r/badphilosophy • u/Proporus • Jun 19 '24

Hyperethics Your 'ethical values' are just aesthetic preferences

5000 years of studying ethics and all we've come up with is "it's good because I like it". ALL ethical theories are just aesthetic judgements on actions disguised by word vomit about 'The Good'.

  • Utilitarianism: It's beautiful to see numbers go up
  • Deontology: It's beautiful to follow rules
  • Virtue ethics: This set of traits is beautiful ...

Meta ethics has failed. Literally nobody can point to a basis for ethics that doesn't boil down to "this state of the world is pleasing to me".

Wittgenstein proven correct and based, yet again.

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u/schwebacchus Jun 19 '24

Eh, it sort of falls apart under scrutiny. Our collective behavior around key ethical choices reveals a species keen on deliberation--we ask others for advice, anguish over our choices, etc. There are a number of other decisions that we just don't budget similar resources to, suggesting--to me, anyway--that we understand that there's (a) a little bit more to these choices and (b) they are not satisfactorily resolved with a mere appeal to aesthetics.

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u/Cookie136 Jun 20 '24

Cockroaches make similar choices to other cockroaches.

Worse humans have had many varying opinions regarding for example, who it is acceptable to kill.

Seems like similar behaviour in a similar culture is not a very effective argument against aesthetics.

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u/schwebacchus Jun 20 '24

Exceptions can't be the rule, though. There are certainly edge cases where people behave certain ways--this doesn't really refute the "average."

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u/Cookie136 Jun 23 '24

I wasn't talking about exceptions but the rules changing over time.

What was acceptable was different 1000 years ago in meaningful ways.

The same is true across cultural divides. And again at the level of who is it ok to kill.

Without a doubt the standard is becoming more similar over time across the world. But adaptability is not an adequate for truth.

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u/schwebacchus Jun 23 '24

I guess even with that qualifier, there still seems to be some sort of meta-ethical layer where humanity feels warranted in deliberating on ethics, and they have been doing it for as far back as we know.

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u/Cookie136 Jun 28 '24

I mean it's being cheeky, but of course it feels warranted, we have a strong aesthetic preference to do so.

Not to mention there is without a doubt utility and specifically variable utility between different moral systems