moral truth
What's the nature of moral truth? We may all agree that it's wrong to steal or assault. And we may all say that the truth of claims like 'James deserves punishment' or 'James needs to make recompense' hangs on it indeed being a fact that what James did was wrong - he stole from George; he kicked Geoffrey. If James hadn't done something like that, then the punishment of him or the expectation of recompense would itself be immoral. Now, 'James did a wicked thing' is what we call a moral judgement; it's true or false depending on the facts of the case. But what of statements like 'it's wrong to steal'? Are there higher order facts in virtue of which such statements are true? The character we may call the moral Nihilist says there are no such facts, and that morality is therefore a sham. The contender we may call the Conventionalist claims that the facts in question are the moral conventions we hold to in our culture. The contender we m...
