I'm a fan of "emotivism", which is the philosophical stance that there is no difference between the emotions we associate with morality and morality itself, that the idea that right and wrong exist in this abstract sense outside of the reaction of human beings is false
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Replying to @arthur_affect @Nymphomachy and
It sort of exists on the opposite pole of "moral realism", which is controversial and opens one up to accusations of being amoral "Would X still be wrong if nobody who existed in the world thought it was wrong?", etc.
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Replying to @arthur_affect @Nymphomachy and
But I mean I think that's stupid You have no way of "knowing" whether things are right and wrong separate from how people react to them, we could live in the world where murder and rape are right and we're all just wrong for thinking it's wrong, you can't prove otherwise
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Replying to @arthur_affect @Nymphomachy and
And I think emotivism is a very strong way to plant a moral flag, honestly There is no difference between saying "I think you're an evil man" and "You piss me off so bad I want to throw up" You can't argue me out of it ("That's just, like, your opinion, man")
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Replying to @arthur_affect @Nymphomachy and
Like yeah of course it's my opinion, of course it's just an emotional reaction, and I'm going to *act on* that emotional reaction, because that's what it means to be a human being, because that's why you act on anything
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Replying to @arthur_affect @Nymphomachy and
I mean, this line of thinking is a little odd to me, because isn't this how a lot of bigotry works, particularly that aimed at queer people? "You gross me out, therefore you must be doing something Wrong." I'm guessing you'd say that those people have bad taste?
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Replying to @DoomguyRT @arthur_affect and
Except we don't express all revulsions in moral terms. Plenty of people are capable of saying “That food grosses me out, but you go ahead and enjoy it.” So not all revulsions are moral.
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Replying to @avram @arthur_affect and
I didn't say they were? But there is a pretty strong aspect of disgust to the way bigots think about the people they are bigoted against, and that disgust often gets rounded up to a moral argument. I just wonder if that's sometimes similar to what Arthur's talking about.
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Replying to @DoomguyRT @avram and
Well, sure, they're disgusted by me and I'm disgusted by them Because our morals are in conflict and are irreconcilable with each other
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Replying to @arthur_affect @DoomguyRT and
A moral realist would say I can't say I'm right and they're wrong unless there's something outside of us, some logical fact about the world, I can appeal to to show that my moral disgust is based on truth and theirs is based on a mistake
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But I don't think, in the end, that that's actually possible Moreover if it is possible I have no idea how to do it and I don't think anyone else really does either
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