In case of a possible misunderstanding: I didn’t mean to imply that moral reasoning is literally hypothetical, but that hypotheticals can be a form of moral reasoning (and I hope we aren’t arguing about what ‘reasoning’ is). The problem that I think you have with this is that you believe hypothetical moral reasoning doesn’t generalize? If so, let me show you how that might work.
Hmm, save one person or let five people die.
My intuition tells me that killing is wrong.
Wait, what is intuition and why should I trust it?
I guess it’s the result of experience: cultural, personal, and evolution.
Now why should I trust that?
I suppose I shouldn’t because there’s no guarantee that any of that should result in the “right”
answer. Or even something that I actually prefer.
Hmm… If I look at the consequences, I see I prefer a world in which the five people live.
And this could go on and on until you’ve recalibrated your moral intuitions using hypothetical moral reasoning, and now when asked a similar hypothetical (or put in a similar situation) your immediate intuition is to look at the consequences. Why is the hypothetical part useful? It uncovers previously unquestioned assumptions. It’s also a nice compact form for discussing such issues.
but that hypotheticals can be a form of moral reasoning (and I hope we aren’t arguing about what ‘reasoning’ is).
We’re not, and I understand. We do disagree on that claim: I’m suggesting that no moral reasoning can be hypothetical, and that if some bit of reasoning proceeds from a hypothetical, we can know on the basis of that alone that it’s not really moral reasoning. I’m thinking of moral reasoning as the kind of reasoning you’re morally responsible for: if you reason rightly, you ought to be praised and proud, and if you reason wrongly, you ought to be blamed and ashamed. That sort of thing.
Hmm… If I look at the consequences, I see I prefer a world in which the five people live.
This is a good framing, thanks. By ‘on and on’ I assume you mean that the reasoner should go on to examine his decision to look at expected consequences, and perhaps more importantly his preference for the world in which five people live. After all, he shouldn’t trust that any more than the intuition, right?
I’m thinking of moral reasoning as the kind of reasoning you’re morally responsible for: if you reason rightly, you ought to be praised and proud, and if you reason wrongly, you ought to be blamed and ashamed. That sort of thing.
Can’t that apply to hypotheticals? If you come to the wrong conclusion you’re a horrible person, sort of thing.
I would probably call “moral reasoning” something along the lines of “reasoning about morals”. Even using your above definition, I think reasoning about morals using hypotheticals can result in a judgment, about what sort of action would be appropriate in the situation.
I’m thinking of moral reasoning as the kind of reasoning you’re morally responsible for: if you reason rightly, you ought to be praised and proud, and if you reason wrongly, you ought to be blamed and ashamed.
That can’t be what people normally mean by “moral reasoning”. Do you have a philosophy background?
I’m suggesting that no moral reasoning can be hypothetical
I don’t see why that would be the case. Cheap illustration:
TEACHER: Jimmy, suppose I tell you that P, and also that P implies Q. What does that tell you about Q? JIMMY: Q is true. TEACHER: That’s right Jimmy! Your reasoning is praiseworthy! JIMMY: Getting the right answer while reasoning about that hypothetical fills me with pride!
I don’t see why that would be the case. Cheap illustration:...
You’ve taken my conditional: “If something is moral reasoning, it is something for which we can be praised or blamed” for a biconditional. I only intend the former. ETA: I should say more. I don’t mean any kind of praise or blame, but the kind appropriate to morally good or bad action. One might believe that this isn’t different in kind from the sort of praise we offer in response to, say, excellence in playing the violin, but I haven’t gotten the sense that this view is on the table. If we agree that there is such a thing as distinctively moral praise or blame, then I’ll commit to the biconditional.
I suspect ABrooks is continuing his tradition of interpreting “X reasoning” to mean reasoning that has the property of being X, rather than reasoning about X.
If I’m right, I expect his reply here is that your example is not of hypothetical reasoning at all—supposing that actually happened, Jimmy really would be reasoning, so it would be actual reasoning. Sure, it would be reasoning about a hypothetical, but so what?
I share your sense, incidentally, that this is not what people normally mean, either by “moral reasoning” or “hypothetical reasoning.:”
I suspect ABrooks is continuing his tradition of interpreting “X reasoning” to mean reasoning that has the property of being X, rather than reasoning about X.
It’s not an interpretation, it’s a claim. If something is reasoning about moral subject matter, then, I claim, it is the sort of thing that is (morally) praiseworthy or blameworthy. When we call someone bad or good for something they’ve done, we at least in part mean to praise or blame their reasoning. And one of the reasons we call someone good or bad, or their action good or bad, is an evaluation of their reasoning as good or bad. And praise and blame are, of course, the products of moral reasoning. And we do consider them to be morally valued: to (excepting cases of ignorance) praise bad people is itself bad, and to blame good people is itself good.
Now, the claim I’m arguing against is the claim that there is another kind of moral reasoning which is a) neither praiseworthy, nor blameworthy, b) does not result in an action or an evaluation of an actual person or action, and c) is somehow tied to or predictive of reasoning that is praiseworthy, blameworthy, and resulting in action or actual evaluation.
So I’ve never intended ‘moral reasoning’ to mean ‘reasoning that is moral’ except as a consequence of my argument. That phrase means, in the first place, reasoning about moral matters. Same goes for how I’ve been understanding ‘hypothetical reasoning’. (ETA: though here, I can’t see how one could draw a distinction between ‘reasoning from a hypothetical’ and ‘reasoning that is hypothetical’. I’m not trying to talk about ‘reasoning about a hypothetical’ in the broadest sense, which might include coming up with trolly problems. I only mean to talk about reasoning that begins with a hypothetical.)
If something is reasoning about moral subject matter, then, I claim, it is the sort of thing that is (morally) praiseworthy or blameworthy.
Er. Just to make sure I understand this: is “whether it’s correct to put babies in a blender for fun” moral subject matter? If so, does it follow that if I am reasoning about whether it’s correct to put babies in a blender for fun, I am therefore something that is reasoning about moral subject matter? If so, does it follow that I am the sort of thing that is morally praiseworthy or blameworthy?
When we call someone bad or good for something they’ve done, we at least in part mean to praise or blame their reasoning.
Sure, if I were to say “Sam is a bad person” because Sam did X, I would likely be trying to imply something about the thought process that led Sam to do X.
And one of the reasons we call someone good or bad, or their action good or bad, is an evaluation of their reasoning as good or bad.
I agree that it’s possible for me to call Sam “good” or “bad” based on some aspect of their reasoning, as above, though I don’t really endorse that usage. I agree that it’s possible to call Sam’s act “good” or “bad” based on some aspect of Sam’s reasoning, although I don’t endorse that usage either. I agree that it’s possible to label reasoning that causes me to call either Sam or Sam’s act “good” or “bad” as “good reasoning” or “bad reasoning”, respectively, but this is neither something I could ever imagine myself doing, nor the interpretation I would naturally apply to labeling reasoning in this way.
And praise and blame are, of course, the products of moral reasoning.
That’s not clear to me.
to (excepting cases of ignorance) praise bad people is itself bad,
That’s not clear to me either.
and to blame good people is itself good.
That’s definitely not clear to me.
So I’ve never intended ‘moral reasoning’ to mean ‘reasoning that is moral’ except as a consequence of my argument. That phrase means, in the first place, reasoning about moral matters.
Ah, OK. That was in fact not clear; thanks for clarifying it.
Just to make sure I understand this: is “whether it’s correct to put babies in a blender for fun” moral subject matter?
Not necessarily, it may or may not be taken up as a moral question. We can, for example, study just how much fun it is and leave aside the question of its moral significance. If you’re reasoning about whether or not it’s right in some moral sense to put babies in a blender, then you’re doing something like moral reasoning, but if this were purely in the hypothetical then I think it would fall short. If you were seriously considering putting babies in a blender, then I think I’d want to call it moral reasoning, but in this case I think you could obviously be praised or blamed for your answer (well, maybe not praised so much).
and to blame good people is itself good.
That’s definitely not clear to me.
Sorry, typo. I mean’t ‘to blame good people (or to blame people for good actions) is bad.’ It shows some praiseworthy decency to appreciate the moral life of, I donno, MLK. It shows real character to stick up for a good but maligned person. Likewise, it shows some shallowness to have praised someone who only appeared good, but was in fact bad. And it shows some serious defect of character to praise someone we know to be bad (I donno, Manson?).
I agree that it’s possible for me to call Sam “good” or “bad” based on some aspect of their reasoning, as above, though I don’t really endorse that usage.
What’s the difference between agreeing here, and endorsing the usage?
OK, so just to be clear, you would say that the following are examples of moral reasoning...
“It would be fun to put this baby in that blender, and I want to have fun, but it would be wrong, so I won’t”
“It would be wrong to put this baby in that blender, and I don’t want to be wrong, but it would be fun, so I will”
...and the following are not:
“In general, putting babies in blenders would be fun, and I want to have fun, but in general it would be wrong, so if a situation arose where I had a baby and a blender and could put one inside the other with impunity, I would not do so, all else being equal.”
“In general, putting babies in blenders would be wrong, and I don’t want to be wrong, but in general it would be fun, so if a situation arose where I had a baby and a blender and could put one inside the other with impunity, I would do so, all else being equal.”
Yes? No?
If so, I continue to disagree with you; I absolutely would call those last two cases examples of moral reasoning. If not, I don’t think I’m understanding you at all.
What’s the difference between agreeing here, and endorsing the usage?
If A is some object or event that I observe, and L is a label in a language that consistently evokes a representation of A in the minds of native speakers, I agree that it’s possible for me to call A L. If using L to refer to A has other effects beyond evoking A, and I consider those effects to be bad, I might reject using L to refer to A.
For example, I agree that the label “faggot” reliably refers to a male homosexual in American English, but I don’t endorse the usage in most cases because it’s conventionally insulting. (There are exceptions.)
‘to blame good people (or to blame people for good actions) is bad.’ It shows some praiseworthy decency
Incidentally, here you demonstrate one of the behaviors that causes me not to endorse the usage of calling Sam “good” or “bad” in this case. First you went from making an observation about a particular act of reasoning to labeling the reasoner in a particular way, and now you’ve gone from labeling the reasoner in that way to inferring other facts about the reasoner. I would certainly agree that the various acts we’re talking about are evidence of praiseworthy decency on Sam’s part, but the way you are talking about it makes it very easy to make the mistake of treating them as logically equivalent to praiseworthy decency.
People do this all the time (e.g., fundamental attribution fallacy), and it causes a lot of problems.
I’m thinking of moral reasoning as the kind of reasoning you’re morally responsible for: if you reason rightly, you ought to be praised and proud, and if you reason wrongly, you ought to be blamed and ashamed.
Oh! I understand you now. Thanks for clarifying this.
In case of a possible misunderstanding: I didn’t mean to imply that moral reasoning is literally hypothetical, but that hypotheticals can be a form of moral reasoning (and I hope we aren’t arguing about what ‘reasoning’ is). The problem that I think you have with this is that you believe hypothetical moral reasoning doesn’t generalize? If so, let me show you how that might work.
And this could go on and on until you’ve recalibrated your moral intuitions using hypothetical moral reasoning, and now when asked a similar hypothetical (or put in a similar situation) your immediate intuition is to look at the consequences. Why is the hypothetical part useful? It uncovers previously unquestioned assumptions. It’s also a nice compact form for discussing such issues.
We’re not, and I understand. We do disagree on that claim: I’m suggesting that no moral reasoning can be hypothetical, and that if some bit of reasoning proceeds from a hypothetical, we can know on the basis of that alone that it’s not really moral reasoning. I’m thinking of moral reasoning as the kind of reasoning you’re morally responsible for: if you reason rightly, you ought to be praised and proud, and if you reason wrongly, you ought to be blamed and ashamed. That sort of thing.
This is a good framing, thanks. By ‘on and on’ I assume you mean that the reasoner should go on to examine his decision to look at expected consequences, and perhaps more importantly his preference for the world in which five people live. After all, he shouldn’t trust that any more than the intuition, right?
Can’t that apply to hypotheticals? If you come to the wrong conclusion you’re a horrible person, sort of thing.
I would probably call “moral reasoning” something along the lines of “reasoning about morals”. Even using your above definition, I think reasoning about morals using hypotheticals can result in a judgment, about what sort of action would be appropriate in the situation.
That can’t be what people normally mean by “moral reasoning”. Do you have a philosophy background?
I don’t see why that would be the case. Cheap illustration:
TEACHER: Jimmy, suppose I tell you that P, and also that P implies Q. What does that tell you about Q?
JIMMY: Q is true.
TEACHER: That’s right Jimmy! Your reasoning is praiseworthy!
JIMMY: Getting the right answer while reasoning about that hypothetical fills me with pride!
You’ve taken my conditional: “If something is moral reasoning, it is something for which we can be praised or blamed” for a biconditional. I only intend the former. ETA: I should say more. I don’t mean any kind of praise or blame, but the kind appropriate to morally good or bad action. One might believe that this isn’t different in kind from the sort of praise we offer in response to, say, excellence in playing the violin, but I haven’t gotten the sense that this view is on the table. If we agree that there is such a thing as distinctively moral praise or blame, then I’ll commit to the biconditional.
I suspect ABrooks is continuing his tradition of interpreting “X reasoning” to mean reasoning that has the property of being X, rather than reasoning about X.
If I’m right, I expect his reply here is that your example is not of hypothetical reasoning at all—supposing that actually happened, Jimmy really would be reasoning, so it would be actual reasoning. Sure, it would be reasoning about a hypothetical, but so what?
I share your sense, incidentally, that this is not what people normally mean, either by “moral reasoning” or “hypothetical reasoning.:”
It’s not an interpretation, it’s a claim. If something is reasoning about moral subject matter, then, I claim, it is the sort of thing that is (morally) praiseworthy or blameworthy. When we call someone bad or good for something they’ve done, we at least in part mean to praise or blame their reasoning. And one of the reasons we call someone good or bad, or their action good or bad, is an evaluation of their reasoning as good or bad. And praise and blame are, of course, the products of moral reasoning. And we do consider them to be morally valued: to (excepting cases of ignorance) praise bad people is itself bad, and to blame good people is itself good.
Now, the claim I’m arguing against is the claim that there is another kind of moral reasoning which is a) neither praiseworthy, nor blameworthy, b) does not result in an action or an evaluation of an actual person or action, and c) is somehow tied to or predictive of reasoning that is praiseworthy, blameworthy, and resulting in action or actual evaluation.
So I’ve never intended ‘moral reasoning’ to mean ‘reasoning that is moral’ except as a consequence of my argument. That phrase means, in the first place, reasoning about moral matters. Same goes for how I’ve been understanding ‘hypothetical reasoning’. (ETA: though here, I can’t see how one could draw a distinction between ‘reasoning from a hypothetical’ and ‘reasoning that is hypothetical’. I’m not trying to talk about ‘reasoning about a hypothetical’ in the broadest sense, which might include coming up with trolly problems. I only mean to talk about reasoning that begins with a hypothetical.)
I am sorry if that hasn’t been clear.
Er. Just to make sure I understand this: is “whether it’s correct to put babies in a blender for fun” moral subject matter? If so, does it follow that if I am reasoning about whether it’s correct to put babies in a blender for fun, I am therefore something that is reasoning about moral subject matter? If so, does it follow that I am the sort of thing that is morally praiseworthy or blameworthy?
Sure, if I were to say “Sam is a bad person” because Sam did X, I would likely be trying to imply something about the thought process that led Sam to do X.
I agree that it’s possible for me to call Sam “good” or “bad” based on some aspect of their reasoning, as above, though I don’t really endorse that usage. I agree that it’s possible to call Sam’s act “good” or “bad” based on some aspect of Sam’s reasoning, although I don’t endorse that usage either. I agree that it’s possible to label reasoning that causes me to call either Sam or Sam’s act “good” or “bad” as “good reasoning” or “bad reasoning”, respectively, but this is neither something I could ever imagine myself doing, nor the interpretation I would naturally apply to labeling reasoning in this way.
That’s not clear to me.
That’s not clear to me either.
That’s definitely not clear to me.
Ah, OK. That was in fact not clear; thanks for clarifying it.
Not necessarily, it may or may not be taken up as a moral question. We can, for example, study just how much fun it is and leave aside the question of its moral significance. If you’re reasoning about whether or not it’s right in some moral sense to put babies in a blender, then you’re doing something like moral reasoning, but if this were purely in the hypothetical then I think it would fall short. If you were seriously considering putting babies in a blender, then I think I’d want to call it moral reasoning, but in this case I think you could obviously be praised or blamed for your answer (well, maybe not praised so much).
Sorry, typo. I mean’t ‘to blame good people (or to blame people for good actions) is bad.’ It shows some praiseworthy decency to appreciate the moral life of, I donno, MLK. It shows real character to stick up for a good but maligned person. Likewise, it shows some shallowness to have praised someone who only appeared good, but was in fact bad. And it shows some serious defect of character to praise someone we know to be bad (I donno, Manson?).
What’s the difference between agreeing here, and endorsing the usage?
OK, so just to be clear, you would say that the following are examples of moral reasoning...
“It would be fun to put this baby in that blender, and I want to have fun, but it would be wrong, so I won’t”
“It would be wrong to put this baby in that blender, and I don’t want to be wrong, but it would be fun, so I will”
...and the following are not:
“In general, putting babies in blenders would be fun, and I want to have fun, but in general it would be wrong, so if a situation arose where I had a baby and a blender and could put one inside the other with impunity, I would not do so, all else being equal.”
“In general, putting babies in blenders would be wrong, and I don’t want to be wrong, but in general it would be fun, so if a situation arose where I had a baby and a blender and could put one inside the other with impunity, I would do so, all else being equal.”
Yes? No?
If so, I continue to disagree with you; I absolutely would call those last two cases examples of moral reasoning.
If not, I don’t think I’m understanding you at all.
If A is some object or event that I observe, and L is a label in a language that consistently evokes a representation of A in the minds of native speakers, I agree that it’s possible for me to call A L. If using L to refer to A has other effects beyond evoking A, and I consider those effects to be bad, I might reject using L to refer to A.
For example, I agree that the label “faggot” reliably refers to a male homosexual in American English, but I don’t endorse the usage in most cases because it’s conventionally insulting. (There are exceptions.)
Incidentally, here you demonstrate one of the behaviors that causes me not to endorse the usage of calling Sam “good” or “bad” in this case. First you went from making an observation about a particular act of reasoning to labeling the reasoner in a particular way, and now you’ve gone from labeling the reasoner in that way to inferring other facts about the reasoner. I would certainly agree that the various acts we’re talking about are evidence of praiseworthy decency on Sam’s part, but the way you are talking about it makes it very easy to make the mistake of treating them as logically equivalent to praiseworthy decency.
People do this all the time (e.g., fundamental attribution fallacy), and it causes a lot of problems.
Oh!
I understand you now.
Thanks for clarifying this.