Moral relativism

In philosophy, moral relativism is the position that moral or ethical propositions do not reflect absolute and universal moral truths but instead are relative to social, cultural, historical or personal references, and that there is no single standard by which to assess an ethical proposition's truth. Relativistic positions often see moral values as applicable only within certain cultural boundaries or the context of individual preferences. An extreme relativist position might suggest that it is meaningless for the moral or ethical judgments or acts of one person or group to be judged by another,  though most relativists propound a more limited version of the theory.

Some moral relativists&mdash;for example, the existentialist Jean-Paul Sartre&mdash;hold that a personal and subjective moral core lies or ought to lie at the foundation of individuals' moral acts. In this view public morality is a reflection of social convention, and only personal, subjective morality is truly authentic.

Moral relativism is not the same as moral pluralism, or value pluralism, which acknowledges the coexistence of opposing ideas and practices, but does not require that they be equally valid. Moral relativism, in contrast, contends that opposing moral positions have no truth value, and that there is no preferred standard of reference by which to judge them.

History
Relativist positions have been recorded for several thousand years. Protagoras' (ca. 481–420 BC) assertion that "man is the measure of all things" is an early philosophical precursor to modern relativism. Greek historian Herodotus (ca. 484–420 BC) observed that each society thinks its own belief system and way of doing things are best, in contrast to that of others. Various ancient philosophers also questioned the idea of an absolute standard of morality.

The 18th-century Enlightenment philosopher David Hume (1711–76) is in several important respects the father of both modern emotivism and moral relativism, though Hume himself was not a relativist. He distinguished between matters of fact and matters of value, and suggested that moral judgments consist of the latter, for they do not deal with verifiable facts that obtain in the world, but only with our sentiments and passions, though he argued that some of our sentiments are universal. He is famous for denying any objective standard for morality, and suggested that the universe is indifferent to our preferences and our troubles. A good example of Moral Relativism is the same example used in Moral Absolutism, where, if a punch is thrown, then, if you so react to that punch by punching back, it shall not be seen as wrong, but as right, because you were protecting yourself, in that respect.

In the modern era, anthropologists such as Ruth Benedict (1887–1948) cautioned observers not to use their own cultural standards to evaluate those they were studying, which is known as ethnocentricism. Benedict said there are no morals, only customs, and in comparing customs, the anthropologist "insofar as he remains an anthropologist . . . is bound to avoid any weighting of one in favor of the other." To some extent, the increasing body of knowledge of great differences in belief among societies caused both social scientists and philosophers to question whether there can be any objective, absolute standards pertaining to values. This caused some to posit that differing systems have equal validity, with no standard for adjudicating among conflicting beliefs. The Finnish philosopher-anthropologist Edward Westermarck (1862–1939) was among the first to formulate a detailed theory of moral relativism. He contended that all moral ideas are subjective judgments that reflect one's upbringing. He rejected G.E. Moore's (1873–1958) intuitionism&mdash;in vogue during the early part of the 20th century, and which identified moral propositions as true or false, and known to us through a special faculty of intuition&mdash;because of the obvious differences in beliefs among societies, which he said was evidence that there is no innate, intuitive power.

Some philosophical considerations
So-called descriptive relativists (for example, Ralph Barton Perry) accept that there are fundamental disagreements about the right course of action even when the same facts obtain and the same consequences are likely to arise. However, the descriptive relativist does not necessarily deny that there is one correct moral appraisal, given the same set of circumstances. Other descriptivists believe that opposing moral beliefs can both be true, though critics point out that this leads to obvious logical problems. The latter descriptivists, for example, several leading Existentialists, believe that morality is entirely subjective and personal, and beyond the judgment of others. In this view moral judgments are more akin to aesthetic considerations and are not amenable to rational analysis.

In contrast, the metaethical relativist maintains that all moral judgments are based on either societal or individual standards, and that there is no single objective standard by which one can assess the truth of a moral proposition. While he preferred to deal with more practical real-life ethical matters, the British philosopher Bernard Williams (1929–2003) reluctantly came to this conclusion when he wrote from a meta-ethical standpoint. Metaethical relativists, in general, believe that the descriptive properties of terms such as good, bad, right, and wrong are not subject to universal truth conditions, but only to societal convention and personal preference. Given the same set of verifiable facts, some societies or individuals will have a fundamental disagreement about what ought to be done based on societal or individual norms, and these cannot be adjudicated using some independent standard of evaluation, for the latter standard will always be societal or personal and not universal, unlike, for example, the scientific standards for assessing temperature or for determining mathematical truths.

Moral relativism stands in marked contrast to moral absolutism, moral realism, and moral naturalism, which all maintain that there are moral facts: facts that can be both known and judged, whether through some process of verification or through intuition. These philosophies see morality as something that obtains in the world. Examples include the philosophy of Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712–78), who saw man's nature as inherently good, or of Ayn Rand, who believed morality is derived from man's exercising his unobstructed rationality. Others believe moral knowledge is something that can be derived by external sources such as a deity or revealed doctrines, as would be maintained by various religions. Some hold that moral facts inhere in nature or reality, either as particular instances of perfect ideas in an eternal realm, as adumbrated by Plato (429–347 BC); or as a simple, unanalyzable property, as advocated by Moore. In each case, however, moral facts are invariant, though the circumstances to which they apply might be different. Moreover, in each case moral facts are objective and can be determined.

Some philosophers maintain that moral relativism devolves into emotivism, the movement inspired by logical positivists in the early part of the 20th century. Leading exponents of logical positivism include Rudolph Carnap (1891–1970) and A. J. Ayer (1910–89). Going beyond Hume, the positivists contended that a proposition is meaningful only if it can be verified by logical or scientific inquiry. Thus, metaphysical propositions, which cannot be verified in this manner, are not simply incorrect, they are meaningless, nonsensical. Moral judgments are primarily expressions of emotional preferences or states, devoid of cognitive content; consequently, they are not subject to verification. As such, moral propositions are essentially meaningless utterances or, at best, express personal attitudes (see, for example, Charles L. Stevenson [1908–1979]). Not all relativists would hold that moral propositions are meaningless; indeed, many make any number of assertions about morality, assertions that they undoubtedly believe to be meaningful. However, other philosophers have argued that, since we have no means of analyzing a moral proposition, it is essentially meaningless, and, in their view, relativism is therefore tantamount to emotivism.

It should be noted that the proposition that moral judgement cannot be verified by empirical means and is therefore meaningless is, according to many philosophers, a self contradiction as the statement, "X is meaningless if it isn't subject to verification" cannot be verified by the very criterion set forth by this proposition. Political theorist Leo Strauss (1899–1973) subscribed to a species of relativism, believing that there do not exist objective criteria for assessing ethical principles, and that a rational morality is only possible in the limited sense that one must accept its ultimate subjectivity. This view is very similar to the one advocated by existentialist philosophers Martin Heidegger (1889–1976) and Sartre. The latter famously maintained that ethical principles only arise from our personal feelings at the time we act, and not from any antecedent principles.

The thought of Karl Marx (1818–83) proposes a type of moral relativism, asserting that each moral system was simply a product of the dominant socioeconomic class, and that the movement of history will settle moral questions, in contrast to moral absolutist or universalist positions.

Critics of relativism
Those who support positions of moral absolutism or universalism are often highly critical of moral relativism; some have been known to equate it with outright "immorality" or amorality. Various historical and cultural events and practices, including The Holocaust, Stalinism and communist atrocities of the 20th century, Apartheid in South Africa, genocide, unjust wars, genital mutilation, slavery, terrorism, Nazism, etc., present difficult problems for relativists. An observer in a particular time and place, depending on his outlook (e.g., culture, religion, background), might call something good that another observer in a particular time and place would call evil. Slavery, for example, was thought by many to be acceptable, even good, in other times and places, while it is viewed by many (though certainly not all) today as a great evil. Many writers and thinkers have held that any number of evils can be justified based on subjective or cultural preferences, and that morality requires some universal standard against which to measure ethical judgments.

Some relativists will state that this is an unfair criticism of relativism, for it is really a descriptive, or meta-ethical, theory and not a normative one, and that relativists may have strong moral beliefs, notwithstanding their foundational position. Critics of this view, however, argue it is disingenuous, and that the relativist is not making a mere meta-ethical observation. These critics contend that stating there is no preferred standard of truth, or that standards are equally true, addresses the ultimate validity and truth of the ethical judgments themselves, which, they contend, is a normative judgment. In other words, the separation between meta-ethics and normative ethics is arguably a distinction without a difference. Relativists, however, would counter that the notion that there is no preferred standard of truth is a straw man argument. Richard Rorty, for example, argued that relativist philosophers believe "that the grounds for choosing between such opinions is less algorithmic than had been thought", but not that any belief is equally as valid as any other.

Some philosophers, for example R. M. Hare (1919–2002), argue that moral propositions are subject to logical rules, notwithstanding the absence of any factual content, including those subject to cultural or religious standards or norms. Thus, for example, they contend that one cannot hold contradictory ethical judgments. This allows for moral discourse with shared standards, notwithstanding the descriptive properties or truth conditions of moral terms. They do not affirm or deny there are moral facts, only that logic applies to our moral assertions; consequently, they contend there is an objective and preferred standard of moral justification, albeit in a very limited sense. Nevertheless, according to Hare, it shows that relativism is mistaken in one very important sense (see Hare's Sorting out Ethics). Hare and other philosophers also point out that, aside from logical constraints, all systems treat certain moral terms alike in an evaluative sense. This is similar to our treatment of other terms such as less or more, the meaning of which is universally understood and not dependent upon independent standards (measurements, for example, can be converted). It applies to good and bad when used in their nonmoral sense, too; for example, when we say, "this is a good wrench" or "this is a bad wheel." This evaluative property of certain terms also allows people of different beliefs to have meaningful discussions on moral questions even though they disagree about certain facts.

It might be argued that if relativism were wholly true, there would be no reason to prefer it over any other theory, given its fundamental contention that there is no preferred standard of truth. On this view relativism is not simply a meta-ethical theory, but is a normative one, and that its truth, by its own definition, cannot in the final analysis be assessed or weighed against other theories. Relativism and absolutism are opposite sides of an argument about the existence (or not) of objective truth. Critics of this view assert that this argument places the burden of proof on relativism, by treating it as a theory that makes the positive existential claim "it is objectively true that there are no objective truths" as opposed to simply being the necessary consequence of a refusal to accept the absolutist's claim "there are objective truths." They argue that this objection can claim only to have defeated a rather singular version of relativism (singular in that it transparently appeals to an objective truth it is purporting to deny).

Social impact of moral relativism
The post-war decadence of Europe is attributed by some to moral relativism replacing absolute values. According to writers such as Josef Cardinal Ratzinger and Marcello Pera, during the last four decades or so, the Europeans massively abandoned many traditional norms rooted in Christianity and replaced them by continuously evolving relative moral rules. In this view, sex has been separated from procreation which led to decline of families and depopulation compensated by immigration. Currently, Europe is challenged by recent immigrants who brought with them absolute values which are at odds with moral relativism.

References and sources

 * 1) Josef Cardinal Ratzinger, Marcello Pera, "Without Roots: The West, Relativism, Christianity, Islam" (Basic Books, 0465006345, 2006).
 * 1) Josef Cardinal Ratzinger, Marcello Pera, "Without Roots: The West, Relativism, Christianity, Islam" (Basic Books, 0465006345, 2006).


 * Kurt Baier, "Difficulties in the Emotive-Imperative Theory" in Moral Judgement: Readings in Contemporary Meta-Ethics
 * Ruth Benedict, Patterns of Culture (Mentor)
 * R.M. Hare, Sorting out Ethics (Oxford University Press)
 * David Hume, An Enquiry Concerning the Principles of Morals, ed. Tom L. Beauchamp (Oxford University Press)
 * G.E. Moore, Principia Ethica (Cambridge University Press)
 * Jean-Paul Sartre, "Existentialism is a Humanism" in Existentialism From Dostoevsky to Sartre, ed. by Walter Kaufmann (World Publishing Company)
 * Leo Strauss, The Rebirth of Classical Political Rationalism, ed. Thomas L. Pangle (University of Chicago Press)
 * Edward Westermarck, The Origin and Development of the Moral Ideas (Macmillan)
 * Bernard Williams, Ethics and the Limits of Philosophy (Harvard University Press)