PHI 2010 Rough Draft 2

RayQuan Nielly Dr. Sarah Malanowski

PHI 2010

16 November 2019 Rough Draft 2 There are no moral truths but there is morality that is relative to individuals and/or cultures. According to Rachels, she claims “that if there were an objective moral truth, then everyone would know it.” Knowing what Rachels said there is no doubt in my mind that there are no true moral truths. Certain people live their lives by claiming that they are an ethical subjectivist and that is a prime example of how people choose to believe in a morality that is relative to to themselves or their cultures. People are raised different in places all around the world and with those different forms of raising comes the different forms of morals. One of the issues that come up with subjectivism is that what one person or group of persons find right, another might find that wrong and believe that their own moral beliefs are correct. Thanks to the Greek historian Herodotus he brought this fact to the light by saying “For if anyone, no matter who, were given the opportunity of choosing from amongst all the nations of the world the set of beliefs which he thought best, he would inevitably, after careful consideration of their relative merits, choose that of his own country. Everyone without exception believes his own native customs… to be the best.” To sum that up Herodotus is basically saying that it is known that when a person is given the responsibility to choose one nations beliefs that person will nine times out of ten choose their own nation. Which ties into my next topic that cultural norms determine Nielly 1 

what is right and wrong, not individuals from opposing cultures or opposing groups of individuals.Contrary to ethical subjectivism and how that contends that each individual determines what is morally right and wrong. Cultural relativism is the view that cultural norms determine what is ethically right and wrong. For example in certain cultural groups the death penalty is seen as morally wrong and that is okay but for some other groups and even some other individuals the death penalty is considered completely fair and reasonable. Cultural relativism shows that no matter what one person or group feels about one topic whether it is right it can always be seen as wrong from another person or group and vice versa. Cultural relativism is a good thing in some cases because it entails that no matter which group you represent or are in, the only person that can say whether your morals are right or wrong is your group. Although the world is aware of cultural relativism there are a lot of cases where because your morals and beliefs come from a group wherever you originated from, your beliefs can be seen as wrong and in some serious cases you can be punished. An example of a belief that isn’t viewed as right but can be tolerated is the middle eastern acceptance of men marrying multiple women. In certain places like America there is a widely known belief that you are only to marry one person at a time, but in some cases if the parties involved are okay with their spouse being married to multiple people then it’s overlooked. Another belief that is on a more serious note would be how in certain parts of the U.S. we accept and encourage same-sex marriage but in other countries there is a strict law against the title itself of homosexuality and sometimes depending on the country the consequence can be instant death. Because of cultural relativism this problem of who is right and who is wrong was supposed to be answered but because of the freedom we have Nielly 2 

among different groups to have different morals we are in a way just segregating ourselves from one another.Morality should be subject to individuals and groups but the part that we all get messed up on is when a person or group with different morals enter another differing group we don’t appeal to learn about their morals we just expect them to drop what they have been taught and not only learn our morals but want to learn our morals. Every person should be able to have their own morals about things and they shouldn’t be judged or held harshly accountable for having a different belief from another group.Nielly 3