I'm afraid there are no easy answers to these very big and important questions. But here are a couple quick responses that sometimes get people who think they are relativists to think about it more. 1. The opposite of Objectivism about morality (there being some Absolute Good grounded in some trans-human source such as God or the Eternal Form or whatever) need not be Relativism (there being no facts or truths about what is morally better or worse). Rather, there might be Normative standards of better and worse moral beliefs and behaviors. Is there an Objective fact regarding who is the Absolute Best rock band (or artist or movie or politician) of all time? What trans-human source would (could) ground such facts? But do negative answers to these questions thereby mean that there are simply no standards by which to judge which are the better and worse rock bands (artists, movies, politicians, etc.)? Surely, the Beatles, the Stones, U2, and Led Zeppelin are contenders and the...

The statistical norm might be defined by what is true of the majority. But why on earth would we want to define the moral norm solely in terms of what the majority of people do? That would mean that, by definition, vegetarianism, atheism, and marriage between different races was wrong. It would mean that you were morally wrong if you were an abolitionist in the South or fought for equality for women in America in the early 20th century (I'm not sure when that became the majority position) or fight for equality for women in many countries today. For that matter, it would make it wrong to be a Jew or a man who goes to college or a firefighter. Perhaps what you mean is that homosexuality could be considered biologically "non-normal" (it's not clear exactly what that might mean, since whatever we do is allowed by our biology). That may not be true, depending on what one means by biologically normal. But even if it were, it would not make it morally wrong, since lots of biologically "non...

I think the answer is yes, many public figures have some moral obligations beyond those of non-public figures, at least if we make a few assumptions: 1. People want and need role models, especially children. 2. The actions of the people we take to be role models influences us, at a minimum by making us happier when they do impressive things (e.g., athletic performances, wonderful art, inspiring political decisions) and by making us sadder when they do despicable things (e.g., betraying their family, embezzling, acting hypocritically, etc.), and possibly more so to the extent that they make it more likely that people emulate their immoral behavior. 3. The public figures know that 1 and 2 are true--that is, they know their behavior is public and that it may influence people's attitudes and behaviors. 4. As you say, there are some facts about what is moral and immoral. Having said this, two caveats: 1. The assumptions above apply wherever people have role models, so to the...

That's a really fantastic question! It raises interesting questions about how to understand promises and the moral obligations they impose (a much-discussed topic in philosophy) and also about how to understand personal identity through time (when I promise myself I'll do X in the future, is the promiser the same person as the promisee?) and weakness of will. When I see such a good question, my first thought is some philosopher must have written about this. Indeed, a quick google search turned up this very recent article by Allen Habib. Since I don't know the literature and am writing this before reading that article, I just offer two thoughts off the cuff: 1. One might answer your question in a somewhat circular way by simply defining promises in certain ways. For instance, if one defines a promise as a vow one person makes to a different person, then you could not really make a promise to oneself (one might be doing something analogous to promising), unless one takes an odd...

Since your question is so timely, given the arrest of the missionaries in Haiti who were illegally taking 33 children out of the country, the first thing to point out is that it might be immoral to adopt such children, even with parental consent, if the adoption was made possible by actions that were illegal . That is, it might be immoral because, in general, it is immoral to break the law. Nonetheless, we might ask whether it would be immoral even if it were not illegal or whether this is one of those cases where breaking the law is not immoral (e.g., though some may take it as controversial, I take it that Rosa Parks was not doing something immoral in breaking the (immoral) segregation laws and that homosexuals were not doing something immoral when they had sex in their own homes in states that had (immoral) laws against such acts). Other philosophers will know this literature better than I, but I take this case of adoption to be one where questions of consent become very difficult,...

Yes, especially if it involves the actual infliction of pain on someone else, not just getting pleasure from watching real or fake depictions of people in pain. On every theory of morality, gratuitous or unnecessary pain is wrong and should be avoided. Some theories try to ground that moral claim in more fundamental moral claims, while others, such as utilitarianism, treat "pain is bad" as a fundamental fact from which to derive moral conclusions. If you believe there are no moral truths, then sadism is not immoral because nothing is, but in that case, there's nothing special about sadism except that, like rape or murder, it is a particularly counterintuitive case for people who think there are no moral truths. A more interesting question is whether masochism is immoral (i.e., deriving pleasure from the experience of pain, though this definition itself is philosophically perplexing if one defines pain and pleasure as opposites!). Or what to think about a sadist and a masochist getting together...

To answer your second question first, you are correct that what is natural is not always good (though of course we need to know what we mean by "natural" and "good"). For instance, if we mean by "natural" what humans have strong desires to do, presumably in part because of our evolutionary history, then it will be natural for humans to eat pretty much as much sugar and salt and fat as we can (in the environments in which we evolved, sugar, salt, and fat, all of which are crucial for survival, were scarce enough that there would be little selection pressure to limit consumption of them). But if by "good" we mean what will keep us healthy and alive, then in our current environment, our natural desires to eat so much sugar, salt, and fat are not good. What is natural is not good. Similar arguments might be given for a variety of desires or behaviors, which humans plausibly have developed in part because of our (natural) selective history, and which we would not call good: promiscuity, racism...

There's a lot of subtext in your question--you seem to be suggesting that if there are genes that influence whether one is homosexual or heterosexual, that indicates that being gay is a mental illness. That would be a very strange argument, since the fact that there are genes that influence traits or behaviors says nothing about whether that trait or behavior is good or bad in either the biological or ethical sense. Perhaps you are thinking that because homosexuals do not have the desire to mate with the opposite sex, any genes that may underlie homosexuality are "maladaptive" in the way some mental illnesses are caused by maladaptive genes. But that is also a mistake, since (a) in humans' past evolutionary environments homosexuals may have reproduced (they wouldn't be the only humans who have had sex for procreation without being particularly attracted to their mates!), (b) there are interesting data suggesting that homosexuality in some animal species (perhaps including humans and their...

Millie, you sound like you may have read Peter Singer's work. If not, you may find it interesting. Here's his website . Of course, his arguments will reinforce your feelings so you may also want to look for some responses to his view. Singer is a utilitarian, which means he thinks (1) that the right action is always that action that will produce the most overall happiness (or the action that will reduce the most amount of suffering). And he thinks (2) that if well-off people in developed nations gave much, much more of their money away to charity (especially for famine relief in developing countries), that would produce the most overall suffering (since the loss of happiness from the rich would be more than offset by the prevention of suffering among those in need). So, he thinks (3) that we are morally obligated to give away much, much more. I love teaching this article in intro philosophy because it is very difficult to see where the argument might go wrong (if it does)--both 1 and 2 seem...

You've picked up on an interesting case some philosophers have used to discuss "moral luck" (see, e.g., Owen Flanagan's Varieties of Moral Personality and I think Bernard Williams discusses this case). It seems like the moral value of an agent's action should not depend on factors that are clearly outside the control of the agent, such as whether the art Gauguin believed he could only produce by doing something bad is deemed to be so good that his action may be deemed a "necessary evil" that he was right to carry out. Your nice twist is to point out that the moral value of his action seems like it might change over time depending on how his art is perceived. (Another case of moral luck is exemplified by the drunk driver who hits and kills a child who happens to be crossing the street when a similarly drunk driver makes it home, though he would have hit the child had he been less lucky. We not only blame the "unlucky" driver more but we prosecute him differently with much worse legal consequences.) ...