Ⅱ．Moral Disagreements and Relativism

Mackie put forward the following opinion in “The Argument From Relativity”: unlike scientific knowledge with objectivity, moral knowledge is the product of different ways of life.

Mackie believes that the specif ic needs of society, culture and geopolitics and different ways of life produce different moral beliefs and values. For example, Part of the Chinese Confucianism was born out of close family relations, while the Western individualism was caused by its specific historical context. The rational spirit, courage and virtue of ancient Greece were attributed to the maritime civilization... There are many, many such explanations.

It is generally believed that scientific thinking and scientific methods have certain objectivity, and scientific knowledge should be able to explain the objective and external world in the end. Although physicists disagree with each other on how quantum mechanics can be compatible with the theory of relativity, people can still reasonably think that physicists can finally reach an agreement to solve this problem. Moral knowledge just like that. Mackie believes that the continuous evolution of moral norms just reflects that morality itself is the construction of different ways of life.If there is a universal moral truth, how can the moral beliefs of different countries, civilizations and nations be so different? Even if the moral truth is objective, why does the belief of the same country keep changing with the course of history? We can summarize Mackie's point of view:

(1) If there are a large number of fundamental cultural disagreements and moral disagreements, then morality is the product of different ways of life.

(2) There are a large number of fundamental cultural disagreements and moral disagreements.

(C1) Morality is the product of different ways of life.

(3) If morality is the product of different ways of life, then we should deny the objective moral truth and realism.

(C2) We should deny the objective moral truth and realism.

Williams expressed a similar view with Mackie's. Williams also believes that ethical knowledge and natural science knowledge are with two different categories: ethical knowledge is about actions, not the world. Therefore, it is difficult for moral realists to provide basic support for moral objectivity. Rawls's view is more radical, and he believes that moral relativity means that some principled disagreements can never be resolved, and philosophers cannot form a common answer. For example,utilitarianism will never agree with Kantians 'requirement of “never lie”,and Kantians can never accept utilitarianism's method of measuring people's value by utility.

What do the views of Mackie, Williams and Rawls mean on the normative level? In other words, if we accept relativism, how should we face the moral disagreements in the real world?

The most common view is the principle of charity: since the moral paradigms of different cultures are not compatible, then one culture has no reason to judge the values of other cultures. Similarly, no culture may have a superior position to arbitrarily ask other cultures to accept its own ideas. As the saying goes, you go your own way, and I'll go mine. This concept is regarded by libertarians as the cornerstone of tolerance, “passive freedom”. In “The Pursuit of The Ideal”, Berlin thinks that relativism(or pluralism in Berlin's words) just makes people transcend platonic illusion: and thinks that there is a universal and absolute rule in the world.After breaking this illusion, people can imagine a picture of pluralism:each culture respects each other's disagreements while communicating,absorbing the agreements that can be reconciled, and respecting incompatible cultural beliefs.