The Dangers of Moral Absolutism

            While scouring the web, I came across a TED talk by Sam Harris. In this talk he attempts to defend the idea that every moral question can have a scientific answer—by that, he means a “yes” or “no” answer. Harris believes that the separation between science and human values is an illusion—he believes that values contain facts (science). He gives the example of increased compassion towards more genetically evolved organisms—we care about monkeys more than ants and ants more than rocks because more genetically evolved organisms have a higher range or happiness or consciousness. He says that this is an example where facts (more genetically evolved = higher range of emotions) intermingle with values (compassion). Harris then introduces more examples of terrible consequences of not following his values.

On the surface, moral absolutism seems like a great idea. If we have answers to the most intriguing moral questions then it will make our judicial system more streamlined and it will also help us make better decisions. But, there are a few problems with living in a morally absolute state. First, I believe that moral absolutism makes people more intolerant. If a person lives in a morally absolute society then they will clash with the societies around them, clashes lead to disagreements and disagreements lead to wars. So a society with a morally absolute philosophy would never be in peace because of the continuous conflicts that will arise with other societies. Why would this happen? Because a moral absolutist who believes that all lies are immoral will clash with a man who lied in order to save a life. That brings me to my second point: is there really ever an absolute? Let’s say, for example, that lying is wrong. A moral absolutist will say that ALL lying is wrong. Well, would it be wrong of me to lie to a Nazi about the Jews I’m hiding in my attic? A moral absolutist will say yes, you should never lie. A moral absolutist would give up Anne and let her die. So, as we can see from that example, what’s moral at one point might not be moral at another point. That is the basis of moral relativism.

Moral relativism states that morality of an action depends upon an individual’s beliefs and what kind of culture he or she is in. So, we can say that a woman wearing a veil is wrong, but that is only from our perspective, it might be completely alright from the other society’s perspective. I tend to agree more with moral relativism because it gives a different answer to morality in different circumstances. Our actions don’t always happen under one circumstance but they happen under many different circumstances. Just like the circumstances differ, the answer to the question of morality of each action should differ too.

TED Talk: http://www.ted.com/talks/sam_harris_science_can_show_what_s_right.html

Sources: http://www.helium.com/items/234320-the-shortcomings-of-absolutism

               http://www.unh.edu/philosophy/media/pdfs/dialectic2009/6MoralAbsolutism.pdf

   http://www.civilpolitics.org/2010/04/sam-harris%E2%80%99-ted-video-and-the- danger-of-liberal-atheist-moral-absolutism

   http://whatwillmatter.com/2012/05/commentary-774-4-the-dangers-of-absolutism/