1
2 105 Relativism
There are no objective (independent of me) ethical rules.
There are no universal ethical rules.
Ethical objectivism: the justification of moral standards is independent of me.
Ethical realism: moral facts exist, just as physical facts
What is right for one person is not necessarily right for someone else.
What is right in one circumstance is not necessarily right in other circumstances.
What is right/wrong is contextually dependent.
So, there are no universal moral principles.
Diversity Argument
There is moral diversity. So, there are no objective moral standards.
CE by analogy: Historically, and currently, there is medical diversity. So, there are no objective medical
standards.
CE by analogy: Historically, there is diversity in physics. So, there are no objective physical standards.
Uncertainty Argument
There is lots of moral uncertainty, so there are not objective moral standards.
CE by analogy: There is lots of medical uncertainty, so there are no objective medical standards.
Situational Variations Argument
The applications of moral principles vary according to situations/contexts, so there are no objective moral
standards.
CE by analogy: The application of medicine varies according to situations, so there are no objective medical
standards.
These CEs prove that the moral relativist’s arguments (for the conclusion that objective moral standards do not
exist) are invalid. Therefore, there are objective moral standards. Is this argument valid?
CE by analogy: Jupiter has more than 7 moons, so there is no elephant sitting on your head now.
The argument is clearly invalid (because it’s possible for the reason to be true and the conclusion false), but,
happily, there is no elephant sitting on your head.
Just because reasons are not sufficient for their conclusion does not establish that their conclusion is false.
Mary Midgley’s “Trying Out One’s New Sword”
You will find below my reconstruction of MM’s presentation of the argument for the moral isolationist position.
It is based on 27-28.2.1 [NOTE “28.1.3” means “p.28, column2, paragraph 1.]
(A)
1. We are a member of only one culture (27.2.3)
2. We never really know or
understand another culture.
&
3. In order to criticize/praise (i.e. judge)
legitimately X, then one must know or understand X.
4. One can never legitimately criticize or praise (i.e., judge) X in another culture. (Moral
isolationism)
2
There are THREE BASIC WAYS TO EVALUATE AN ARUGMENT/EXPLANATION
1. Criticize the truth of one or more reasons, by presenting arguments supporting claims that are
inconsistent with one or more of the given reasons. (Counter-arguments)
2. Criticize the support of its reasons (by means of counterexamples).
3. Criticize the truth of its conclusion, by presenting arguments supporting a claim that is
inconsistent with the conclusion. (Counter-arguments)
MM’s 1st objection: 28.2.1-2 Against the truth or acceptability of (4).
(B)
1. Other cultures are “mirrors”: they help us to become aware of ourselves and of alternatives/options.
2. If we can’t (morally) judge other cultures,
we won’t be able to (a) judge our own culture, &
3. We (morally/practically) must judge
4. We should learn from other cultures’
(b) learn from other cultures’ insights or mistakes. & our own culture.
& insights and mistakes.
& 5. We can judge our own culture.
& 6. We can learn from other cultures’
insights and mistakes.
5. We can (morally) judge other cultures.
Premises (2&3&4) logically imply (5): It’s impossible for (2&3&4) to be true and (5) false.
Premise (3) and (4) are acceptable.
Problems: Premise (2) is false. It states that not being able to judge (morally) other cultures is a sufficient
condition for not being able to do 2(a) and 2(b). Can you imagine situations where the alleged sufficient
condition is satisfied but where we can do either 2(a) or 2(b)?
CE to show that the alleged sufficient condition, not being able to judge (morally) other cultures, is not
sufficient for not being able to do 2(a): We can judge our own culture simply by inventing or creating our own
standards from which to judge ourselves, even if we can’t judge (morally) other cultures. Imagine a totally
isolated culture, which believes that it’s the only culture in existence, and that judges itself (e.g., over fishing).
CE to show that not being able to judge (morally) other cultures is not sufficient for not being able to do 2(b):
Imagine a culture1 discovers that an culture2 drives on the left rather than on the right. This expands culture1’s
options. It can adopt that practice to explore it and thus learn from it, even if it does not judge whether that
culture driving practice is right or wrong for it.
NOTE: Since (2) is false, it ‘s possible for (1) to be true and (2) false, so the inference from (1) to (2) is false.
28.1.2- 28.2.2 She presents an example (Samurai testing his sword on a “consenting” on a wayfarer) illustrating
(a) the difficulty of conforming to the moral isolationist theory, and that
(b) If we accept something as a serious moral truth about one culture, we can’t refuse to apply it … to other
cultures. Problem: This is inadequate. It must be shown that this example is representative of all attempts to
come at the defense of judgments about other cultures. Can it?
28.2.3 to 29.1.1 MM seems to supporting premise B(3). This should have been done much more clearly.
29.2.3 MM correctly criticizes premise (1) of argument (A)
30.2.1 Additional example: she refers to anthropologists who judged the remote cultures they observed.
Problem: MM does not provide any evidence for this example.
Statement 2(b) is a psychological fact about us humans, but it’s not enough to show that we shouldn’t apply it to
what we take to be serious moral truths to all other cultures.
MM makes some good points, but they could have been much better developed and organized. She does NOT
model a systematic way of evaluating arguments.