hello to you I do hope you're well welcome to this a level religious studies video I'm Ben Wardle and today we are looking at meta ethics which is all about taking a step back and asking the big fundamental question in ethics which is what is the good and we'll be looking at three different approaches to answering this question we'll be looking at naturalism intuitionism and emotivism so yes met ethics it's all about taking a step back can take in a bird's ey view where you ask that fundamental key question what actually is the good and as I say we're going to have a look at the ao1 and ao2 for three different approaches we'll be looking at naturalism intuitionism and emotivism and there's lots of opportunities here for us to be of course critiquing each of these and also comparing the three of them and then at the end of the video we'll actually be asking is asking what is the good the most important question in ethics or are normative ethics and applied ethics more important so let's get started cha we with the keywords and our first keyword is of course meta ethics because this is the area of Ethics where we take that step back and we take that bird ey view because it's where we ask fundamental questions about the meaning of Ethics itself and in particular the meaning of good but also it means of course asking what is good what is right what is wrong do is all about this fundamental key question and so met ethics involves discussion and debate about the nature and purpose of morality and we're going to be looking as I say at these three different approaches at naturalism and intuitionism which are examples of moral realism and then emotivism which is an example of moral anti-realism and we'll be making lots of links and connections to religious language and the verification principle when we are looking at emotivism because it is principally associated with AJ a and of course we know him very well from our religious language studies so just to put this into context for you within ethics we have three different tiers of Ethics we've got met ethics at the top which is Big ethics the birds ey view we've then got normative ethics and then just below that we've got applied ethics and we've already looked at normative ethics on our journey on the course so far because normative ethics is what we call first order ethical questions about how we should behave and what ethical Norms we should follow so this is what we could call normal everyday ethics and we've looked at and we've evaluated many examples we've looked at natural moral law haven't we but we've also looked at situation ethics and utilitarianism now interestingly natural moral law and utilitarianism are both examples of naturalism so we have already had a look at naturalism today of course we'll also be looking at intuitionism and GE Mo's idea that goodness is a simple concept self-evident to us much like the color yellow it's not something we can Define but it's something that we can intuitively identify uh and then of course we'll also be looking at emotivism but yes when we've studied natural moral law and utilitarianism we have been looking at examples there of theological naturalism and ethical naturalism but we'll look at that in much more detail as we go through this video the other area of Ethics just to mention is applied ethics which again we've already started looking at so this is where we apply those normative principles and arguments so where we apply you know natural moral law situation ethics and utilitarianism to particular areas so you know medical ethics animal ethics business ethics for example where we're actually applying those uh moral approaches to different issues and we're seeing you know well what would a utilitarian say about this and we're asking what would St Thomas the aquinus have made of this issue we then have and again there's a lot of key terms here but really important that that we do understand them at the start of the video so then we can discuss these key terms as we go through the video so we've got moral realism and this is uh the belief that right and wrong objectively exist independently from the mind so in other words right and wrong are out there for us to discover so they do objectively exist so they are real properties we could say so they can be discovered via observation which is what a naturalist would say that's what ethical naturalism is is all about or intuitively and that's what intuitionism is all about but with moral realism it's the idea that morality is real it is a real thing that exists that we need to discover because then in contrast to that we have moral anti-realism and that is the belief that right and wrong do not actually objectively exist independently from the mind so they are not real things and examples of this would be emotivism and prescriptivism so emotivism just very quickly before we talk about it later is the idea that moral judgments are just expressions of opinion they're just expressions of an emotion that they're not actually factual statements and of course this is very reminiscent of the verification principle and AJ believes that ethical statements are meaningless that they are just personal preferences that in the same way you might say that you like a certain food you might say whether you like murder or stealing so you know with emotivist perspective on ethics any ethical statement any ethical judgment is simply an expression of your personal opinion because right and wrong do not objectively exist they're not to be discovered by us we decide in that moment based on our feelings how we feel about that issue so whether we think it's right or wrong so this reduces morality this reduces ethics to personal opinions and preferences we then have two other contra in terms cognitivism and non-cognitivism so cognitivism is the belief that moral statements are subject to being either true or false they are meaningful so I feel like I'm back to in religious language again whereas non-cognitivism is the belief that moral statements are not subject to truth or falsity they are meaningless and again that's what your emotivist would believe uh and we will be coming back to those terms as we go through today's video we then have highlighted in yellow just to emphasize how important they are naturalism intuitionism and emotivism that they are our three approaches to met ethics so naturalism is that moral values can be correctly defined by observation of the natural world so aquinus develops theological naturalism and then uh benam develops his ethical naturalism based of course on his assertion that nature has placed mankind under two Sovereign Masters Pleasure and Pain and so he assumes that pleasure is the good and that pain is bad um intuitionism then which is developed by GE Moore is that moral truths are indefinable and self-evident so the good cannot be defined by us it is intuitively known and he was very critical of naturalism he uh developed something called the naturalistic fallacy and he said we can't assume that something being natural means that it is good he said that instead the good is intuitively known to us much like the color yellow it is something that we can identify but we can't actually explain or Define it so it s self evidence so we should intuitively we should instinctively I suppose you could say just know what the good is and then emotivism is the idea that moral statements are not statements of fact but they are indicators of an emotional state or personal opinion and then the final key word there is the naturalistic fallacy and this was GE Mo's criticism of naturalism that we cannot assume that just because something is natural it must be good so we will be coming back to that when we look at our a 2 for naturalism but a great critique there that shows us why GE Moore was not happy with bentham's approach that just because Nature has placed us under this master of pleasure we shouldn't necessarily see that as the good for us to be pursuing as I've said GE Moore instead believed that goodness is something we can't Define it's just self-evident it's just intuitively known by us so let's get started shall we today's video is going to cover those three main approaches naturalism intuitionism and emotivism so I really look forward to seeing your responses in the comments please do let me know which of these approaches to matter ethics you are personally impressed by which one do you think is you know most in sync with your thinking on this question of what is the good and how do we discover the good so as I mentioned before we've got these three tiers of Ethics we've got normative ethics applied ethics and met ethics and we have met ethics at the the very top because this is your big fundamental question it's where you're taking that step back and you're taking that bird ey View and you're asking what is the good and we're going to look at naturalism intuitionism and emotivism there is then a separate video for you if you're doing the AQA specification on Divine command Theory so please do have a look at that but just to again put this into context the other te of Ethics are normative ethics which is how do we do good and then applied ethics is how do we apply the good really how do we apply the approach and one question that I want us to start considering is whether meta ethics is the most important type of Ethics do we need to establish what is the good before we can actually practice normative ethics and think about how do we do good and then of course then apply that to specific scenarios with applied ethics so some people say that matter ethics is too remote and it's too abstract you know it's too theoretic iCal so we shouldn't spend time studying it because we should focus on how we actually apply ethics you know we want to be pragmatic about it but then others would say that actually met ethics is essential because if we don't establish what is the good and how we know the good then how can we do normative ethics and then how can we apply that when we're doing applied ethics so at the end of the video we will be asking is met ethics the most important area of Ethics so just start thinking you know do you believe matter ethics is the most important area or actually should we focus on something that's a bit more practical and a bit more relevant uh to everyday life so for example thinking about our normative approaches and how we apply them so as we mentioned when we looked at our keywords we need to know that there is a contrast between moral realism and moral anti-realism and I want to give you a bit more detail on these at the start of the video and then we'll be able to see how naturalism and intuitionism are examples of moral realism and then emotivism is an example of moral anti-realism now for me the best way to remember these is by thinking of the 2DS okay so moral realism is about discovery that there is moral Truth for us to discover either through observation or intuition whereas moral anti-realism is the idea and I apologize that it's covered up there by me I do apologize for that but moral anti-realism is the idea that we actually decide for ourselves what we think is right or wrong and that of course reduces morality to a matter of personal opinion so morality isn't real if you like it's not independent from us for us to discover but it's actually just our personal opinions and our feelings and preferences so moral realism this is the belief that right and wrong objectively exist independently from the mind so in other words they are real properties there are mind independent external moral properties and facts for example murder is wrong is a moral fact because the act of murder has the moral property of wrongness so it's the idea that murder is wrong is not an opinion it's a moral Truth for us to discover so that would suggest if it's for us to discover that it independently exists and it objectively exists so of course with moral realism it's all about morality being objective and it's about morality being discovered by us and our examples are naturalism and intuitionism in contrast then moral anti-realism is this idea here that right and wrong do not objectively exist independently from the mind so there are lots of different anti-realist theories about morality so for example you know some people believe that moral language is an attempt to make a claim about objective properties but that it fails and we know that as error Theory um but there's other approaches for example that actually when you're making a moral statement you're not attempting to assert a truth claim at all you're just expressing an emotion or you're prescribing what someone should do um now this is really interesting because as I say it reduces morality to personal opinion and that would suggest Mary misley wrote that nothing can be known in the sphere of morals because moral judgments are just the same as having a you know a personal preference for a certain food for example and the implication of course is well what do we do in terms of the law because if all morality is just a matter of personal opinion then what can we actually have objective clear rules about because you could say murder is wrong and I might say I don't feel the same way and then how do we actually establish a consensus so that we can agree within a community a society or indeed the whole world of what is right and what is wrong so you know moral anti-realism is this idea of us deciding for ourselves what is right what is wrong um and of course we have to think about the implications of that in terms of what actually happens then to to morality you know if everything is just a personal opinion or preference so plenty to talk about today as you can say I hope matter ethics is a really fascinating area of Ethics that you know gets us asking a lot of questions and it really makes us think about some of the morals and some of the you know theories that we've already discussed on the course um and actually what their foundations are so met ethics just to recap again this big picture that met ethics is before we actually start to break each of these theories down met ethics is about big questions and the big question we're asking is what is the good so naturalism would say the good is what is natural it is known by looking at nature and what comes naturally to us intuitionism would say that the good is a simple notion that is known by intuition so it is self-evident we just know it Divine command theory is the idea that the good is whatever God has commanded and that of course leads to the you of thr dilemma and then emotivism the good is a subjective matter of personal opinion it is an expression of an emotion so they are in a nutshell the answers that the different theories give to the Met ethical question what is the good and for each of these we are going to look at your ao1 knowledge we'll be looking at the scholars and what they've said and we'll be doing our ao2 evaluation as well so we'll look at the strengths and the weaknesses of naturalism intuitionism and emotivism and yeah I would love to hear what you think in terms of which of these theories which of these approaches gives the best answer to the Big Met ethical question of what is the good so if you have downloaded the PowerPoint you might like to print this slide off here and then actually fill in the key ao1 knowledge and then the ao2 strengths and weaknesses as we go through the video so that might help you in terms of your note taking today uh but that sort of you know puts on to one page I suppose the key things you need to know about met ethics in terms of you need to know your key A1 knowledge and you then need to know your strengths of each approach and then the criticisms as well so just one final thing before I promise we are going to get started with naturalism and this is the open question argument by GE Moore who will talk about when we criticize naturalism and when we look at intuitionism and he said Is it true that what is natural is good so that is what he calls the naturalistic fallacy because he says it's not he says we can't just assume that what is natural is therefore good okay but that is a question I want you to start thinking about is it true that what is natural to us is good because two people who would say yes it is are Thomas aquinus and Jeremy Benson so let's have a look you see I promised we're actually going to get started and now we are so naturalism the idea that moral values can be correctly discovered by observation of the natural world so ethical naturalism is the belief that moral values can be discovered by observation of the world so what is right and wrong can be established by looking at the world around us so of course be empirical observation and this is therefore a moral realist Theory so we're now applying the keywords because it's based on the idea that moral facts and truths actually exist because they are out there for us to discover through observation and it is therefore also cognitivist because statements about morality are either objectively true or false and that would mean of course that for an ethical naturalist ethical statements are meaningful because you are empirically observing something which means that it is then seen as a moral fact as a moral truth that is objectively right because you are discovering moral values that are out there and you're doing so empirically through observation so let's have a look at some case studies hope hopefully you recognize this man here Thomas the aquinus because his natural moral law is an example of theological naturalism and that's because it's based on the idea that the world has a god-given order built into it and so moral values can be worked out by understanding our god-given purpose and observing the natural order and that of course leads to the idea that there is one right way to live by living in accordance with the natural moral law you know those primary precepts are not subjective he doesn't say decide your own primary precepts based on your own observations he says that if we all use right reason in accordance with nature we will all agree with him that they are five primary precepts that have not been invented but they are to be discovered y so it's the idea that there is one right way to live it's a moral absolutist approach because you have discovered it through right reason in accordance with nature and that is why there are five primary precepts that are binding upon all people at all times and then we have another example for you Jeremy Bentham because remember utilitarian thinkers Jeremy benam and then of course John Stewart Mill who developed utilitarianism with his rule utilitarianism believed that humans can Discover right and wrong by discovering what actions lead to pleasure or pain remember their normative ethical theory of utilitarianism is all about doing what is useful for maximizing pleasure and minimizing pain and that's based on the understanding that what is good is pleasure because that is what comes naturally to us and so their entire ethical Theory with the honic calculus for example is all about working towards pleasure because benam has said that through observation we can see pleasure is the good and the brilliant quote just such a great quote that you know Benson wres is nature has placed mankind under the governance of two Sovereign Masters so he's literally you know explicitly mentioning naturalism there isn't he because he's saying Nature has done this and so we need to discover what nature natur has done so Nature has placed mankind under the governance of two Sovereign Masters pain and pleasure it is for them alone to point out what we ought to do as well as to determine what we shall do so of course this is the best quote whenever you're talking about naturalism because he's literally saying that because something is natural we need to use that as our idea of the good or that that tells us maybe I should we that a little bit better that tells us what is the good so he's saying that because um pleasure is something we SE and pain is something we naturally avoid that means they must be good bad right and wrong and so this is such a great clear example of ethical naturalism isn't it because he's saying that we can discover goodness we can discover morality moral truth moral absolutes by observing the natural world around us so you know this is something that GE more than criticizes because he says you can't just assume that because pleasure is something that seems natural to us it must be good he said the goodness is something else good is something we know intuitively H but for benam he is saying that because pleasure is something we naturally seek that must be the good we need to work towards and that's why utilitarianism is all about doing whatever is useful for maximizing pleasure and minimizing pain and then just another example FH Bradley here argued that it is possible to understand our moral duties in life by observing our position or station in life so you know a nice link actually here to Canan ethics you know let's bring all of the normative ethical theories in if we can he said that what he has to do depends on what his place is what his function is and that all comes from his station in the organism so again it's this idea that through observation we can understand moral values and moral absolutes so as I say you know we've brought in aquinus here we've brought in benam here and we've got Bradley who's making a nice link for us to C in ethic so you know a lot of what we've talked about when we've been looking at our normative ethics has been based on ethical naturalism and you know that shows doesn't it the relationship between normative ethics and met ethics because utilitarianism for example is completely dependent on accepting bentham's definition of pleasure equaling good so as you can imagine you know there's a lot of discussion about whether that is correct and we're going to have a look at the A2 for naturalism now so let's start with the strengths shall we let's start with the positives our first strength of naturalism is that of course it makes morality objective doesn't it because you know it therefore or I should say the reason this is good is that it therefore gives it importance you know so let's have a look naturalism makes morality objective rather than subjective therefore morality is universal and we could say this gives morality importance rather than just being a matter of personal opinion which is what emotivism would reduce it to so if you want to compare it with emotivism you could say that this is a much better approach because it makes morality objective therefore giving it importance so if we look at uh you know the fact of naturalism it gives morality a set of absolutes yeah they are to be discovered they are moral absolutes to be discovered there are moral truths for us to discover uh so for example that murder is wrong or that rape is wrong those assertions would not be matter the personal opinion they would not be meaningless they would be you know meaningful assertions of moral truth that you have observed that you have discovered a second strength then is that it fits with widely used normative ethical theories as we know because we've just mentioned haven't we natural moral law and utilitarianism so we can say a strength of this is that it fits with widely used normative theories such as natural moral law with aquinus and utilitarianism with benenson it is a popular approach to understanding morality that clearly has real world relevance because of course ethical naturalism clearly underpins many of those normative ethical theories so it shows it's got that direct relevance to Everyday moral decision making so it can help us understand can't it the foundations of the normative ethical theories that different people use and that we have been studying in terms of the weaknesses though we've got two the first one is from David Hugh who we will be talking about today when we mention um emotivism but always great to bring in David Hume he's got a lot to say about a lot of the topics on the course hasn't he and he argued that no matter how closely we examine a situation we cannot see or we cannot observe empirically the rightness or wrongness of the action okay this is a really important point and he calls it the is ought distinction and this is the idea that there is a difference between what you can OB observe is factually the case and what we think ought to happen so there is a big difference between what you um empirically observe which he is saying is neutral because it is just an observation and then there is this jump if you like this bridge to your judgment about it to the perspective you then have on it so for example he killed someone is what factually happened and Hume says that is something that we can empirically observe however he says we cannot empirically observe that it is wrong to kill someone he says we can see what happened and that is is yes so that is what actually happened but then your judgment about what happened is not something that you empirically observe that is something separate that you come up with yourselves that is based on your interpretation of the event because you know we could both see the same person being killed and the fact is that they were killed your interpretation of that could be this is awful how could that happen my interpretation could be great well done I never liked him anyway of course just for the avoidance of doubt I would never say that about death um absolutely not but the point is you know what we empirically see is different Hume is saying from what we then understand of that or our opinion on that so Hume as it says here proposes that is ought distinction that although we can observe a situation and we can see what happened empirically we cannot see the rightness or the wrongness of that as I say the Act is pretty much neutral because then morality kicks in in terms of our perspective our interpretation our beliefs our opinions about what we've seen so that is the is or distinction and then very similar to this actually is GE Mo's naturalistic fallacy because he identifies the naturalistic fallacy as the key error that naturalism makes and we will talk about him in a moment when we discuss intuitionism because he says that is a much better answer to the question of what is the good but his point here and as I say you know this is very relevant to Jeremy Bam's quote our nature placing us under these Sovereign Masters he says that just because something is natural we should not assume that it is good so for each natural property we can still ask is it really good so for example is pleasure really good so hum is saying okay Nature has placed us under this Sovereign Master pleasure but then more is saying but we could then still ask but is pleasure good we can't then just assume okay because it's natural it must be good he says we can still then ask another question which is but is pleasure really good and the fact that the answer could be no means natural properties cannot just be assumed to be the same as good there is actually a difference between something being natural and something being good to make that assumption that just because something is natural that means it is good which is l literally what benam writes in utilitarianism then you know that that's an assumption that's without Foundation you you know it's a leap in logic which of course a fallacy is isn't it you're making an assumption without any foundation without any reason to do so so that is GE Mo's criticism of naturalism that just because something is natural we shouldn't assume it is good so that leads us on very nicely to GE Moore's own answer to the question question of what is the good which is intuitionism and intuitionism is the idea that moral truths are indefinable and self-evident and this is the idea that we don't discover them through observation but we discover them by intuition so we know right and wrong by intuition and the key example that we're going to talk about here is the color yellow okay so Mo says that the color yellow like goodness is a simple concept so it's indefinable and self-evident so when we see the color yellow we can instantly identify that is yellow but if someone then asks you to explain what is yellow we just have to say well it's yellow we can see it but we can't describe it and in the same way um he says Mo says that goodness is known by intuition that we can see goodness we can know goodness but we can't Define it so it is a simple concept that is indefinable and self-evident and of course your key critical analysis here is going to be well if everybody just had this intuitive knowledge of good why don't they do it you know clearly different people do have different ideas of what is good because they you know they do have different morals and they do have different moral values so let's just have a look at the key facts here so intuitionism believes that moral truths can't be discovered by observation of the world right and wrong can't be discovered instead they are self-evident so they are known by us intuitively so with intuitionism it is is you know a rejection of this observation of nature because remember G Moore said with the naturalistic fallacy just because something is natural we can't assume it is good that is a leaping logic that we shouldn't be making he said instead we know right and wrong by intuition so we do see however you know even though of course it's very different from naturalism in terms of it saying that you can't empirically observe good in nature you just intuitively know it there are similarities between naturalism and intuitionism in the sense that they are both moral realist and they are both cognitivist yeah because it is the idea that there are moral truths but of course for more and intuitionists those moral truths are not to be empirically observed and discovered in the world around you you discover them intuitively you just know them so I suppose discover is stretching it a bit with intuitionism because actually you don't need to do much work you don't need to do much digging so to speak because you just know it it's self-evident to you so here is GE Moore in his little suit and his little tie on and he argued as I say for intuitionism and remember he says we don't recognize goodness through empirical facts the good is self-evident to our intuition and that is because good is a simple concept that we just know intuitively it is self-evident to us all and the example that I mentioned before is of the color yellow so he said if we were asked to describe yellow we would find find it difficult to do so we only answer the question of what is Yellow by pointing out an object that is yellow so it's self-evident to us and we can identify it but we cannot Define it and he said that in the same way we are able to recognize goodness it cannot be defined but it can only be shown and known so this is based on Mo's idea that there is a difference between simple and complex ideas and a complex idea is one that we can break down down and explain whereas the simple one is self-evident and it should just be known intuitively so he gives the example of a horse as a complex idea because um you know a horse can be broken down into its parts if someone said you know well what is a horse explain to me describe it to me you could say well it's got a leg it's got a neck Etc you know you can break it down and you can explain it in that sense whereas simple ideas such as the color yellow or the concept of goodness for more cannot be broken down into parts or divided he said that goodness is a simple idea and that simple ideas are grasped by intuition so again it's about moral uh realism and again it's cognitivist but it's the idea that the moral truths are inde definable and self-evident so essentially the good is the good that's it full stop that's how Mo would put it and my key question here is do people just know what is the good are we all um you know equipped with this selfawareness if you like or this sense of you know intuition of what goodness is do people have that is that something that people actually have now here's what Moote in his text principal Etha he said if I am asked what is good my answer is that good is good so you know that's the great quote to memorize and use in the exam isn't it that you could just say mo says that good is good so the only way you can Define good is with the word good in the same way that you could only say yellow is yellow you can only say good is good that's it that's how he feels about this H and he said and that is the end of the matter so he wasn't you know wasn't interested in pursuing this any further he said good is good and that's it um and he said or if I am asked how is good to be defined my answer is that it cannot be defined and he goes on to say and that is all I have to say about it so there we go the case is closed good is good and it cannot be defined full stop there's intuitionism for you solved sorted there's met ethics the question what is the good More's answer good is good and that's the end of the story so met ethics is solved we can all stand down we don't need to do any more thinking about this fundamental question so again really great to memorize that actually and use that in the exam that more literally writes the good is good and that is the end of the matter so in terms of his answer to this met ethical question of what is the good his answer is very straightforward it's very simple isn't it and it is you know very concise that good is good there you go done finished so do you agree with more that we can't actually Define the good it's just intuitively known by us and self-evident to us well let's do our evaluation we'll start again with our strengths and we can say that again a strength of this is that it presents morality is objective because it's based uh on the idea that the good is objective because the good is the good yeah full stop so the good is the good so it's not about your idea of the good or their idea of the good it's the idea there is this objective good that is intuitively known that is self-evident to us all so this is again an example of moral realism and of course it sets a moral standard and this means that morality is consistent and clear and we can say that this is supported by the fact that people do actually universally agree on certain moral values and issues so could say you know is the fact that if we look around the world every country does seem to have laws against murder for example does that show us that there are certain things that are self-evident to humans as being good so if we do look at Universal values and universal laws that we find in every corner of the world does that not show us that actually good is self-evident that everybody knows what good is um so you know that's an interesting strength that we can use that it's a it's a strength because it presents morality's objectiv so we can be very clear that the good is good uh and it's not a matter of personal opinion but at the same time you can add on to that that we can see this in action yeah although mo didn't like us to empirically observe morality H we can actually see that around the world there are many moral values that are universally shared and so does that not demonstrate that everybody has this self-evident understanding uh or that it is a self-evident understanding we all have of good so that's an interesting strength isn't it and we could also say of course that it avoids a naturalistic fallacy so if you were comparing it with um naturalism you could say that intuitionism has got the edge over naturalism uh because it avoids the naturalistic fallacy you know it maintains the idea of uh morality being objective and it is still a moral realist Theory but this is without the naturalistic fallacy so it may be seen as better than naturalism because it avoids the fallacy of assuming that just because something is natural it must be good intuitionism says that morality is not discovered empirically but is known intuitively so as Mo wrote good is good and that is all so you could say that that is a strength and that you know makes it much better than um naturalism because it avoids a naturalistic fallacy uh but of course you could say that actually just saying good is good doesn't give us any meaningful knowledge at all in terms of the weaknesses then we could say that a problem with this is that people have different ideas of the good so if you're saying that goodness is intuitively known different people's intuitions seem to be telling them different things about what the good is so not everybody has the same idea of goodness people's intuitions do seem to differ and that undermines the idea that an objective good is intuitively known macki for example argued that this suggests our idea of good is the result of social conditioning not intuitionism so so the way we've been raised the moral values we've been instilled with the things we've seen around us in the society we've been brought up in you know your idea of good he believed is shaped by your upbringing and it is shaped by the society that you're in so two people born in you know two different countries will have a different idea of what the good is based on the relative norms and values of that culture and so of course this presents a problem doesn't it for more and his idea that the good is good and that is all because that suggests that everybody's got a different idea of good and that of course undermines the idea that this presents morality as objective because if everybody's got a different understanding of good that reduces intuitionism to being a subjective uh answer to the question of what is the good and another problem of course is how do we resolve conflicts of intuition so you know this is meant to be a very simple concept according to more but actually it's becoming very very complex isn't it and very difficult for us to actually establish what the good is when we do see these conflicts and we do consider that different people have different understandings of good and then another weakness for you we're going to bring in emotivism here because ajs said that good is a matter of personal preference or it is a uh evincing of an emotion not importantly intuition so a would reject the idea of non-natural moral properties that we Inuit it as unverifiable and meaningless that he would say that you know his assertion Mo's assertion that good is good is absolutely meaningless and absolutely ludicrous he instead argues that morality is a matter of personal preference and opinion it is the expression of an emotion not something we know via intuition so you can see here again how we can compare these different theories and these different answers to the question what is the good because for a he would say that you know our ideas of goodness are expressions of opinions um and the expressions of an emotion rather than something that we intuitively know through our intuition that is self-evident to us a would say it's not self-evident it's self- decided in that moment so you know always be thinking how can I use naturalism intuitionism emotivism as critiques for one another and I think this is a great example you know because I often say to students you know I put intuitionism kind of in the middle because you've got more going over there criticizing naturalism with the naturalistic fallacy but then you've got air coming from this angle saying that intuitionism is rubbish as well because good is a matter of personal preference not something we know through intuition so you know it's a great one when you want to be comparing to both of the other theories because you can use intuitionism as a critique for uh naturalism but then you can uh critique intuitionism with emo ISM if that makes sense so yeah it's a great one when you want to showcase your ability to compare all of the theories um to be honest it is the one that I I struggle to get my head around in terms of good is good and that's all I feel like I get what he's saying I feel like I want that to be the case that we all know what the good is but then again I want to know well where did that self-evident understanding come from in the first place you know so I feel like with more I can see what he's trying to do but for me you know it raises more questions than it provides answers but again great to hear what you think in the comments below so building on that criticism there from a we're going to move on to our Final Approach which is emotivism so the first two as I've mentioned were moral realist and they were cognitivist whereas we now move on to our moral anti-realist and our non-cognitivist answer to the Met ethical question what is the good so emotivism is the idea that moral statements are not statements of fact I think that says yes it does thank God for that but our expressions of emotion they are indicators of an emotional state so emotivism and we associate this as I say with AJR and we're going to bring in a lot of his work on religious language and um the verification Principle as we look at emotivism but emotivism believes or in emotivist believes I should say that there are no moral approves moral statements are based on feelings of approval or disapproval and this is often known as the harah Buu Theory because it's literally the idea that you are given a situation that happens you know so somebody is killed for example and you either cheer and go harah that's great or you start booing as if you're at a panine so it's the idea that again these moral truths don't exist that morality is just you expressing an emotion in response to to something that's happened so nothing ultimately can be known or universally established in the sphere of morals because morality is simply a matter of personal opinion and preference so this is obviously an anti-realist Theory because it's saying there are no moral facts morality is just do reacting yeah think about it emotivism it reminds me of emojis it's about you reading a new story which is just facts of what's happened and then you react in the comments with a load of emojis you might pick a load of Happy emojis you know little smiling faces or you might get the cry eyes emojis so emotivism is the idea that morality is just you emotionally reacting to something that's happened so of course it's anti-realist you know the morality cannot be empirically seen it's not out there that morality is your emotional reaction within you so it's completely subjective and so it is of course a non-cognitivist theory as well because uh believing that statements made about right and wrong are not subject to truth or falsity yeah you can't then say your morality is right your morality is wrong because for air that would be like saying the fact that you like that food is right the fact you don't like that food is wrong you know it reduces morality to personal preference to Personal Taste in the same way that you might say I don't like fish and chips you might say I don't like stealing it's not a fact to be discovered it's something that's completely subjective to you to your personal taste to your personal preference to your personal opinion and that is why I've put there is that final bullet point the ethical statements are expressions of opinion again I think the best comparison I can make is to your tase in food that is how air sees moral judgments it's literally like someone saying my favorite food is pizza you know he'd say okay well good for you but that's not a moral fact that we've discovered out there is it you know your taste could change you know in 10 years time you might say my favorite food is now out Pastor I don't know you know do let me know what your favorite food is in the comments by the way guide always great to hear what would be your death roll meal if you had one final meal what would it be uh just something to think about um but yes um completely gone off topic now but hopefully that helps us to understand that for emotivism Morality is not something to discover there are no moral truths there are no moral facts there is no objective morality all moral statements all moral judgments are expressions of a personal op opinion they are simply you emotionally reacting you know typing your emoji in the comments on a news article or on a social media site it's an emotional reaction it's a personal preference it's your you know your personal feeling about what's happened but that's not an objective Truth for us to discover it's something you decide it's something you feel in the moment so AJR here looking very emotionless looking very austere in this Photograph I don't know where it's taken though looks like it's at booking and Palace you'd think he'd be a bit more excited but no he uh of course is very familiar to us because of his work on um religious language and the verification principle and it's important to know that the background to emotivism is found in the work of The Logical positivist so you can see here that you know the philosophy of religion content is now actually infusing into ethics and so it's a great opportunity for a synoptic link which is a great way to show The Examiner you are an e star candidate um so remember the logical positivist develop the verification principle for ascertaining whether a statement is Meaningful and the principle suggests that a statement is only meaningful if it is an analytic statement that is true by definition so something like a triangle has threee sides or it's a synthetic statement that can be verified by the senses so it's empirically verifiable and of course as moral statements then fail this criteria then they are factually meaningless and of course that links in with what Hume was saying about that is or distinction that you can't empirically observe the morality of an action you can see what happened but then that question of what someone ought to have done or not done is within you that's not something you can empirically see now of course you could argue well you can see the consequences of the action and if you can see that harm has been caused by the action surely that shows you that that action is wrong but again is still your understanding that you didn't think that harm should have been caused and for an emotivist all that you're doing is feeling sorry for those people if they've been harmed so you know with emotivism it's the idea all moral statements are just expressions of emotions they are meaningless they are non-cognitivist and remember AJR had two versions of the verification principle he pioneered he took on board the weaker version which says we can see statements as meaningful if we can say say how we could verify them in practice but of course even that weaker version that a presents doesn't uh meet um sorry no even with A's weaker version of verification principle moral statements still don't meet it there we go let me get my words out today h so as moral statements are neither logical nor provable by the senses this means that they are factually meaningless this is because emotional statements instead show emotional states or feelings they convey an approving or disapproving tone so it's about you saying Oh I like that they did that or I didn't like that they did that you're not giving a fact it's nothing we can verify it's nothing meaningful it is simply an opinion it's a reaction it's a judgment that you are personally making that is therefore subjective to you it is not a moral truth to be discovered it is a personal opinion that you are expressing or to use as language that you are evincing so this I think is a quote that will really help you to you know solidify your understanding of emotivism so er wrote that the presence of an ethical symbol in a proposition adds nothing to its factual content so I say to someone you acted wrongly in stealing that money I am not saying anything more than if I had simply said you stole that money in adding that this action is wrong I am not making any further statement about it so moral statements add nothing of value yeah we again we bring it back to human that is or distinction that you can say what happened for example you stole that money but then if you add on you acted wrongly you shouldn't have done that that adds nothing that just adds your personal opinion and someone can turn around and say well good for you I'm sorry you feel that way but that's not a moral fact that you're giving it's not a moral truth that you're asserting you're just adding your personal opinion and that absolutely adds nothing as a wrote it adds nothing to its factual content so this is is the idea there's a big difference between facts and values and you might have heard of this it's the fact value distinction very similar to the is or distinction there is a significant difference between what actually happened and what you think about it and the point here which builds upon the verification principle and that whole discussion about the meaningfulness of language is that just because you didn't like what happened that doesn't make your statement meaningful the only meaning meaningful bit is what was empirically observed the only meaningful bit is the facts of what happened you then adding your personal opinion is pointless basically that bit is the expression of an emotion that bit is not a moral truth that bit is not meaningful that is simply you adding on what you feel and someone can turn around to you and go well good for you but I disagree so there is this significant difference between the facts which um obviously are meaningful and then the values or what you're saying ought to have happened your feelings about it your opinion about it which air says adds nothing to its actual content and therefore is meaningless it is not a statement of fact it is simply an expression of emotion or an indicator of your emotional state and he writes this when you do that when you say it was wrong for you to do that you are simply evincing and that is the key word that he uses my moral disapproval of it it is as if I had said you stole that money in a peculiar tone of horror or written it with the addition of some special exclamation marks yeah or in the modern world that you added a load of shocked upset emojies on the end of that statement so he is saying that all you're doing when you are making a statement where you're saying you wrongly stole that money is you are adding on your little bit of um emotion basically so you might as well be adding on those emojis or you know if you were saying it to someone saying it in a really shocked appalled voice but he says that add adds nothing meaningful if we go back it adds nothing meaningful to its factual content so for him he's not interested remember a key criticism of the verification principle is that it is too narrow and one example of it being narrow is that it excludes ethical um judgments or statements from being seen as meaningful so for a there's no point making these moral statements and thinking that they have authority you know he's quite happy for you to express your your view on what's happened but he doesn't want you to think that that's got any meaning to it it is simply your evincing of a view or you know your expression of your emotional state so obviously with naturalism and intuitionism there's the idea that the good can be objectively known and that there is moral truth to be discovered or to be intuitively known whereas REM motivis there is no good that objectively exists all that we have are emotional reactions to things that happen and they are meaningless so you know obviously this one is radically different isn't it to naturalism and intuitionism uh very quickly before we evaluate it another big influence on emotivism was of course David Hume who we mentioned before because he had earlier argued that moral judgments are feelings and sentiments rather than factual statements so you know a strength of emotivism could be that it is consistent with the earlier thinking and writing of David Hume he said remember that you know your moral judgments cannot be empirically verified as true or false they are the expression of an emotional response a personal opinion and remember that is called the is or distinction also known as the fact value distinction you can empirically see the facts you can empirically see what happened you know the is but you cannot empirically see the values or what ought to have happened they are separate they are your emotional response they are subjective to you they are personal to you and they are in the words of a meaningless so just a bit more on that sorry I thought we were getting on to the evaluation then uh just a bit more detail on that there is a significant difference between facts and values and the original version of the fact value distinction is found in hum's is or formula and remember is refers to the factual claims about things how things actually are so example he killed him or is then your evaluative Claim about how you feel that things should be and of course um this reminds me of our ao1 and our ao2 yeah is are the facts that we uh write down for our ao1 marks and then art is our evaluation and our critical analysis which we do for our ao2 marks so you know really interesting to think about how our exam is marked in this way with this distinction between the facts and then the judgment ments um so of course the facts are empirically based he killed someone whereas the values are emotionally based he was wrong to kill him you're evincing as I would say your your moral feeling there your emotional reaction now is this right is the question we've got to ask you know is it right to reduce morals and to reduce ethical statements to being expressions of emotions that we are just expressing a personal feeling a personal preference about what we have factually observed and remember emotivism is about that key distinction is all facts and values um and that our moral judgments are just these subjective personal opinions they are our expressions of an emotion now Jeffrey warock here believed that it seems absurd to reduce morality to emotions um and I just wonder you know spend a couple of minutes thinking about this what does he actually mean by that and do you agree with him you know saying that to reduce morality to being the expression of an emotional opinion or reaction is absurd what does that mean why does he think it's absurd and do you agree with that and I would certainly say we need to think about the implications don't we we have to think about the implications if you're going to say that moral statements are not objectively true but they are simply expressions of emotion uh what is the implication of that for ethics and for the law and for Morality you know there is a massive implication there if you're saying that ethics then the idea of right and wrong is simply a personal emotion it's a personal opinion A Feeling a preference you know because does that then just reduce all ethical conduct to personal opinion and so as I say what is the implication for the law for example or for Morality In general massive massive implications I would say but I wonder what you think do you see this in the world around you today do you think that the world is becoming very emotivist in terms of how people do see morals you know a lot of people will talk about moral standards decaying uh and is that because of this growing Trend towards emotivism that everything is just my truth or your truth how you feel rather than the being one set standard for Morality you know if we think back to what cth said that there will be one more eternal binding upon all people at all times emotivism is arguing for the opposite you know emotivist would say there are eight billion different personal opinions slash emotions slash feelings about what is right and wrong so really interesting to think about this is or distinction uh and to think about emotivism should we be reducing moral statements to be expressions of emotion is this accurate can you understand the logic behind the thinking here and is this going to be helpful for human beings as they try to you know navigate through the world and consider what it means to be moral so lots to think about um let's evaluate shall we let's have a look at our strengths and weaknesses of emotivism you could say a strength is that it promotes tolerance of different viewpoints doesn't it because if there is no objective idea of what is good or bad uh then no one has the right to say their morality is true and anothers is false so if you want to link this to uh the study of Religion and you want to talk about exclusivism for example this promotes pluralism you know this challenges the idea of exclusivism that one religion has a monopoly on the truth because you know with emotivism one must simply accept moral diversity in the same way that we have come to accept diversity in Musical and culinary tastes so you could say that promotes social harmony so you know in the same way that you're not going to fall out with somebody over what their favorite food is or you know what kind of music they listen to well I don't think you would anyway um you know you're you're going to have more tolerance for people even if they've got different moral opinions to you because they are just opinions and so you know it's not a struggle for who's right and who's wrong everybody body can be right because you know it's all about their personal preference you know within their own little bubble um they can have their own opinions so we can link that in as well can't we with Vicken Stein and language games that you know truth is relative to the form of life you're operating in and they can all be consistent because you can't then use the rules of one game to criticize and critique another because everybody's right everybody's got a right to have their own emotional reaction to whatever's happened um you know and make their moral judgments H and of course another strength would be that it is supported by the verification principle because based on the verification principle which again we talk about air when we talk about it is correct to see ethical statements as meaningless because they cannot be verified so we could say that it is right to see moral judgments as matters of personal preference because they are meaningless because they don't meet the criteria for verification remember that difference between is and ought you can empirically see what happen happened but you can't empirically see the rightness or the wrongness of it that is something separate that is then meaningless that is personal that is subjective to you H and of course as I've put there actually this is also consistent with hume's isort distinction based on his empirical thinking so really interesting actually these strengths of emotivism that it promotes tolerance because everybody can have their personal preference for Morality and that it is supported by the verification principle which of course we've studied for paper one philosophy of religion in terms of the weaknesses though we've got a massive problem here that is that it means there's no basis for Morality so you know we've got a big problem because if emotivism is correct then morality is reduced to a matter of personal preference and opinion isn't it so this means that there can be no moral standards and that nothing can be definitively known in the sphere of morality it is just an expression of feelings nothing more substantial and of course if morality and if right and goodness is nothing more than a personal feeling or emotion that could lead to the breakdown of society because again you know how do you have a legal system for example how do you have rules how do you have laws about things being right or wrong if that's just a matter of personal preference and opinion so actually you know if we think about the implications of this for how Society functions and how the world functions they could be pretty major because it means there is no longer any basis for Morality and then we could add to that that of course it is therefore not useful for moral decision making because it undermines our attempts to make moral judgments you know because it reduces them to matters of personal opinion if we cannot establish what good is then we cannot make moral judgments so you know that reaffirms doesn't it the importance of matter ethics as foundational for the practice of normative ethics because we need to establish what the good is so we can then put it into action and work towards it with our normative ethical theories so natural moral law and utilitarianism show that we do need to establish moral standards not just express emotions as benam says Nature has placed mankind under two Sovereign Masters it is for them alone to determine what is right and wrong but of course you know for air absolutely not he'd say benam that's your opinion good for you you live your life by that standard I'm going to choose something else I'm going to feel how I emotionally react to the situation I see and then just express my opinion about it so of course if you get to this position where there are no moral standards there are no moral truths or facts everything is a matter of personal opinion that is then very unhelpful for uh morality and ethics but you could also say couldn't you that's very unhelpful for society when you then have no moral standards no rules no agreement on what is right or wrong because it's just a matter of personal preference and opinion so really interesting actually to evaluate emotivism in terms of we've got a strength there that it promotes tolerance of different viewpoints but then the problem with it is that it undermines the entire system of morality and the entire idea of establishing right and wrong on a universal scale so very interesting I think I love love this topic I think it's fascinating and when we actually think about it and the implications of it for society it's you know pretty major isn't it to say that if you are an emotivist you could potentially end up with no no basis for Morality um and as I say what are the implications of that for society so yeah very interesting again do let me know what you're thinking in the comments great to hear your thoughts on emotivism and of course on naturalism and intuitionism so if we take a step back now which of course we were already doing because we're doing met ethics and we actually think about these approaches from a bird ey perspective um are ethical statements objective and meaningful or are ethical statements subjective and meaningless well hopefully we now know with confidence that naturalism and intuitionism both say that ethical statements are objective and meaningful naturalists of course would say that they are observed empirically whereas intuitionists would say that they are known intuitively and then of course on the other side of the table we have emotivist who beli that ethical statements are subjective and meaningless because they are matters of personal preference and opinion so no moral truths can be discovered because they don't exist it's all a matter of personal opinion it's your emotional reaction it's your personal preference it's a matter of individual taste so the final thing we need to take a look at as I promised at the start of the video is this question about whether met ethics is the most important type of Ethics remember we looked at those three different tiers of Ethics didn't we we looked at Art met ethics normative ethics and applied ethics there the question we need to consider is is what is good which of course is the key matter ethical question is that the most important question in ethics or are normative and applied ethics more important so what do we think yes it is why might someone say meta ethics is the most important type of Ethics now that we've spent a few uh hours not a few hours it feels like it hopefully the video had gone very quick for you there weren't too many adverts um but now we've spend some time I should say thinking about this why might somebody say that yes it is the most important type of Ethics well we could say that meta ethical questions need addressing first if we are unclear on what goodness is it is difficult to build normative theories on how we should act and again we see that with benam and his assertion about nature placing mankind under those two Sovereign Masters we need to know what they are so that our ethical Theory can be about working towards them hence the fact utilitarianism is about doing what's useful to maximize pleasure and minimize pain we could say the word good May mean very different things and we know that don't we we've discussed that if we each mean something different by the word then practical ethics become very tricky so it's very important that we answer the question what is the good as our starting point and then we can build our ethical Theory and then apply our ethics to different situations but we need to understand that first before we can then apply it and we could say addressing what goodness is also affects our moral motivations if I believe that the Universe have fixed god-given standards of goodness so you know natural moral law but also Divine command Theory then I may be more inclined to be good than if I think that goodness is just a subjective idea so of course you know interesting as well when we think about emotivism does that lead to people being immoral because they think that morals are just a matter of personal opinion so you can do what you want basically so would that lead to Anarchy whereas with naturalism or intuitionism and the idea that there are moral truths and therefore there are objective Universal moral laws does that encourage goodness because you know we think right okay that morality has been established it is set in stone it is clear I need to follow it I need to work towards fulfilling it whereas if good is just whatever you feel like it's potentially going to lead to more immorality You could argue in terms of why someone might say met ethics is not the most important type of Ethics then well you could say that the question of what is good is too remote and actually it's too complex um there seems to be little agreement on what the answer might be we certainly know that we've just seen haven't we by looking at naturalism intuitionism and emotivism there are lots of different opinions there is you know real contradiction in those theories so it seems actually we're no further to An Answer than we were at the start of the video so we could say you know there's no point really spending time studying this we should just focus on the practicalities of normative ethics and we could say it also seems to Bear little relation to the Practical issues in ethics and we could also say in terms of why it's not the most important question in ethics that regardless of whether we answer the question of what goodness is we are not excused then from the practicalities of needing to make ethical decisions about the issues we face so you could say that instead of asking what is the good we should be asking what shall I do um and that could be seen as the more far pressing um far more pressing sorry more important question um but I think interesting with that is surely asking what shall I do is going to be based on your answer to the question of what is the good so again you know just a little counterargument for you there in terms of the uh answers we've got here for is matter ethics the most important type of ethics and again please do let me know in the comments below always great to hear from you what you are thinking on this and whether you you know you personally prefer naturalism intuitionism or emotivism but then also whether you think matter ethics is the most important type of Ethics that we have so that is it from me thank you for watching I hope that's been helpful and good luck with your studies take care bye-bye for now