Morality: a primer for moralists August 15, 2006
Posted by Evil Bender in Uncategorized.trackback
It’s a regular occurrence around here that I am accused of being moral relativist. This would surprise me if I hadn’t seen that same charged leveled against basically anyone who is openly left-of-center. See, many conservatives believe that they are the only ones who believe in moral action. Which just makes choices like the Iraq war all the more baffling.
The latest challenge comes from a poster on this thread, whose shifting and baseless assertions I will address in another post.
For now, I will settle for addressing the question of how I can have a moral standard.
I would like to begin by pointing out that what I’ve been asked for is “objective morality,” but of course this no-one can provide. I do not have a positioning to be absolutely objective about anything, nor does anyone else. What I CAN do is establish assumptions about the nature of morality and work from their, using logic to come to conclusions.
Obviously, millions of pages have been dedicated to questions of morality, and I do not hope to scratch the surface of them here. Instead, I will argue for a place to begin discussing morality without needing to make a religious viewpoint a priori, since, as I’ve discussed before, that gets us nowhere.
My fundamental assumption is that morality, to exist at all, must be generalizable: that is, for me to claim an act is moral (or immoral), I must be able to claim that anyone in the same position should act the same way. Without this assumption, there can be no morality, only personal opinion, so it seems a safe place to begin.
The second assumption is that morality requires choice: a man forced to avoid killing another has not acted morally when he fails to murder; a man who has the choice to murder and chooses to restrain himself has made a moral choice.
Working from that point, I ask myself what maxims should I most be willing to impose on others? My answer, as is–in various forms–the answer of many sages, gurus, and philosophers throughout history, is that everyone should act towards others as they would wish others to act toward them. The Golden Rule arises naturally from my assumptions. If I want to call an act moral, I should be able to claim anyone should make the same choice in the same circumstance. This by itself is no perfect guide, but it is a good start. After all, if I say “you shouldn’t do that,” I’m implicitly claiming that niether should I, in your circumstances.
My second assumption suggests that, whereever there is not a persuasive reason for doing elsewise, I should let people do as they will. Of course, if they want to punch me in the face for fun, I’m going to suggest that’s a immoral choice, just as they would do in reverse. So not every act is acceptable, but denying one’s ability to act in a certain way, or attempting to make that action so undesirable that it is unlikely to be taken, takes away the moral choices of someone. Since morality is about generalized “shoulds,” taking moral choice away from someone already risks morality in general. Coersion is dangerous precisely because if we begin to take choice from people, we leave them with no capability to act morally. And when we systematically deny others the chance to behave morally, we condemn ourselves as well, for we have removed the only way of extending morality beyond ourselves. We have given ourselves choices, not morality.
So when I claim, as I have, that profiling is wrong because it treats others in a way we would not wish to be treated, I am making a moral claim. There is no relativism there.
I have given our commenter the chance to say similar sanctions against, say, white fundamentalist Christian men would be appropriate if they committed enough violence. So far he has not agreed. Perhaps it is he who needs to understand the moral implications of his actions. If he punishes all Muslims for the actions of some, he is most certainly not treating others as he would wish to be treated.
I used the word “punish” here, and in my next post, I will further explore the profiling-as-immoral-punishment question. Stay tuned!
Wow, nice. I agree with you totally, you have made a very thoughtful and well-reasoned post :)
‘See, many conservatives believe that they are the only ones who believe in moral action.’
I find it hilarious that some folks tend to think that a lack of belief in a God and religious system = a lack of morals. I hear it all the time on Right-Wing conservative websites (I have to force myself not to actively seek them out to observe/weigh in on the nuttiness!). Anonymous Lefty (http://anonymouslefty.blogspot.com)put it quite nicely in a recent post, too:
‘My life is based on a compassionate human morality, which is not dependent on imaginary deities distributing tablets from the top of mountains. I don’t need to believe in the existence of a God to see certain things as wrong or right. Human reason is perfectly adequate.’
Hehe. Your comment reminded me of a line from Monty Python and the Holy Grail:
“Listen, strange women lyin’ in ponds distributin’ swords is no basis for a system of government.”
But for a religiously-motivated quest, it’s perfect.
Moral relativism is a self-refuting belief system and therefore it is not reasonable to adhere to it. Furthermore, an insurmountable problem moral relativists have when they start talking about rights is that they have no objective grounds on which to define or even defend anyone’s rights. In fact, the moral relativist can’t argue on objective grounds that rights even exist.
This reminds me of the book “Moral Relativism: Feet Firmly Planted in Mid-Air” by Francis J. Beckwith and Gregory Koukl. In it they shed light on another fundamental dilemma the moral relativist is faced with:
“For to deny the existence of universally objective moral distinctions, one must admit that [fundamentally] Mother Teresa was no more or less moral than Adolf Hitler, that torturing three-year-olds for fun is netither good nor evil, that giving 10 % of one’s financial surplus to an invalid is neither praiseworthy nor wrong, and that providing food and shelter for one’s spouse and child is neither a good thing nor a bad thing.” (p. 13)
A conclusion Koukl arrives at is that moral relativists can’t objectively:
1. accuse others of wrongdoing
2. complain about the problem of evil
3. place blame or accept praise
4. make charges of unfairness or injustice
5. improve their morality
6. hold meaningful moral discussions
7. promote the obligation of tolerance
Due to comment size limitations I’m going to continue this debate at http://josephnadir.wordpress.com
[...] I’m currently engaged in a debate with a moral relativist. Due to the comments section size limitation at their blog I’ve decided to reply here. [...]
Josephnadir,
I’m done with this debate. You haven’t addressed my supposed moral relativism; all you’ve done is put yourself in a position where humans would be required to have perfect knowledge in order to act morally. Since that’s demonstrably impossible, you have to accept that moral claims come from an imperfect point of view, and therefore are, according to your argument, relative. Or would you like to argue that only your God of choice can provide morality?
> I’m done with this debate.
You have a strange way of showing it since you continue to respond to my criticism.
> my supposed moral relativism
Why do you use the word “supposed”? You said: “I would like to begin by pointing out that what I’ve been asked for is ‘objective morality,’ but of course this no-one can provide. ”. Hence, you have taken the leap of faith to believe there is no such thing as an objective morality; this is moral relativism. By your own admission you are a moral relativist despite your hesitation to accept it.
> all you’ve done is put yourself in a position where humans would be required to have perfect knowledge in order to act morally
Not at all. Knowledge of what is moral does not guarantee that you will act morally.
> Since that’s demonstrably impossible.
Your premise is flawed and therefore the conclusion you reached is false.
>Or would you like to argue that only your God of choice can provide morality?
I acknowledge that moral relativists can act morally. That said, any reason they give for acting morally is based on quicksand for their worldview is ultimately based on nothing more than something subjective.
Just think about it, the moral relativist position is so weak it can not objectively differentiate between Mother Theresa and Hitler.
Admitting that no one can have absolute confidence in their knowledge eliminates the possibility for completely objective morality. It does not make the world into moral relativists. Admitting you might not have all the facts is not the same as believing all acts are equally (a)moral.
You don’t have to be foolish enough to believe that you have all the answers in order to condemn evil. Stop confusing subjectivity and relativism and you’ll make more sense.
> Admitting that no one can have absolute confidence in their knowledge eliminates the possibility for completely objective morality.
What you are basically saying is that admitting the impossibility of having “absolute confidence in their knowledge” implies the impossibility for a “ completely objective morality”. I think what you are trying to say is that admitting the lack of absolute knowledge prevents people from knowing all absolute moral truths. If this is what you are trying to say, I agree with you, but that is beside the point. One can part from the premise that absolute moral truths exist and at the same time logically allow that only a subset of those truths are knowable.
> You don’t have to be foolish enough to believe that you have all the answers in order to condemn evil.
Anyone, including moral relativists, can condemn evil. Here is a variation of what I pointed out earlier: I acknowledge that moral relativists can condemn evil, but any reason they give for doing so is based on quicksand for their worldview is ultimately founded on nothing more than something which is is subjective.
> Stop confusing subjectivity and relativism and you’ll make more sense.
Moral relativism is based on the premise that absolute moral truths (i.e., objective moral truths as opposed to subjective moral truths) do not exist. Your premise is that “no-one can provide” an “objective morality” and have I concluded that the reason you hold this position is that you believe absolute moral truths do not exist.
By all means if you believe that absolute moral truths exist, but are unknowable please say so.
I’ll elaborate further at http://evilbender.wordpress.com/2006/08/17/morality-pt-2-subjectivity-and-relativism/
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