Moral relativism vs. moral absolutism

I sent a message to BlackRegiment the other day, as I had read a thread he had created about abortion a while back and missed the opportunity to question him at that time. This is the message I sent him:

Hey BR,

I'd ask this in the "Do you consider yourself to be a good person" thread but it's not relevant to what's being discussed. This comes from genuine curiosity, so please do not construe this as a personal attack against you or your faith. Anyway, what I wish to ask is this:

I've seen you of the opinion in numerous threads that you don't believe in moral relativism. You also don't believe in abortion, yet you agree with the death penalty. Is that correct? I believe life begins at conception, and as I remember from reading one of your posts you do as well? So how is being against abortion yet being for the death penalty not equal to holding a moral relativist standpoint?

Thanks for any response.

He went into no explanation but sent me two links instead that explained Christianity's position. Basically it justifies the death penalty under the rationale that the person being executed has commited acts of evil, and the life being taken is not "innocent", as an unborn baby is. That both acts are not morally equivalent. But that's completely irrelevant. Moral absolutism is absolute, there are no exceptions. Circumstance is not even a consideration. If one believes in moral absolutism and believes killing is wrong, then killing is wrong, period. End of story. Otherwise it wouldn't be absolute, yes?

So what's up? How are there exceptions?

I'm pro-life. In fact, I'm so pro-life that I think that people who get an abortion "deserve" the death penalty. However, I am against the death penalty, even if people deserve it, so the same holds true with people who get an abortion. Giving them death prevents them from making a second chance in this life and it is also more expensive than locking them up for life. Also, crime is more prevalent in states that are more for the death penalty, although the old saying goes that causation is not correlation. I like to look at things in their most absolute sense, but I do hold the notion that it ultimately is subjective, and that as a result, I can see how it can be contemplated as relative, if that were to make sense. To be honest, I don't muse much about morality in terms of its perception but in terms of implementation.

EDIT: I am aware that my stance on abortion can be viewed as controversial, but to me, it isn't. I am unrepentant on the subject.

I'm pro-life. In fact, I'm so pro-life that I think that people who get an abortion "deserve" the death penalty. However, I am against the death penalty, even if people deserve it, so the same holds true with people who get an abortion. Giving them death prevents them from making a second chance in this life and it is also more expensive than locking them up for life. Also, crime is more prevalent in states that are more for the death penalty, although the old saying goes that causation is not correlation. I like to look at things in their most absolute sense, but I do hold the notion that it ultimately is subjective, and that as a result, I can see how it can be contemplated as relative, if that were to make sense. To be honest, I don't muse much about morality in terms of its perception but in terms of implementation.

Genetic_Code

First you say your incredibly against abortion and then you say you want it to be dealt with the death penalty. Then say your against the death penalty.... Right. Also keeping someone in prison costs around 20-30 thousand a year. Once your given the death penalty your thrown on death row. You stay there usually for some time. After you run out of appeals and you reach your execution date, your killed by lethal injection. Some states offer the electric chair as an alternative at your discretion. Now tell me how being killed is more expensive then serving life in prison at 20-30 thousand a year? My only complaint about lethal injection is it is done in a inefficient manner. With 2 barbiturates you could achieve an easy death in what takes the prison 3 or 4 separate drugs that depend heavily on body type. But then again I could careless if a serial killers dies horrendously.

First you say your incredibly against abortion and then you say you want it to be dealt with the death penalty. Then say your against the death penalty.... Right.

Uxal

Perhaps I didn't make myself clear. I said that they deserve the death penalty, but that does not mean I advocate the death penalty to be used against them.

Either way, there's no reason to be rude about it.

Also keeping someone in prison costs around 20-30 thousand a year. Once your given the death penalty your thrown on death row. You stay there usually for some time. After you run out of appeals and you reach your execution date, your killed by lethal injection. Some states offer the electric chair as an alternative at your discretion. Now tell me how being killed is more expensive then serving life in prison at 20-30 thousand a year? My only complaint about lethal injection is it is done in a inefficient manner. With 2 barbiturates you could achieve an easy death in what takes the prison 3 or 4 separate drugs that depend heavily on body type. But then again I could careless if a serial killers dies horrendously.

Uxal

• The California death penalty system costs taxpayers $114 million per year beyond the costs of keeping convicts locked up for life.
Taxpayers have paid more than $250 million for each of the state's executions. (L.A. Times, March 6, 2005)
• In Kansas, the costs of capital cases are 70% more expensive than comparable non-capital cases, including the costs of incarceration.
(Kansas Performance Audit Report, December 2003).
• In Indiana, the total costs of the death penalty exceed the complete costs of life without parole sentences by about 38%, assuming
that 20% of death sentences are overturned and reduced to life. (Indiana Criminal Law Study Commission, January 10, 2002).
• The most comprehensive study in the country found that the death penalty costs North Carolina $2.16 million per execution over the
costs of sentencing murderers to life imprisonment. The majority of those costs occur at the trial level. (Duke University, May 1993).
• Enforcing the death penalty costs Florida $51 million a year above what it would cost to punish all first-degree murderers with life in
prison without parole. Based on the 44 executions Florida had carried out since 1976, that amounts to a cost of $24 million for each
execution. (Palm Beach Post, January 4, 2000).
• In Texas, a death penalty case costs an average of $2.3 million, about three times the cost of imprisoning someone in a single cell at
the highest security level for 40 years. (Dallas Morning News, March 8, 1992).

http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/FactSheet.pdf

I'm pro-life. In fact, I'm so pro-life that I think that people who get an abortion "deserve" the death penalty. However, I am against the death penalty, even if people deserve it, so the same holds true with people who get an abortion. Giving them death prevents them from making a second chance in this life and it is also more expensive than locking them up for life. Also, crime is more prevalent in states that are more for the death penalty, although the old saying goes that causation is not correlation. I like to look at things in their most absolute sense, but I do hold the notion that it ultimately is subjective, and that as a result, I can see how it can be contemplated as relative, if that were to make sense. To be honest, I don't muse much about morality in terms of its perception but in terms of implementation.

Genetic_Code

I'm pro-life as well as anti-death penalty, but am also a moral relativist to most other issues. I just don't understand how many theists always claim to be moral absolutists yet they are pro-life while also pro-death penalty. I have yet to hear a sensible explanation from them aside that they're "not the same", which is irrelevant. A consistent moral standpoint supersedes all acts.

Perhaps I didn't make myself clear. I said that they deserve the death penalty, but that does not mean I advocate the death penalty to be used against them.

Either way, there's no reason to be rude about it.

Genetic_Code

I hate it when people do this. Whilst I don't support abortions, people who get abortions are usually in very difficult positions. It's not a simple throwaway decision.

"Moral relativism" and "moral absolutism" are both basically just ideas. The first one seems to be in touch with reality while the other one isn't. If your interpretation is correct, is it not clear that the scripture has it's own moral standards which is relative to something or someone else? Whereas "moral absolutism" is literally an absolute term in itself and shouldn't be subjective to any religion or anyone or anything what so ever.

Killing and lying according to "moral absolutism"is wrong. I could ask how can the act of lying and killing be immoral where as an act of eating or dancing isn't? What I am trying to say is these simple acts are not born immoral or moral. They are attributed as moral or immoral according to the effect they have on people when they are performed, either directly or indirectly. 

Abortion is an immoral act in most cases but it would be very naive to assume that the baby's parent's doesn't have the slightest remorse about it. I can say with certainty that those parents feel a lot worse about things like these than those people who looks at them as if they are evil-spawn.  No one can say that a murderer killing someone for money can be equated to parents aborting a child.

It is in rigid dogma of theism that true "Moral relativism" lies. Consider the idea, for instance, that certain behaviors are immoral for humans (murder, genocide, infanticide, lying, jealousy, etc.) but perfectly okay when God does them, or that the stoning to death of adulterers, homosexuals, clam-eaters, multi-fabric wearers, etc. used to be perfectly moral, but is now assumed to be forbidden now that the savior has come. These are inherently "relativist" positions, and ridiculous ones at that.

But even when ethics are pondered with reason rather than faith, the fact remains that  there are few, if any, actions that could be considered immoral in any possible situation, and even Christians will acknowledge this if you place things in the right perspective. Here's an example: the Nazi officer at my door wants to know if I'm letting Jews hide out in my basement, which I am, and simple answer of "no" will easily spare their lives. Oh, but what about that good old commandment, "Though shall not lie?" Hmm, decisions, decisions.

Even the seemingly obvious maxim that killing is wrong has its exceptions. Again, for Christians it goes without saying, as their Holy Book is positively brimming with commands and detailed instructions by God himself to kill people in various horrible ways for numerous idiotic reasons, but even in the secular realm there are understandable disputes and countless shades of gray. One who approves of killing on the battlefield, in a gas chamber or in a slaughterhouse may find it utterly disdainful in an abortion clinic. Whether the proverbial thumb is turned up or down will always depend on the beliefs and circumstances of the killer, the killed and the observers.

Actually I never really considered this before but yeah it seems as though there are many examples of moral relativism in religion. It doesn't quite add up.

Anyway I guess you could call me a moral relativist. I believe that righness and wrongness is defined by people rather than by the nature of the action itself. That is to say that any given action does not have the property of being right or wrong just as any given peice of art does not have the property of being beautiful or ugly. Society ascribes morality to actions rather than actions ascribing morality to society.

It is in rigid dogma of theism that true "Moral relativism" lies. Consider the idea, for instance, that certain behaviors are immoral for humans (murder, genocide, infanticide, lying, jealousy, etc.) but perfectly okay when God does them, or that the stoning to death of adulterers, homosexuals, clam-eaters, multi-fabric wearers, etc. used to be perfectly moral, but is now assumed to be forbidden now that the savior has come. These are inherently "relativist" positions, and ridiculous ones at that.

But even when ethics are pondered with reason rather than faith, the fact remains that there are few, if any, actions that could be considered immoral in any possible situation, and even Christians will acknowledge this if you place things in the right perspective. Here's an example: the Nazi officer at my door wants to know if I'm letting Jews hide out in my basement, which I am, and simple answer of "no" will easily spare their lives. Oh, but what about that good old commandment, "Though shall not lie?" Hmm, decisions, decisions.

Even the seemingly obvious maxim that killing is wrong has its exceptions. Again, for Christians it goes without saying, as their Holy Book is positively brimming with commands and detailed instructions by God himself to kill people in various horrible ways for numerous idiotic reasons, but even in the secular realm there are understandable disputes and countless shades of gray. One who approves of killing on the battlefield, in a gas chamber or in a slaughterhouse may find it utterly disdainful in an abortion clinic. Whether the proverbial thumb is turned up or down will always depend on the beliefs and circumstances of the killer, the killed and the observers.

creepy_mike

Christian theology isn't nearly as rigid in morality as you might think; most subscribe to some form of situational ethics, as I do myself.

 

But even when ethics are pondered with reason rather than faith, the fact remains that  there are few, if any, actions that could be considered immoral in any possible situation, and even Christians will acknowledge this if you place things in the right perspective. Here's an example: the Nazi officer at my door wants to know if I'm letting Jews hide out in my basement, which I am, and simple answer of "no" will easily spare their lives. Oh, but what about that good old commandment, "Though shall not lie?" Hmm, decisions, decisions.

 

creepy_mike

This is actually easily resolved: the morality of a given situation is not based upon its circumstance; meaning that if I were to lie to the Nazi's, I would still sin, but I would simultaneously save the lives of the Jews. The ends aren't justifying the means, but rather the ends of one course of means is preferable to another.

I believe that rightness and wrongness is defined by people rather than by the nature of the action itself. That is to say that any given action does not have the property of being right or wrong just as any given piece of art does not have the property of being beautiful or ugly. Society ascribes morality to actions rather than actions ascribing morality to society. domatron23

Word! I agree completely.

I'm pro-life. In fact, I'm so pro-life that I think that people who get an abortion "deserve" the death penalty. However, I am against the death penalty, even if people deserve it, so the same holds true with people who get an abortion. Giving them death prevents them from making a second chance in this life and it is also more expensive than locking them up for life. Also, crime is more prevalent in states that are more for the death penalty, although the old saying goes that causation is not correlation. I like to look at things in their most absolute sense, but I do hold the notion that it ultimately is subjective, and that as a result, I can see how it can be contemplated as relative, if that were to make sense. To be honest, I don't muse much about morality in terms of its perception but in terms of implementation.

EDIT: I am aware that my stance on abortion can be viewed as controversial, but to me, it isn't. I am unrepentant on the subject.

Genetic_Code

What right can an embryo have to life?

What right can an embryo have to life?

MetalGear_Ninty

Shortly after conception, we all have our unique DNA. No additional genetic information is required for the fetus as it goes through life.

Jon E. Dougherty of  WorldNetDaily.com writes that humans are never "...'fully-developed.' We're not born 'complete.' We grow, change, mature and age constantly, which means we're always 'developing,' and we develop though the first nine months of our lives attached to a 'host' — our mothers. So, the fact that the first nine months of our developmental life is in utero is of no consequence to our overall lifespan; it is just the first stage. There are many developmental stages — early, middle and late. But life has to begin somewhere. We don't go from 'nothing' to adulthood....It begins when it begins — at the moment a human being is biologically 'under construction'."

[QUOTE="MetalGear_Ninty"]

What right can an embryo have to life?

Genetic_Code

Shortly after conception, we all have our unique DNA. No additional genetic information is required for the fetus as it goes through life.

Jon E. Dougherty of  WorldNetDaily.com writes that humans are never "...'fully-developed.' We're not born 'complete.' We grow, change, mature and age constantly, which means we're always 'developing,' and we develop though the first nine months of our lives attached to a 'host' — our mothers. So, the fact that the first nine months of our developmental life is in utero is of no consequence to our overall lifespan; it is just the first stage. There are many developmental stages — early, middle and late. But life has to begin somewhere. We don't go from 'nothing' to adulthood....It begins when it begins — at the moment a human being is biologically 'under construction'."

But-but, morally, it's not a human, so there!

[QUOTE="Genetic_Code"][QUOTE="MetalGear_Ninty"]

What right can an embryo have to life?

Theokhoth

Shortly after conception, we all have our unique DNA. No additional genetic information is required for the fetus as it goes through life.

Jon E. Dougherty of WorldNetDaily.com writes that humans are never "...'fully-developed.' We're not born 'complete.' We grow, change, mature and age constantly, which means we're always 'developing,' and we develop though the first nine months of our lives attached to a 'host' — our mothers. So, the fact that the first nine months of our developmental life is in utero is of no consequence to our overall lifespan; it is just the first stage. There are many developmental stages — early, middle and late. But life has to begin somewhere. We don't go from 'nothing' to adulthood....It begins when it begins — at the moment a human being is biologically 'under construction'."

But-but, morally, it's not a human, so there!

I'm sorry, were you trying to be funny there? :P

Anyway, it is pure nihilism to even suggest that humanity is contained within a bunch of non-sentient cells.

Oh crap man is this going to turn into an abortion debate with genetic_code and Theokhoth? *shudders in fear*

Well I'll ask the same question that I always do. Why do humans have the right to life, freedom and the pursuit of happiness as opposed to, say a cow.

[QUOTE="MetalGear_Ninty"]

What right can an embryo have to life?

Genetic_Code

Shortly after conception, we all have our unique DNA. No additional genetic information is required for the fetus as it goes through life.

Jon E. Dougherty of  WorldNetDaily.com writes that humans are never "...'fully-developed.' We're not born 'complete.' We grow, change, mature and age constantly, which means we're always 'developing,' and we develop though the first nine months of our lives attached to a 'host' — our mothers. So, the fact that the first nine months of our developmental life is in utero is of no consequence to our overall lifespan; it is just the first stage. There are many developmental stages — early, middle and late. But life has to begin somewhere. We don't go from 'nothing' to adulthood....It begins when it begins — at the moment a human being is biologically 'under construction'."

I don't see why having DNA means right to life.Funky_Llama

[QUOTE="Funky_Llama"]I don't see why having DNA means right to life.7guns

[QUOTE="7guns"][QUOTE="Funky_Llama"]I don't see why having DNA means right to life.Funky_Llama

Well..........I'm pro-choice, also if the baby is aborted before it gains consciousness I don't find it immoral, but the ones who does, may differ that they find it immoral to stop the process because there is a chance of a possible "conscious life-form" coming into existence.

As you can see I personally agree with this statement: "Well, if abortion is not immoral, then there's no problem about keeping our morality intact" and when I was saying: "I think its more about keeping our morality intact" I wasn't talking about myself only.

[QUOTE="Funky_Llama"][QUOTE="7guns"][QUOTE="Funky_Llama"]I don't see why having DNA means right to life.7guns

Well..........I'm pro-choice, also if the baby is aborted before it gains consciousness I don't find it immoral, but the ones who does, may differ that they find it immoral to stop the process because there is a chance of a possible "conscious life-form" coming into existence.

As you can see I personally agree with this statement: "Well, if abortion is not immoral, then there's no problem about keeping our morality intact" and when I was saying: "I think its more about keeping our morality intact" I wasn't talking about myself only.