8 Moral Relativism

t.Z Explaining Moral Diversity

In this and the following section I argue that the following claim is a reasonable inference from the most plausible expla-nation of moral diversity.

There is no single true morality. There are many different moral frameworks, none of which is more correct than the others.

I begin by mentioning data to be explained: the nature and extent of moral diversity.

Members of different cultures often have very different beliefs about right and wrong and often act quite differently on their beliefs. To take a seemingly trivial example, different cultures have different rules of politeness and etiquette: burping after eating is polite in one culture, impolite in another. Less trivially, some people are cannibals, others find cannibalism abhorrent.

The institution of marriage takes different forms in different societies. In some, a man is permitted to have several wives, in others bigamy is forbidden. More generally, the moral status of women varies greatly from one society to another in many different ways.

Some societies allow slavery, some have caste systems, which they take to be morally satisfactory, others reject both slavery and caste systems as grossly unjust.

It is unlikely that any nontrivial moral principles are univer-sally accepted in all societies. The anthropologist George Sil-berbauer (1993, p. 15) is able to say only that "there are values which can be seen as common to nearly all societies," a remark limited by the phrases ''can be seen as" and "nearly all." He further limits this claim by adding, "there are sometimes strong contrasts in the ways in which (these values) are expressed in precepts, principles and evaluations of behaviour.''

Some say that there is a universally recognized central core of morality consisting of prohibitions against killing and harm ing others, against stealing, and asainst lying to others. Walzer (1987, p. 24) offers a more limited list of universal prohibitions:

ContentsPrefacePart I: Moral Relativism (Gilbert Harman)Chapter 1: Moral RelativismChapter 2: Social ContractsChapter 3: Expressing Basic DisagreementChapter 4: Universality of Practical Reasons?Chapter 5: Judgments about Outsiders

Part II: Moral Objectivity (Judith Jarvis Thomson)Introduction to Part IIChapter 6: Epistemological Arguments for Moral ScepticismChapter 7: EmotivismChapter 8: Evaluatives and Directives

Part III: ResponsesChapter 9: Harman's Response to Thomson's Part IIChapter 10: Thomson's Response to Harman's Part I

BibliographyIndex