Hello everyone
This is to Struan, Horse, Dave T. and everyone else interested in the
discussion.
It seems to me that what is good is expressed as value-situations according
to the Metaphysics of Quality. Looking to musicology, there is a term known
as "absolute (and/or) perfect pitch" which signifies the ability of a
musician to identify a tone without reference to any other tone. It seems
that a very small number of people do indeed possess this ability. Is this
somehow related to the current discussion of what is good?
Struan writes:
As you seem to espouse a non-naturalist ethic, Magnus, may I ask you how you
discern this 'good?'
Intuition perhaps? Horse pointed out that this whole question derives from
the fact/value debate
which brings me to the second question. Can we ascertain what is good from
empirical evidence? If we
can, then how? Equally, if we can, then how does this square with
non-naturalism?
Glove:
It seems that no one can explain the phenomonon of perfect pitch. It would
seem to be the act of perceiving value directly rather than in a
relativistic manner to which we are normally accustomed. In essence, it
would seem that there is "something" certain individuals are able to tap
into intellectually in a way that cannot be taught (a social level
activity). Either the individual is born with this ability or he/she is not.
Value situations are what dictate our lives. We are each born with unique
abilities and tendencies, but the social culture we inhabit constricts these
unique abilities into social level patterns, which are relativistic by
nature. So pervasive is this that only a very few unique abilities still
shine through intellectually in a few individuals. These are our geniuses,
true innovators and inventors who simply feel "something" is good without
need of empirical data, then set about to get their new idea socially
accepted as a good idea by accumulating empirical evidence.
So when you ask "Can we ascertain what is good from empirical evidence?" I
would rather put it that we acertain empirical evidence from what is good
intellectually and turn it into unambiguous social level agreements which
has no regard to the "absolute" value contained therein, yet it must be
there implicitly. Looking at the ability to hear and identify/reproduce one
tone perfectly seems to indicate that it is upon this ability the rest of
our cognition rests, though this "ability" is uniquely individualistic and
certainly not limited to the field of music.
Struan:
Consider the statement, "A bachelor is an unmarried man." this is a closed
question in that it is
self referential. The meaning of bachelor is inbuilt into the concept of
being unmarried so I can't
ask, "I grant you that a bachelor is unmarried, but does he have a wife?" It
doesn't make sense. Now
consider the statement, "Quality is good." To that I can legitimately
respond, "Explain what you
mean by good," to which you might reply, "Quality is dynamic, value,
power(?), quality, etc." Now I
might still ask the question, "I grant you that quality is
dynamic/static/powerful etc, but is it
good?" The fact that I can ask that question without contradiction shows
that quality does not
directly equate to good. According to Moore, then, any ethical statement
which reduces good to
naturalistic terms (quality, happiness, virtue etc) is mistaken as it has
committed the naturalistic
fallacy described above.
This is a genuine question I am asking here. If anyone can give me a
satisfactory answer I will be
most grateful to them as I have been pondering this one for some time. An
answer could also clarify
the ethical stance of the squad as a whole as, at the moment, naturalistic
fallacies are flying left
right and centre without the problem being addressed.
Glove:
Basically your question seems to boil down to "what is quality?" I am not
sure anyone has an answer to that question, for even by looking deeply into
the interaction between the social and intellect levels, we are still unable
to say with certainty what Dynamic force of value dictates in any given
situation. Therefore I would say that the MOQ states that all schools of
thought are correct on this very difficult question.
Now, before I am accused of "copping out" on this, it must be remembered
that Niels Bohr used this same arguement in his last debate with Einstein.
Best wishes
glove
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