[lit-ideas] Re: Reductive vs. Reductionist
- From: "Walter C. Okshevsky" <wokshevs@xxxxxx>
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx, Jlsperanza@xxxxxxx
- Date: Mon, 4 Mar 2013 17:20:07 -0330
Why would we need a "metaphysical explanation" of the irreducibility of moral
rightness to (empirical) facts? I ask this, in part, because I don't know what
such an explanation would look like. I await edification. Isn't Hume's version
of the naturalistic fallacy (NF) sufficient here? Zum beispiel:
"Lesbians cannot reproduce, therefore, they ought not to be allowed to marry."
What can metaphysics offer here to show invalidity of inference that is not
already covered by the NF acc to Hume? (No "ought" from only an "is.")
Walter O
Quoting Jlsperanza@xxxxxxx:
>
>
> In a message dated 3/4/2013 10:09:34 A.M. UTC-02,
> donalmcevoyuk@xxxxxxxxxxx writes:
> Popper does not give is a fuller metaphysical explanation for the
> irreducibility of moral rightness to facts. The problem of more fully
> explaining
> how moral rightness is irreducible to facts is left, in Popper's philosophy,
>
> as one of the many problems of irreducibility that defy full explanation:
> for example, why mathematics is not reducible to logic, or biology to
> physics. To say the irreducibility is because a distinct level of problem
> emerges
> [say when we move from logic to mathematics, or from physics to biology]
> may be true - but it is not an explanation of that emergence. Further, the
> problem of the irreducibility of morals to facts is also of a different
> order to these other kinds of irreducibility, as the other kinds of
> irreducibility each pertain to explanation within a 'factual' and non-moral
> realm
> [e.g. the realm of logic, mathematics, physics, biology etc.].
>
> The subject line may sound technical but it's vintage Grice.
>
> When Julie M. Jack wrote (but never published) "The rights and wrongs of
> Grice", Grice replied that Mrs Jack fails to distinguish between 'reductive'
>
> and 'reductionist'.
>
> E.g.
>
> Suppose Hegel is into a reductive analysis of moral pheneomena to facts.
>
> This is still different from Hegel providing a REDUCTIONIST (i.e.
> eliminationist) analysis of them.
>
> Thus, I hold Grice to be a naturalist when it comes to matters moral --
> "The conception of value" --. He is a constructionist, or constructivist
> (cfr.
> supervenience, which as McEvoy may think, does not explain much), who sees
> rationality as grounded on natural pre-rational phenomena, for example. He
> is not an eliminationist alla Churchlands, e.g.
>
> Popper may have something to say on this. Or not.
>
> Cheers,
>
> Speranza
>
>
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