Moral realism and naturalism

Abstract

[I]f there ever was a consensus of understanding about “realism”, as a philosophical term of art, it has undoubtedly been fragmented by the pressures exerted by the various debates – so much so that a philosopher who asserts that she is a realist about theoretical science, for example, or ethics, has probably, for most philosophical audiences, accomplished little more than to clear her throat. (Wright: 1992: 1) CHAPTER AIMS To explain moral realism. To explain the attractions of naturalistic versions of moral realism. To outline a presumptive argument in favour of moral realism. To explain the distinction between analytic and synthetic realism. Introduction Moral realists are cognitivists – although, as Mackie has shown us, not all cognitivists are realists. To be a moral realist is to think that moral properties are real and that these properties are in some sense independent from what people think, believe and judge. Yet what is it to say that a moral property is real? At first it seems a rather odd claim because if we think of things that seem unquestionably real (at least to non-philosophers) such as tables or footballs or street lights, it would be bizarre to think that moral properties were in the same class of things as these. It is not as if we could bump into wrongness on the way to work, or as if rightness could obscure our view of the sunset, or goodness might get caught in the lift, or badness interfere with our television reception.