Chapter 7: EthicsThe Nature of Moral Inquiry:

Is Morality Relative?Introducing Philosophy, 10th edition

Robert C. Solomon, Kathleen Higgins, and Clancy Martin

What Is Morality?

• Morality gives us the rules by which we live with others

• Morality tells us what is permitted and what is not

Morality as “Coming from Above”

• Moral laws are often said to come from God

• They are often taught to us by our parents, who literally “stand above us”

• Morality is “above” any one individual or group of individuals

God and Morality

• Different people seem to think that God has given us different commands

• Should we follow God’s laws because they are God’s laws or because they are good?

The Appeal to Conscience

• What are the demands of conscience? Where do these demands come from?

• Morality is doing what is right, whether or not it is commanded by any person or law and whether or not one “feels” it in one’s conscience

• Morality involves autonomy--the ability to think (and act) for oneself and to decide for oneself what is right and wrong

The Problem of Moral Relativism

• Moralities vary between cultures and people

• But morality is supposed to be a set of universal principles; this set of principles should apply to all cultures and all people

• How can we justify making judgments about other societies’ morals?

• The problem of relativism

• Philosophers generally distinguish between two theses: –Cultural relativism: do apparent

moral differences between cultures have a similar basic moral principle, or are they fundamentally different?–Ethical relativism: if two moralities

are fundamentally different, can both be correct?