Psychological Origins of Relativism

I've started to think about moral relativism again, so I dug out the paper I wrote on the general subject last semester. There, I argued that the psychological source of some forms of relativism is a sort of partial apathy. The position seemed plausible to me when applied to relativism involving predicates of personal taste (cf. Peter Lasersohn). It may account for relativism involving vague predicates (cf. Mark Richard). Partial apathy is clearly not the motivating factor for relativism involving future contingents (cf. John MacFarlane) or epistemic modals (cf. Egan, Hawthorne, and Weatherson). I'm trying to determine if I think the idea can apply to moral relativism....

A central motivation for relativism is discourse which we are intuitively drawn to characterize as faultless disagreement. Two people appear to contradict one another, e.g., Jay says "Roller coasters are fun," and Kay says "No, roller coasters are not fun." It seems they disagree. But it also seems that they're both right. It is extremely plausible to think that roller coasters really are fun for Jay, and not fun for Kay. So we have disagreement (Jay accepts and Kay rejects the same proposition: that roller coasters are fun), but both parties are faultless (what Jay says is true for him; what Kay says is true for her).

A natural question is: why do our intuitive judgements come out this way? My claim is that partial apathy will cause us to make assessments of faultless disagreement. My claim depends crucially on the argument in "Relativism and Disagreement", a recent paper (to be published in Philosophical Studies) by John MacFarlane. There, he argues (convincingly, I think) that it is insufficient for disagreement for one party to accept a proposition and another party to reject it. According to MacFarlane, our assessment of disagreement is perspectival. Consider a person, Elle, who observes Jay and Kay's conversation. MacFarlane says, roughly, that Elle concludes that Jay and Kay disagree when she concludes that their claims cannot both be correct, when assessed against her (Elle's) own standard of taste. (I omit much detail, mainly because the argument for this is somewhat complex and would take too much space here. See "Relativism and Disagreement" for MacFarlane's specific claim, and his argument for the claim.)

If MacFarlane is right, then we face a curious fact about faultless disagreement. The relativist judges that there is disagreement between two parties because she assesses their claims according to her own standards. But the relativist judges that the two parties are faultless because she assesses their claims according to their respective standards. Elle thinks Jay and Kay disagree when she notices that their claims can't both be correct, given her own standard of taste. But if Elle is a relativist, she thinks Jay and Kay both speak faultlessly: what Jay says is correct given Jay's standards of taste, and what Kay says is correct given Kay's standards of taste.

So the question is this: why does Elle do this? Why does she import her own standard of taste when she assesses Jay and Kay for disagreement, but she determines the truth of Jay and Kay's claims according to their respective standards of taste?

To get an answer, I bring in an idea from Simon Blackburn's Ruling Passions. Blackburn is concerned with locating the domain of ethics within our overall values. He uses the analogy of what he calls a "staircase of practical and emotional ascent." Blackburn starts with "simple preferences" (such as having a favorite particular color), noting that these choices typically evoke neither aversion nor favor from others. (You tell me your favorite color is blue. I may make a note of it, but will not have much emotional reaction to this information.) The next steps up yield cases where we are provoked by someone's preferences to some reactive attitude--whether aversion, contempt, etc.--and we may also react to these reactions. (I note, for instance, that I thoroughly enjoyed Snakes On A Plane, and you marvel with dismay at how anyone could be amused with such mindless sensory stimulation. A third party may despise those who take such highbrow views against populist entertainment.) At a higher level of ascent, we are compelled to evangelize our perspective. (Perhaps an example of this is the effort of computer advocates who urge their friends on XP to switch to Mac.) Going further up the staircase, we not only evangelize our position, but also take it to be compulsory. Blackburn locates the ethical realm in the highest domains of emotional ascent.

Blackburn's picture suggests that we posit a scale of emotional involvement, which measures the degree of importance which we attach to making a particular choice and taking a particular perspective. At the low end of emotional involvement, we may have a preference but attach little importance to it. At the high end, we find our perspectives to be of such importance that we take them to be compulsory.

So here is my proposal. When we don't care about what others' preferences are regarding an issue, we will not import our own standards into our assessments of disagreement. I find, for instance, no disagreement between two parties who have different favorite colors. But when we start to care enough about what others' preferences are, then we will import our standards into our assessments of disagreement. At this higher level of emotional involvement, we take conflicting claims on an issue to be cases of disagreement. But our emotional involvement may still not be high enough to support the finding of fault. So we do not import our standards into the evaluation of fault, and we assess disputes as cases of faultless disagreement. On issues where our emotional involvement is high enough, we end up concluding not only that there is disagreement, but also that one party is at fault. We import our own standards into our evaluation of both disagreement and fault.

In summary:

1. Low Emotional Involvement: Do not import our own standards into evaluation of either fault or disagreement. Assess as: faultless, no disagreement.
2. Medium Emotional Involvement: Import our own standards into evaluation of disagreement, but not fault. Assess as: faultless disagreement.
3. High Emotional Involvement: Import our own standards into evaluation of both fault and disagreement. Assess as: at-fault disagreement.

So we end up as relativists when our emotional involvement is enough to get us to import our own standards into our assessment of disagreement, but not enough to import our own standards into our assessment of fault. We notice that the debating parties make claims that cannot both be correct, given our own standards (this generates disagreement). But we think that both parties speak faultlessly because what they say seems correct, given their respective standards.

If the relativist cared less about the issue, she wouldn't bother to import her own standards into her assessment of disagreement. She would not think that the parties have any substantial disagreement at all. But if she cared more about the issue, she might find herself compelled to import her own standards into her assessment of fault. She would no longer think that the debating parties are, in fact, both faultless in their claims. So relativism is sustained by a partial apathy.

In regards to moral relativism, I think much of this carries over. I would add, though, that insufficient emotional involvement is, most likely, not the only source of the intuitions that lead us to relativism. Consider a debate: Jay says "You ought to bomb the abortion clinic." Kay says, "You ought not bomb the abortion clinic." Suppose you are a relativist, and it is clear to you that, on your own moral standards, the claims cannot both be true. So you import your own standard into your detection of disagreement and you find that Jay and Kay disagree. But as a relativist, you wish to refrain from importing your own moral standards into your evaluation of whether Jay or Kay is at fault. Why? Is it because you're not sure who is correct? Because you want to be tolerant? Something else? Or is my entire framework inappropriate for moral relativism (or relativism in general)?