Ariadne's Thread on Ethical Relativism
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Relativism: For and Against

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Vera Speaking
I have a lot of problems with ethical relativism because I think it can be used to justify a "hands off" policy when people are being hurt bad. And I believe that the bottom line is that weaker groups like women are going to bear the burden of such a policy.

That said, I don't think that relativism can be refuted with Singer's approach.

I can think of a couple of specific problems with what Singer is saying.

  • Singer's generalization principle requires us to be able to identify the morally relevant features of any given situation. Can we really do that? It seems to me that many of our moral arguments are about which features are relevant.

  • Singer claims that his principle of consequences is a necessary truth. In other words, it cannot be denied without contradiction. How does he know that?

For hundreds of years European and American philosophers have been trying to come up with irrefutable principles to serve as the foundations of ethics. Kant proposed his categorical imperative and Singer is doing more of the same. I don't think it can be done.

We have to develop a concept of ethics that doesn't rely on philosophical myths like necessary truths and rock solid foundations.

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