Harman's Arguments Against Moral Relativism

Even though Harman provides a plethora of moral diversity examples to support his defense on moral relativism, a mistake already persists in his claim for defending it. Harman claims that all moral right and wrong are always relative to a choice of moral framework. This claim proposes an absolute moral standard. It is illogical for one to propose a relativist’s claim by using an absolute moral standard. Therefore, the relativist’s claim is illogical. To add on to this argument for endorsing an absolutist attitude, despite moral relativists taking a tolerant attitude toward other cultures and their customs, the concept of ‘one should do whatever the local custom does, given all things are seen as equal’ is not purely moral relativism because it is based on the existence of an absolute norm.

Another reason to reject moral relativism is because relativism does not welcome the possibility that there may just be certain universal moral values. Relativism does not evaluate, analyze, or criticize certain practices in different cultures. An example would be murder. Harman briefly shares how there are societies that socially accept arbitrary beating and killing, and that infanticide is considered acceptable in some societies. I object Harman’s point for his reasoning of moral relativism because of this explanation:

Premise 1: Killing babies just …show more content…
Perhaps it is just simply that moral relativism does not claim meaning or intent on anything. It is about how things are or are not. There is only relativity in the moral framework between what is good, right, or just. Moral relativism does not offer any analysis of what is right or wrong. Moral relativism is also simply accepting each other’s differing moral