Ethical naturalism

Meta-ethical view

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Ethical naturalism (also called moral naturalism or naturalistic cognitivistic definism)[1] is the meta-ethical view that holds that moral properties and facts are reducible to natural properties and can be studied through empirical or scientific means. It asserts that moral values are objective features of the natural world and can be understood through reason, observation, or the natural sciences. Ethical naturalists argue that moral statements, such as "kindness is good" or "stealing is wrong," are fact-based and can be verified in the same way as other statements about the world. This position stands in contrast to ethical non-naturalism, which maintains that moral properties are not reducible to natural properties, and to moral anti-realism, which denies that objective moral truths exist. Ethical naturalism has been supported by various philosophical traditions, including utilitarianism, virtue ethics, and evolutionary ethics, but has also been challenged by critics, most notably through G.E. Moore’s "open-question argument," which questions whether moral properties can be fully explained in natural terms.

## Overview

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The versions of ethical naturalism which have received the most sustained philosophical interest, for example, Cornell realism, differ from the position that "the way things are is always the way they ought to be", which few ethical naturalists hold. Ethical naturalism does, however, reject the fact-value distinction: it suggests that inquiry into the natural world can increase our moral knowledge in just the same way it increases our scientific knowledge. Indeed, proponents of ethical naturalism have argued that humanity needs to invest in the science of morality, a broad and loosely defined field that uses evidence from biology, primatology, anthropology, psychology, neuroscience, and other areas to classify and describe moral behavior.[2][3]

Some proponents of naturalistic ethics have noted that traditional terminology—such as utilitarianism, hedonism, or even eudaimonia—may fail to capture the full moral and emotional resonance of a scientifically enriched vision of well-being. Critics argue that these terms either carry misleading connotations or lack popular appeal, making them less effective in rallying moral motivation. Consequently, there have been calls for developing more compelling language and framing strategies to communicate naturalistic ethics in ways that are emotionally engaging and politically viable. For instance, the concept of "abolitionism"—understood as a naturalistic project to eliminate suffering in all sentient life—has been proposed as one such alternative, though it, too, faces challenges in clarity and public understanding.[4]

Ethical naturalism encompasses any reduction of ethical properties, such as 'goodness', to non-ethical properties; there are many different examples of such reductions, and thus many different varieties of ethical naturalism. Hedonism, for example, is the view that goodness is ultimately just pleasure.[5]

## Ethical theories that can be naturalistic

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* Altruism
* Consequentialism
* Consequentialist libertarianism
* Cornell realism
* Ethical egoism/ Objectivism
* Evolutionary ethics
* Hedonism
* Humanistic ethics
* Natural law
* Natural-rights libertarianism
* Utilitarianism
* Virtue ethics

## Criticisms

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Ethical naturalism has been criticized most prominently[according to whom?] by ethical non-naturalist G. E. Moore, who formulated the open-question argument. Garner and Rosen say that a common definition of "natural property" is one "which can be discovered by sense observation or experience, experiment, or through any of the available means of science." They also say that a good definition of "natural property" is problematic but that "it is only in criticism of naturalism, or in an attempt to distinguish between naturalistic and nonnaturalistic definist theories, that such a concept is needed."[6] R. M. Hare also criticised ethical naturalism because of what he considered its fallacious definition of the terms 'good' or 'right', saying that value-terms being part of our prescriptive moral language are not reducible to descriptive terms: "Value-terms have a special function in language, that of commending; and so they plainly cannot be defined in terms of other words which themselves do not perform this function".[7]

### Moral nihilism

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Moral nihilists maintain that there are no such entities as objective values or objective moral facts. Proponents of moral science like Ronald A. Lindsay have counter-argued that their way of understanding "morality" as a practical enterprise is the way we ought to have understood it in the first place. He holds the position that the alternative seems to be the elaborate philosophical reduction of the word "moral" into a vacuous, useless term.[8] Lindsay adds that it is important to reclaim the specific word "morality" because of the connotations it holds with many individuals.

## Morality as a science

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Main article: Science of morality

Author Sam Harris has argued that we overestimate the relevance of many arguments against the science of morality, arguments he believes scientists happily and rightly disregard in other domains of science like physics. For example, scientists may find themselves attempting to argue against philosophical skeptics, when Harris says they should be practically asking – as they would in any other domain – "why would we listen to a solipsist in the first place?" This, Harris contends, is part of what it means to practice a science of morality.

Sam Harris argues that there are societally optimal "moral peaks" to discover.

In modern times, many thinkers discussing the fact–value distinction and the is–ought problem have settled on the idea that one cannot derive ought from is. Conversely, Harris maintains that the fact-value distinction is a confusion, proposing that values are really a certain kind of fact. Specifically, Harris suggests that values amount to empirical statements about "the flourishing of conscious creatures in a society". He argues that there are objective answers to moral questions, even if some are difficult or impossible to possess in practice. In this way, he says, science can tell us what to value. Harris adds that we do not demand absolute certainty from predictions in physics, so we should not demand that of a science studying morality (see The Moral Landscape).

Physicist Sean Carroll believes that conceiving of morality as a science could be a case of scientific imperialism and insists that what is "good for conscious creatures" is not an adequate working definition of "moral".[9] In opposition, John Shook, vice president of the Center for Inquiry, claims that this working definition is more than adequate for science at present and that disagreement should not immobilize the scientific study of ethics.[10]

## References

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1. ^ Garner & Rosen 1967, p. 228
2. ^ "The New Science of Morality". edge.org. Edge Foundation, Inc. Retrieved Oct 27, 2017.
3. ^ Miller, Greg (9 May 2008). "The Roots of Morality" (PDF). American Association for the Advancement of Science. Science Magazine. Retrieved October 27, 2017.
4. ^ Pearce, David (1995). "The Hedonistic Imperative". p. 223. `{{cite web}}`: Missing or empty `|url=` (help)
5. ^ Weijers, Dan. "Hedonism". Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Retrieved 29 January 2021.
6. ^ Garner & Rosen 1967, p. 239
7. ^ Hare 1964, p. 91
8. ^ Center Stage | Episode 24 – Bioethics and Public Policy, Part 1. Center for Inquiry (2010-04-12). Retrieved on 2011-04-30.
9. ^ Sam Harris Responds | Cosmic Variance | Discover Magazine Archived 2010-07-07 at the Wayback Machine. Blogs.discovermagazine.com. Retrieved on 2011-04-30.
10. ^ Sam Harris vs. The Philosophers on Morality. Center for Inquiry (2010-05-14). Retrieved on 2011-04-30.

## Other sources

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* Garner, Richard T.; Rosen, Bernard (1967). Moral Philosophy: A Systematic Introduction to Normative Ethics and Meta-ethics. New York: Macmillan. OCLC 362952.
* Hare, R.M. (1964). The Language of Morals. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

## External links

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* Lenman, James (August 7, 2006). "Moral Naturalism". In Zalta, Edward N. (ed.). Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
* Philosophy 302: Naturalistic Ethics

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