The idea that one cannot derive an “ought” from an “is” is so often asserted as a settled fact and so rarely actually argued by means other than historical difficulty or personal incredulity. I’d prefer it be stated without the chaotic inversion, if at all — not “one cannot derive an ‘ought’ from an ‘is’”, but “I don’t know how to derive an ‘ought’ from an ‘is’”. In any case, have you read the metaethics sequence? A lot of people seem to disagree, but I found that it mostly resolved/dissolved this problem to my satisfaction (you know, that wonderful feeling when you can look back upon your past self’s thoughts on the matter and find them so confused and foreign that you can barely even empathize with the state of mind that generated them anymore).
(Also, I find your claim that wanting is not a naturalistic property baffling, and your argument for that also seems to boil down to personal incredulity (I don’t know how to explain wanting in reductive naturalistic terms → it’s impossible).)
It may not be great, but I did give an argument. Roughly, again,
a) wants do entail oughts (plausible)
b) wanting = being in unproblematically naturalistic state ABC (from assumption of naturalism)
c) from a and b, there is some true statement of the form ‘being in naturalistic state ABC entails an ought’
d) but no claim of the form ‘being in naturalistic state ABC entails an ought’ is plausible
I infer from the contradiction between c and d to the falsity of b. If you could formulate your dissatisfaction as a criticism of a premise or of the reasoning, I’d be happy to listen. In particular, if you can come up with a plausible counter-example to (d), I would like to hear it.
t may not be great, but I did give an argument. Roughly, again,
a) wants do entail oughts (plausible)
b) wanting = being in unproblematically naturalistic state ABC (from assumption of naturalism)
c) from a and b, there is some true statement of the form ‘being in naturalistic state ABC entails an ought’
d) but no claim of the form ‘being in naturalistic state ABC entails an ought’ is plausible
I infer from the contradiction between c and d to the falsity of b. If you could formulate your dissatisfaction as a criticism of a premise or of the reasoning, I’d be happy to listen. In particular, if you can come up with a plausible counter-example to (d), I would like to hear it.
The idea that one cannot derive an “ought” from an “is” is so often asserted as a settled fact and so rarely actually argued by means other than historical difficulty or personal incredulity. I’d prefer it be stated without the chaotic inversion, if at all — not “one cannot derive an ‘ought’ from an ‘is’”, but “I don’t know how to derive an ‘ought’ from an ‘is’”. In any case, have you read the metaethics sequence? A lot of people seem to disagree, but I found that it mostly resolved/dissolved this problem to my satisfaction (you know, that wonderful feeling when you can look back upon your past self’s thoughts on the matter and find them so confused and foreign that you can barely even empathize with the state of mind that generated them anymore).
(Also, I find your claim that wanting is not a naturalistic property baffling, and your argument for that also seems to boil down to personal incredulity (I don’t know how to explain wanting in reductive naturalistic terms → it’s impossible).)
It may not be great, but I did give an argument. Roughly, again,
a) wants do entail oughts (plausible) b) wanting = being in unproblematically naturalistic state ABC (from assumption of naturalism) c) from a and b, there is some true statement of the form ‘being in naturalistic state ABC entails an ought’ d) but no claim of the form ‘being in naturalistic state ABC entails an ought’ is plausible
I infer from the contradiction between c and d to the falsity of b. If you could formulate your dissatisfaction as a criticism of a premise or of the reasoning, I’d be happy to listen. In particular, if you can come up with a plausible counter-example to (d), I would like to hear it.
t may not be great, but I did give an argument. Roughly, again,
a) wants do entail oughts (plausible)
b) wanting = being in unproblematically naturalistic state ABC (from assumption of naturalism)
c) from a and b, there is some true statement of the form ‘being in naturalistic state ABC entails an ought’
d) but no claim of the form ‘being in naturalistic state ABC entails an ought’ is plausible
I infer from the contradiction between c and d to the falsity of b. If you could formulate your dissatisfaction as a criticism of a premise or of the reasoning, I’d be happy to listen. In particular, if you can come up with a plausible counter-example to (d), I would like to hear it.