On ethics, part I: Moral philosophy’s third way

by Massimo Pigliucci

Ethics, its implications and its justifications keep appearing at Rationally Speaking in a variety of forms, from my critique of Sam Harris’ scientism to my rejection of Objectivism, from Julia’s skepticism about meta-ethics to Michael’s criticism of the non-morality of markets. This is, of course, inevitable because ethics is both a crucial component of our lives and a topic that can — with due caution — be approached rationally, which means it does belong to this blog.

So, I have decided to take the bull by its nasty horns and do a multi-part series on ethics (haven’t decided how many parts just yet) with the following objectives: a) make as clear as possible my “third way” between moral relativism and objective moral truths (this essay); b) systematically explore the differences among the major ethical systems proposed by philosophers: deontology, consequentialism, virtue ethics and egalitarianism; and c) apply the method of reflective equilibrium to my own thinking about ethics to see whether I need to revise my positions about moral philosophy (I am starting this quest with a marked preference for virtue ethics, but mixed with the apparently not so easy to reconcile with egalitarianism of John Rawls). We’ll see how far we get, yes?

The starting point for my discussion of what I will refer to as ethics’ “third way” is a recent thoughtful article published in The Stone, the New York Times’ philosophy blog. There, NYU philosopher Paul Boghossian does an excellent job at summarizing the perennial discussion between moral relativists and moral absolutists. Boghossian introduces an interesting contrast to make his readers think about the differences among moral absolutism, moral relativism, and nihilism. Consider first the ancient concept of witches. We (well, most of us) no longer believe that there are witches in the world, so we have dropped talk of witches altogether, engaging in what Boghossian calls “eliminativism” about witches (analogous, of course, to the much more debatable eliminativism in philosophy of mind proposed by Patricia and Paul Churchland).

Now think of Boghossian’s second example: Einstein’s theory of Special Relativity, which teaches us that there is no such thing as absolute space and time. That did not lead us to abandon the concepts of space and time, but rather to substitute relative forms of those concepts in our ways of thinking about the world. We can still all agree about a particular space-time point if we have already agreed to use a given frame of reference. Change the frame of reference and you’ll have to rethink that particular point in space-time.

I think you know where this is going. The question is whether ethics is more like the case of witches or that of Special Relativity. As Boghossian puts it: “When we reject absolute moral facts is moral relativism the correct outcome or is it moral eliminativism (nihilism)?” Think about that one for a second before we proceed.

Okay, we are back. So next consider the quintessential example of culturally relative rules: etiquette (this is also from Boghossian’s article, I told you it’s good!). There is no question that etiquette is not per se a moral absolute: if you are in a certain country and/or a particular type of company, action X (say, belching at the dinner table) will be frowned upon and cause offense, but in a different company or culture the same action X will be welcomed, indeed, even considered a required response to show your appreciation of what the locals have done for you.

Boghossian then proceeds with the punch line, which I will leave entirely to him: “our relativism about etiquette does not actually dispense with all absolute moral facts. Rather, we are relativists about etiquette in the sense that, with respect to a restricted range of issues (such as table manners and greetings), we take the correct absolute norm to be ‘we ought not, other things being equal, offend our hosts.’ This norm is absolute and applies to everyone and at all times. Its relativistic flavor comes from the fact that, with respect to that limited range of behaviors (table manners and greetings, but not, say, the abuse of children for fun), it advocates varying one’s behavior with local convention.”

Did you see that coming? Good for you, but let’s recapitulate what Boghossian is saying: if you take the road to moral relativism you only have two choices, let’s call it Boghossian’s dilemma (in homage to the famous Euthyphro’s dilemma, which allowed Plato to dispense once and for all with the pernicious idea that gods are necessary for morality, regardless of whatever other nonsense you may have heard from religious people). Either you go all the way down to moral nihilism, or you have to assent to some absolute standard with which to ground your (now local) relativism. If you pick nihilism, you will have a hard time justifying or criticizing any kind of societal conduct at all, while if you go for local relativism you will have won a Pyrrhic victory and essentially conceded the case to the moral absolutist.

But there is a third way, and it is indeed illustrated precisely by Boghossian’s example of Special Relativity applied to etiquette. It is also what I have been trying to articulate for some time now, so I’ll give it my best shot yet. For me, moral philosophy is about a type of reasoning, which — like all reasoning, and particularly the logico-mathematical variety — begins with certain assumptions (which can, of course, in turn be scrutinized, empirically or logically) and attempts to unpack the logical consequences of such assumptions. Occasionally, some of those consequences lead to incoherence, or to unfruitful results, in which case one may want to (very cautiously) go back and revise a sub-set of the assumptions themselves before resuming the process. (This is a common procedure in philosophical reasoning, the above mentioned reflective equilibrium.)

In Special Relativistic terms, of course, this means that we first agree to a particular frame of reference — which we may choose because it is convenient for our purposes, it’s easy to calculate, or whatever — and then all our measures of space-time are objective and unquestionable relative to that frame of reference. In terms of the etiquette example, Boghossian is quite right that what appears to be culturally relative is in turn the result of what seems to be a human cultural universal: don’t offend your hosts if you can avoid it. But of course one can imagine situations in which that universal does not apply, for instance and most trivially in the case of a non-social species of primates, where the very concept of “host” (of “social offense”) doesn’t compute.

Where does all of this leave us? With the idea that morality is a human (and other relevantly similar beings’) phenomenon, so that to talk about universal morality makes precisely no sense. But human beings share certain (local to the species) attributes,*** such as preferring a long and healthy life to a nasty and short one, and it is those parameters of humanness that set the axioms of our moral thinking. Ethical reasoning, then, consists of what sort of rules and outcomes logically emerge from that particular set of assumptions. Just like a good mathematician would do, we pick the most promising axioms and work with them, but we acknowledge that sometimes the search gets stuck into unproductive corners of logical space and we go back and — cautiously — tweak the assumptions themselves and get back to work.

Two obvious caveats about ethics’ third way: first, the assumptions from which we start are arrived at empirically (human nature), but this does not mean that science is sufficient to answer moral questions, because most of the work is done by logical analysis unpacking the implications of those assumptions. Second, I am not arguing that what is (human nature) in any straightforward way determines what ought to be (ethics), I am simply taking the eminently sensible position that morality is about human behavior, and so it cannot prescind from considerations of human nature.

So, in a nutshell:

* Moral absolutism: X is universally right / wrong.

Indefensible because one cannot make coherent sense of what “universally” may possibly mean in this context.

* Moral relativism: X is acceptable / non-acceptable practice within a particular culture at a particular historical moment.

Inevitably leads to either sterile nihilism or to some sort of hidden absolutism.

* Moral reasonism (for lack of a better term): If assumptions {W,Z} are accepted, then X is right / wrong.

Where the assumptions are provided by our best (and changing) understanding of human nature, and the rest is done via rational thinking.

Next: the four major systems of moral reasoning, and where they lead us if we adopt them.

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*** Yes, I’m aware that some human beings do not seem to care about other people having the same sort of long and healthy lives that they wish for themselves (many Republicans in Congress come to mind); or indeed that some don’t even necessarily wish for long and healthy lives. We call the first ones psychopaths and we try to help the latter out of their depression. And that’s all I’m going to say about those exceptions in this context.