Moral Relativity: Is There an Absolute Moral Fact?

[Dawguard]

Dmstifik8ion,
I apologize. I wasn't paying close enough attention to the thread but my earlier comment about the "personal struggle" was intended for Dawguard. I am getting the impression that he wants the answer to be "there is only absolute morality" and it seems based on his religious conviction. That may or may not be an accurate interpretation of his position but I'm sure he will correct me if I have mischaracterized his stance.

This might be a personal struggle, but it has nothing to do with religion. I understand that morals must be believed, otherwise cultures will disappear, but the logical conclusion I came to was that they either exist as absolutes or not at all. My reasons are, as stated in my previous post,

Scenario 1. Morals do not exist. If they do not we will be forced to make them up on our own, which in turn makes them relative and nothing more then practical ways to live our lives. They are not right and wrong.
Scenario 2. Moral do exist. If this is the case then one of the following must be true: they always existed as a part of science, some being made them, i.e. a god, or we made them up. The first cannot be true for they are not part of science. The second can only be true if there is a god, which so far cannot be proven positive or negative. If the third is true then the conclusion of scenario one is true. This can only be proven by disproving any of the other statements, which is impossible.

This is entriely based on logical, and is the main premise of my position.

 

[Tide]

I have a question for you tide. If Morals are determined by society, is it then wrong for the individual to do something that their society disagrees with? I want you to explore the relationship between the individual and society in ethical relativism.

Ethical relativism? Are we changing the subject?

If society has deemed certain behavior as wrong then society has deemed it to be wrong. One difference between absolutism and relativism is that the absolutists will always regard some behavior as bad and other behavior as good whereas the relativists can evolve. An individual violating the "moral code" may in some cases cause the social order to rethink its position and adopt a new position on that behavior.

For example, in many societies of the past, slavery was acceptable. Some individuals rebelled against that by, for example, freeing slaves and creating an abolition movement. Absolutists of the day were appalled by that outrageous "wrongful" behavior. Were morals absolute we would not and could not have moved beyond that sad state of affairs. I think that relativism has selfcorrecting features not available to absolutism.

 

[Tide]

If the third is true then the conclusion of scenario one is true.

That is a false conclusion. You are saying that if we invent a concept then the concept cannot exist.

 

[Dawguard]

For example, in many societies of the past, slavery was acceptable. Some individuals rebelled against that by, for example, freeing slaves and creating an abolition movement. Absolutists of the day were appalled by that outrageous "wrongful" behavior. Were morals absolute we would not and could not have moved beyond that sad state of affairs. I think that relativism has selfcorrecting features not available to absolutism.

For thousands of years before slavery there were people saying that all men were equal. Certain religions did it, as did many members of the Refomation, i.e. John Ball and John Hus. The Magna Carta was a statement of freedoms and equality, so all the abolitionists did was apply these concepts to slaves. Slaves were equal, and therefore it was a violation of human rights if they were owned by anyone.
Just becuase the majority of the population thought slavery was moral did not make it so. You are taking relativism's approach of defining morals by the society and placing it on absolute's ideals. That doesn't work, nor has it ever worked. Absolutism is not as rigid and unforgiving as you think, for who are we to say we know exactly what these absolutes are? We must discover them like everything else, and so the beliefs of what morals are will change, and not the morals themselves.
Continuing with slaves, was it OK to have slaves thousands of years before the abolition movment? Society deemed it permisible and took it for granted, and it would be countless years before it was questioned. Was it alright in the Roman empire, the Persian empire, the Greeks?

As for your other point about things we make up existing: I can think of no example where a human has made something up, and it then becomes real. Words aren't, numbers aren't, characters in a fiction book aren't, ideas aren't, so why should morals be any different?

 

[Tide]

Dawg,

Just becuase the majority of the population thought slavery was moral did not make it so.

You are implicitly assuming morals are absolute. It is not valid to use your conclusion as a premise. However, you are supporting the notion that morals are indeed mutable.

I can think of no example where a human has made something up, and it then becomes real.

Numbers, words and sci-fi characters are just as real as morals. They all exist as concepts but none are physical.

 

[Smurf]

Ethical relativism? Are we changing the subject?

not that I'm aware of.

If society has deemed certain behavior as wrong then society has deemed it to be wrong. One difference between absolutism and relativism is that the absolutists will always regard some behavior as bad and other behavior as good whereas the relativists can evolve. An individual violating the "moral code" may in some cases cause the social order to rethink its position and adopt a new position on that behavior.
For example, in many societies of the past, slavery was acceptable. Some individuals rebelled against that by, for example, freeing slaves and creating an abolition movement. Absolutists of the day were appalled by that outrageous "wrongful" behavior. Were morals absolute we would not and could not have moved beyond that sad state of affairs. I think that relativism has selfcorrecting features not available to absolutism.

Well, I don't really understand how you think that should affect the individual's decision-making. I can see two possible conclusions from your argument, one, that if an individual acts in violation with their society, it is wrong. Or two, to deny the existence of right and wrong altogether.

 

[Smurf]

Dawg,
You are implicitly assuming morals are absolute. It is not valid to use your conclusion as a premise. However, you are supporting the notion that morals are indeed mutable.

I think what Dawg was getting at is that collectivism (which is, I think, what you're arguing for) is an appeal to popularity.

Numbers, words and sci-fi characters are just as real as morals. They all exist as concepts but none are physical.

That's true that morals are not physical, but that does not mean that they are in the same grouping as science fiction characters (same for numbers, and possibly words). With that logic then TVs exist, because they're physical. However, the physical laws that govern them and ultimately make TV possible don't exist, because they're not physical either. They're just human 'concepts'. But physical laws do exist. How we understand them is what's inside our mind. Something doesn't have to be physical to exist and be real.

Same with numbers, a number is a human concept, yes, but that concept is a representation of something very real. If I say "there are two rocks there, and two rocks there, so there's really four rocks in all" the amount of rocks won't change just because I decide to call "two" and "four" something else, or get brainwashed into thinking that 2+2 actually equals 5. There's still four rocks. That's very real, even if our concept of numbers is not physical.

You seem to be grouping human "inventions" such as sci fi character and human "discoveries" such as physical laws, numbers, and arguably morals together. Neither of them are necessarily physical, but our "discoveries" do exist outside of the human mind. Unless you're a solipsist, but let's not even go there.

So really, to say that morals are relative "because they're not physical" is like saying science laws are relative because they're not physical. Clearly that's not true, e=mc squared everywhere, not just in our culture. (I don't know how to do superscript)

I can't really think of any arguments for or against morals being "discoveries" or "inventions", but I think I'll bring it up with my philosophy club next semester.

 

[Tide]

Smurf,

So really, to say that morals are relative "because they're not physical" is like saying science laws are relative because they're not physical.

The only problem with that is that I never said any such thing. Dawg is the one who seems to be implying some kind of physical reality to morals. He is struggling with "existence" of morals ("either they exist or they do not exist") and is attempting to craft some kind of distinction between relative and absolute morality based on a logical argument related to existence.

I am merely pointing out flaws in his reasoning. I don't think you can make a case for morality existing outside of mind. At least I have yet to see any convincing argument supporting that thesis.

 

[Rade]

I don't think you can make a case for morality existing outside of mind. At least I have yet to see any convincing argument supporting that thesis.

Could not robots be created to act in ways that were "moral" as relates to how they interact with humans ? Such would be one example of moral action outside mind--and given the vast similarities of mind (elctro-chemical wave functions) to electrons in computer chips--it just seems like a matter of time until "moral robots" are created by humans.

 

[Tide]

Rade,

The android, Data (Brent Spiner), on Star Trek: The Next Generation was programmed with an ethics subroutine. He was also declared to be a sentient life form. I'll consider the possibility of moral robots when they can be declared sentient life.

Nevertheless, you do raise an interesting prospect. If morality can be programmed then the program can be edited and the morality subroutines changed. It would not be immutable or absolute.