Posted: Nov 12, 2010 2:08 am
MattHunX wrote:I am reading the book. Haven't finished it yet. I don't find anything wrong with his reasoning on why and how science could and should be able to eventually informs us on morality, as being related to the well-being of conscious creatures, and he is right in saying why Hume's is/ought distinction and moral relativism is wrong.
I am past the part I've posted, actually.
This is what he says about Hume:
Despite the reticence of most scientists on the subject of good and evil, the scientific study of morality and human happiness is well underway. This research is bound to bring science into conflict with religious orthodoxy and popular opinion—just as our growing understanding of evolution has—because the divide between facts and values is illusory in at least three senses: (1) whatever can be known about maximizing the well-being of conscious creatures—which is, I will argue, the only thing we can reasonably value—must at some point translate into facts about brains and their interaction with the world at large; (2) the very idea of “objective” knowledge (i.e., knowledge acquired through honest observation and reasoning) has values built into it, as every effort we make to discuss facts depends upon principles that we must first value (e.g., logical consistency, reliance on evidence, parsimony, etc.); (3) beliefs about facts and beliefs about values seem to arise from similar processes at the level of the brain: it appears that we have a common system for judging truth and falsity in both domains. I will discuss each of these points in greater detail below. Both in terms of what there is to know about the world and the brain mechanisms that allow us to know it, we will see that a clear boundary between facts and values simply does not exist.
He promises to explain these 3 points in further detail, but he doesn't. His claim in (1) is pure conjecture. Maximising well-being of conscious creatures is the only thing we can reasonably value? Why? There is a whole field of study that spans back centuries that disagrees with him there, so if he wants to make that claim, he sort of needs to support it with something stronger than his opinion. He even tries to answer that criticism here:
And here is where the real controversy begins, for many people strongly object to my claim that morality and values relate to facts about the well-being of conscious creatures. My critics seem to think that consciousness holds no special place where values are concerned, or that any state of consciousness stands the same chance of being valued as any other. The most common objection to my argument is some version of the following:
But you haven’t said why the well-being of conscious beings ought to matter to us. If someone wants to torture all conscious beings to the point of madness, what is to say that he isn’t just as “moral” as you are?
While I do not think anyone sincerely believes that this kind of moral skepticism makes sense, there is no shortage of people who will press this point with a ferocity that often passes for sincerity.
Let us begin with the fact of consciousness: I think we can know, through reason alone, that consciousness is the only intelligible domain of value. What is the alternative? I invite you to try to think of a source of value that has absolutely nothing to do with the (actual or potential) experience of conscious beings. Take a moment to think about what this would entail: whatever this alternative is, it cannot affect the experience of any creature (in this life or in any other). Put this thing in a box, and what you have in that box is—it would seem, by definition—the least interesting thing in the universe.
So how much time should we spend worrying about such a transcendent source of value? I think the time I will spend typing this sentence is already too much. All other notions of value will bear some relationship to the actual or potential experience of conscious beings. So my claim that consciousness is the basis of human values and morality is not an arbitrary starting point.
But he still doesn't answer the fucking question! Instead he just says "But surely conscious well-being is all that matters!" and then starts talking about religious concepts. It's ridiculous. What if I define values as increasing my own well-being - why is his definition better than mine? What if I define it as only relating to humans? Why should we care about animals? He devotes entire pages to discussing how animals can suffer, but who cares? Why does their ability to suffer afford them moral concern?
How can he be so ignorant of the issues surrounding his branch of utilitarianism?!
Basically, if he wants to make the claim that we should strive for a model of ethics that can be informed by objective facts, then I can absolutely support him. I think it's a noble and intelligent approach. But that's not what he's doing. He is presenting his personal opinion, without any supporting arguments, as if it were an undeniable truth about the world. Why should we care about the well-being of conscious creatures? His defence: Because we should.
His problem is that he really doesn't understand Hume's argument. If a first year philosophy student used any of Harris' arguments in an essay on Hume, they would get an instant F for not understanding any of the subject material. Take this section for example:
Rather I am arguing that science can, in principle, help us understand what we should do and should want—and, therefore, what other people should do and should want in order to live the best lives possible. My claim is that there are right and wrong answers to moral questions, just as there are right and wrong answers to questions of physics, and such answers may one day fall within reach of the maturing sciences of mind.
The problem? He's equivocating the world "should". Hume doesn't deny that facts can inform moral decisions, but the choice over what we should value is not something that can be determined by science. Harris has implicitly accepted that he cannot escape Hume's is/ought argument, or moral relativism, by abysmally failing to address the issues presented by both positions.
If Harris truly believes that he has defeated the is/ought distinction and moral relativism, then he needs to present the scientific evidence that demonstrates that concern for the well-being of conscious creatures is what we should value. I'm not even sure what an experiment like that would look like, how does he measure what is "good" or "right" without an appeal to values or a moral system?
Once we see that a concern for well-being (defined as deeply and as inclusively as possible) is the only intelligible basis for morality and values, we will see that there must be a science of morality, whether or not we ever succeed in developing it: because the well-being of conscious creatures depends upon how the universe is, altogether. Given that changes in the physical universe and in our experience of it can be understood, science should increasingly enable us to answer specific moral questions.
No, you jackass (Harris), once we have decided that concern for well-being is the moral position we choose to adopt, then we already have our system of morality. We can't have a "science of morality" because you've already decided your moral position without invoking science at all! Once we have reached our moral conclusion, then we can use science to inform our decisions - yes, this is a trivial point that nobody in the entire world disagrees with.
Sorry MattHunX, Harris has written a steaming pile that is not worth the paper it's written on.