1. Subjectivism in Ethics
EMP 3 [32-47]
&
RTD 6 [49-60]

2. David Hume’s Subjectivism
“Take any [vicious] action….Willful murder, for instance. Examine it in all its lights, and see if you can find that matter of fact, or real existence, which you call vice….You can never it, till until you turn your reflexion into your own breast, and find a sentiment of [disapproval], which arises in you, toward this action. Here is a matter of fact; but tis the object of feeling, not reason” (32).
Example: the unreasonableness of ingratitude—the return of ill-will or indifference for good-will or good offices—a sentiment of blame is excited.

3. Evolution of a Theory-Simple Subjectivism
Hume—morality is a matter of feelings that arise in the viewer of a given action and nothing more—not facts.
The same applies to all moral judgments.
Simple subjectivism “X is right” means I approve of X etc. (see page 34)
Objections: 1-simple subjectivism suggests that people are infallible in their moral judgments since these are reports (which can be true or false) of the speaker’s attitude alone. Thinking or choosing something as good makes it good.
2-simple subjectivism accounts only for differences in attitudes not moral disagreements. Falwell example.
A flawed theory. Need a better version of Ethical Subjectivism.

4. Evolution of a Theory—Emotivism
Charles Stevenson—language has various purposes—propositions convey information, commands get you to act, and interjections express attitudes.
Moral expressions are used to influence actions and express, not report, attitudes. Thus emotivism does not interpret moral judgments as statements (true or false) but as commands or expressions.

5. Evolution of a Theory—Emotivism
Moral disagreements reflect only disagreements in attitude and a desire for different outcomes.
All moral judgments are nothing but expressions of preference, expressions of attitude or feeling, insofar as they are moral in character. Unlike factual judgments, moral judgments are neither true nor false; and agreement in moral judgment is not to be secured by any rational method, for there are none. Moral judgments beyond reproach—see Mark/Katie example with rottweilers (39).
Emotivists insist that we use moral judgments not only to express our own feelings and attitudes, but also to produce precisely such effects in others.

6. Emotivism’s Problems
If you say “Homosexuality, yuck” or “Hurrah for Lincoln” isn’t it appropriate to ask why you have that attitude? Doesn’t emotivism have to identify and characterize the sentences that express the feelings and attitudes underlying moral judgments?
What are the reasons behind your attitude?
Emotivism cannot account for the place of reason in ethics. It cannot answer questions such as “what kind of approval?” (unqualified?)
Moral truths are truths of reason; that is a moral judgment is true if it is backed up by better reasons than the alternatives. (45)
If it feels good do it????

7. Moral Facts?
Rachels insists that moral judgments must be supported by good reasons. (40). Moral judgments not backed by reasons are merely arbitrary personal preferences. A reason cannot be any statement that might alter an ethical judgment—false claims should be disregarded (40).
Although values are not “objective” like stars and planets, objective ethical truths are those backed by the best reasons. “Such truths are objective in the sense that they are true independently of what we might want or think.” (41)

8. Proofs in Ethics Are there no proofs in ethics? Test example (42)
After giving good reasons what more can be asked? Explanations have to end somewhere.
Proof is seen as a series of experiments & observations. (proving and persuading)
Proof for complex issues is sought while simple issues upon which people agree are overlooked.
To reject proof in ethics is not the same as to reject proof in science.

9. Question of Homosexuality
Claims of threat have no factual basis. What does homosexuality’s alleged unnaturalness prove? The vagueness of the term.
Homosexuality’s threat to family values centers on the unnaturalness of gay sex.
Masturbation, oral sex, post menopausal sex, or any sexual activity whose outcome is not procreation is just as unnatural. But the notion that “it is wrong to use parts of one’s body for anything other than their natural purposes is surely false." (49) We use eyes to see, but also for flirting. Is this wrong? Is it wrong to snap one’s fingers? (i.e., is it unnatural?)

10. Question of Homosexuality
How is homosexuality opposed to family values if what homosexuals desire are the right to start and maintain families.
Finally, the notion that because homosexuality is condemned in the Bible is addressed.
Leviticus’ proscriptions are peculiar to the time and culture in which they were generated. If the Bible is the literal “word of God” can we pick and choose among its proscriptions? Is wasting one’s seed an issue when the earth is burdened with overpopulation? People may have strong feelings about doing what they feel the Bible dictates, but moral thinking requires that we be guided by reasons rather than feelings alone.

11. Mackie’s Claims—Subjectivity of Values-1
Mackie express a particular view of moral skepticism when he asserts that there are no objective values.
He is not a skeptic who rejects morality and rejects all moral judgments or merely rejects conventional moral judgments. He is a skeptic whose second order view is “a view about the status of moral values and the nature of moral valuing, about where and how they fit into the world” (50).

12. Mackie’s Claims—Subjectivity of Values-2
Granting Mackie’s conception of moral value, it is false to think that there are moral values. According to Mackie: “Plato’s Forms give a dramatic picture of what objective values would have to be” (59). Hence, he concludes that values are not part of the fabric of the world—not like Plato’s Forms—external extra-mental realities, although there can be objective evaluations relative to standards.
Denial of objective values is the result of his second order analysis—an error theory. The “false” claim to objectivity is simply characterized as error theory. All reasoning is tainted by immediate subjective responses.
What are the arguments for the error theory view?

13. Mackie’s Claims—Subjectivity of Values
Argument from relativity—best explanation of moral diversity—disagreements are not like those in science—based on ways of life and accompanying beliefs and practices. The critique of CR applies. That mores arouse certain responses, does not make ways of life adopted immune from criticism.
Argument from queerness—objective values would be strange or mysterious entities (i.e. non-natural). Not necessarily—to make judgments independently of one’s personal perspectives; to act and form intentions and desires for the best reasons—to conceive of a world of reasons that exists from more than my own point of view is to posit objective values. (Rachels and Nagel)

14. Objectivism In Ethics
If the foundation for ethics is in improving human welfare generally and in enhancing freedom and autonomy for all, how is this basis subjectivist? The values associated with welfare and freedom apply to human beings universally. Not everyone will make a commitment to morality (hit-men, drug dealers, selfish egoists), but such a commitment to agent-neutral reasoning is possible for all rational moral agents. The lives, interests, and welfare of the “other” make claims on us as we try to lead moral lives of our own. Nagel, in The View From Nowhere, asserts: “If impersonal value is going to be admitted at all, it will naturally attach to liberty, general opportunities, and the basic resources of life, as well as to pleasure and the absence of suffering” ( ).