The is–ought problem, as articulated by Scottish philosopher and historian David Hume (1711–76)...

>The is–ought problem, as articulated by Scottish philosopher and historian David Hume (1711–76), states that many writers make claims about what ought to be on the basis of statements about what is. Hume found that there seems to be a significant difference between positive statements (about what is) and prescriptive or normative statements (about what ought to be), and that it is not obvious how one can coherently move from descriptive statements to prescriptive ones. The is–ought problem is also known as Hume's law, or Hume's guillotine.

What the fuck does this even mean, can someone break it down for me?

>people are poor
>let's tax the rich and give money to the poor people

You have a positive statement (people are poor) and basing your opinion on only that you make a prescriptive statement (we should tax rich people and give those taxed money to the poor people).
What David is telling us, instead, is that we should let poor people starve

are you in high school or something, its pretty easy to understand

example: just because its raining doesnt mean we should stay inside

go to bed Sam

Pretty easy to understand. It ties into his problem of induction I.e. how things follow.

One cannot 'logically' assert with normative statements that something 'ought' to be simply because of what 'is'.

I.e. I cannot 'logically' or 'inductively' state that the future will act the same way as the past because there is no definitive knowledge of such.

that's some ol busllhit right there I tell ya wjuat.

OP here, I understand what you mean. I suppose what I am missing is the historical context and significance of it?

what ought to be = what you should do, what is morally good, what our moral duty is
what is = what people do, what works, what you can observe

basically it means you cannot derive morality from facts

The analogical bus is leaving, does that mean I should get on it?
Hume's guillotine is really about, say, just -what- is it that bridges this gap between cognitions of a particular nature and ones of a universal nature. The logical content of the cognition that the bus is leaving does not transfer over into the normative cognition about what to do given this fact, or rather at some point the logical framework changes abruptly.
This kills the materialist.

I is fucking your mother, prove I ought not to be

what you're missing is your frontal lobe mate, seriously are you retarded or summit?

I'm not sure the context is essential, but the issue can be related to things that Rousseau also said, regarding justice. When Rousseau refutates the "right of the strongest", he also means that dominating does not give a right to dominate. And being dominated does not mean that you should be dominated. It sounds really obvious, but it's directed against what Hobbes or Pascal said. (Pascal : "And thus being unable to make what is just strong, we have made what is strong just" - (as if there was no means of determining what's good, what "ought to be", other than looking at what's strong, what "is" ; like, who should rule ? Pascal replies : well, the one who does : the king)

P: moral truths exist
C: Hume BTFO

P → C

Hume BTFO
QED

Thanks, I think because it sounds obvious, it doesn't quite click with me why this was such big thing at the time?

>just because I'm hungry doesn't mean that I should eat
>starves to death
Well, thanks David, you dipshit

That's only because the concept of "morality" is poorly elaborated.

your mental incapability or lack of knowledge of historical development of ethics does not make ethics "poorly elaborated", you fucking nigger

literally kys yourself

is'ought

Wittgenstein agrees with. You cant predict future.from the.precent

...

>>>/startwiththefuckinggreeks/

get off my board you racist

Actually Hume argues that you CAN (and he does) derive it from facts.
He just states that many philosophers who went before him didn't bother to do that. Hume deduces how our morality arises from our inner passions and society, and (tries to) build a picture that matches reality.

This is indeed more than most old philosophers (and sadly many contemporary) can say.
Honestly, Hume's "Inquiry" is a piece of art, and having read both, I believe it is vastly underrated compared to Kant's "Critique".

I don't know if you're trolling or not, but you got it completely backwards. Your example should be:

>people are poor
>so they ought to be poor
"Let poor people starve" is precisely what it means to think what is indicates how things ought to be.

Formula:
>Something is a certain way, but that doesn't mean it ought to be that way.

Example:
>I normally wear a fursuit, but that doesn't mean I ought to wear a fursuit.

Basically, it's a fallacy to assume that whatever's going on is good. This doesn't seem like a big deal, but political philosophers do it all the time, so Hume had to step in and formalize why this kind of logic is bad.

Different to prove positive conclussion (Posssitive meaning its scientific terminology i.e. concrete hard facts connected through empiricall thought) philosophers have claimed that, precisely, as empirical phenomena runs ad infinitum in casualty there should be a first cause for natural world itself. However the paradox falls in the sense that this first cause (God, First Motor, Monads, etc.) falls into the category of dissaproval because its arguments in favor only describe qualities of such first cause without demonstrating how does it produces empiricall nature. The other aspect concerning Hume's critique towards this conclussions is that any first cause postulated does not share the same concrete nature as what it is suppossed to cause. (Think this, how substance can be part of matter if substance isn't matter? NOTE: this up to debate depending on which philosopher you take as its proposition of substance, because this term had many functions in philosophy prior to Hume, in Aristotle's case, for example; substance must be material to be able to be abstracted, Scholastic thought, however, postulated secondary substances as ultirior forms of reallity and truth such as essence, the soul, the angels, and God)

>What the fuck does this even mean, can someone break it down for me?
Nothing really matters lmao

>" is precisely what it means to think what is indicates how things ought to be.
No. Because according to the person your responding to example, if money wasnt given to the poor they would starve. That is the natural case. From that natural case it was said, "lets do this". That "lets do this" is an, "we ought do this", not necessarily, from God, God and Truth is demanding we ought do this..and thats the very point, there is nothing demanding what we ought to do. Nature is nature, and then we say, should we, could we, do this or that, and than choices must be made. One can than say, these choices are based on good and great evidence and opinion and desire of 'better or worse' out comes of doing and not doing.

Was trying to figure out if you're incredibly sophisticated or just not a native english speaker, now I'm fairly sure it's the latter

It's the latter. Sorry, I wrote that to fast, I hope it was clar eneough.

No, you're both wrong (or right) and just seeing the problem from different sides.

Both of these examples are susceptible to Hume's guillotine.

Nature is: People create products and services, and trade this for money.
One needs money to exist.
If one does not have money (generally, the rule) one can not for long exist.
There are people that have very little money and/or heading towards none, and/or none.
Nature is; people have no money.
Nature is; money is needed to continue existing.
Nature is; people without money after a certain amount of time cannot continue to exist.
There ought to be government coercion at the barrel of a gun (nukes, jails, bombers, electron rail gun, mines, robot drones) to take money from my family, and give to those who have none.

But Hobbes and Burke and Pascal were totally right on that matter especially.

Yeah I agree with pretty much everything you wrote, but now if we stand from a strictly humian point of view, then the other user who said morality was poorly elaborated is arguably right too.
>Actually Hume argues that you CAN (and he does) derive it from facts
Yes, provided that morality is what our inner passions and society lead us to define as 'good'. It's not dumb at all, it's just that some people may not call it "morality" in a strong or accurate sense. But that's because these people read Kant or are influenced by him.
Pascal, yeah, since he does not claim to derive what "should" be from reason itself. When it comes to Hobbes I think it's less obvious since he still has some rationalist point of view, meaning that his view on morality is supposed to be derived from reason itself.

I think the key point is the opposition between two conceptions of reason. The page where Hume states that it's NOT rational to prefer your finger being hurt, rather than the end of the world, is essential and that's exactly what most people nowadays would disagree with. But I also think Hume is underrated.

Reminder that morality is part of hedonism


People are too nihilistic[=project ''values'' on what they experience] and they claim that painful pain is bad or that ''it makes men stronger'', but pain is jsut pain, no need to tack on words on it. pain sucks and the way to stop craving going from pain to pleasure is the way to stop personifying whatever is experienced, NOT to go from pain to pleasure (like people claim and built society as an attempt to secure a comfy life (and whine when their secured pleasure turns to shit) )

In two lines:
egotism= hedonism = unhappiness

stop egotism= stop hedonism = stop unhappiness

how do you stop hedonism/egotism ? you stop it by first understanding this post so far and by attending what you experience trying to separate what you believe is your self to what you believe is not your self.

you go first from the most explicit objects that are not-you, like a car in a street that you see, to thoughts/opinions/ideas you experience, then emotions, then consciousness {this list is not detailed}
objects->thoughts->emotions->consciousness. bit by bit, you ''externalize'' what first you thought were you, like you naturally externalize a car in a street, until there is nothing left to ''be personal, of your essence, be self''.

the lack of seeing all what is written so far is the source of hedonism [=going form displeasing experience through the 5 senses+thoughts [=immorality, falsehood, randomness] to pleasing experience through the 5 senses+thoughts [=morality, truth, certainty-contingency]]

I think its pretty simple

"Writers should stop being such preachy dicks"
- David Hume

Thick concepts. Didn't think of that, huh David?
>implying you can coherently separate positive and normative