It occurred to me that the moral judgments around disgust are related to the conceptual processing we need to do in terms of achieving or avoiding goal states. The point is this: if we attempting to achieve a positive outcome, then we use a functional model - go to for the gusto. But if we are trying to avoid a bad outcome, we have to use causal reasoning, because (hopefully) we are dealing with counter-factuals. If you are alreading in some disgusting deep doo-doo, you've already blown it. What I was wondering was about the asymmetry of the moral reasoning of disgust vis-a-vis its opposite (pleasure? delightful? blissful?). I wrote a short essay on Medium, describing the moral issues involved, but also laying out the conceptual issues in terms of computer reasoning such as you would find in Artificial Intelligence:
In terms of morality, the conceptual reasoning behind states you want to avoid is qualitatively different from the reasoning you use to achieve a positive state. We strive for eudaimonia, but we employ causal reasoning to avoid ill-being. They are not mirror-images of each other. Striving at its best is automatic and almost intuitive. Causal reasoning is conditional.
Antony, I'm not sure. I think in both cases we use a combination of causal reasoning and intuition. Please and pain/disgust are evolved abilities that warn us, at an intuitive level, of certain things and attract us to others. But in themselves they are insufficient, hence the additional of reasoned-based causal thinking.
Yes, I am aware of that. For example, the causal reasoning around disgust must be combined with an intuitive judgement of what object or event is disgusting. So it is a combination.
But functional processing (intuition) versus causal reasoning predominates depending on whether you want to achieve a goal or avoid it. I think it is worthwhile to point out this asymmetry. It is a warning that the way we go about making decisions, indlucing moral choices is not one uniform method, but is tailored to the situation.
One example of the difference is the idea of a feedback loop. This is like the thermostat in your air conditioning unit. It requires a goal to aim for. You cannot create a stable feedback loop by saying "do anything but this setpoint".
The reason that this distinction is important is that when we discuss reasoning, we tend to focus on logic which mostly applies to causal reasoning. But we tend to give short shrift to the nature of our intuitions and how they are formed. For example, in your Stoic logic you mention "kataleptic impressions". This is obviously a type of functional, intuitionistic reasoning, which I am claiming is what we do when we try to achieve a goal - in this case, the kind of impression that one has that the day outside is sunny or cloudy. How do we arrive at these impressions? We tend to leave this part uninspected and focus on logic which is somewhat easier to analyze.
My point is that at the most abstract there is a distinction: causal reasoning helps us to work out hypothetical alternative and counter factuals and allows us to plan things by analyzing alternatives. But this type is reasoning is "slow". Functional reasoning is thinking "fast". Sometimes it is necessary to think fast, because thinking slow gets in the way. In the moral realm, someone of good character is often that way because they have internalized the functional reasoning to such an extent that doing the right thing (or wrong thing, if they are of lesser character) is automatic.
Discussions of reasoning must handle both cases. In my field of Artificial Intelligence, this distinction came up pretty early, in the contrast of procedural versus declarative knowledge in the 1970s:
Although the process of reasoning is always a combination of the two, one type prdominates over the other. My insight was that this often happens if you want to achieve something or avoid it.
Antony, I think I'm largely in agreement. Yes, we have, broadly speaking, two systems of thinking, fast and slow, as Kahneman calls them. But these have been known from antiquity. The Stoics do distinguish between what we would today call autonomic and deliberate thoughts.
Within a Stoic context we tend to focus on deliberate reasoning because that's the part that is "up to us," as Epictetus puts it. Autonomous thoughts just float by, and the only thing we can do about them is to assent to them or not.
Kataleptic impressions are not just a form of intuition. They are resistant to arguments as well. If I see that it is day outside, you will have a really hard time trying to convince me otherwise.
Also, sometimes causal thinking is instinctive. We see smoke and we automatically infer fire, we don't have to sit down and think about it.
And yes, a major goal of Epictetus's training, his Discipline of Assent, is to automatize our moral judgment, shifting them, if you will, from slow to fast thinking. We do that, as you say, by reflection-driven habituation.
Doug, no, murder is defined as the unjust killing of another human being. And *because* it is unjust then it is also socially disapproved and therefore unlawful.
Where does that "unjust" come from? From the fact that human beings are social animals, and social groups cannot survive if members start murdering each other.
In the area in and around Gaza a large number of people have recently died as the result of intentional human actions. Is there some criterion of justice that allows everyone to evaluate each death to assess whether it was just or unjust? If so, why is there such disagreement and so much killing going on?
Doug, I believe I've answered that question several times. It has to do with human flourishing, one doesn't have to evaluate every single life lost to figure out that war is a bad idea.
I think I've also addressed the disagreement argument a number of times: disagreement, on its own, is no evidence at all of lack of a good answer. See, as an example, the creation-evolution debate: half of Americans disbelieve evolution. That's not because there is an actual scientific controversy, it's because they don't get it.
Let me ask you a count-question: is there any scenario under which you, as a Pyrrhonist, would be moved to say that killing a human being is wrong?
If war is a bad idea then it must be bad for everyone. But if some engage in war and others refrain from it, those who refrain from it will be killed. For those who would otherwise be killed, war therefore is a good idea.
We have laws and customs about assessing whether a particular killing was wrong. We also have personal feelings. For example, I feel that the killing of my father was wrong.
So, you think you would be mistaken that if another society declared war on your society that your society should not engage in war?
Why should I have anything better to say about my father's death than to say that I feel it was wrong? It is perhaps interesting to point out that laws and customs about such things have changed since the time it happened. While it was considered wrong then as it is now, now it seems to be considered more wrong. More is done to prevent such things and the punishments are greater now for those who are considered culpable. I suspect that this is because people in the past who felt as I do influenced law and custom.
In 1930s Germany it was not the custom to kill all the Jews. This was pursued only by a small faction of society. This faction knew what they were doing was against common opinion and worked carefully to hide their actions. Even those involved at the highest levels used euphemisms in official documents.
Very Interesting piece. Although I’m quite often in favor of suspending judgement, how one gets from there to “error theory” is a bridge, way too far, for me.
Hi Massimo thank you for this excellent artical! I believe strongly in our evolutionary ethical past also and in many ways I think it gives us reason to believe in an objective morality - albeit a contingent and constructed one. However some philosophers , especially Joyce like you mentioned , make the case that our evolutionary past ‘debunks’ rather than vindicates morality. Richard Joyce argues that since morality is evolved to help us survive - morality therefore doesn’t derive from anything true - he argues at best we have non-cognitivism and cannot go beyond ‘our’ viewpoint to condemn something as objectively wrong; he writes ‘how much sounder might we sleep at night, were we confident that we hanged the criminal because he did something objectively wrong, as opposed to acknowledging that we hanged him because he did something we found wrong’ i.e non cognitivism. How would you respond to this - can criminal behaviour be objectively wrong or is it just a cultural prejudice to promote cooperation as Alex Rosenberg argues? Joyce is a strong error theorist and forcefully argues in many of his papers morality can claim no objectivity or overriding reasons and really someone that lacks moral desires has no reason to be moral.
Stella, as you wrote yourself, evolutionary ethics provides a local, contingent type of objectivity. Joyce is forcing the usual false dichotomy: either morality is universally objective or it is subjectively relative. There is a third way. What is moral,y “wrong” is anti-social behavior that hampers people’s ability to flourish. Since I’m against the death penalty and in favor or rehabilitation, I wouldn’t hang the criminal, but I would rather treat him as a patient to be cured, if possible, in the meanwhile putting him in a position not to harm.
What am I to make of the timing of this essay? A dissection of the trope 'Genocide is wrong' at a time when the possible genocide of two million people is in progress? A little self-indulgent, Massimo?
I don't really agree completely with Massimo's reply. His analysis IS relevant, whether he intended it to apply or not, to anyone's claim that one side or the other in a war is committing "genocide." Any who wish to dismiss any claim of complex rationale for complex actions with a single, sweeping moral denunciation /label would do well to read and understand the analysis this essay included.
Ed, I certainly hope that an essay on moral philosophy is going to be applicable no matter the situation. What I meant in response to Dorothy was that this particular essay wasn’t written with *that* particular situation in mind.
Fascinating. Always happy to see Hume discussed too. The background discussions of Pyrrhonism in your notes has helped me understand much I did not (or at least provided a framework for my thinking).
A couple of years ago, I had an email exchange with Paul Rozin after his work on disgust appeared in the New York Times:
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/12/27/magazine/disgust-science.html
It occurred to me that the moral judgments around disgust are related to the conceptual processing we need to do in terms of achieving or avoiding goal states. The point is this: if we attempting to achieve a positive outcome, then we use a functional model - go to for the gusto. But if we are trying to avoid a bad outcome, we have to use causal reasoning, because (hopefully) we are dealing with counter-factuals. If you are alreading in some disgusting deep doo-doo, you've already blown it. What I was wondering was about the asymmetry of the moral reasoning of disgust vis-a-vis its opposite (pleasure? delightful? blissful?). I wrote a short essay on Medium, describing the moral issues involved, but also laying out the conceptual issues in terms of computer reasoning such as you would find in Artificial Intelligence:
https://medium.com/science-and-philosophy/functional-versus-explanatory-models-for-learning-708a36e57150
In terms of morality, the conceptual reasoning behind states you want to avoid is qualitatively different from the reasoning you use to achieve a positive state. We strive for eudaimonia, but we employ causal reasoning to avoid ill-being. They are not mirror-images of each other. Striving at its best is automatic and almost intuitive. Causal reasoning is conditional.
Antony, I'm not sure. I think in both cases we use a combination of causal reasoning and intuition. Please and pain/disgust are evolved abilities that warn us, at an intuitive level, of certain things and attract us to others. But in themselves they are insufficient, hence the additional of reasoned-based causal thinking.
Yes, I am aware of that. For example, the causal reasoning around disgust must be combined with an intuitive judgement of what object or event is disgusting. So it is a combination.
But functional processing (intuition) versus causal reasoning predominates depending on whether you want to achieve a goal or avoid it. I think it is worthwhile to point out this asymmetry. It is a warning that the way we go about making decisions, indlucing moral choices is not one uniform method, but is tailored to the situation.
One example of the difference is the idea of a feedback loop. This is like the thermostat in your air conditioning unit. It requires a goal to aim for. You cannot create a stable feedback loop by saying "do anything but this setpoint".
The reason that this distinction is important is that when we discuss reasoning, we tend to focus on logic which mostly applies to causal reasoning. But we tend to give short shrift to the nature of our intuitions and how they are formed. For example, in your Stoic logic you mention "kataleptic impressions". This is obviously a type of functional, intuitionistic reasoning, which I am claiming is what we do when we try to achieve a goal - in this case, the kind of impression that one has that the day outside is sunny or cloudy. How do we arrive at these impressions? We tend to leave this part uninspected and focus on logic which is somewhat easier to analyze.
My point is that at the most abstract there is a distinction: causal reasoning helps us to work out hypothetical alternative and counter factuals and allows us to plan things by analyzing alternatives. But this type is reasoning is "slow". Functional reasoning is thinking "fast". Sometimes it is necessary to think fast, because thinking slow gets in the way. In the moral realm, someone of good character is often that way because they have internalized the functional reasoning to such an extent that doing the right thing (or wrong thing, if they are of lesser character) is automatic.
Discussions of reasoning must handle both cases. In my field of Artificial Intelligence, this distinction came up pretty early, in the contrast of procedural versus declarative knowledge in the 1970s:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Procedural_knowledge
Although the process of reasoning is always a combination of the two, one type prdominates over the other. My insight was that this often happens if you want to achieve something or avoid it.
Antony, I think I'm largely in agreement. Yes, we have, broadly speaking, two systems of thinking, fast and slow, as Kahneman calls them. But these have been known from antiquity. The Stoics do distinguish between what we would today call autonomic and deliberate thoughts.
Within a Stoic context we tend to focus on deliberate reasoning because that's the part that is "up to us," as Epictetus puts it. Autonomous thoughts just float by, and the only thing we can do about them is to assent to them or not.
Kataleptic impressions are not just a form of intuition. They are resistant to arguments as well. If I see that it is day outside, you will have a really hard time trying to convince me otherwise.
Also, sometimes causal thinking is instinctive. We see smoke and we automatically infer fire, we don't have to sit down and think about it.
And yes, a major goal of Epictetus's training, his Discipline of Assent, is to automatize our moral judgment, shifting them, if you will, from slow to fast thinking. We do that, as you say, by reflection-driven habituation.
Why is David Hume in a toga, and do you think not believing in time is against nature which makes the belief immoral?
Maks, don't know why David is in toga. I guess it looked cool to the sculptor.
Not sure what you mean by "not believing in time," can you elaborate?
According to Clifford any belief based on insufficient evidence is immoral. What is yours based on?
But isn't "murder" defined as socially disapproved killing, in turn meaning that all societies disapprove of murder?
Doug, no, murder is defined as the unjust killing of another human being. And *because* it is unjust then it is also socially disapproved and therefore unlawful.
Where does that "unjust" come from? From the fact that human beings are social animals, and social groups cannot survive if members start murdering each other.
In the area in and around Gaza a large number of people have recently died as the result of intentional human actions. Is there some criterion of justice that allows everyone to evaluate each death to assess whether it was just or unjust? If so, why is there such disagreement and so much killing going on?
Doug, I believe I've answered that question several times. It has to do with human flourishing, one doesn't have to evaluate every single life lost to figure out that war is a bad idea.
I think I've also addressed the disagreement argument a number of times: disagreement, on its own, is no evidence at all of lack of a good answer. See, as an example, the creation-evolution debate: half of Americans disbelieve evolution. That's not because there is an actual scientific controversy, it's because they don't get it.
Let me ask you a count-question: is there any scenario under which you, as a Pyrrhonist, would be moved to say that killing a human being is wrong?
If war is a bad idea then it must be bad for everyone. But if some engage in war and others refrain from it, those who refrain from it will be killed. For those who would otherwise be killed, war therefore is a good idea.
We have laws and customs about assessing whether a particular killing was wrong. We also have personal feelings. For example, I feel that the killing of my father was wrong.
Doug, once more: disagreement among people is not an indicator of anything, on its own. Because people may be mistaken.
I’m sorry about your father. But seriously the best you can say is that you “feel” it was wrong and that otherwise you go with the prevalent custom?
So if the custom is to kill all the Jews in 1930s Germany you’re good with that?
So, you think you would be mistaken that if another society declared war on your society that your society should not engage in war?
Why should I have anything better to say about my father's death than to say that I feel it was wrong? It is perhaps interesting to point out that laws and customs about such things have changed since the time it happened. While it was considered wrong then as it is now, now it seems to be considered more wrong. More is done to prevent such things and the punishments are greater now for those who are considered culpable. I suspect that this is because people in the past who felt as I do influenced law and custom.
In 1930s Germany it was not the custom to kill all the Jews. This was pursued only by a small faction of society. This faction knew what they were doing was against common opinion and worked carefully to hide their actions. Even those involved at the highest levels used euphemisms in official documents.
Very Interesting piece. Although I’m quite often in favor of suspending judgement, how one gets from there to “error theory” is a bridge, way too far, for me.
Exactly!
timely and telling--thanks
Hi Massimo thank you for this excellent artical! I believe strongly in our evolutionary ethical past also and in many ways I think it gives us reason to believe in an objective morality - albeit a contingent and constructed one. However some philosophers , especially Joyce like you mentioned , make the case that our evolutionary past ‘debunks’ rather than vindicates morality. Richard Joyce argues that since morality is evolved to help us survive - morality therefore doesn’t derive from anything true - he argues at best we have non-cognitivism and cannot go beyond ‘our’ viewpoint to condemn something as objectively wrong; he writes ‘how much sounder might we sleep at night, were we confident that we hanged the criminal because he did something objectively wrong, as opposed to acknowledging that we hanged him because he did something we found wrong’ i.e non cognitivism. How would you respond to this - can criminal behaviour be objectively wrong or is it just a cultural prejudice to promote cooperation as Alex Rosenberg argues? Joyce is a strong error theorist and forcefully argues in many of his papers morality can claim no objectivity or overriding reasons and really someone that lacks moral desires has no reason to be moral.
Stella, as you wrote yourself, evolutionary ethics provides a local, contingent type of objectivity. Joyce is forcing the usual false dichotomy: either morality is universally objective or it is subjectively relative. There is a third way. What is moral,y “wrong” is anti-social behavior that hampers people’s ability to flourish. Since I’m against the death penalty and in favor or rehabilitation, I wouldn’t hang the criminal, but I would rather treat him as a patient to be cured, if possible, in the meanwhile putting him in a position not to harm.
What am I to make of the timing of this essay? A dissection of the trope 'Genocide is wrong' at a time when the possible genocide of two million people is in progress? A little self-indulgent, Massimo?
Dorothy, make what you like of it. But the essay has nothing whatsoever to do with what is currently going on. Not everything does or has to.
I'm very glad to hear that.
I don't really agree completely with Massimo's reply. His analysis IS relevant, whether he intended it to apply or not, to anyone's claim that one side or the other in a war is committing "genocide." Any who wish to dismiss any claim of complex rationale for complex actions with a single, sweeping moral denunciation /label would do well to read and understand the analysis this essay included.
Ed, I certainly hope that an essay on moral philosophy is going to be applicable no matter the situation. What I meant in response to Dorothy was that this particular essay wasn’t written with *that* particular situation in mind.
Fascinating. Always happy to see Hume discussed too. The background discussions of Pyrrhonism in your notes has helped me understand much I did not (or at least provided a framework for my thinking).
John, glad to hear it!
I hope you are doing well, Morton!
Glad you like them!
but we still agree--most of us at least--that Massimo is the better looking of the two
😆