Morality: Subjective or Objective

R2 Theme: Bach, "Brandenburg Concerto #5". http://www.youtube.com...Before I jump into the heart of this discourse, I want to clarify something about the idea of subjectivism--by Pro's wording, subjective ethics, understood as the view that morality changes based on context, seems to indicate that objective moral truth changes. Pro does not seem necessarily to accept that interpretation, but I want to make it clear that subjectivism does not imply that the objectivity of a moral code is refreshed with each successive alteration; rather, I argue, subjectivism can be understood as claiming that morality is something experienced only subjectively--that is, that moral evaluations are only products of the natural course of a subject's pursuit of its interests, rather than of some mind-indepenent fact which validates the content of normative propositions.So, as in the case of homosexuality, subjectivism does not necessarily commit itself to the idea that changing attitudes suddenly change the objective moral status of an activity. In other words: subjectivism may entail that moral evaluations consist only in expressive statements reflecting preconceived emotional dispositions. It is not that peoples' changing attitudes toward homosexuality makes it objectively "right"; rather, I argue that homosexuality has no inherent moral status (i.e., it isn't right or wrong), and that our moral sentiments always break down to (often collective) subjective preferences.Moving to the main body of Pro's advocacy, I want to premise by observing that argumentation doesn't start until (4) in Pro's case structure. So, this is where I will start. For signposting reasons, I'll structure my rebuttal under a section header with lettered subpoints. My particular counterarguments will be numbered from there,"Why morality is objective"a. "Morality is objective because right and wrong are always right and wrong no matter what... You would teach a child not to steal because it is wrong. So, what if the child decides when it is eighteen that they believe that stealing is right to them? Does it make it right?"1. The question for debate is whether there are any moral propositions which are verifiably objectively true. Hence, Pro does not have the luxury of starting with the proposition that stealing is wrong--this is an example of the very thing we're investigating. Generally put, we cannot begin from the position that objective right and wrong are legitimate classes, because we're trying to find out whether they actually are.2. I have never claimed, implicitly or otherwise, that someone believing that stealing is right makes it morally "legitimate". As I pointed out, the root of moral experience in sets of subjective preferences suggests that stealing per se does not carry an intrinsic moral status.b. "That same child decides that they want to jump off the empire state building because they believe they can fly. Just because they believe it is it any more unlikely that they will die?... This shows that morality cannot be subjective and that there is only one right and wrong."1. While it is pretty likely that one cannot fly just through unmediated willpower, using this case an an analogy to ethics leave us with an indeterminate conclusion--while it might be true (albeit irrelevant to my rebuttal) that believing X to be morally permissible/praiseworthy/justified does not make it so, the same is true for the converse--assuming that X is immoral also does not make it so. On this view, moral objectivists encounter as much difficulty verifying the objectivity of their ethics as Pro claims subjectivists encounter when trying to modify allegedly "objective" moral propositions with their own subjective preferences.2. As noted prior, Pro attempts to trap us in a false dichotomy--objective morality or a self-defeating conception of ethical subjectivism which entails holding multiple, conflicting ethical statements to be equally legitimate; however, there are naturally other routes. As many of my prior debates might suggest, I argue a conception of subjectivism according to which meta-ethical propositions find their only source of verification in the discursive fiat of the speaker (and subsequent agreement among the speaker's colleagues). So, normative pluralism isn't my only option. I can also maintain the nihilist thesis that there are no justifiable normative/meta-ethical frameworks, which functions as a kind of descriptive subjectivism (insofar as it only remarks that multiple frameworks exist--not that they're sound).c. "You cannot simply run a nation depending on how people "feel" about something."This is only true if you assume that morality is objective. Since that's what's up for debate, I'm free to counter that, if my thesis is true (or at least more compelling), then we always already administrate political affairs based on how people "feel". And, if people like moral psychologist Jonathan Haidt are correct, then much of our moral reasoning is only post hoc justification for intuitions to which we've already committed ourselves. In other words, Haidt suggests that we use reasoning to retrospectively validate what we already believe [http://billmoyers.com...] [http://www.ted.com...]Just One More Thing...One last "big picture" thing: not all ethical realists agree that a morality whose prescriptions change based on context is subjectivist. Pro is, I think, confusing moral absolutism and moral objectivism. Absolutism, which tends to hold that things simply are categorically right or wrong, regardless of circumstance (consider the deontologists, particularly Kant) [http://en.wikipedia.org...]; moral objectivism, on the other hand--particularly consequentialist theories--only hold that there is some objective ethical truth, even if the practical application of that truth varies based on context. Act utilitarianism, for instance, is the representative par excellence of a framework which rejects rigid absolutist distinctions between the always-right and the always-wrong. Whereas Kant would say that actions-in-themselves can be judged according to the maxim from which they're derived, [act] utilitarians argue that a good action is one which conforms to a maximization principle (where the object can be utility, happiness, pleasure, etc.).Back to Pro.