Sam Harris: Science can answer moral questions

[jayman]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=


This is Sam Harris at TED. Can science answer moral questions? Does Sam Harris even answer that question in this talk?

What do you think?

 

[bluskool]

I struggle with this issue. He seems to be saying that morality is based on human flourishing and he claims that some things are "really right" and some things are "really wrong." IOW, objective morality exists. But he doesn't explain why. Why is human flourishing the grounds for objective morality?

 

[bokonon]

I haven't watched the TED talk yet, but in a local interview I heard that was conducted at the TED conference, he mentioned that he'll soon have a book coming out on the subject. Perhaps if he doesn't adequately answer the question in the 15-minute talk, he will in the book.

 

[ponderingturtle]

Well what kind of society and what are we assuming is an answer to a moral question?

It can refute moral arguments, it could using some arbitrary measurements determine if one society is more effective than another. It can inform moral positions.

IF you view those as answering moral questions then sure it can.

 

[quixotecoyote]

I didn't watch the video, but it seems obvious that if you accept certain base moral assumptions, then science can help find the best way to make a given decision or question match those assumptions.

Science might not be able to tell you what the base moral assumptions should be, but it might even be able to tell you what assumptions you would be most comfortable with and then proceed as above.

 

[TraneWreck]

Well what kind of society and what are we assuming is an answer to a moral question?

It can refute moral arguments, it could using some arbitrary measurements determine if one society is more effective than another. It can inform moral positions.

IF you view those as answering moral questions then sure it can.

One of the most important moral questions in human history was pretty conclusively answered by genetics: are there meaningful differences between races?

Hell, they basically showed "race" isn't even a discernable concept genetically speaking.

I suppose you could argue that the old naturalistic fallacy prevails, and just because we have that knowledge, we can't draw any conclusions about how to behave towards other humans. But I think it's pretty clear that rejecting the basis of various race-based arguments is sufficient to undermine those claims and the resulting behavior.

 

[paiute]

Fail marketing

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=


This is Sam Harris at TED. Can science answer moral questions? Does Sam Harris even answer that question in this talk?

What do you think?

As morals are relative and science is not, no.

But as other posters have noted, he has a book coming out, so it does not matter as long as you buy the book.

I can't fault him. Just look at my sig, for Bob's sake.

 

[bokonon]

I struggle with this issue. He seems to be saying that morality is based on human flourishing and he claims that some things are "really right" and some things are "really wrong." IOW, objective morality exists. But he doesn't explain why. Why is human flourishing the grounds for objective morality?

I don't think that's exactly what he's saying. More like "life" flourishing, where human life is given a bit more value based on the range of experiences it is capable of, sentient life is given more value than plant life, and plant life is given more value than rocks. I don't think he would argue that dogfighting is moral based on the fact that it benefits some humans and doesn't physically injure any.

What he is saying is that there are objective answers to moral questions, and it would be good to acknowledge that. "It's all relative" is an amoral position which values Ted Bundy's opinion on the best way to spend an idle evening equally with the Dalai Lama's.

 

[bluskool]

I don't think that's exactly what he's saying. More like "life" flourishing, where human life is given a bit more value based on the range of experiences it is capable of, sentient life is given more value than plant life, and plant life is given more value than rocks. I don't think he would argue that dogfighting is moral based on the fact that it benefits some humans and doesn't physically injure any.

It's not a question of what things we value. It's a question of why certain actions are objectively wrong and certain actions are objectively right. What is the basis for saying one or the other.

What he is saying is that there are objective answers to moral questions, and it would be good to acknowledge that. "It's all relative" is an amoral position which values Ted Bundy's opinion on the best way to spend an idle evening equally with the Dalai Lama's.

I know, but what makes those answers objectively correct?

 

[bokonon]

It's not a question of what things we value. It's a question of why certain actions are objectively wrong and certain actions are objectively right. What is the basis for saying one or the other.

I know, but what makes those answers objectively correct?

I haven't read his book, so I don't know what Harris' answer would be, but my own would probably involve agreeing on some measure of benefits.

Meters and joules don't exist objectively, they're a convention that people have agreed to adopt. Once adopted, however, they enable us to quantify things in wildly different situations, and say things like this one is bigger or stronger or louder or redder than that one.

I doubt we'll ever have meter-like precision for units of morality, but even crude units might enable us to quantify things we can't currently compare very well. Once crude standards are familiar tools, perhaps refinement and increased precision will become possible too.

 

[Ziggurat]

Meters and joules don't exist objectively, they're a convention that people have agreed to adopt.

You are wrong. Units are objective. In general, they are also arbitrary, but arbitrary is not the same this as unobjective. And the difference matters. Whether I measure energy in Joules, calories, BTU's, or megatons, these are all still objective measurements. Our choice of units is irrelevant, any calculation or measurement of energy can be done in any units, and conversion between units is trivial.

But morality is not objective. It isn't simply a matter of finding "units" for it: units will do no good if we can't even agree on which of two outcomes is morally preferable. No system of measurement will work if we cannot agree on that. And we cannot.

 

[Trent Wray]

I don't think science can answer moral questions with absolutes and objective responses until we are capable of immortality.

 

[Kahalachan]

It's an obvious plea to a society that already agrees with most of his values he presented. He's pretty much intolerant of any belief system that is religious.

Yes, we do value human life and equality.

But there are also metaphysical moral concepts that just can't be studied. How would you scientifically study honor?


I used to think as Harris until I couldn't answer the question bluskol posed "Why is human flourishing the grounds for objective morality?"

 

[Cavemonster]

Here's a great moral question that I've been thinking about lately.

PSA tests are used to detect prostate cancer. However, the data is showing that at the current recommended age for PSA screening, a lot of false positives turn up, and many men have unneeded surgery and other treatment procedure which can lead to a whole slew of serious complications, not to mention a gigantic amount of stress.

So, doctors must weigh that earlier tests prolong a few more lives by catching the cancer early, but they damage the quality of life of a much larger number of patients.

This is an essential question. When quality of life is pitted against quantity, how are the values compared? This is a question I don't think we can ever handle objectively.

 

[Trent Wray]

Here's a great moral question that I've been thinking about lately.

PSA tests are used to detect prostate cancer. However, the data is showing that at the current recommended age for PSA screening, a lot of false positives turn up, and many men have unneeded surgery and other treatment procedure which can lead to a whole slew of serious complications, not to mention a gigantic amount of stress.

So, doctors must weigh that earlier tests prolong a few more lives by catching the cancer early, but they damage the quality of life of a much larger number of patients.

This is an essential question. When quality of life is pitted against quantity, how are the values compared? This is a question I don't think we can ever handle objectively.

Suppose a large number of people trust in a psychic. They even base their lives off her input. Suppose this psychic is correct some of the time, and some of the time she's not.

Do you think her hit/miss ratio is fair to determine whether or not she is a legitimate psychic? At what point do you tell people to stay away from her, regardless of whether or not you believe she is a legit psychic? Afterall ... people are trusting her with their lives at times.

 

[INRM]

While he makes some interesting points, I don't know if it's a good idea to rely excessively on science to answer and "map" every single moral question...

 

[Dragoonster]

I haven't read his book, so I don't know what Harris' answer would be, but my own would probably involve agreeing on some measure of benefits.

Which is a subjective judgement. There's always going to be some axiomatic, subjective basis for any morality that claims "x is desirable".

Moral questions have as many answers as there are moralities, and none of the answers are objective. If science can answer moral questions, that means science is now one of many moral philosophies merely with a science-leaning set of axioms, making subjective judgements on what is desirable and what's not.

I'd much rather science stick to objective facts. It's incapable of answering any moral question. In the "race" example above, it's answering a scientific question. The scientific question is: "how do "races" differ?" The moral question is "why does this matter morally and what should we do with the information?" The language, definition, or sociological question is "what is a race?"

If some person based their morality on exactly how many atoms are in a gram of salt does "how many atoms are in a gram of salt" become a moral question?

 

[ponderingturtle]

One of the most important moral questions in human history was pretty conclusively answered by genetics: are there meaningful differences between races?

Well this can be shown with out genetics, because you can't get people from different cultures to agree on what races there are.

I suppose you could argue that the old naturalistic fallacy prevails, and just because we have that knowledge, we can't draw any conclusions about how to behave towards other humans. But I think it's pretty clear that rejecting the basis of various race-based arguments is sufficient to undermine those claims and the resulting behavior.

But so what? Why does there have to a meaningful difference between my group and some other group to get people to fight for the dominance of the group that they are in? This idea of equality needed to be there first. For example has science proven that say the king is the divinely ordained ruler of all of our nation, who's word has the force of rightness? Could genetic studies show that you can't distinguish between the king and his butler do anything to disprove that?

The thing is that with many positions it depends on how they frame the argument as to if it can be refuted with evidence or is something that must be accepted or rejected and evidence can play no roll in its determination.

On a non ethical ground take this question, can science disprove the biblical creation story? Well it depends on what the person believes about it, if they believe that the evidence supports a 6 day creation of the world 6000 years ago, then it can be. But if they believe that some supernatural entity hid all the evidence of creation and replaced it with evidence of a 14 billion year old creation of the universe, then science can not say anything about that belief.

 

[ponderingturtle]

It's an obvious plea to a society that already agrees with most of his values he presented. He's pretty much intolerant of any belief system that is religious.

Yes, we do value human life and equality.

But there are also metaphysical moral concepts that just can't be studied. How would you scientifically study honor?

You could look at the impact of honor on societies and work out if it is beneficial or detrimental to those societies relative to others with out it.

Of course a truly valid experiment on this subject would be both impractical and immoral.

 

[MG1962]

You are wrong. Units are objective. In general, they are also arbitrary, but arbitrary is not the same this as unobjective. And the difference matters. Whether I measure energy in Joules, calories, BTU's, or megatons, these are all still objective measurements. Our choice of units is irrelevant, any calculation or measurement of energy can be done in any units, and conversion between units is trivial.

But morality is not objective. It isn't simply a matter of finding "units" for it: units will do no good if we can't even agree on which of two outcomes is morally preferable. No system of measurement will work if we cannot agree on that. And we cannot.

Thank you - you saved me a lot of typing