Disguised Queries

OK, thanks for clarifying.

For what it's worth, I agree with you that "it's bad for people to suffer" is a moral belief, but I disagree that "I derived it from..." is any sort of justification for a moral belief, including a rational one. It's simply a speculation about how I came to hold that belief.

I agree that there's no way to determine whether a moral belief is "valid" in the sense that I think you're using that word.

I agree that it's possible to hold a belief (including a moral belief) in such a way that it inhibits my ability to perceive the universe as it actually is. It's also possible to hold a belief in such a way that it inhibits my ability to achieve my goals.
I agree that one example of that might be if I held a moral belief about how my computer should work in such a way that when my computer fails to work as I think it should, I throw it out the window.
Another example might be if I held the belief that pouring lemonade into the keyboard will improve its performance. That's not at all a moral belief, but it nevertheless interferes with my ability to achieve my goals.

Would you say that if choose to simply accept that my computer behaves the way it does, and I calmly consider possible actions to get the behavior I want, and I don't have the sense that I'm being cheated by a cruel universe, that it follows from all of that that I have no relevant moral beliefs about the situation?

But if we adopt the conventional practice of translating "lo tirtzoch" as "don't murder", and further adopt the conventional practice of not labeling killings we're morally OK with as "murder"

That doesn't sound like a convention that the quite fits with culture or spirit of the holy law in question or of the culture which would create such a law.

I've never actually watched Dexter, but I gather it's about someone compelled to murder people who chooses to murder only people where the world is improved by their death?

In what I've seen of Dexter the most ethically grey kill was of a pedophile who was stalking his step-daughter (and that's a murder I'd be comfortable committing!). The rest were all murderers who were highly likely to kill again.

For my part I would prefer to live in a world in which other people don't go around being vigilantes and also don't want to be a vigilante myself. Because frankly it isn't my problem and it isn't worth the risk or the effort it would take me.

I've never actually watched Dexter, but I gather it's about someone compelled to murder people who chooses to murder only people where the world is improved by their death?

Slightly more specific and slightly less consequentialistic than that. He chooses to kill only other murderers, and usually only cold-blooded murderers who are unrepentant and likely to murder again, (example: one time he stopped when he realized his selected victim had only murdered the person that had raped him in prison).

But it's not about improving the world really, sometimes he even sabotages the police investigation just so he can have these people to himself.

But if we adopt the conventional practice of translating "lo tirtzoch" as "don't murder", and further adopt the conventional practice of not labeling killings we're morally OK with as "murder", then I squeak by here as well...

I think the general idea is that by "murder" the concept of 'do not kill people without it being prescribed by the law' is meant -- with the rest of Mosaic law indicating in which cases it was okay to kill people nonetheless.

So killing insects doesn't count (because they're not people), nor being a state executioner counts (because it's prescribed by the law).

The implication of Swimmer's post was that atheists have reasons to obey the ten commandments (well, 4 or 5 of them) comparable in formal terms to the reasons Christians have (God'll burn me if I don't, or whatever).

I didn't claim that, and if I implied it, it was by accident. (Although I do think that a lot of atheists have just as strong if not stronger reasons to obey certain moral rules, the examples I gave weren't those examples.) I was trying to point out that if someone decides one day to stop believing in God, and realizes that this means God won't smite them if they break one of the Ten Commandments, that doesn't mean they'll go out and murder someone. Their moral instincts, and the positive/negative reinforcement to obey them (i.e. pleasure or guilt), keep existing regardless of external laws.

The point is that the murderer hasn't just given us a bad reason, she hasn't given us a reason at all. We cannot call her rational if this is all she has.

So we ask her why, and she says "oh, he took the seat that I wanted on the bus three weeks in a row, and his humming is annoying, and he always copies my exams." Which might not be a good reason to murder someone according to you, with your normal neurobiology–you would content yourself with fuming and making rude comments about him to your friends–but she considers it a good reason, because her mental 'brakes' are off.

Beliefs don't feel like beliefs, they feel like the way the world is.

Perhaps on some level this is right, but the fact that I can assess the truth of my beliefs means that they don't feel like the way the world is in an important respect.

OK, let me give you a better example. When you look at something, a lot of very complex hardware packed into your retina, optic nerve, and visual cortex, a lot of hard-won complexity optimized over millions of years, is going all out analyzing the data and presenting you with comprehensible shapes, colour, and movement, as well as helpful recognizing objects for you. When you look at something, are you aware of all that happening? Or do you just see it?

(Disclaimer: if you've read a lot about neuroscience, it's quite possible that sometimes you do think about your visual processing centres while you're looking at something. But the average person wouldn't, and the average person probably doesn't think 'well, there go my empathy centres again' when they see an old lady having trouble with her grocery bag and feel a desire to help her.)

I think I really don't understand your question. Could you explain the idea behind this a little better? My objection was that there are reasons to do things, and reasons why we do things, and while all reasons to do things are also reasons why, there are reasons why that are not reasons to do things.

Okay, let's try to unpack this. In my example, we have a sociopath who wants to murder someone. The reason why he wants to murder someone, when most people don't, is because there's a centre in his brain that's broken and so hasn't learned to see the world from another's perspective, thus hasn't internalized any social morality because it doesn't make sense to him...basically, people are objects to him, so why not kill them. His reason to murder someone is because, let's say, they're dating a girl he wants to date. Most non-sociopaths wouldn't consider that a reason to murder anyone, but the reason why they wouldn't is because they have an innate understanding that other people feel pain, of the concept of fairness, etc, and were thus capable of learning more complex moral rules as well.

Sure, but I take myself to have moral reasons for this. I may feel this way because of my biology, but my biology is never itself a reason for me to do anything.

The way I see it, the biology aspect is both necessary and sufficient for this kind of behaviour. Someone without the requisite biology wouldn't be a good parent or friend because they'd see no reason to make an effort (unless they were deliberately "faking it" to benefit from that person). And an ordinary human being raised with no exposure to moral rules, who isn't taught anything about it explicitly, will still want to make their friends happy and do the best they can raising children. They may not be very good at it, but unless they're downright abused/severely neglected, they won't be evil.

I may feel this way because of my biology, but my biology is never itself a reason for me to do anything.

Relevant LW post.