Are you a good person?

[Druidic]

Mithras, I am just a humble student of the Fourth Way. I believe the universe is blind and indifferent. Our physical reality isn't. There's nothing 'indifferent' about moments of pure pain...or pure joy for that matter.

A small part of the universe is alive; and, for better or worse, we're part of that.

Quote Originally Posted by Druidic

There's nothing 'indifferent' about moments of pure pain...or pure joy for that matter.

Yes, within one's mind, but my point is that pain doesn't reflect objective moral properties outside oneself in a purely physical world.

Regardless, one of my values is compassion, and I have engaged in charitable actions (e.g., donating to charities, etc.) However, this does not make me a good person for the reasons given hitherto.

I was just relating these questions to the topic "Are you a good person?".

[Ibrahim]

i was of course merely referring, perhaps somewhat facetiously, to our personhood being a mere veneer over the essence of our cosmic nothingness...

I think a better question is can we reconcile normativity with naturalism?

[Druidic]

Not all values are 'arbitrary'.

We are physical creatures, grounded in the physical.
A man starving to death, a man being flayed alive, a man dying of a horrible disease knows that freedom from pain, from suffering, from hunger, is an Absolute value dictated by our physical existence. The intellect plays no part here. None at all.

A man caught between the couplers of two freight cars does not spend his last minutes reflecting unpon Nietzsche.

[Druidic]

Quote Originally Posted by Druidic

Not all values are 'arbitrary'. We are physical creatures, grounded in the physical. A man starving to death, a man being flayed alive, a man dying of a horrible disease knows that freedom from pain, from suffering, from hunger, is an Absolute value dictated by our physical existence. The intellect plays no part here. None at all. A man caught between the couplers of two freight cars does not spend his last minutes reflecting upon Nietzsche.

("He was in shock and asked for a cigarette. We lit one for him and placed it in his mouth. At some point the cars were uncoupled and he died.")

Quote Originally Posted by Druidic

Not all values are 'arbitrary'. We are physical creatures, grounded in the physical. A man starving to death, a man being flayed alive, a man dying of a horrible disease knows that freedom from pain, from suffering, from hunger, is an Absolute value dictated by our physical existence. The intellect plays no part here. None at all. A man caught between the couplers of two freight cars does not spend his last minutes reflecting unpon Nietzsche.

Of course a man facing imminent dangers would, in all likelihood, not reflect on Nietzsche, but there's no moral absolute that he should act in such and such way in face of danger. There are no "shoulds" or "oughts" in a purely naturalized world, I think.

[Druidic]

Here's the thing, Mithras: a man who argues that pain is illusory, irrelevant or meaningless is, simply, a man without pain. At the moment.

Our physical responses are as absolute as an Atomic bomb.

[Druidic]

Actually, I don't think anyone in extreme pain ever thinks "This is good." If you're not in pain, the intellect can think whatever it wants about the 'value' of another's pain.
When it comes to physical values, the intellect has no place.
Gurdjieff talks of the emotional. intellectual and physical centers (lower centers) feeding like vampires on each other's energy.
So many intellectual decisions are dictated by our emotions. And when it comes to the physical, the intellect can only obfuscate. Little more.

Quote Originally Posted by Druidic

So many intellectual decisions are dictated by our emotions. And when it comes to the physical, the intellect can only obfuscate. Little more.

Okay, I was initially wrong. What you're arguing is "ethical sentences serve merely to express emotions" (i.e., Emotivism). Am I correct?

However, this is still a form of Moral Anti-Realism because those moral utterances do not reveal objective moral facts in a purely physical world. Those ethical sentences lack truth value because they do not express genuine facts beyond feelings of disapproval or approval.

Quote Originally Posted by Ibrahim

If you cannot obtain objective knowledge of morality, how can you claim it is or is not inherent in the material world.

I feel as if we have enough empirical data to know the material world is blind and indifferent, so this fact would stand regardless of not being able to attain objective knowledge of morality.