Ethical Terms as subjective or meaningless

Key Terms:

Moral Anti-Realism: The belief that right and wrong do not actually exist; ethics is a matter of opinion

In suggesting that ethical language may be subjective and meaningless, we are claiming that our language is not describing real facts when we use the terms 'good', 'bad', 'right' and wrong'. Instead, it is merely reflecting what is in our minds rather than describing the world. Hence this page shows some of the arguments for and against emotivism.

Arguing for and against morality as subjective and meaningless (moral anti-realism)

The following arguments are covered in more detail on the previous page.

• Lack of shared moral values: The supporter of emotivism points to the differences in moral values and behaviour rather than the similarities.

• Moral progress: It is difficult for those who do not believe in moral values to properly explain moral progress.

• The need for a standard: For emotivists and other anti-realists, the lack of overall standards is a problem. They attempt to answer this by appealing to the good sense of human beings; although there is no objective and absolute right and wrong, we are able to have subjective agreement on what good moral standards are.

• If morality is subjective and not based on facts then the difficulties of the naturalistic fallacy and the is-ought gap are avoided.

In addition, the following arguments are also relevant.

• Trivialisation: Theories such as emotivism which argue that ethics is subjective and meaningless trivialise ethics. If morality is just personal preference then 'I don't like killing' becomes no more important than 'I prefer the red sweets'.

• No discussion: A key criticism of emotivism is that it prevents intelligent and reasoned discussion. For example, our discussion of an issue such as abortion is reduced to a shouting match of 'abortion, boo!' versus 'abortion, hurray!'

Going further: Prescriptivism and error theory

It is possible to be sympathetic to Ayer's basic idea that there are no objective moral facts but feel that Ayer's emotivism leaves a lot to be desired. Two other theories that offer subjective views of moral statements are Hare's prescriptivism and Mackie's error theory

1) Prescriptivism: R.M. Hare (1919-2002) argues that when we make moral statements we are not just expressing feelings, we are prescribing those views to others. To say that 'killing is wrong' is to effectively say I do not approve of killing and you should not do so either.' In making moral statements, we are attempting to give imperatives to others.

2) Error Theory: J.L. Mackie (1917-1981) argues that there are no moral facts, merely subjective values. However, when we make moral statements, we speak as though the statements we make are actually true or false. We are in error. A belief in objective values is built into moral language, but this belief is false. Within everyday life, we assume and speak in terms of moral facts, yet when viewed objectively from the outside these facts do not exist.