Leo's DemystifySci Podcast Appearance

[Leo Gura]

23 minutes ago, Joseph Maynor said:

But it's also a relative too right, we associate truth with some ego taking right conduct in the world.  Honoring truth from a human perspective as well.  

There are relative truths and there is Absolute Truth.

"Elephants are large" is a relative truth.

Edited 2 hours ago by Leo Gura

[Joseph Maynor]

1 minute ago, Leo Gura said:

There are relative truths and there is Absolute Truth.

"Elephants are large" is a relative truth.

Aren't health, finances, relationships relative issues?  What is the relationship of relative truths to Absolute Truth?

[Leo Gura]

1 minute ago, Joseph Maynor said:

What is the relationship of relative truths to Absolute Truth?

I address that issue at length in my video: Absolute vs Relative Truth

Relative truths are conceptual. Absolute is not a concept.

Edited 2 hours ago by Leo Gura

[Joseph Maynor]

39 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

I address that issue at length in my video: Absolute vs Relative Truth

Relative truths are conceptual. Absolute is not a concept.

Got it.  I'll rewatch that video today.  However, you seem to consider both as valuable to share as oughts, i.e., you seem feel like both ought to be integrated or embodied, and are both true/True on some level.  

I'll re-watch both of these videos today.

 

Edited 2 hours ago by Joseph Maynor

[zurew]

4 minutes ago, Joseph Maynor said:

However, you seem to consider both as valuable to share as oughts, i.e., you seem feel like both ought to be integrated or embodied, and are both true/True on some level.  

How is that incompatible with antirealism?

[Leo Gura]

5 minutes ago, Joseph Maynor said:

Got it.  I'll rewatch that video today.  However, you seem to consider both as valuable to share as oughts, i.e., you seem feel like both ought to be integrated or embodied, and are both true/True on some level.  

There are no oughts in my worldview.

No one ought to do anything.

IF you love Truth, then The Work is for you.

[Joseph Maynor]

18 minutes ago, zurew said:

How is that incompatible with antirealism?

The presence of ought statements as epistemically valid.  That's moral realism.

[zurew]

33 minutes ago, Joseph Maynor said:

The presence of ought statements as epistemically valid.  That's moral realism.

You can cash out "ought" statements by relating them to subjective preferences and desires and intuitions.

Like the statement "You ought to do X" can be cashed out as "I have the preference of you doing X or I want you to do X"

Some of them can also be cashed out as descriptive goal related statements about reality like "If you want to achieve goal x then you ough to do y"  - where "ought" just describes a constitutive necessity, namely that y is something that is necessary to  achieve X , but there isn't anything in there that moral antirealists couldnt agree with.

 

The other thing is that when Leo makes statements about Love and such is that those statements are not moral realist claims, those are just claims about metaphysics - about the nature of reality.

They are descriptive claims, not normative claims.

Edited 1 hour ago by zurew

[Joseph Maynor]

21 minutes ago, zurew said:

You can cash out "ought" statements by relating them to subjective preferences and desires and intuitions.

Like the statement "You ought to do X" can be cashed out as "I have the preference of you doing X or I want you to do X"

Some of them can also be cashed out as descriptive goal related statements about reality like "If you want to achieve goal x then you ough to do y"  - where "ought" just describes a constitutive necessity, namely that y is something that is necessary to  achieve X , but there isn't anything in there that moral antirealists couldnt agree with.

 

The other thing is that when Leo makes statements about Love and such is that those statements are not moral realist claims, those are just claims about metaphysics - about the nature of reality.

They are descriptive claims, not normative claims.

This is actually really interesting because it shows how metaphysics and ethics blur.  We assume there's a brite-line distinction between metaphysics and ethics.  This gets into intellect mastery.  Someone wants to draw a conclusion with concepts that shade into each other.

[zurew]

12 minutes ago, Joseph Maynor said:

This is actually really interesting because it shows how metaphysics and ethics blur.  We assume there's a brite-line distinction between metaphysics and ethics.  This gets into intellect mastery.  Someone wants to draw a conclusion with concepts that shade into each other.

To be fair to you, there are versions of moral realism where moral claims can be reduced down to descriptive claims (like certain descriptive facts about the world) - I just take it that 

1) those kinds of views are miselading, because I personally wouldn't even categorize them as moral views.

2) Since they can be reduced down to descriptive claims, they essentially lack action-guiding.

 

There are other types of moral realist views where those normative claims are irreducible. There the issue that I have is that those views are mostly unintelligible to me and those views just lack persuasion.

Like why would you ever care about a random irreducible moral claim just based on the fact that it is objectively true? Like imagine there would be an objectively true irreducible moral claim  "You ought to walk backwards when you go to work" - like why would you ever abide by that?

and if those objectively true irreducible moral claims are such that are already aligned with your subjective preferences, then sure you will abide by them, but not because they are objectively true, but because they are aligned with things you subjectively care about.

[Joseph Maynor]

Just now, zurew said:

To be fair to you, there are versions of moral realism where moral claims can be reduced down to descriptive claims (like certain descriptive facts about the world) - I just take it that 

1) those kinds of views are miselading, because I personally wouldn't even categorize them as moral views.

2) Since they can be reduced down to descriptive claims, they essentially lack action-guiding.

 

There are other types of moral realist views where those normative claims are irreducible. There the issue that I have is that those views are mostly unintelligible to me and those views just lack persuasion.

Like why would you ever care about a random irreducible moral claim just based on the fact that it is objectively true? Like imagine there would be an objectively true irreducible moral claim  "You ought to walk backwards when you go to work" - like why would you ever abide by that?

and if those objectively true irreducible moral claims are such that are already aligned with your subjective preferences, then sure you will abide by them, but not because they are objectively true, but because they are aligned with things you subjectively care about.

It's always been popular with kids to resist moral realism.  Why is that?  This is why everyone has to try to bring morality in thu the back door in spirituality.  Because the assumption is spirituality is superior to someone (usually the human is scapegoated here).  

[zurew]

1 minute ago, Joseph Maynor said:

It's always been popular with kids to resist moral realism.  Why is that? 

There can be many different possible reasons.

I think one reason could be that spiritual people want to differentiate themselves from religious people and one way to do that is to just negate some of the views religious people take on certain things.

One other reason could be thinking through all possible options and actually arriving on their own that moral realism is implasuible or that it is false - but I personally take it that this is much less likely to be the case (just based on the fact , that most spiritual people are typically not well educated about the literature on morality).

One other reason could be that they picked up antirealist moral intuitions from their culture and from their parents. 

 

[Joseph Maynor]

Just now, zurew said:

There can be many different possible reasons.

I think one reason could be that spiritual people want to differentiate themselves from religious people and one way to do that is to just negate some of the views religious people take on certain things.

One other reason could be thinking through all possible options and actually arriving on their own that moral realism is implasuible or that it is false - but I personally take it that this is much less likely to be the case (just based on the fact , that most spiritual people are typically not well educated about the literature on morality).

One other reason could be that they picked up antirealist moral intuitions from their culture and from their parents. 

 

Examining every possibility could fill volumes.  This is why ultimately you have to be the source when it comes to judgment.  

This is an interesting video I'm re-watching now:

 

[Human Mint]

The way I see it is morality = conformity = manipulation.

There are just actions and consequences.

Can humans live consciously without morality? Yes, that is the point.

[Willy Phallicus]

How much potential has been destroyed by conformity and morality as well as the dialectic opposites of perversion and addiction?

You live in nature.  Nature is a violent bloody war - total all encompassing all consuming war for survival, growth and evolution - no holds barred - no morality - no right - no wrong - just what is and what can be accomplished.  You can cling to your morality or whatever nonsense you're working with but you can not never ever no how no way impose your moral presumption upon nature. 

This does not imply that human wisdom or discernment is irrelevant.  It simply means that 'it is what it is' and human convention regarding meaning and morality does not apply - anyone who can wrap their noodle around this fact will save themselves mucho trabajo.
 

 

[Joseph Maynor]

1 minute ago, Willy Phallicus said:

How much potential has been destroyed by conformity and morality as well as the dialectic opposites of perversion and addiction?

You live in nature.  Nature is a violent bloody war - total all encompassing all consuming war for survival, growth and evolution - no holds barred - no morality - no right - no wrong - just what is and what can be accomplished.  You can cling to your morality or whatever nonsense you're working with but you can not never ever no how no way impose your moral presumption upon nature. 

This does not imply that human wisdom or discernment is irrelevant.  It simply means that 'it is what it is' and human convention regarding meaning and morality does not apply - anyone who can wrap their noodle around this fact will save themselves mucho trabajo.
 

 

Actually for me nature has been pretty good.  I've had my issues of course.