Meta-Ethics: Realism, Anti-Realism, Non-Cognitivism, Error Theory, etc. (Moral Philosophy Episode 4)

An overview of the different theories and categories within meta-ethics as well as some arguments for and against various meta-ethical positions. Where normative ethics (e.g. utilitarianism, deontological ethics, virtue ethics, etc.) takes 'good' and 'bad' for granted, meta-ethics asks what morality actually is. The main debate is between moral realism - the view that mind-independent moral properties (e.g. 'good' and 'bad') and facts (e.g. "stealing is bad") exist - and moral anti-realism, which says these properties and facts don't exist. A related debate is whether moral judgements (e.g. "stealing is wrong") are meant as truth-apt descriptions/beliefs, and this is the debate between cognitivism and non-cognitivism. Then within these two sets of categories (realism/anti-realism and cognitivism/non-cognitivism) you've got more specific theories like naturalism, non-naturalism, error theory, emotivism, and prescriptivism. Yes it's a topic with a lot of definitions but my PERFECT explanations will make it 100% clear and then we can start evaluating these theories with arguments like the naturalistic fallacy, Mill's 'proof' of utilitarianism, Ayer's verification principle, and Mackie's arguments from queerness. These videos are based around the AQA A-level philosophy syllabus. 00:00 Intro 02:34 Overview and definitions 07:38 Moral realism 08:58 Moral realism: moral naturalism 11:33 Moral realism: moral naturalism: Mill's proof of utilitarianism 13:52 Moral realism: moral non-naturalism 15:56 Moral realism: moral non-naturalism: The naturalistic fallacy 17:37 Moral realism: moral non-naturalism: Moore's intuitionism 20:15 Moral anti-realism 20:51 Moral anti-realism: non-cognitivism 25:21 Moral anti-realism: non-cognitivism: emotivism 26:51 Moral anti-realism: non-cognitivism: emotivism: Ayer's verification principle/Hume's fork 30:24 Moral anti-realism: error theory 30:42 Frege-Geach embedding argument against non-cognitivism 34:13 Moral anti-realism: error theory: Mackie's arguments from queerness 40:11 General realist arguments against moral anti-realism 40:56 Moral progress argument against anti-realism 43:18 Moral nihilism argument against anti-realism 46:11 Summary: Meta-ethics 50:09 Outro and books References/further reading: - My website (AQA notes): https://philosophyalevel.com/aqa-philosophy-revision-notes/metaethics/ - My website (OCR notes): https://philosophyalevel.com/ocr-religious-studies-revision-notes/religion-and-ethics/#MetaEthics - My book (AQA philosophy): https://www.amazon.com/How-Get-Level-Philosophy-Deconstructing/dp/B093B6J5TH/ - My book (OCR RS): https://www.amazon.co.uk/Level-Religious-Studies-Revision-Exercises/dp/B0HBCCGT5S/ - Utilitarianism by John Stuart Mill. Full text available here: https://www.earlymoderntexts.com/assets/pdfs/mill1863.pdf - Principia Ethica by G.E. Moore. Full text available here: https://www.gutenberg.org/files/53430/53430-h/53430-h.htm - Treatise of Human Nature by David Hume. Full text available here: https://philosophyalevel.com/david-hume-a-treatise-of-human-nature/ - Language Truth and Logic by A.J. Ayer. Full text available here: https://antilogicalism.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/language-truth-and-logic.pdf - Ethics: Inventing Right and Wrong by J.L. Mackie. Relevant chapters available here: https://spot.colorado.edu/~heathwoo/readings/mackie.pdf - Assertion by Peter Geach (this is where the embedding argument against non-cognitivism comes from). Original paper here: https://www.jstor.org/stable/2183123 - Stanford page (a good resource) on meta-ethics: https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/metaethics/ - Stanford page on cognitivism and non-cognitivism: https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/moral-cognitivism/ #philosophy #metaethics #moralphilosophy #alevelphilosophy