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Towards a Moral Science Philosophy is difficult to refute with evidence because it creates the framework for evaluating the evidence. If a philosopher claims that the world around us is an illusion created by unknown creatures, how can you test it? How can you find evidence to refute it? What evidence could refute it? Any evidence, whether ordinary or bizarre, could be explained by that premise. Morality is one such area of philosophy. It provides some kind of standard to evaluate our actions. That standard is used to judge all of our actions. It can't be refuted by showing that it leads to undesirable choices or consequences because it is the moral standard that we use to determine if those choices or consequences are desirable or not. Morality isn't like a scientific theory. It makes no predictions. It can't be tested as true or false with the right experiment. Evidence can't refute it because it is the method of evaluating the evidence. Can morality be scientific at all? Is it possible to create some kind of science of morality? Looking at science in general, it should be clear that the method is dependent on certain philosophical premises. For science to be an objective enterprise, certain philosophical premises needed to be assumed. The world around us must be real. We must have the capability of perceiving the world as it really is. The world has identity and it acts through causality. It exists outside of our minds. These premises, and more, justify a methodology for gaining knowledge about the world. We can make observations about the world. We can perform experiments where we can isolate factors to see what effect they have. We can look for causal explanations. We can take measurements. We can systematically explore the world, gathering empirical data and formulating theories to explain the data. And we can test those theories. One important point about science is that it isn't replacing philosophy. In order to have science, it must rest on an fairly well integrated set of philosophical premises. Science then works within that framework to explore the world and gain knowledge. A philosophy that rejects these underlying premises would end up rejecting science as well. Or more importantly, it would be altered in such a way that it no longer resembles science as we know it. So for instance, if a philosopher assumed that the laws of logic are not true, they would not see an experiment as a possible way of refuting a theory. If contradictions are possible, then the theory could be true and not true at the same time and in the same respect. This philosopher's version of science might be a form of data gathering, and might even generate theories, but without the ability to refute ideas they would have to be selected based on some other criteria like how interesting they are. This would not be science as we know it. What if we model a science of morality on this understanding? What we'd end up with is a set of philosophical premises that would need to be assumed, but within that framework we could expect to gather evidence, formulate theories, perform experiments, and generally look to the real world to decide what's real and what's not. This would not be changing morality into a science. Instead, it would be dividing morality into two parts. One would be philosophy, and the other science. Consider moral systems that promote some form of consequentialism. These moralities judge actions based on their consequences. Results are what matter at the end of the day. If a morality is a guide to your choices, then a consequentialist morality will seek to predict the consequences of taking either alternative, and judging by which one has the best results. What's important to note with this kind of morality is that there are two distinct actions taking place. The first action is to predict the likely consequences, or range of consequences of each choice. We can call this moral forecasting. The second step requires evaluation of the alternatives based on the forecasted results. We can call this moral comparison. Since moral forecasting is purely predictive and does not include any actual evaluation, it is a perfect example of a field that should be studied as a science. If you have a choice between lying and telling the truth, you should be able to forecast the likely results through the use of science. You could study the context, the kind of lie, the number of people who will be exposed to the lie, and any other relevant factors. Experiments could be performed. Statistics could be gathered. Theories explaining the results could be formulated and tested, and even rejected. Consider two very different moral standards. One moral standard holds that helping other people is the basis of moral action, and that the results of your choices is the important criteria. A different standard holds that you should be the beneficiary of your own moral actions, not other people, and that it is indeed the results that matter. These are two completely different standards that would result in very different evaluations and choices. Now consider a conversation between a follower of each moral standard. When confronted with an alternative, each of them will try to predict the expected results. But while their moral positions are radically different, they can agree completely regarding the moral forecasting. The likely results of the actions are objective in nature. Agreement is possible in principle. Of course, forecasting future events can always be difficult and disagreements may arise over the likely consequences. But disagreements between an altruist and an egoist need be no more likely than between two egoists or two altruists. The field of moral forecasting is perfect for scientific investigation. Principles can be discovered, tested, and possibly even quantified to some degree. An altruist and an egoist could both accept that telling a lie can lead to additional lies, or to a chance of being discovered, or any number of other results. They may refine these principles together to point out the harm of being discovered may be reduced based on the intentions of the lie, such as a "white lie" told to make someone feel better. While they may come to different conclusions about whether these actions should be taken or not, they can agree on the consequences. By splitting the field of morality in two, the field of moral forecasting wouldn't need to stay a branch of philosophy where common sense and best guesses are needed. Instead, it could be opened up to scientific investigation, including predictions, theories, experimentation, observations, double-blind studies, statistical analysis, etc. Of course, this doesn't turn the whole field of morality into a science. You still couldn't run an experiment to see if consequentialism is "right", or if egoism is "better" than altruism. But by understanding the context that makes science possible, many of the ideas in the field of morality can be approached scientifically. Note also that even with moral forecasting changed into a science, it would not be relevant to every moral framework. Many moral systems are not consequentialist in nature, and would find no value in the field of moral forecasting. A deontological morality isn't concerned with consequences at all, and so the field of moral forecasting would be pointless. The lack of universal acceptance of moral forecasting is not a real problem, though. There are philosophical perspectives that reject the foundations of science, and so find that field pointless as well. Science does not exist because it is universally accepted. It exists because many people accept the philosophical foundation of science and therefore judge it as useful and the only appropriate way of gaining detailed knowledge of the world. Moral forecasting also does not need universal acceptance for it to be useful. And since most people do care about the consequences of their choices, despite what their explicit moral theory may say, it would be widely useful.
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