I take it you want to reduce a hypothetical imperative like “If you want to stretch, then you ought to stand” into a physically-kosher causal claim like “standing is causally necessary for satisfying your desire to stretch”. Now, I’m skeptical about this reduction, simply because I don’t see how a mere causal claim could provide any normative direction whatsoever. But in any case, it seems that you could equally well reduce a categorical imperative like “Regardless of what you personally want, if you are the only one around a drowning child, then you ought to help save it from drowning” into a physically-kosher causal claim like “your help is causally necessary for the survival of the drowning child”. Both causal claims are equally physicalistic, and both seem equally relevant to their respective imperative, so both physicalistic reductions seem equally promising.
Of course, the question “why should I assume that the drowning’s child survival actually matters?” seems reasonable enough. But so does the question “why should I assume that satisfying my desire to stretch actually matters?” If the first question jeopardizes the reduction of the categorical imperative, then the second question would also jeopardize the reduction of the hypothetical imperative.
it seems that you could equally well reduce a categorical imperative like “Regardless of what you personally want, if you are the only one around a drowning child, then you ought to help save it from drowning” into a physically-kosher causal claim like “your help is causally necessary for the survival of the drowning child”
I’m not used to the term ‘categorical imperative’ being used in this way. Normally, a categorical imperative is one that holds not just regardless of what you want, but regardless of any stated ends at all. Your reduction of this categorical imperative assumes an end of ‘survival of the drowning child.’ To me, that’s what we call a hypothetical imperative, and that’s why it can be reduced in that way, by translating normativity into statements about means and ends.
I think you must be mistaken about categorical imperatives and ends.
In the Groundwork, Kant deems rational nature (‘humanity’ in us) to be an end in itself which can ground a categorical imperative, in the 2nd Critique, he deems the highest good (happiness in proportion to virtue) to be a necessary end of practical reason, and in the Metaphysics of Morals, he deems one’s own perfection and the happiness of others to be ends that are also duties. For Kant, the categorical imperative of morality is directed at ends, but it is not a mere hypothetical imperative grounded in subjective ends.
And leaving Kant aside, plenty of moral systems aspiring to categorical force have ends at their center. Classic utilitarianism picks out the greatest overall balance of pleasure over pain as the one and only end of morality. Eudaimonist virtue ethics has as its end a well-lived flourishing life for the agent. Thomist ethics says an intellectual vision of God in the afterlife is the ultimate end of humans. These systems do not traffic in merely hypothetical imperatives: they present these ends as objectively worth pursuing, regardless of the agent’s personal preferences.
But if your main point is simply that my ‘reduction’ assumes that the end ought to be pursued, and that this assumption is a form of cheating, then I agree. I’ve left the normativity unexplained and unreduced. But then in exactly the same way, your reduction of hypothetical imperatives assumes that effective means to one’s ends ought to be taken, and this assumption is also a form of cheating. You have also left the normativity unexplained and unreduced.
So I don’t see how hypothetical imperatives are any more fit for naturalistic reduction than categorical imperatives.
I’m sure I speak differently about categorical imperatives than Kant does. I haven’t read much of Kant, and I don’t regret that. In your language, what you call an “end in itself” is what I mean to pick out when I talk about an imperative that “holds… regardless of any stated [arbitrary, desired, subjective] ends at all.” I don’t really know what it means for something to be an “end in itself”. Kant’s idea seemed to be that we ought to do X regardless of what anyone wants. Your way (and perhaps Kant’s way) of talking about this is to say that we ought to do X regardless of what anyone wants because X leads to a particular “end in itself”, whatever that means.
your reduction of hypothetical imperatives assumes that effective means to one’s ends ought to be taken, and this assumption is also a form of cheating
My reduction of hypothetical imperative doesn’t assume this. It only translates ‘ought’ into a prediction about what would realize the specified end. If there’s something mysterious left over, I’m curious what you think it is and whether it is real or merely a figment of folk wisdom and linguistic practice.
So, on your use of ‘end’, an ‘end’ cannot be objective and unconditional? I think that’s a highly uncommon use of the term.
But if you go this way, it seems like it’s less of a reduction of ‘ought’ and more of a misinterpretation, like reducing ‘Santa Claus’-talk into talk about Christmas cheer, or ‘God’-talk into talk of love.
After all, one important constraint on any interpretation of any ‘ought to X’ is that it should be positive towards X as opposed to negative or neutral, in favor of some action or attitude as opposed to against it or indifferent. But a mere predictive causal claim doesn’t have any valence at all: it’s just a neutral claim about what will probably lead to what, without anything positive or negative. So any attempt to reduce oughts to predictive causal claims seems doomed to failure.
EDIT: For the record, I’m an expressivist about normativity, and I think any attempt to understand it in terms of some actual or hypothetical ontology that could serve as the truth-conditions for a descriptive belief is a mistake. The mystery, I would say, lies in a descriptive interpretation of normativity, not in normativity itself.
So, on your use of ‘end’, an ‘end’ cannot be objective and unconditional? I think that’s a highly uncommon use of the term.
No, I just should have been clearer that when I said “stated end” I meant “subjective, desired end”. As commonly used, ‘end’ includes unconditional ends, I just haven’t ever been presented with an argument that persuaded me to think that such ends exist.
one important constraint on any interpretation of any ‘ought to X’ is that it should be positive towards X as opposed to negative or neutral, in favor of some action or attitude as opposed to against it or indifferent. But a mere predictive causal claim doesn’t have any valence at all: it’s just a neutral claim about what will probably lead to what, without anything positive or negative. So any attempt to reduce oughts to predictive causal claims seems doomed to failure.
Sure, you can stick that feature into your meaning of ‘ought’ if you want. But I’m not going too deep into the conceptual analysis game with you. If you want to include positive valence in the meaning of a hypothetical ought, then we could translate like this:
“If you want to stretch, you ought to stand” → “standing will make it more likely that you fulfill your desire to stretch, and I have positive affect toward you standing so as to fulfill your desire to stretch”
As I said in my post, expressivism is fine—and certainly true of how many speakers use normative language. I happen to be particularly interested in those who use normative language cognitively, and whether their stated moral judgments are true or false, and under which conditions—which is why I’m investigating translations/reductions of normative language into natural statements that have truth conditions.
I take it you want to reduce a hypothetical imperative like “If you want to stretch, then you ought to stand” into a physically-kosher causal claim like “standing is causally necessary for satisfying your desire to stretch”. Now, I’m skeptical about this reduction, simply because I don’t see how a mere causal claim could provide any normative direction whatsoever. But in any case, it seems that you could equally well reduce a categorical imperative like “Regardless of what you personally want, if you are the only one around a drowning child, then you ought to help save it from drowning” into a physically-kosher causal claim like “your help is causally necessary for the survival of the drowning child”. Both causal claims are equally physicalistic, and both seem equally relevant to their respective imperative, so both physicalistic reductions seem equally promising.
Of course, the question “why should I assume that the drowning’s child survival actually matters?” seems reasonable enough. But so does the question “why should I assume that satisfying my desire to stretch actually matters?” If the first question jeopardizes the reduction of the categorical imperative, then the second question would also jeopardize the reduction of the hypothetical imperative.
I’m not used to the term ‘categorical imperative’ being used in this way. Normally, a categorical imperative is one that holds not just regardless of what you want, but regardless of any stated ends at all. Your reduction of this categorical imperative assumes an end of ‘survival of the drowning child.’ To me, that’s what we call a hypothetical imperative, and that’s why it can be reduced in that way, by translating normativity into statements about means and ends.
I think you must be mistaken about categorical imperatives and ends.
In the Groundwork, Kant deems rational nature (‘humanity’ in us) to be an end in itself which can ground a categorical imperative, in the 2nd Critique, he deems the highest good (happiness in proportion to virtue) to be a necessary end of practical reason, and in the Metaphysics of Morals, he deems one’s own perfection and the happiness of others to be ends that are also duties. For Kant, the categorical imperative of morality is directed at ends, but it is not a mere hypothetical imperative grounded in subjective ends.
And leaving Kant aside, plenty of moral systems aspiring to categorical force have ends at their center. Classic utilitarianism picks out the greatest overall balance of pleasure over pain as the one and only end of morality. Eudaimonist virtue ethics has as its end a well-lived flourishing life for the agent. Thomist ethics says an intellectual vision of God in the afterlife is the ultimate end of humans. These systems do not traffic in merely hypothetical imperatives: they present these ends as objectively worth pursuing, regardless of the agent’s personal preferences.
But if your main point is simply that my ‘reduction’ assumes that the end ought to be pursued, and that this assumption is a form of cheating, then I agree. I’ve left the normativity unexplained and unreduced. But then in exactly the same way, your reduction of hypothetical imperatives assumes that effective means to one’s ends ought to be taken, and this assumption is also a form of cheating. You have also left the normativity unexplained and unreduced.
So I don’t see how hypothetical imperatives are any more fit for naturalistic reduction than categorical imperatives.
I’m sure I speak differently about categorical imperatives than Kant does. I haven’t read much of Kant, and I don’t regret that. In your language, what you call an “end in itself” is what I mean to pick out when I talk about an imperative that “holds… regardless of any stated [arbitrary, desired, subjective] ends at all.” I don’t really know what it means for something to be an “end in itself”. Kant’s idea seemed to be that we ought to do X regardless of what anyone wants. Your way (and perhaps Kant’s way) of talking about this is to say that we ought to do X regardless of what anyone wants because X leads to a particular “end in itself”, whatever that means.
My reduction of hypothetical imperative doesn’t assume this. It only translates ‘ought’ into a prediction about what would realize the specified end. If there’s something mysterious left over, I’m curious what you think it is and whether it is real or merely a figment of folk wisdom and linguistic practice.
So, on your use of ‘end’, an ‘end’ cannot be objective and unconditional? I think that’s a highly uncommon use of the term.
But if you go this way, it seems like it’s less of a reduction of ‘ought’ and more of a misinterpretation, like reducing ‘Santa Claus’-talk into talk about Christmas cheer, or ‘God’-talk into talk of love.
After all, one important constraint on any interpretation of any ‘ought to X’ is that it should be positive towards X as opposed to negative or neutral, in favor of some action or attitude as opposed to against it or indifferent. But a mere predictive causal claim doesn’t have any valence at all: it’s just a neutral claim about what will probably lead to what, without anything positive or negative. So any attempt to reduce oughts to predictive causal claims seems doomed to failure.
EDIT: For the record, I’m an expressivist about normativity, and I think any attempt to understand it in terms of some actual or hypothetical ontology that could serve as the truth-conditions for a descriptive belief is a mistake. The mystery, I would say, lies in a descriptive interpretation of normativity, not in normativity itself.
No, I just should have been clearer that when I said “stated end” I meant “subjective, desired end”. As commonly used, ‘end’ includes unconditional ends, I just haven’t ever been presented with an argument that persuaded me to think that such ends exist.
Sure, you can stick that feature into your meaning of ‘ought’ if you want. But I’m not going too deep into the conceptual analysis game with you. If you want to include positive valence in the meaning of a hypothetical ought, then we could translate like this:
“If you want to stretch, you ought to stand” → “standing will make it more likely that you fulfill your desire to stretch, and I have positive affect toward you standing so as to fulfill your desire to stretch”
As I said in my post, expressivism is fine—and certainly true of how many speakers use normative language. I happen to be particularly interested in those who use normative language cognitively, and whether their stated moral judgments are true or false, and under which conditions—which is why I’m investigating translations/reductions of normative language into natural statements that have truth conditions.
What do you think human wellbeing is for,then?