What is your view on ethical properties?

[Cottagecheeseman]

So let's try a basic metaethics poll for fun. I tried to add most choices to the poll. If it is missing a major one, let me know and I will edit the poll!

Edited February 20, 2014 by zizeksucks

[Gnothi_Seauton]

I think that ethical properties are real but I'm undecided about whether I think they are non-natural or reducible to natural properties.  I lean towards non-natural.  

 

Another option:  Ethical properties are constitutive of or the output of some idealized form of practical deliberation.  That would be the constructivist position, and I'm not sure that it neatly fits into any of the categories in the poll (it could fit into a couple of them depending on how it is spelled out).

[Cottagecheeseman]

I think that ethical properties are real but I'm undecided about whether I think they are non-natural or reducible to natural properties.  I lean towards non-natural.  

 

Another option:  Ethical properties are constitutive of or the output of some idealized form of practical deliberation.  That would be the constructivist position, and I'm not sure that it neatly fits into any of the categories in the poll (it could fit into a couple of them depending on how it is spelled out).

Yeah constructivism is an area of metaethics that I'm weak on, so I wasn't sure what they would put at. I'll add something close to it. If you lean someway, choose that one, it's a fairly informal poll I hope!

[dgswaim]

I guess you might include something like the view of Michael Ruse, Stephen Pinker et. al., which holds something like the idea that ethics is a brain system developed through selective pressures. I guess this would be equivalent to saying that ethics are (in some sense) not "real," but that ethics does have a cognitive corollary. 

[Monadology]

I think I'm just a non-cognitivist about everything. 

[brettmullga]

A difficulty I've had with statements of ethics and moral philosophy is one of scope. I lean to the non-cognitivist side regarding traditional moral statements, such as 'don't kill Bob.' Given a suitably expansive applicability to include all instances of choice, there may exist principles that one should follow, such as transitivity. These do seem outside of ethics' scope, so I went with the last option. 

[ianfaircloud]

My position on this question is based purely on a hunch.

[objectivityofcontradiction]

I've been influenced on this issue by the work of William Fitzpatrick at Rochester. He argues for a non-naturalistic, robust ethical realism whereby 'ethical standards and facts are independent of us in the sense that they are not constituted by the actual or hypothetical results of any ethically-neutrally specifiable set of conditions or procedures applied to our beliefs, desires, attitudes, etc.' Currently I am interested in arguments that call into question the existence of anything like a 'moral' or 'practical' point of view or stance that is independent of certain metaphysical limits placed on values and the notion of moral truth. I am vehemently opposed to any kind of constructivism, but I am not sure why just yet. I also tend to think of myself as a moral realist but I am more influenced by the 'realism' of some one like the political philosopher Raymond Geuss (I'd highly recommend his Outside Ethics), and less the very dense metaethical realism of people like Brink, etc. Then again, my MA supervisor instilled in me the belief that the best moral philosophers are never a something-ist, but rather are usually independent of any particular camp. 

Edited February 20, 2014 by objectivityofcontradiction

[philstudent1991]

I'm surprised there are so many moral realists here.

[Gnothi_Seauton]

I'm surprised there are so many moral realists here.

I'm curious why?  There's some empirical evidence to suggest that it is the majority view in the field.  See, http://philpapers.org/surveys/results.pl .  Or is there something specific about "here"?

[humean_skeptic]

I'm curious why?  There's some empirical evidence to suggest that it is the majority view in the field.  See, http://philpapers.org/surveys/results.pl .  Or is there something specific about "here"?

 

Good question. I too assumed it was the dominant view. 

[Monadology]

I'm quite pleased by the number of non-naturalists, even if my metaethical view is in the minority at this point. 

[lesage13]

I also tend to think of myself as a moral realist but I am more influenced by the 'realism' of some one like the political philosopher Raymond Geuss (I'd highly recommend his Outside Ethics), and less the very dense metaethical realism of people like Brink, etc.

 

I don't think you're guilty of this, but your wording wrongly suggests (to my eyes, at least) that political realism and moral realism are comparable (there's a better word for what I'm trying to say, but I'm drawing a blank...) positions when they belong to very disparate debates. Moral realism is a metaphysical view that affirms the existence of the putative objects of moral statements and implies a cognitivist semantics of moral talk. Political realism, on the other hand, holds that moral principles should not (it's unclear what kind of normativity is intended here...) be invoked in normative politics, because such principles are too abstract for real politics (or some such). For the sake of clarity, if I have to talk about both in the same breath, I usually call political realism 'antimoralism' (following Bernard Williams, who described political realism as the rejection of 'moralism' in politics) and reserve the label 'realism' for metanormative views about the metaphysical status of moral/political properties.

[objectivityofcontradiction]

I don't think you're guilty of this, but your wording wrongly suggests (to my eyes, at least) that political realism and moral realism are comparable (there's a better word for what I'm trying to say, but I'm drawing a blank...) positions when they belong to very disparate debates. Moral realism is a metaphysical view that affirms the existence of the putative objects of moral statements and implies a cognitivist semantics of moral talk. Political realism, on the other hand, holds that moral principles should not (it's unclear what kind of normativity is intended here...) be invoked in normative politics, because such principles are too abstract for real politics (or some such). For the sake of clarity, if I have to talk about both in the same breath, I usually call political realism 'antimoralism' (following Bernard Williams, who described political realism as the rejection of 'moralism' in politics) and reserve the label 'realism' for metanormative views about the metaphysical status of moral/political properties.

 

Come on. It's insulting that you think I would not know the difference between moral realism and political realism, and the fact that you laid out definitions is a bit ridiculous and seems quite patronizing to me, I'm not an 18 year old college freshman. This response may seem juvenile and again, I do not want to waste time bickering on here, but that was insulting. I sketched a sketchy comment on a discussion forum. I think moral realism can relate to Geuss' political realism (or at least what he takes to be practical realism in a very general sense) in a very simple way, and that is basically just insofar as his political realism is so much the more historically informed than a lot of political theory, and this very basic motive, I think, is something that much metaethics could do with understanding. So much metaethical theory suffers from being wholly ahistorical. I don't care if it is a highly theoretical branch of philosophy, and if in the realist case they are dealing with the existence of objects of moral sentiments. Such objects have a history, are formed by history, and are reacted to in historically mediated terms. I understand the difference between moral and political action, but I often find that one of the three big 'political' question that Geuss likes to ask, 'Who Whom?' is not asked enough in metaethics: to Whom do those objects of moral sentiments belong? And it is not merely enough to answer 'to rational agents.' That is ethics in void. That's all I mean when I cross the gulf between Geuss and the more analytical moral realist jargon. 

Edited February 21, 2014 by objectivityofcontradiction

[lesage13]

Come on. It's insulting that you think I would not know the difference between moral realism and political realism, and the fact that you laid out definitions is a bit ridiculous and seems quite patronizing to me, I'm not an 18 year old college freshman. 

 

All I wanted to do was make a clarificatory point about an unfortunate terminological ambiguity that may not have been obvious to those who are not familiar with this fairly niche (in philosophical circles, at least) position in political philosophy. As you admitted yourself, your comment was a sketchy sketch on an internet forum. I explicitly said that I did not think you were making any interpretive or definitional error. I sketched a general definition to draw out the ambiguity and to help clarify any confusion for the sake of others who might not have read what you or I have--imagine how unhelpful it would've been if I had merely said, 'There's an ambiguity here!', and left it at that--and suggested an alternative term to help avoid any confusion going forward. I did not mean to personally insult you. I'm sorry if you feel insulted.

 

I think moral realism can relate to Geuss' political realism (or at least what he takes to be practical realism in a very general sense) in a very simple way, and that is basically just insofar as his political realism is so much the more historically informed than a lot of political theory, and this very basic motive, I think, is something that much metaethics could do with understanding. So much metaethical theory suffers from being wholly ahistorical. I don't care if it is a highly theoretical branch of philosophy, and if in the realist case they are dealing with the existence of objects of moral sentiments. Such objects have a history, are formed by history, and are reacted to in historically mediated terms. I understand the difference between moral and political action, but I often find that one of the three big 'political' question that Geuss likes to ask, 'Who Whom?' is not asked enough in metaethics: to Whom do those objects of moral sentiments belong? And it is not merely enough to answer 'to rational agents.' That is ethics in void. That's all I mean when I cross the gulf between Geuss and the more analytical moral realist jargon. 

 

There is a lot to unpack in the latter half of your comment (quoted above) and I think I would disagree with much of it. It's an interesting topic for me (did my MA thesis on the relationship between political normativity and moral normativity), so I'm game for chatting about it some more. However, if you think that'll just end up being so much time wasting bickering, then I'll happily wander off to some other part of the internet.

Edited February 21, 2014 by lesage13

[nietzschemarket]

objectivityofcontradiction, I'm not at all familiar with Geuss' work, but what you're describing reminds me of Ronald Dworkin's theory of moral objectivity as grounded in what he calls 'interpretive communities'. Moral sentiments belong to different interpretive communities, and are objective in the sense that they must answer to normative standards that fit within the framework of a particular interpretive community. Cool stuff, although I'm not sure it does all the work Dworkin wants it to.