@Ratttz Cool! Unfortunately, I already lost the bit I was writing, and started another big writing piece. I'll see about getting back to you though. XD

@Ratttz Alright, so let me give you the short version. Essentially, I disagree on the semantics you're using. "Empirical" usually means relating to experimentation and measurement. It's usually used in opposition to logical, or relating purely to reasoned deduction. Objective, on the other hand, means not influenced by personal feelings or preferences. Now, when it comes to morality, you can't pull it ex nihilo - it all has to be based on some kind of an axiom. And the only place to base that axiom is on personal feelings or preferences, which are subjective - thus making all morality subjective. :/

@Ratttz Now of course, I personally agree that the golden rule is pretty decent. I just don't think that's an objective truth. And yes, some things are more easily agreed upon than others - I think we can pretty much all agree that we'd prefer it if the world were more as we prefer it, for example. (That's basically a tautology.) But that doesn't make it objective.

And yes, I know this basically puts me in exactly the position you were complaining about, holding objectivity as some universal truth. But, at least for the moment, that's where I stand. I don't think that anything two people can agree on is objective. :/

@Angle "Objective, on the other hand, means not influenced by personal feelings or preferences." No, that's the common vernacular use of the phrase.

I'm referring specifically to objective facts of consensus reality, which is fundamentally a different thing. Within this framework, moral axioms aren't created ex nihilo, but are consequences of social relations.

I agree that there can be no moral axioms from first principles, but that framework sucks.

@Ratttz I don't think it's fair to call consensus morality objective. I'd prefer some other term for it. :/

@Angle It is because we haven't found any other realities, and even if we did they'd _become_ consensus realities.

@Ratttz Individual realities? Or competing consensus realities. Actually, thats a good point - even when a consensus reality seems dominant, theres always competition. Even when homosexuality was something that could get you thrown in prison, there was still stonewall inn. :/

@Angle You really can't have an individual reality for reasons detailed in Being and Nothingness.

To paraphrase or shorten Sartre's criticism of Des Cartes, the cogito can't be the basis for the individual because the individual needs to exist within an outside context, and unless that outside context precludes other people or intelligences by default, then that context is a shared, hence, consensus reality.

@Ratttz@mastodon....Wait, but why does that mean you can't have an individual reality? You can still have people, and those people can still have their own ideas and opinions. :/