The Philochistos 1973 commemorative debate

As indicated, I will be arguing that morality is mind-dependent and would not exist absent the presence of moral creatures. Morality is not just dependent on minds, it"s dependent on certain kinds of minds. Humans are moral agents; we've constructed morality, live by it, and feel it deeply within us. But it"s easy to imagine an alternate human race which evolved past morality or never evolved it at all. The lives of such agents would be entirely absent of moral norms. Their legal codes would be constructed entirely for pragmatic purposes. If we were to somehow meet them, it would be impossible to have a moral discussion, or convey to them exactly what morality is. Our morality would be impossible to translate to non-moral creatures, no matter their intelligence, because morality is not an objective field. It would be like discussing the greatness of Bach to beings who had no enjoyment or concept of music. Morality is related to desires and humans have many generally shared desires. We hate to see suffering. We hate to see manipulation. We hate to see egoistic power mongers rising at the expense of others. We hate being deceived. We hate people who have no empathy for others. We all desire a world free from people who commit these acts. Our morality mirror our desires. By necessity, humans have desires, goals, and interests. We could not have evolved otherwise. Among the highest of these interests is our own well-being and the well-being of those we care about. Both were integral to evolution. Protecting one"s well-being lets him pass on his genes. Kin-altruism similarly helps to pass on one"s genes since kin members share much of the same genes. Moreover, interest for one"s group at large--though less powerful than self-interest and kin-altruism--leads to survival advantages for that group and the general survival and propagation of that species. This does not explain morality in full. For example, religion played a key role in the enforcement of moral intuition throughout evolution. It seems requisite that humans were once quite primitive in their moral intuitions. Religion was and is used to validate laws by linking them to the will of the gods/God. Moreover, promises of divine punishment and rewards further solidified morals within humans. There is no doubt that religion held huge sway over humans in the past and still does to many today. Fear and hope not only made people obey laws, it made them emotionally invested in them. The emotional aspect to the religious drive to live morally helped to give humans the moral intuition and conscience they have they today. After discerning the connection between morality and desire we can ponder whether things can be desirable in and of themselves, which seems requisite to moral realism. This presents problems since desires are subjective. Moreover, it is conceivable for humans to have as strong desires as they do now but without the coexisting moral feelings. Though morality is connected to desires, desires are not in themselves morally related. Morality is merely a byproduct of human desires. By the realist view, the statement "Stalin was evil" expresses that Stalin possesses the objective property of evilness. The anti-realist, non-nihilist view posits that the statement expresses a dislike for Stalin, the attitude of which matches up with the general institutionally formed notions of morality. The statement "Stalin was evil" is true only in so far that it connects with the socially constructed notions of morality that humans have formed. An ethical statement expresses approval or disapproval by the sentient agent. An ethical fact at best means that an ethical statement conforms to more universally agreed upon moral views, or that it is most consistent with other "institutional facts"--to borrow Searle"s vocabulary. I. e. , someone might argue rationally that x is more moral than y even if y is the status quo. Humans do not have a full understanding of their desires and interests and it"s possible for other moral judgments to fit more consistently with their more foundational viewpoints after rational analysis. So morality is not just a popular majority game. To return to the moral judgement of Stalin"s evilness, objective facts are the basis of the claim but do not themselves lead to the normative judgement. In other words, Stalin"s actions form the basis of the moral judgment of him. However, the empirical claim, "Stalin willingly caused the deaths of millions" has trouble connecting with the normative claim "Stalin"s actions were evil". Consider the question: who was more evil, Stalin or Hitler? Again, death tolls and other such facts will form most of the content of the debate, while the negative value of death is presupposed. Nothing prescriptive can be derived from descriptive claims. Descriptive statements can only ever combine with normative claims in order to derive a normative conclusion. I"d argue this is a direct threat to all moral realist theories. In particular for Pro, since God is supposed to give rise to morality, his commands, or mental state, would be non-normative (otherwise moral facts would exist prior to what is supposed to create them). Thus, Pro is presented with the difficulty of assuming that non-normative states give rise to normative values, obligations, goals etc. This problem applies to all moral realist theories since all realists must provide an account of why objective moral facts exist. Unless they are simply brute facts--which would be nonsensical since meaning is directly tied into objective morality and brute facts "simply exist"--moral facts have an origin. Barring infinite regress--which would also imply meaninglessness and meets epistemic problems--the origin must always be non-normative. Therefore, the requirements of moral realism cannot surpass the is/ought problem. Arguments drawn in part from Searle, Hume, Moore, and Nietzsche.