Veeky Forums explain moral relativism

And yet it does.
Idk, try to read it again, but slower this time?

that is still a reasoning, not a stance.

what does it mean to be a moral relativist?

No, it doesn't even matter if the belief system of a particular religion is true or not. Even if a God existed, that wouldn't overcome the IS-OUGHT problem.

Look, the idea of "moral objectivity" isn't even coherant. Lets look at what that term even means. Here are all the possible definitions I know of for it.

1. An objective morality is a morality that is consistent with itself and coherent. If this is the case, there are literally dozens of objective moralities.

2. An objective morality is a morality that is universally known of. Despite the pleas of men like Saint Paul and C.S. Lewis, this is nowhere near the case. If it was, we wouldn't be having this conversation. No such morality exists.

3. An objective morality is a morality rooted in some feature of Nature or the cosmos. If this is the case, there are dozens of objective moralities. The Stoics, the Thomists, and the Darwinists can all claim to base their moralities on Nature, and be right, because "Nature" does not prescribe any particular imperatives, unless you assume axiomatically that some things are desirable. And what things you decide are not desirable, are the parts of "Nature" your morality leaves out. In other words, no such morality exists.

4. An objective morality means a morality that is universally enforced. This type of morality is the ONLY type of moral system that becomes any more valid or true when a God is thrown into the picture, and even then it accomplishes this purely through realpolitik. If a morality being objective simply means its universally enforced, then the concept is valid, but it also destroys the ONLY criticism moral objectivists make against relativists, namely, that their moralities are arbitrary and only maintained through force! Its hypocrisy of the highest type.

In short, not only does a God existing not help the issue of metaethics and answering Hume, it has literally nothing to do with the problem at all.

It means realizing that moral systems and value systems are human constructs created for particular persons by particular interests, and that there is no such thing as a universally accurate and prescribed way of behavior.

That things you find abhorrent are not cosmically wrong.

I seriously don't understand why people have trouble with this. Do they not understand what the word "objective" means?

is there supposed to be a difference to moral nihilism

Yes. Nihilism means "There is no value", relativism means "Value is constructed"

And if you think those are the same thing, it says more about your weak psychology than about metaethics.

Not the user you replied to but that is a reasoning that leads to taking the stance as moral relativist and what being a moral relativist is can be seen quite well in that reasoning: A stance that declares that morals are relative to a particular desires of particular agents, living in particular places, at particular times.
Can you clarify you question?

if value was constructed then there would previously have been no value

i mean this is an analogy i have no actual clue what the fuck you mean by constructing value. that combination of words does not have some obvious meaning to me.

it seems to lead to moral nihilism but this is not the word that was used

You're assuming that value and meaning are things to be found and discovered, things that are built into the universe and that if you find value and meaning in the "wrong" things you are "wrong", and if you fail to find meaning in the "right" things then you are wrong.

The reality is that "value" as a concept means "evaluated by someone". Its something human beings literally just make the fuck up.

Morality is like concepts like money, and "The State" and laws. Its all shit thats only real in our heads. That doesn't mean we should get rid of it all.

But it is, what it is. If I say "X is Good", you can ask me "Why?" until you reach the point where I say "Because I fucking said so", and at that point morality becomes relative.

Based on the conversations I've had, way too many people seem to use "objective" not as an absolute objective but rather as an "well we can pretty much mostly agree that this is x so it must be objectively x because if it were subjective we'd all disagree"

OH man the best of those conversations is when people realize that someone actually disagrees on one of their axioms.

Like if someone says "Well we can all agree torture is objectively wrong so, wait someone disagrees? user how can you say that, thats horrible!"

Just as an example, not stating my views on the above one way or the other.

moral nihilism doesn't deny the physical world or that people have differing opinions

I'm not sure I get it myself. As far as I can tell, it's basically "take a light touch, because everyone has their standard of good, and don't be a dick."

t. Moral Nihilist.

From what I understand, to a moral nihilist the act of killing simply isn't right of wrong.
To a moral relativist killing can be right or wrong, but it being either one is relative to the values, the culture, the time etc.

Pff, kek. I don't get where people get that idea

"Values are relative, lets be SUPER NICE AND INOFFENSIVE"

If anything, the idea that there are no moral absolutes means you should fight for YOUR values with great intensity. Just because other standards of good exist, doesn't mean I have to RESPECT that.

>Pff, kek. I don't get where people get that idea

Same guy here, I got that from looking at society at large. I guess it's because relativist language is usually paired up with the whole politically correct thing.

Personally, although I hold that all moral values are fictions, I'm pretty willing to stick by the shit I do value.

Exactly! Just because my enemies aren't WRONG in some cosmic sense, doesn't stop them from being my enemies.

Just because ISIS isn't "evil", doesn't mean I don't want to bomb them forward into the stone age.

but that's not in any way philosophy.

it's literally just acknowledgement that other people disagree with you and an utter lack of action concerning that. speaking it out loud produces word salad since there is no communication. is this brain damage?

unless you defend it by saying you don't care in which case it's nihilism, not relativism.

No, its saying that the entire subject is founded on a false premise, and any examination of what is meant by the concepts used in the subject reveals the whole thing to be nonsense.

Its ethics based on reality instead looking for some Cosmic Ideal Philosophy that does not exist.

that's still nihilism

No, its not.

it completely lacks a difference from nihilism. do you mean to convince me that doesn't make it the same, or do you disagree?

Moral relativism is the idea that the concept of right and wrong differs between different societies.

But morality is subjective, it deals with the outcomes for subjective beings. Something is not good because society says it is, or because it is good for society, something is only good from the perspective of a person who benefits from it. Something is wrong if it wrongs someone.

So even though the concept of right and wrong do differ from society to society, this doesn't mean that an act which is wrong in one part of the world may be right in another part of the world; it just means that societies tend to include aesthetic choices and moral choices in the same category.

I'm telling you, as a matter of fact, that existentialism is not the same thing as nihilism. Saying values are constructed and self-oriented is not the same thing as saying life is meaningless and valueless.

You saying "Yes it is" is not an argument. The reality is that the mere concepts of value and meaning are by necessity linked to the individual. When we say "This matters", we are necessarily saying "It matters to somebody"

The idea of meaning independent of an agent isn't just wrong, it doesn't even make sense.

Spooky spookism is objective

>not the same thing as saying life is meaningless and valueless
moral nihilism is not existential nihilism

is this just rebranding moral nihilism to unassociate from the edgelord thing?

No, but neither is moral nihilism the same as moral relativism. They are distinct concepts. Saying

"There is no subject-independent value" is not the same statement as

"There are no values"

do you imagine moral nihilists deny that people have opinions? you'd be mistaken.

Are you missing the user's point on purpose?
>Saying values are constructed and self-oriented is not the same thing as saying life is meaningless and valueless.
analogically
>Saying moral values are constructed and self-oriented is not the same thing as saying that nothing is moral or immoral

No one said that moral nihilists deny that people have opinions. Moral nihilists just don't believe that something is moral or immoral based on someone's opinion.

generally no one does

do you mean relativists do or are you just typing aimlessly

is this really how it is? you spout nonsense and then leave?

>this is bad
>NUH UH WHO SAYS
>this is good
>NUH UH WHO SAYS
>this is
>NUH UHHHHHHHHHHHHH

Why do we take moral relativism seriously?

The maximization principle is not an axiom. It requires justification, which is what all those books on the groundwork of utilitarianism set out to demonstrate.

It's a fancy way of rationalisation for those who are unwilling to face the severity of their actions or inaction. People who are more together are more willing to understand that they did the best they could. Relativists believe they did the best the situation could reasonably allow.
It's the moral equivalent of giving away your agency. Making your moral short comings the fault of fortune rather than your choices and interactions.

Pretty cowardly tb//h

It allows the relativist to devalue the concept of morals. While everyone knows that people disagree on what is and isn't moral, rather than deciding for themselves the relativist eschews all such responsibility and claims that as it is constructed it is all equally vacuous.
When ethics and moral codes have no more weight or legitimacy than deciding what you're having for dinner the relativist may swap and choose between them at will in order to continually be on the side of 'morality'. How can they be wrong if they can change the rules to suite the situations as they arise?
Who could critique them given that their morals are just one 'perspective' and they don't 'understand' the relativistic nature of them.

>constructed and self-oriented
these two words are literally the entire explanation of these supposedly existing values which have no visible difference from other people's opinions

are people's opinions morally important?

It's a slow board mate. Chances are whoever has 'left' will be back.

>ITT people with no formal philosophy education whatsoever discuss metaethical issues they don't understand via concepts the meanings of which they don't know
Brilliant.

well educate us faggot. there's a clearly defined question in the OP.

There's this thing called Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, which can be found with Google fairly easily

Ok, and you're going to belittle them trying their best because?

In general people should shut the hell up about things they have business discussing, uneducated blabbering never brought anything worthwhile to the table (see: climate change deniers, homophobes, YECs, supporters of homeopathy and alternate medicine, moral realists and religious fundamentalists/terrorists).

>just shut up and listen to your betters :^)

This is an open image board with no central ideology or purpose beyond facilitating discussion; it doesn't even archive its own threads for any substantial length of time. There is literally no place better suited for uneducated sorts to come here and try and work through this kind of shit on their own. Go climb into your fedora.

according to this moral relativisim has no meaning at all and everyone who has ever used it has first chosen the word and then tried to invent something for it to mean

this word has to be the most retarded fucking thing i have ever seen

and yet you can't seem to bring anything useful to the thread's topic. you're even worse than us.

Does it feel bad writing a long post and then getting no (you)s?

I thought your post was interesting and informative though.

this

Moral relevancy is essentially one big bystander effect

>How is it supposed to work? I don't get it.
There is no source of objective morality and our moral systems are to a large extent arbitrary. There are common themes across all cultures but they are essentially a result of evolutionary history and not evidence of some greater moral force.

>what does it mean to be a moral relativist?
To recognise that morals are relative. It's fairly simple. What you define as "right" and "wrong" are dependent on the moral system you subscribe to. For example, a religious man might consider faith to be virtuous, an atheist might consider faith to be dogmatic or servile, and therefore be opposed to it. A Hindu might think that ritual is virtuous, a muslim might think that it is idolatrous and therefore wrong. A communist might think that property is evil, an ancap might think that property is the most fundamental good in human society, and so on.

To be a moral relativist is simply to recognise this heterogeneity.

>if value was constructed then there would previously have been no value
yes, (leaving aside the discussion about whether or not animals or theoretical aliens have morals) before humans existed there can have been no morals.

yup, I agree. This quote from a British official in India sums up how I feel about it.

“Be it so. This burning of widows is your custom; prepare the funeral pile. But my nation has also a custom. When men burn women alive we hang them, and confiscate all their property. My carpenters shall therefore erect gibbets on which to hang all concerned when the widow is consumed. Let us all act according to national customs."

Almost no one who claims to be a moral relativist actually is.
They are fine with different values up to a point, but can't fathom going beyond it.

True moral relativism means that even principles like the value of human life mean nothing.

That's not moral relativism. Moral relativism is not being fine with other morals. It's knowing that morality is not objective.

Dogmatic people say there is an objective morality.

Moral relativists say morality is subjective.

Nihilists say there's no inherent value and morality is a spook.

These are not the same thing. You've just been in your echobox too long.

>those bad dumb homophobes XPPP
>haha homeopathy XDDD

literally a list of reddit wrongthink. kill yourself you cookie cutter mongoloid faggot

Moral relativism means that nihilism is equally valid to any other moral system

Not that faggot but if you like homeopathy you're a literal retard.

Reality is Reality. A man killing a man is a man killing a man. Nothing more or less.

Moral relativism is recognising this and that all forms of morality are abstractions that have no basis in reality.

>These are not the same thing
please explain where this supposed difference is

wut

Not all opinions are equally valid.

explain further

There's nothing to explain. It's complete bullshit. Forget about it.

>A Hindu might think that ritual is virtuous, a muslim might think that it is idolatrous and therefore wrong.
No, religion is different. The whole thing about religion is that it claims to be about "is".

So the Muslim doesn't think that the Hindu has the wrong values, he thinks that the Hindu is factually wrong about what God wants.

>supposed

nump

You're still trying to apply an objective criterion with your use of valid.

The subtext being if we really believe morality is relative then we'll balk at the thought of the opposing system. You've managed to miss the point.

Imagine an innocent child being eaten by starving wolf and its cubs (which are starving because of the lack of game from human hunting), and then being slaughtered by the towns people. Who is in the moral right objectively?
Neither is, because objective morality doesn't exist. To the wolves they are good and the towns people are bad. To the people vice versa.

There is a certain subset of the population that is deathly afraid of making value judgement in general. "Moral relativism" is what happens when they talk morals. The question is why are some people so scared of making value judgement?

>So the Muslim doesn't think that the Hindu has the wrong values, he thinks that the Hindu is factually wrong about what God wants.
A lot of religions equate values with what god wants. Not sure about hinduism but Muslims definitely do it a lot.

moral nihilism is exactly the same except things that aren't true are just called "false" regardless of if someone else believes in them.

there is no difference between what you call "morally irrelevant" and "morally relevant in someone else's opinion".

because it's easier to live apathetic? i dont know

I had an axiomatic disagreement with a friend that took ~4 conversations to track down. It's an interesting process.

>hurr there is no right and wrong
>everyone is a law unto himself

That's literally it.

Literally Satanism.

C.S Lewis has refuted it.

God exists.
There is an objective morality.

/thread

>the bible is not objective

The most concise answer is that it ISN'T supposed to 'work' in the sense of a normative ethical theory.
It is merely means by which to explain why conflicting moralities exists within the global community.
Its shrouded in a lot of confusion and scoffed at in the contemporary philosophical community because it was put forward originally by anthropologists, not philosophers.
And, as demonstrated by others ITT, relativism isn't useful as a guide, again it is more a means by which to explain why various moral codes exist and contradict. In this way it also preserves the anthropologists' precious ideas about the egalitarian value of said various cultures systems. Meaning that, using relativism, all cultures are equally right and or wrong.

So, relativism is can be accepted as a general rule of the basis of morality, that it comes subjectively from humans, but relativism isn't a guiding moral theory. Hope that answered your question OP

>I don't know what the right course of action is in this particular situation.
>That means there is no right course of action, it's all the same!!
>I don't know the answer to this math problem.
>That means any answer I give is equally valid!!

Trash-tier morality for little baby brained beta fucbois.

>There is an objective morality.

Prove it.

Do you agree that truth exists independently of human thought?

No one knows what objective means anymore, if it even meant anything to begin with.

No one knows what adjective means anymore, if it even meant anything to begin with.

You are retarded if you think this is what moral relativism actually is.

It's just recognising that all forms of morality are inherently subjective because they are human abstractions i.e. not objective. How the fuck do you even come to that conclusion?

>I'm a lazy 16 year old that just read Nietzsche for the first time and completely misunderstood the essence of the first 25 pages of 'Thus Spoke Zarathustra' before I got bored and drank a pepsi

That's moral relativism in a nutshell

>3. An objective morality is a morality rooted in some feature of Nature or the cosmos. If this is the case, there are dozens of objective moralities. The Stoics, the Thomists, and the Darwinists can all claim to base their moralities on Nature, and be right, because "Nature" does not prescribe any particular imperatives, unless you assume axiomatically that some things are desirable. And what things you decide are not desirable, are the parts of "Nature" your morality leaves out. In other words, no such morality exists.

I can see no reason why a system of morality could not take into account both the desirable and undesirable portions of 'nature'. It a moral system did this, would that then make it objective? If a moral system could not do this, explain why.

Buhcuz adjectives aren't the same as pronouns.

...

*tips*

Kant.

>An objective morality is a morality rooted in some feature of Nature or the cosmos.

but wouldn't an objective morality by definition need to be rooted in all features of Nature or the cosmos? And if it fulfilled this requirement would it not in fact be objective?