Recap Key-Terms Cognitivism Non-Cognitivism Realism Anti-Realism Can you define what is meant by the following terms: Cognitivism Non-Cognitivism Realism Anti-Realism

Where do we get morals from? A starting point in our discussion of meta-ethics may be to ask where we get our idea of morality from. This of course, is not a question of who taught us right and wrong, but where the concept of morality itself comes from. An ultimate origin. Whilst this list is not exhaustive there are a number of options we’ll be discussing over the next few lessons: Morality is a natural fact about the world. Morality is a non-natural fact about the world. Morality is an emotional response to a particular event. Morality comes from society / culture.

First Up: Moral Realism The different forms of moral realism argue that there are moral truths, and we can discover these truths by using reason. This reasoning may be: Empirical, so the origin of moral principles is somewhat similar to the origin of scientific beliefs in rational investigation of the natural world. Rational intuition, so the origin of moral principles is somewhat similar to the origin of mathematical beliefs in a priori reasoning. But the thing in common is that there are definitive truths to be discovered about morality and therefore by extension we can say that certain moral claims are true or false.

Moral Realism In short moral realism claims that good and bad are actual properties of situations and people, right and wrong are actual properties of actions. These moral properties are genuine parts of the world. Whether moral judgements are true or false depends on how the world is, on what properties an action, person or situation actually has. What reasons might we have for assuming that there are in fact moral truths in the world we can discover?

Moral Realism – 3 Quick Arguments We think we can make mistakes about morality. Children frequently do, and have to be taught was is right and wrong. If there were no facts about moral right and wrong, it wouldn’t be possible to make mistakes. Morality feels like a demand from ‘outside’ us. We feel answerable to a standard of behaviour which is independent of what we want or feel. Morality isn’t determined by what we think about it. Many people believe in moral progress. The idea that overtime our concept of right and wrong will improve. But how is moral progress possible, unless some views about morality are better than others? And how is that possible unless there are facts about morality?

Naturalism Vs Non-Naturalism Ethical Naturalists Claim that moral properties are just natural properties and can be examined as such. They relate to something we can examine through sense experience and science. In the last 150 years, moral realism has focused on trying to decipher the exactly relation between moral properties and natural properties i.e. properties that we can identify through sense experience and science. This has led to two separate views we will be looking at in turn: Ethical Non-Naturalists Claim that moral properties are a distinct kind of property. Whilst they are definitely part of the world (moral realism) we cannot easily examine them through experience and science.

Naturalism: Reductionism Important Note: Ethical Naturalism as discussed here is a form of reductionism. It claims that the things in one domain – moral properties of goodness and rightness – are identical with some of the things in the other domain – certain natural properties. The most plausible / often identified natural properties are certain psychological properties. Can you think of any obvious things we might already / could look to reduce morality to?

What does it mean to call moral statements realist? What reasons might someone have for saying morality is realist? What does it mean to take a naturalist view of morality? What does it mean to say that morality is reductive?

Naturalism: Utilitarianism The most commonly identified naturalistic theory is utilitarianism. This is because, for utilitarians, moral judgements are simply judgements about how much happiness an action will produce – happiness, as a psychological phenomenon is a natural fact of the world.

Naturalism: Utilitarianism Utilitarianism claims that the only good is happiness. We can interpret this to mean not simply that happiness is the only thing that is good, but that happiness is what goodness is. They are the same property. Happiness is a natural (psychological) property, and therefore, since they are the same property, so is goodness. So we can say that an act that maximises happiness is good and (by extension) a complex natural property. This seems to be the way that Bentham puts across Utilitarianism. He argues that happiness (pleasure) not only tells us what we ought to do, it tells us what we will do (it is a motivating force). Since happiness is a psychological property Bentham by extension seems to be linking Utilitarianism intrinsically to natural properties.

Mill’s Naturalism Argument In his book Utilitarianism, Mill also makes the case for Utilitarianism being a naturalistic theory when he tries to answer the question ‘Can Utilitarianism be proved?’ He provides an argument that seems to draw a link between the moral concept of ‘good’ and the natural fact of ‘happiness’ or ‘desirable’. What can you remember about Mill’s argument for UT? Reread his section on it on page 451. How does he reach the conclusion that the ‘good’ for all people can be defined as general happiness? Write it out in numbered steps. What problems / weaknesses can you remember / find in this argument?

The naturalistic foundations of Utilitarianism: We know something is visible if people see it. Similarly, we know something is audible if people hear it. To show that something is desirable, we therefore need to show that people do desire it. If something is desirable, then it is good to the individual who desires it. Everyone desires their own happiness Therefore people’s happiness is desirable, and by extension good. Because each of us desires our own happiness, the sum of all our desires is happiness for all. C: Therefore the ‘good’ for all people can be defined as the general happiness of all.

Strengths of this view… No puzzle about what kind of thing goodness is. We can discover what is good empirically. We can measure right and wrong through experience.

Criticism 1 - Equivocation Equivocation is when you treat two things as if they are the same. But they’re not really the same. In premise 1, Mill equivocates “desired” with “desirable”. But they are not the same. Just because something is desired, doesn’t mean it is desirable. Desirable means something more than that – something like “worthy of being desired”. “Desired” just means that at least one person desires it. But people desire all sort of things. Someone could desire to be repeatedly hit on the head with a frying pan. But this does not make it desirable! People’s arguments are often full of equivocation (in everyday life as well as in Philosophy). Watch out for it!

Criticism 2 – Fallacy of composition Mill jumps from “the good for me is my own happiness” to “the general good is general happiness”. Sidgwick: This jump commits ‘the fallacy of composition’ i.e. thinking that because there is some property common to each individual in a group, that property must also apply to the group as a whole. It is true that each of us, as an individual, desires our own happiness, but it is a fallacy that the 'aggregate of individuals‘ (group) desires happiness for that group as a whole. So Mill fails in his attempt to give firm, common-sense grounds for understanding 'Good' in the purely natural terms of 'happiness' and 'pleasure'.

Reductive Vs Non-Reductive Naturalism Naturalism: Moral properties are natural (e.g. psychological) properties. Reductive naturalism ‘Natural’: Properties that can be identified through sense experience and science Reductionism: Things in one domain are identical with things in another Non-reductive naturalism Morality is an expression of the natural capacities of human beings Not ‘supernatural’, not some strange ‘non-natural’. But moral properties can’t be reduced, they are not the same or identical as other properties. © Michael Lacewing

Naturalism: Virtue Ethics Some philosophers have also read Aristotle’s Virtue Ethics as a naturalist theory. His focus on the idea of ‘Eudaimonia’ as a natural goal for all seems to emphasise this. However, they argue that Virtue Ethics is a non-reductive naturalist theory. It is a naturalist theory because there are natural facts about what our characteristic activity is (our rationality) and there are natural facts about what character traits (virtues) enable us to perform our characteristic activity well. But this does not mean that goodness can simply be reduced to these facts. Goodness is not the same as rationality or the virtues (in the same way it is with happiness in Utilitarianism). It is instead a sum of all the constituent parts. Morality is supervened by these natural properties.

Naturalism: Virtue Ethics Rationality is a natural capacity that we have, but the rationality involved in moral judgment can’t be understood just in terms of discovering natural properties. Instead, we must grasp moral reasons, reasons for thinking, feeling, choosing, acting and living in certain ways. There is nothing ‘non-natural’ about reasons and reasoning, it is just something we do by being human, but reasons are not empirical properties, properties we discover through sense experience and science. Thus whilst Virtue Ethics is based on ‘natural’ properties – it cannot be reduced to them.

Tasks: Explain why Utilitarianism can be seen as a reductive naturalistic theory. Outline two criticisms of Mill’s UT argument: Equivocation Fallacy of composition Explain how Virtue Ethics differs from UT as a type of naturalism.