ethical naturalism:

• absolutist

• cognitive

• ethical statements are factual statements

• “murder is wrong” = “the car is blue” « no factual difference

• independent of culture/historical context/religion

strengths

• empiricism: provides a scientific, accessible basis for ethical n moral statements

• moral standard: if there’s no objective right n wrong, there’s no moral standard

weaknesses

• is-ought problem: hume argued one can’t go from a descriptive premise of what “is,” to a prescriptive conclusion, “ought” statement

  • no matter how closely you empirically examine a situation, the rightness/wrongness will not be objectively clear

• naturalistic fallacy: g.e. moore argues moral properties may be correlated w natural properties, but moral properties aren’t identical to natural properties

  • eg: a moral act such as giving to charity might make me happy, but the morality of the act merely gives way to the happiness, and isn’t the happiness in itself » inflicting pain for a sadist is pleasurable, but is it good?

• open question argument: if goodness n pleasure were the same thing, it would not make sense to ask “is pleasure good?” coz it would be like asking “is pleasure pleasure?”

  • as the former question does make sense, clearly good is distinct from pleasure/any other natural property

  • moral properties can’t be reduced to anything simple eg plain or pleasure, as moral properties are basic

• relativist naturalism: many different forms n types of goodness, cannot be defined as one thing

proponents

FH Bradley

ethical naturalism:

• absolutist

• cognitives

• ethical statements are factual statements

• “murder is wrong” = “the car is blue” « no factual difference

• independent of culture/historical context/religion

Aquinas

theological naturalism:

• what is good can be known through rational thinking

• what is good is objectively true through Divine Law

• all humans have the natural capacity to know n understand what is good through contemplating the teachings of God

P Foot

• moral evil is ‘a kind of natural defect’

  • if a person is evil they are lacking in goodness

• when we call a person a ‘just man’ or ‘honest woman’, we are referring to ‘something

  • eg an honest women may keep her promises to others = observable behaviour

• a moral person has qualities which are the reasons they carry out a certain action » also observable

• these observations are the moral absolutes that empiricists argue we cannot measure

• foot uses aristotle’s model of the qualities that humans need to survive eg behaving morally is in our best interests

  • helps us to survive n flourish ∴we can see naturally the goodness we need to thrive

• ‘oaks need to have deep sturdy roots: there is something wrong with them if they do not’

  • humans need to behave morally: there is something wrong with them if they do not

critics

D Hume

C Pigden

JL Mackie