Moral Objectivism Versus Ethical Relativism

Loretta Kopelman’s dissertation, Female Genital Circumcision and Conventionalists Ethical Relativism, takes a new approach in a global plight. Kopelman begins her thesis by elaborating on a particular tribe in southern Kenya. She describes how young girls are being mutilated for marriageability. Their fathers, eager for large dowries, perform the ritual on girls as young as nine. While some victims are able to escape and seek sanctuary, this obviously isn’t always possible and thus these girls must live with an inflicted deformity their whole life that doesn’t only cause serious health complications but sometimes even death.

To compare Ethical Egoism with Ethical Subjectivism, we could use the abortion example. If it is in the mother’s best interest to do abortion, then it is right to do it. Along with Ethical subjectivism, when people say, abortion is “murder,” they are expressing their feelings towards this case, and when other people say abortion is an optional and it’s up to the women to decide, they’re also stating their feelings. The decision would be based on how you feel abortion not weather its right or wrong. Ethical subjectivism opposes with the concepts of good and bad or right and wrong, and it believes that these concepts do not exist. For this reason, ethical subjectivism was more developed afterwards and has divided into many other theories such as relativism which advocates that good

In chapter 19 of the philosopher, Russ Shafer-Landau’s book, The Fundamentals of Ethics, he presents an overview of the moral theory of ethical relativism. Ethical relativism is the view that there is some moral truth and that truth is relative to each person or culture. The overarching moral principle can be broken down into ethical subjectivism and cultural relativism. The difference being ethical subjectivism says an act is morally acceptable or forbidden if an individual approves or disapproves of the action. And cultural relativism relies on the judgment of morally acceptable or forbidden if a culture or society approves or disapproves of the action (Shafer-Landau, p. 295).

Imagine someone is lost, standing in a checkout line at a corner drugstore. They need directions to get back on the road. The couple in front of them is having a very engaging conversation, fluently, in Spanish. Most would not even give an effort to talk or ask where to go, but why not? Too often the assumption is made that people who speak Spanish are immigrants, and do not speak English well. Hispanics are, persons of Cuban, Mexican, Puerto Rican, South or Central American descent, other Spanish culture or origin regardless of race. Too often the assumption is made that Spanish-speakers are unamerican, lazy, receive low income, or are uneducated in any way. Hispanics are also demonized in the media as people who are stealing American jobs. That is the belief that some Americans associate with Hispanics.

Let's start off with moral relativism, This is the belief that that there is no right or wrong answer to anything. This being said, you can still have your own views on different subjects and or beliefs, but you will not force those views/opinions upon anyone. This is because it would go against moral relativism in that you are not going to force your views upon another individual. Moral relativism opens up a whole new world of perspective, this is good because if we had no moral relativism the whole world would go into chaos because we would see the world as if we were one of the men in the cave in the story of “Plato’s Allegory “ The men in This story only saw the shadows from a fire, only showing them a false reality about the world they

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

"Moral Objectivism: The view that what is right or wrong doesn"t depend on what anyone thinks is right or wrong. That is, the view that the 'moral facts ' are like 'physical ' facts in that what the facts are does not depend on what anyone thinks they are. Objectivist theories tend to come in two sorts:"(1)

The world does have independent moral values and is therefore centered on moral objectivism. Moral truths do exist that are true for all humans, regardless of their personal beliefs or cultural norms. I take a stand in the realist, universalist, or absolutist ethical theories because what is good is discoverable and therefore can be done. We all have a belief of what is morally right and wrong.

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

Understanding the different situations that we must face daily is one of the main goals in our lives. Aware or not of that goal, we constantly find ourselves trying to figure out what is happening around us and why people say or act in certain ways. The Homo sapiens possess an extraordinary level of cognition as a mean to understand reality. Ethical Objectivism also called Moral Realism is a theory that holds as its principle that we as individuals must think objectively to be able to analyze any situation rationally. This theory somehow leads to egoism because morality directly benefits our self-interests . If we keep in mind all the great things modern human has been able to accomplish so far its because the capacity of working together

In China, the ethnic group Manchus ruling Chinese for many years. However, the Manchu rulers sacrificed many Chinese territories and rights to foreigner in order to preserve their dynastic ruling. The corruptions of Qing dynasty arouse a lot of resentment from Chinese people. To unify the Chinese nation, Sun Yat-sen advocated the Chinese nationalism (minzu zhuyi) and encouraged the cooperation of ethnic groups including the Han Chinese, the Manchus, the Mongols, the Tibetans and the Hui and so on. He emphasized the assimilation of these ethnic groups and jointly build up a unify nation.

It is fair to agree with the idea of Moral Relativism. Each culture has their own views of right or wrong. Stepping into different cultures is similar to being a part of new societies, each with differing practices and ideals. There is no single definition of what is right or what is wrong. Individuals has their own opinions on separate topics and each reason for a belief is acceptable. For example, in some cultures it is important for a man to have multiple wives and women are not allowed to leave their homes without a man accompanying them. In the United States, it is not acceptable to have multiple wives and each woman has the freedom to go where ever they like whenever they please. When discussing the idea of abortion individuals have opposing views depending on what their morals are and if they believe in the life of an unborn child. While some people believe it is entirely up to the pregnant women whether they desire to abort their

To summarize a little about ethical relativism it is based on what the person or society would believe to be morally correct without any influence from outsiders, ethical objectivism is mainly based on facts and sound reasoning that even if we weren’t here to witness it, it would still happen. Ethical objectivism is just plain simple facts, for instance if a tree fell in the woods even though we aren’t there, it would still make a crashing sound as it fell to the forest bed.

Often referred to as the Last Great Dynasty, The Qing Dynasty ruled China for over three centuries. The Qing were a proud dynasty and relied little upon foreign trade and influences to grow their economy. This was partly because The Qing were a self-sufficient society. Another reason for the denial of Western influences was due to The Qing’s great pride of their own culture. Any acceptance of Western influences would dilute the values and traditions of The Qing. That being said, The Qing did allow a trivial amount of foreign trade to take place in the Port of Canton. The refusal to allow Western influences, the lack of knowledge of the importance of foreign relations and the continued reliance of Confucian teachings all played a part in the demise of The Qing Dynasty. The modernization of China would not be possible without the rebellion of 1911.

Moral Relativism is generally used to describe the differences among various cultures that influence their morality and ethics. According to James Rachels, because of moral relativism there typically is no right and wrong and briefly states : “Different cultures have different moral codes.” (Rachels, 18) Various cultures perceive right and wrong differently. What is considered right in one society could be considered wrong in another, but altogether all cultures have some values in common.