Evaluating Prescriptivism
Is it possible to judge practices of other cultures and individuals as abhorrent?
Non-cognitivism – ‘anything goes!’ If anything goes can you tell anyone that their morality is wrong? The denial of moral truth implies tolerance as you cannot correct anyone.
Why does this not apply to cognitivism? (Use the key term of ‘standard’)
The question tolerance raises is whether we should tolerate every practice including racism, sexism, homophobia, age-ism?
What is morality trying to do?
Why is this not possible if we say we have to tolerate all practices?
Under Emotivism and Prescriptivism morality comes from our feelings, choices or a set of conventions relative to that society. Therefore morality has no authority over the individual and so therefore cannot be used to judge others.
Because they have no authority over the individual, do you think Emotivists and Prescriptivists are going to claim their moral judgements should be ignored?
Emotivists and Prescriptivists disapprove of anyone who advocates that morality doesn’t matter or is just a matter of taste. The theory that moral values reflect our feelings or our social conventions does not imply that we should stop having moral feelings or stop living according to convention.
How is Emotivism and Prescriptivism different to Relativism? So can a Relativist judge another culture?
Is there an issue with judging another culture? Even if there are standards do we still need tolerance?
Evaluating Prescriptivism – The limits of tolerance!
If tolerance is a moral value (You ought to tolerate other people’s values), the denial of moral truth does not necessarily lead to tolerance.
Why?
Relativists
The question arises ‘who are you to tell someone else to be tolerant?’ Because tolerance is a moral claim therefore there is no authority with which you can demand/command someone to be tolerant. There is no difference between saying they ought not to eat meat or ought not to be racist (and therefore tolerant of other races). Different cultures have different conventions relating to tolerance. Some endorse tolerance and some are not tolerant at all.
Why is this a problem for relativists and different societies?
If people disagree, will they just agree to disagree? What usually happens from both sides?
Morality is not just a set of conventions – groups will apply their morality (if not all then parts) to everyone. We see this in prescriptivism.
Do you think relativism can disapprove of this practice and therefore approve of morals being confined to one particular society?
The response from Emotivists and Prescriptivists
Tolerance has its limits! Our attitudes don’t exist on their own so disapproving of poverty leads to disapproving of people who approve of poverty. Tolerance is a moral attitude towards other people’s attitudes, so it may conflict with other moral attitudes I have. I might feel tolerance is a moral value but this will have its limits.
Situation: A racist murder such as Damilola Taylor. How do we see a conflict between the value of tolerance and the value of preventing harm to others?
Non-cognitivists argue it is possible to interfere with other’s behaviour/judge others because they are being racist, cruel, cowardly etc. It is not because their behaviour doesn’t accord with my feelings. However that I think racist discrimination is a good reason to prevent an action is an expression of my moral feelings. In contrast, the cognitivist is going to claim they have the backing of reality and it is not just an emotion. There is a fact about a reason here. You are acting because it is wrong to harm others not just because of a feeling or emotion.