The Normative Contingency Thesis (NCT) is a compelling objection to Moral Realism.

Truth/Provability Justificationalism is a topic that I haven’t directly taken up until now. As we see, Pro’s nihilism entails that certain truth standards have not been met and that FPs are ultimately unable to be “validated. ” In this sense, we can see that nihilism contains positive claims – it seems to assert that one cannot truly believe in all sorts of objective standards until certain proofs have been met. In essence, it just seems to set the bar much higher than many of us would. Now, as we have seen, Con likes to doubt. However, he’s admitted that his argument and his nihilism is derived from FPs although he believes that they’re unable to be validated. Still Pro is a nihilist as opposed to simply nothing or purely agnostic towards everything. i. e. the difference between “there are no objective morals” and “I can’t comment on whether there are objective morals because the criteria is unclear. ” Given Pro’s FPs and his BoP, it would seem his task is to validate these FPs as somehow more logical than the FPs that comprise my belief system. However, Pro objects to this. As this is the last round, I feel it’s important to re-focus the case on the original topic and in doing so I’ll unfortunately have to drop several points that simply are not relevant to the case at hand. Pro’s case places a large emphasis on the flaws of the justificationalist method. I take it these are “objective” or real flaws, Pro? We see how much we have to give Pro even in the process of his doubts. Pro is still playing the game, he’s still making positive assertions about the nature of truth and verification standards. Additionally, since Pro is the one making the case the BoP rests on him. However, I believe I’ve exposed some glaring internal inconsistencies that render his case null before it even gets off the ground. This entire debate Pro’s believed that he can argue from a position beyond doubt, or a position that he believes is doubt embodied – nihilism. Nihilism really consists of a number of claims such as that there are no objective moral truths, there is no objective reality, etc. As mentioned, these claims all contain positive content relating to standards of belief. When Pro asserts nihilism he’s asserting it as a kind of de facto truth although he denies the ability to ever prove it despite the counter-intuitive implications. After all, to say there is a “flaw” in a system is to presuppose that the concept of “flaw” is meaningful and objective. Pro cannot possibly rely on subjective flaws or else his case falls apart completely. Once it’s been established that Pro’s position has positive content the rest of his case falls fairly quickly. Pro already doesn’t believe he can validate his FPs – if I ever admitted such a statement it would be death to my position. Pro now plays the usual game of asking justification for the FPs that underlie moral realism while conveniently neglecting the FPs that underlie nihilism (or in any case saying that despite them being unable to be validated that he still believes in them and so forth. ) If I’m reading Pro right he seems to believe the FPs he believes in are trivial and follow simply from the nature of logic and language use. I completely disagree, nihilism has its own web of FPs that are far from any immutable logical truth. Defaults and Certainty I have never understood why Pro believes that logic demands that our philosophical defaults can be determined by a strictly reductionist analysis (“nihilism ray”). It simply doesn’t make sense to me, but unfortunately this is the last round and I will not get a reply. My other contention is that certainty is unavoidable, and Pro ignores the string of certainty questions I asked him either in R3 or R2. Certainty must be admitted to on some level. Pro insists there is no certainty, is he certain of that? No? Then there is certainly the possibility for certainty? A continuing string of “no” just leads to complete philosophical paralysis much, much deeper than nihilism which actually does asserts metaphysical claims. Objectivity Pro has repeatedly stressed the seemingly impossible standard that must be met for this word’s meaning to be realized. As mentioned, I simply believe moral realism to be the case rather than claiming any 100% certainty standard to it, as Pro does with his nihilism. This feel or this sense of a shared intuition serves as a justification, it’s just not one that Pro accepts – just as I don’t accept a strictly reductionist analysis of logic, ethics, etc. is necessarily rational. Pro and I can both provide our reasons for a given belief, but after that it’s up to the individual. End game My claim all along has been that there is a certain incommensurability between worldviews when it comes down to first principles. As the starting points of reason, they’re notoriously difficult to sort out rationally in discussion. Pro agrees he has FPs, but seems to believe it’s not important to justify his FPs or that they’re apparently beyond validation – the claim is especially peculiar in light of his demand that I justify my FPs with some deeper reason beyond “I’m throwing in with it” or “it seems right. ” Isn’t this exactly what Pro is doing? Can Pro cite an immanent logical rule that leads to nihilism? Of course not, and the demand itself is silly. Moreover, to doubt FPs is, as already mentioned, to invoke FPs. Even if we grant Pro the benefit of the doubt on this objection, it certainly applies to his nihilism and entire position and serves as a metaphorical shot in the foot to the objection.