Justifying your ethics without objectivity

Philosophy Forums Philosophy
1

This is for anyone on here who is an ethical relativist; For those who do not believe morality is objective, but rather is subjective. (This is me as well)

How can you condemn any action? How can you justify your beliefs? We think killing is wrong. We think slavery is wrong. But if asked to explain why… Can we? How would you explain slavery is wrong? I can see a whole bunch of answers but to every answer I can ask “why is that desirable? Why is that good?” And when you answer that, Ill ask it again for that answer. Without being able to claim “slavery is simply objectively wrong.” or “Slavery is wrong because it breaks this objective moral rule” how can we say it is wrong? How could I convince a slave holder that slavery is wrong? If I cant, then 1) he will continue to have slaves and I cant say anything bad about it and 2) I dont have any justification for my belief

This bothers me a good deal and Id like to hear your views and relativists.

2

might makes right. slavery is only wrong to the slave. murder is only wrong to the murdered. (and maybe to those who fear being enslaved or murdered as well…)

-Imp

3

Think of it this way:

If the relativist holds slaves and says to them, “I have you captive because -I- feel I should be able to have slaves” then they would be right to assume that should they break free, they’d be justified in saying “I’m going to kill you because -I- feel I should be able to kill slave holders.”

It’s like… Reading Nietzsche is signing the disclaimer:

“I shall adhere to the law of rise to power and agree to suffer any occurrences that shall result because of that – including death.”

I personally am not an ethical relativist but for those that would choose to be, one would hope that they are aware of the rules. That it’s definitely a two way street and you could get burned if you act like an ass.

That’s how I operate – I’m nice and empathetic, and feel everyone -should- be, but when I come across someone who clearly doesn’t give a fuck about me, then I like to give them a taste of their own medicine. So for assholes like Imp who sit around thinking the theoretical it would be cool to corner them in an alley --in real life-- and give them a taste of the real world they so passionately flee from with their disgusting politics.

4

The relativist is goign to argue that ‘social contracts’ are what justify and constitute justifiable condemnation. Everyone enters into a social agreement to ‘be nice’ to differing degrees. They;kk argue thaT just because we can reason that we shouldn’t have to literally be obligated to any social contracts of any kind, the otherwise wise thing to do ‘for the benifit of the species’ they’ll say, is to enter into said social contracts.

In my opinion, this ‘social contract’ is nothing but a reinterpretation of an objective moral code to which there are differing degrees of sensitivity.

5

I’ve been a fair amount of Fuzhi lately, and he’s slowly but surely got me pretty convinced that objective reality probably doesn’t exist.

Now, since humans are pretty much all the same, we can expect our subjective realities to have a large degree of homology, so much so as to often be indistinguishable. So, the line between objective and subjective is a touch blurred.

But, within that, we do know that certain ethical behaviours work and some don’t. So, it becomes a task of looking at history to observe which behaviours work better within society and which don’t. This applies to both the short and long term.

So then it becomes a task of harmonizing ourselves with both those progressive elements of history as well as modern society to produce a vehicle whereby the future can be made, the present can be stabilized, and the past can be honoured.

6

I expect objective reality exists, but I’m not sure how much we can ever know about it (as we can only percieve it subjectively). It doesn’t seem logical that reality can be affected by our perceptions of it.*

[size=75]Even though it seems that it does! There have been some weird experiments in quantum mechanics where observing a partical seems to sometimes change it’s behavior! :astonished: Maybe the watched pot really doesn’t boil. :wink: [/size]

7

Well, it is more that since there is always going to be an interpreter through which it is filtered, what does ‘objective’ reality really mean in this case? Since the only information we can get is through our senses (which are limited, but sufficient) and the only understanding we can achieve is through our relationships to objects (and in turn, their relationship to us), how can there be objectivity? We can speak of consistency, which is where things like universal morals come into play.

That there is some degree of regularity to the system is not surprising, but that doesn’t mean that the system is actually regular. For example, in order to make science work, statistics need to be applied, due to both problems in the equipment as well as irregularity (or rather, non-perfect uniformity) of the experiments being performed. Once we’ve created a rule, however, it always seems to be consistent because we are looking for it, so we are better able to ignore the outliers.

8

I still am having trouble with this. I was reading the debate over God’s existence between Russell and Copleston and I find Russell’s explanation of ethics completely inadequate. He says he can see the difference between good and bad and needs no other justification. This seems to imply an innate objective moral code in ourselves which I completely deny. He claims that that doesnt make an action right for the performer if they enjoy the action because they could be making a mistake. He claims people can want to do something and it be a mistake. I dont see how he can claim this. Russell seems to be implying that because the majority of people agree with him, it is reasonable to conclude that this belief is correct and if someone does otherwise, it is wrong. This seems to be saying morality is decided by opinion polls. I think Russell tries to overcome this by saying you have to take consequences into account but I can always ask how one knows what consequences are desired. This will bring us back where we started about explaining why certain consequences are wanted. We have no objective standard to judge what consequences are good and I dont see how we can determine between them.

As I read this and Principia Ethica by Moore they keep talking of desirable consequences etc etc. But they seem to completely ignore the issue that we have no justification for saying which consequences are desirable and which are not. We have no moral code to say if something is right, so we shift it over to consequences… The thing is, we dont have a moral code to say which consequences are right. It gets us no where and I dont see how they ignore this issue. Why is life more desirable than death? Why is freedom more desirable than slavery? It seems common sense but without objective morality we cannot say. Because of this, I feel that Russel’s ethical explanation completely falls apart as well as Moore’s.

Am I missing something? Do Moore and Russell believe in objective morality just not from God? That seems to me to be quite foolish.

If they dont, why do they not see this blatant issue? You cant claim to base ethics on consequences when you have no ground whatsoever to say what consequences are good and which ones are bad. If you were able to do that, you wouldnt need to judge consequences because you would have an objective standard to apply situations to.

Enough rambling… Im not making sense. I appologize.

9

If you are asking that question prima facie, then you truly are confused.

10

If the answer is so simple and obvious, please explain it to me. Because I value my life? Why are things I value good? What if I value torturing people? Thats my point. Without objective morality you can ALWAYS ask “why” to everything. When I spoke about Moore’s PE, its the same thing. I can ask “why” certain consequences are good. When you answer this, Ill ask why your answer is good. And it will continue either into an infinite regress (and you have no backing or standing for your ethical position) or it will end with an objective truth.

I dont believe morality is objective, but I fail to see how philosophers such as Moore and Russell feel they can make a coherent ethical system while denying the objectivity of morality.

The only possible way is to almost have a set of axioms. These axioms are good or desirable. Perhaps life, pleasure, security, etc. And from these axioms we can decide which consequences are best. But the thing is, we have no true reason in choosing those axioms. There is no objective standard to relate to so our axioms are arbitrary. Why not chose fear, pain, and hardship? It seems like a stupid question, but you cant logically reason and explain why unless you adhere to an objective moral standard.

It seems to me that Moore and Russell (along with many other philosophers) are being completely and totally inconsistent. Am I missing something?

11

Explaining a moral system without any appeal to emotions is doomed to failure. Your looking for an impossibility. Logic doesn’t tell us what we should do, but only how to remain consistent when we make a choice.

I personally am an emotivist in the Humean sense. What is bad, is always what is bad to humans, and what is bad to humans is prima facie what makes them feel bad. Its pretty simple. Watching animals being murdered, makes me feel bad, so I don’t eat animals because I know that somewhere an animal died for that meat. Emotivism can be adapted to create cultural value or subjective values or human values.

The reason why I said that “if your questioning why it is better to live than to die, then your confused,” is because it is foundational to every endeavor and questioning that foundation leads one no where. You will not get anything of philosophical value by asking prima facie “Why should one live rather than die.”

12

Ok… But I fail to see how we could apply ethics. If we have to appeal to emotions and people have different emotions about different things, how can we settle disputes? Russell is asked the same thing in the debate. He is asked to explain why the Commandment of Belsen was evil. Russell claims that he judges it is by his feelings and others agree with him. But to the Commandment of Belsen the actions were good. The feelings he had about the actions were good.

Russell says people can make mistakes. He can tell something is blue by seeing it and thats all. And if he and everyone else thinks something is blue and someone with jaundice says its yellow, the person with jaundice is wrong. But when you apply that to ethics, it seems to just fall down to an opinion poll deciding ethics. Most people find X to be wrong so its wrong. Anyone that thinks otherwise is just as mistaken as the person with jaundice. He says the consequences must be taken into account, but the consequences can be good for one and bad for another. (The commandment of Belsen found the consequences good… Russell found them bad) So appealing to feelings and consequences doesnt seem to fix the problem of making morality an opinion poll.

But maybe thats not too bad. Perhaps an opinion poll is the best one can do since there is no objective morality. Decide what kind of consequences are good arbitrarily (whatever the majority of the people feel are good consequences) and base all actions on that decision.

13

Hehehe, topics get recycled around here, good revision :slight_smile:

Morals are based on principles that ensure some sort of benefit for perhaps the majority of humankind.

When I think of justifying my beliefs, I think the average person would say, “I would use a reason that’s good enough for me”. If it’s not good enough for other people, then if the moral decision doesn’t affect them directly in any way, I don’t see why you should HAVE to answer.

Because if you HAVE to, that implies some sort of relationship between the two debaters, and that some sort of cooperative agreement is trying to be reached. In other words, I understand you, you understand me, and we’re all good, right?

Because to try to convince someone else to switch to your beliefs, is not a matter of making a logical connection, it’s a matter of making an emotional connection.

Look at how motivational speakers work. They use emotional imagery rather than words. That’s why you ‘feel’ motivated rather than ‘think’ motivated.

In relation to a moral belief, you hold this because it makes you feel something, serves some purpose in this way.

In Relation to Slave Owner
The benefits one has in owning slaves in a slave-based society far outweigh those of not owning them. They do work, make dinner, farm, etc all for the low price of almost nothing.

Perhaps it’s some sort of desire for the slave owner to fit in, and use the majority as an excuse for doing things that could be deemed immoral.

However, it’s not just a moral problem, it could be deemed a cultural problem in that sense. Because everyone does it, how can it be deemed to be immoral? If morals are in a sense a shared set of assumptions and beliefs, then anyone who suggests otherwise doesn’t belong in the world that they are in and so, their opinion is deemed ‘uninformed’ or not taken seriously, because they are an outsider and don’t know as well as they do.

I’m kind of on the track that ANY action can be justified by logical connections, and fulfil emotional purposes.

In this case, to justify your beliefs you need some sort of authoritative document or figure to do this for you. Becomes a value-based game at its simplest. For example, the human rights movement. Now that we have HR, moral codes have filtered down into society the point that ‘FREE SPEECH’ is a right given by authority of a document. (downside is, people think they can say anything anywhere and not be held accountible to anything other than that document that says so, in a sense, it becoming something powerful). Slavery was also abolished by some sort of authority.

The majority listen to authority. (hey that rhymes…LoL)
Therefore to persuade people that slavery is wrong, justification through authority is a good idea.

In my opinion.

You could argue it I know. But then I’ll say ‘reason is your authority’.

14

Russell wrote on ethics? Oh god. Whatever it was it sucks (and by that it surely didn’t in some way) Don’t listen to him beyond logic and science and …semantics… and… :unamused:

Does anyone else feel forced to love Russell? I feel like if I saw Russell on the street I’d wanna give him a shove or something – I feel like he’s an asshole.

I really like the angle you/he/she approached that at. I like it a lot actually; that’s a sexy little compact perspective but it ties in (quantum) science effortlessly. Something I suspect you know :smiley:

15

The problem is that even with what you erroneously call “objective morality” what’s moral is whatever your particular dogmatic moral system has invented. If morality is based on fixed and unchanging edict from On High then you must admit that hundreds of faiths and credos each have different Unchangeable Truths. That isn’t objective at all- unless you reject all but yours as false. And if you do so, I’d love to hear the objective basis for doing so. :slight_smile:

Of course, if you’re advocating an Absolute Ethics without any theological presumptions than I may be misconstruing you. Although I’d love to hear your theory for an objective morality without the moral imperative you’d expect to come from God.

16

I’ll give this forum an interesting run for its monney, lets start by focusing not on objective morality but subjective morality, I’ll focus on certin concepts first, ie, harming someone

when you cause harmto someone they often become your enemy, enemys have a nasty habit of making your goals more diffacult, the greater degree of harm you cause the worse of an enemy you make and therefore the more interferance, I’d class this as a bad idea because it only makes things harder in the long run.

now one enemy might not seem that bad and when you dont really care it dosent seem like a big thing, but consider this, if you regurlarly harm people, you dont have one enemy making things diffacult for you but many,perhaps even hundreds, and regardless of what you think of them they will make your life a living hell, making such an idea just plain stupid.

now I’ll take the flip side by talking about helping people

when you help someone they very often are grateful for it and may become friends, they will feel inclined to help you later on, or at least not interfear, this is good by making things easyer for you in the long run.

now contunue this forward if by reguralarly helping others you make a great deal of friends over time, and in doing so made your life a great deal easyer, making this a very good idea.

this is a vast oversimplifacation but it holds true, unfortunatly the majority do not see things far enough down the road to knotice this until it has allready happened. making it much easyer to harm others for temporary gains, not knowing they are screwing themselves later.

Peace

17

onlyhuman,

Your system doesn’t address morality, it only addresses behavior. Saying there are practical reasons not to do something is not the same as saying something is evil.

Do you feel that the child rapist is merely impractical? If you think there’s more to it than that, then your description doesn’t address what morality really is.

18

My post is long, repetitive(whats new?) and probably not worth your time to read… So dont say I didnt warn you : )

WillNZ,

I understand all the points you are making. Im simply pointing out the arbitrary manner that all of this must be done. As has been pointed out to me, trying to make a subjective ethical system without relation to emotions is pointless. I agree and thats my entire point. Doing so is arbitrary, yet there is nothing else we can do. Its a double edged sword. I cant reject objective morality because the idea of it is ridiculous and I cant accept making decisions arbitrary because I can then chose anything to be right (ie: slavery) based on whatever ethical system I chose. If I were a consequentialist, I could say you need to do what gets the best consequences… But I must arbitrarily choose what consequences are “best” Surely it will be what most people want, but then we are reducing ethics to an opinion poll which seems undesired. Afterall, that would make you wrong during slave holding society if you said slavery was bad.

Im starting to sound like I support objective morality. I dont in any way. Im simply voicing my concerns for my own belief system. My basic point is that we are screwed. There is no objective morality and we can never be fully satisfied with a subjective one. (at least I cant) The only possible way for this problem to be diminished (not destroyed) is basing ethical systems on CORE ideals and emotions that almost all people hold. Not all will ever hold any ideal but thats the point. We cant base an ethical system on extremely up in the air assumptions that not all agree on. We could, however, base the system on very basic (evolutionary?) assumptions such as the want to live and the want to reproduce. This would still be arbitrary since we are deciding to base it on our basic wants, but at least its agreed upon by almost all in the society. (And if one does not agree, they can leave the society) I would say that holding slaves, killing, and lying directly harms those basic ideals that all people hold, thus it would be wrong under such an ethical system.

Old_Gobbo,

Well, Russel himself didnt write anything original as far as Im aware. I mean, Im sure he did as it seems every major philosopher has, but I havent read it. I have read his views which are very similiar to that of Moores. (It was because of Russell speaking about ethics and mentioning Moore that I went and read Principia Ethica) So in saying Russell’s view of ethics is unsatisfactory, Im claiming both his and Moore’s are. (as well as every other philosophers) Keep in mind what I said above them, Im kind of beginning to accept that thats just the best we can do so I better get over it and accept it.

Phaedrus,

I should mention first off that I most certainly do NOT hold morality to be objective in any sense whatsoever. Im merly playing devil’s advocate against myself and asking you all to help me see more clearly. Secondly, when I speak of objective morality I personally am speaking about this morality coming from religion (God). I think people who feel there is objective morality but do not believe in God are completely naive and fooling themselves. Its as if they recognize the problems of subjective morality and wont accept it, thus attempt to claim morality can be objective without God. It makes no sense to me.

As to the “unless you reject all but yours as false” I would say that is exactly what happens. No religion thinks another to be true. Theirs is the soul trouth and the soul ethical system and all other religions (and their ethical systems) are false. Period. What is their reason for doing so? Because they know their God exists and they know their religion is correct. They need know other basis for thinking what they think. (keep in mind Im using the word “know” in a sense relative to the person. I personally “know” that they do NOT “know” because their God really doesnt exist. But to them they “know” and that is what is important here.) Believing in their God as the one true God is their objective basis and no other reason is required to them.

As far as absolute ethics without theological presumptions, I would say Im attempting to show the exact opposite. Im saying that that is what people want and that is what an ethical systems needs. However, it CANT BE GOTTEN. Im attempting to show that the popular subjective ethical systems all ground themselves on certain ideas which are in themselves completely arbitrary and we have absolutely no reason to chose any one system over another. That is why there so much trouble in deciding to be a Humanism or a Utilitarian or a Deontologist or whatever. Because we dont really have a reason to accept any one of them except feelings and all feelings differ.

I realize Im not saying anything that everyone doesnt already know. Im simply voicing my problem with this conclusion and trying to get other peoples opinions on it. It doesnt seem to bother other people that subjective ethical systems are based on completely arbitrary grounds. Utilitarianism says to do what is best for all. What is best? Defining best is arbitrary. Same with consequentialism. It says to do what makes the best (most good) consequences. Not only is the idea of doing what has the best consequences arbitrary, but what one means by “best” is completely arbitrary.

Why should I ever agree to any ethical system over another? They are all just as arbitrary as the next. The only thing I can do is pick the system that helps me the most. I think that is why we had slavery and other horrible things. It helped the person who had the slave and that is what they accepted. And with subjective morality, we dont really have any way to tell that slave owner he is wrong. Thats what bothers me and thats why I posted here. Im not saying its solvable and Im not saying Im claiming anything new. Im just voicing my obvious trouble with this. However, this does not mean that I think ethics are objective. It just means that I recognize the problems with subjective morality and am trying to deal with them.

19

Well, reducing any complex system down to an almost parody of it will produce problems!

If you look at the three major schools of normative ethics (deontologist, virtue, and consequentialist), it quickly becomes apparent that none of those three, on their own, is really a terribly good idea.

Instead, it is an organic process whereby what works lingers (despite its often dubious philosophical underpinnings) and what doesn’t work is forgotten.

Personally, I like this system because it manages to internally curb the excesses of any of the three forms of thinking. In pure virtue ethics, you can end up with a situation where an action is good because the person doing it is good, so you have the agent defining the good. Clearly that isn’t a good idea. Likewise, deontology is rigid and inflexible and when applied across the board it can lead to tyranny (see: Qin controlled China). And likewise with consequentialism, the ‘ends justify the means’, and I think we all have a rough idea as to what kind of atrocities have been committed with that kind of thinking.

So, instead we have a system that tries to set up rules that will lead to a desired outcome, but when either system breaks down, we have cultivated individuals who will hopefully be able to bridge the gap and restore equilibrium.

Couple this with the fact that humans are a social animal, and as such, have certain modes and norms of interaction pre-programmed into us. While these can be warped and twisted, they cannot be completely lost. This gives us both a solid starting point for the process to begin, as well as a means whereby the process is continued, because it is a natural, self-sustaining process that we cannot escape.

20

I’m pretty much into virtue ethics, where morals are discovered through direct reference to exemplars coupled with emotional reaction, but I don’t see how it would be possible without theism.