Can morality be objective?

[John Day]

One a desert island knowing how to get food and avoiding injury is a lot more important than morality. Can morality guide you in making a fire or spearing a fish or snaring an animal? I have thought for some time now the morality and $2.67 will get you a small coffee and an Old Fashioned donut at the local Dunkin' Donut ™ shop.

I can understand moral and ethical considerations when interacting with other folks, but what relevance do they have in isolation?

Ba'al Chatzaf

"You who prattle that morality is social and that man would need no morality on a desert island—it is on a desert island that he would need it most. Let him try to claim, when there are no victims to pay for it, that a rock is a house, that sand is clothing, that food will drop into his mouth without cause or effort, that he will collect a harvest tomorrow by devouring his stock seed today—and reality will wipe him out, as he deserves; reality will show him that life is a value to be bought and that thinking is the only coin noble enough to buy it." - Atlas Shrugged, page 1018

More simply, a man's code of values and rationality will determine his survival.

[BaalChatzaf]

More simply, a man's code of values and rationality will determine his survival.

Nonsense. A sociopath on a desert island who knows basic survival skills and applies them will just as likely survive as a paragon of moral virtue who knows basic survival skills and applies them.

Quoting a John Galt Speech cuts no lumber with me. I work on the basis of facts and logic, not Rand's fantasies.

Ba'al Chatzaf

Edited December 22, 2009 by BaalChatzaf

[Brant Gaede]

More simply, a man's code of values and rationality will determine his survival.

Nonsense. A sociopath on a desert island who knows basic survival skills and applies them will just as likely survive as a paragon of moral virtue who knows basic survival skills and applies them.

Quoting a John Galt Speech cuts no lumber with me. I work on the basis of facts and logic, not Rand's fantasies.

Ba'al Chatzaf

Sometimes you have to be lucky.

--Brant

[syrakusos]

Nonsense. A sociopath on a desert island who knows basic survival skills and applies them will just as likely survive as a paragon of moral virtue who knows basic survival skills and applies them.

Quoting a John Galt Speech cuts no lumber with me. I work on the basis of facts and logic, not Rand's fantasies.

First, you dropped the context. A sociopath exhibits pathological behavior in a social context. The question is whether morality is social. Morality, at root, must be individual because it comes from choice. You also ignore the reality of sociopathy. To say that a sociopath would have "good survival skills" on a desert island is to ignore the social nature of that person's choices. The theory of Objectivist psychology says that an individualist identifies reality and in a social context that means acknowledging other people. On an island, it is the identification of reality that brings survival, even in the absence of others. For the sociopath, the focus is entirely on getting from other people, getting over on them. Other people are their reality. The Objectivist prediction is that on a desert island, the sociopath will lack basic survival skills.

Granted, that as sociopathic person who, for instance, was in the Army could have learned such skills. The counter argument is that in the Army, the sociopath focuses on getting other people to do the work and taking from them. For a milder example, consider the character Zack Mayo played by Richard Geer in An Officer and a Gentleman. He comes to the flight school as a grifter and a con. He is not centered on his own achievement, but in getting from others, as for instance, by selling them polished brass. In the movie, of course, he changes. Real life might be different than that.

As for Galt's Speech, I am sure that it bothers you and it is somewhat quirky if not disturbing when Ayn Rand quotes one of her own characters as an authority, but the fact remains that the speech (and other monologues) stands alone as an essay. So for Rand (or one of us) to quote it is not much different than citing chapter and verse from non0-fiction. It is important to cite your sources when you take from others. Otherwise, that would be sociopathic, right?

[tjohnson]

We had a discussion on this and Rand definitely is using 'morality' in a non-standard way here. Nowhere in a dictionary that I know of does 'morality' have anything to do with survival skills. The definitions are invariably about right/wrong, ethical/unethical, etc. , things that have a social context - nothing about survival. So Rand has some reason for using this word so differently, I wonder why that is?

[Alfonso Jones]

We had a discussion on this and Rand definitely is using 'morality' in a non-standard way here. Nowhere in a dictionary that I know of does 'morality' have anything to do with survival skills. The definitions are invariably about right/wrong, ethical/unethical, etc. , things that have a social context - nothing about survival. So Rand has some reason for using this word so differently, I wonder why that is?

Fortunately, Rand's definition for morality is specific and is given, along with her rationality for a different definition, in The Objectivist Ethics. This major essay is easily available, among other places, in the paperbook The Virtue of Selfishness.

Discussions of Rand's thought on morality and selfishness are well-prefaced by a reading of this essay, if one wants to know what Rand said and thought.

Bill P

[Darrell Hougen]

The fact that a person has a choice to live or die doesn't affect the necessity of morality. If one chooses to live, morality is necessary, regardless of whether one exists in society or alone on a desert island.

Darrell

One a desert island knowing how to get food and avoiding injury is a lot more important than morality. Can morality guide you in making a fire or spearing a fish or snaring an animal? I have thought for some time now the morality and $2.67 will get you a small coffee and an Old Fashioned donut at the local Dunkin' Donut ™ shop.

I can understand moral and ethical considerations when interacting with other folks, but what relevance do they have in isolation?

Ba'al Chatzaf

In Objectivist parlance, every choice a person makes is a moral choice. Every value that he holds is a moral value.

Now, you are free to define the words "moral" or "morality" differently, for your own use, but I am hard pressed to see how you are going to succeed in arriving at consistent meanings for the words. It appears that you wish to invoke the word "moral," as in "moral choice," only when a person's choice affects another person. But, I could argue that virtually every choice a person makes affects or could affect other people.

Imagine the following scenario. A person is stranded on a desert island. He spends his spare time experimenting and learning all kinds of skills from making spears to building ever more elaborate huts, houses, and buildings. One day, a primitive tribe arrives at the island in boats and takes him to their island. With the skills he has learned, he is able to teach the natives new ways of doing things and eventually becomes their leader. In this story, the manner in which the stranded person spends his time has enormous effects on other people.

If you don't like that scenario, imagine that the stranded person spent his time making more and more elaborate boats until he was able to return to civilization where his wife and children were still living. His return could have enormous effects on them.

For a more realistic scenario, imagine that you, in your spare time, decided to learn how to program. Eventually, you became quite good at it and wrote a piece of software used by thousands or, perhaps, millions of people.

At every moment of every day, a person must decide what action to take next. The choice that he makes is a consequence of the values that he holds. You may refer to some of the values as moral values and some as non-moral values, but, in my view, it is a distinction without a difference. Every action that a person takes could affect other people.

If I were an altruist, which I'm not, I might argue that every person has an obligation to spend his spare time learning or perfecting his knowledge or skills because they might be useful to someone else in the future. As an Objectivist, I would argue that every person has an obligation to spend at least some of his spare time learning or perfecting his knowledge or skills because they might be useful to him in the future.

Darrell

[Darrell Hougen]

Michael, I appreciate your nice comments. Thank you.

.

Darrell,

I still don't think we're seeing eye-to-eye. The evaluations I speak of are biologically implicit and differ from products of cognition or personal taste, such as preference for vanilla ice cream.

The confusing point might be that whereas we tend to think of the factual universe as represented by matter, life is about processes. Those processes that sustain life (ex. a plant growing towards sunlight) act in a manner that contain evaluations (sunlight = good), although no such explicit evaluation of good exists per se. Other plants could potentially grow away from the sun (sunlight = bad). Even though we consciously speak of good and bad, the processes themselves are natural and inherent in the biological system. Stop those processes and life stops. I don't consider the existence of life to be subjective, therefore the processes that represent life cannot be subjective. The implicit evaluations contained in those processes should therefore not be considered fully subjective either.

Pro-life evaluations are objective to the degree that we consider life to be objective.

I think that's about the best I can describe what I've been thinking.

When a non-volitional creature acts in life sustaining manner, one might say that its actions implicitly "contain evaluations." However, the central question of ethics is, why should a volitional creature act in a life sustaining manner? If a volitional creature does act in a life sustaining manner, then its actions are explicitly the result of evaluations that are directed at sustaining its life.

Of course, a volitional creature is also dependent upon low level processes such as the beating of its heart or the digestion of food that are not volitional. But, the central of ethics involves volitional choices and actions.

Darrell

[Darrell Hougen]

We do not see "images in our brains." We may see an image on a movie screen or a TV, but not in our brains. We see the external world.

You obviously know nothing about physiology.

Was that an argument?

Do you want me to spell it out for you explicitly? There is no little homunculus in your brain watching the images in your brain. Light forms an image on your retina. After that point, there is no image in your brain.

Darrell

[Dragonfly]

We had a discussion on this and Rand definitely is using 'morality' in a non-standard way here. Nowhere in a dictionary that I know of does 'morality' have anything to do with survival skills. The definitions are invariably about right/wrong, ethical/unethical, etc. , things that have a social context - nothing about survival. So Rand has some reason for using this word so differently, I wonder why that is?

Because her definition is of course the true one, and all the other ones are false... ;)

[Darrell Hougen]

Actually the desert island scenario is useful in exposing the fundamental flaw in Objectivist morality.

In brief, Rand declares "life" to be the standard of value--which implies that "life" is itself not a value, but something inherent in reality by which value choices can be measured and judged.

If I declare that a meter is to be the standard of length, does that imply that a meter is not a unit of length?

But (here is the flaw) she then declares that "life" is something chosen (or at least, sought after), meaning that "life" is itself a "value": the most important value but still a value which must be chosen.

The Objectivist counter to this problem is, as far as I understand it, not a good counter. "You have to choose life because otherwise you will die, therefore life is the objective standard of value."

And if I do not care whether I live or die?

Or suppose I value life only as a means to another goal: suppose I am a musician who lives for the sake of playing my music, and not, as Objectivism has it, playing my music for the sake of living.

Here, you have identified the correct question to ask. Although Rand pointed the way to the correct answer to this question, I don't think her answer was 100% satisfactory. Providing a complete answer to this question is a difficult proposition. In fact, I started writing an essay on the subject some time ago, but haven't had a chance to finish it.

In a nut shell, I would argue that if your chosen, long-range goal, for which life is a subordinate goal, causes you to act in any manner that is substantially incompatible with the requirements of your life, you will substantially increase your probability of death and, therefore, will substantially reduce your odds of achieving your primary goal. Therefore, it is impossible to choose any goal that is substantially different from the maintenance of your life. That does not mean that you cannot maintain your life by different and various means. Rather, it implies that the maintenance of your life can never be subordinate to any other long-range goal, at least not in any substantial manner.

In other words, not only is life not an "objective standard of value" but simply another value which I can freely choose.

This is why the "indestructible robot" scenario fails to establish what Rand wants it to establish, since the robot is free to choose something else as its ultimate value.

The "indestructible robot" is free to choose any goal at all. A human is not. A human cannot achieve any long-range goal that is substantially at odds with the maintenance of his own life.

Darrell

Edited December 22, 2009 by Darrell Hougen

[tjohnson]

Was that an argument?

Do you want me to spell it out for you explicitly? There is no little homunculus in your brain watching the images in your brain. Light forms an image on your retina. After that point, there is no image in your brain.

Darrell

Well, if you don't like the term 'image' how about a representation? Even better, an abstraction The point is that what we have to work with are things created in our brain from the stimuli our nervous system receives. So we do not see the real world as it is, it is humanly impossible.

[Xray]

Actually the desert island scenario is useful in exposing the fundamental flaw in Objectivist morality.

In brief, Rand declares "life" to be the standard of value--which implies that "life" is itself not a value, but something inherent in reality by which value choices can be measured and judged. But (here is the flaw) she then declares that "life" is something chosen (or at least, sought after), meaning that "life" is itself a "value": the most important value but still a value which must be chosen.

The Objectivist counter to this problem is, as far as I understand it, not a good counter. "You have to choose life because otherwise you will die, therefore life is the objective standard of value."

And if I do not care whether I live or die?

Or suppose I value life only as a means to another goal: suppose I am a musician who lives for the sake of playing my music, and not, as Objectivism has it, playing my music for the sake of living.

In other words, not only is life not an "objective standard of value" but simply another value which I can freely choose.

Excellent points, JS.

We had a discussion on this and Rand definitely is using 'morality' in a non-standard way here. Nowhere in a dictionary that I know of does 'morality' have anything to do with survival skills. The definitions are invariably about right/wrong, ethical/unethical, etc. , things that have a social context - nothing about survival. So Rand has some reason for using this word so differently, I wonder why that is?

Because her definition is of course the true one, and all the other ones are false... ;)

So true, GS and DF.

John Galt on what he believes is "morality":

"You who prattle that morality is social and that man woould need no morality on a desert island - it is on a desert island that he would need it most.

Let him try to claim when there are no victims to pay for it, that a rock is is a house, that sand is clothing, that food will drop into his mouth without cause or effort, that he will collect a harvest tomorrow by devouring his stock seed today - and realtiy will wipe him out as he deserves; reality will show him that life is a value to be bought and that thinking is the only coin noble enough to buy it." (Galt)

What Galt thinks is 'morality' is something completely different. It is as if one defined chalk with the semantic markers pertaining to cheese.

For a man's belief that e. g. "a rock is a house" or "sand is clothing" has nothing to do with "morality", but is a simple error about facts. Big difference.

Edited December 22, 2009 by Xray

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Because her definition is of course the true one, and all the other ones are false...

Dragonfly,

Why do folks keep getting this wrong?

If you are discussing Rand's work and meanings, her definition is the only one you should use to characterize her meaning. Call it the only true one if you want, but for that purpose it is.

What I keep seeing is Rand critics saying her words have their meanings, that her meanings do not exist (or are anomalies or not standard or whatever), then bashing her for being inconsistent with their meanings.

The reason Rand went to great lengths to define her terms is because people smuggle in package deals in standard definitions. The end of those package deals is always a gun pointed at someone telling they must do something or surrender something.

Rand doesn't give folks that wiggle-room if they want to discuss her work and be legitimate, that is, unless they hold that it is legitimate to mischaracterize the meanings of—and attribute alien ideas to—a thinker. I say it is reasonable to dismiss such a person. Who should take someone like that seriously unless he is pointing a gun at you? Rand certainly didn't. I don't either.

Rand was against that gun, not against your precious right to hold and express a different view. And I use the word "precious" here without sarcasm. I am serious. Rand defended that right—your right—with every breath she took.

Why people spit on her for that, I don't know...

Michael

[tjohnson]

Well, I can certainly agree that a man on a desert island will need his reason or rationality to survive. It's almost as if Rand equates these to morality. In other words, being a moral person is being a rational person. I sometimes think she is using 'morality' this way to counter the religionist view of morality, because religion is basically irrational.

Edited December 22, 2009 by general semanticist

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

GS,

The choice to use reason on a problem, say, like feeding yourself on a desert island, or of going "Uga uga!" and hoping for food to miraculously appear from the gods being uga-pleased are moral choices.

One type of morality results in choosing the first and another kind of morality results in choosing the second.

Most people are mixed bags morally speaking, but those extreme choices are accurate poles of the value of reason and whether to choose to use it or not.

Michael

[BaalChatzaf]

Because her definition is of course the true one, and all the other ones are false... ;)

Are you displaying your sardonic wit again?

Ba'al Chatzaf

[anthony]

It seems incontrovertible that it is precisely on a desert island that Objectivist morality would be essential; it is, after all, a morality founded upon reality, Reason, and Man's life.

But back at home, amongst people, I have sometimes thought that there is a gap in that morality.

We cannot avoid other people; we might not want to avoid them; we even gain value of survival with them; and we even, and especially, gain value of 'flourishing', with them.

Whether it's hard-wired in us to form some sort of primitive alliance with them - or at the top end of the scale, where we hold some people in high esteem by a code of value - our morality should be a finely-tuned guide to how we deal with them.

(Hell is other people, at times. But so too, is heaven.)

It appears that between the one 'stool' of rationality, enlightened self-interest, autonomy of the individual,the 'trader premise',esteem for other producers, and romantic love ... and the other 'stool', of Capitalism, individual rights, non-initiation of force --- to name some of Rand's magnificent achievements, well, between them there seems to be discontinuity.

Of course, rightly so, Objectivism places the full emphasis on the individual - his morality is for him, and by him. For too long, was ethical living the preserve of religion, based on subservience to others, and a deity.

I am sticking my neck out here, but stated briefly,I feel a vacuum exists between the personal area, and the public arena, in O'ism. Other people's premises come in many forms, mixed, or contradictory, or plain confusing, I've found, and one's morality has to grow to keep up with it all. Then again, I for one can't claim absolute consistency, in my dealings with others, either.

(This 'morality gap' that concerns me, is this the gap that good-will, respect, and benevolence, fill?)

Still, for Objectivism to be complete (imo) it should provide a broader morality for one's dealings with other people. Today, more than ever before, other people are Reality.

This began as a response to GS's post, and ended up off topic, I'm afraid...

Tony

[merjet]

We had a discussion on this and Rand definitely is using 'morality' in a non-standard way here. Nowhere in a dictionary that I know of does 'morality' have anything to do with survival skills. The definitions are invariably about right/wrong, ethical/unethical, etc. , things that have a social context - nothing about survival. So Rand has some reason for using this word so differently, I wonder why that is?

I think it is more accurate to say Rand used "moral" in a broad, not non-standard, way. She used it to mean good or bad. See here as well.

Here is a dictionary definition (source):

moral (adj.)

1. relating to, dealing with, or capable of making the distinction between right and wrong in conduct

2. relating to, serving to teach, or in accordance with the principles of right and wrong

There is nothing there about "only in a social context". Is smoking good or bad for your health? Is eating contaminated food or poison mushrooms good or bad for you? These questions don't involve other people.

[Xray]

Because her definition is of course the true one, and all the other ones are false...

Dragonfly,

Why do folks keep getting this wrong?

MSK,

DF did not get this wrong, but was right on target.

Or do you believe that Rand did not think of her definitions as the true ones?

MSK: If you are discussing Rand's work and meanings, her definition is the only one you should use to characterize her meaning.

To a Christian, the definition of Jesus is "God's son". Does being aware of the definition used by the theist imply that one just leaves it at that, merely saying "Okay, so that's your definition?

Isn't putting those definitions to the test actually the starting point if one wants to get to the core of an issue?

Edited December 22, 2009 by Xray

[Dragonfly]

Because her definition is of course the true one, and all the other ones are false...

If you are discussing Rand's work and meanings, her definition is the only one you should use to characterize her meaning. Call it the only true one if you want, but for that purpose it is.

From Galt's speech:

You who prattle that morality is social and that man would need no morality on a desert island—it is on a desert island that he would need it most.

Observe that Galt doesn't say "this is my definition of morality" - no, he claims that people who "prattle" that man would need no morality on a desert island are clearly wrong, implying that the definition of morality that it is social and concerns the behavior towards other people is a false definition. It is not just that Rand uses her own idiosyncratic definitions, but she insists clearly that the standard definition is wrong and that her own definition is correct.

[Dragonfly]

The choice to use reason on a problem, say, like feeding yourself on a desert island, or of going "Uga uga!" and hoping for food to miraculously appear from the gods being uga-pleased are moral choices.

This is setting up a straw man. There may be primitive savages who utter "Uga uga!" or something like that and who do silly things like rain dances or asking the gods for food, but they don't wait for that food to appear miraculously. They would never have survived in the first place by only doing that. If I had to bet on who would survive longer on a desert island, an Objectivist who can recite Galt's speech from beginning to end, or a savage who can only yell "Uga uga!" and who believes in all kinds of gods and ghosts and has other superstitions, then I would bet on the savage. He is no doubt much better equipped to survive on desert islands, even if he doesn't know the Pythagorean theorem nor the finer points of metaphysics.

[BaalChatzaf]

GS,

The choice to use reason on a problem, say, like feeding yourself on a desert island, or of going "Uga uga!" and hoping for food to miraculously appear from the gods being uga-pleased are moral choices.

One type of morality results in choosing the first and another kind of morality results in choosing the second.

Most people are mixed bags morally speaking, but those extreme choices are accurate poles of the value of reason and whether to choose to use it or not.

Michael

You seem to be conflating morality with rationality. An immoral person can be perfectly rational. An irrational person can be moral.

People who consistently chose those actions which preserved their life and health are manifesting rational (reason based, fact recognizing) behavior.

Ba'al Chatzaf

[BaalChatzaf]

Observe that Galt doesn't say "this is my definition of morality" - no, he claims that people who "prattle" that man would need no morality on a desert island are clearly wrong, implying that the definition of morality that it is social and concerns the behavior towards other people is a false definition. It is not just that Rand uses her own idiosyncratic definitions, but she insists clearly that the standard definition is wrong and that her own definition is correct.

That is an oft made Objectivist move. First substitute the Obectivist definition of a term into discourse, then assert anyone who uses the conventional definition is clearly wrong minded or even worse, an Evil Evader, a Looter and a Moocher or even (gasp!) a Social Metaphysician.

Ba'al Chatzaf

Edited December 23, 2009 by BaalChatzaf

[Christopher]

When a non-volitional creature acts in life sustaining manner, one might say that its actions implicitly "contain evaluations." However, the central question of ethics is, why should a volitional creature act in a life sustaining manner? If a volitional creature does act in a life sustaining manner, then its actions are explicitly the result of evaluations that are directed at sustaining its life.

Of course, a volitional creature is also dependent upon low level processes such as the beating of its heart or the digestion of food that are not volitional. But, the central of ethics involves volitional choices and actions.

Darrell

Making morality objective is a two-part process. Looks like we agree on the first part (implicit in life-sustaining action exists evaluations). The second part addresses volition as described in the origin of this thread. All of man's objective statements are based on volitional processes. This is probably why GS argues that subjective and objective cannot be completely divided. If I assert that a block of granite weighs 5 kilos, I had to first validate my knowledge (which requires volition) prior to asserting what appears to be an objective statement.

When I make an explicit evaluation consistent with an objective implicit evaluation, I am basically re-asserting objective reality. Biologically, vitamin C is "good" for me. Therefore, I hold the explicit evaluation that vitamin C is good for me. My explicit evaluation is not subjective, it is completely based on objective truth. Sure, evaluations can be subjective... but so can assertions. It is when assertions are based on fact that those assertions become objective. Likewise, it is when evaluations are based on fact that those evaluations become objective.