Moral Absolutism free essay sample

Another example is lying, certain absolutists feel that they should never lie no matter what the consequences are, even if it was in order to save an innocent persons life or to promote some sort of good. Plato was the first philosopher to raise an example of moral absolutism in western society; the Theory of the Forms. Plato stated that the forms are concepts that are eternally constant, and provide meaning and structure to the universe. Contrary to the natural state of change that the world is in, the forms are unchangeable. According to Plato, all of the forms came to be a single, and unalterable, idea. This made the â€Å"Form of the Good. † Therefore, for example; beauty is the Form of the Good in aesthetics, justice is the Form of the Good in politics and virtue is the Form of the Good in ethics. But what is the â€Å"Good†? Plato believed that the â€Å"Good† was the one thing that all humans should aim to find and pay attention to. We will write a custom essay sample on Moral Absolutism or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page Moral absolutism may be clearer to explain in terms of moral relativism. Moral relativism is the complete opposite of moral absolutism and originated with the Sophists from Ancient Greece. The Sophists believed that morals differed in different societies because people and thoughts are different. The Ancient Greek philosopher, Protagoras, wrote that: â€Å"Nothing is absolutely good or bad, but that everybody decides themselves depending on their situation. † Unlike moral absolutism, which is based on a foundation of moral truths, moral relativism is built on ideas and emotions. Utilitarianism doesn’t support the idea of moral absolutism and instead supports moral relativism. When faced with a moral dilemma, Utilitarianism argues that we should choose to act in such a way that brings about the maximum possible happiness for the most people. Looking at an example of a moral absolutist who believes it is always wrong to kill, we are able to understand this concept more clearly. If this individual is faced with the decision to kill a person who is about to set off a nuclear bomb that could potentially kill 7 million people, the absolutist wouldn’t kill the bomber, despite the fact that the greater number of people will die because of their choice. Immanuel Kant, a deontologist, said that we should act according to maxims – laws that should be seen as universal and therefore are not verified through experience, but through ideas beforehand. However, the consequences of our actions could be said to be irrelevant to whether they are right or wrong evil actions may have unintended good consequences, and someone might act heroically without any guarantee that the consequences will be good. No human quality can be absolutely good for example, it is possible to act kindly but do the wrong thing. The only good thing is a good will that does what is logically the right thing to do. Therefore, moral absolutism cannot really exist as the ideology could be broken throughout every circumstance. Going back to the example mentioned before, (the decision about whether to kill a nuclear bomber or leave them to kill millions of people) you could say that the absolutist inadvertently killed those 7 million people by not stopping the bomber. 7 million people died because of their decision, just as a man would die if I decided to shoot him in the head. Louis Pojman made the point that a moral absolutist doesn’t necessarily have to believe that every single moral law is universally applicable. Instead, they could believe that one particular moral principle is non-negotiable; therefore making an ethical theory absolute. If we coincide with this, we could be absolute about one thing, like committing adultery, and relative about something else, like lying. However, contrary to Pojman’s idea, that isn’t all that absolute as we would probably end up being more relative. The ethical theory of moral absolutism has raised many arguments since Plato produced the Theory of the Forms. Philosophers have argued over it for centuries; whether it is correct, whether we should be absolutists or relativists or whether we bypass both of these theories and decide our actions based on virtuous people. The one thing we should be able to agree on, is that, as human beings, we should be making decisions for ourselves on how to live our own lives, not how other people should live their lives. b) â€Å"Moral absolutism cannot be justified. † Discuss. 10) Moral absolutism can be justified, but only partly. I think that humanity should follow a certain set of rules, like â€Å"Do not kill† and â€Å"Do not steal. † However, certain situations could arise that would compromise this view, such as; A man’s wife has just gone into labour. Their neighbours are on holiday, they have no mobile phone signal and their landline is broken. The only possi ble way he could get his wife to the hospital is by stealing his neighbour’s car. Without going to the hospital, both his wife and child will die, so it is paramount that he gets them to medical assistance. In this situation, would stealing his neighbour’s car be wrong? I would say that it wouldn’t. Because of this, moral absolutism cannot be justified as two lives would have been lost if that man didn’t steal, which is obviously the greater evil of the two. Another weakness in the appliance of moral absolutism is the disagreement it could cause amongst different cultures. What is seen as morally acceptable in one culture may be frowned upon in another, for example it is the norm to have human sacrifice in a tribal community but in our society, a human sacrifice would be seen as very, very wrong. Reason itself is another reason on how moral absolutism cannot be justified. If we are aiming toward the Good, as Plato called it, reason can lead us to discover what the right thing to do is. It may even provide principles we need to live by. However, reason on its own does not enable us to do the right thing. Knowing what is right and actually doing what is right, are two completely different things; therefore, reason needs will. For example, a smoker knows that smoking isn’t right in terms of their health, yet it requires a great amount of will to fully act on that knowledge to stop smoking. However, reason is more likely to be led astray by emotions, as to control them. We plan what to do or say, or review what should have been done or said in the past, in order to avoid supposed future dangers. Without reason, we wouldn’t be able to consciously make decisions involving ethics or moral choices. Yet with reason, we could be too controlled by our emotions and past experiences to properly judge the situation. So reason itself, could be the cause behind whether we are morally absolute or not. Like Plato suggested, there is a need, however, to have a universal truth because there is a lot of evil in the world. In an ideal world, everyone would follow the same principles and there would be no murdering, no adultery, no stealing, no abusing†¦ Everyone would be a moral absolutist. But we don’t live in that type of world and to have a mixture of absolutists and relativists isn’t exactly idyllic as some people believe it is okay to lie, where other people would never dream of it in any situation. Everyone is different, so cannot follow Plato’s theory of the Good. We all come from different cultures, different societies and different ideas. What we are brought up with, determines a part of whom we are when we age. Logically, a child will learn morals from their parents and their examples. But we all have different parents, so therefore all have different morals. In this case, moral absolutism cannot be justified as we would all justify it in a different way, which doesn’t leave a universal law that everyone follows.