Meta ethics: Moral realism Flashcards
What is Cognitivism?
The belief that ethical language/moral sentences e.g., “killing is wrong” express beliefs, which have truth values (can either be true or false), and are propositions (things that have truth values)
What is Non cognitivism?
Non cognitivism: Ethical language does not express beliefs, but some other non-cognitive mental state.
Ethical language/claims are not propositions (so they cannot be true or false), and they do not try to describe the world
What is Moral realism?
Cognitivist theory
-Claim that moral properties exist as mind independent phenomena (which are a genuine part of the world)
-good and bad are properties of situations and people, and right and wrong are properties of actions
E.g., “Murder is wrong” is a moral fact because the act of murder has the moral property of wrongness
What is Naturalism? (Cognitivist)
In favour of Moral realism?
Is a type of moral realism that claims moral properties are natural properties (properties we can identify empirically)
Moral properties such as goodness and righteousness can be identified empirically
E.g., Utilitarianism is a common form of moral naturalism: Bentham argues all humans seek to seek pleasure and avoid pain, which are natural properties of the brain, making utilitarianism a naturalist theory
“Murder is wrong” expresses a belief where wrong refers to a type of natural property
What is Non-naturalism? (Cognitivist)
In favour of Moral realism
The claim that moral properties are not natural properties, but are distinct non-natural properties
Eg. Murder is wrong is true if the act of murder has the non natural property of wrongness
Intuitionalism (Non Naturalism)
E.g., Intuitionalism:
Knowledge of non natural properties is difficult to explain as non natural moral properties aren’t like physical properties that can be percieved or measured
How do we acquire knowledge of these?
Intuitionalism: Moore argues that we can obtain these via rational intuition, which helps us to directly reflect on the truth of moral judgements
Eg. Murder is wrong
We can directly reflect on the truth/falsehood of this, and the truth/falsehood of this is self evident due to intuition
What is the verification principle
Issue for Moral realism
Empiricist approach to philosophy that aims to disprove moral realism by pointing out the flaws in moral judgements
Claims that a proposition/truth claim is only meaningful if it’s a tautology (true by definition) or verifiable through experience. If a statement cannot be verified via empirical means or it isn’t a tautology, its meaningless
(Goes on to attack moral judgements, stating that they fail the principle, and aren’t analytic truths)
E.g., “Stealing is wrong” isn’t true by definition, and this also cannot be verified by an empirical investigation (we can’t see/intuit wrongness) Therefore making moral judgements meaningless. Moral judgements only express feelings of approval/disproval, and do not express anything factual about the real world
What is Hume’s Is/Ought gap
Issue for moral realism
Non cognitivist/non realist stance, deductive argument
Claims that there is a logical gap between facts and values
Moral values can’t be inferred from factual premises alone
Facts don’t apply any moral judgements
Moral judgements aren’t grounded in facts, reason or belief but a non-cognitive process
P1: Innocent human beings ought not to be killed
P2: Abortion is killing of innocent human being
C: Therefore, abortion ought not to be performed
P2 is a factual premise (Is sentence)
-the conclusion can only be inferred if supported by P1 (an imperative ought sentence) rather than a truth claim
“Is/ought gap” suggests moral claims on what ought to be done can’t be done by facts alone
Moore’s open ended argument
Moore’s open-ended argument (Aims to show naturalism as deeply flawed)
Moore- Terms are either definable or undefinable
We can double check a definition with further questioning
Genuine definitions only have closed questions
If the double check leads to further questions requiring more investigation, it’s not genuine
Eg. Closed question: Is good good/ is pleasure pleasure
Open: Is pleasure good?
If they really were the same thing (like naturalism claims) it would be a closed question, it wouldn’t make sense to ask if pleasure is good as it would be like “is pleasure pleasure?”
Moral naturalism (Mill)
P1-People desire their own happiness, individual happiness is desirable
P2-This is reason to believe general happiness is desireable too
P3-The fact that general happiness is desirable is the only proof we could give that general happiniess is good
P4-happniess is the only good as all over values are part of what makes us happy
C-“Good” reduces to happniess, and since happiness is a natural property, good reduces to a natural property
Moral naturalism (Virtue ethics)
Aristotles discussion of the ergon (Characteristic of a thing) could be interpreted as a discussion of natural facts of humans
Aristotle argues that the good is what most humans value, and we can determine this by seeing what people strive for (Eudaimonia)
To live a good life you need to live as a good human, which is fufilling our function well
Our function is a natural fact about us, which is to use reason
Therefore using reason (natural fact) links to doing moral goodness
Naturalistic Fallacy (Moore)
Criticises moral naturalism (In favour of non naturalism) for equating moral goodness with a natural property (Eg. Mill)
P1- its a fallacy to conclude that drinking beer is good due because its pleasurable as these are two different properties
P2-Good is a moral property, pleasure is a natural property
P3-Even if these accomany each other, they are not the same thing
C-Moral properties are different to natural properties
C2-Moore argues that moral properties therefore cannot be reduced to natural ones, if not at all
Mackie’s argument from relativity
Argues against moral realism, for anti realism, to show that MI moral properties do not exist, which he does through different societies
P1-Some cultures are polygamous, others think its wrong
P2-Some think eating some animals are wrong, others don’t
P3-Some think slave ownership is wrong, some dont
P4-If moral realism is correct, there would be only one objective answer to these issues, but there isn’t
P6-If moral realism were true, we wouldn’t expect to see so many divergent moral beliefs
C-Therefore its false
Mackie’s argument from Queerness
Attacks idea of non natural moral properties, as they are strange
Argues that if moral realism is true it must contain two peculiar features
Metaphysical Queerness: Moral realists believe that strange objective moral properties in the world exist and these strange properties are able to generate motivation for action. Mackie believes this is reason enough to suggest that MR is wrong as our needs are what motivates us
Epistemological queerness: If mind independent Moral properties exist, its a mystery to how these are aquired
Natural knowledge can be explained natural, but moral knowledge cannot be explained in the same way, and requires intuitionalism to explain it
Hume: Moral judgements are not beliefs
P1- Beliefs by themselves can never motivate us to act, nor cause any other states that do
P2-Moral judgements motivate us to act
C1- Therefore moral judgements cannot be beliefs
