Defining Intrinsic Goodness, Using Marriage As An Example

September 20, 2011 By 13 Comments

The other day, I wrote a post exploring a major reason that getting away without penalties would not be enough to make at least some kinds of wrongdoing in our best interests. I was taking one of a few possible tacks at answering Glaucon’s question in Plato’s Republic as to how being a just person might be [...]

Filed Under: Ethics, Ethics, Love, Love, Metaethics, Moral Psychology, Moral Psychology, Morality, Morality, My Theory of Morality's Rational Foundations and Nature, Philosophical Ethics, Philosophical Ethics, Sex, Teleology, Teleology, Virtues, Virtues 13 Comments

The Objective Value of Ordered Complexity

September 13, 2011 By 9 Comments

I argue that the word goodness should be interpreted to mean, in the most fundamental sense of the word, “effectiveness”. I also argue that since effectiveness is a factual issue, goodness is a factual issue. These controversial positions of mine raise a lot of thought provoking questions and challenges from readers. I am using this [...]

Filed Under: Contemporary Ethics, Contemporary Ethics, Ethics, Evolution, Evolution, Metaethics, Morality, Morality, My Theory of Morality's Rational Foundations and Nature, Philosophical Ethics, Philosophical Ethics, Philosophy, Teleology, Teleology, Virtues, Virtues Tagged With: 9 Comments

Can Good Teaching Be Measured?

September 8, 2011 By 7 Comments

In recent posts I have been arguing that if only we interpret the word “good” to mean “effective” we can ground our discussions of values (moral and otherwise) in facts about effectivness. I argue that in that context we can have greater and lesser degrees of goodness, measurable in terms of greater or lesser degrees [...]

Filed Under: Contemporary Ethics, Contemporary Ethics, Education, Epistemic Justification, Epistemic Justification, Epistemology, Epistemology, Ethics, Ethics, Evidence, Evidence, Intellectual Virtues, Intellectual Virtues, Metaethics, My Theory of Morality's Rational Foundations and Nature, Naturalistic Fallacy, Naturalistic Fallacy, Philosophical Ethics, Philosophical Ethics, Philosophy, Teleology, Teleology, Virtues, Virtues 7 Comments

The Contexts, Objective Hierarchies, and Spectra of Goods and Bads (Or "Why Murder Is Bad")

September 7, 2011 By 14 Comments

I wrote a post which laid out the cornerstone of my theory of objective value. In it I argued that “goodness equals effectiveness”. Wherever one uses the word “good”, one could substitute the word “effectiveness” and the sentence would mean the same thing. My view is that since effectiveness is clearly a measurable and factual matter [...]

Filed Under: Applied Ethics, Applied Ethics, Atheistic Ethics, Atheistic Ethics, Contemporary Ethics, Contemporary Ethics, Ethics, Ethics, Metaethics, Morality, Morality, My Theory of Morality's Rational Foundations and Nature, Philosophical Ethics, Philosophical Ethics, Philosophy, Teleology, Teleology Tagged With: , 14 Comments

Believing Too Little Is As Bad As Believing Too Much

September 6, 2011 By 5 Comments

When formulating principles and practices for forming good beliefs and avoiding bad beliefs, the first thing we must keep in mind is that consciously affirming a belief, consciously affirming a disbelief, deliberately avoiding believing or disbelieving are all actions. When we choose our standards for what propositions count as worthy of our belief, our disbelief, or [...]

Filed Under: Applied Ethics, Applied Ethics, Epistemic Justification, Epistemic Justification, Epistemology, Epistemology, Ethics, Ethics, Philosophy, Probability, Skepticism, Skepticism, Teleology, Teleology, Virtues, Virtues Tagged With: , , 5 Comments

Santorum's Hypocrisy and Backwardness on Questions of Epistemic Authority

September 1, 2011 By 5 Comments

My thoughts:

Filed Under: Applied Ethics, Applied Ethics, Christianity, Christianity, Civil Rights, Civil Rights, Contemporary Ethics, Contemporary Ethics, Cultural Secularism, Cultural Secularism, Ethics, Faith, Faith, Free Speech, Free Speech, Gay Marriage, Gay Marriage, Gay Rights, Gay Rights, Homophobia, Homophobia, Homosexuality, Homosexuality, Hypocrisy, Hypocrisy, Law, Law, LGBTQAA, Philosophy Of Religion, Political Secularism, Political Secularism, Politics, Politics, Psychology, Psychology, Religion, Religion, Religious Extremism, Religious Extremism, Religious Moderates, Religious Moderates, Religious Rights, Religious Rights, Right Wing Politics, Right Wing Politics, Roman Catholic Church, Roman Catholic Church, Same Sex Marriage, Same Sex Marriage, Secularism, Separation of Church and State, Separation of Church and State, Teleology, Teleology, Theocracy, Theocracy, Theocrats, Theocrats, Videos Tagged With: 5 Comments

TOP Q: “Do Children Have Higher Moral Status Than Adults?”

February 9, 2011 By 1 Comment

In his book Moral Status and Human Life: The Case for Children’s Superiority, law professor James Dwyer argues that children are not merely equal to adults in moral status but actually have a higher moral status than adults.  Below is a brief video in which he sketches out the broad contours of his thought on moral [...]

Filed Under: Abortion, Abortion, Applied Ethics, Applied Ethics, Autonomy, Autonomy, Bio-Medical Ethics, Bio-Medical Ethics, Civil Rights, Civil Rights, Contemporary Ethics, Contemporary Ethics, Duty, Duty, Ethics, Ethics, Featured, Law, Law, Metaethics, Moral Psychology, Moral Psychology, Morality, Morality, My Theory of Morality's Rational Foundations and Nature, Philosophical Ethics, Philosophical Ethics, Teleology, Teleology, Today's Open Philosophical Question (TOP Q) Tagged With: , 1 Comment

Moral vs. Non-Moral Values

January 28, 2011 By 2 Comments

In a recent post I distinguished numerous times between moral and non-moral values and between different sorts of intrinsic and instrumental goods.  James Gray asks for clarifications about how I use these terms: First, I don’t know that it matters to call something a “moral value.” Of course, there are instrumental values concerning morally neutral [...]

Filed Under: Ethical Pluralism, Ethical Pluralism, Ethics, Ethics, Featured, Metaethics, Moral Psychology, Moral Psychology, Morality, Morality, My Theory of Morality's Rational Foundations and Nature, Philosophical Ethics, Philosophical Ethics, Teleology, Teleology, Virtues, Virtues Tagged With: , , , 2 Comments

Pleasure And Pain As Intrinsic Instrumental Goods

January 27, 2011 By 2 Comments

In recent posts I have been arguing that there is one sense of the word “good” which can be analyzed in terms of facts and that this is the kind of “goodness” which we can consider a real part of the world.  This real, intrinsic, factual sense of goodness is its meaning as “effectiveness”. We [...]

Filed Under: Applied Ethics, Applied Ethics, Atheistic Ethics, Atheistic Ethics, Autonomy, Autonomy, Contemporary Ethics, Contemporary Ethics, Ethics, Ethics, Examining Conceptions of God's Attributes, Goodness, Knowability, and Existence, Featured, Historical Ethics, Historical Ethics, Metaethics, Moral Psychology, Moral Psychology, Morality, Morality, My Theory of Morality's Rational Foundations and Nature, Nietzsche, Nietzsche, Philosophical Ethics, Philosophical Ethics, Philosophy, Problem of Evil, Teleology, Teleology, Torture, Torture, Virtues, Virtues Tagged With: , , , , , 2 Comments

Non-Reductionistic Analysis Of Values Into Facts

January 27, 2011 By 1 Comment

I have recently been arguing that the term good: must be cashed out in fact terms lest it just be a projection of our preferences and nothing more.  [And] if it means anything objective, it means effectiveness. In reply, James Gray accuses me of reductionism: One, “good” does not have be defined in non-good terms. [...]

Filed Under: Atheistic Ethics, Atheistic Ethics, Contemporary Ethics, Contemporary Ethics, Ethical Pluralism, Ethical Pluralism, Ethics, Ethics, Featured, Metaethics, Metaphysics, Metaphysics, Moral Psychology, Moral Psychology, Morality, Morality, My Theory of Morality's Rational Foundations and Nature, Naturalistic Fallacy, Naturalistic Fallacy, Nietzsche, Nietzsche, Philosophical Ethics, Philosophical Ethics, Philosophy, Philosophy of Mind, Philosophy of Mind, Teleology, Teleology Tagged With: , , , , , , , , 1 Comment