On Balance, Non-Cognitivism is the Proper Moral Model

" If the statement is purely descriptive, pray tell what the truth value of the moral proposition is... " Already did. ""Does this action, in fact, further the end I am seeking?""" If the answer to that is yes, then the statement "It is wrong" is false, if not, the statement "it is wrong" is true. "your subjective consideration of the matter as true or false is not sufficient to make it objectively so - only true "FOR you." My attempting to shoot you in the head DOES objectively lead to you and many others being motivated to respond in kind, and DOES objectively contradict the end I've laid out. "Furthermore, whether or not something is emotive is completely independent of the CONTENT of the emotions expressed." Independent on WHETHER there is content? How, exactly, can a statement be emotive yet express no emotions? " Equating that which is good with that which fulfills the actors subjective ends begs the question of what is good. If you state that what is good is what advances the subjective ends of an actor, "good" becomes a tautology - what I want is good and what is good is what I want." This makes use of he straw man fallacy. There is no "What I want is good" component involved in what I've said. It is eminently obvious that if the statement of the good follows from a goal-- then your goal has no reference to any previous standard of the good. It lays solely at the beginning of the argument, not at the end. "The good" has no meaning without a predefined goal in the argument, a predefined goal that is not itself subject to moral evaluation. Unless, of course, you were simply meaning to express equivalency by "is" rather than justification-- in which case EVERY DEFINITION OF EVERY WORD IS INVALID BY YOUR ARGUMENT. Every definition of every word can be reversed-- if A is B then B is A. Is this a tautology? Well sure, but tautology is just another word for logical truth. Declaring a point tautological is admitting that it is true insofar as it is tautological :). " If the actor sets the goals, then the goals are subjective, and if the means to those goals are evaluated by the actor in terms of what the goals are, then the means are subjective as well." This is not true. The fact that it is up to the subject whether they wish to live or wish to die does not alter the fact that where they point their bullets has objective consequences regarding these courses of action. You can seek whatever you want, but nature dictates what paths lead to your goal. :If the code is external to the agent, then the criteria for determining what is good must also be external to the agent My car is external to me, as are the laws of physics which determine how it operates (If I had a car anyway :P). Does that mean that I can't decide where I bloody well want to drive? No. I can drive a number of different locations, arbitrarily-- but for any of those, I must obey nature's dictates about what the path to get there is. "Morality," essentially, is the most effective route to get to whatever destination you choose. :and be able to be expressed without egocentric terms that refer to the agent... No code of action expressed without reference to an agent can ever be followed. The very notion is a contradiction. :waiting for a definition of good. Already gave you mine. What you seek. The good is what you seek. There is no preexisting "good" outside of that, the notion of good is useless to one who doesn't seek anything anyway. :WHAT morality? My opponent has yet to espouse this objective moral system you insist exists to evaluate the means to these goals. The only succinct expression of a "system" for following a complex goals-- is that you must evaluate the alternatives you come across, see what consequences each course of action likely results in, and take the course that leads to the greatest rational expectation of fulfilling the goal. I can give examples of how this works and have. :But then he states that discussion of morality is impossible because two actors can both be right. This is obviously false, because no two conflicting opinions about an objective state can both be correct. Taken out of context. I said that discussion of morality between people with INCOMPATIBLE GOALS are-- not impossible, I didn't say that, but don't make sense as they won't resolve anything. If two people are playing on different football teams, will discussion settle their differences? No. Does that mean one of them is wrong about morality? No, both realize they have to try their hardest to defeat the other given their goal, both are correct about this. They don't have differing opinions about an objective state-- they are concerned with different objective states. Both, if they think about it, agree that the other person is correct about their situation, given their goals. Both agree on the same basic laws which make up their code of morality. They are just following that code to get to different destinations. Their choice of destination is no more determined by morality than your choice between Palm Springs or New York is determined by the nature of roads, yet this makes neither morality nor roads things without objective reality to them. :Disanalogy - we're talking about two people with the same perspective disagreeing about the moral import of a situation. Precisely speaking, these people, if they actually do exist (if they have actually chosen contradicting goals) can hardly be said to disagree at all. They are fighting, not arguing. I can't remember who said this about what country, but it boils down to something like this. "He and I are in perfect agreement. We both want to rule the country." " With no acceptable definition of good, theoretically, at least, rational persons should recognize that non-cognitivism is the appropriate method of engaging moral propositions." Even were my arguments false, how on earth could any judgement of any course of engagement be deemed appropriate, when no purpose may be pursued and no notion of appropriateness has any meaning? :).