key terminology

Question 1

cognitivism

Answer 1

• also described as descriptivism
• 2 main claims:
• 1. moral claims report beliefs about the world
• 2. those moral claims have the feature of truth-aptness
• ” giving money to charity is right” - can be true or false (that I believe that or that its actually right/wrong?)
• cognitivists can argue that all moral claims are true OR false

Question 2

common meta-ethical cognitivists

Answer 2

error theory? all moral claims are neccessarily false?

Question 3

non-cognitivism

Answer 3

• when making moral claims we are expressing a non-belief state ie emotions (emotivism)
• usually expressing disapproval or approval
• you can infer certain ideas about the claim but you are not explicitly telling people you believe it
• “boo! murder!” has no truth value and should not be judged on truth-aptness
• they’re like signals

Question 4

realism

Answer 4

• moral properties exist and are in some way independent from people’s judgements.
• For example, the act of killing someone has the property of wrongness, and that it has it independently of whether people think it does.

Question 5

non-realism

Answer 5

• The moral non-realist argues that there are no moral properties or facts.
• Non-realism includes, among others, quasi-realism, anti-realism, error theory and irrealism.
• similar to anti-realism, can use interchangeably but non-r is more on the fence than anti-realism

Question 6

relativism

Question 7

naturalism

Answer 7

• The naturalist claims that the only things that exist are those things that would appear in the scientific picture of what exists.
• ie if we know how to drink water from a lake from watching wild packs

Question 8

non-naturalism

Answer 8

• The non-naturalist thinks that there are some things that exist that could not show up on the scientific picture of what exists

Question 9

internalism and motivation

Answer 9

• when we make a moral judgement we are motivated as a matter of conceptual necessity to act in accordance with that judgement
• there is a necessary connection between moral judgements and motivation to act
  -in judging that giving money to charity is right is necessarily to be motivated to give money to charity.
• For the internalist it is conceptually impossible that someone could be psychologically normal, make a judgement and yet remain unmotivated to follow it.

Question 10

externalism and motivation

Answer 10

• there is no necessary connection between making a moral judgement and being motivated
• Moral judgements motivate an agent because of the agent’s desires.
• the link between judgement and motivation is contingent on the psychological states of the agent.

Question 11

amoralist

Answer 11

the “amoralist” is defined as someone who makes genuine moral judgements and is psychologically “normal” but who fails to be motivated by a particular judgement.