moral anti realism

Question 1

anti realist theories

Answer 1

• error theory: says that moral judgments are cognitive statements but properties don’t exist
• emotivism: says moral judgments are non cognitive statements that express feelings of approval or disapproval
• prescriptivism: says moral judgments are non cognitive statements that are intended as intrustuctions

Question 2

Mackie’s error theory

Answer 2

• cognitivist, anti realist theory
• moral judgments are beliefs that are intended to be true or false (cognitivism)
• however, error theory also says that moral properties don’t exist (anti realism) and so these moral judgments are all false
• so according to error theory, the statement (e.g.) ‘murder is wrong’ expresses a cognitive belief that murder is wrong, but ‘wrong’ refers to a non existent property and so the statement is false

Question 3

Hume’s emotivism

Answer 3

• non cognitivist, anti realist
• Hume provides two arguments for the view that moral judgments are not judgments of reason, i.e. that moral judgments are non cognitive
  1. according to Hume, judgments of reason (e.g. belief that grass is green) don’t motivate us to act in any way; instead, its emotions and desires that motivate us to act
  2. according to Hume, moral judgments motivate action; e.g. the belief that ‘murder is wrong’ will motivate me not to murder
• so Hume’s argument here is essentially:

1. moral judgments can motivate action
2. judgments of reason cannot motivate action
3. therefore, moral judgments are not judgments of reason and are non cognitive

Question 4

Ayer’s emotivism

Answer 4

• non cognitivist, anti realist
• the verification principle: a statement only has meaning if it is either:
  1. an analytic truth (e.g. a triangle has three sides)
  2. empirically verifiable
• any statement that does not fit these descriptions is meaningless, according to the verification principle
• Ayer argues that moral judgments fail the verification principle
• Naturalism would argue that we could prove that murder causes pain, anger, etc. However, Ayer argues that this is not the same as proving murder is wrong. Hence, Ayer rejects naturalism: We can empirically verify that murder causes pain, say, but we cannot empirically verify that murder is wrong
• Ayer also argues that there is no way to empirically verify the presence of non-natural properties. Even if “murder is wrong” did possess the non-natural property of wrongness, how could we ever prove this? It’s not empirically verifiable, nor is it an analytic truth. Hence, Ayer also argues against non-naturalism: The existence of non-natural properties cannot be empirically proven

Question 5

Hare’s prescriptivism

Answer 5

• non cognitivist, anti realist
• prescriptivism says that moral judgements express (non cognitive) instructions that aim to guide behaviour
• according to prescriptivism, when someone says ‘murder is wrong’ what they really mean is something like ‘don’t murder people’
• when you instruct someone to do something, you are not expressing a belief that is capable of being true or false; hence, emotivism is a non cognitivist theory
• Hare argues with emotivism that moral judgments express non cognitive attitudes
• but Hare argues this isn’t the main point of moral judgments: the main point of moral judgments is to guide conduct
• as well as the above analysis of moral judgments, Hare provides an analysis of general value terms such as ‘good’, ‘bad’, ‘right’ and ‘wrong’
• Hare argues that the meaning of these terms is not simply to describe but mainly to commend or criticise

Question 6

Hare’s strawberry example for prescriptivism

Answer 6

• a purely descriptive analysis of ‘good strawberry’ might reduce its meaning to ‘sweet’
• but description is clearly not the only thing meant when it is said ‘this is a good strawberry’ because there are ways in which we use language that conflict this analysis
• so according to Hare, ‘good strawberry’ doesn’t simply describe, it also commends the strawberry
• but in order to commend or criticise something, we must assume a certain set of standards against which the strawberry is commended as ‘sweet’
• however, these standards are not objective and there are no facts that can determine one set of standards as correct or incorrect

Question 7

problems for anti realism

Answer 7

• moral nihilism
• moral progress

Question 8

moral nihilism

Answer 8

• if moral anti-realism is true, it can be argued that this leads to moral nihilism: the view that no actions are inherently wrong
• there’s nothing true about moral judgements (e.g. ‘murder is wrong’)
• this then raises the question of why anyone should bother to be moral at all

Question 9

response to the moral nihilism objection

Answer 9

• non-cognitivists can respond that just because there’s no inherent right or wrong, people still have moral attitudes and feelings
• and the realisation that moral values are just expressions of feelings doesn’t mean we should (or could) stop having these moral feelings
• it’s also somewhat self-defeating to be a moral nihilist according to non-cognitivism
• living as if there are no moral values is itself an expression of a certain attitude or feeling
• cognitivist anti-realist theories have a harder time responding to the charge of moral nihilism
• one response could be to just accept the charge of moral nihilism and argue that, though undesirable, this doesn’t make error theory any less true
• there may also be practical reasons to behave as if some moral judgements are true; e.g., if you were always stealing from your friends, chances are they wouldn’t remain friends with you for very long

Question 10

moral progress

Answer 10

• our moral values have changed over time
• e.g., it was considered morally acceptable to keep slaves back in the time of Plato but it’s not today
• if we accept that such changes are examples of moral progress, then we can argue that:
  1. if moral anti-realism is true, then there would be no moral progress
  2. but there has been moral progress
  3. therefore moral anti-realism is false

Question 11

response to the moral progress objection

Answer 11

• it is a somewhat question-begging argument
• the second premise essentially assumes the conclusion
• why should the anti-realist accept there’s been objective moral progress when he doesn’t accept the existence of objective morality in the first place?
• however, we can define moral progress in less question-begging ways
• it could be argued that our morality has become more consistent over time, or that we have adapted our moral values in response to greater knowledge of the facts