Moral system

Overview

A moral system a particular set of ethical values which can be used to decide the rightness or wrongness of an act.

Attributes

• moral absolutism vs. the alternatives
• Moral externalism (important truths are discovered by observing reality) vs. moral internalism (important truths are discovered by meditation, reflection, prayer) vs. moral dogmatism (important truths come only from the wisdom of the past)

Purpose

Issuepedia is particularly concerned with values which define particular moral systems. These values are not generally subject to rational debate; what is more useful is to attempt to determine:

• meta-rules by which people with different moral systems can get along.
• where the basic differences lie between moral systems (e.g. if two people disagree about some particular issue, what are the basic irreducible principles upon which each person is basing their point of view?), with the goal of devising meta-rules (see above) to work across those differences

Value Dichotomies

Most moral systems weigh in somewhere between the two extremes for each of these, but the differences in opinion between one system and another are significant. The following principles may or may not be truly basic, but they at least are closer to being principles than they are opinions about specific issues.

• Human nature is essentially: good or evil (not quite the same as Hobbes vs. Rousseau; see below)
• Human nature comes from: genetics and other factors fixed at birth ("nature") vs. training and learning after birth ("nurture")
• Property rights: personal property is sacrosanct (propertarianism) vs. all property should be held in common
• Power: absolutism (Hobbes: "abuses of power by [legitimate] authority are to be accepted as the price of peace") vs. separation of powers and social contracts (Rousseau). This may be a restatement of Brin's question "To what degree should the state or party have to power to coerce cooperation?", or it may be subtly different.

Related Articles

• Belief in a particular moral system is usually the basis (or a strong component) of an individual's agreement with a particular political ideology.