As written, my comment is flawed. I should clarify what I meant. Let me rewrite it.
> moral relativism is intellectually bankrupt
There are three forms of moral relativism (see my other comment).
I agree with descriptive moral relativism in a sense, even though I think practically there are huge swaths of overlap between most well-known ethical/religious systems.
I don’t think I’m willing to categorically dismiss meta-ethical moral relativism (MMR), but in practice, I find it unpersuasive at best, delusional in most cases, and dishonest at worst.
Say you find a meta-ethical moral relativist (MMR). You present them with a set of hypothetical moral dilemmas. They will claim there is no objective
ethics to guide us.
I accept this as a philosophical position; however, if that person were immersed in the dilemma and had to choose, they will choose. (Note: doing nothing is a choice.)
Their choice will reveal their “private” morality, which is certainly not completely relative. That person won’t agree with any ethics that say it is ok to kill them (under a scenario where they have done nothing wrong) for example. If it was a real situation, they would use various means at their disposal to protect their life: fleeing, fighting, or negotiating.
So, while perhaps the MMR person claims that it is ok for an ethical system to endorse killing them, but they would act differently from that belief.
> moral relativism is intellectually bankrupt
There are three forms of moral relativism (see my other comment).
I agree with descriptive moral relativism in a sense, even though I think practically there are huge swaths of overlap between most well-known ethical/religious systems.
I don’t think I’m willing to categorically dismiss meta-ethical moral relativism (MMR), but in practice, I find it unpersuasive at best, delusional in most cases, and dishonest at worst.
Say you find a meta-ethical moral relativist (MMR). You present them with a set of hypothetical moral dilemmas. They will claim there is no objective ethics to guide us.
I accept this as a philosophical position; however, if that person were immersed in the dilemma and had to choose, they will choose. (Note: doing nothing is a choice.)
Their choice will reveal their “private” morality, which is certainly not completely relative. That person won’t agree with any ethics that say it is ok to kill them (under a scenario where they have done nothing wrong) for example. If it was a real situation, they would use various means at their disposal to protect their life: fleeing, fighting, or negotiating.
So, while perhaps the MMR person claims that it is ok for an ethical system to endorse killing them, but they would act differently from that belief.