Meta-Ethics

Interested in the nature of ethics itself and looking at ethical language itself: what do we mean by good or bad? 'birds eye view' considers the meaning of moral judgement.

VS normative ethics - natural law, util, deontology which are focused on the application of ehtical theories - what we ought to do in a moral circumstance, not why

• Cognitive - making statements which can be known to be either true or false
• Non- Cognitive - language does not refer to things which can be made true or false

• Naturalistic - goodness can be defined as something that actually exists e.g. utilitarianism, deontology
• Non- Naturalistic - doesn't define goodness e.g. intuitionism

Ethical Naturalists - treating statements as something that can be proved either true or false, as science does. e.g. murder is wrong, and we can use evidence to determine whether this is true or false.

• Objective - based on external facts, lacks bias
• Subjective - based on personal opinion

• Factual Language - concerned with actual details or information, rather than ideas or feelings
• Symbolic language - figurative/metaphoric often used by religious believers

• Moral Realism - there are objective moral values, the truth of which are independent of the human mind
• Moral Anti-Realism - there are no objective moral values

• Moral Absolutism - ethical principles can be established a priori (independent of experience because they are intrinsically right, regardless of outcome)
• Moral Relativism - ethical principles are established according to social custom and individual moral judgement. A posterirori, dependent on experience, ethical statements are true/false relative to the moral framework of the speaker's community. 

Cultural Relativism - an individual's statement should be interpreted in the context of that individual's culture (20th century anthropological study) (anti-realist)

Cognitive, Realist

• Moral Laws exist, we understand and experience these laws through an analysis of nature (a priori)
• Moral values are an objective part of the universe  
• Therefore, moral values exist and can be described (here are moral properties + values that can be described in terms of natural, non-ethical properties e.g. love, pleasure)

we can observe the world around us and create moral theories which fit with our empirical observations.

Bradley: moral statements are propositions and these propositions are made tru by objective features of the world, independent of human opinion.

e.g. NML, Utilitarianism, Deontology 

• The Naturalistic Fallacy: G.E Moore argues it cannot be said that seeking happiness, doing our duty or pursuing the virtues id the definition of 'goodness', and therefore is not morally obligatory. --> Confuses the meaning of 'good' with a natural or metaphysical property. Holds it to be identical with such a property e.g. love = good, therefore goodnees = love. But there is a conflation since love can be bad. 
• The Is-Ought Gap: Hume: There is a jump from the way something is, to how something ought to be done. "How can an ought be derived from an is?" e.g. just because doing action x promotes happiness it is a huge jump to then say this is the action we ought to do. There is a gap in the reasoning. Argues morality cannot be proven empirically because it is a question of personal sentiment. 
• Hume's Fork: either ethical statements are Analytic (includes tautologies or abstract knowledge like maths) or Synthetic (gained from sense experience, are empirical). = supports is/ought gap because an 'ought' statement does not fit on either prong of Hume's fork.
• The Verification Principle: A statement is only meaningful if it can be empirically verified.Ethical 'ought' statements are neither true nore false as they cannot be verified, therefore are meaningless.
• Open-Ended Question: (Moore's attack on Util) In the example of utilitarianism, where goodness is equated with pleasure. If we ask 'is pleasure good?' This question makes sense to us which shows pleasure and goodness are not the same thing. The same for is duty good? If they were the same the question would be redundant. Therefore, Moore argues you cannot reduce goodness to anything natural.

Moore has misinterpreted Mill =

Mary Wanock, disagrees with the naturalistic phallacy: Mill (util) is making an empirical observation about what people believe to be desirable. Not making a statement about the meaning of words, but informing us that people consider happiness to be desirable and good.

The Open Ended Argument confuses concepts + properties: happiness and goodness are different concept. 'Happiness is good' is not an analytic truth, Moore is correct, but the two concepts could refer to the same property in the world (goodness could be happiness).

Narure is universal, so the theory supports the idea that morals are universally known. Easy to follow in any situation. Empiricism is linked to science, so the theory has storng foundarions. 

Cognitive/ Realist

• There are objective moral properties (e.g. goodness) and we sometimes have awareness of this
• Can't define goodness, but we can find out what is through our intuition. We can also work out what is good through our intuition. (just know that something is good)
• Intuitions are self-evident propositions

Yellow example: can't define yellow but we know what it is, similarly we can't define good, but we know intuitively what it is. It is a quality that can be found in things and has no further parts which is can be reduced (it is non-defineable).

- we can't describe yellow to a blind person as you have to see it. Can't describe good either. It is detected by intuition

Matches the human experience of morality and does justice to the fact humans have an innate moral sense

Allows objective moral values to be identified, therefore proposing a form of moral realism

Not guilty of the naturalistic fallacy as it separates the natural world from morality

Problems:

• 1. anyone who is a supporter of a naturalistic ethical theory would argue you can define goodness (e.g. util, kantian ethics)
• 2. "The theory, appraised as a contribution to philisophy, seems deliberately, almost perversley, to answer no questions" - Warnock. There is no authoratative foundation fo ethics
• 3. how do we know that our intuitions are correct? How do we deal with the fact that different people have different intuitions on what is good. Majority of people would agree on what yellow is, but would not necessarily agree on lots of ethical issues. 
• 4. Freud - our intuition is actually based on our childhood experiences and social background we have. It's not a reliable access to goodness.
• 5. Logical positivist - it is meaningless because for example 'I think murder is wrong' this intuition cannot be empirically verified.
• 6. What do we do when intuitions conflict? e.g. do not murder + protect innocent life. (Moore: ideal utilitarisn suggested there were 3 intrinsic goods: pleasure, friendship, aesthetic appreciation so right actions will increase these in the world for the most people)
• What if one is ethically colour blind? 

disagreements within intuitionism, led to complete rejection of Intuitionism 

Moore = self-evident some things were valuable

Ross: every reflective persons knows he has a duty to do acts of a certain type 

A mature person recognises his prima facie duties ('at first glance') intuitively through reason. When intuitions conflict, Ross says above all we should not lie and protect innocent life + Morality is objective, but morals (Prima facie duties) are conditional; whether they should be followed depends on the over-riding duty for that situation. 

There are 6 prima-facie duties (duties one ought to follow, intuitively in the absence of an over-riding duty) - no particular order of worth 

• 1. fidelity - faithful to promises made
• 2. Gratitude - appreciation for support
• 3. Justice - impartial, equal treatment of others and distribution of please
• 4. Beneficence - help for others
• 5. Self-improvement - self-fulfilment
• 6. Non - maleficence - avoid harming others

non-cognitive. Direct result of logical positivism, which suggests statements must be verifiable in order for them to be meaningful. Ayer still wanted people to be able discuss ethical statements, so came up with emotivism.

Moral statements refer to emotions not facts, they cannot be true or false.

Two people can consider the same facts and come to different moral conclusions. Neither can say they are right, or the other is wrong because there are no facts that separate them. = if you like somethinig, you call it good. If you dislike it, you call it bad (known as the 'hurrah-boo' theory)

Hume: emotivists were influenced by his ideas, as morality was a question of personal sentiment "reason is and ought to be the slave of the passions". Morality cannot be proven empirically (justification for this found in Hume's fork).

Stevenson: moral language was emotive, but there was more too it than Ayer suggested. Some moral debates are more serious than simply a 'hurrah-boo' such as euthanasia, which is a fundamental issue. + as a statement is an expression of a person's preference, it is intended to influence the feelings of the heaer and produce a response.  

Problems:

1. Reduces all moral statements to personal preferences, so for example 'it is wrong to murder' would be of equal value to 'I prefer chocolate'. Some would argue a moral statement is more than just our personal feelings, and therefore cannot be equated to for example a preference to chocolate. It makes ethical statements redundant and of less worth.

2. Promotes complete freedom of action and speech, which could lead to what many consider something that is absolutely immoral being acceptable because it is simply someone’s opinion. For example, someone could say "**** is good" and since it is simply based on their opinion and emotion, it is valid because moral statements are only our emotional reactions to things. It is non-cognitive.

Strengths: 

1. Allows for the development of a complex and sophisticated discussion of moral language

2. Stresses the importance of an individuals moral feelings

Prescribes moral behaviour and our opinions onto other people.

• non-cognitive.
• Ethical statements are more than simply an expression of personal values or emotions and suggest that others should apply the same values in a similar situation.
• This is universal (what is correct in a particular situation, is correct for all) but the prescriptions are not objective.
• Suggested following the Golden Rule when prescribing ethical behaviours through our statements. Acknowledged some people need moral laws to guide them, as not everyone is capable of reasoning needed to effectively apply the GR. 

Someone else may prescribe other behaviour, and this theory allows room for debate. Can't prove anything is objectively right or wrong, but providing ways for us to continue talking about these issues.

--> Alistair Macintyre - interested in the way western society moral language has developed. We have developed believing we have some kind of telos, which he argues is not true. (People say we ought to do things because we believe we have some purpose we are aiming towards.)

Problems:

1. (similar to emotivism) Moral judgements are founded on prescriptions of our opinions and have no claim to objective moral truth.

2. How do we decide which opinions to follow, why should we follow one person’s prescriptions over another’s? There is no valid reason to follow one person's prescriptions more than anothers. 

3. Hare's rule could allow us to universalise anything and make it moral; this prinicple could be dangerous.

Strengths:

Provides a storng defence of freedom as a key element of moral life. We are free to judge + choose how we act. 

Explains moral disagreementsm as there can be a genuine disagreement over which prescriptions should be univeral.