Q&A: Subjective Decisions and Ethics
Subjective Decisions and Ethics
Question
Hello, Honorable Rabbi.. In your writings, the idea is accepted that ethics has axioms. For example, in your article on vegetarianism, you developed the motif of a universal morality that is self-evident and called for by itself. You compared scientific axioms to ethical axioms in order to prove the validity of the claim that there are ethical axioms. And here the questioner asks.. personal decisions can never be universal. The only thing that can be universal and shared among human beings is science: chemistry, physics, biology, geology, and astronomy. Anything that has scientific proof is universal. Personal decisions are subject to the individual, or in Leibowitz's words, the private domain of consciousness. No person has any ability to know these decisions, or what motivates them. They vary from person to person, and cannot be observed or predicted. Leibowitz's clearest example is a camera and the human eye. Science can prove in both cases the passage of photons to the camera / to the retina of the eye. However, science cannot say a thing, not half a thing, about the question: do I see? That is subjective. And therefore universality does not apply to subjective decisions. And universal axioms are irrelevant as well, because the concept of axioms, and certainly the concept of universalism, belongs only to science.
Answer
Hello Neria.
I disagree. Science too is based on a priori assumptions that have no empirical confirmation. For example, the principle of causality and induction. A scientific generalization is an intellectual step, not an observational one, since any collection of facts can be generalized in several different ways. Therefore, in both cases we are dealing with basic assumptions that cannot be proven. And in general, since Popper it has been clear that a scientific theory or scientific law is not proven, but at most corroborated.
Therefore, the existence of basic assumptions does not undermine anything. There is no field that is not based on basic assumptions. It is indeed true that in the scientific context a broader agreement is created than in matters of taste and smell (such as artistic taste). But it seems to me that this is only a quantitative question. The basic principles of morality are usually agreed upon by most human beings, and the arguments are only at the margins. And even in argument one can persuade. Therefore I do not accept your assumption (!) that morality is relative. At most, you can say that there is no agreement on every moral instruction, but that does not mean there is no right and wrong instruction. The fact that people argue does not mean both sides are right. Even the fact that one cannot persuade does not mean both sides are right. It only means that sometimes persuasion is impossible. I also cannot persuade many people that relativity or quantum theory is correct. They will not be able to follow the arguments because of lack of knowledge and/or lack of talent.
It is true that there is no observational confirmation for moral theses, because morality is not an empirical field. But empiricism is not a necessary condition for truth.
Discussion on Answer
Hello Neria. In my book Truth and Unstable and in the fourth booklet I explained that morality too is the result of observation. It is just that the means of observation are a bit vague, and therefore there are arguments. But for the most part there is agreement. I do not see a difference between this and the principle of causality, and in my opinion in both cases one can speak of truth and falsehood. Someone who thinks differently from me morally is mistaken (in my opinion), just as on the factual plane. The question of how much one can prove to him that he is mistaken is a different question.
If morality is the result of hidden observation..
then someone who grows up in Syria, Yemen, and in many places in Africa will have moral standards completely different from the standards in the United States, Europe, Israel, etc.?
I don't think so. On most things there is agreement. Beyond that, even on the disputed points there is a direction of progress. Usually the more primitive societies accept the moral principles of the West, and not the other way around. That means this morality is more advanced (sorry for the bluntness that is not politically correct).
And above all, even if there is a dispute, that does not mean there is no truth. It is possible that one is right and the other is mistaken. The question of how to persuade is a different question, as I already wrote.
Have a good week.
When I spoke about science, I meant pure science, without additional intellectual theories. Any particular fact that is scientifically proven, like the example I gave that photons pass to the retina of the eye / camera—that is a scientific fact confirmed by a kind of technological observation.
Basic scientific principles, even though they are intellectual and not observational, like the principle of causality, are still a kind of initial conclusion from observing the world. (If I am not mistaken, you call this intuition in your book.) That intuition and intellectual conclusion is the result of a certain observation, on which an intellectual inference is built. In contrast, in matters of ethics there is no observation that gives rise to intuition. Usually the accepted observation for moral standards is society, but the constitutive observation of private morality is a person's own decision as an individual to act in a certain way. And therefore it makes no sense to speak of a right or wrong instruction, justified or unjustified—it is completely subjective.
Empiricism is not a necessary condition for truth. However, ethics can never use terms like justified and correct—not because of the lack of empiricism, but דווקא because of the polarization in the realm of subjectivity.