Lecture 1 - Morality: Who Decides? Flashcards
Cultural relativism
Whatever a culture things is right is right for that culture.
Moral decisions are always ___, so we must be prepared to ___ and ___.
Moral decisions are always fallible, so we must be prepared to consider new evidence and the possibility that we could be wrong.
Is the evidence moderately against CR, strongly against CR, moderately for CR, or strongly for CR?
Strongly against.
There is no reason to believe that moral reasoning is ___.
Arbitrary.
Arguments for cultural relativism
Lots of disagreements between cultures and no rational way to solve them.
Promotes tolerance, respect for others, open-mindedness.
No one gets to decide for others what is right/wrong.
Are moral disagreements more often due to disagreements about values or disagreements about non-moral facts?
Non-moral facts.
Moral decisions are based on the ___ of ___.
Weight of evidence.
Arguments against cultural relativism
Disagreement does not mean there is no right/wrong answer.
There is a great deal of agreement on value.
Tolerance and respect for others are values, so CR can’t promote them. They’re promoting a universal value when they do so.
What reason does a CR-ist have to be tolerant, respectful and open- minded?
It could be said that cultural relativists are really ___ in disguise.
Moral liberals.
Is morality a rational sphere of inquiry?
Yes
Moral values
Reflected in states of affairs that are referred to using moral terms such as duty, justice, rights, virtue, rightness, and wrongness.
A ___ moral realism seems justified.
Provisional moral realism.
Distinction between ___ and ___ ___ is crucial to understanding moral reasoning.
Moral and non-moral facts.
What is the schema for thinking about moral beliefs and moral disagreements?
Moral values + Non-moral facts = Moral Judgements (beliefs, claims, assertions)
Does CR have anything valuable to say?
Yes. There is often more than one right way to answer a moral problem. Culture has a profound influence on how we view things.
