The idea that ethical statements are anything more than “just expressions of emotion” is, to paraphrase Lucretius, “regarded by the common people as true, by the wise[1] as false, and by rulers as useful.”
I figure you think the wise are correct. Well, then. Consider randomly selected paragraphs from Supreme Court justices’ opinions. Or consider someone saying “I’d like to throw this guy in jail, but unfortunately, the evidence we have is not admissible in court, and the judicial precedent on rules of evidence is there for a reason—it limits the potential abusiveness of the police, and that’s more important than occasionally letting a criminal off—so we have to let him go.” Is that an ethical statement? And is it “just an expression of emotion”?
For the record, in an ethical context, when I say a behavior is bad, I mean that (a) an ethical person shouldn’t do it (or at least should have an aversion to doing it—extreme circumstances might make it the best option) and (b) ethical people have license to punish it in some way, which, depending on the specifics, might range from “social disapproval” to “the force of the law”.
Alarming and dangerous as this view may be, I’d be really surprised if literally everyone who had power (“in charge of anything important”) also lacked the self-awareness to see it.
I think there are lots of people in power who are amoral, and this is indeed dangerous, and does indeed frequently lead to them harming people they rule over.
However, I don’t think most of them become amoral by reading emotivist philosophy or by independently coming to the conclusion that ethical statements are “just expressions of emotion”. What makes rulers frequently immoral? Some have hypothesized that there’s an evolved response to higher social status, to become more psychopathic. Some have said that being psychopathic makes people more likely to succeed at the fight to become a ruler. It’s also possible that they notice that, in their powerful position, they’re unlikely to face consequences for bad things they do, and… they either motivatedly find reasons to drop their ethical principles, or never held them in the first place.
I was being glib because you made some favorable (iyo) remark about the views of the people “in charge”.
I don’t actually think the “wise” I made up are entirely correct; that was just to make my paraphrase hew to the original quote about religion. Ethical statements are also tools for social signaling and status-seeking, which the “rulers” understand implicitly, among whom it is their primary purpose.
When I say a behavior is bad, it’s almost always merely an expression of my preferences. (I say almost to leave open the possibility that I might need to engage in social signaling sometimes.) But yes, I agree that all good people ought to share them and punish those who don’t.
I figure you think the wise are correct. Well, then. Consider randomly selected paragraphs from Supreme Court justices’ opinions. Or consider someone saying “I’d like to throw this guy in jail, but unfortunately, the evidence we have is not admissible in court, and the judicial precedent on rules of evidence is there for a reason—it limits the potential abusiveness of the police, and that’s more important than occasionally letting a criminal off—so we have to let him go.” Is that an ethical statement? And is it “just an expression of emotion”?
For the record, in an ethical context, when I say a behavior is bad, I mean that (a) an ethical person shouldn’t do it (or at least should have an aversion to doing it—extreme circumstances might make it the best option) and (b) ethical people have license to punish it in some way, which, depending on the specifics, might range from “social disapproval” to “the force of the law”.
I think there are lots of people in power who are amoral, and this is indeed dangerous, and does indeed frequently lead to them harming people they rule over.
However, I don’t think most of them become amoral by reading emotivist philosophy or by independently coming to the conclusion that ethical statements are “just expressions of emotion”. What makes rulers frequently immoral? Some have hypothesized that there’s an evolved response to higher social status, to become more psychopathic. Some have said that being psychopathic makes people more likely to succeed at the fight to become a ruler. It’s also possible that they notice that, in their powerful position, they’re unlikely to face consequences for bad things they do, and… they either motivatedly find reasons to drop their ethical principles, or never held them in the first place.
I was being glib because you made some favorable (iyo) remark about the views of the people “in charge”.
I don’t actually think the “wise” I made up are entirely correct; that was just to make my paraphrase hew to the original quote about religion. Ethical statements are also tools for social signaling and status-seeking, which the “rulers” understand implicitly, among whom it is their primary purpose.
When I say a behavior is bad, it’s almost always merely an expression of my preferences. (I say almost to leave open the possibility that I might need to engage in social signaling sometimes.) But yes, I agree that all good people ought to share them and punish those who don’t.