Lecture 25 (outline) Relativism

1 The fact of moral disagreement

One of the most striking features of morality is the widespread disagreement it generates.  People disagree profoundly about what is right and wrong, good and bad. The empirical data clearly support the following:
 
 Different societies have different moral codes.
What can be concluded from this? Many different theses have been drawn from this including the following:
 
i     The morality of oneís own society has no special status.  It is just one among many.

ii     It is not possible to justify the morality of oneís own society, or of any society.

iii    There is no such thing as objective moral truth, as THE ONE TRUE MORALITY.

iv    To judge another morality inferior or wrong is unjustifiably intolerant and arrogant.

v     If according to a certain morality some action is right, then it is right for adherents of that morality to perform the action.  The right thing for you to do is what other members of your society think is right.

2 Are these arguments any good?

I am going to parody the first three arguments by considering an analogy.  Over space and time many different theories of the nature of the physical world have been proposed.  By a “physics” I will understand one way of understanding the physical world.  So it is just an observable fact that:
 
 Different societies have different physics.
What follows from this fact?  Here is an analogue of our first argument above:
 
Different societies have different physics.
therefore
The physics of oneís own society has no special status.  It is just one among many.
Hardly anybody thinks the conclusion here is true.  Science pursues a method which, we think, does give its deliverances a special status.
     Consider an analogues of the second argument:
 
 
Different societies have different physics.
therefore
It is not possible to justify the physics of oneís own society, or of any society.
Similar remarks apply to this as to the first.  It may well be possible to justify a preference for current physical theory over, say Aristotelian physics, or Maori physics.
     The third analogue:
 
Different societies have different physics.
therefore
 
There is no such thing as objective moral truth, as THE ONE TRUE PHYSICS.
Again this seems like a complete non-sequitur.  The fact that people disagree about the external physical world does not establish that there is no such thing as an external physical world, or that it does not have a determinate nature.
    Consider the forth and fifth conclusions drawn.

iv To judge another morality inferior or wrong is unjustifiably intolerant and arrogant.

This is a strange conclusion for the moral relativist to draw.  For a start it seems to endorse a couple of moral principles which are apparently applied to everyone:  that is to say, that it is wrong or bad to be intolerant.  Consider what the upholder of iv will say about a highly intolerant morality.  (Many moralities have extreme intolerance for those who disagree or flout the morality built right into the morality itself. Very few actual moralities endorse toleration of those who don’t conform to them.)  Will the relativist of type iv say:  “You just have to tolerate those intolerant people.  Let them be as intolerant as they want to be!”  Surely note, for that would involve them endorsing the the behavior of highly intolerant people.

v If according to a certain morality some action is right, then it is right for adherents of that morality to perform the action.  The right thing for you to do is what other members of your society think is right.

This, like iv, ends up endorsing both moral truths and the knowability of moral truths.   So it is incompatible with some of the other conclusions that have been drawn.  It also endorses a single universal moral principle which is society-independent (viz: when in society S do as those in society S do).  If here can be one such society-independent moral truth, why not others?

None of these arguments is particularly compelling.  But the divergence of moral opinion does leave us with a worry.  It seems as though moral knowledge is hard to come by.  (If it were not there would not be so much disagreement about morality.)  How can we find out about morality.  What epistemic resources do we have?