anti-slavery, equal pay for equal work, laws should not limit freedom unnecessarily, laws should not apply to groups based on irrelevant differences like skin color, religion, gender, the poor should be helped...
All of these seem to me to be components of modern society’s moral philosophy. I think it could be said that there is not universal sign-on or agreement to the components of society’s moral philosophy, but I don’t think that negates the rich content. Plus there are many things where sign-on seems nearly universal, anti-slavery for instance.
The presence of modern outputs of a moral philosophy would seem to suggest the existence of a modern moral philosophy.
Or if they are free floating intuitions, it is remarkable how they seem consistent with a fairly complicated view where the individual humans have great value and significant rights against the collective or other random strangers. And how different this modern view of the individual is then hundreds of years ago or more when moral theories revolved around various authoritarian institutions or supernatural beings rather than individuals.
The presence of modern outputs of a moral philosophy would seem to suggest the existence of a modern moral philosophy.
The presence of outputs of a moral philosophy need not mean that the moral philosophy is still present, or even that there’s one moral philosophy. For example, imagine a world in which for centuries, the dominant moral philosophy was that of fundamentalist Christianity, and popular moral ideas are those derived from it. Then there is a rise in secularism and Christianity retreats, but many of its ideas remain, disconnected from their original source. Temporarily, Christianity is replaced by some kind of egalitarianism, which produces some of its own moral ideas, but then it retreats too, and then there isn’t any dominant moral philosophy. You would find that in such a society, there would be various scattered ideas that can be traced back to Christianity or egalitarianism, even though it’s possible that no one would be a Christian or an egalitarian.
if they are free floating intuitions, it is remarkable how they seem consistent with a fairly complicated view where the individual humans have great value and significant rights against the collective or other random strangers
If you put it that broadly, it’s not concrete enough to be called a moral philosophy. Utilitarians, Kantians, and others would all agree that individuals have great value, but they’re very different moral philosophies.
anti-slavery, equal pay for equal work, laws should not limit freedom unnecessarily, laws should not apply to groups based on irrelevant differences like skin color, religion, gender, the poor should be helped...
All of these seem to me to be components of modern society’s moral philosophy. I think it could be said that there is not universal sign-on or agreement to the components of society’s moral philosophy, but I don’t think that negates the rich content. Plus there are many things where sign-on seems nearly universal, anti-slavery for instance.
Those are outputs of a moral philosophy, not components of one. Or they’re freely floating moral intuitions, which is usually the case.
The presence of modern outputs of a moral philosophy would seem to suggest the existence of a modern moral philosophy.
Or if they are free floating intuitions, it is remarkable how they seem consistent with a fairly complicated view where the individual humans have great value and significant rights against the collective or other random strangers. And how different this modern view of the individual is then hundreds of years ago or more when moral theories revolved around various authoritarian institutions or supernatural beings rather than individuals.
The presence of outputs of a moral philosophy need not mean that the moral philosophy is still present, or even that there’s one moral philosophy. For example, imagine a world in which for centuries, the dominant moral philosophy was that of fundamentalist Christianity, and popular moral ideas are those derived from it. Then there is a rise in secularism and Christianity retreats, but many of its ideas remain, disconnected from their original source. Temporarily, Christianity is replaced by some kind of egalitarianism, which produces some of its own moral ideas, but then it retreats too, and then there isn’t any dominant moral philosophy. You would find that in such a society, there would be various scattered ideas that can be traced back to Christianity or egalitarianism, even though it’s possible that no one would be a Christian or an egalitarian.
If you put it that broadly, it’s not concrete enough to be called a moral philosophy. Utilitarians, Kantians, and others would all agree that individuals have great value, but they’re very different moral philosophies.