This is one of many appeals to justification for moral realism, and it seems you have not yet been able to find one on the web. I will try to offer you my justification..
The place I start is epistemology.
We seem to have three methods of arriving at knowledge:
1) direct intuitive knowing
2) derivation thru reasoning
3) empirical investigation.
Note this was an intuition. I cannot derive this thru reasoning, and instead, if I try to reason it thru, I end up in the Munchausen Trilemma, where all three legs are fallacies. And empiricism famously cannot be derived -- this is Hume's and other radical skeptic's critique of empiricism. Empiricism itself, and its successes, provide an explicitly circular justification for empiricism.
Further, when one investigates 2) above, one discovers that reasoning itself is suspect. Godel's incompleteness theorem, and the Munchausen trilemma, provided strong hints of this -- and the discovery that math is infinitely pluralistic and Kant's belief that Euclidean geometry can be directly intuited to be true is itself empirically false in our universe -- should make one pretty suspicious of method 2. And the recent realization by logicians that logic as well is infinitely pluralistic has pretty much destroyed leg 2 as a valid knowledge route, at least for me.
Aside on logics. We are gifted by evolution with a logical sense. We can reason, even pre-linguistically. I have not explored the psychological literature on this, but offer up my intuition, based on self examination -- which I know you dislike intensely. I suspect that our logical sense has at least three elements. One which looks similar to First Order Logic, with its yes/no absolutes, but which is itself logically flawed, because evolution isn't a logician, an just needed to get us close enough. A second seems to be pseudo-Positivist empiricism, with three states (likely, unlikely, uncertain) and a desire to do hypothesis forming and verification. A third seems to be just open complex reasoning, which we use when critiquing the first two, and led to our improved logics and empirical understanding. All three seem to operate both consciously, and very importantly, unconsciously. The unconsciously driven sense of "just knowing truth" seems to actually mask some examples of our fallible unconscious logic mechanisms generating rationales under 2) and 3) for us.
Further aside on testing. Can one test this complex speculation of mine? Probably. Has it been rigorously tested? I strongly suspect not. It is very specific, and testing this hypothesis would involve massive back-contamination of the test subjects with presumptions about reasoning. Should I withdraw my presumption, and limit my thinking to only points supported with strong empirical evidence? Absolutely not! We humans would never be able to get out of bed in the morning if we limited ourselves to presumptions that are well supported with scientific evidence! To a large extent, we humans MUST rely upon intuitions and very partial justifications.
Back to my case for moral realism. Now, I will discuss in more depth method 3), empiricism. I have summarized reasons why both 1) and 2) should be somewhat suspect as knowledge sources. Method 3, despite its issues with the Trilemma and the difficulty of actually doing enough science, is the best way we have to check our knowledge claims off 1) and 2). However, method 3) appears to be intrinsically realist. The developers of our empirical method, Bacon, Locke, and Popper, were indirect realists. In Popperian terms, we infer reality in our world to the hypotheses that are well supported and useful. We non-scientific humans infer reality to our world, as demonstrated by the development of object permanence in babies, and almost every physical scientist I know is a realist. There are exceptions among theoretical physicists though, so I can't universalize this. And I don't know enough of the social/psych/anthropology etc side. But as a physical scientist, I am pretty confident that almost no physical scientists would have pursued their calling unless they considered what they are doing to be discovering reality.
Indirect realism is subject to all the radical skeptical critiques -- YES this inference cannot be proven (however, under logical pluralism this is an impossible standard) -- and YES we can construct all sorts of alternative logical possibilities. Quine, with his Quine-Duhem thesis, pointed out that even WITHIN empiricism, there are an infinity of possible hypotheses that can match all our relevant data. This is also true of ontological assumptions (which realism is). Nominalism of various forms has been advocated by anti-realists vs. science and the material world. And yes, one can construct complex ontologies that do not assume realism in our world, and are not refuted by our data, or the empirical/scientific method. This is where realists invoke pragmatism. Just as one cannot "prove" empiricism, one cannot "prove" realism. We can only justify it with empirical success -- and possibly appeals to our psychology.
Scientists and babies could operate on a nominalist framework, as per Quine-Duham. But realism is far more motivational, and works better as an IBE. Rationalist skeptics can protest that IBE is not itself justified all they want -- ultimately skeptical babies fail to thrive, and die young. This is G.E. Moore's "These are hands" case. Assuming realism is pragmatic.
For materialists, who may want to engage in a special pleading and deny that one can extend the inference of realism to anything other than matter, there are three replies: a) there is no presumption of matter in Popperian methodological naturalism. It is neutral as to what subject or inference one applies it to. It is on materialists to make a strong case for special pleading exemptions. and b) Psychology tried such an exemption with minds, and the bizarre behaviorism era of trying to do psychology as if we humans had no consciousness. The outcome of that sociological experiment in applying a philosophic dogma to a science field, was a decisive repudiation of the materialist presumption. Theory of Mind is a critical and immensely valuable developmental process for babies and children, and it was almost literally crazy to deny minds while studying them! c) Quine put the burden of defending a special pleading exception directly on Carnap with reference to mathematics, in Two Dogmas of Empiricism. Math is immensely useful, as are all sorts of other abstractions. Inference to indirect realism for abstractions should therefore be the default, and it is on abstraction deniers to bear the burden of justification.
This sets the stage, the last step in moral realism is to go through normativity. We have a science, sociology, that has discovered the tremendously utility of the concept of norms in understanding how societies operate. In your recent debate with David Enoch, he went through norms to infer moral realism. As he is a non-naturalist, my very naturalist argument is not what he was arguing, but his path is appropriate. Inferential indirect realism applies to norms as well. And there is a massive science database on the fruitfulness of norm theory.
I am not myself well read on the psychological literature on moral realism, but I am at least familiar with Kohlberg's stages of moral development, which couple psychological development and how moral thinking manifests in societies. As with all science fields, there are rivals and critics to Kohlberg, but his world is pretty widely accepted. A human moral impulse that generally follows Kohlberg's stages is a reasonable realist inference.
What inferences about moral realism can one draw from Kohlberg?
i) We have a moral intuition. We can sense morality. This is an essential part of our psychology. This is further reinforced by studies of psychopathology -- that there are anomalous humans who do not have a moral sense.
ii) This sense basically assumes moral realism. Every stage of Kohlberg's development assumes there is a compulsion from our moral sense, and the two highest stages presume that realism is objective, rather than sociologically subjective.
iii) Evolution often adapts features present in organisms to other purposes as well, often leading to pluralism of use for a feature in an organism. Kohlberg's stages strongly suggest this is true of the human moral sense as well. The first two stages show adaptation of this moral sense to maintain obedience in children, while they are young and unaware of the risks of the world. The second two appear to be adaptations to maintain our Eusociality -- the tribe/community is RIGHT -- therefore one should submit one's selfish focus to the tribal norms. Eusociality normalizes us/them hatreds, to maintain an "us" focus with a moral compulsion.
iv) All six stages are nominally "open" slots. Kohlberg did not have a specific moral theory, and all sorts of different ones can get plugged into those slots.
v) Among higher level theories, to sort between them to determine if there is a particular moral reality, one must normalize for the lower level biases/adaptations that the moral sense is also used for. Cross-cultural studies on shared norms, the recognition of saintly behavior traits cross-culturally, and the appeal cross-culturally of several specific higher order theories (Rights ethic, Higher Virtues ethic of Love/Truth/Beauty, Utilitarianism, and Gaia Theory all have cross-cultural appeal, and can be seen as "better" working models of moral reality.
This Popperian methodologically naturalist approach get me to moral realism, with flexible content, and pluralist complexity that allows an answer to most of the counterarguments against moral realism.
"Do people discover or create their food preferences? I don’t know about you, but when I try food for the first time, I don’t “create” whether I like it or not."
This is true for individuals. But it is not necessarily true for forms of life. Individuals are born into particular forms of life, hence their tastes and preferences are shaped by such. This may not seem true for people, but I suspect it is because our western forms of life are much more global and hence exposed to many different types of food derived from many different forms of life across the globe.
I am reminded of the story of the Tasmanian Aboriginals who were cut off from the mainland for thousands of years and consequently lost the cultural know how to fish. This despite the fact that Tasmania has an absolute abundance of easily gotten fish. When Captain Cook discovered Tasmania he offered the locals fish as a goodwill gift - they were repulsed.
J.P. Andrew claims:
"Moral Realism: there exist stance-independent moral truths — truths about what one morally ought and ought not to do that obtain independently of anyone’s beliefs, preferences, desires, emotions, or attitudes."
I think there is a fair amount of truth in this, but not in the way that entails moral realism: at least not in the way I understand it (mind you, I find it all quite confusing as to exactly what they mean). To clarify, I am inclined to realism in spirit, but not in any objective sense that seems to imply moral realism.
As individual I am born into a form of life in which I am socially and encultured into a moral sensibility that I did not create or choose, and which I am soon made aware is indifferent to my beliefs, preferences, desires, emotions, or attitudes. That is because I am bequeath from my parents and the wider culture - beliefs, practices, skills, language, and moral values - that are essential to survive and prosper in the form of life that I am born into. Hence different forms of life bequeath different beliefs, practices, morals values etc.
These beliefs, practices etc, are independent of individuals in the same way as the rules of grammar are independent of the individuals preferences, desires etc. They are not however independent of the demands in which our unique forms of life place on us. When JPA claims: "morality presents itself as something to which we are answerable", there is again a sense in which I understand. Life demands certain responses from us in order for us to survive - another way of saying this (perhaps less precisely) is that we are answerable to life for our survival. What complicates this picture, is that different forms of life place different demands upon us.
Anyway, I could go on indefinitely, but hopefully some of this has made sense.
Forgive me, a couple more things. You say: "Morality does not appear to me to possess authority." It does to me. Though I am not sure what you mean by 'appear'. But it does compel certain attitudes. But I do not hold that morality possesses objective, universal authority.
"it seems that the only possible way to adequately critique realism by accounting for realist “seemings” is to engage in empirical psychology."
This is pretty much Nietzsche's view, which I am partial to insofar as a critique of objective, universal moral values.
I'm not sure what's meant by "appear" myself. This isn't an issue for me though. It's just another problem for JPA and others. Compelling attitudes isn't authority. I'm compelled to use the bathroom. I wouldn't consider that authority.
Your comments here, that you feel no moral compulsions, appears to place you among a small anomalous exception to the vast number of the rest of us humans. This subgroup has been studied extensively, and there is a lot of psychology literature about it.
I didn't say that I feel no moral compulsions. This is a false and rather nasty misrepresentation of what I've said, and you've made it worse by implying I'm a psychopath.
You can apologize and retract the false accusation. Otherwise you will be blocked. I have no patience for bullshit like this.
"Psychopathy is characterized by a pronounced lack of empathic concern for the welfare of others, lack of empathy or remorse, poor impulse control, antisocial behavior, and a propensity for uninhibited and selfish behavior. It is also frequently associated with reduced emotional expression and reduced stress and fear response.
In addition, it is typically linked to impulsive action, risk taking, exploiting others, cold and emotionless behavior, callousness, manipulative behavior, and appearing charming at least in one’s initial interactions with others.
I do not recall making any statements about my psychology remotely related to any of this. So I don’t know what people would even want me to distinguish my views from this. I’ve denied that philosophical intuitions are a legitimate psychological phenomenon. I’ve stated that I don’t have realist intuitions. Neither of these claims has anything to do with psychopathy.
Psychopathy is a hypothesized mental illness associated with a certain pattern of behavior. It has nothing to do with people’s philosophical views. People accusing me of psychopathy are either ignorant, malicious, or both."
Accusing someone of psychopathy is very serious. It immediately suggests I am some kind of evil lunatic, and associates me with serial killers and genocidal maniacs.
I have no idea how you could have formed that impression from anything that I said.
Lance, and your followers here,
This is one of many appeals to justification for moral realism, and it seems you have not yet been able to find one on the web. I will try to offer you my justification..
The place I start is epistemology.
We seem to have three methods of arriving at knowledge:
1) direct intuitive knowing
2) derivation thru reasoning
3) empirical investigation.
Note this was an intuition. I cannot derive this thru reasoning, and instead, if I try to reason it thru, I end up in the Munchausen Trilemma, where all three legs are fallacies. And empiricism famously cannot be derived -- this is Hume's and other radical skeptic's critique of empiricism. Empiricism itself, and its successes, provide an explicitly circular justification for empiricism.
Further, when one investigates 2) above, one discovers that reasoning itself is suspect. Godel's incompleteness theorem, and the Munchausen trilemma, provided strong hints of this -- and the discovery that math is infinitely pluralistic and Kant's belief that Euclidean geometry can be directly intuited to be true is itself empirically false in our universe -- should make one pretty suspicious of method 2. And the recent realization by logicians that logic as well is infinitely pluralistic has pretty much destroyed leg 2 as a valid knowledge route, at least for me.
Aside on logics. We are gifted by evolution with a logical sense. We can reason, even pre-linguistically. I have not explored the psychological literature on this, but offer up my intuition, based on self examination -- which I know you dislike intensely. I suspect that our logical sense has at least three elements. One which looks similar to First Order Logic, with its yes/no absolutes, but which is itself logically flawed, because evolution isn't a logician, an just needed to get us close enough. A second seems to be pseudo-Positivist empiricism, with three states (likely, unlikely, uncertain) and a desire to do hypothesis forming and verification. A third seems to be just open complex reasoning, which we use when critiquing the first two, and led to our improved logics and empirical understanding. All three seem to operate both consciously, and very importantly, unconsciously. The unconsciously driven sense of "just knowing truth" seems to actually mask some examples of our fallible unconscious logic mechanisms generating rationales under 2) and 3) for us.
Further aside on testing. Can one test this complex speculation of mine? Probably. Has it been rigorously tested? I strongly suspect not. It is very specific, and testing this hypothesis would involve massive back-contamination of the test subjects with presumptions about reasoning. Should I withdraw my presumption, and limit my thinking to only points supported with strong empirical evidence? Absolutely not! We humans would never be able to get out of bed in the morning if we limited ourselves to presumptions that are well supported with scientific evidence! To a large extent, we humans MUST rely upon intuitions and very partial justifications.
Back to my case for moral realism. Now, I will discuss in more depth method 3), empiricism. I have summarized reasons why both 1) and 2) should be somewhat suspect as knowledge sources. Method 3, despite its issues with the Trilemma and the difficulty of actually doing enough science, is the best way we have to check our knowledge claims off 1) and 2). However, method 3) appears to be intrinsically realist. The developers of our empirical method, Bacon, Locke, and Popper, were indirect realists. In Popperian terms, we infer reality in our world to the hypotheses that are well supported and useful. We non-scientific humans infer reality to our world, as demonstrated by the development of object permanence in babies, and almost every physical scientist I know is a realist. There are exceptions among theoretical physicists though, so I can't universalize this. And I don't know enough of the social/psych/anthropology etc side. But as a physical scientist, I am pretty confident that almost no physical scientists would have pursued their calling unless they considered what they are doing to be discovering reality.
Indirect realism is subject to all the radical skeptical critiques -- YES this inference cannot be proven (however, under logical pluralism this is an impossible standard) -- and YES we can construct all sorts of alternative logical possibilities. Quine, with his Quine-Duhem thesis, pointed out that even WITHIN empiricism, there are an infinity of possible hypotheses that can match all our relevant data. This is also true of ontological assumptions (which realism is). Nominalism of various forms has been advocated by anti-realists vs. science and the material world. And yes, one can construct complex ontologies that do not assume realism in our world, and are not refuted by our data, or the empirical/scientific method. This is where realists invoke pragmatism. Just as one cannot "prove" empiricism, one cannot "prove" realism. We can only justify it with empirical success -- and possibly appeals to our psychology.
Scientists and babies could operate on a nominalist framework, as per Quine-Duham. But realism is far more motivational, and works better as an IBE. Rationalist skeptics can protest that IBE is not itself justified all they want -- ultimately skeptical babies fail to thrive, and die young. This is G.E. Moore's "These are hands" case. Assuming realism is pragmatic.
For materialists, who may want to engage in a special pleading and deny that one can extend the inference of realism to anything other than matter, there are three replies: a) there is no presumption of matter in Popperian methodological naturalism. It is neutral as to what subject or inference one applies it to. It is on materialists to make a strong case for special pleading exemptions. and b) Psychology tried such an exemption with minds, and the bizarre behaviorism era of trying to do psychology as if we humans had no consciousness. The outcome of that sociological experiment in applying a philosophic dogma to a science field, was a decisive repudiation of the materialist presumption. Theory of Mind is a critical and immensely valuable developmental process for babies and children, and it was almost literally crazy to deny minds while studying them! c) Quine put the burden of defending a special pleading exception directly on Carnap with reference to mathematics, in Two Dogmas of Empiricism. Math is immensely useful, as are all sorts of other abstractions. Inference to indirect realism for abstractions should therefore be the default, and it is on abstraction deniers to bear the burden of justification.
This sets the stage, the last step in moral realism is to go through normativity. We have a science, sociology, that has discovered the tremendously utility of the concept of norms in understanding how societies operate. In your recent debate with David Enoch, he went through norms to infer moral realism. As he is a non-naturalist, my very naturalist argument is not what he was arguing, but his path is appropriate. Inferential indirect realism applies to norms as well. And there is a massive science database on the fruitfulness of norm theory.
I am not myself well read on the psychological literature on moral realism, but I am at least familiar with Kohlberg's stages of moral development, which couple psychological development and how moral thinking manifests in societies. As with all science fields, there are rivals and critics to Kohlberg, but his world is pretty widely accepted. A human moral impulse that generally follows Kohlberg's stages is a reasonable realist inference.
What inferences about moral realism can one draw from Kohlberg?
i) We have a moral intuition. We can sense morality. This is an essential part of our psychology. This is further reinforced by studies of psychopathology -- that there are anomalous humans who do not have a moral sense.
ii) This sense basically assumes moral realism. Every stage of Kohlberg's development assumes there is a compulsion from our moral sense, and the two highest stages presume that realism is objective, rather than sociologically subjective.
iii) Evolution often adapts features present in organisms to other purposes as well, often leading to pluralism of use for a feature in an organism. Kohlberg's stages strongly suggest this is true of the human moral sense as well. The first two stages show adaptation of this moral sense to maintain obedience in children, while they are young and unaware of the risks of the world. The second two appear to be adaptations to maintain our Eusociality -- the tribe/community is RIGHT -- therefore one should submit one's selfish focus to the tribal norms. Eusociality normalizes us/them hatreds, to maintain an "us" focus with a moral compulsion.
iv) All six stages are nominally "open" slots. Kohlberg did not have a specific moral theory, and all sorts of different ones can get plugged into those slots.
v) Among higher level theories, to sort between them to determine if there is a particular moral reality, one must normalize for the lower level biases/adaptations that the moral sense is also used for. Cross-cultural studies on shared norms, the recognition of saintly behavior traits cross-culturally, and the appeal cross-culturally of several specific higher order theories (Rights ethic, Higher Virtues ethic of Love/Truth/Beauty, Utilitarianism, and Gaia Theory all have cross-cultural appeal, and can be seen as "better" working models of moral reality.
This Popperian methodologically naturalist approach get me to moral realism, with flexible content, and pluralist complexity that allows an answer to most of the counterarguments against moral realism.
"Do people discover or create their food preferences? I don’t know about you, but when I try food for the first time, I don’t “create” whether I like it or not."
This is true for individuals. But it is not necessarily true for forms of life. Individuals are born into particular forms of life, hence their tastes and preferences are shaped by such. This may not seem true for people, but I suspect it is because our western forms of life are much more global and hence exposed to many different types of food derived from many different forms of life across the globe.
I am reminded of the story of the Tasmanian Aboriginals who were cut off from the mainland for thousands of years and consequently lost the cultural know how to fish. This despite the fact that Tasmania has an absolute abundance of easily gotten fish. When Captain Cook discovered Tasmania he offered the locals fish as a goodwill gift - they were repulsed.
J.P. Andrew claims:
"Moral Realism: there exist stance-independent moral truths — truths about what one morally ought and ought not to do that obtain independently of anyone’s beliefs, preferences, desires, emotions, or attitudes."
I think there is a fair amount of truth in this, but not in the way that entails moral realism: at least not in the way I understand it (mind you, I find it all quite confusing as to exactly what they mean). To clarify, I am inclined to realism in spirit, but not in any objective sense that seems to imply moral realism.
As individual I am born into a form of life in which I am socially and encultured into a moral sensibility that I did not create or choose, and which I am soon made aware is indifferent to my beliefs, preferences, desires, emotions, or attitudes. That is because I am bequeath from my parents and the wider culture - beliefs, practices, skills, language, and moral values - that are essential to survive and prosper in the form of life that I am born into. Hence different forms of life bequeath different beliefs, practices, morals values etc.
These beliefs, practices etc, are independent of individuals in the same way as the rules of grammar are independent of the individuals preferences, desires etc. They are not however independent of the demands in which our unique forms of life place on us. When JPA claims: "morality presents itself as something to which we are answerable", there is again a sense in which I understand. Life demands certain responses from us in order for us to survive - another way of saying this (perhaps less precisely) is that we are answerable to life for our survival. What complicates this picture, is that different forms of life place different demands upon us.
Anyway, I could go on indefinitely, but hopefully some of this has made sense.
Forgive me, a couple more things. You say: "Morality does not appear to me to possess authority." It does to me. Though I am not sure what you mean by 'appear'. But it does compel certain attitudes. But I do not hold that morality possesses objective, universal authority.
"it seems that the only possible way to adequately critique realism by accounting for realist “seemings” is to engage in empirical psychology."
This is pretty much Nietzsche's view, which I am partial to insofar as a critique of objective, universal moral values.
I'm not sure what's meant by "appear" myself. This isn't an issue for me though. It's just another problem for JPA and others. Compelling attitudes isn't authority. I'm compelled to use the bathroom. I wouldn't consider that authority.
Your comments here, that you feel no moral compulsions, appears to place you among a small anomalous exception to the vast number of the rest of us humans. This subgroup has been studied extensively, and there is a lot of psychology literature about it.
I didn't say that I feel no moral compulsions. This is a false and rather nasty misrepresentation of what I've said, and you've made it worse by implying I'm a psychopath.
You can apologize and retract the false accusation. Otherwise you will be blocked. I have no patience for bullshit like this.
I apologize if I have misunderstood you. I was shocked by the prior post, and did not see another way to interpret it.
As I said to someone else:
"Psychopathy is characterized by a pronounced lack of empathic concern for the welfare of others, lack of empathy or remorse, poor impulse control, antisocial behavior, and a propensity for uninhibited and selfish behavior. It is also frequently associated with reduced emotional expression and reduced stress and fear response.
In addition, it is typically linked to impulsive action, risk taking, exploiting others, cold and emotionless behavior, callousness, manipulative behavior, and appearing charming at least in one’s initial interactions with others.
I do not recall making any statements about my psychology remotely related to any of this. So I don’t know what people would even want me to distinguish my views from this. I’ve denied that philosophical intuitions are a legitimate psychological phenomenon. I’ve stated that I don’t have realist intuitions. Neither of these claims has anything to do with psychopathy.
Psychopathy is a hypothesized mental illness associated with a certain pattern of behavior. It has nothing to do with people’s philosophical views. People accusing me of psychopathy are either ignorant, malicious, or both."
Accusing someone of psychopathy is very serious. It immediately suggests I am some kind of evil lunatic, and associates me with serial killers and genocidal maniacs.
I have no idea how you could have formed that impression from anything that I said.