The Puzzle of Relativism

Peter Baron

The Nature of Moral Theory

Moral theory asks the questions: what is meant by “good”,what makes a “good action” or a “good character”? Considerthe following statements which all have the word “ought” inthem, implying that I am strongly for or against someaction.

“You ought not to steal, because it will upset the personyou steal from”.

“You ought to steal if you are starving and have no choice”.

Both are moral statements with the word “ought”. Both areabout stealing. But they take two different views.

Why is this?

Both are reasonable statements because they give grounds for adecision.

Both refer to an end in sight: the first example considersthe end to be the welfare of the person you are stealingfrom, and the second, your own welfare, because if you don’tsteal, you will die!

We call theories that refer to ends teleological theories,from the Greek telos = end or purpose.

We call theories that refer to duties or rules deontologicaltheories. An example might be the statement: “stealing isalways wrong”.

As the above example of stealing shows, if we present twodifferent aims or ends (protecting your property or

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preserving your life) then we find two different moralprescriptions: “don’t steal” and “steal”. This is evidencefor moral relativism – the claim that values are notabsolute but depend on differences in ends, beliefs orcultures.

Relative and absolute theories of morality

Below is a diagram showing the essential distinction we makewhen considering ethical theories, between relative and absolutetheories. We make a distinction between two types ofrelativism, cultural and normative relativism, and the ideaof absolute morality or absolutism.

The basic issue in question is whether there is such a thingas objective values, which hold for everyone, everywhere,irrespective of time or culture, such as the value in thestatement genocide is wrong.

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Moral Theories

CulturalRelativism

Normative Relativism

Absolutism

(Fig Moral theories)

A relative theory can be of two types.

Cultural relativism is simply the observation when we lookat different cultures that they have different views ofright and wrong. We are not judging the cultures, theirpractices or the ways they think about goodness. We arejust observing and describing them. As one writer observed in1934, “morality …is a convenient term for socially-approvedhabits” (Benedict: 1934).

Normative or ethical relativism makes the stronger claimthat all values are relative to a framework of thinking –there is no such thing as an objective value or oneuniversal way of reasoning (as Kant believed).

As an example of cultural relativism consider Spartanculture. Sparta was a warrior state which thrived in thesecond and third centuries BC, and was well illustrated bythe film the 300 which told the story of the Battle ofThermopylae in 480 BC, when 300 Spartans held a pass againstthe huge Persian army until betrayed by a shepherd whoshowed the Persians a secret way through the mountains.

The end or telos of Spartan culture was to produce a strongwarrior race in order to survive in the cut-throat world ofGreek city states.

Here are some of the culturally-specific ways they producedthis virtue of heroism.

• Infanticide - weak male babies were left to die on thehillside and weak female babies were thrown off a cliffaccording to the decision of a panel of old wise men.

• Childen’s education – this was taken over by the state atthe age of 7, when boys were forced into the wildernessto fend for themselves.

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• Slavery - the Spartans enslaved the Macedonian people,who had no rights. Indeed, to prove yourself a warriorit was enough to kill a Macedonian in cold blood.

James Rachels’ argument

James Rachels argues that we make a false inference when wesay:

1. Different cultures have different moral codes.2. Therefore there is no objective truth.

The false inference lies in the “therefore”. Both appear tobe statements of fact.But statement (2) is actually a belief. We cannot prove thecase that there is no objective morality, and it doesn’tfollow from the observation that there are different moralsystems in the world.

After all, we can have different belief systems (as a matterof fact) about whether the world is round or flat, but itdoesn’t change the truth or falsity of the objective claimsof science.

Rachels goes on to consider some consequences of relativism:

• We can’t judge other societies (such as Hitler’sGermany)

• We could in principle take a vote on slavery and judgeits rightness by a simple majority decision.

• We can’t judge our own society and find, for example,fast driving “wrong”.

• Moral progress is called into doubt, where we seem tohave new laws protecting human rights, for example.

Rachels concludes that “it makes sense to think that our ownsociety has made some moral progress, while admitting thatit is still imperfect and in need of reform” (Rachels,1998:23).

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Rachels goes on to argue that differences in moral codes stem fromdifferences in beliefs.

If we go to India we may be surprised to find it’s wrong toeat a cow, but this is because cows have divine status inIndia, so relativism is correct in so far as it reminds usthat morality is relative to belief systems.

Yet relativism is wrong if it claims to establish that wecannot judge some practices as universally desirable andothers undesirable.

For example, all cultures protect their young, otherwise wewould not survive. Similarly, truth-telling is universallyaccepted, because trust is necessary for survival.

What relativism helps us to see, however, is that all valueshave some reasonable basis, and it is our task to find thereasonable basis for moral statements and establish thereasonable grounds for saying, for example, that killing iswrong.

And we must be humble about our own culture which maycontain practices which we should seek to reform, whereprogress is still required.

The nature of normative relativism

J.L.Mackie argues in his book Inventing Right and Wrong thatthere are no objective moral values, even though, as WilliamJames observed, many of us are “absolutists by instinct”.

Mackie argues that the claim to objectivity is stronger thanjust a claim to adopt the same “methods of ethics”, as HenrySidgwick called the shared approach to ethical reasoning.It is a commitment to ideals.

These ideals are deeply held beliefs about the nature of theworld, ourselves, and the right or wrong course of action.R.M. Hare called this “fanaticism” because very little can

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shake us from these deeply held beliefs, except perhaps sometrauma, such as the slaughter of the First World War or thehorror of the Holocaust.

Mackie concludes that “a belief in objective moral values isbuilt into ordinary moral thought and language, but holdingthis ingrained belief is false” (1977:49).

Mackie claims it is possible to show how people persist inthese false claims. This is because morality depends onwhat Mackie calls “forms of life”. The way we live, thepatterns of behaviour adopted by our culture determine ourviews of right and wrong. It is not our views of right andwrong which determine our culture.

For example, even though there are plenty of verses in theBible which, in principle, could be used to establish theequality of men and women (Galatians 3:28 “there is neitherJew nor Greek, male nor female, slave nor free, but all areone in Christ Jesus”), nonetheless, it took the two worldwars, the rise in women’s employment in times of crisis, toshow that women really could do the jobs men do.

So a change in form of life, the employment of women infactories to aid the war effort, came before a change inmoral thinking, that the inequality in job opportunitiesbetween men and women was morally wrong.

Another example of a change in “form of life” leading to achange in moral thinking might be the attitude to pre-marital sex. If we think, for example, of changes in sexualethics in the last hundred years, the invention of thecontraceptive pill empowered women to make reproductivechoices for themselves independent of any decision by theirsexual partners. The change in the form of life arguablydrove the change in ethical beliefs and practices. Peopleincreasingly argued “pre-marital sex is good and enjoyable,so it cannot be wrong”, not least because the risk ofpregnancy was practically removed altogether.

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Normative ethics

Normative ethics is the study of the values which underpinviews of right and wrong and how these values are derived.Normative ethics looks at criteria of reasonableness. Whatdifferent reasons can people give for saying something iswrong, and are those reasons coherent and logical?

So normative relativism, for example, is the study of whyvalues differ according to different ends or purposes whichpeople may define as “good” or desirable. The idea ofgoodness is relative to the end or goal we select as desirable.Notice the ambiguity here. Goodness can be relative to anend, which we may call “relativism of application”. How thevalue is applied differs from circumstance to circumstance.

However, there is a second implication: the value itself maybe an absolute, unchanging value. So the absolute value forJoseph Fletcher is love (agape or unconditional love). Theabsolute for the utilitarian J.S.Mill is happiness. Forthis reason there has been disagreement about whetherUtilitarianism and Situation Ethics are absolute or relativetheories. The American academic Richard Jacobs evendescribes Situation Ethics as “principled relativism”.

As an example, consider these two relativistic theories ofmorality: situation ethics and utilitarianism and how theymight be applied in practice.

Recall that in situation ethics the end (Greek: telos) is love,a special form of love (agape or commitment love). Inutilitarianism the end or purpose is the maximising of happinessor pleasure (depending on the type of utilitarianism).

So if a family is considering the ethical question, should a16 year old girl have an abortion, the situation ethicistwill ask the question, what course of action will producethe most loving outcome? They would tend to look at theindividual first, so the daughter’s interests would be

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paramount here. If the decision was to keep the child, thenthe family might find ways of giving the girl maximumsupport and love.

A utilitarian would look at the overall happiness of thedaughter and her wider family.

If the society around them found illegitimacy unacceptable,then the family might argue that the daughter, the communityand her family’s happiness would be maximised by having anabortion. The place of the unborn child would depend onanother argument: whether a foetus should be given thestatus of a person. If the answer was “yes, it should” thenwe should consider the future happiness of the unborn childas well in our moral calculation.

So there are two factors which can vary and which arerelative ideas: the cultural context of approval anddisapproval and the view we take (most probably due to ourbelief system rather than any empirical test) over whetherthe foetus is a person.

Both situation ethics and utilitarianism are relativistic inthis sense, that they look at circumstances and calculateconsequences. We can see this as relative in application.But the values they make goodness relative to, agape loveand happiness respectively are different and in a sense,absolute, because they are not negotiable.

So moral relativism can produce very different outcomesdepending on the different goals or ends in view which arefelt to be desirable – the relativism of application. Andat the same time, internal to each theory, there may be aclaim that one supreme value is absolute (unchanging).

Absolute theories of ethics

Absolute theories of ethics establish rules or duties whichmust always be followed, irrespective of the circumstances.

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For example, some people have argued that the tencommandments in Exodus 20 are absolute rules which mustalways be obeyed, because they come from God.

There is a problem with this argument, however. Even in theOld Testament it seems God himself commands people to kill.For example, Joshua is commanded to destroy Jericho and itsinhabitants; “then they killed all in the city, both men andwomen, young and old, oxen, sheep and donkeys” (Joshua 6:21)and also annihilates the people of the city of Ai (Joshua8), not even sparing the children.

If we argue that killing is absolutely wrong, how to weexplain these apparent acts of murder (killing of theinnocent children) as supposedly commanded by God himself?When does killing in war become justified?

There is a further difficulty. In court we distinguishbetween different degrees of murder. First degree murder iswhen someone kills in cold blood, for example, shooting apoliceman to make good an escape.

Second and third degrees of murder have extenuatingcircumstances. For example, killing someone in a fit ofanger because you discover they have lied or cheated on you.Then there is killing is self-defence, or shooting a burglarwho you find in your house. We tend to treat the latter asmanslaughter, and in law it takes a lesser penalty andsometimes, no penalty at all.

So to say “thou shalt not kill” is an absolute, even if wetranslate “kill” as “murder” doesn’t escape the problem,“what sort of killing is acceptable”?

As soon as we admit exceptions, or particular circumstances when we would kill,we become a relativist, because we make goodness relative to some other end,such as saving a life or preventing a bigger evil. We are making, to borrowKant’s terminology, a hypothetical rather than a categorical judgement. We aresaying, as Joshua may have reasoned as he set about killing the people of Jerichoand Ai, “it’s okay to kill if idolatry is eliminated”.

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Deontological theories

The word deon comes from the Greek word meaning “duty”.Duties and rules tend to be non-negotiable. For example,Kant establishes his theory of ethics on something he callsthe categorical imperative.

With a relativistic statement, we present a conditional, if…then clause. The purpose of this clause is to try andestablish the circumstances under which we might do or notdo something.

“If you are hungry, then it’s acceptable to steal”.

“If you are defending yourself, it’s ok to kill”.

However, a duty tends to be expressed categorically with no“ifs”.

“You ought to defend the young”.

“Society should make provision for the elderly”.

Neither of these two statements say anything about thecircumstances under which these things, the defending of theyoung, and providing for the elderly, should take place.The two statements are statements establishing duties.

Kant derives his theory of duty from a priori reason,before experience, as a universal rational principle and weshould follow it in obedience to what he calls “the morallaw”, irrespective of circumstances.

Natural Law is another form of theory which establishesrules for conduct based on what is observable as the naturalfunction of something. For example the Roman CatholicChurch has argued in documents like Humanae Vitae (availableon the website philosophicalinvestigations.co.uk) that the

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natural function of sex is reproduction, and that anythingthat interferes with this natural function is wrong.

For example, contraception interferes with this naturalfunction of sex, according to the catholic view, and so is aserious sin. The Catholic view as expressed by the 1967encyclical Humanae Vitae is that the use of contraception (andabortion) is an offence against God because it removes thepotential for life and interferes with this natural processof conception.

So we have a law or rule,

“The use of contraception is wrong” and there are nocircumstances considered in which this rule can be broken.

We might ask, however, do we agree with the Natural Law viewof contraception? If we disagree, what argument can wethink of that might oppose this view? Indeed, natural lawtheorists might argue that the preservation of life is amore important precept than reproduction, and in preventingAIDS and reducing population growth, contraception is aperfectly rational proper purpose for human beings.

Meta-ethical relativism

Part of the puzzle of relativism is that people meandifferent things by it. So far we have seen that we can bea relativist in the application of a norm in arguing thatthe norm is interpreted differently in differentcircumstances. This is Joseph Fletcher’s own justificationfor calling Situation Ethics relativistic.

Yet others might argue that, because Situation ethics hasone absolute principle at its heart, we should describe itas absolute. I have argued here that both are right in thissense: relativism looks two ways. It looks backwards at thevalue which is the source of goodness, and this value may benon-negotiable, and if so, then we can describe the theoryas absolute in this sense. But it also looks forwards at

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the application to specific circumstances. In this,different, sense theories like Situation ethics andUtilitarianism can also be described as relativistic.

There is a third meaning of relativism. Meta-ethicsexamines the meaning of words like “good” and “right”.Meta-ethical relativism makes the claim that there is noethical principle we can find that is objectively trueeverywhere and for all time. This is in fact what Mackie isclaiming when he argues “there is no objective truth”. Inthis meta-ethical sense, you can be an absolute Kantian andI can be a relativistic follower of Joseph Fletcher and wecan agree to differ because we can find no way of resolvingour differences.

Our worldviews don’t connect, our assumptions about humanityand reason are so different, that both of us, the absolutistand the relativist may, without contradiction, agree to berelativists on the meta-ethical level.

Reading

Bowie R. (2004) chapter 1Mackie J.L. (1977) Inventing Right and Wrong chapter 3Rachels J. (1998) Problems of Moral Philosophy chapter 5David Wong in Singer ed (1994) chapter 39Humanae Vitae (1967)

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