WJEC/Eduqas RS for A2/Yr2: Religion and Ethics (DRAFT)

WJEC / Eduqas Religious Studies for A Level Year 2 and A2 Religion and Ethics

This is the very basis of the challenge to the proposal of Intuitionism that J .L. Mackie proposed in his book, Ethics: Inventing Right and Wrong , published in 1977 (pages 38–42). Mackie argues that what Intuitionism does, in hiding behind the explanation of self-evident truths, is to present us with implausible oddities and strange suggestions that ultimately make the whole theory queer; hence, he refers to it as ‘the argument from queerness’. Mackie argues: ‘If there were objective values, then they would be entities or qualities or relations of a very strange sort, utterly different from anything else in the universe … Correspondingly, if we were aware of them, it would have to be by some special faculty of moral perception or intuition, utterly different from our normal ways of knowing everything else.’ This is similar to Kant’s challenge against the cosmological argument for the existence of God that if a God did exist, this ‘first cause’ would be so very different from anything that we experience or know and so would not be able to recognise or know about it. This is because our knowledge is limited to the phenomenal world of space and time and it is not possible to speculate about what may or may not exist independently of space and time. Another argument was presented by David Hume. David Hume argued that knowledge can never provide an ‘influencing motive of the will’ and that any ethical term that does this has to add the element of queerness to a particular description. This also supports Mackie’s argument that Intuitionism is ‘is a travesty of actual moral thinking’. It appears we can adopt different conclusions as follows: Moral terms are intuitive; or, moral terms come from testing our views over and over again in different situations; or, moral terms are both given by our intuition and develop in response to real-life situations. Ultimately, it would seem, the problem of ‘testing’ and evaluating whether moral terms are intuitive all reduces to the principle that intuition is self-evident. Therefore, even if we demonstrated that ethical terms were not intuitive we would be wrong according to intuitivists and that we simply have not used our intuitions correctly! Key quote Moreover, since the truths which are supposed to be self-evident are, by definition, ones for which no reasons can be given, there can be no way of resolving the disagreement or of showing which of the views in question is really the apprehension of a self-evident truth. (Norman) Study tip It is vital for AO2 that you actually discuss arguments and not just explain what someone may have stated. Try to ask yourself, ‘was this a fair point to make?’, ‘is the evidence sound enough?’, ‘is there anything to challenge this argument?’, ‘is this a strong or weak argument?’ Such critical analysis will help you develop your evaluation skills.

Key questions Is our intuition really a trustworthy guide to ultimate truth? What about my intuition that there is a ghost in my closet? Is there really one true order to the universe, or is that viewpoint merely an interpretation of reality? Is there really no uniformity amongst the various moralities the world over? Do people in our own culture really disagree on the most important aspects of morality? Do you need to have empirical evidence to know if an action should be judged as moral or immoral?

DRAFT

AO2 Activity List some conclusions that could be drawn from the AO2 reasoning from the above text; try to aim for at least three different possible conclusions. Consider each of the conclusions and collect brief evidence to support each conclusion from the AO1 and AO2 material for this topic. Select the conclusion that you think is most convincing and explain why it is so. Try to contrast this with the weakest conclusion in the list, justifying your argument with clear reasoning and evidence.

46