Dr Sam's clear thinking techniques #2: No, it's not all relative
I was going to write something snarky about how the fact that a post is trending is not an indication of quality of content or of the intelligence of the author, but I think @yallapapi has done a better job of stating this. So, I thought I'd keep going down my list of philosophical bugbears.
“It’s all relative” – the catchphrase of moral commitment-phobes and 1st-year university students everywhere, these three words strike fear and existential dread into the hearts of philosophy lecturers causing them to don further layers of protective tweed and develop a deep fear of human contact.
What is wrong with this idea though? Maybe questions of ethical import are simply relative to the situation in which they occur. How we deal with this piece of mental laziness will depend on how we philosophically ‘unpack’ it. There are two ways this can be interpreted, and the responses vary accordingly.
- Claims that ethical/moral truths are ‘relative’ are a subset of the larger claim that all propositions are true relative to the situation in which they are made.
If all truths are relative, then so is the truth of the claim that “all truths are relative”. Thus, the claim that “it’s all relative”, if true, will only be true in some (but not all) situations, rendering it paradoxically untrue.
- Ethical truths are relative in a way that non-ethical truths are not. So, while claims such as: “all actions should be voluntary” are true relative to their context, meta-ethical claims about the truth of relativism are not.
This view is more coherent, but still causes problems. If meta-ethical claims (i.e.: claims about ethics) are not relative, then, by this account, they have no ethical or moral weight. Why does this matter? I guess it depends on how you want to use the “all relative” idea.
If it’s purely descriptive, then fine. But if you want to use it as a piece of moral guidance, you are in trouble, because that’s exactly what you can’t do. As soon as you tell someone that they should respect other moral codes that sanction actions they don’t approve of, because “it’s all relative”, you’ve broken your own rule and are back wallowing in the paradoxical territory described earlier.
My advice: In my considered opinion, the easiest way for ethical and moral claims to be equally correct and valuable is if they are all equally nonsensical and that none of them are true. There’s plenty of precedent for this view – but it’s hard to maintain as an action-guiding principle when you are trying to decide what to do, or have been on the receiving end of violence, coercion or anything else that seems manifestly unfair or unjust. Ethical nihilism, like ethical relativism, is hard to maintain when you are being robbed or punched in the face.
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Absolutely agree with your assessment of the status quo... ethical relativism and ethical nihilism are a real threat. Unsure if I would go so far as to say that this is okay when doing a merely descriptive thing... is that even possible, to be purely descriptive in that sense?
But what I don't really get from this, is what you suggest we do about this. (Yes, this is a mean question, but also an honest one that I've been trying to deal with the past months/years.) I'm still not positive as to what answer I would give to that, but was wondering if you have something to say about that...
I think it's logically possible (lol). In theory, I can observe that ethical norms differ from place to place with out making any normative judgement - though as my more sociologically-minded colleagues would argue, there is no 'view from nowhere'. There's a whole rabbit-hole we can go down by seeking to collapse the is-ought distinction too, but I think this is pretty contested across (and between) analytic philosophy and sociological approaches that seek to be more 'grounded'in people's lived experience.
No need to feel bad for asking that question of a philosopher. My personal answer hovers somewhere between Rawls-style reflective equilibrium and Russell-style emotivism, depending on how good or bad a day I'm having. I'm still working on what I think in that regard. (Of course, pretending to know THE ANSWER is vastly more profitable).
More broadly, I'm not sure that an answer is really essential to change things. I suspect that if more people thought about the question, and were better equipped to do this thinking, things would be different, and they might well be better.
Fair enough. I'm more in what you would call the sociological field--I call it the continental philosophy side of things. So yeah, I would contest you can logically say something purely descriptive--except within one's world obviously. (Which is meaningless in this discussion, actually part of the problem.)
I absolutely agree with your thoughts on change there. Thinking is essential, but a re-evaluation of what thinking is might be even more essential. My personal answer lies more in the realm of post-Lacanian matrixial thinking a la Ettinger. But I guess we shouldn't open that can of worms here ;)
And yes, I am writing a book about this atm. And no, it's not done yet ;)
I think about ethical paradoxes whenever I imagine what's outside my box and how I got in here.
There's a weird sense of irony going on here.
I say it's not all relative but context plays a big part.
This is also an interesting topic that you have initiated here. I suppose the answer lies between 'relativism' and 'absolutism' in a 'fractal' sort of way! It is also a dynamic.
An example would be two separate cultures, living side by side. At the center of each culture would be the most absolute and pure expressions of the norms and ethics of the culture and this is true for each culture. The interesting thing happens where these cultures meet or overlap. There is a merging or a cross adoption that happens, which changes with perspective! (in the same way when one measure the coastline from outer space, one would get a measurement, and as one moves closer to the earth surface the measure changes as it becomes more detailed. The measurement also changes by way of the instruments used to measure it with. Until finally, you are on the beach and things are no less clear, if not less so!
Now imagine multiple cultures living side by side! Now imagine every home is a separate culture (which is possibly the case).
Therefore in it's most extreme case we have the absolutes of individuals interacting with relative boundaries on an individual basis (I hope this makes sense). This either works out well or not depending on how far apart the core ethics are separated in a "polar" sense.
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I don't know it all seemed so "irrelevant" to me. If "it’s all relative" then is the opposite "irrelevant"? If the truth is all relative then that makes all lies (the opposite of truth), irrelevant. But it is all relative, since thinking about this has given me a headache, and once again has shown me the only eternal truth is change. Stuff changed in the past, it changes today, and will likely change tomorrow. Hard to say change is all relative, it just is. But I most likely missed the entire purpose of the post.
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Lol, gee, this brings back memories. I was probably one of those 1st year students damn it :P
The Statement 'everything is relative' always seemed somewhat incomplete to me. I myself wasn't happy with the idea that it was used to blithely dismiss critical reasoning when comparing different moral codes or ideas. For if you consider the context of two human cultures with different moral values there is shared contextual basis that allows comparison, namely, that we are human.
I used to say that everything is relative was incomplete for if I was the one saying it I 'd have to add that for me, everything was relative to being a human, who grew up in Australia, who came from a working class family, who studied philosophy etc.
And I thought that this extended statement wasn't subject to paradox for I'm only saying that for me, I see things, and understand them, and accept truths as I can from my own perspective, as best that I can.
And some of these contextual parameters are shared with other thinking people around me, some more than others.
Perhaps a better way of saying 'everything is relative' is to say that 'if anything can be considered to be true it is so by virtue of its context.'
Even mathematical theorems are true by virtue of the stated rules and propositions. They are not true without any context. There is no simple one to one matching of a proposition to the truth of how the World absolutely is, the map is not the territory as they say.
But maps can be better or worse even if their merits are relative to the stated assumptions, values, rules, propositions etc.
All this is to say that I think relativity is both hardly as earth shattering as many think it is and it also seems that it is misused or misstated. To appreciate that a proposition is true by virtue of its context, setting, and of how it relates to things is just to say, pay attention to detail. It doesn't allow you to blithely dismiss all attempts at the better use of reason. But paying heed to the relative details, to context that's important right?
Or so says me, from my point of view, as best that I can.
Thinking it through a little more... I do remember thinking that Cultural relativism was sort of about reacting to the idea that there was a singular ultimate truth about the independent world, or rather that there was one True World which we aimed to describe. I recall thinking that perhaps the World was actually multifarious and could be seen from many different perspectives and that these perspectives could generate different truths about the many fold World. This isn't to say that anything goes. The World still exists and it still resists. Reality can still be demonstrated by thumping the solid table and yet things can be seen in different ways. This isn't a call to lazy thinking. You can't just dismiss the importance of rigorous thought and some ideas, thoughts or theories have more utility then others (and sometimes they even show us that our ideas are flawed) for while our understanding of the World is shaped, in part, by our vision of it, yet it still resists, for it doesn't simply bend to our will, it is beyond us, and is also in an important sense beyond our understanding, even while we learn more and more as much as we can.
So I guess not everything is relative... yet its still true that everyone I know who is right mysteriously agrees with me.