A while back Blogodidact posted a reply to my previous entry in this thread. And a lengthy post it was indeed! I’ve tried to get time to make a complete repost. But since he touches over so many topics, I soon found that if I were to answer all the questions raised, the answer would be in the format of a book and not a blog post. I therefore decided to narrow the scoop and instead try to develop the two points in my previous post that Blogodidact found most reason to oppose, and in doing so touch on his criticism.

Is and ought

“Is” and “ought” are indisputably different grammatically. They are both verbs but represent different moods. Formally speaking “is” is of the epistemic mood and “ought” is of the deontic mood. In English the different forms of moods aren’t brought about by modulations of the main verb, as in many other languages, but are expressed by the use of auxiliary verbs such as “can, must, ought, may, will”. This ought-class of auxiliary verbs are sorted under the deontic mood and further under the many subgroups, such as jussive, precative, deliberative, imperative and so forth. In one way or another each and every human language is constructed so that this difference in mood is upheld in the grammatical structure of a sentence. It would be a strange coincidence indeed if all languages spontaneously organized themselves in this manner and the distinction made in grammar did not also correspond to a distinction made in the minds of the speakers.

The linguistic distinction between “is” and “ought” have also been of interest within philosophy, especially the branch of logic that codifies language into a propositional structure. Here predicate logic deals with “ought” under the heading of deontic logic and “is” under the heading of epistemic logic. Deontic logic was not seen with kind eyes during the heydays of positivism since deontic statements could not be treated as logical hierarchies. Value statements were viewed as ambiguities since “You ought not to smoke!” doesn’t stand in any obvious relation to you smoking. The properties of the statement do not imply anything about properties of the thing the statement is made about, or so it was thought. Consequently a deontic statement was considered to have no other meaning than being an emotive exclamation. But advances in logic soon made it possible to analyze moral statements within the context of a reasoned discourse. The earlier depiction of moral statements as simple emotive exclamations [i.e. It’s good to have social welfare = social welfare Hurray!] was abandoned and morality became incorporated within the framework of logical analysis. One of the chief agents behind the reinstitution of ethics as a respectable discipline within philosophy was the British Oxford professor R.M. Hare with his book “The Language of Morals” from 1952. In this book he began by a definition of his topic “Ethics, as I conceive of it, is the logical study of the language of morals”. In doing so he rested heavily on a distinction made by Stevenson between attitude and belief. The former is a mental disposition and the latter a reasoned representation of the world.

So what did Hare and the philosophers mean concretely? Well, it’s actually rather trivial. One of the problems with earlier attempts to deal with morality within the discipline of logic had been the negligence of values. Moral statements had been viewed more or less as erratic growls of pleasure or dislike. At least a vulgar interpretation of the earlier philosophers can be made thus. What Hare and other philosophers embarked upon was an enterprise to incorporate the value element as a starting point of a logic discourse. If values (attitudes) are accepted as an a priori and pre logical element in a discourse a merger with a person’s mental representation of reality (belief) could result in a reasoned discourse.

Let’s return for a moment to our previous example about social welfare. While an earlier philosopher might have interpreted a debate between an antagonist and a protagonist, for say state founded shelters for homeless, as a series of purrs (pro) and growls (con) a post Hare philosopher would have been keen to trace the arguments (the reason and logic) for each contender back to the point of pure value, i.e. attitude. The chances are that he would never have needed to go so far back as to the naked values. Far more likely he would have found that the contenders weren’t in conflict over values but over beliefs. The person in favor of state measures would perhaps think that charity can’t be relied upon for basic social security, while the person against would think that state measures could hamper economic growth by an increased need of taxation and thus forcing even more people out on the streets. The likelihood is great indeed that confronted with the plights of homeless people the emotional responses in both contestants would be fairly equal, at least within two standard deviations. This blessed similarity in brain activation pattern we ought to thank evolution for, and we should contemplate the equation rB − C > 0 in great adoration.

However, Blogodidact wasn’t in agreement with me equating morals with emotion. Perhaps it was because he thought me a representative of the older school of positivism. But I think not. More likely he resent the idea that a value (an attitude) should not in itself be a factual truth just as the subsequent rational arguments based on that value. Of cause there is a raison d’être for values and that reason is, as I indicated above, evolution. Man is just one of many beasts with the capacity to appraise actions and reciprocate. In the chimpanzee culture individuals that don’t return favors are ousted but also selfless acts of helpfulness are present in chimpanzee infants as they are in human. There is a wealth of research in the area of sociability among beast but hoisting examples from the literature would serve no point. A good starting point in the vast literature is none the less R. Trivers “Natural Selection and social Theory”.

To anticipate a retort I’d like to point to some other research, namely from the field of psychology. There is good research based on the trolley problem that goes like this “A trolley is running out of control down a track. In its path are 5 people who have been tied to the track by a mad philosopher. Fortunately, you can flip a switch which will lead the trolley down a different track to safety. Unfortunately, there is a single person tied to that track. Should you flip the switch?” Originally this kind of moral dilemma was used in moral philosophy but psychologists came up with an interesting idea. What will happen if we manipulate small bitts in the story? For example what if you physically have to push the man down to the tracks? Perhaps not so surprisingly these alterations in the story made people report different answers. But here’s the bug, the majority of subjects who undergo these tests can’t give a reason to why they thought it permissible to push the level but not to push the man. Another, and rather famous, study along the same line was done by asking people what they thought about a brother and a sister who decide to have intercourse but keep it absolutely secret and were careful to use contraceptives. Those people who found this objectionable were then asked why and again the vast majority was unable to supply any reason for their moral objections. One more line of evidence is needed to make the picture clear. MRI technique have been used to picture the brain activation pattern while this kind of dilemmas have been given to people, and low and behold, the first activation occurs not in our prefrontal cortex where our reason is situated but deep down in our limbic system where our emotions dwell.

The point I’d like to make, and have supplied reason for, is then this. At the heart of morality lie the necessities of having evolved and having our brain shaped by natural selection. We can’t inherit reason so our genes have given us the nest best thing, an emotional susceptibility for social interaction. Basically it is these core attitudes that underlie our rational deliberations in moral questions. Above and beyond them there is neither need nor reason to seek for any further justification of being moral or accept the rationality of a moral discourse. To be moral is to be human, it is an essential quality (property) of our species. People who lack or are impaired in this capacity are rightly conceived as dangerous and kept away from society. But we must now advance further and in doing so again return to our reason.

Broadening our view – scientifisism

In my previous post I wrote that science had the capacity to liberate humans from the moral calamities brought about by religion. This Blogodidact found objectionable. I really had trouble understanding his objection since he mainly criticized particular individuals that he in one way or the other thought about as representatives of a scientific outlook. I’ll try to restate my case and hopefully make it a bit clearer. As a conclusion I’ll take on an example he used and give my analysis of it as an alternative interpretation in light of what have been said.

If a values is the causa prima for moral deliberation what is then the object and meaning of the discussion itself? I will give the same answer as R. Carrier in “Sense & Gondess Without God – A Defense of Metaphysical Naturalism”. An “ought” statement is an apodosis (a then-clause) in a conditional proposition where the protasis (the if-clause) is implied or suppressed. A moral dictum such as “you ought not to steel” is thus a conclusion in a clause were the antecedent might be “if you wish not to go to jail […] if you wish not to make harm […] if you wish not be the object of contempt”. The protasis might in turn be an apodosis in a new line of induction and so it might go on a great many steps. The truth of the moral judgment is thus objectively true as long as the protasis is true and the apodosis stands in a true casual relationship with it. Consequently a moral argument can be every bit as objective as an epistemic statement of the type “If you switch the knob then the lights will go on”. The basic reactions of humans seems to be rather homogenous so for all practical reasons one can assume that there never is any difference in the desire to reduce suffering and promote happiness. There are however immense difference in people’s beliefs about the relationships between the apodosis and protasis. These beliefs are true or false in an epistemic sense and it is here science come into the picture. Religions cling on to faulty deductive chains of reasoning and therefore represent an obstacle for the truly moral life. At best a religious person can mimic morality but often enough he will have to use his cognitive ability to commit acts of cruelty under the false assumption that they are acts of mercy. To save their souls burn their bodies as they used to say during the inquisition. It is science that establishes true causalities, not religion. Good literature and poetry uses this knowledge to exhort and expound on moral questions in a humanistic fashion, making it accessible to the wider public and delightful to our esthetic sense.

Blogodidact used Hitler as an example of an enlightened scientist. I assume we then must overlook his use of astrologers and references, in public and private, to the guiding hand of providence (Schicksall) as well as many open displays of affection for the Christian religion. But let us leave that and look to his morality instead. Was it his assumed lack of religious convictions that led him and his people as well as the Jews he sought to destroy to a götterdämmerung of unseen proportions? Was it his reliance on science that brought this about? I think not! To analyze Hitler’s morality we need not travel long down the deductive path to find where he and the Nazis strayed from the right moral path. But to see this more clear it might be better to start with the primal moral value that drove them into action. To protect ones kin is a primary moral value (an attitude), so does each parent with its child, and every neighbor with one another. Hitler saw a large and menacing threat to his entire culture and to all his kin and that threat was the Jew. A great many propositions about the demonic nature of the Jew were held true up and against what science and reason dictated even at that time. Already Darwin had noted that the differences among humans were infinitesimally small compared to the diversity within other species and the well educated Jewish middleclass was one of the most loyal elements in the state. For one thing it was the Jewish minister of reconstruction, Walther Rathenau, who saved Germany from the worst effects of the war indemnities while avoiding a French reoccupation of the Rhineland. Hitler himself was confused when he meet the well integrated German Jews. He being of Austrian decent had only seen the Jews from the ghetto in Vienna and once noted that he was grateful he had seen the Jews as “they really were” (he called them Kaftanjuden) in the ghetto, so he would now not be confused by the apparent resemblance between German and Jew. Himmler, when visiting a concentration camp, was so moved by what he saw that he fell physically ill and threw up, never again was he to do an inspection. On a speech held after that he talked about the great sacrifice the guards had to do in regard to the moral strain the work placed upon them. He then pointed out that mass murder was more merciful than to let the Jews live, since they being the weaker race were destined for devastation and many generations in this way was spared from suffering. He also mentioned the horrible dangers that would befall the Germans if the Jew was not eliminated. But German hands had very little to do with the physical labor of the crematorium and gas chamber. Early on in the process reports made clear that moral sank among the guards and people just refused to show up for duty. It was therefore organized that the Jews had to do the dirty work themselves. This was then used as an indication among the guards that the Jews were not really human after all since they killed their own kind.

I could go on like this for a considerable length of time and write about how people tried to retain a sense of being on the right and when failing to do so make an effort to at least alleviate their own guilt. If the specific topic be of interest I could point to two books besides the classics: first; a book that explores this topic from the historical perspective is R. Browning “Ordinary men” and yet another but from a psychological perspective by oxford professor in psychiatry A. Storr “Human Destructiveness”. A. Storr also touches on the role the doctrinal nature of Christian anti-Semitism played in making it an equally unquestionable dogma in German political life.

But what does this tell us about our main them, the “is” and the “oughts”. Well it obviously tells us that even though man might have a common moral sentiment it can be corrupted, first and foremost by false beliefs about casual relationships and factual states. Hitler’s anti-Semitism and that of the Nazis was based on a mythological Jew, a nonexistent malignant entity that threatened their very survival. Based on false assumptions about reality and unaided by scientific reason and embedded in pseudo-Christian mysticism they came to be the worst ever manifestation of the religious mindset.

This concludes my remark. If I have left out anything of particular weight it was unintended, but if so please point them out and I’ll promptly see to it that they get my attention.

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