The Problems with Objective Morality

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I came up withe following:
Do you love someone
-because it is moral to love someone or...
-is it moral to love the person because you love them?
-If it is the first, and you found morality required hatred of others, then you would hate the person (you love them for the sake of fulfilling a moral law, not for their own sakes).
-If it is the second, then morality is dependent on subjective preference.

Basically, morality is either irrelevant to what we do or it is subjective.

(BTW, even if such things as objective moral rules existed, they are uselss to us if we don't know what they are. Analogy: a map will not help you find the way if you don't have access to the map.)

I also don't see how "objective morality" (whatever that means) is even a coherent concept:

What isn't problematic:
-Speaking of moral rules as rules (but without a non-subjective basis).
-Using moral “rules” as a way of describing human and animal behavior.

What is problematic:
-Defining the term “objective” in the context of “objective” moral laws.
-What does it mean for one action or thought to take “precedence” over another (what does it mean for one action to be “better” than another? Does it mean anything for that matter)? I have yet to encounter a definition of what this means.
-Determining what criteria we use to determine which ethical theory is correct (not the more approximate question of which actions are “correct,” but how we determine which corresponding criteria of right and wrong are correct).
-Determining how & what it means for values to exist apart from those who form the the value judgments.

Love is subjective, not objective. It is something that happens between 2 people (may be possible between more than 2 or oneself, but that's a different issue). You want to be with that person, you trust them and understand, or at least put up with that person's quirks .

I think your comment sort of shows your AS. over-thinking it all

Also considering a lot of what is considered morally right and wrong is learned and not instinctive I don't think the concept of "objective morality" is plausible. Most would consider it morally wrong to murder right? In some cultures it can be a morally right thing to do, in certain circumstances.

So hrmm yeah morality is subjective but it is learned subjectiveness for the most part. I dont think morality has anything to do with love, just what is considered acceptable and not acceptable within a love relationship.

Well then, I guess we agree.

(BTW, your last paragraph refers to what is often called inter-subjective ethics)

As for over thinking,
-Those who say this usually lack support for their arguments (sometimes you need to be detailed to see where an error in reasoning lies).
+ Though you should always answer the broader questions first.
-Interesting questions and issues maybe considered all the same.

My analogy to love was to demonstrate how we relate to value judgments in general. My focus was not on love specifically (except as an analogy) and more on value judgments in general.

There can be no values outside of the context of something that values. To be alive is to have things that can work for or against that life. A rock can not have values, for instance. So don't try and distance values away from a valuer.

And Love IS objective. It is a recognition of your own highest values in another person. Whether you know they are your highest values or not is another matter.

This thread really needs to be in PPR.

There is no such thing as objectivity. There is only ever consensus. The thing about being human is that we can only ever see things from our unique perspective. We are a conciousness that is wrapped (trapped!)in a phsysical body. This is in my opinion both a great blessing & a curse. To claim objectivity is to put oneself at an artificial remove from this & claim to know the 'truth'. There may well be an absolute truth but we humans experience life from a point of view. We cannot see everything from everywhere at the same time, so we will never know true objectivity or absolute truth.

We can know the existance of things outside of our immediate experience because the world presents itself like a 'horizon' to us. This is to say that it's appearance changes to us as we move through it. We know that a building has more than one side to it because we can move around it. We then mine our knowledge of this for future reference. As we move though life our perspectives change both spatially and in terms of our perceptions of reality. Our aquired knowledge changes too and if we allow ourselves, we can learn to change our assumptions based on new evidence as it presents itself.

These perceptions can be influenced by outside forces (society, media, peer pressure, etc) but we always see the world subjectively, that is 'from a distinct point of view'.

People experience certain little 'truths' in our lives but what is true for one person is untrue for another. Everything else is consensus reality - ie: 'grass is green - the sky is blue' etc.

The irony of objectivitists is that they use their supposed 'objectivity' to push their own highly subjective agendas down other peoples throats. The fact that theres a group of them saying the same thing does not mean that they are nesscesarily right. The point is that they have to find other like-minds who are in agreement with their subjective points of view in order to arrive at their 'objectivity' or 'truth'.

Izzak - A rock has no conciousness but people do Love is entirely subjective. if this was not the case then there would be no (or very little) confict between the sexes (and/or individuals - in the case of gay people).

We had a 'lively' debate regarding objectivity a while ago. I think I offended you. I didn't mean to, I just disagree strongly with you on this one. I've since read some of your other posts and responded to a few and you seem like a great guy!

I'll leave you all with the following quote;

"Is", "is." "is" — the idiocy of the word haunts me. If it were abolished, human thought might begin to make sense. I don't know what anything "is"; I only know how it seems to me at this moment." - Robert Anton Wilson

I realize that i've just said that such and such 'is' so and so in the above. This is a paradox of being human and seeing from a point of view. We think that what we say IS right and that other people are wrong.

Ethics, morality, truth and value judgements depend entirely on the people who are making them, at the specific point in time that they are making them. Things that individuals or society consider 'wrong' usually change over time, only to come back later in a changed form. Life is in constant flux.