Existence of objective morality

But moving right along to my argument, I will be using a somewhat revised form of J. L. Mackie's error theory. The concept is similar to the one that I brought in my "The number four is even" debate with head. Below I will list the quick-form syllogism and then move on to defend the premises and final conclusion from those premises. Premise 1: a moral fact is an objectively prescriptive fact, so that the truth of a moral sentence would require the existence of objectively prescriptive facts. Premise 2: there are no objectively prescriptive facts. Concusion: there are no moral factsMy argument goes like this. M is X. X does not exist. Therefore M does not exist. An analogy would be if I said that an elf is a unicorn's cousin. But since unicorn's do not exist they cannot have cousins. So a unicorn's cousin cannot exist without a unicorn first existing. The logical validity of my argument is apparent and so I can assume that my conclusion will follow the affirmation of my two premises. Defense of Premise 1Premise 1 is not an argumentative premise, but a conceptual premise. I am stating what a moral fact would be. This was simply a combination of the definitions of objective and morality that my opponent agreed to in R1. Morality is a prescriptive requirement. But there could simply be subjective prescriptive requirements. Person A wanting Person B's possessions is a subjective situation. If Person A tells Person B that he must relinquish his possessions to Person A because he wants it, this would not be an objectively prescriptive requirement since it depends on the subjective wants of Person A. This debate is on objectively prescriptive facts and whether or not they exist. Premise 1 is a valid conceptual claim on what a moral fact would be. Defense of Premise 2This will be the main part on which the argumentation will rest. P1 is simply conceptual as to what an objective morality would be. As to my conclusion, I have shown that it is valid so long as my premises are shown to be true. Before I begin I feel as though we should look at the nature of objectivity more closely. To be objective, by our agreed upon definition, something must exist even if there are no minds to think about or form opinions about it, For this reason, an apple is an objective thing in nature. They were around before humans developed the capability to make choices as to which are more tasty or decide which color of apples is most appealing. Even if all intelligent life were wiped out tomorrow, apples would still exist and so they are objective. When we look at morality though we are dealing with something much different. We deal with what one 'ought' to do. But to make a distinction on what one 'ought' to do, there must be a person to ponder on the correct form of action. An apple is red regardless of opinion or thought. Red exists as a specific wavelength of light and so an apple can be red even if intelligent life never existed. Morality on the other hand is conditional to choices made by people. If people never existed, choices of correct action would not exist. In sense an objective prescriptive fact cannot exist. Perhaps though my opponent will argue that an objectively prescriptive fact's existence need not be conditional to human thought. Suppose my opponent argues that we can derive categorically prescriptive facts from the nature of the world around us. While this would be a simply get out of jail free card, it inevitably runs into it's own problems. Hume famously pointed out that there is as of yet no bridge that can connect descriptive and prescriptive statements, unless of course we resort to a hypothetical imperative(if I want X then I should do Y). Though this obviously takes away objectivity in that it would necessarily be conditional to human thought or opinion. I hope that this is sufficient explanation of my points as to get the ball rolling in this debate. I look forward to my opponent's response and again look forward to an interesting exchange of ideas. I now pass on the debate to headphonegut.