Transcript The Basis of Moral Claims

What makes these
questions moral
questions?
Why have these moral
questions resisted
resolution?
Do what’s “normal:” Ask
no questions, seek no
answers.
Easy street “undermines your
personal freedom.”
Do what “feels” right.
Easy street results in moral
positions that are “incomplete,
confused, or mistaken.”
Do whatever: it doesn’t
matter anyway.
Easy street prohibits “moral
growth.”
Easy street leaves one
unable to explain ones
judgments and actions.
How about Divine Command Theory as
an ethical path?
Ambiguity & Contradiction.
Silence of religious texts on some issues.
“Good” and God—the Euthyphro
Dilemma.
If I do the something because I’m told to
do it, in what sense is it an expression of
my moral self?
“Our commonsense moral
experience suggests that if a
moral judgment is to be
worthy of acceptance, it
must be supported by good
reasons” (7).
“Logic requires that moral
norms and judgments follow
the principle of
universalizability” (7).
Endless opinion?
What
happened or is
happening?
What
responses are
possible?
What can
I/we/they do?
What do I
know?
How should things be?
What ought to
happen?
What response should
I/we/they choose?
What should I/we/they
do?
What is significant
about what I/we/they
know?
Moral reasoning.
A set of principles or a
framework that guides the
application of value to
knowledge and directs
thought toward action.
How does one discover or
create that set of
principles or that
framework?
Is
Ought
Everyone desires a “good life.”
The world has limited resources.
Individuals fight for their own interests
against the interests of others.
Individual conceptions of “good life” and
interests are determined by race, sex,
country of origin, economic status,
intelligence, etc.
Define a society from a
position of ignorance—
that is, without
knowledge of individual
abilities, economic
status, race, sex, social
position, etc.
Based on what “is,” what
“ought” to be?
Is that “just” your opinion?
From behind the veil,
what “is”? In other
words, what do you
know?
No rope to tie them up.
Let them go, and they could give
away location of Seals to Taliban.
Kill them or let them go?
100 goats, two farmers, one
14 year old boy.
All unarmed.
Where is value located? Where does it come
from?
Does it matter whether value is inherent or
assigned?
From where can we derive moral authority?
When we claim that something is good/bad or
right/wrong, what are we saying?