Moral skepticism

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Moral skepticism is the meta-ethical view that we cannot possess justified moral beliefs, or at least that we cannot possess moral knowledge. Moral nihilists, such as J.L. Mackie, argue that we do not possess moral knowledge because all moral beliefs are false. Emotivists have supported moral skepticism by arguing that moral statements are actually expressions of emotion, on par with "Yuk!". Still others claim that the cultural influences on our moral thinking are so strong that all of moral reasoning is unavoidably tainted with bias. Hence we cannot have justified moral beliefs. What unites all of these positions is a suspicion that our moral beliefs are not as defensible as common sense would have us believe.

1 Weak and strong version
2 Conclusion
3 See also
4 References
5 External links

[edit] Weak and strong version

The strong version says that the claim "it is wrong to kill" is false because ethical claims implicitly pre-suppose the existence of objective values, and that these do not exist. The weak position would go no further than saying that we are not epistemically justified in asserting that it is wrong to kill.

The stronger position is exemplified in J. L. Mackie's book Ethics: Inventing Right and Wrong. Mackie does not deny that there is moral goodness in the world. His point is that "goodness" of any sort is always relative to certain desire(s) or interest(s) that are relevant to the context. For example, a sharp, durable knife is usually considered a "good" one, but it counts as good only because knife users have an interest in cutting things, such as food. Sharpness and durability are properties of knives that make them more efficient for such a purpose. Mackie believes that moral discussion typically assumes that there is an objective kind of moral goodness, which transcends any actual desires and interests, and that this assumption is an error.

Mackie's main argument against the existence of objective values is the argument from queerness - objective values would be very peculiar things indeed, fundamentally different from everything else in the world — indeed, they would have to be something like the Platonic forms (which Mackie considers a "wild product of philosophical fancy"). Furthermore, how we are supposed to discover these objective values is mysterious.

[edit] Conclusion

The moral skeptic's conclusion is that supposedly objective values (in the sense explained above) are merely useful fictions that function for such purposes as social preservation. Furthermore, it is possible to invent moral values that are more likely to further our actual desires and interests as human beings living in particular historical circumstances.

Mackie's position is also known as the "error theory" of morality. Strictly speaking, a more agnostic position that we simply cannot justify ethical claims is also an error theory, as acknowledged by Richard Joyce, who defends such a theory in The Evolution of Morality. In this case, the alleged error is the common belief that moral claims are justifiable.

Contemporary defenders of moral skepticism include Joyce, Michael Ruse, Joshua Greene, and the psychologist James Flynn. Strictly speaking, Gilbert Harman's work, which argues in favour of moral relativism, does not advocate moral skepticism, but it has been influential on some contemporary moral skeptics.