when we use moral terms, we may be referring to a shared concept of “normativity”… This may well not be the case, but it is a possibility that I’m not willing to rule out...
Agreed.
I disagree with your approach of assuming linguistic reductionism.
Well, but I don’t ‘assume linguistic reductionism’. What I say is that if the intended meaning of ‘ought’ refers to structures in math and physics, then linguistic reductionism about normative language is correct, and if it doesn’t, then normative language (using its intended meaning) fails to refer (assuming ontological reductionism is true).
But when people argue over realism vs anti-realism, they are not arguing over whether people sometimes stipulate different definitions for “morality”, but instead are disagreeing over the nature of the intended meaning of ‘morality’.
Philosophers usually are, but not always. One thing I’m trying to avoid here is the ‘sneaking in connotations’ business performed by, in my example, Bill Craig.
I don’t think you’ve succeeded in dissolving the question that people are really asking.
No, I haven’t, and I’ve tried to be clear about that. But perhaps I need to edit ‘Pluralistic Moral Reductionism’ with additional clarifications, if it still sounds like I think I’ve dissolved the question that people are really asking. What I’ve dissolved is some debates that I see some people engaged in.
Edit: Also, I should add that I’m fairly skeptical of the idea that humans share a concept of morality or normativity. I do intend to write something up on the psychology and neuroscience of mental representations and ‘intuitive concepts’ to explain why, but I’ve got several other projects stacked up with priority over that.
What would it mean to share a concept of morality or normativity, or more generally, any concept? If I think of gold as “atomic number 79” and my Aunt Joan thinks of it as “the shiny yellow heavy valuable stuff in certain pieces of jewelry” do we fail to share a concept of gold? If such divergence counts as failure to share the concept, would failure to share concepts of morality be important to metaethics? (On this last question I’m thinking: not so much.)
Yeah, I’m not sure exactly what Wei Dai and Vladimir Nesov have in mind when they talk about a shared concept of ‘ought’ or of ‘right’. Will Sawin talks about humans having a cognitive module devoted to the processing of ‘ought’, which I also find implausible given the last 30 years of psychology and neuroscience. I think I have a different view (than Dai, Nesov, and Sawin) of what concepts are and how they are likely to work, but I’d have to put serious time into a post to explain this clearly, I think. For the moment, those who are interested in the subject should read the SEP articles on concepts and mental representation.
Agreed.
Well, but I don’t ‘assume linguistic reductionism’. What I say is that if the intended meaning of ‘ought’ refers to structures in math and physics, then linguistic reductionism about normative language is correct, and if it doesn’t, then normative language (using its intended meaning) fails to refer (assuming ontological reductionism is true).
Philosophers usually are, but not always. One thing I’m trying to avoid here is the ‘sneaking in connotations’ business performed by, in my example, Bill Craig.
No, I haven’t, and I’ve tried to be clear about that. But perhaps I need to edit ‘Pluralistic Moral Reductionism’ with additional clarifications, if it still sounds like I think I’ve dissolved the question that people are really asking. What I’ve dissolved is some debates that I see some people engaged in.
Edit: Also, I should add that I’m fairly skeptical of the idea that humans share a concept of morality or normativity. I do intend to write something up on the psychology and neuroscience of mental representations and ‘intuitive concepts’ to explain why, but I’ve got several other projects stacked up with priority over that.
What would it mean to share a concept of morality or normativity, or more generally, any concept? If I think of gold as “atomic number 79” and my Aunt Joan thinks of it as “the shiny yellow heavy valuable stuff in certain pieces of jewelry” do we fail to share a concept of gold? If such divergence counts as failure to share the concept, would failure to share concepts of morality be important to metaethics? (On this last question I’m thinking: not so much.)
Yeah, I’m not sure exactly what Wei Dai and Vladimir Nesov have in mind when they talk about a shared concept of ‘ought’ or of ‘right’. Will Sawin talks about humans having a cognitive module devoted to the processing of ‘ought’, which I also find implausible given the last 30 years of psychology and neuroscience. I think I have a different view (than Dai, Nesov, and Sawin) of what concepts are and how they are likely to work, but I’d have to put serious time into a post to explain this clearly, I think. For the moment, those who are interested in the subject should read the SEP articles on concepts and mental representation.
Oh, even better:
Mareschal, Quinn, & Lea, eds. (2010). The Making of Human Concepts.
Mahon & Caramazza (2009). Concepts and categories: A neuropsychological perspective.
Kourtzi & Connor (2011). Neural Representations for Object Perception, Structure, Category, and Adaptive Coding.
Nieder & Dehaene (2009). Representation of number in the brain.