Sunday, January 3, 2021

Distinguishing Moral Skepticism From Default Skepticism

There are many ways that some of the most unheard of and unacknowledged truths can be loosely compared to erroneous, shallow ideas that non-rationalists might sometimes hold to.  The latter ideas are certainly more specific and novel than plenty of worldviews discussed out in the open across history, but the rarely understood but provable truths that they might occasionally resemble from a distance are quite obviously distinct when rationalistically examined.  An example of this is moral skepticism.  On one hand, moral skepticism of some form is not so uncommon as to be only held to by an incredibly small subset of philosophically inclined people.  On the other hand, the truth about the relationship between conscience and morality is not outwardly acknowledged--or even seemingly internally understood--by more than a handful of people, most of whom are likely genuine rationalists [1].

A total skeptic, the kind who is skeptical of all things instead of only what cannot be logically established, would not believe in the existence or non-existence of moral obligations.  This, though, does not put this kind of skeptic in the same category as a rationalist who realizes conscience is epistemologically useless except for understanding one's own self.  First of all, skepticism of every idea or truth claim together is a wholly self-refuting philosophy that is disproven by the self-verifying nature of reason, meaning that the veracity of deductive reasoning, when used without assumptions and fallacies, cannot have been any other way.  In other words, some things follow and do not follow from specific concepts regardless of how aware or satisfied with those logical truths sentient beings are, and this much is knowable.  The reasons why certain conclusions do not follow from certain premises can vary drastically from one case to another, however.

The correct basis for rejection of the idea that conscience is epistemically connected to objective moral obligations is realizing that to believe otherwise is to merely assume and to stand on non sequiturs.  Not only is default skepticism to every idea philosophically false thanks to the knowability of logical truths, but it is intellectually lazy: different ideas whose truth or falsity cannot be known by humans are not all unknowable for the exact same reasons.  Various epistemological frameworks, moreover, can be false for differing reasons even if each of them share a lack of conformity to the laws of logic.  Sometimes these reasons may overlap beyond the baseline deviation from reason, and sometimes they may not.

It follows that someone who just assumes that conscience and the concept of objective morality have no epistemological connection has not come anywhere near grasping the demonstrable acts the actual disconnect is rooted in.  Likewise, someone who rightly thinks that morality is not proven to exist by conscience due to an incorrect stance of total skepticism regarding the truth of any concept has also missed the mark.  The latter can in no way be legitimately said to have embraced some scarcely acknowledged truth!  Instead, they merely rejected a false framework of moral epistemology because they were being consistent with an even more flawed epistemological framework!  They have turned their back on one type of stupidity in favor of something far more irrational.

This distinction can help clarify why certain logically provable stances like the total lack of metaphysical and epistemological relevance between moral feelings and the actual existence of morality itself are far more unique, precise, and neglected than some people might think.  In distinguishing these different stances, rationalists can celebrate the specificity of truth while perhaps feeling empowered by letting reason lead them to knowable facts that almost everyone else seems to be aware of.  Beyond this, they are equipped by this knowledge to push back against petty misconceptions and false equivalencies that might otherwise never go unchallenged.  Each of these things alone can be worthwhile, and the combination can be even greater.


[1].  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2018/12/a-list-of-neglected-truths.html

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