I sense that there may have been a bit of a miscommunication. I don’t think that constructivism per se is crazy—I think it’s wrong, but it’s held by smart respectable people. It’s cultural relativism that’s held by no-one reasonable—the idea that, if society approves of vicious torture, it’s okay to torture people is crazy. This is one reason why there are virtually no contemporary defenders of cultural relativism. Also, I’m not so sure that I’m right—I’m 85% confident in moral realism and 70% confident in non-physicalism!
Moral relativism does not necessarily entail that if society approves of torture, then torture is “okay.” It only entails that it’s okay relative to that culture’s moral standards. But it does not follow that other individuals or cultures must also think it’s okay. They can think it’s not okay.
Relativism holds that moral claims are true or false relative to the standards of individuals or groups. So a claim like “torture is not wrong,” would mean something like “torture is not inconsistent with our culture’s moral standards.” If it isn’t inconsistent with a culture’s moral standards, the statement would be trivially true. Furthermore, an appraiser relativist does not have to tolerate another individual or culture with different moral standards acting in accordance with those moral standards. At best, only certain forms of agent relativism which hold that an action is morally right or wrong relative to the standards of the agent performing an act (or that agent’s culture). As Gowans notes in the SEP entry on agent and appraiser relativism:
”[...] that to which truth or justification is relative may be the persons making the moral judgments or the persons about whom the judgments are made. These are sometimes called appraiser and agent relativism respectively. Appraiser relativism suggests that we do or should make moral judgments on the basis of our own standards, while agent relativism implies that the relevant standards are those of the persons we are judging (of course, in some cases these may coincide). Appraiser relativism is the more common position, and it will usually be assumed in the discussion that follows.”
Are you rejecting agent relativism, appraiser relativism, or both with your example of torture?
As far as most philosophers not being relativists: this isn’t to say you’re mistaken (since that’s also my impression) but what are you basing that conclusion off of?
I agree relativism doesn’t entail that—cultural relativism does, however. Cultural relativism holds that right means approved of by my culture. This applies to both appraiser and agent relativism—as long as someone thinks something is right just because it’s supported by society, it will have a similar reductio.
Ethics teachers report that their classes consist almost entirely of relativists, and they have to start the course by putting a preliminary case for realism , just to get the students to realise there is more than one option.
Yes, and, in addition to that, the best current studies on how nonphilosophers think about these issues find that across a variety of paradigms, respondents in the US tended to favor antirealism at a ratio of about 3:1, with most endorsing some type of relativism. See Pölzler and Wright (2020). In other words, when given the option to endorse a variety of metaethical positions, about 75% of the respondents in this study favored some type of antirealiasm.
Note that P&W’s studies relied on online samples from a population that is disproportionately nonreligious, and student samples, which are disproportionately more inclined towards relativism (see Beebe & Sackris, 2016), so they are probably not representative of the United States population as a whole.
References
Beebe, J. R., & Sackris, D. (2016). Moral objectivism across the lifespan. Philosophical Psychology, 29(6), 912-929.
Pölzler, T., & Wright, J. C. (2020). Anti-realist pluralism: A new approach to folk metaethics. Review of Philosophy and Psychology, 11(1), 53-82.
I sense that there may have been a bit of a miscommunication. I don’t think that constructivism per se is crazy—I think it’s wrong, but it’s held by smart respectable people. It’s cultural relativism that’s held by no-one reasonable—the idea that, if society approves of vicious torture, it’s okay to torture people is crazy. This is one reason why there are virtually no contemporary defenders of cultural relativism. Also, I’m not so sure that I’m right—I’m 85% confident in moral realism and 70% confident in non-physicalism!
Moral relativism does not necessarily entail that if society approves of torture, then torture is “okay.” It only entails that it’s okay relative to that culture’s moral standards. But it does not follow that other individuals or cultures must also think it’s okay. They can think it’s not okay.
Relativism holds that moral claims are true or false relative to the standards of individuals or groups. So a claim like “torture is not wrong,” would mean something like “torture is not inconsistent with our culture’s moral standards.” If it isn’t inconsistent with a culture’s moral standards, the statement would be trivially true. Furthermore, an appraiser relativist does not have to tolerate another individual or culture with different moral standards acting in accordance with those moral standards. At best, only certain forms of agent relativism which hold that an action is morally right or wrong relative to the standards of the agent performing an act (or that agent’s culture). As Gowans notes in the SEP entry on agent and appraiser relativism:
”[...] that to which truth or justification is relative may be the persons making the moral judgments or the persons about whom the judgments are made. These are sometimes called appraiser and agent relativism respectively. Appraiser relativism suggests that we do or should make moral judgments on the basis of our own standards, while agent relativism implies that the relevant standards are those of the persons we are judging (of course, in some cases these may coincide). Appraiser relativism is the more common position, and it will usually be assumed in the discussion that follows.”
Are you rejecting agent relativism, appraiser relativism, or both with your example of torture?
As far as most philosophers not being relativists: this isn’t to say you’re mistaken (since that’s also my impression) but what are you basing that conclusion off of?
I agree relativism doesn’t entail that—cultural relativism does, however. Cultural relativism holds that right means approved of by my culture. This applies to both appraiser and agent relativism—as long as someone thinks something is right just because it’s supported by society, it will have a similar reductio.
What’s the reductio, exactly?
Ethics teachers report that their classes consist almost entirely of relativists, and they have to start the course by putting a preliminary case for realism , just to get the students to realise there is more than one option.
Yes, and, in addition to that, the best current studies on how nonphilosophers think about these issues find that across a variety of paradigms, respondents in the US tended to favor antirealism at a ratio of about 3:1, with most endorsing some type of relativism. See Pölzler and Wright (2020). In other words, when given the option to endorse a variety of metaethical positions, about 75% of the respondents in this study favored some type of antirealiasm.
Note that P&W’s studies relied on online samples from a population that is disproportionately nonreligious, and student samples, which are disproportionately more inclined towards relativism (see Beebe & Sackris, 2016), so they are probably not representative of the United States population as a whole.
References
Beebe, J. R., & Sackris, D. (2016). Moral objectivism across the lifespan. Philosophical Psychology, 29(6), 912-929.
Pölzler, T., & Wright, J. C. (2020). Anti-realist pluralism: A new approach to folk metaethics. Review of Philosophy and Psychology, 11(1), 53-82.