Ahh, I disagree, truth in the human sense is not universal not does it not change. let me give you an example. if I make a statement "Girl A is the prettiest" right now, and it is true, it does not mean that this statement is true before or after; or by an other measure of beauty.
First, you need to decide whether there is an objective truth in beauty. If there is, your statement is about a fact, if there isn't, your statement is about your preference. Fact stand up to any method of mesurement. Preference is personal and unreasonable. People have different perceptions of facts, they also have different preferences, but fact and perference are essentially different.
Next, when you state "Girl A is the prettiest.", you audiance naturally assume you statement is about the present to assess its truth. When Roosevelt stated "America is under attack", he meant america was under attack when he made the speech. He certainly didn't meant to say America will be under attack at 13 Feb 2013 3:00pm mountain time when I write this post. So, you need to put a time stamp on a statment in order to assess its truth.
when you state "Girl A is the prettiest", the truth of that statement is determined at the time you made that statement. So the truth is contained in whether "Girl A" is the prettiest at the time you made the statement. That truth does not change with time.
Science is not truth, there is a reason why it is called the "theory of relativity" not the "natural law of relativity" no one have ever proven it; and for good reason. Because, science on it's basic blocks is by definition. prove to me 1+1=2; does one square + one square = 2 square or 1 square (stacked on top) or one rectangle? when you add 2 pitcher of water together do you get a bucket of water? Truth also change over time; to the perspective of the historian and more so to the victor of war - American Separatist Rebels to the British Empire; or; Founding Fathers of the United States of America? Any truth we have today in science is contingent on empirical science, empirical science is not truth.
I never stated science is truth. Science is our endavor to know the truth. I don't know how you can change truth over time. Scientific theories changed over time. And the reason they change is because they evolve to approach absolute truth. If truth changes all the time, physical law hold at one time, don't hold at another time, why bother with science? Historical facts also don't change. American Separaists rebeled against British rule, fought independence war and founded United States of America. That is a historical fact. if historical fact can change, why bother studying history?
I also do not see how your argument follows, do you equate truth to morality? if so, you have not build any case but only reasoned.
science is inherently different than philosophy, Science, is a theory, philosophy is a reasoning. you can disprove a theory; and you can dissuade against reasonings. There is a reason why you don't use the word disprove for philosophy, but trustworthy. well, something that is not trustworthy does not mean that it is wrong, but something disproved is wrong; see the difference?
I'm a very intuitive person, so I sometime ignore the intermidient steps in making an argument, my apology. Here is how my argument worked:
My thesis: Morality is objective.
Counter-argument: No, morality is not objective
Example in support for the counter-argument: different societies have differnt social norms(conciences about acceptable behavior), Social norm also varys through history.
My Counter-counter-argument: the example provided does not consitute a support for the counter-argument
My support: If by looking at human conciences about something, we can arrive at conclusion about the thing, then the following argument would be valid:
1) human conciences about truth change over time and vary across societies
2) truth change over time and vary across societies
since this argument clearly is invalid, the example of history and societal variation cannot serve as an evidence for the conclusion that morality varys in time and across societies.
I hope this is a good enough autopsy.
I relate philosophy with science not to say two are the same, but to say, philosophy, like science, can be falsified. So "philosophy" is not an iron umbrella that you can stick anything under and shield them from scrutiny and critism. You need dicipline to produce good philosophy, just like you need dicipline to produce scientific theory. I found myself in need to defend the seriousness of philosophy a little since I detect a "this is a philosophy so you can't argue with it" attempt. Rational argument is essential to philosophy(western trandition), if you start quoting Laozi, then, yeah, I will simply just stop arguing since there is no point.
simple philosophy is that, life requires resources to sustain; which you will agree. to gather resources to sustain life would result in degradation of the environmental - you take resources from the environment; AKA Degrade. So by simple logic, No life = no degradation of the environment by life; having life WILL result in degradation of the environment; so in helping life, you are helping to degrade the environment. It does not matter; what you choose to do with already made wealth or not; hence the moral contradiction. You can argue all day about how much is significant; but again in abstract, does it matter? losing a drop of water and losing an ocean of water; in effect is still losing water by definition.
What you said is just not true. Sustaining life does not necessarily lead to environmental degradation. As a physical geographer by trainning, I can spend a whole day to make the case and I have a duty to do so but I don't want to derail this thread(any further). So, regretably, I will point you to knowledge DIY
I can argue that you are in denial, we have significant moral dilemmas in our everyday life, Do we buy technology - computers, cellphones - so we can be competitive in the job market and earn a living to feed us and our family KNOWINGLY that the rare earth metal used in the chips, batteries is funding genocides in third world countries that produced it? Do you feed your children genetically modified food not knowing their long term effect on them; or do you take motor transport, knowing fully well that the mercury in the catalytic converter to reduce pollution is known to be at a high enough concentration to poison plants, animals near roads?
I think, if you want to rely on your moral intuition, you should keep yourself oblivious to the things that your actions will lead. If you don't know about it, you can't be wrong about it right?
The fact is, you have already taken a perspective that morality is intuitive; and you are relying on wiki quite a bit, why don't you give convincing arguments; does it matter if the child you help in Africa is not significantly damaging the environment? the only fact is that he is degrading the environment, and he is doing it with your help which makes your responsible. Significant or not, is a perspective; and as you are presenting your case, and me mine, is a perspective of our own.
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What you face is not moral dilemma, morality contradicting itself, what you face is personal dilemma, that's when your different priorities and imperitives cross roads and you are forced to make a choice. Morality often conflicts with our personal goals, our "wants" and "needs" and it is painful to forgo our desire to satisfy our conscience. However, not to satisfy our conscience is painful too, that's why life poses the enternal question. "to be or not to be?" it's pain either way, you only get to choose which pain.
If you think it is impossible to survive and feed one's family without doing harm to people and environment, I'd like to introduce you to this person:
. He thought human can live in harmony not only with nature, with each other, but also with their own inner beings. During his time, he lived by his words, tried to recocile with his moral being and strived to tell the truth. This is what he said:
If one advances confidently in the direction of his dreams, and endeavors to live the life which he has imagined, he will meet with a success unexpected in common hours.
You and I cannot live life like Thoreau did, without tremandous effort and agony on our part, but we can at least try, we can at least improve, we can at least tell the truth. that is, if we choose to.
