here's a complicated question, I think

Are all "oughts" obligatory? That is, when we make a judgment about a particular thing we should do, is it always obligatory? I don't think so. Policraticus said that this is a contradiction because all "ought" statements are obligatory. Maybe he's right? I wrote this in response to his claim:

I’d say all “oughts” where are knowledge is complete and authoritative are obligatory. In other cases, most especially political cases, not all oughts are absolutely obligatory because we can’t do everything at once and our knowledge is often incomplete.

For example, in the case of the dogmas of the faith, we have greater certainty and “truer” knowledge than we do in many other areas of knowledge. Our knowledge comes from Divine Authority and therefore it is more certain, and it is also totally binding because it comes from that Most Authoritative of sources.

In the case of a political opinion, our knowledge is less certain because it is not part of revelation. We have to make judgments ourselves, based upon incomplete knowledge and our own conscience. There is still an “ought” involved with the question - we are trying to answer the question “what ought we to do?” - but the answer is not so certain, therefore what we need to do is not necessarily certain, and therefore not necessarily obligatory.

I’m not sure that makes any sense but it’s an interesting question, I think. Or maybe I'm just missing something very basic.