“ Our moral values concern other people’s conduct (often everyone), while our taste preferences are typically limited in scope to our own conduct.
Our moral values matter a whole lot to us, while our taste preferences matter comparatively less.”
It might could be framed slightly differently though, where our moral values are in regard to what people ought or ought not do because it impacts our own goals and desires.
Coupling this with it being a goal or desire that supersedes the value we place on others autonomy and we get a preference that “feels” different from our other preferences.
"Preferences" is a gross oversimplification, or at least lacks clarity. I pretty much agree with your entire second paragraph. I think people are predisposed to pick up and respond to local and cultural norms, and that guilt, shame, and social reinforcement all serve to motivate people to comply with the status quo and not simply act exclusively on whatever idiosyncratic personal preferences they happen to have. We are cultural organisms and this is reflected in our psychology.
I don't typically get into much detail about this because the battles over the nature of morality in metaethics are typically so shallow on the psychological front that there's little opportunity to do so, but to assuage your concerns: No I don't have a naive and psychologically misguided view about moral psychology that ignores culture.
I also agree moral rules are (usually? almost always) not arbitrary, but I think they can be arbitrary and there wouldn't be any error if so. Also, "arbitrary" is one of these funky terms philosophers throw around, often as a sneer, without it being all that clear what they have in mind.
Combine these two-
“ Our moral values concern other people’s conduct (often everyone), while our taste preferences are typically limited in scope to our own conduct.
Our moral values matter a whole lot to us, while our taste preferences matter comparatively less.”
It might could be framed slightly differently though, where our moral values are in regard to what people ought or ought not do because it impacts our own goals and desires.
Coupling this with it being a goal or desire that supersedes the value we place on others autonomy and we get a preference that “feels” different from our other preferences.
What do you make of this argument? https://substack.com/@williamjoy/note/c-153935285?utm_source=notes-share-action&r=2b1728
Excellent, per usual. Thanks!
"Preferences" is a gross oversimplification, or at least lacks clarity. I pretty much agree with your entire second paragraph. I think people are predisposed to pick up and respond to local and cultural norms, and that guilt, shame, and social reinforcement all serve to motivate people to comply with the status quo and not simply act exclusively on whatever idiosyncratic personal preferences they happen to have. We are cultural organisms and this is reflected in our psychology.
I don't typically get into much detail about this because the battles over the nature of morality in metaethics are typically so shallow on the psychological front that there's little opportunity to do so, but to assuage your concerns: No I don't have a naive and psychologically misguided view about moral psychology that ignores culture.
I also agree moral rules are (usually? almost always) not arbitrary, but I think they can be arbitrary and there wouldn't be any error if so. Also, "arbitrary" is one of these funky terms philosophers throw around, often as a sneer, without it being all that clear what they have in mind.