What is it that makes these judgments not examples of moral/ethical judgment?
And, what would you call these judgments isntead (chauvinistic judgments)?
I am trying to get at something essential to moral discourse here.
- You should support Italy for the World Cup title this year.
- You should support OSU against UM in the upcoming game.
Bonus points to anyone who can refer me to a scholarly essay and/or monograph that explicitly deals with this or a similar question.
------
"He Himself is our Peace." (Eph 2)
Posts
2 comments:
I think that one aspect would be "scope." I would posit the category of "practical statements," that is, statements which are concerned with some behavior/action/goal/etc. Within this category, you have:
1) Emotive statements: "you ought to do x because I like x"
2) Relative statements: "you ought to do x in order to accomplish goal y"
3) Absolute statements: analysis forthcoming.
(1) and (3) look similar, because against (2) they are not merely ordered to a given goal. If I were to ask you why I should support UofM or OSU, you would not be able to give me a practical reason; you might give me reasons for feeling the appropriate way, but there is nothing which rooting for the given team would accomplish in most cases.
I would think that there could not be any truly moral discourse unless the set of (3)-type propositions is not empty. There must be some absolute, good in and of itself, or possibly multiple absolutes (if so, however, then there can be cases in which one both ought and ought not to perform an action without and way of arbitrating). Coming from a medieval standpoint, I would say that the sole direct inhabitant of the set of (3) is God, or more precisely, "God ought to be loved as the ultimate final cause." Other traditions may wish to answer differently, though I think this answer has the benefit of giving a metaphysical basis for ethics (among other benefits).
The set of moral statements {M} would then be made up of the following:
a) everything from (3)
b) everything from (2) which is necessary for doing everything in {M}
c) everything from (2) which is used to perform something in {M}, in its specific performance
d) maybe statements from (1) which are the emotive equivalents to everything in {M}? Is it moral to feel in a particular way?
So, "You ought to cheer for OSU" could never be a moral statement. If God were to will it ("God ought to be loved" entailing "God's will ought to be followed"), though, then "You ought to cheer for UofM" could be ;o).
How about calling them judgments of taste? (That is, they're relatively morally neutral judgments based instead on one's knowledge of the game, knowledge of skill level of the players, and/or knowledge of the players (or coaches) themselves & their history -- which would also involve the history (i.e. context) of the person doing the judging.)
That's the best I can do off the top of my head. If I think of something better I'll post it.
Post a Comment