Sam Harris offers a great counter argument to the idea that "science can only ascertain what is, but not what should be" in the Moral Landscape. Essentially, many aspects of human emotional wellbeing are counter-intuitive and can be best studied by empirical means (fMRI, psychology studies, etc.). In that way science offers a better alternative to religion in defining societal rules and ethical behavior.
This is making the assumption that emotional well-being is the goal of morality, or that even global immediate utilitarianism is preferable to long-term utilitarian values.
Neither of these assumptions appear to be true, at least to me. It may be better for society to have the individual lead a life in which they find no emotional value. Or it may be better for the species to have an entire society live a miserable life. The idea that immediate individual emotional well-being is a metric for morality is dubious at best.
That's not saying that science can't offer something of value: I'm sure it can. It's just that many times scientists in various fields have a tendency to overstate the implications of their research.
> Neither of these assumptions appear to be true, at least to me.
It's been my observation that if you ask most people who espouse a particular philosophy couched in "morality", that they claim that following their particular moral code will lead to well being. I've also found that the strong that belief is, the less likely that those followers have actually spent time thinking on the ramifications of their moral code towards that goal. They think they have thought about it a lot, but typically they've just spent brain cycles thinking about the code and how to follow it most closely -- not what following that code leads to.
I'm not disagreeing, just throwing in an observation -- most moral codes claim to lead to well being, but in reality many of them do not actually go there.
This phenomenon seems to create a particularly powerful barrier to rational thought that very few people seem to be able to overcome and can even seem to defeat some individuals.
I've seen friends, family and colleagues fail repeatedly to come to terms with this, they think it's because they haven't applied themselves completely to some arbitrary code so the only solution is to double down again and again.
After decades of doubling down this seems to drive people closer and closer to a kind of insanity...I've seen a few withdraw into fantasy worlds constructed of such powerful cognitive dissonance (arising from the inherent contradictions of their moral code and the observed outcome) that having a normal conversation about simple things, like the weather, become impossible -- they can barely complete a sentence without contradicting themselves or becoming lost and sidetracked about how such and such random topic has some particularly deep meaning in their hyper acute moralist world.
most moral codes claim to lead to well being, but in reality many of them do not actually go there.
Good points. It's a tough subject and, well, it's open to interpretation. That's the problem.
As a counter-example, I'd offer up Mother Theresa, who suffered a lot and had severe doubts both about her faith and her work, yet most outside observers believed she was a moral person. I would also offer up early Christians, which surprised the Romans at being more than willing to tend to people stricken by the plague. To them it was the moral thing to do.
Moving to the stoics, it's a common belief among them that you train yourself to enjoy life more by purposely taking away things from yourself: sleep on the floor, or try skipping a couple of meals.
The point is that there is no point. You can look at this short-term, medium-term, long-term, from the point of view of the individual, community, country, or species. Or you can imagine some ethereal world in which important things don't align with any physicality. Good arguments can be made for each of these viewpoints.
Hell, it may be that the reason things are generally more or less moral than others is that they promote advancement of the species as a whole, in which case to truly understand morality you would have to be able to understand the social, political, and technological dynamics of 4+ billion people interacting with one another. It could simply be incalculable.
Beats me. I just wanted to provide a counter-example. Your point is as good as any.
BTW, I've also observed this you notice as well, and it's very sad. Perhaps a noble goal of science would be to help folks identify these cognitive dissonances, both in themselves and in their work. I have a feeling it's much more prevalent than we imagine. Always easy to find the fault with the other guy -- much tougher to find it in ourselves.
Insofar as morals and ethics are the result of human thought, I think the sciences of neurology and psychology have a great deal to say about them. This is, in part, Harris' point.
Harris is a good writer and a great popularizer of certain reductionist ideas, but far from a great philosopher. Statements like this from him are to be taken with a grain of salt the size of the Western Philosophical Tradition.
The Moral Landscape is an ok discussion of ethics, but the real question is one of meta-ethics. Sure, science can give some pointers to help human wellbeing. But it can't make the assertion that thriving is a good thing, or that individuals ought (in the sense of a moral imperative) to care about anything beyond their individual wishes.
Harris starts with a naturalist/atheist/humanist/utilitiarian meta-ethic, and goes from there. But he doesn't (and cannot, due to the nature of science) show that such a meta-ethic is correct to begin with.
My problem with Harris' argument was that it was speculative in a way science, almost by definition, can't be. He doesn't say science can provide answers now, but it will in the future. However this latter proposition runs counter to what we know about the trajectory of science via Feyerabend and Kuhn, who are more Harris' opponents than Hume, though even his response to Hume on the is/ought distinction is disturbingly dismissive.
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[ 3.0 ms ] story [ 17.9 ms ] threadNeither of these assumptions appear to be true, at least to me. It may be better for society to have the individual lead a life in which they find no emotional value. Or it may be better for the species to have an entire society live a miserable life. The idea that immediate individual emotional well-being is a metric for morality is dubious at best.
That's not saying that science can't offer something of value: I'm sure it can. It's just that many times scientists in various fields have a tendency to overstate the implications of their research.
It's been my observation that if you ask most people who espouse a particular philosophy couched in "morality", that they claim that following their particular moral code will lead to well being. I've also found that the strong that belief is, the less likely that those followers have actually spent time thinking on the ramifications of their moral code towards that goal. They think they have thought about it a lot, but typically they've just spent brain cycles thinking about the code and how to follow it most closely -- not what following that code leads to.
I'm not disagreeing, just throwing in an observation -- most moral codes claim to lead to well being, but in reality many of them do not actually go there.
This phenomenon seems to create a particularly powerful barrier to rational thought that very few people seem to be able to overcome and can even seem to defeat some individuals.
I've seen friends, family and colleagues fail repeatedly to come to terms with this, they think it's because they haven't applied themselves completely to some arbitrary code so the only solution is to double down again and again.
After decades of doubling down this seems to drive people closer and closer to a kind of insanity...I've seen a few withdraw into fantasy worlds constructed of such powerful cognitive dissonance (arising from the inherent contradictions of their moral code and the observed outcome) that having a normal conversation about simple things, like the weather, become impossible -- they can barely complete a sentence without contradicting themselves or becoming lost and sidetracked about how such and such random topic has some particularly deep meaning in their hyper acute moralist world.
Good points. It's a tough subject and, well, it's open to interpretation. That's the problem.
As a counter-example, I'd offer up Mother Theresa, who suffered a lot and had severe doubts both about her faith and her work, yet most outside observers believed she was a moral person. I would also offer up early Christians, which surprised the Romans at being more than willing to tend to people stricken by the plague. To them it was the moral thing to do.
Moving to the stoics, it's a common belief among them that you train yourself to enjoy life more by purposely taking away things from yourself: sleep on the floor, or try skipping a couple of meals.
The point is that there is no point. You can look at this short-term, medium-term, long-term, from the point of view of the individual, community, country, or species. Or you can imagine some ethereal world in which important things don't align with any physicality. Good arguments can be made for each of these viewpoints.
Hell, it may be that the reason things are generally more or less moral than others is that they promote advancement of the species as a whole, in which case to truly understand morality you would have to be able to understand the social, political, and technological dynamics of 4+ billion people interacting with one another. It could simply be incalculable.
Beats me. I just wanted to provide a counter-example. Your point is as good as any.
BTW, I've also observed this you notice as well, and it's very sad. Perhaps a noble goal of science would be to help folks identify these cognitive dissonances, both in themselves and in their work. I have a feeling it's much more prevalent than we imagine. Always easy to find the fault with the other guy -- much tougher to find it in ourselves.
Harris starts with a naturalist/atheist/humanist/utilitiarian meta-ethic, and goes from there. But he doesn't (and cannot, due to the nature of science) show that such a meta-ethic is correct to begin with.
I do get your point however, and since you got more up-votes than me here I wont argue with it. I'm still a newbie at HN. :)