I love this topic. Some people, particularly, Sam Harris, can’t seem to understand the distinction. For example, take the propositional statements below:

(P1) if you punch John, then he will feel pain.

(C) so, one ought not to hit John.

C doesn’t logically follow from P1. You would have to add another descriptive premise to fill the gap. A better example:

(P1) if you punch John, then he will feel pain

(P2) you ought not do things that cause pain.

(C) so one ought not to hit John.

This is more sensible. To make it more clear why the first example wasn’t a logically conclusive deduction, here’s an example, and this highlights why I love this topic lol:

(P1) if you punch John, then he will feel pain.

(P2) you ought to do things that cause pain.

(C) so, you ought to hit John.

Hume really arrived at a really cool and interesting here, regarding the gap which presents succinct insights into reason and logic. For the life of me, I will never understand how someone can claim to derive values from facts (like Sam Harris). But alas, here we are haha.

Good article!