Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Posting-Version: $Revision: 1.6.2.16 $; site ISM780B.UUCP
Path: utzoo!linus!philabs!cmcl2!seismo!harvard!think!ISM780B!jim
From: jim@ISM780B.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.philosophy
Subject: Re: Definitions of Morality
Message-ID: <27500106@ISM780B.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 26-Aug-85 16:06:00 EDT
Article-I.D.: ISM780B.27500106
Posted: Mon Aug 26 16:06:00 1985
Date-Received: Fri, 30-Aug-85 00:10:27 EDT
References: <374@aero.UUCP>
Lines: 55
Nf-ID: #R:aero:-37400:ISM780B:27500106:000:2779
Nf-From: ISM780B!jim    Aug 26 16:06:00 1985


>MORAL ABSOLUTE - A principle concerning morality which is absolutely true,
>                 regardless of which moral system you subscribe to.
>
>(not to be confused with absolute morals)
>
>ABSOLUTE MORAL RELATIVISM - the idea that it is impossible to conclude that
>                any particular moral system is correct.
>
>(as compared to ordinary moral relativism, which holds that it is impossible
> within any particular moral system to judge that another is incorrect)
>
>The curious fact is, absolute moral relativism is self-contradictory, because
>it states a moral absolute.

I get the feeling you just like to cheat.  Why did you state "not to be
confused with absolute morals" if you were going to ignore it?
AMR makes a statement *about* moral systems; it does not in any way state
a *moral* absolute.  The absolute statement it makes is not a *moral*
statement.  Consider:

	+---------------------------------------------------------+
	|   1) Exactly one of the statements in this box is false.|
	|                                                         |
	|   2) Charley Wingate exists.                            |
	+---------------------------------------------------------+

If the first statement is true, then the second statement is false.
But, if the first statement is false, then the second statement cannot
be true, because then the first statement would be true, not false.
So the second statement is false.

As with your argument, the logic seems designed to produce the desired
conclusion regardless of its content.

>Some moral systems do in fact state that it can be determined that they are
>correct and others are wrong.  Some simply state that it can be determined
>that certain morals are always incorrect.  According to absolute moral
>relativism, however, such conclusions are incorrect.  This means that this
>principle that you cannot determine incorrectness is a moral absolute, and
>that one can therefore determine outside of any particular system that
>a particular system is incorrect, contrary to absolute moral relativism.
>Hence, absolute moral relativism cannot be correct.  (Incidentally, this
>would seem to imply that there are moral absolutes, since the denial of
>this leads to the same contradiction.)

I suggest that you read Richard Smullyan's "What is the Name of This Book?".
You are making a fundamental logical error of confusing statements *about*
moral systems with *moral* statements *within* moral systems.  The latter
are statements about desired human behavior, not about moral systems.
Aquinas and Berkley argued for the *logical* existence of God with arguments
which, like yours, are as logically flawed as arguments that all numbers are
equal, via hidden use of division by zero.

-- Jim Balter (ima!jim)