I don’t see how this answers my objection. I’ll try to restate my main point in a more clear form.
The claim that “‘healthy’ is not a precisely defined concept, but no one is crazy enough to utter that medicine cannot answer questions of health” is, while superficially plausible, in fact false under the interpretation relevant for this discussion. Namely, the claim is true only for those issues where the concept of “health” is precise and uncontroversial. In situations where the concept of “health” is imprecise and a matter of dispute, there are sane and knowledgeable people who plausibly dispute that medicine can legitimately answer questions of health in those particular situations. Thus, what superficially looks like a lucid analogy is in fact a rhetorical sleight of hand.
(Also, I’d say that by any reasonable measure, questions of health vs. disease are typically much more clear-cut than moral questions. The appearance of coughing or headaches, ceteris paribus, represents an unambiguous reduction of health; on the other hand, even killing requires significant qualifications to be universally recognized as evil. But my main objection stands regardless of whether you agree with this.)
Its easier to tell that something is unhealthy than if its optimally healthy. Coughing up blood is worse than not doing so, but is good stamina better than increased alertness?
(I’d posit that) Most moral arguments are over if something is immoral or not, and I think that a lot of times those can be related to facts.
You’re right that people often wonder whether something is moral as if it were a binary question, but they should be concerned about precisely how good or bad various actions or policies are, because all actions have opportunity costs.
It makes little sense to say “it is immoral for teachers to beat schoolchildren” without considering the effects of not beating schoolchildren.
I am not sure whether I can fully agree, although I see your point more clearly now. To give one example, we had a discussion about deafness recently. One of the disputed question was whether the deaf are “sick” or “a linguistic minority”. If deafness can be easily cured in all instances (and this is purely a question of medicine), then the “linguistic minority” stance would be hardly defensible. Anyway, there are questions which medicine certainly can answer (typically—what are the causes, can the condition be cured, what are the side effects of the treatment) pertaining to conditions whose qualification as disease is disputed by reasonable people.
The idea that someone who is fat is unhealthy isn’t obvious. Science has shown that they’re more likely suffer from heart disease among other things. Because of this, nearly everyone agrees that being fat is bad.
I’m confused. It looks like the original post is arguing that science can answer some moral questions, and using the health analogy to advance this claim. In that case, pointing out that science can’t answer all health issues but only some, even if true, does not undercut the original argument.
Perhaps the fields of psychology and ethics both exhibit a continuum of objectivity of a similar nature. If this is the case, then as surely as psychology is helpful, so could be a well constructed formal theory of ethical action. Certainly moral solutions are not clear cut, and many factors can play in to choosing how to act.
An Ethical system qua normative claims is effectively a system of heuristics for effecting an outcome. The normative claims represent our physical (neurological) response to external consequences, and there is definite interplay between situational parameters that weight the decision to act in one way or another. Many people, for instance, claim it is wrong to murder one person to save another, but various factors can come in to play that alter the weight of that conviction. For instance, it is generally considered acceptable to kill an attacker when it is necessary to prevent him/her from killing you.
I am not convinced that is is not possible to effectively model average (or any augmentation of) human morality, and I think that it is also likely that if we could do this we might be able to more effectively sort out which actions to take given certain parameters. However, like a healthy psyche, a healthy morality is defined via social standards. Due to that, it will not be absolute, but rather goal relative. As far as I can tell, a healthy psyche is most generally one that allows for adherence to the most commonly held social conventions for what is of value and how that which is valuable is acceptably obtained.
As long a certain basic reactions to certain consequences of one’s actions are nearly universally accepted (and this seems to be the case when it comes to very basic questions of morality), I think that it is reasonable in theory (though I am fuzzy about how one might work out the details) to think that we could model moral decision making in such a way that it could effectively help us to make practical decisions to yield optimal results.
I don’t see how this answers my objection. I’ll try to restate my main point in a more clear form.
The claim that “‘healthy’ is not a precisely defined concept, but no one is crazy enough to utter that medicine cannot answer questions of health” is, while superficially plausible, in fact false under the interpretation relevant for this discussion. Namely, the claim is true only for those issues where the concept of “health” is precise and uncontroversial. In situations where the concept of “health” is imprecise and a matter of dispute, there are sane and knowledgeable people who plausibly dispute that medicine can legitimately answer questions of health in those particular situations. Thus, what superficially looks like a lucid analogy is in fact a rhetorical sleight of hand.
(Also, I’d say that by any reasonable measure, questions of health vs. disease are typically much more clear-cut than moral questions. The appearance of coughing or headaches, ceteris paribus, represents an unambiguous reduction of health; on the other hand, even killing requires significant qualifications to be universally recognized as evil. But my main objection stands regardless of whether you agree with this.)
Its easier to tell that something is unhealthy than if its optimally healthy. Coughing up blood is worse than not doing so, but is good stamina better than increased alertness?
(I’d posit that) Most moral arguments are over if something is immoral or not, and I think that a lot of times those can be related to facts.
You’re right that people often wonder whether something is moral as if it were a binary question, but they should be concerned about precisely how good or bad various actions or policies are, because all actions have opportunity costs.
It makes little sense to say “it is immoral for teachers to beat schoolchildren” without considering the effects of not beating schoolchildren.
I am not sure whether I can fully agree, although I see your point more clearly now. To give one example, we had a discussion about deafness recently. One of the disputed question was whether the deaf are “sick” or “a linguistic minority”. If deafness can be easily cured in all instances (and this is purely a question of medicine), then the “linguistic minority” stance would be hardly defensible. Anyway, there are questions which medicine certainly can answer (typically—what are the causes, can the condition be cured, what are the side effects of the treatment) pertaining to conditions whose qualification as disease is disputed by reasonable people.
The idea that someone who is fat is unhealthy isn’t obvious. Science has shown that they’re more likely suffer from heart disease among other things. Because of this, nearly everyone agrees that being fat is bad.
I’m confused. It looks like the original post is arguing that science can answer some moral questions, and using the health analogy to advance this claim. In that case, pointing out that science can’t answer all health issues but only some, even if true, does not undercut the original argument.
Perhaps the fields of psychology and ethics both exhibit a continuum of objectivity of a similar nature. If this is the case, then as surely as psychology is helpful, so could be a well constructed formal theory of ethical action. Certainly moral solutions are not clear cut, and many factors can play in to choosing how to act.
An Ethical system qua normative claims is effectively a system of heuristics for effecting an outcome. The normative claims represent our physical (neurological) response to external consequences, and there is definite interplay between situational parameters that weight the decision to act in one way or another. Many people, for instance, claim it is wrong to murder one person to save another, but various factors can come in to play that alter the weight of that conviction. For instance, it is generally considered acceptable to kill an attacker when it is necessary to prevent him/her from killing you.
I am not convinced that is is not possible to effectively model average (or any augmentation of) human morality, and I think that it is also likely that if we could do this we might be able to more effectively sort out which actions to take given certain parameters. However, like a healthy psyche, a healthy morality is defined via social standards. Due to that, it will not be absolute, but rather goal relative. As far as I can tell, a healthy psyche is most generally one that allows for adherence to the most commonly held social conventions for what is of value and how that which is valuable is acceptably obtained.
As long a certain basic reactions to certain consequences of one’s actions are nearly universally accepted (and this seems to be the case when it comes to very basic questions of morality), I think that it is reasonable in theory (though I am fuzzy about how one might work out the details) to think that we could model moral decision making in such a way that it could effectively help us to make practical decisions to yield optimal results.