Thanks for your reply -- makes perfect sense.

Do you mean the morality of any given action is a different thing from that action's goodness?

No, that's not what I meant. The agony is the thing that is bad.

The context of the action -- including the ability of the actors to be moral agents -- can render an action morally right or wrong.

The chemo treatment can help cure cancer, but it makes one horribly ill for several extended periods of time. It is the experience of being "horribly ill," of being in agony, from chemo that is bad.

But the child with cancer and the parents and the medical staff that administers the chemo and the doctor who prescribes the chemo are all performing morally right actions.

(Except if the doctor is prescribing the chemo in order to defraud the insurance company because it has no chance of being successful for this child's cancer. Then that doctor's prescribing chemo would be morally wrong, both for the greed as a motive and for causing the child unnecessary agony.)

If so, I find it a bit disconcerting. Just my opinion though - I don't have the eloquence to defend this, but again, it's quite unsettling to me that morality is "freely flowing". Or am I understanding this incorrectly?

"First, in moral philosophy, there is a vast difference between whether something is intrinsically good or bad and whether an action is moral or immoral.

Just to confirm I understand (and apologies if I don't -- I'm a little late to this discussion): Do you mean the morality of any given action is vastly different from that action's goodness? Or is it vastly different from the goodness (or badness) of things that result from that action?

It seems to me your example illustrates the second proposition (which I happily agree with), rather than the first:

Even though something may be intrinsically bad, like agony, ceterus paribus, experiencing it or allowing it to be experienced may be morally right, such as pain suffered while giving birth (if no pain medication is available) or allowing a child to receive chemotherapy to treat a deadly cancer.

I suggest the action of prescribing chemo (with the intention of fighting cancer) is good, both morally and 'intrinsically' (the two being one and the same in the case of an action deliberately chosen). The pain that results from it is bad, and even evil in the sense of being 'an evil'.

I therefore suggest the first proposition -- that an action's moral goodness/evil is a different feature from its intrinsic goodness/badness -- is not illustrated by this statement.

This debate is about morality, and the definition of bad regarding moral deprivation is more appropriate than the ones you gave

First, in moral philosophy, there is a vast difference between whether something is intrinsically good or bad and whether an action is moral or immoral. That's a central issue in moral philosophy. Even though something may be intrinsically bad, like agony, ceterus paribus, experiencing it or allowing it to be experienced may be morally right, such as pain suffered while giving birth (if no pain medication is available) or allowing a child to receive chemotherapy to treat a deadly cancer.

Second, Dillon himself states otherwise. As Dillon says, while he contends that agony is bad, it cannot be said to be intrinsically wrong. Sometimes it is necessary to accept or experience something bad in the course of acting morally (right).

In his opening statement, Dillon writes:

"I’m not asking whether agony is good for certain things. I’m asking about the experience itself. I think the answer has to be yes."

In one of his comments to his own article, Dillon wrote:

"it's a fundamental truth that good is to be pursued and badness to be avoided. To say otherwise (or even to question this) is, it seems to me, to remove the normativity that *characterizes* goodness and badness.
But, without that normativity, I'm not sure what 'goodness' and 'badness' are."

In another comment there, Dillon wrote:

"[I]f you're suggesting that a statement is 'moral' only if it concerns actions performed by moral agents, then I think we're just equivocating on the word 'moral'. Moreover, I wholeheartedly agree that sensations like agony cannot be right or wrong, but I think that's because only intentional actions can be right or wrong."

Third, in case you are interested, the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy has this to say about Intrinsic and Extrinsic Values:

Many philosophers have followed Plato's lead in declaring pleasure intrinsically good and pain intrinsically bad. ... One of the most comprehensive lists of intrinsic goods that anyone has suggested is that given by William Frankena [1908–1994]. It is this: life, consciousness, and activity; health and strength; pleasures and satisfactions of all or certain kinds; happiness, beatitude, contentment, etc.; truth; knowledge and true opinions of various kinds, understanding, wisdom; beauty, harmony, proportion in objects contemplated; aesthetic experience; morally good dispositions or virtues; mutual affection, love, friendship, cooperation; just distribution of goods and evils; harmony and proportion in one's own life; power and experiences of achievement; self-expression; freedom; peace, security; adventure and novelty; and good reputation, honor,
esteem, etc.

This debate is about morality, and the definition of bad regarding moral deprivation is more appropriate than the ones you gave

Dillon himself states otherwise. As Dillon says, while he contends that agony is bad, it cannot be said to be intrinsically wrong.

In his opening statement, Dillon writes:

"I’m not asking whether agony is good for certain things. I’m asking about the experience itself. I think the answer has to be yes."

In one of his comments to his own article, Dillon wrote:

"it's a fundamental truth that good is to be pursued and badness to be avoided. To say otherwise (or even to question this) is, it seems to me, to remove the normativity that *characterizes* goodness and badness. But, without that normativity, I'm not sure what 'goodness' and 'badness' are."

In another comment there, Dillon wrote:

"Hm, if you're suggesting that a statement is 'moral' only if it concerns actions performed by moral agents, then I think we're just equivocating on the word 'moral'. Moreover, I wholeheartedly agree that sensations like agony cannot be right or wrong, but I think that's because only intentional actions can be right or wrong."

This debate is about morality, and the definition of bad regarding moral deprivation is more appropriate than the ones you gave regarding unpleasantness and exploding molecules:

”bad: "not such as to be hoped for or desired; unpleasant or unwelcome"

Venkman: I'm fuzzy on the whole good/bad thing. What do you mean, "bad"?
Spengler: Try to imagine all life as you know it stopping instantaneously and every molecule in your body exploding at the speed of light.

Speaking of which, Joe does write that agony is unpleasant:

If, by “agony is intrinsically bad,” you mean that it’s intrinsically painful or unpleasant, then yes, I agree.

As pointed out, there are many definitions of bad. This makes answering Steven’s question awkward because it is a loaded question, relying on the fallacy of ambiguity and the conflating of different meanings.

To use an example from Joe, is childbirth intrinsically bad?

I didn't say Dillon "defined" bad. I said he gave descriptions of them. I agree that he should have provided a definition.

Dillon was asking Heschmeyer if he agreed that agony is bad. This is a debate regarding ethics, and it is absolutely clear to anyone in discussing ethics that 'evil' is not a synonym for 'bad.' They are two completely separate concepts in moral philosophy. Different. Not the same. Ever.

The only valid answer to this question, which Heschmeyer did not answer, is either: "yes, it is bad" or "no, it is not bad."

Heschmeyer instead answered two different questions. He answered that agony is painful (pain = pain), which is, as he said, tautological, and agony is not morally evil.

He specifically did NOT write that agony is unpleasant, which is a synonym for bad. Heschmeyer was specifically AVOIDING saying whether agony was good or bad. He AVOIDED answering the question.

He’s also making an appeal to emotion.

No, he is not. He is asking a very clear and basic question. (Significant. But basic.)

Steven gives a few examples of bad things but he does not actually define “bad.” He’s also making an appeal to emotion.

While bad does mean “not such as to be hoped for or desired; unpleasant or unwelcome,” another definition is “morally depraved; wicked.” A reasonable person would realize that this definition is more relevant to this discussion on morality. It is #6 on Google’s list of 8 definitions for bad. (To compare, Merriam-Webster has 10, Dictionary.com has 36.) In addition, your definition of bad is not the first on Google’s list. The first one is “of poor quality; inferior or defective.”

Steven’s question can then be asked two ways: “Is extreme pain, in and of itself, unpleasant?” and “Is extreme pain, in and of itself, morally depraved?” Joe has answered both questions because Steven's question is not specific enough (Joe uses the word “evil” where I have used “morally depraved”).

To use an example from Steven, is a shattered bone unpleasant? Yes. Is it evil? No.

Below I've included the description of 'agony' and 'bad' that Dillon gave in his opening statement. It seems that this description would inform any reasonable person that Dillon's meaning of 'bad' is the first (most commonly used) definition in the dictionary, which I provided above.

Since Heschmeyer was deliberately obtuse fhe first time around, I agree with you that Dillon should have provided a definition of 'bad.' But that's only because Heschmeyer should be expected to repeat his evasion again, not because Dillon's meaning was unclear. "Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me."

We all know what [agony] is: it’s an intense and extreme amount of pain. It could be anything from searing burns and shattered bones to a parent losing its child on a hospital bed in the ICU. We’re not talking about paper cuts here, this is the kind of pain that can ruin someone’s life.

What about badness? Here are some paradigmatic examples of bad things: it is bad when a young and vulnerable child is bullied until she commits suicide. It’s bad when parents have to live their lives in worry and stress because of inopportunity and an unfair society. Racism, animal cruelty, human trafficking, all of these things are bad.

With these concepts in mind, let’s return to the experience of agony. Is this harrowing level of pain in and of itself a bad thing? I hope you find the question a little ridiculous. Is a pain so consuming that it leads some to think their life isn’t worth living any more a bad thing? Of course! It’s horrible. I’m not asking whether agony is good for certain things. I’m asking about the experience itself.I think the answer has to be yes.

Asking why agony is intrinsically bad is like asking why we ought to do what we ought to do: the answer is that if it’s true that
we ought to do something, then that’s why! Likewise, if something really is agonizing, then that’s why it’s bad! How could anything further explain the badness of agony? It’s not like you have these two things: agony and badness, and something has to add badness to agony.