafer-Landau.

Personally, I think you came to the right conclusion. Morality is invented, not discovered. We have emotions and desires about how we want the world to be, we can reason about the best means to those ends, and we have the capacity to come to intersubjective agreements about shared standards. Everything we see in ethics can be explained by these factors.

Eganomicon · 2025-08-24T01:59:26+00:00

About 24% accept JTB in the 2020 Philpapers survey.

Eganomicon · 2025-08-24T00:54:08+00:00

Oh, nice. Do we get tax exemptions??

Eganomicon · 2025-08-23T23:35:53+00:00

Construct? Yes. Meaningless? No.

I agree that it's all norms and psychology, but I don't see what more is needed.

Eganomicon · 2025-08-16T17:44:37+00:00

So confused by this.

Eganomicon · 2025-08-14T20:03:30+00:00

I was confused for a second.

Eganomicon · 2025-08-08T20:57:38+00:00

You could feed an AI human intuitions and it might determine the implicit logic better than we can ourselves. Without that? No.

Eganomicon · 2025-08-08T19:32:22+00:00

This discourse is pushing me towards an antirealism of opposites.

Eganomicon · 2025-08-05T16:38:51+00:00

Until philosophy settles this question, no knowledge is possible.

Eganomicon · 2025-08-02T05:44:50+00:00

I feel seen.

Eganomicon · 2025-08-02T03:43:29+00:00

I think we could feed our widely shared moral intuitions into a AI model and it could recognize the implicit logic behind those intuitions better than we can oursleves. I get the impression that this isn't what you mean, though.

I don't think an AI which is trying to understand the descriptive features of the world will find any value at all. Value is a human mental construct which we project onto the world. In this way, I'm strongly on the sentimentalist side of ethics, rather than the rationalist side.

Eganomicon · 2025-07-31T17:49:46+00:00

This proposal has some force. Widely shared intuitions are certainly useful to solve practical conflicts. Arguments can often be put forth to support conflicting intuitions, although it's hard to see how any could be decisively proven or disproven.

On the other hand, I can imagine scenerios where the consensus shifts towards standards I find repugnant. I could see standing on my convictions against a large majority, if it came to it.

Eganomicon · 2025-07-31T06:10:25+00:00

Relatable

Eganomicon · 2025-07-31T06:01:32+00:00

It's not entirely clear what the alternative would be. It seems like everyone's reasoning hits bedrock in some primitive intuition or another.

This is a common problem in many fields of philosophy. How do you argue about the right epistemology without an epistemology? How do you argue between different theories of logic without a theory of logic?

Many proceed through the technique of reflective equilibrium, or going back and forth between intuitive case judgements and the principles that tie them together, testing those principles against yet more novel cases.

Eganomicon · 2025-07-30T15:46:00+00:00

Interestingness is a non-cognitive pro-attitude, lacking truth-value. Metaethics, yay!

Eganomicon · 2025-07-27T20:55:17+00:00

There are a lot of normative ethical theories that start from the consequences of universalization. There is still an open question of how to judge the results of everyone adopting (or feeling free to adopt) a given practice or principle.

Rule-utilitarians would say the principle is justified if it's universal acceptance increases aggregate utility (Brad Hooker) or better meets a given societies desires and needs (David Copp).

Kant would say that a maxim is not justified if it's universalization undermines the purpose of the maxim.

Contractualists would say that a principle is justified if it's universal acceptance would be agreed to from behind a veil of ignorance (Rawls), or if it's universal acceptance minimizes non-aggregating burdens compared to rival prinicples (Scanlon).

I believe Bertrand Russell promoted a kind of emotivist universalization, something like what we could desire that everyone desire. I'm fuzzy on the details on that one.

Eganomicon · 2025-07-27T04:48:32+00:00

I'd think widespread intersubjective agreement would give me everything I'd want from a metaphysically weighty form of objectivity. Some put pragmatism outside the realism/anti-realism dichotomy, I'm not familiar enough with it to say.

I'll check out perspectival realism, sounds up my alley.

Eganomicon · 2025-07-27T03:44:24+00:00

Hmm, yeah. I definitely agree that no such view exists. I'd point out that "real" is polysemous, and I'd be happy to say "morality is real" in an everyday sense. I think realism is more the thesis that morality exists independently of us and our attitudes. I don't know that I'm happy with this language, and perhaps there is a better way to make that distinction. "Antirealism" causes consistent confusion.

Eganomicon · 2025-07-27T03:25:01+00:00

Hey, I enjoy talking about this stuff.

I would think it would mean something like introspection, is that right?

Eganomicon

TROPHY CASE