Well, when it comes to pain especially, the perception is the reality, n'est-ce pas?
Well, okay, but your big "if" is...an awfully big "if", isn't it?
Well, sure. Moral judgements are ultimately about whether or not a particular consequence of your actions is wrong. When it comes to determining whether or not a particular action will result in a particular consequence, then you need to apply logic, which admittedly may be incomplete (I mean, I guess I can't "know" for sure that hitting the wrong button on my keyboard won't cause a nuclear bomb to go off somewhere). But it would be* utterly usesless without the initial framework provided by moral law.
And more seriously, is this a moral judgement, or a pragmatic one?
It's definitely a moral judgement. It's not about preventing myself from feeling pain (though that's not a bad idea either); it's about knowing that it's wrong if someone inflicts it on me, and therefore it would be wrong for me to inflict it on another. I mean, what motivates the human spirit of self-sacrifice for others? If it's "survival of the species", why should I care more about that than about simply doing right by my neighbor?
"Definitely" seems awfully strong. It seems to me that a pragmatic judgement gets you from A to B just as well, and that therefore calling it a moral judgement might very well be arbitrary. More on this to come...
It's not about preventing myself from feeling pain (though that's not a bad idea either); it's about knowing that it's wrong if someone inflicts it on me, and therefore it would be wrong for me to inflict it on another.
Ah, but now I've got to lay bare the assumptions inherent in this statement. Why, precisely, is it "wrong" for someone to inflict pain upon you? Why, precisely, is it "wrong" for you to inflict pain upon another person?
If it's "survival of the species", why should I care more about that than about simply doing right by my neighbor?
Assume for the sake of argument that I accept your notion of "doing right" for a moment. You don't have to care more about survival of the species than about doing right by your neighbor - if you do right by your neighbor, survival of the species follows as a consequence. It's not an either/or proposition ;)