Philosophy Forum

We've discussed quite a few types of ethics in this forum already, but today I'd like to discuss one more. This one has to do with virtues of the individual and the group. In a previous post, a statement was made: "This leads me to the idea...

Here's a question for you. Can religion by itself be moral? Or put a better way, can a person being only religious without any other input be a moral person? Can the mere fact of following a religion create some sort of morality? I say no, it...

The Divine Command Theory of Morality is actually very simple to understand. There's not a lot to it, so there's little room for confusion. Basically, it states that our own morality is tethered to the words and commands of God himself. If goes...

Last night, I got to thinking about how nice it would be if we as humans stopped fighting with one another. I though that one way to do this would be to develop a common goal we could all work towards. Something larger and greater than any one of...

The many issues with moral relativism have already been discussed here, here and here. And many more places. There really is no shortage of questions and concerns when it comes to this type of thinking. While on one hand I can understand some of...

How do you feel about tolerance? Do you feel that we should be a largely tolerant people? What does tolerance mean, anyway? Does it have anything to do with the word "tolerate?" Like, "Yes, I'll tolerate my neighbor's dog barking all night long."...

The question is, does relativism support moral improvement? If the moral standards of one culture are just as good and right as another culture's, then how do we know what's actually moral in reality? Let's say that one nation supports the...

The more I read about moral relativism, the more I have issues with it. I have never been a huge fan of people who think that just because someone isn't just like you and me, that makes them automatically "right." There are actually people like...

Have you ever heard of something called reductio ad absurdum? If you haven't, this is what it means: Reductio ad absurdum is a mode of argumentation that seeks to establish a contention by deriving an absurdity from its denial, thus arguing that...

While descriptive relativism and metaethical relativism are fun to talk about, normative relativism takes the cake. Descriptive relativism states that views on morality can differ from location to location and between cultures and metaethical...

By now, you should be an expert on descriptive, metaethical, and normative relativism. Each of these theories basically states that moral standards are relative to one another, culture by culture. These claims are offered in varying degrees, but...

I saw a fascinating video a few days ago. I've been researching moral relativism and came across a video on YouTube by Steven Pinker. Basically, the crux of it went like this: Steven claims that not all issues we face need solutions that are...

Have you ever noticed how much cultures around the world disagree on basic moral principles? Sure, there are some nations, such as the United States and Canada, that agree on a good majority of areas, but there are also many nations or cultures...

On the surface, descriptive relativism and metaethical relativism may seem very similar. But when you look under the hood a bit, the differences become stark. While the descriptive version accounts for moral variations among different cultures...

To learn about moral relativism, please read through this post on realism vs. anti-realism as it relates to ethics and philosophy. The relativism section is down towards the end. What I'd like to discuss in this post is a very specific type of...

What are you? Are you a realist or an anti-realist? Do you know what each is? If not, read on below and I'll do my best to explain. What if you were to get in an argument with someone one day? Let's say that the two of you were arguing about the...

Let me ask you something. Is there anything in this world that is absolutely wrong? Anything you think no one should partake in, no matter what? I've been reading a lot about ethics and morality in a few different books and I've begun to wonder...

This is a huge question and one that can lead you down many paths. If I had to guess (as I'm an expert at neither ethics, nor philosophy), ethics is taught early on in any general philosophy education. I've heard about this topic for years and...

I've only dabbled in philosophy, but I'd like to learn a lot more. So far in my life, I've read a few books that have given me just a tad of background. About ten years ago, I read an Ethics paperback. That one was called A Handbook For Ethics...

I watched a very interesting video a few days ago that had to do with a basilisk. It discussed a thought experiment that a user named Roko posted on a philosophy blog called LessWrong that was apparently removed due to its alleged propensity to...