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The Universe Knows Right from Wrong

nautil.us

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Re: The Universe Knows Right from Wrong

#41

Post by TeMPOraL »

roenxi wrote: post #35
TeMPOraL wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, doesn't make sense. I prefer a simpler argument for why there is a subset of morality that's universal for (vast majority of) humans: argument from shared brain architecture. We're essentially running the same wetware under the hood, at least on the time scales of human civilization. So while the universe doesn't necessarily privilege a set of values, human brains are . And that's all that really matters (until…

There is an even simpler explanation: some moral principles push people towards a game-theoretic optimum, so evolution selects for it. Eg, a society that allows random murders will be at a staggering disadvantage. By magic, most (all?) societies have strong moral arguments against murder. Ditto honesty - honest societies have structural advantages. Any cooperative species will have something that looks like morality.…

I feel those explanations are complementary. Being a product of evolution, the brain has some game-theoretic principles encoded in it. And with capability of conscious thought, communication, and later language and writing, we learn to recognize and apply game-theoretic principles more abstractly. Culture is, in part, game theory in form of heuristics.

On the other hand, where game theory says some choice is arbitrary, the brain can have a default encoded - and that default will be universal across humans.

Re: The Universe Knows Right from Wrong

#42

Post by ukj »

jjgreen wrote: post #30
amelius wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It also doesn't make sense to define axioms as true. What if later it turns out that the axioms were a mutual contradiction?

Truth is tricky. If I state "The sky is blue", I can look out of the window, the sky is blue, my statement corresponds to the state of the world, my statement is true, right? But in mathematics there is no window, everything is internal, abstract, so what does "truth" mean when there is no state of the world with which to compare? More importantly, would the mathematics be any different if the axioms are declared to…

That's the first error of the objectivists. Mistaking "blue" as a property of the sky.

Color happens in your head.

That is why trichromacy, tetrachromacy, pentachromacy, dodecachromacy etc. is a thing.

Re: The Universe Knows Right from Wrong

#43

Post by fenomas »

MaxBarraclough wrote: post #9
fenomas wrote: post #3

> But the problem for .. anyone who tries to ground moral truth in the natural world, is that moral truths, like mathematical truths, are necessarily true, which means that it’s impossible for them to be false. What a bizarre argument. Mathematical truths are defined to be true -- entirely the opposite of what the author is trying to claim about moral truths, so this is about as absurd a comparison as one could make.…

> Mathematical truths are defined to be true Perhaps a nitpick, but: axioms are defined to be true. Mathematics, roughly speaking, is the business of exploring the consequences of chosen sets of axioms. Sometimes published mathematical theorems turn out to be wrong.

I don't follow what you're taking issue with. Naturally by "mathematical truths" I meant axioms and statements that are reducible to axioms - there isn't really anything else for it to mean, after all. On the "sometimes published theorems are wrong" part you've lost me entirely.

Re: The Universe Knows Right from Wrong

#44

Post by abdulhaq »

bawolff wrote: post #15

Maybe im missing it, but the argument seems to be morality is objective because everyone thinks it is. How is that not begging the question? Then there are a bunch of pithy lines, which the author seems to treat as obvious in context revelations, but to me seem to utterly lack evidence/argument. > "No matter how the universe had turned out, two plus two would equal four and it would have been wrong to torture people…

I think you _are_ missing the point TBH. The people who say that there is no real objective value, and that that knowledge is important, are claiming that knowing that nothing has objective value, has value.

Re: The Universe Knows Right from Wrong

#45

Post by ikeboy »

>This objection, though, is jam-packed with value-claims: It claims what we “ought” to believe and references “good” evidence. The very challenge pre-supposes the reality of value.

There's no reason those terms need to be taken as objective. They're as socially constructed as the rest of science and philosophy. We ought to believe things with good evidence because that's what our scientific culture values.

If another culture didn't value that, we'd pity them for being less effective at their goals - it turns out that updating beliefs on evidence makes you more effective. But there's no objective more sense in which they're "bad", they're just less effective.

Re: The Universe Knows Right from Wrong

#46

Post by RandoHolmes »

MaxBarraclough wrote: post #9
fenomas wrote: post #3

> But the problem for .. anyone who tries to ground moral truth in the natural world, is that moral truths, like mathematical truths, are necessarily true, which means that it’s impossible for them to be false. What a bizarre argument. Mathematical truths are defined to be true -- entirely the opposite of what the author is trying to claim about moral truths, so this is about as absurd a comparison as one could make.…

> Mathematical truths are defined to be true Perhaps a nitpick, but: axioms are defined to be true. Mathematics, roughly speaking, is the business of exploring the consequences of chosen sets of axioms. Sometimes published mathematical theorems turn out to be wrong.

Thank you, I took the same issue you did when reading this.

There are not "truths" in mathematics, it's literally a system of logic with definitions at the bottom (axioms) and then a following of the results based upon the agreed upon logic.

Re: The Universe Knows Right from Wrong

#47

Post by RandoHolmes »

jjgreen wrote: post #30
amelius wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It also doesn't make sense to define axioms as true. What if later it turns out that the axioms were a mutual contradiction?

Truth is tricky. If I state "The sky is blue", I can look out of the window, the sky is blue, my statement corresponds to the state of the world, my statement is true, right? But in mathematics there is no window, everything is internal, abstract, so what does "truth" mean when there is no state of the world with which to compare? More importantly, would the mathematics be any different if the axioms are declared to…

It's almost as if defining anything as a "mathematical truth" is definitionally wrong and anyone having done so should be called out as a liar.

Only the person who responded to the person who made such a statement were more polite about it, hence this "discussion".

Re: The Universe Knows Right from Wrong

#48

Post by keiferski »

danidiaz wrote: post #36

Bart Streumer is mentioned in the piece. His book "Unbelievable Errors: An Error Theory about All Normative Judgements" begins with a pretty cool sentence: > You cannot believe the view I will defend in this book. I therefore will not be able to convince you that this view is true.

Honestly not a bad approach. I wish more people just shared their ideas instead of trying to persuade and convert me to their position.

Re: The Universe Knows Right from Wrong

#49

Post by motohagiography »

There is an argument for theism that I find very persuasive, which is that, faith is a ridiculous conclusion but a necessary axiom. The point being it's not something you arrive at through reason after ruling out the alternatives, it's just a point you start at, or not.

It's not an artifact of reason, but it's the other way around, where we can only reason about the things the theistic object of faith has caused. (or even just deistic).

Without too much woo, I'm less circumspect about these beliefs, and think we all believe what we respectively perceive we need to. However, something curious I think I may have discovered is that both faith and fear cannot be experienced simultaneously. If this were true, and fear was just an interpretation of an emergent chemical/biological artifact of life in the universe, it implies that something which necessarily extinguished it could also be just as real.

On the question of what is more absurd, belief in the existence of a superbeing we cannot conceive of yet whose will we can somehow divine, or that our reasoning is sufficient to rule out the existence of such a being, if you have ever tried to argue with a dog or a horse or even a baby, the limits of the latter case seem too stark to provide much confidence in their powers.

Re: The Universe Knows Right from Wrong

#50

Post by radford-neal »

ukj wrote: post #23
bawolff wrote: post #15

Maybe im missing it, but the argument seems to be morality is objective because everyone thinks it is. How is that not begging the question? Then there are a bunch of pithy lines, which the author seems to treat as obvious in context revelations, but to me seem to utterly lack evidence/argument. > "No matter how the universe had turned out, two plus two would equal four and it would have been wrong to torture people…

Every question beggs another. Münchhausen trilemma All definitions are (meta)circular. Because language is recursive.

So far, in this brief comment and a brief comment above, you've mentioned Goodhart's law, the McNamara fallacy, and the Munchhausen trilemma. I know nothing of any of these.

I think that you would communicate better if you avoided such references. I'd even venture to suggest that your internal thoughts might be improved by not shoving arguments into such pre-defined categories.

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