This partially depends on where you place ‘ethics’. If ethics is worried about “what’s right” in Eliezer’s terms, then it’s not relativist at all—the pebble-sorters are doing something entirely different from ethics when they argue.
However, if you think the pebble-sorters are trying to answer the question “what should I do” and properly come up with answers that are prime, and you think that answering that question is what ethics is about, then Eliezer is some sort of relativist.
And the answers to these questions will inform the question about subjectivism. In the first case, clearly what’s right doesn’t depend upon what anybody thinks about what’s right. - it’s a non-relativist objectivism.
In the second case, there is still room to ask whether the correct answer to the pebblesorters asking “what should I do” depends upon their thoughts on the matter, or if it’s something non-mental that determines they should do what’s prime; thus, it could be an objective or subjective relativism.
This partially depends on where you place ‘ethics’. If ethics is worried about “what’s right” in Eliezer’s terms, then it’s not relativist at all—the pebble-sorters are doing something entirely different from ethics when they argue.
However, if you think the pebble-sorters are trying to answer the question “what should I do” and properly come up with answers that are prime, and you think that answering that question is what ethics is about, then Eliezer is some sort of relativist.
And the answers to these questions will inform the question about subjectivism. In the first case, clearly what’s right doesn’t depend upon what anybody thinks about what’s right. - it’s a non-relativist objectivism.
In the second case, there is still room to ask whether the correct answer to the pebblesorters asking “what should I do” depends upon their thoughts on the matter, or if it’s something non-mental that determines they should do what’s prime; thus, it could be an objective or subjective relativism.