What is Meta-ethics? (L1-Introduction) — Transcript

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1. 0:00on the one hand socrates argued that
2. 0:02morality really exists and that we can
3. 0:04judge human actions against an
4. 0:07unchanging and objective standard but
5. 0:09then we have thrashy marcus who
6. 0:11disagreed and he argued that morality is
7. 0:14just a human creation it's made up who
8. 0:17is right socrates or thrashimakis is
9. 0:20morality real or made up is morality
10. 0:22about fact or opinion objective or
11. 0:26subjective these are the sorts of
12. 0:28questions asked in metaethics this is a
13. 0:31video tutorial introducing metaethics
14. 0:33for a level students what we have just
15. 0:36seen is one of the earliest recorded
16. 0:37discussions on metaethics that can be
17. 0:39found in plato's republic
18. 0:42this is the kind of contextual
19. 0:43information you can use in assessments
20. 0:46when you unpack what meta ethics is
21. 0:49as is often the case we can trace it
22. 0:51back to the ancient greeks
23. 0:53so what is metaethics and what are the
24. 0:56two main positions in this area of
25. 0:58philosophy
26. 1:00metaethics is one of the three main
27. 1:02branches of moral philosophy we have
28. 1:04applied ethics normative ethics and then
29. 1:07meta ethics meta means beyond or behind
30. 1:11so what is the study of what is behind
31. 1:14ethics well it's the deepest level
32. 1:16questions we can ask about morality meta
33. 1:19ethics is about the nature of ethical
34. 1:22language itself these three branches
35. 1:24layer on top of each other in fact
36. 1:27whenever someone makes a moral claim
37. 1:29about a specific issue in applied ethics
38. 1:32they're also taking whether they know it
39. 1:35or not a position in normative and met
40. 1:38metaethics
41. 1:40this is what makes metaethics so
42. 1:42interesting as it's the deepest level
43. 1:45it examines the most fundamental
44. 1:46assumptions we have about the nature of
45. 1:49morality everything else is built on top
46. 1:51of it
47. 1:52as we will see we can map all norms of
48. 1:54ethical theories so utilitarianism
49. 1:56natural moral law canteen ethics
50. 1:58somewhere in metaethics
51. 2:01in fact we're going to explore this
52. 2:02whole unit in the form of a map
53. 2:05it makes it more visual and it helps us
54. 2:06remember what would otherwise be a lot
55. 2:08of different ideas and positions
56. 2:11you'll want to be able to draw this from
57. 2:12memory but don't worry not yet
58. 2:15first just have luke is there any terms
59. 2:17that you recognize
60. 2:19hopefully you notice some of the
61. 2:20normative ethical theories that you may
62. 2:22be studied already
63. 2:24now these represent the main positions
64. 2:26in meta ethics that you should know some
65. 2:28might not be necessary for you depending
66. 2:30which specification you do so check
67. 2:32yourself but just because something
68. 2:34isn't on your spec doesn't mean you
69. 2:36can't mention it to show off knowledge
70. 2:38but they shouldn't form the main part of
71. 2:40your answer in the exam most important
72. 2:42information for most specifications are
73. 2:45these areas so let's start by unpacking
74. 2:48the two main sides in metaethics which
75. 2:51are cogtivism and non-contivism
76. 2:55these are terms students tend to get
77. 2:57muddled with but we really want to know
78. 2:59these as some exam questions can ask you
79. 3:01to evaluate which side is more
80. 3:03successful i'll give you two ways to
81. 3:04remember them and you choose the way
82. 3:06that works best for you the simple way
83. 3:08of remembering is that cognitivism is a
84. 3:10belief that moral language is meaningful
85. 3:13non-cognitivism is the belief that moral
86. 3:15language is meaningless if this is all
87. 3:18you can remember then that's what you
88. 3:19want to state in your exam answers in
89. 3:22fact if an exam question were to ask you
90. 3:24to evaluate the view that moral language
91. 3:27is meaningless they're asking you to
92. 3:29evaluate non-cognitivism
93. 3:32so this is a good and straightforward
94. 3:34way to understand these terms however a
95. 3:37more complicated definition one that
96. 3:39lets you show off a little bit more
97. 3:41involves the word proposition hopefully
98. 3:44you've come across this word before
99. 3:46remember a proposition is a statement
100. 3:48that makes a claim about something that
101. 3:50can be true or false
102. 3:52okay so how does this link to our new
103. 3:54terms well cognitivists think moral
104. 3:57statements are propositions so they can
105. 4:00be true or false
106. 4:02non-cognitivists think moral statements
107. 4:04are not propositions so cannot be true
108. 4:07or false where students get confused is
109. 4:10that non-cognitivism
110. 4:12is not the same as saying moral
111. 4:14statements are false they're saying
112. 4:16moral statements aren't meaningless
113. 4:19not false when we utter a moral
114. 4:21statement we do not say something
115. 4:23capable of being true or false according
116. 4:27to non-cognitivism anyone who thinks
117. 4:29moral statements can be true or false is
118. 4:31on the same side
119. 4:33and that's cognitivism another way of
120. 4:35saying this is that cognitivists think
121. 4:38moral statements are truth apt
122. 4:40non-cognitivism think moral statements
123. 4:42are not truth act cannot be true or
124. 4:45false or what we said in our simple
125. 4:47definition
126. 4:48meaningless non-cognitivism will make
127. 4:50more sense when we look at specific
128. 4:52examples like emotivism that claims
129. 4:55moral language is just an expression of
130. 4:57emotion
131. 4:58so don't worry too much about the
132. 5:00details at this stage but try to lock
133. 5:02down this definition
134. 5:03let's review our definition
135. 5:05cognitivism
136. 5:06means moral language is meaningful moral
137. 5:09statements are propositions so they can
138. 5:11be true or false they're truth apt
139. 5:13non-contravism is the position that
140. 5:15moral language is meaningless
141. 5:18moral statements are not propositions
142. 5:20they cannot be true or false
143. 5:22they're not truth apt
144. 5:25have you understood so far pause and
145. 5:27complete before going on to the next
146. 5:29video
147. 5:40[Music]
148. 5:47so
149. 5:51[Music]
150. 5:58you