@ig0774 “a use of F that is contrary to a use of F that produces E.” (immoral) is different from “a use of F that is other than a use of F that produces E.” (morally neutral) how?

@J.Tate the central question is if Feser meaningfully and consistently differentiates “in a manner contrary to E” and “for an end other than E”.

@J.Tate I've edited to make it clearer and emphasize the main point.

@Conifold I'd say that one “natural end” of the sex organs is reproduction, if we grant that teleology on this level exists at all. But I agree with you that it is unclear how we be so confident that we have knowledge of all natural ends. What are the natural ends of the bonobo's sexual faculties? But then the argument is extremely confused what we do in the case of multiple natural ends anyway.

@Conifold by any normal meaning of the word, “harmful” doesn't apply to masturbation and chewing gum. I just tried to somehow reconstruct his notion of “contrary to” – it may be like “you manipulate the faculty F so that the teleological process in direction E gets running but you take care that the situation is so that E cannot be achieved”.

Another question is how extreme the anti-consequentialism is? Bone marrow donation harms the donor slightly (and by itself removal of healthy bone marrow would be just self-harm and so, as Feser would agree, immoral), but it helps the recipient immensely. If that's a valid “excuse” (come on, it must be!) then there may be others. Though Leeuwenhoek took great pains to defuse any suspicions that he got the sperm samples he studied under the microscope by “any sinful contrivance” … would Feser accept “expanding human knowledge” as “excuse” for masturbating? Ok, I'm getting sarcastic…

I'm a little bit lost in following your position here. The way I read what you're writing: (1) You seem to grasp the difference between contrary to and other than. (2) You merely deny the way he's categorizing things with respect to that. These are two completely separate issues.

To reword that, you understand the tools he's using, but you think the moral universe Feser is painting is wrong and doesn't match up to the world we live in (either on a physical or social level). Or at least I think you understand the tool, if not, here's an example, using a screwdriver to put in / take out a screw is its function F (stipulating), using a flathead to pry something open is other than its function. Smashing down on a screw repeatedly with a screwdriver is contrary to its function.

@virmaior regarding your screwdriver example: giving an example is one thing, specifying a concept precisely is another. Can you specify the difference precisely? For example, is smashing down the screwdriver repeatedly on a heavily painted-over screw (so that the hard, crusted paint crumbles up) “contrary to its function”?

@virmaior I don't deny that I engage in some vague guessing what the difference might be. But I still deny that Feser has given a remotely precise explanation of the difference, which he should have done because this difference is crucial. This allows him his undisciplined use by which quite surprisingly gum chewing is “obviously” (!) morally neutral but masturbation “obviously” (!) immoral. Surprising indeed, because the similarity between the two activities is striking.

I feel like you're being pedantic here on two fronts. First, even with what you're saying you are demonstrating you recognize the screwdriver has a function and asking me to navigate you through every hard case. That's pretty much absurd. I don't think it goes to the point of specifying a concept precisely so much as it points out that if we want to argue ad infinitum, we can.

Second, I think you're confusing two layers with part of your chewing gum / masturbation analogy. One layer is what anyone takes to be the function of something and how these acts differ from the central functional acts. A second layer is the idea that things have functions. You seem to be conflating the two attacks or at least being careless in explaining how they relate.

It's conceivable that your objection is "there's so many edge cases that this proves there's no functions to be identified" (which would relate the two layers coherently), but then that's the only point of arguing about the functions. If so, then your position is really "I don't believe there are functions, so Feser makes no sense." If you want to argue about what the function is (rather than deny the function), then I think you're committed to believing there are functional, edge-case, and anti-functional uses of things -- at which point what goes where is empirical science + judgments...

@virmaior I don't think I'm pedantic here. If s/o ethical theory is so that the line between “moral” and “immoral” hinges on a super-vague difference between “other than” and “contrary to”, that's his problem. And though I recognize that the screwdriver has a function, I believe the difference between “contrary to” and “other than” is SUPER-vague and barely comprehensible, if at all.

@virmaior it's not about edge cases. The difference between “contrary to” and “other than” hasn't been defined, nobody bothers to define it – why? Because it's an empty, ill-defined, incomprehensible distinction. I don't deny that there are functions, but I deny the difference between “other than” and “contrary to” makes sense.

I don't think capitalizing "super" makes it so nor does stringing together synonyms...

If things have functions, then it seems to follow that uses that depart from those functions can depart to varying degrees (where the degree to which we believe it departs depends both on what we judge the function to be and the degree to which we think the usage deviates from that). It's going to be hard to reach agreement on that, but that's not the same thing as saying the concepts of "function", "other than", and "contrary to" are vague themselves

Maybe in part this just expresses that you don't have Aristotelian sentiments about the nature of the good -- i.e. that you believe it should be patently obvious to everyone.

For me, I take smashing down on top of a screw with a screwdriver to be contrary to its point (minute edge case with caked paint notwithstanding). If we can't at least get that far, I'm a bit incredulous as to whether or not you're doing this in good faith.

To repeat it, I find the difference between “other than” and “contrary to” extremely more vague than the concept of “function.” Hammering on a screw seems pretty pointless anyway, even if you use a hammer. Which probably lies behind the intuitive feeling that “contrary to” applies in the screw-driver case.

I do not deny that “smashing down on top of a screw with a screwdriver” is in everyday language “contrary to its function”. But that a term fits well in the case of an example doesn't show that the term is not confused. Nearly everybody agrees that “decadent” applies to the court of Louis XIV. But is “decadent” therefore a well-defined concept? I rather doubt it.

Part of my point which I don't think you're following me on is that merely because we have difficulty applying something does not make that thing vague. It merely makes that thing difficult to apply. Join that with a clarity about the function of at least some things, and I'm not really seeing why we must throw "contrary to" vs. "other than" out of the window.

Decadent is a good example in a sense because "decadence" is a relative judgment -- a judgment relative to an idea of what is necessary and appropriate. So in a sense it doesn't need a solid definition, because it's the extreme that opposes the mean. / Similarly, contrary to is going to be an extreme misuse or one to the opposite effect.

Again, this "contrary to" and "other than" are a toolkit that seems to follow naturally from accepting things have functions.

Well, vague means here “unclear in meaning”. “Opposite effect” is very clear in meaning, and I don't object to that. But you also mention “extreme misuse” in your definition. What is that? The question is not where “extreme misuse” begins or ends (like “is turquoise blue or still green?”). The question is how we should imagine the misuse-spectrum itself.

well, my point is that there's two questions. The first question is about the metaphysics of (a) having functions and (b) having misuse and/or other use in relation to these functions and (c) how the other/mis distinction works. The second question is the application of this metaphysics to real world cases, which can depend on differences on judgment and produce lots of edge cases.

That #1c cannot be settled might be an argument against functions or more narrowly against distinguishing forms of other-use, but settling what is "other" vs. "mis" for everything is not the task of establishing the metaphysics, so it's important not to get stuck quibbling about that (and only to focus on it when its material for the truth of #1a, #1b, #1c)