Is the core of what is considered ethical in my feelings or is it in my thoughts? Thoughts are propositional statement like mental objects, and by mental perhaps it can mean subjective events, which are one’s personal experiences. Experiences are our perceptions of the world. Perceptions are quite complex, for both feelings and thoughts are perceptions because we perceive them, or are aware of them. Experiences are also conceptions, recollections, emotions, ideations, etc. Does the suffix -tion have anything to do with the nature of experience? -Tion is used to form abstract nouns from verbs or stems not identical with verbs, whether as expressing action (revolution; commendation), or state (contrition; starvation), or associated meanings (relation; temptation), says dictionary.com. Recollections, emotions, conceptions, and ideations are all states of mind, since we can feel or cause these events to occur in us, and can distinguish each thing by the mere feeling of it, without having to use propositional statements. However, though we think in propositional statements, our thoughts are still feelings essentially, since we must be in a particular state of mind to have any particular thought. Therefore, thoughts and feelings are distinguishable, yet are both states of mind. Perhaps the core of ethics is in a state of mind?
Maybe what caused me to compare and contrast feelings and thoughts was in the distinction between states of mind and propositional statements. States of mind are innate to objects in reality, all objects have a “feel” to them; ie all objects influence the senses, either directly by touching or somehow interfering with our sensory system, or indirectly by affecting something that affects our sensory system. States of mind are created by those effects and the other capacities of the mind. Another capacity of our minds (by our here I mean human minds) is language. Language is connected to propositional statements. The main function of language seems to be communication with other organisms, and the organization of ideas and concepts. For the words I use are more than just mental or physical noise, by which I mean nonsense. Nonsense being the opposite of sense is something I can only experience as incomprehensibility, or no appeal to any sense at all, which can be achieve by disconnecting or not having the capacity for a particular sense. Language is directly connected to our senses, since we must somehow be able to sense the other being we are attempting to communicate with. Language also requires being able to perceive certain motions as being more than accidental occurrences. Most accidental occurrences are mindless matter reactions, but some are mindful matter actions. Mindful matter actions are motions meant to achieve something more than mere motion, either now or in the future. But all one can ever get from existence is motion essentially, yet our goals are not completely random and without some sort of organization, so language must be organized movement of some kind. Language is just another state of mind, but with a particular organization of moving parts.
Perhaps the core of ethics is in the idea of truth and falsehood. These two ideas are related to propositional statements and accidental occurrences. I have a state of mind that I can call truth, or the feeling of truth, and one that I can call falsehood, or the feeling of falsehood. These words I write are clear and to the purpose for me, though it may not be for others, but these distinctions are causes by differences in our mind states, particularly and most likely in the various ways that states of mind can be organized. Most coherent thought has an idea or feeling of truth or falsehood applied to it. The distinction between truth or falsehood is first based on what exist, then based on how mindful actions are interpreted. Existence is given. Interpretation is knowing or understanding the meaning of an action, ie knowing or understanding why the action occurred. Knowing or understanding are states of mind we analogize to truth or falsehood. All actions appear to me to be accidental motion or mindful motion, perhaps the core of ethics is in this distinction.
(How do physical laws manifest ethical phenomena or thought? Do they manifest these things?)
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