Moral Relativism - Is It Unavoidable or Unacceptable?

[hovis]

Yep, so that's your view. But someone else is likely to think something else and who are you to say that they are wrong.

If someone is religious and believed that there was an afterlife, then the ending of the human race wouldn't be such a disaster. In fact, for Christians, it is predicted in the bible so they expect it to happen. They might interpret the 'killer virus' or whatever to be God's word being carried out and as something which must happen before the judgement.

Religious warriors believe they are fufilling their role in life by killing others. These are all valid, but conflicting, viewpoints.

 

[Good Intentions]

What is best for survival of society becomes inheritally good.

This isn't inherently good. This is good for society. What about an evil society (or does your values not include societies being evil?)?

Nothing is inherently good. Nothing is inherently evil. Every 'good' thing is beneficial to someone or valued by a moral system, and conversely adverse to someone and not valued by another system. In the first case because different things are in the interest of different people, and the second because what we believe is arbitrary.

And that is as much attention as this topic deserves.

 

[MysteryGuest]

Gonna (hopefully) do a proper post tomorrow (later today) but in the meantime, I suddenly remember reading a book in the form of a dictionary by Deleuze & Guattari (in late 1988) linking Spinoza and Nietzsche in their own inimitable fashion. The only bit I really remember (and thus for me the 'punkte' or whole point of the book) is (as I think GI has already referred to) the idea of "good for me" or "bad for me". It still makes me wonder what in that context "good" or "bad" could mean...

Thassit. I'm too tired & pissed to contribute any more at the moment.

 

[Splat]

This isn't inherently good. This is good for society. What about an evil society (or does your values not include societies being evil?)?

Nothing is inherently good. Nothing is inherently evil. Every 'good' thing is beneficial to someone or valued by a moral system, and conversely adverse to someone and not valued by another system. In the first case because different things are in the interest of different people, and the second because what we believe is arbitrary.

And that is as much attention as this topic deserves.

I am actually in total agreement with you everything is arbitrary and subjective, but i honestly believe that all societies want to survive and the moral systems that exists are strongly related to this fact. This is the common ground for every society. If it wasn't then the societies would die out and not exist (see Aztecs) .

 

[nosos]

I am actually in total agreement with you everything is arbitrary and subjective, but i honestly believe that all societies want to survive and the moral systems that exists are strongly related to this fact. This is the common ground for every society. If it wasn't then the societies would die out and not exist (see Aztecs) .

Surely in that case social cohesion would (and should - that's the unfortunate conclusion) lie at the heart of all political system?

 

[Splat]

In the future hopefully this will happen if not we will not exist. At some point something bad is going to happen to humanity whether it is a virus or a supernova, if we are still preoccupied with killing each other we will soon cease to exist, simple as that really.

 

[nosos]

In the future hopefully this will happen if not we will not exist. At some point something bad is going to happen to humanity whether it is a virus or a supernova, if we are still preoccupied with killing each other we will soon cease to exist, simple as that really.

Don't get me wrong, mate, I agree with this.

I just think that if you take the stance that one arbitrator of moral beliefs (should be?) is survival of the society in question then you can come to some very unpleasent and uncomfortable political conclusions.

 

[MysteryGuest]

But societies of people have always , and still are, killing each other for land, for amusement, for the 'greater good'. Who is to say that they are wrong to do this now or in the past. You and I might think it is absolutely abhorent, but that is our opinion.

So nobody can have anything other than a ‘mere’ opinion. Which you’re now stating in the manner of an objective fact. You seem to be quite (understandably) upset regarding what you ‘merely in your opinion’ see as exploitation of women in the porn thread over in the Relationships forum, but by what you’ve posted here, you have to keep it to yourself. I can see why this would cause anguish. I feel your pain!

However…

I don’t understand why if morals need to be agreed by society, that counts as mere agreement, as if morals somehow ‘ought’ to have a deeper, more solid reality? The process of society agreeing on morals is the sum total of their reality but this is not reductive of the reality of morals. I am honestly fascinated in this thread at the constant use of deflationary, pejorative terminology when referring to the subjective aspect of morals.

Perhaps some of the problem comes from a feeling that we are somehow apart from reality, qualitatively different. So you (hovis I mean) refer to a greater, Other reality, in cosmic terms which you then place in opposition to ‘merely’ us. Yet I prefer a kind of ‘weak anthropological principle’ style shift of focus, or change of aspect (as in Wittgenstein’s duck/rabbit picture) which emphasises the fact that we are here now, and avoids hidden metaphysical assumptions that in some way we ‘ought’ not to be here (or indeed ‘ought’ to be here). And just as this shift of emphasis allows us to accept our existence, so it also allows us to examine our mental flora and fauna without this strange ambiguity towards morals where we are fascinated yet torn by anxiety as we cannot explain them. Morals seem to be mental flowers that are highly regarded as a genera, with various species and subspecies of varying degrees of beauty, or they could be viewed as part of the music of human interaction.

To use a musical analogy, some people may be tone deaf but that doesn’t mean music doesn’t exist.


A line must be drawn. The concept of compassion, or that of empathy is found in all humans. Sexual sadists are perfectly aware of the fact that they’re causing pain; otherwise they wouldn’t be interested in doing what they do. I’m specifically bringing up sexual violence here because imo it most forcefully undermines the relativist viewpoint. Issues of consent are what temper relativism. Issues of consent also bring in the matter of when to intervene. Moral relativism must be found wanting first (a priori I suppose) if it’s unable to give any reason to intervene when somebody’s being raped.

Which philosopher was it who pointed out that humans have this tendency to try to take arguments to infinity and thus nullify them? (Honest question… can’t remember now… was it Leibniz? Or not?)

Speaking more poetically, I feel that morals seem to appear out of the edges of the eyes of the mind, and only appear when the ‘seeing’ of intellectual analysis relaxes and looks more deeply ahead. It doesn’t mean that they have no reality. In a practical sense they could be treated as objects mostly behind our (metaphorical) ‘field of vision’ which we can only assess by ‘looking outwards’, ie in this metaphor by acting in the world.

There will always be a tension between the subjectivism with which we individually experience the world and form viewpoints, and the fact that we are able to imagine ourselves in somebody else’s place. This does not need to be regarded as a bad thing, just a thing that goes with creation of morality.

(There could be a corker of an essay to write on the psychological aspect of moral relativism, as regardless of the theory, in practice it often seems to be infused with self-loathing, or at least misanthropy).

 

[broken]

If it's a social construct then what constitutes a society? Would 10 Paedophiles locked in a room be justified in commiting child abuse because they all agree it's ok?

I don't know much about this, but surely if no one else is in the room with them, then no one would be there to cast a moral judgement.
Morality is, presumably, a purely human construct. I don't believe that anything that isn't capable of concious thought could be capable of morality. Thus something is only 'good' or 'bad' if someone decides that it is. And therefore as long as the paedophiles remain locked in the room without our knowledge of their being there, we can't cast a moral judgment. Sort of like the old tree falling in a forest question, except that there is no underlying science behind morality like there is behind sound.

I don't really see that it matters whether or not there is a universal standard of morality, or whether we have free will, or whether or not the world exists. Whatever the philisophical dilemma of the day, which we will never be able to answer to the satisfaction of everyone involved, we still have to live our lives. All that really matters is our perception of the world, seeing as we can never realy know anything more than that. And so each peson just has to behave accordfing to his own perceptions.

This doesn't mean that we can't pass moral judgments on others, because the need to do so is just as much part of our experience of the world as our desire not to do things that we judge to be wrong. So yes, morality is subjective, undeniably so. But that doesn't mean that it is pointless, or that we can't make moral judgements.

Hope that i don't sound to naive.

 

[MysteryGuest]

Hiya broken!

I think that's a very interesting post.

I obviously liked this bit:

So yes, morality is subjective, undeniably so. But that doesn't mean that it is pointless, or that we can't make moral judgements.

 

[Splat]

i concur

 

[hovis]

So nobody can have anything other than a ‘mere’ opinion. Which you’re now stating in the manner of an objective fact. You seem to be quite (understandably) upset regarding what you ‘merely in your opinion’ see as exploitation of women in the porn thread over in the Relationships forum, but by what you’ve posted here, you have to keep it to yourself. I can see why this would cause anguish. I feel your pain!

LOL! Of course we can share our opinions, or life would be boring. I never said we weren't allowed to argue our own mere opinions! The thing with opinions is that they can change. Also an educated opinion is a lot different to an ignorant one. For example, if people know that poor women and children (and some men, I don't want to exclude anyone here) are sold into sex slavery, shipped to richer countries and forced (financially or otherwise) to perform on sex sites and as prostitutes with virtually no rights, but choose to still look at the sites, then that is a lot different to an uneducated person going 'oooh tits and fannys great!'. I think that it is wrong (the sex slavery, not the tits and fannys), so obviously I will argue my point, but if the majority of people don't agree then they can argue their point and try to change my mind. Our opinions shape our actions, even if they are 'merely' our own personal opinions.

I don’t understand why if morals need to be agreed by society, that counts as mere agreement, as if morals somehow ‘ought’ to have a deeper, more solid reality? The process of society agreeing on morals is the sum total of their reality but this is not reductive of the reality of morals. I am honestly fascinated in this thread at the constant use of deflationary, pejorative terminology when referring to the subjective aspect of morals.

The idea that morals are agreed by society is fine, more or less, in an individual society, but without thinking too deeply on a friday, there are two problems that I can see:

1) When two societies meet, it is highly unlikely that the two societies will agree that the same things are right and wrong.
2) Everyone has their own agenda, even within one society, the rich person, who never has to steal, may think stealing is absolutely wrong always.

And then what about lying, brainwashing and moral duplicity as practised by the western governments? For example, AFAIK the majority of people in this country thought that invading Iraq was wrong, but this was overruled by the government.

 

[DaveCinzano]

so, basically: it's a funny old world

 

[MysteryGuest]

so, basically: it's a funny old world

One thing I do know for sure is that you are a rapscallion, young bristle!


Still, it's nice to remember the dim and distant days when I used to do serious posts. Before I realised that I didn't want to for the time being.

 

[innit]

And I was just thinking that your posts were the very best ones on the thread!

Twatbag

 

[MysteryGuest]

And I was just thinking that your posts were the very best ones on the thread!

Twatbag

Breastbollock.

 

[innit]

Breastbollock.

Scrotenipple

 

[MysteryGuest]

My posts are the best, yes.

Scrotenipple

knobflange

 

[knopf]

Is moral relativism unavoidable or unacceptable?

Depends.

 

[ViolentPanda]

I'm confused. Which one is the right set of morals, guv?

Or are you smart people going to come together and decide where all these sensible views come together, would that be it? A everyone-can-agree set of common sense? Wow, that would be neat.

The main problem with the idea of a consensus morality is, IMHO....














people.

 

[likesfish]

whats good for me and mine is what counts
appeals to higher aurthority are bollocks IF I consider something bad and can get enough force on my side I can stop you from doing it end of arguement .

 

[Azrael23]

You can stop it for how long?


Until the innate nature of humanity addresses the balance?
Until you die?

Either way you can`t stop anything for any real amount of time.

And then when you die, you`ll have the pleasant experience of feeling your effects upon the web of life from the perspective of each and every person you`ve ever interacted with both personally and by association.

I bet Hitler had loads of fun.

 

[Dubversion]

if anyone cares, relativism was the theme of Bragg's In Our Time on Radio 4 just now, so it'll be on the Beeb's Listen Again if you missed it.

and i found it REALLY frustrating...

 

[deeplight]

Morality is bollocks

There is simply what you love to be, and what you dont.

Some people are in tune with it, others are temporarily lost.

Everything starts and ends with the individual and somwhere inbetween is society.

You get what you give in life. Show love get love. Show hate...

What many dont get is that its all on an emotional level which is the most joyous and painful level there is. Theres your relativism.

Life is a mirror but if you kill someone it doesn't mean that you'll die. You will suffer emotionally though and probably already did in order to be driven to murder.

In the end the only standard that can be truly known is do unto others what you would have done unto you.

Yes there are some twisted fucks out there but the worlds not perfect and some people cant see what they would love to be from the hate and bitterness. There again there is no worse punishment for them than their own lives.

 

[118118]

I don't know much about this, but surely if no one else is in the room with them, then no one would be there to cast a moral judgement.
Morality is, presumably, a purely human construct.

Surely this is nonsence. People can cast moral judgements on hypothetical situations that could encompass all possible transgressions of this sort- do they have to see a particular instance in order to cast judgement on it? Its almost like saying if I get away with murder, then its not wrong - it has not been possible to morally condemn me in particular has it.

So yes, morality is subjective, undeniably so.

I don't know if its undeniable. See I'm going to deny it. There.
Edit:Alright explain why it is.

 

[JLN88]

It depends on what you believe morals to be, are they some sort of duty, and are we to abide by this duty? though these can conflict, as shown in kants utilitarianism.

 

[tangerinedream]

"Is it useful to society? Then it is good. Is it hurtful? Then it is bad" - P. Kropotkin

That simple, IMO, morality can be derived from common good, moral relativism is naval gazing bollocks.

No, but 'common good' is also a reletive concept no? What I think is good for society is not neccassarily what you think is good. That depends entirely on the direction that you think your society should be taking - and that surely can only be truly decided by a good prolonged bout of naval gazing.

 

[MysteryGuest]

It's been said before, but still...

I really like the way that moral relativists always try to argue in such a way as to give great significance to the universality (ie objectivity) of their relativity.

 

[inflatable jesus]

I'm sure you'll all be pleased to know that in the year and a bit since I last posted in this thread, I've come up with a complete theory of why moral relativism exists as a theory but is ultimately bankrupt.

Unfortunately I can't go into it now, because I promised some friends I would go to a Karaoke bar with them.

 

[Nadsy]

can notions of good and bad ever be anything other than contextual or culturally specific?

It's my belief that there is no right or wrong. There are things that personally you think are right and personally think are wrong based on your own set of belief systems but it is unfair to judge others based on that.

For example you are told murder is wrong and you probably believe yourself that killing another human being is bad , but then when you're given permission by the government and a justifiable excuse (kill them before they kill us), murder becomes good...