Oh boy, this is just ducky. Sort of a follow up to what DW was on to here--simply put this is a deeply confused poll--it has no idea what it's really asking. It drifts between ethics and meta-ethics seemingly at random, and isn't comprehensive of either.
Because I didn't get any sleep last night and am feeling cranky, I'm going to nitpick. Oh, and the quotes are going to be highly edited for convenience--I'm clipping to the relevant bits.
Shinova wrote:Originally from SB by LT_Ryguy:
Utilitarianism -Maximize pleasure at the minimum cost of pain and all are equal in cosideration.
One of the most famous philosophical ethical foundation ever, and still rather popular. Can't complain much here, since it's only the first option after all. I would point out though that it's not a meta-ethical view, but a normative one.
And unless you're willing to take the position of JJC Smart, you still have to explain why it's not justifiable to hang the innocent man. The theory tends to be very awkward except for situations like distrobution of scarce medical resources.
Absolutism- There are absolute standards to which moral problems can be judged by.
And now we're into a meta-ethics. I find it ironic that DW was pointing this out as a criticism, since the thread claims to be about meta-ethics. He should have pointed out that things like utilitarianism were normative theories, not meta-ethical ones, if we are to be taking the thread at its face value at least.
Incidentally, this position can be applied to about half the other ones as well, bringing out the endemic murkiness in the poll. It paints the views with such a coarse brush that it's impossible to separate them out and make only one choice. I'm guessing it was not a philosopher who came up with it.
Relativism -Moral values are as applicable only within certain cultural boundaries or in the context of individual preferences.
We're staying consistent to giving meta-ethical positions at least, although it's more properly a metaphysical metaethical position. It's also an incredibly bad one, since it tries to keep intra-societal normativity, while dispensing with inter-societal normativity for no particularly good reason. In the end it turns into a form of nihilism, or at least that's what I've come to believe.
Oh, and it doesn't apply within the context of individual preferences--only societal ones. Otherwise it's subjectivism. Actually I think that subjectivism reduces to the exact same thing as relativism at the end of the day, but on the face of them they're different views.
Nihilism -Traditional morality is false, and secular ethics are impossible; therefore, life has no meaning, and no action is preferable to any other.
FUCKING NO!
What you have just described is a popular misconception of nihilism popularised by whiny teenagers that want to seem cool. Nihilism as it is thought of by people who actually know what they're talking about is merely the metaphysical position that there are no moral facts. To apply that to each point in the desciption:
Traditional morality is not false. Nor is it true. Since there are no moral facts, traditional morality (insofar as we think of religious morality, utilitarianism etc.) is simply nonsense. It fails to refer to anything in reality. Secular ethics however are perfectly possible. To deny that there are no moral facts does not require that we deny that we can be moral. Moral non-cognitivism for instance denies moral facts, but still upholds morality. I myself am a moral non-cognitivist in the vein of Mark Timmons. Go read some of his work. Now.
Life having meaning is completely beyond the scope of any merely moral system, nihilistic or no. There are forms of nihilism that deny life meaning (nihilism about the meaning of life, surprise surprise) but that has nothing at all to do with ethics. Nihilism at its heart, after all, is just the denial of whatever you're talking about. I personally am a nihilist about moral facts, God and unicorns amongst other things.
There is finally nothing in moral nihilism that necessitates that all actions are equally preferable. Even if we pretend that there's many other things other than morality that make actions preferable (like, say, whether or not they end up with you getting killed) we can consistently deny moral facts and hold there are moral preferences. Take expressivism for instance--people can express moral preferences quite easily, and do so all the time.
Moral nihilism is a perfectly respectable metaphysical position. Would someone please tell those mopey emo and goth fuckers to stay the hell away from my theory?
Humanism - A commitment to the search for truth and morality through human means in support of human interests.
And we're out of meta-ethics and back into normative ethics again. This poll is schizophrenic. I might also point out that any time that a theory starts talking about truth and it's not an epistemic one, start calling bull shit. Truth, despite what people seem to think, is a very simple concept that underlies almost every pursuit we take up--there is no field which looks for truth in any unique way except for epistemology, and that's mostly 'cause they have to define truth for everyone else.
Simply put, here's what truth is:
For any sentence 'x,' 'x' is true if and only if x. So take the sentence 'snow is white' for example. 'Snow is white' if and only if snow is white. Is snow white? Well, go find out. If it is, then the sentence is true. If it's not, then the sentence is false. There's nothing more mysterious to truth than that.
Empathy - Recognition and understanding of the states of mind, beliefs, desires, and emotions of others in a sort of resonance.
Umm, huh? That's... great. But it isn't a moral theory, meta- or normative. Empathy is a part of quite a few moral theories, but it's nothing on its own. It just doens't make sense on its own. Incidentally, it's generally not even mentioned in theories on its own, but as a part of what's commonly called moral sentiment. That is to say, the part of morality that occurs outside the intellect.
Realism -Moral facts exist in the world, and hence moral judgements refer to these moral facts.
At least this is recognisably a moral position, another meta-ethical metaphysics position actually. In direct opposition to moral nihilism, it claims that there are moral facts, and moreover that they have a mind-independant existence. That is to say, that they define morality independantly about our desires, beliefs and so on about them.
Has huge issues with the problem of queerness and issues of epistemic inscrutability. More or less, if there were a moral fact, what the fuck would it look like? What sort of fact can account for the "goodness" or "badness" of an action? And even if such facts could exist, how could we come to know them? There doesn't seem to be any ready access at all.
Egoism -One ought to do what is in one's own self-interest which may incidentally be detrimental, beneficial, or neutral in its effect.
Fuck you, Ayn Rand. You're not a real philosopher, and you're not even a good novelist to make up for it.
Immoral -Quality of having no concept of right or wrong or behavior that is self-consciously within the scope of morality but does not abide by its edicts. Try only choosing this if your a sociopath, if you're just self interested, choose egoism.
Actually, that's an incoherent passage. Having no concept of right and wrong is
amorality. Immorality is choosing to act in a morally reprehensible manner, and as such presupposes that there is a moral standard to do the reprehending. Being immoral only works when you have a notion of morality already.
There, I'm done. And feel a lot better now to boot. Oh, and I'm not voting out of protest of the butcher job done to the positions. But for the record, as I mentioned I'm a kind of nihilist, but *gasp* a nihilist that doesn't deny that we can be moral!
Your head is humming and it won't go, in case you don't know, the piper's calling you to join him
Commander of the MFS Darwinian Selection Method (sexual)