Meta-Ethics

Ethical Naturalism starts by accepting that moral/natural laws exist in the world and they can be experienced through the natural world.

Through observation of this natural world ethical language can be categorised as meaningful or meaningless. Hume would be an ethical naturalist as he believed that empirical knowledge was the only way of finding the truth.

Through the observation of the natural world we can see that statements, such as 'murder is wrong', can be meaningful due to self-preservation is an esential feature of human nature.

Both cognitivists and non-cognitivists would reject ethical naturalism as it does not with-stand the 'naturalistic fallacy'. This is thr idea that just becasue nature acts in a certain way it does not follow that this is how things ought to be. Illogical to go from an 'is' to an 'ought'.

Cognitivists argue that this view of ethical statments allows for language to be reduced into laws, such as natural law theory.

This is an absolute and strong realist moral view. Philosopher W.D.Ross and G.E.Moore first put forward this view. They believed that moral norms have an objective existence that is independent of human experience. Morality is intuitive.

"We know what yellow is, but cannot define it. In the same way we know what good is" (G.E.Moore)

When referring to morality we are referring to properties we cannot define, yet we all objectively know it. They believe in 7 fundamental moral principles in which we all intuitively know, for example one being faithfullness.

J.L.Mackie saw this view as weak, he argues that morality is not just about what a person believes but actually putting it into practice. Many say that it cannot be univeral due to the contradictory cultural beliefs.

This is a non-cognitivst view, which developed from the logical positivism theory by the Vienna Circle.They believe that the only absolute truths were based on science. Theu have to be logically coherent statments otherwise they are meaningless.

A.J.Ayer believed in this view and came up with the 'Hurrah-Boo' theory. Arguing that morals are determined by people's feelings and opinions. He said when we use ethical language we are only expressing our emotions on an issue. If a statment cannot be analytic or synthetic then it cannot be verified and is meaningless. He said, however, that if you say a statement with context then it can be capable of verification.

Charles L Stevenson agrees with Ayer. He said that ethical statements contain element of persuassion. When a person expresses an emotion the reciever is expected to share the same feelings too.

Warnok argues, however, that this view is too subjective. Making ethical statements do allow for debate so are not just emotions.

Richard Hare explains how moral language is persriptive and tells us how we ought to act. It means that everyone should follow this moral truth. This is the universalizability principle, that when an individual prefers one thing rather than sommething else this implies that this preference would be good for all.

It adds to the idea that ethical statments are expressions of opinion by saying that they also give directions as to how we ought to act.

However, many argue that there is no way of knowing whos preference is more superior to anothers.