Quote:
Originally Posted by TimMason
There's no tautology involved. By natural morality I am referring to the idea that has been expressed here that it is possible to found morality on scientific principles, taking account of evolutionary imperatives. No god there, for the moment. But if you then show that there is a great variety of modes of evolutionary success, many of which you would *not* consider moral, then you need something that guarantees your choice of the one, or the ones, that you lean on to create your 'natural morality'. That is move 2 in the argument. Still no tautology, but we see a god appearing. That something cannot but be transcendental: ergo, you need god. If you are going to argue for a morality based on nature.
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I think I see the logic of your argument, but I am still not sure that there isn't a slightly more hidden tautology in there. You still seem to be, by definition, understanding "natural" to imply something beyond the experience and actions of humans. You claim that in order to have any claim on naturalism an ethics is required to rely on such a claim. Without relying on such a claim there is nothing to warrant one course of action as against another. And yet, much in the manner of G E Moore in another context, I can demonstrate that this is wrong in the following way: I place no reliance on a transcendental guarantor and yet I find myself able to make moral choices, evaluate my actions, and the actions of others, with respect to their moral value, and seem to be able to distinguish, sometimes, between those actions which have a moral value - either positive of negative - from those that do not. I do not think I am unique in having this ability nor in not requiring a transcendental guarantor. I sometimes find that conspecifics reach different judgments on the moral status of my or others actions, and then sometimes I enter into discourse with them and sometimes am able to persuade them - without relying on a transcendental guarantor - that my judgment is, in any of a variety of ways, better than theirs. Sometimes the opposite happens and I am convinced that their judgment is better. I would call this a naturalistic process in that it relies on general cognitive abilities that I and my discourse partners possess.