When I went to visit my son’s second grade open house, I found a troubling pair of signs hanging over the bulletin board. They read:Fact: Something that is true about a subject and can be tested or proven.Opinion: What someone thinks, feels, or believes.
Hoping that this set of definitions was a one-off mistake, I went home and Googled “fact vs. opinion.”
I agree with McBrayer that a lot of young people today end up with a serious case of doublethink. On the one hand, they insist that things like sexual morals are merely personal opinions. On the other, they are great devotees of social justice, which is nothing but a system of morality. It's very strange. His partial explanation for why that is sounds true to me.
I like the slightly different set of definitions I was taught:
ReplyDeleteFact: A statement that can be proven true or false.
Opinion: Any other statement.
Clever wordsmiths can construct some problematic examples. "It is my opinion that this statement is a fact" proves to be a fact, and therefore not an opinion; but if it is not an opinion, the statement is false; yet if it can be proven false, it is a fact, and therefore the statement is true. Hm, that's a logical contradiction. So maybe it is an opinion, in which case it's true that it's an opinion.... but if we've proven it true, then it's a fact, which means...
Such pleasant games aside, it's really helpful in moral philosophy to have a distinction between facts and opinion. To declare something a "moral fact" means that you need to be able to prove that it's the case (or is not the case). Otherwise, you'd better give me a good set of reasons for feeling as you do about it!
Both things are possible to do. I can prove that courage is a virtue, from the definition of virtue ("A quality that creates an excellence of human capacity") and some facts about courage (whatever your goals are, you'll accomplish more of them more completely if you are courageous in pursuing them).
I can also probably provide you sufficient reason to accept that it would be better if people didn't cheat on tests. That may not be a 'moral fact,' but it's not too hard to make it a commonplace opinion.
Justice Kennedy Anthony Kennedy had a thought on moral equivalence, a related area of confusion in our schools, from a question and answer session after a talk at Chautauqua a while ago [emphasis added]:
ReplyDeleteJustice Kennedy made a point similar to this section's opening quote in a July 2013 speech and question-and-answer at Chautauqua Institution, as described by Andrew Cohen [emphasis mine]:
"A nation that's in the grips of moral relativism, as a private philosophic matter, cannot protect basic values," [Justice Kennedy] said, before offering an example about a group of students he met last summer who later went to Europe and then returned to "give little reports on what they had done." As the justice recounted, a young woman said to him: "'And I elected to go to Auschwitz and it was very important.'
"'Why was it important?' Justice Kennedy said he asked the student. And she said: "That's where Schindler's List was filmed.' Justice Kennedy then said:
"'Well, I had this sinking feeling that even with the crime of the enormity of the Holocaust, or of the Stalin massacres, that we are reluctant to condemn.... A strong society, a happy society, a society with a civic consensus, must make judgments on what's good, bad, beautiful, ugly, right, wrong. That's not just your right as a citizen. In my submission it's your responsibility.'"
Eric Hines
I like your definitions better.
ReplyDeleteAnd she said: "That's where Schindler's List was filmed.'
ReplyDeleteWow.
Hines, that's a powerful story.
ReplyDeleteGrim, I think it's essential to be able to separate fact from opinion, but there are problems if that's all we do. I think I would simplify your definitions like this:
Facts are only statements that can be proven true or false.
I wouldn't worry about labeling everything else if I'm only interested in finding the facts.
When we do identify a statement as opinion in a teaching situation, however, I think the definition should go something like this:
Opinions are statements that may be true or false, and for which there might or might not be good evidence, but which we can't prove one way or the other.
For a practicing philosopher, I think your definitions are very useful, but not so much for elementary school students who are just learning how to think. For them, the "fact vs. opinion" sorting exercise makes all opinions equal, but that's not true. A three-year-old child may have an opinion about why he's sick, but a pediatrician's opinion about the matter is a lot better.
PS By 'teaching situation' I was thinking K-12. Apologies for the imprecision.
ReplyDelete"It is my opinion that this statement is a fact"
ReplyDeleteThis is only a problem if you proceed from the premise that the language is a logical one. An illogical statement can be made without invalidating logic. It simply means the language is not being logical.
The idea that we must be hidebound to the definition of English words as if the definition itself was an immutable and universal truth is silly. In programming, an illogical statement does not invalidate the programming language, it is merely discarded as a syntax error. Which is precisely what "It is my opinion that this statement is a fact" is. Syntactically (if English was a language based on logic and not just a mishmash of Germanic and Latin roots with some foreign cognates thrown in) the statement is nonsensical. It's the logical equivalent of "true=false". You can make these statements in a logical language (as every programming language I know is) but they'll be rejected as erroneous statements.
"The next sentence I speak will be the truth. I am now lying." is not a "paradox" that would force a computer to explode (as seen in Star Trek). It's simply nonsense and any computer would simply reject it as such. Why this solution seems difficult to accept in philosophy while a computer can solve the dilemma immediately is beyond me.
Well, bear in mind I only brought it up to wave it away as an objection. :)
ReplyDeleteNatural language can equivocate on senses of the meanings of words. Frege understood that. Truth, as a natural language concept, can also have senses: you can mean that it's true in the sense that it corresponds to something about the world, or you can mean that it's true in the sense that it follows from other things you believe.
A lot of 'true opinions' in the way you two are speaking are really correspondence truths: "It is true that the proposal for reducing regulation on business will improve economic growth" isn't true in the sense of corresponding to a fact in the world (the proposal hasn't passed yet) but it is true that you believe similar proposals have produced economic growth in the past, and that your economic theory predicts it, and that industry experts you respect agree that it will, etc.
For a logical language, it doesn't really matter which theory you use, but you can't equivocate on it. If I tell you that "Gamma entails P" then whatever would make Gamma true has to be the same sense of truthmaking in which P is going to be true.
Well, Grim, that's not what I mean when I talk about "true opinions." To take an example from the article, there may or may not be life on another planet. I can't prove it either way, but I can have an opinion about it, and my opinion might be true, or it might not.
ReplyDeleteAll facts are true, but not all true things are facts, because factualness depends on our ability to prove it, but truth does not.
That said, as McBrayer points out, facts sometimes change. At one point it was a fact that the universe turned around the earth. Today, it isn't. Facts are more slippery than many people like to think.
I don't quite understand why anyone thinks it's important to use the word "fact" to describe moral laws or judgments.
ReplyDeleteThe word "fact" doesn't really seem to apply - seems like a veiled appeal to authority ("X is indisputable b/c it's a fact"). But most moral laws *are* disputable, though there are cases where the only arguments for one side are extremely weak.
Morality involves judgment calls. Facts aren't really subject to judgment calls. We can demonstrate that killing people for fun is harmful, but I don't really think we can "prove" it is wrong the same way we can prove this statement is incorrect:
"On planet earth, the force of gravity causes an object dropped from a height to fall to the ground."
Factually wrong and morally wrong are two completely different things.
I think in the two cases you mention, what is really going on is that a statement is shifting between fact and opinion as capacities to prove it shift. I have an opinion on alien life because we don't have a capacity to prove or disprove it. If we obtain the capacity, I will have a factual belief about it.
ReplyDeleteNote also that the definitions I use mean that facts can be statements which can be proven false, so that the statement "the universe turns in concentric spheres around the Earth" is still a fact. It's a fact because we can show that it is not true.
Now, I don't really care if you want to say that my belief about alien life (which, by the way, is that it is probably extremely common) is an opinion that becomes a fact, or that it's already a fact because it's the kind of thing that we could prove. It's different from my belief that prostitution is immoral, which I can argue convincingly, but which I can't prove if you don't accept the premises on which the argument is based.
OK, Grim, now I don't like your definitions! :-)
ReplyDeleteI think the issue is that I find it essential to distinguish between the truth and what we can prove. Just because I can't prove something doesn't mean it isn't true, but it does mean it isn't a fact. The line between fact and opinion can shift as human knowledge and capabilities change, but the line between what is true and what is false does not.
Also, I don't find it useful to say a fact remains a fact when reversed. If I claim that the universe is geocentric, when it turns out that it isn't, I'm just wrong. I took the "be proven true or false" to mean one or the other, not both (dang the inclusive or!).
Also, while I'm picking nits, I would argue that "can" is the wrong word. To me, a fact is a statement that has been proven either true or false.
BTW, did you mean "coherence" above when you said "the way you two are speaking are really correspondence truths"? Or am I confused?
Kate has touched upon something pretty profound. Why IS there such an interest in labeling "moral truths" as "fact", if not for the purpose of making it inarguable? It IS an appeal to authority. "You cannot question if it is wrong to profit off of the poor, because it is a moral fact that it is wrong to do so!" My belief that it is wrong to harm another person for nothing more than one's own personal pleasure is not diminished by the assertion it's not a "fact", nor does calling it a "moral truth" or "fact" make it more correct. But then again, I don't believe that my morality needs outside validation, nor do I demand that anyone else conform to it. If society did not conform to that particular opinion, then I'd feel compelled to move somewhere that did hold that same belief.
ReplyDeleteAnd that is something I find troublesome about the overreach of the Federal government. By ruling that Federal preferences trump State interests, it says that every community in the nation must live by the same standards. And that chokes out the ability to decide to move somewhere more in line with your own moral system. And this works both ways. Chicago would like nothing more than to ban its citizens from legally owning firearms. Sure, individual citizens would rather be allowed to, but the vast majority of the popularly elected government feels otherwise. In a true Federal system, people who felt this was wrong would be able to move somewhere more in line with their beliefs (say... Texas). And conversely, a gay couple who lived in a small town in Mississippi would be able to get married if they moved somewhere like Boston, or San Francisco. But that's no longer an option. It has been decided that everyone must live under the same set of rules (though gun rights apparently aren't held to the same level of scrutiny as other "rights" have been). We no longer have a Federal form of government. We are now a single nation-state with no meaningful internal political boundaries. And what little boundaries are left are slowly disappearing.
Kate/Mike,
ReplyDeleteI think the argument I gave in my first comment shows that there are some things we can talk about in morality objectively enough that we should call them facts. That courage is a virtue is my paradigm case, and I think virtues are the main cases where you will encounter 'moral facts.' "Self-discipline is a virtue" is very difficult to contest, because our nature is such that someone who really lacks self-discipline will probably succeed at very little and self-destruct in any case. There is thus something about the world that makes it true.
Tom,
I think the issue is that I find it essential to distinguish between the truth and what we can prove. Just because I can't prove something doesn't mean it isn't true, but it does mean it isn't a fact.
You can do that if you accept the proposal in the last comment to restrict the class of facts to 'the kind of thing we could prove,' rather than what can actually be proven. Then it would be enough to say that if it could in principle be proven true or false, it is a fact.
That means that 'the universe revolves around the earth' was always a fact, and still is: it doesn't change classes. It's just we thought we knew it to be true, and now we know it to be false. But it's the kind of statement that it should be possible to prove or disprove.
The argument about prostitution doesn't work that way at all. It depends on your acceptance of the assumptions that serve as principles: "Our laws should protect a basic moral dignity of people," combined with "Prostitution is inevitably damaging to basic moral dignity." If you belonged to a culture that rejected one or both of these principles, you wouldn't find the argument convincing.
Kate, I think the interest in moral facts comes from considering how we should act and how society should be ordered. If we divide things only into facts and opinions, and all morals are opinions, then it's difficult to say how we should act or how society should be ordered. If we make any moral claim, "That's just your opinion" is a perfectly valid counter-argument.
ReplyDeleteAs McBrayer explains, this way of viewing morality means that morality no longer means anything. How can we punish students for cheating when the statement that cheating is wrong is just someone's opinion? Why isn't the students' opinion that cheating is a valid test-taking strategy just as good?
I'd also like to point out that there is a difference between demonstration (an object falls) and proof. Grim provides examples of moral proofs above, but let's stick with science. We cannot demonstrate that Darwin's theory of evolution is the reason we have so many species today, but we generally accept it as a fact.
On the question of an appeal to authority, sure, some people use it that way. But people use science that way as well. Should we abandon the idea of science because some people misuse it in their rhetoric?
ReplyDeleteAgain, a moral fact is something that can be proven. If I can genuinely prove it, then it's not an appeal to authority.
Grim, that doesn't seem to be a useful definition to me.
ReplyDeleteIf I say a fact is a statement that has been been proven true or false, then I can use facts as premises to make arguments. If I say that a fact is a statement that can be proven true or false, then it would seem to me that facts could guide research, but not much else.
How can we punish students for cheating when the statement that cheating is wrong is just someone's opinion? Why isn't the students' opinion that cheating is a valid test-taking strategy just as good?
ReplyDeleteBy not having our rules and laws only based upon facts. That it is morally wrong to cheat IS an opinion. But it's an opinion that is almost universally accepted in our society, so our society makes rules and laws based upon that opinion. And anyone who believes for a hot minute that all of our laws are based on "facts" or even "moral truths" is sadly mistaken. And speaking as one of the local wacko libertarians, I don't believe that it is wrong to base laws on things that are "merely" opinions held by the majority of society. The rightness or wrongless of a law is not tied to whether it is based upon fact or opinion. What I personally use to judge the rightness or wrongness of a law is "does this serve to protect the life, liberty, and/or property rights of the individual citizen". Shocker... I don't always get my way. But by the same token, it doesn't matter if I can prove that it's a "fact" that your property rights should be respected. I can't. That's an opinion.
And this is where it dovetails in with my other claim. There is no reason for me to convince you of the "factuality" of my opinions. Only the "rightness" of them. Because if I can convince you that my opinion is one you believe in, and we get the majority of society to hold those same beliefs, then we can get laws passed enforcing them. The desire to proclaim my beliefs as "moral truths" or "facts" is nothing more than a game to use the inherent bias of language to shut down debate as to the worthiness of my opinions. If it's a "fact" then you cannot argue against it. And that's intellectually dishonest.
I can use facts as premises to make arguments. If I say that a fact is a statement that can be proven true or false, then it would seem to me that facts could guide research, but not much else.
ReplyDeleteBearing in mind that 'proving false' is the ordinary standard in science, you are always dealing with hypotheticals when you talk about scientific facts as true. What we mean by 'true' in this sense is usually that it's the best standing theory. We think it might be true. It is in principle the kind of thing that ought to be provably false if it is false, and no one has yet figured out how to prove it false. So we accord it a status as if it were proven true, with the understanding that this could be lost later.
This means that you can use it as a premise in the way you want, with the understanding that all hypotheticals depend on the truth of their premises. If we later discover that Darwin's theory is wrong, hypotheticals that begin with its assumption will have to be re-examined.
By not having our rules and laws only based upon facts. That it is morally wrong to cheat IS an opinion. But it's an opinion that is almost universally accepted...
ReplyDeleteKant would say that the logic of the argument shows you what is true in this case. That's not empirical -- you don't have to test it and look for 'moral facts' to prove or disprove your hypothesis. The structure of the proposal itself shows the failure.
What is the purpose of cheating on the test? To do well, so you can advance in some way. What would happen if we accepted your argument that cheating was an acceptable strategy for test-taking? The tests would become useless as measures justifying advancement as everyone began to cheat. Thus, without regard to anything else, we can see that your proposal is illogical: if we accepted the proposal, you'd lose the very good you were aiming at (i.e., advancing by cheating on tests would become impossible as no one would then believe the results of the tests).
That may depend on Kant's opinion that morality is tightly connected to rationality. Then you might say that the fact that it is illogical doesn't make it immoral: a hedonist might be able to justify it even if the tests become useless, just because it is fun to cheat on tests.
But it's an opinion that is almost universally accepted in our society, so our society makes rules and laws based upon that opinion.
ReplyDeleteNow THAT is an appeal to authority. It's really bizarre that you think trying to establish moral facts is an attempt to appeal to authority when are otherwise happy to do so: We're more numerous, so we make the rules, and you will follow them, young man, or else.
That is nothing but an appeal to authority.
It happens, however, to be the way our society works. Attempts to find or establish moral facts might be an attempt to establish an authority to misuse, but they might also be an attempt to impose or enforce limits on the use of authority. If our society violates basic moral facts, then we can use those facts against the appeal to authority you use.
For example, if I could establish the right to speak freely as a moral fact, then I could use that against appeals to authority that wanted to silence certain opinions.
Moral facts could also help build your social consensus upon a more solid foundation. We might be able to say, cheating is wrong because of X, Y, and Z, where X + Y + Z proves it is wrong. I really don't see what the objection to this is.
A clarification is in order. As I sometimes do, I haven't said precisely what I meant to say.
ReplyDeleteI said that I think facts are statements that have been proven true or false, but that's not what I meant. I really meant, proven true, where "true" can be a negative.
For example, the following would be facts:
Beijing is the capital of the PRC.
Beijing is not the capital of France.
On the other hand, the following is not a fact for me:
Beijing is the capital of France.
My apologies for any confusion.
Sorry, "Kate" earlier was me (Cass). I guess there's no harm in revealing my super-secrit identity :)
ReplyDeleteOn the question of an appeal to authority, sure, some people use it that way. But people use science that way as well. Should we abandon the idea of science because some people misuse it in their rhetoric?
That's not what I was arguing at all, though.
What I was arguing is that science and morality aren't the same discipline. They don't have the same purpose, nor do they deal with the same phenomena. Consequently you can't treat them the same.
The word "true" is likewise problematic. I do believe in moral truths, but I don't believe we can "prove" them in the same way we can prove that gravity causes inanimate objects to fall to the ground when dropped. And even gravity doesn't apply everywhere (in space, for instance!).
Morality is (IMNSHO) at least *somewhat* relative. Yes, I believe that killing for fun is always wrong, but "wrong" is very much a judgment (wrong means it violates some moral law, whether it be a human law or God's law). There are tons of examples of general, widely held moral precepts that can be violated in certain circumstances without triggering moral condemnation.
We generally believe it's wrong to kill other humans, except in self defense. Some people believe it's wrong even then.
We generally believe in an exception for wartime (this is really sort of a "self defense" case combined with a "just war" case), but some people - and religions! - believe killing is always wrong, even in wartime.
All of this, even if we disagree with it, is "morality".
We generally believe it's wrong to torture puppies and kittens, yet puppies and kittens have been used for medical testing that involves significant pain. So these things are absolutes, right up until they're not for some reason.
By the way, great post and discussion.
ReplyDeleteBy the way, I'm open to the argument that there really are no moral facts, but the idea that looking for moral facts is in and of itself intellectually dishonest is complete BS.
ReplyDeleteI do see the dangers Mike and Kate are concerned about, and of course anything can be misused. I just don't think they're terribly relevant to what McBrayer is talking about.
What he is talking about is teaching kids to really think for themselves about what is moral and what isn't, and to avoid simplistic and misleading definitions and methods. I guess that constitutes a conspiracy to subvert Truth, Justice, and the American Way, now.
Beijing is the capital of France.
ReplyDeleteThat ought to be a fact, though, because negation is a logical operator. Its opposite is a fact:
"Beijing is not the capital of France."
So if we formalize the statement:
Bx: x is Beijing
Fx: x is the capital of France
Cx: x is the capital of China
We should be able to say:
A1. (∃x)Bx&Cx (assumption)
A2. (∃x)Fx (assumption)
A3. ~(∃x)Bx&Fx
--
4. Ba&Ca (from A1, existential elimination)
5. Ba (from 4, &-e)
6. Fa (from A2, existential elimination)
7. Ba&Fa (from 5, 6, & introduction)
8. (∃x)Bx&Fx (from 7, existential introduction)
9. ~(∃x)Bx&Fx (A3 reiteration)
∴
~(∃x)Fx&Cx
That proof works because we've proven that no random thing, "a," could be both an instance of F and and instance of B. Therefore, since we know that there is a thing that is both a B and a C, that same thing can't also be an F.
But the ability to do this sort of work means retaining all these statements as facts that have truth values (T, F) and not opinions that might be true 'in a way' or 'a little bit.' And that means the false statements have to be the same kind of statements as the true statements.
I don't believe we can "prove" them in the same way we can prove that gravity causes inanimate objects to fall to the ground when dropped. And even gravity doesn't apply everywhere (in space, for instance!).
ReplyDelete:)
Actually, we do think gravity applies in space -- that's what keeps the planets circling the sun, for example.
However, I'm not sure we have 'proven' that gravity does this in the sense of proving it true. We've proven that it happens, and named whatever-it-is that causes it to happen "gravity." We've observed that this whatever-it-is has effects that can usually be described according to the inverse square law, but exactly what it is that is going on is still a little bit mysterious.
Tom,
I'm open to the argument that there really are no moral facts, but [not] the idea that looking for moral facts is in and of itself intellectually dishonest...
I think it's honest, and that there are clear examples of them. But I like that we recognize that many moral views are opinions, and therefore need a more complete justification before we accept the dictates of whatever authority is proclaiming them.
Hi, Cass. Good to see you. You posted while I was composing, so I hadn't seen your replies.
ReplyDeleteI would answer that science is not the only way to establish facts, and neither McBrayer nor I suggested we use science to find moral facts.
For example, we're having this conversation over the internet. That's a fact, but it doesn't take science to tell us that. Fire burns, water wets, but I don't need to perform controlled experiments to know those things for facts.
Can some method be used to determine moral facts? I really don't know.
By the way, great post and discussion.
ReplyDeleteSocrates would be pleased. We began with a significant moral problem, began by asking "just what is a fact?" and are now invoking physics and metaphysics to try to help us understand the moral. It's very much in line with his project as Plato presents it to us. I think it's nice to be in such a long and noble tradition of human inquiry into things like right, the moral, and justice. :)
Can some method be used to determine moral facts? I really don't know.
ReplyDeleteDo you have an objection to the one I suggested? If moral facts are facts about chosen human behaviors, the one way to find true statements about chosen human behaviors is to look at the ones that are empirically successful all or most of the time, and whose absence is destructive to the person all or most of the time.
That seems like a fact, because it can be shown to be true or false, and it is clearly moral by definition.
Now THAT is an appeal to authority. It's really bizarre that you think trying to establish moral facts is an attempt to appeal to authority when are otherwise happy to do so: We're more numerous, so we make the rules, and you will follow them, young man, or else.
ReplyDeleteActually, that's exactly how societies work. Not just ours, but all (at least theoretically). A society is formed when a group of individuals decide to band together, and give up some measure of individual freedom in order to work together for a mutual benefit. Now, most of these freedoms we're surrendering are those which very few of us would really miss. Things like the freedom to kill everyone you meet. I certainly have no desire to do that, but in a true anarchy, that's exactly what everyone is allowed to do. There literally are no rules against it, because rules are an establishment of a society. I may have individual morals I live by, but without a society, nothing forces me to live by them except for my own conscience.
The majority of a society decides the rules either directly (as in a democracy), through representatives (as in a republic), or through an authority figure (or figures) that the majority is willing to allow to lead (be it a monarch, military dictator, communist politburo, or other absolute ruler). You can claim that the ones living under a dictatorship do not have any rights to help determine the rules, but I'd argue they do in that if a dictator so abused his people and ruled with no regard to his consent, they would depose him. History is full of examples. The most successful dictators are those who let the people think they're really in control (see Putin, Vladimir). But even those can wear out their welcome if they turn unpopular.
But basically, your statement that it is an appeal to authority is kind of strange. Not because it's untrue, but because you're saying that there's something odd about the fact that a rule is in place because that's what society has agreed upon. Again, I posit that it must be, because that's what a society is. When I say that trying to call a moral issue a "fact" is an attempt to stifle debate as "an appeal to authority", I'm saying that it's attempting to use language to claim a false authority that it does not deserve. By calling it a "fact", you're not actually changing the validity of the moral judgment, you're just trying to deny anyone the ability to argue against it by giving it authority it does not actually possess. Whereas a rule or law actually HAS that authority by virtue of being created by the society. That is what "authority" is. Now, you can certainly debate the rightness of a rule or law (Obamacare for example) but until society discards it, it IS the authority. It IS the law.
And Cass, I knew there was a reason I thought that "Kate" lady was pretty darn smart! ;)
You're giving Hobbes' argument there, Mike, but it's not the only one. Aristotle argues that it is groups of families that come together, not groups of individuals; no one comes to be or can sustain himself to adulthood as an individual.
ReplyDeleteNow families already have moral rules. So the appeal to 'the state of nature' as a kind of anarchy is wrong on its face.
That has important consequences, one of which is that it disables government's claim to be the source of morality. Hobbes follows that all the way in The Leviathan, stating that any sort of tyranny is preferable to return to an amoral anarchy. But if there are pre-political moral laws, then the government's righteous power is much less: it ought, itself, to be bound by the pre-political morality under which it was brought into being. It should be constrained as a creature of that pre-political morality, not free as the creator of moral laws to do what it wills.
Grim, you're right (or at least, having never studied formal logic, I assume you're right) as far as you go, but why should we call that kind of statement a 'fact'? After all, what we're arguing about is the definition of a term.
ReplyDeleteI see clear advantages to my definition of the word 'fact': it's close enough to common usage that it would be useful in public debate, it's easy to explain to my students, and it's simple enough that my students could easily use it in developing arguments for their essays.
Your definition is notably different from the common meaning, meaning it seems to require a lot more explanation and funny symbols before it can be used in public debate or my classroom, and it's more complicated for my students to use when they are writing argumentative essays.
That's what interests me here. I really, really wish I had taken a minor, or even majored, in philosophy, but I was stupid(er?) in my 20s and I don't have the time to seriously study it now, and without doing that, I have difficulty seeing how your definition is better.
What do you think? What definition should I teach my students, and why?
But I like that we recognize that many moral views are opinions, and therefore need a more complete justification before we accept the dictates of whatever authority is proclaiming them.
ReplyDeleteAbsolutely.
But basically, your statement that it is an appeal to authority is kind of strange. Not because it's untrue, but because you're saying that there's something odd about the fact that a rule is in place because that's what society has agreed upon.
No, I'm saying it's odd that you are fine with an argument from authority in one circumstance, but not another. That you don't see the contradiction is strange to me.
When I say that trying to call a moral issue a "fact" is an attempt to stifle debate as "an appeal to authority", I'm saying that it's attempting to use language to claim a false authority that it does not deserve. By calling it a "fact", you're not actually changing the validity of the moral judgment, you're just trying to deny anyone the ability to argue against it by giving it authority it does not actually possess.
And as I've repeatedly said, I'm not relying on moral judgments; facts must be proven, and if they are proven, then it does change them from mere judgments. I am NOT arguing that we simply change what we call them, and I never did. That would be ridiculous.
...but why should we call that kind of statement a 'fact'? After all, what we're arguing about is the definition of a term.
ReplyDeleteYou tell me you want facts to be about truth. Logical statements have truth values. The whole point of logic is to ensure that forms are used that preserve truth.
To say that the class of facts and the class of true logical statements are not the same means that you have to say that there is a difference between these two statements:
1) "Beijing is the capital of China."
2) "Beijing is the capital of China."
Statement (1) is a fact, but statement (2) is a true statement in logic. However, if we make this division, I can only apply logic to statements like (2). Thus, logic cannot be applied to facts.
Is that a happy conclusion? :)
No, I'm saying it's odd that you are fine with an argument from authority in one circumstance, but not another. That you don't see the contradiction is strange to me.
ReplyDeleteI see. The issue for me is that claiming that a moral judgement is "truth" or "fact" is assigning it a level of indisputability it does not actually possess. There is no universal "truth" to morals. Only ones that are generally accepted and those that are not. There is no logical proof that "it is better to be kind", or "you shouldn't hurt people for no reason". Those aren't statements that we can prove or disprove. But they are things that a society can be based upon. The lack of ability to prove or disprove it doesn't make it invalid for society to base rules upon it.
But to claim that "it's wrong to cheat" has been near universally accepted in the society in which we live, so we have made rules based upon that value judgement is a statement of fact, not an appeal to authority. Now if you made the argument that "we make rules against cheating because experts say we should" then you are making an appeal to authority. And if you say "it is a moral truth that cheating is wrong", that's trying to elevate the moral judgment of the rightness or wrongness of cheating to be an unassailable opinion, because you're arguing that it's universally true and to disagree with that premise is non-factual.
So at the root, I'm saying that the way society makes rules based upon moral choices we (for the most part) agree with is fine. But it is not fine to attempt to justify those choices as beyond question by trying to accord them the status of "fact".
I think this is an area where Grim and I often disagree. He has suggested in the past that moral questions can be established definitively, and I don't believe that at all.
ReplyDeleteWhat I believe is that sound moral arguments can be used to persuade a critical mass of people of their worth. They create consensus, which is valuable (it's how we make laws and arrive at societal rules for human interaction) but not sufficient to definitively settle moral questions for all time.
Now one could argue that science works similarly (sound evidence builds consensus, but consensus < > truth, as in "the world is flat"), but we've also seen this defeated by the human tendency to go with the herd, cherry pick evidence, be deceived by inaccurate feedback/evidence, etc. Global warming's a great example, or pretty much any pediatric "fact" (really, fad): whole milk will make your child fat, salt in moderation is still bad for you, the best way to lose weight is to eliminate fat from your diet, etc.
If you don't like today's scientific consensus, wait a few years - it'll change :p
I like Mike's framing - that's pretty much where I am.
ReplyDeleteThat moral precepts are generally accepted is one indication of possible truth (probably "necessary, but not sufficient"). Slavery was once generally accepted, so were anti-miscegenation laws. But I don't think slavery was ever morally right, so that can't be the sole test for either science and morality.
I believe the attempt to discern objective truth/reality is critically important - we need a balance to the natural filter through which we see reality (emotions, bias, experience, personality). But I'm uncomfortable with the notion that we can or should consider a lot of this stuff to be beyond dispute.
What's the term, Grim - epistemology? How do we know, what we know? When it comes to morality, I'm more comfortable with phrases like "justified belief" than "fact". What people of good faith believe is "justifiable", differs. For some, justified belief is grounded in the Bible, or Aristotle, education, or life experience, or some mix of the above.
That's been at the heart of some of our best discussions :)
There is no universal "truth" to morals.
ReplyDeleteI think this is an area where Grim and I often disagree. He has suggested in the past that moral questions can be established definitively, and I don't believe that at all.
I do think there are a few questions that can be established definitively -- I've given the example of virtues as objective and definitive moral facts.
Also, as Christians, we do believe that there is a universal moral truth. At least in theory, we expect our individual actions to be judged by the eternal moral law at some point.
I do think that there's an epistemelogical problem. Even where we think we've been given revelations from the divine, we have to interpret them. And, as you've heard me belabor many times in the past, I think political and ethical thinking is chiefly analogical, not logical. Thus, your reasoning is bedeviled by the fact that you aren't reasoning from cases that are exactly like the current case, but which are always different in some ways.
Coming to a hard moral rule that applies universally is thus not likely for most cases. (Here Kant and I disagree sharply!) We can say a few things with enough objective certainty that I think "fact" is the right way to speak about those few things. But there aren't a lot of these; most of the rest of the time, we are feeling our way along.
To say that the class of facts and the class of true logical statements are not the same ...
ReplyDeleteIs "China is the capital of France" a true logical statement?
The issue for me is that claiming that a moral judgement is "truth" or "fact" is assigning it a level of indisputability it does not actually possess.
ReplyDeleteBut I've been talking about proof. What if a moral judgment could be proven true? Then, it would be a fact. If you are going to deny my premise, then just say "That can't be proven." Then we could have a meaningful discussion about that. But repeatedly accusing me of saying something I've never said isn't helpful.
There is no universal "truth" to morals. Only ones that are generally accepted and those that are not.
If there are no universal moral truths, then the concept of morality is merely a deception; it is just one more way people in group A try to dominate and control people in group B. Nothing more, nothing less. What you accuse me of trying to achieve by 'moral facts,' you achieve bluntly, through force alone. If there are no moral truths, then society has no right to force anyone to act in any particular way. You worry about not being able to argue against a fact? Try arguing against the police officers who've come to arrest you.
Or, rather, if there are no moral truths, then nothing is right or wrong, so society can do what it likes, but I wish it would stop being so pretentious about it by going on and on about right, wrong, morals, ethics, etc. None of those things have any real meaning, so stop pretending they do.
Unless, of course, you can prove it.
Is "China is the capital of France" a true logical statement?
ReplyDeleteIt's a false logical statement, that is, a statement in a logical language with a truth value ("F").
If there are no universal moral truths, then the concept of morality is merely a deception; it is just one more way people in group A try to dominate and control people in group B.
ReplyDeleteI don't believe that's true.
Why wouldn't it be just as valid to say that definitively declaring that your moral judgment is universally true (even though a great many people don't agree) is an attempt by group A (those who believe) to dominate group B (those who don't)?
Why you seem to want is some authority to make a binding ruling. Given that there's no universal authority who would be considered universally legitimate, I don't see how anyone can simply declare a moral precept to be universally "true".
You can do that only by ignoring the beliefs of people who disagree, or by dismissing them, or by imposing your morals on them by force. Which is what law does, but I don't consider law to settle moral questions.
Cass: I believe the attempt to discern objective truth/reality is critically important - we need a balance to the natural filter through which we see reality (emotions, bias, experience, personality). But I'm uncomfortable with the notion that we can or should consider a lot of this stuff to be beyond dispute.
ReplyDeleteI'm not sure that's where the idea of moral facts leads us. First of all, we (or I at least) am talking about things we can establish as facts; that's probably not very many things at all. Second, if we can honestly establish them as facts, why not? What's the danger if someone actually does establish as indisputable fact that murder is immoral? Third, you can always dispute a fact; this is America. We do it all the time.
When it comes to morality, I'm more comfortable with phrases like "justified belief" than "fact". What people of good faith believe is "justifiable", differs. For some, justified belief is grounded in the Bible, or Aristotle, education, or life experience, or some mix of the above.
I think that's a good standard as well. Prove the things we can, work along toward justified belief in other things.
Why wouldn't it be just as valid to say that definitively declaring that your moral judgment is universally true (even though a great many people don't agree) is an attempt by group A (those who believe) to dominate group B (those who don't)?
ReplyDeleteSure, Cass, if there is no universal moral truth, ANY use of moral concepts to persuade is an illegitimate appeal to authority.
Why you seem to want is some authority to make a binding ruling.
Really? That puzzles me. What have I written that makes you think that?
I pretty much agree with Grim's comment at 7:05 yesterday, and I'd like to highlight this contrast:
ReplyDeleteI do think there are a few questions that can be established definitively -- I've given the example of virtues as objective and definitive moral facts.
I would be a bit more tentative and say "can probably be established," but, yes.
Coming to a hard moral rule that applies universally is thus not likely for most cases. (Here Kant and I disagree sharply!) We can say a few things with enough objective certainty that I think "fact" is the right way to speak about those few things. But there aren't a lot of these; most of the rest of the time, we are feeling our way along.
It's a false logical statement ...
ReplyDeleteI think I need to go back and re-read what you've written about this. I'll come back to it.
Just to clarify, when I say "truth," I'm talking about something being true. I'm not talking about being able to prove that it's true. When I say, "If there are no universal moral truths," I'm NOT saying, "If we can't prove universal moral truths ..."
ReplyDeleteFor example, it's either true or not that life exists on other planets, but I can't prove it either way. That's the sense of "If there are no universal moral truths ..."
So, it's a claim about the universe, not about what we can or can't prove.
I guess I simply don't understand your point then. "For example, it's either true or not that life exists on other planets, but I can't prove it either way." I get this, because it establishes that it is something that is a provable concept. We may not know the truth of it now, but it is either true or false. My belief based upon my knowledge and experience is that it is likely true (given the absolutely astronomical odds, no pun intended, against this one planet being the only one in the entire universe capable of sustaining life), but ultimately my belief is irrelevant to the actual truth of the matter.
ReplyDeleteBut then you lose me: "That's the sense of "If there are no universal moral truths ..."
So, it's a claim about the universe, not about what we can or can't prove."
But "this is morally right" is not something that can ever be proven true or false. It's a subjective value judgment. It is never going to be provable. So how can it be a "truth"?
The most obvious way (though not the only way) is if morality is divinely created. Then God knows whether it is right or wrong, even if you aren't sure (or even if you are sure, but are wrong).
ReplyDeleteThis is one of the oldest and most important debates in philosophy: Plato attributes the opposing position to Protagoras, who argues essentially as you are that there 'are only value judgments.' (His phrasing: "Man is the measure of all things.") The alternative is called "moral realism," and it usually requires a god to be the measure -- that's how Plato puts it. I think at least some times we can look at things about the world, but Enlightenment figures like Hume dispute that (on what strike me as poor grounds).
Mike, that's a good point.
ReplyDeleteTo me, what's provable and what's true are two different things. Instead of alien life, let's look at the past. Due to the historical curiosity and efforts of an aunt and a grandmother, I know a number of facts about my ancestors back to around 1500. However, beyond that is quite a mystery. Now, I firmly believe I had ancestors before that, but I will probably never be able to know their names or deeds; the records become too sparse. So, things really happened in the past that we can never know or prove, but they are true nonetheless.
Secondly, and I think this is where our discussion earlier went a bit awry, I come from a very religious background where the existence of moral truth was assumed. When you say, "But 'this is morally right' is not something that can ever be proven true or false. It's a subjective value judgment," you're asserting something I don't believe.
Now, you may well be absolutely right. But I would venture to say that most religious believers do actually believe in moral truths, even if they can't prove them to you in a way you would accept, and they would deny that they are subjective value judgments.
Grim, I think Buddhism may do it without a God, but it does seem to need metaphysics of some sort.
ReplyDeleteAlso, I seem to have given the wrong impression that I want, as Cass put it, "some authority to make a binding ruling."
ReplyDeleteWhat I really want is for our schools to stop teaching a simplistic and misleading formula for sorting claims. I want, as McBrayer concludes, for our schools to teach children how to really think about these things and come to their own conclusions:
Our children deserve a consistent intellectual foundation. Facts are things that are true. Opinions are things we believe. Some of our beliefs are true. Others are not. Some of our beliefs are backed by evidence. Others are not. Value claims are like any other claims: either true or false, evidenced or not. The hard work lies not in recognizing that at least some moral claims are true but in carefully thinking through our evidence for which of the many competing moral claims is correct. That’s a hard thing to do. But we can’t sidestep the responsibilities that come with being human just because it’s hard.
The educational aspect has always been my first concern in this discussion. We are failing to teach students how to think critically, and our society is suffering for it.
Now, you may well be absolutely right. But I would venture to say that most religious believers do actually believe in moral truths, even if they can't prove them to you in a way you would accept, and they would deny that they are subjective value judgments.
ReplyDeleteIn fact, I am a believer myself. But I do not think for a moment that I have the indisputable truth. How can I? God has not appeared before me and confirmed the things I am right about, or clarified the things I am not so sure of. And while I realize there are some out there who are believers in the inerrancy of their religious texts, I am not one. I believe the Bible to be written by man, inspired by God. But it isn't His word made text. And in fact, much of the Old Testament predates the invention of writing, so is passed down from the oral tradtion. And while works like Beowulf and the Iliad demonstrate that the oral tradition can keep much of the source material alive and relatable, they also prove that the meanings of things can become lost through time.
To take a very basic example. In the Iliad, Homer declares that the Greeks ride their chariots up to the battle front so that the heroes can dismount and engage the foe. And yet, historically, this is never how chariots have been used, as some form of battle taxi. But by the time of Homer, no one used them anymore. He knew of them, but had no idea how such a thing would be used in battle.
Or for an even more modern example, take the depictions of Arthur and his knights. They clearly could not have been feudal knights as understood by Medieval audiences, nor would they have worn "shining" plate armor... none such existed at that time in history. In fact, it's a certainty they did not fight with couched lances, as they did not even have stirrups until the Norman invasion. Much of what is assumed about Arthurian legend is viewed through the lens of the times in which it was written down.
Because of this, logic tells me that the Bible must be likewise so. No one (save for the Moslems and Mormons) claim that angels descended and passed along verbatum texts from God with his exact word. Instead, it is the inspired history of the people of Israel (and not 100% factual history at that) in the Old Testament, and the impressions of the four Apostles in the Gospels (plus assorted letters, all written after Christ's death and ascension) and even those do not always agree internally.
Please do not misunderstand. I think the universal messages of the Bible are good and positive things, but without knowing the mind of God (so to speak), I can't call them "true". Which parts? The Slaughter of the Innocents (not documented anywhere in Roman or Jewish history, nor in any of the other three Gospels)? The Flood (which appears to be a Jewish adaptation of the Babylonian flood myth from their time in slavery)? The visions of Elijah? Of John in Revelations? Genesis? Which are parable and which are literal? Which are lessons to draw moral lessons from and which are literal history? How are we to tell? "Is there life on other planets?" It is knowable, but we do not currently know. We may never know the truth of it in my lifetime, just as we may never know the truth of which parts of the Bible are literal truths and which are lessons taught through parable.
But when you speak of "moral truths" I do not know how you can prove "love thy neighbor as you love yourself" as a true or false thing. It is a command, I agree. But I don't know that I can call it a "universal truth" because there is nothing to test it against. There is no logical construct to place it within. But by the same token, I don't believe it NEEDS to be proven, because it's NOT a statement of truth or falseness. It's a command from God. I don't need laws or commands from God to be truths to accept them. And I'm not sure why anyone else would either.
But I do not think for a moment that I have the indisputable truth.
ReplyDeleteI'm not talking about anyone knowing the truth. My point was, truth exists regardless of whether we know it, and regardless of whether it can be proven.
Let's take an example: Killing people for fun is wrong.
That's either true, or it's not. If it's true, it is a moral truth. Furthermore, if it's true, then it's true whether or not we can prove it. If we can't prove it, then we can't know it's true, but then, truth doesn't depend on our knowing it. It's still true, regardless of our knowing or our ability to prove it.
Why might it be important to believe in moral truth if we can't prove it?
What we believe to be true changes our behavior. Since you are a believer, I assume that your belief in God changes your behavior in some way. However, I also assume that you can't definitively prove God exists. But you believe it's true, and that changes your behavior, right?
Similarly, with moral truth, whether we believe it exists or not can affect our behavior, regardless of whether we can prove it. If someone believes that there are moral truths, even though they're difficult to discern and we can't quite be sure we've found them, then they are more likely to live a moral life. If someone doesn't believe there are moral truths, then they are more likely to live an amoral life.
I'm going to pause here to think about what you've written more.
So, to continue, "love thy neighbor as you love yourself" is a command, but we can frame it as a moral statement: "You should love your neighbor as yourself." That statement is either true or false, and it's truth or falsehood doesn't depend on our ability to prove it. For many people, if God commands it, that is good enough. However, even that implies that we should obey God, and the statement "We should obey God" is a moral statement that is either true or false.
ReplyDeleteI want to look a bit more at the idea that "God commands it, so it's right." God's commands could be arbitrary, in which case they can't be organized into a coherent moral system from which to reason out proper behavior in new situations. This seems to me to be the result of your claim that there are no moral truths, only commands.
I prefer to think God that commands us to do things because they are right. For me, his commands form a coherent system of moral truths that we can use as premises to work out what we should do in situations not detailed by scripture or tradition. I think it's very useful, then, to have moral truths we can reason from.
Correction: "I prefer to think that God commands ..." (not "God that commands").
ReplyDelete