The person I was contending with is a moral realist, who would say that the function which represents those rules, the rules under which we play chess now, is the correct set of rules, and that this correctness is objective and independent of the minds of chess players.
I explained the point I was making and that wasn’t it: The point was what obligation/compulsion means. It doesn’t mean it is physically impossible to
do what is morally forbidden. It doesn’t mean it is an edict you will be punished for
disobeying. It does mean that it is logically impossible to be moral (or rational or a chess player) after having significantly departed from the rules.
This person would, I presume, argue that if suddenly every chess player in the world at the same time agreed to eliminate en passant from the game of chess, that they would then be playing the game “wrong”.
They would be playing a different game..chess 2.0 or chess++. Plainly,
you can’t have one player using the revised rules and her opponent the old ones.
With your chess analogy, those moves that are forbidden are set by human minds and decisions. The game of chess itself is a product of human intelligence, and they can change the rules over time, and indeed they have.
Are you saying that morality works the same way? That what is morally forbidden are those things which most people find objectionable / assign negative value to?
They would be playing a different game..chess 2.0 or chess++. Plainly, you can’t have one player using the revised rules and her opponent the old ones.
Dude, you just said a minute ago that the word “chess” could be a family of different but related rulesets when I asked about castling, but now when it comes to changing en passant the game becomes something else entirely? I think you should respond to my question on that thread about a precise explanation of what you mean by “chess”, as I cannot figure out why some things count and others do not.
If you vary the way games work too much, you end with useless non-games (winning is undefinable, one player always wins...)
If you vary the way rationality works too much, you end up with paradox, quodlibet etc.
If you vary the rules of meta ethics too much, you end up with anyone being allowed to do anything, or nobody being allowed to do anything.
“The rules are made up” doesn’t mean the rules are abitrary.
There is a family of chess-type games, and they are different games, because they
are not intersubstitutable.
I explained the point I was making and that wasn’t it: The point was what obligation/compulsion means. It doesn’t mean it is physically impossible to do what is morally forbidden. It doesn’t mean it is an edict you will be punished for disobeying. It does mean that it is logically impossible to be moral (or rational or a chess player) after having significantly departed from the rules.
They would be playing a different game..chess 2.0 or chess++. Plainly, you can’t have one player using the revised rules and her opponent the old ones.
With your chess analogy, those moves that are forbidden are set by human minds and decisions. The game of chess itself is a product of human intelligence, and they can change the rules over time, and indeed they have.
Are you saying that morality works the same way? That what is morally forbidden are those things which most people find objectionable / assign negative value to?
Dude, you just said a minute ago that the word “chess” could be a family of different but related rulesets when I asked about castling, but now when it comes to changing en passant the game becomes something else entirely? I think you should respond to my question on that thread about a precise explanation of what you mean by “chess”, as I cannot figure out why some things count and others do not.
If you vary the way games work too much, you end with useless non-games (winning is undefinable, one player always wins...) If you vary the way rationality works too much, you end up with paradox, quodlibet etc. If you vary the rules of meta ethics too much, you end up with anyone being allowed to do anything, or nobody being allowed to do anything. “The rules are made up” doesn’t mean the rules are abitrary.
There is a family of chess-type games, and they are different games, because they are not intersubstitutable.