PHILOS 1E03 Lecture Notes - Lecture 19: Ethical Subjectivism, Moral Relativism, Cultural Relativism
8 Dec 2014
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Moral relativism is the view that moral standards (standards of right/wrong, good/bad) are always relative to particular individuals or groups. On this view, there are no moral facts (facts about what we should or should not do, morally speaking) independent of what we think we should or should not do wither as individuals or as societies. There are two main kinds of moral relativism: Cultural relativism: moral standards are relative to cultures; the standards of moral rightness and wrongness within a culture are set by that culture"s prevailing values. Individual relativism ( subjectivism ): moral standards are relative to individuals; the moral standards for a person are set by the judgements or principles of that person. Arguments for cultural relativism typically begin with observations about diversity: di erent societies and cultures have di erent moral standards and values. Two common lines of argument: the existence of widespread disagreement about moral questions makes it prima facie unlikely that there are any.
