definitions for chapter 2 (ethical and cultural relativism)

MORAL NORMS: they happen to be fundamental rules for human welfare.

ETIQUETTE: important rules but not fundamental to human welfare.

LEGAL NORMS: are commands or rules dealing with specific present issues of importance to human welfare (a legal system is a closed, logical system in which correct decisions are deduced from predetermined legal rules without reference to social considerations, they are called "precedent").

LEGAL ≠  MORAL

example: "in 1819 slavery was legal but immoral" 

moral disagreements are inevitable. disagreements and difference is part and parcel of the moral landscape.

moral theories analyze and normativize moral disagreements.

the existence of disagreements doesn't rule out ethical consensus and best consensus.

note: don't confuse tolerance or understanding with relativism. you can understand a person and yet realize that what she does is wrong. see that tolerate and defend are different things. you may tolerate what you disagree and defend its right to exist, but the tolerance stops once you realize that someone is exploiting or abusing another human being. why? because that action is wrong. you don't tolerate or defend wrong doing.  

descriptive ethical relativism: different people have different moral values that are right to them. here you are merely stating a fact, not morally evaluating it.

ethical relativism: what makes an action right is that someone approves of it.

counterarguments to ethical relativism:  

1- an action cannot be both right and wrong at the same time.
2- it makes the ethical relativist infallible, and there's no point in discussing the disagreement. no one will ever win.
3- if you were an ethical relativist you don't have any way to convince someone that disagrees with you other than saying: "the action is wrong because I disapprove of it". 
 
cultural relativism: what makes an action right is that it's approved by that culture. 

cultural relativity of behavior: different people express different behaviors. that's culturally obvious. note: you may disagree with costumes of your culture. I do, and having said that I add: I love my culture. THEY ARE NOT EXCLUSIVE. i.e., values that are not fundamental, manners, eating, hygiene, dressing, mating, family, etc. these are called cultural peripheral values.
counterarguments to ethical relativism:

1- an action cannot be both right and wrong at the same time for different cultures. it's contradictory. we need to further investigate the issue.
2- moral norms express deeper values. and moral values (or norms) seem to be trans-cultural. many different cultures surprisingly agree with core values: do not kill your own, incest is wrong, respect the elders, do not cheat, worship your gods, etc.
3- cultural relativism happens not because people have different views o morality but because they have different views of reality.  
 4- it doesn't tell us how to act when cultures overlap. if you're a haitian-american you know that you are different than a haitian from the island (my haitian students confide me all the time of the shock they have when visiting the island for the first time). how to explain that hybrid that agrees and simultaneously disagree with her culture? she's between two cultures! who is right?  2-  cultural relativism doesn't say WHY we should act in a certain manner. all it says is "it's right to act in this manner because we believe it."  (cultural relativism lacks moral reasons).