Newsgroups: bit.listserv.politics
Date:         Sat, 5 Sep 1992 12:44:00 EDT
From:         rf35 <Richard_A_FYFE@UMAIL.UMD.EDU>
Subject:      Re: homosexuality
Comments: To: Forum for the Discussion of Politics <POLITICS@ucf1vm.cc.ucf.edu>

Greetings: To Missy

> "Aversions" are a type of *feelings.*  Therefore, your scheme
> is every bit as subjective as mine--more even, since mine is
> derived from an *external* source.

        This is better.

        First (though this is actually a technical matter which
should have little impact on the argument) aversions and desires
are dispositions to behave in particular ways.  They are commonly
associated with feelings, but they are not (strictly speaking)
the same thing.  This is a minor point.

        Second, I grant that there is a sense in which the term
'subjective' applies to the account I have given.  The account
is NOT subjective in the sense that it makes moral truth depend
upon the BELIEFS of the agent, of society, or anybody else.
Beliefs can be completely mistaken.  The account is also NOT
subjective in that the moral truth depends upon what the agent
wants the moral truth to be.  An agent may find that morality
demands him to do what he does not want to do (thought it does
tell him to do what he ought to want to do).  So, charges that
this account is 'selfish' and based on 'greed' do not apply.

        It is 'subjective' in the sense that, without any
desires, there would be no value.  And desires are a psycho-
logical state.  However, to say that this counts as 'sub-
jective' in any strong sense is highly misleading.  Claims
about desires (and of about how states of affairs stand in
relation to desires) can be just as objective as any other
scientific claim--as objective, for example, as the fact that
I am sitting in front of a computer.  The fact that moral
claims count as facts about psychological states (and rela-
tionships between psychological states and states of affairs
in the world) does not imply that they are not facts.

        As for the 'external' source of value which you speek
of, its existence has yet to be established.  The fact that
you BELIEVE that this external source exists does not imply
that it does exist; nor is its existence assured by the fact
that you WANT it to exist.  If it does exist, then I would
like you to provide an account of what it is, evidence that
it is real, an account of how it can be a source of value.  I
would like evidence for your claims.  Faith is simply an asser-
tion that "what I believe is true and really want to be true
really is true."  It serves as no more of a ground for objec-
tive reality than the beliefs and desires themselves.  Having
faith that one's actions are not harmful to others provides no
better foundation than having a belief they are not harmful

        In addition, you need to provide evidence that the ex-
ternal value you provided is different from the account that
I provide.  If, for example, your account is founded on the
existence of a diety, then it is still open to me to say that
the account I have provided--grounded on reason (which God has
given me)--is a good account (though, certainly, fallible) of
the universe God made.  In other words, why is it not the case
that God created a universe in which value was founded on de-
sire?

        If, as I suspect, your answer would turn this into a
theological discussion, many on this list would certainly wish
that we discuss it elsewhere.  I have raised objections against
this in the past.  I agree that the (non)existence of God
matters; and to bar an appeal to God is, for all practical pur-
poses, to require participants to discuss political matters un-
der the presumption that God does not exist.  I do agree on a
prohibition against appeals to faith and other subjective
forms of justification--a person who refuses to appeal to reason
gives us no reason to listen to what he has to say.  But, though
it may be true, it is not obvious that belief in God is un-
reasonable.

                                        Richard A. Fyfe
                                        rf35@umail.umd.edu
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