A Taxonomy of Moral Realism Essay

Ethics can be defined as "the conscious reflection on our moral beliefs with the aim of improving, extending or refining those beliefs in some way." (Dodds, Lecture 2) Kantian moral theory and Utilitarianism are two theories that attempt to answer the ethical nature of human beings. This paper will attempt to explain how and why Kantian moral theory and Utilitarianism differ as well as discuss why I believe Kant's theory provides a more plausible account of ethics.

This paper explores the things that have influenced my moral worldview. It includes insight on what I consider when making decisions. I discuss who and what I look too when deciding my morals and what I consider to be right and wrong.

Louis Vaughn states that the purpose of morality is not to describe how things are, but to “prescribe how things should be” (2). In Philosophy, moral relativism and moral objectivism are two conflicting but somewhat overlapping school of thought. These beliefs govern the way an individual acts; they also decide the ethical guidelines from which the law is written. In this essay we will delineate the differences between the two sects of belief.

Every day we are faced with certain situations that challenge us with how to act in an ethical manner. It can be human nature to feel unsure or conflicted with the correct moral choice. Some can say that one should know how to handle such dilemmas and others may say that there should be a reference of some sort to help guide through such conflicts. Sometimes we know the answers and sometimes we are unsure of how to handle certain situations. Most times we go through life wondering what we should do. As I become further educated on the different theories of ethics, I believe there are answers that are available in guiding one through an ethical dilemma and or judgment. I will discuss Vincent Ruggiero’s three basic criteria, Robert Kegan’s order of consciousness, the three schools of ethics and the correlation between all three.

The second major part of Mackie?s article convincingly undermines the plausibility of the realist belief in independent and objective values. Mackie attacks the belief from two major angles, the origin of objectivity-laden morals and the supposed nature of objective values, each of which is really a two-pronged approach.

Moral relativism, as Harman describes, denies “that there are universal basic moral demands, and says different people are subject to different basic moral demands depending on the social customs, practices, conventions, and principles that they accept” (Harman, p. 85). Many suppose that moral feelings derive from sympathy and concern for others, but Harman rather believes that morality derives from agreement among people of varying powers and resources provides a more plausible explanation (Harman, p. 12).The survival of these values and morals is based on Darwin’s natural selection survival of the fittest theory. Many philosophers have argued for and against what moral relativism would do for the world. In this essay, we will discuss

According to Beauvoir, while the moralists are “enamored with eternal principles,” (1), and believe in God and his sovereign, the realists who “boasts in vain about his effective methods and the useful results achieved” (1) are practicalists. While moralists are preoccupied about how their actions influence the future and afterlife, the realists are concerned with the present. The conflict between moralists and realists, as a result, has always existed with “neither side being able to convince the other of the validity of its values-each side is imprisoned its own value system in the name of which it rejects the values of its adversary” (1). In modern-day society, the perception of morality has shifted into what we known consider ethics. Unlike morality, which is defined by God and the Bible, however, ethics is defined by people’s perceptions of values and principles. Society, as a result, evolved from one in which values and principles are defined by a preset based on a supernatural being God and the Bible to a rational one in which people can influence and control. Because people define what good or bad, man is capable of influencing how their actions play a role to their future, or fate, emphasizing the idea of free will. Thus, reality and ethics are subject to human decisions and is always dynamic;

When people hear the term “ethics,” most of their minds turn to dilemmas discussed by figures such as Immanuel Kant, Jeremy Bentham, Aristotle, and other famous philosophers. These men debated what is considered to be morally good and how a person can become ethical. Operating under normative ethics, these philosophers did not question whether or not ethics even existed, but rather if they exist, what are they? The branch of ethics that questions the foundation of ethics and morality is metaethics. There are three standpoints when debating metaethics: moral realism, moral relativism, and moral skepticism. I will be discussing my argument for moral realism and contend that moral relativism and skepticism are inaccurate. I will prove the

The ethical theory of moral absolutism has raised many arguments since Plato produced the Theory of the Forms. Philosophers have argued over it for centuries; whether it is correct, whether we should be absolutists or relativists or whether we bypass both of these theories and decide our actions based on virtuous people.

Anscombe argues that the word ‘ought’ in the sense of ‘morally ought’ has a ‘mere mesmeric force’ and suggests that it contains ‘no intelligible thought at all’. She claims that ‘it is not profitable to do moral philosophy’. She sees that to clarify what morally means in terms of what a being ought to do is nonsensical. She says that modern philosophers see a parallel between ‘intellectual virtues’ and a ‘moral aspect’. For these reasons, she discounts

What is the aim of moral (ethical) theory that you learned from the reading? Elaborate on this by explaining how you think that having a clearer understanding of ethics can affect your life.

The question of what constitutes morality is often asked by philosophers. One might wonder why morality is so important, or why many of us trouble ourselves over determining which actions are moral actions. Mill has given an account of the driving force behind our questionings of morality. He calls this driving force “Conscience,” and from this “mass of feeling which must be broken through in order to do what violates our standard of right,” we have derived our concept of morality (Mill 496). Some people may practice moral thought more often than others, and some people may give no thought to morality at all. However, morality is nevertheless a possibility of human nature, and a

In his influential book, Ethics: Inventing Right and Wrong, J.L Mackie begins with the bold claim that “[t]here are no objective values.” Mackie holds that moral judgements are beliefs and that moral statements are propositions, meaning that they are capable of being true or false. However, for Mackie, all such propositions are false, and thus one is in error about what they are actually claiming. In this paper I will summarize two of Mackie’s arguments for why we should accept error theory: the argument from relativity and the argument from queerness. I will then explain two possible positions error theory leaves us with respect to morality —abolitionism and fictionalism —followed by some objections to both. While these positions have certain benefits, their strict forms, I will argue, are ultimately unsatisfying with the addendum that fictionalism seems the more tenable.

A discussion of moral theories must begin with a discussion of the two extremes of ethical thinking, absolutism and relativism. Moral Absolutism is the belief that there are absolute standards where moral questions are judged and can be deemed right or wrong, regardless of the context. Steadfast laws of the universe, God, nature itself are the forces that deem an action right or wrong. A person’s actions rather than morals and motivations are important in an Absolutism proposition. Moral Relativism states, that the moral propositions are based on Ethical relativism is the theory that holds that morality is relative to the norms of one's culture. That is, whether an action is right or wrong depends on the

When conflicts such as moral contradictions and inconsistencies arise, conversations including ethics and moral reasoning is the only way to solve these inconsistencies. Those who are genuine devotees of a certain religion may question if their religion’s moral instructions make sense according to one another. In these distinct cases, intelligent resolution of the claims can only be sorted out by putting in place an unbiased standard that can classify the competing viewpoints. This is where ethics comes in as the neutrality in the form of critical thinking, proficient arguments, and careful analysis.