Thank you for clearing up that ambiguity in your post.

However, if you are saying that Cultural Ethical Relativism does not entail acceptance by the individal, then you have no grounds for criticism of Cultural Ethical Relativism. It is a quite coherent worldview, wherein “wrong” is wrong because some group considers it as such. And, moreover, it does not require the positing of some weird entity that has “objectivity”.

??? Only if you think so. Pornography is in the eye of the beholder, as has been established my many court cases as well as philosophical ruminations (perhaps I should call them “philosophical onanism”?). An object, in and of itself, cannot be pornographic, unless it is imbued with specific qualities by an observer. Breasts–as well as any other body part–are not pronographic in any way, except to those that have been raised to believe they are. So, those that do believe so are simply cultural relativists hiding behind a pretended absolute. Hm, reminds me of much of religious thought in general…

I think the problem you cite is due to the fact that you snipped the relevant sections from the citation. You quote me as follows

Cultural Ethical Relativism: An action is wrong for a person, if and only if, that person’s society or cultural group condemns that action…. Two things follow from this view of ethics… Second, moral principles only apply to people or cultures who accept them.

I agree this argument is invalid but that’s not what I said, what I said (as attested by anyone who reads the original post) is this.

Cultural Ethical Relativism An action is wrong for a person, if and only if, that person’s society or cultural group condemns that action. Individual Ethical Relativism An action is wrong for a person, if and only if, that person believes that the action is wrong. Two things follow from this view of ethics; first, humans create right and wrong, either by societal consensus of some sort or by an individual choosing to adopt and/or believe in, certain principles of action. Second, moral principles only apply to people or cultures who accept them.

So when you read what I actually said without snipping relevant parts of the context. It’s clear that I did not say that cultural ethical relativism entails that moral principles only apply to people or cultures who accept them. When I drew this inference Ireferred back to the *two* different types of relativism I had just defined. On cultural ethical relativism moral principles apply only to cultures that accept them and on individual relativism it only applies to people who accept them.

That this is my argument is evident when you take into account the very next phrase. I continued by saying “A few of examples will illustrate this” and then I provide examples from both different types of relativism to illustrate my point.

So in context, when my quotes are not cited to creative editing, it is very clear that I did not argue as you contend.

“…He does not depend on me in any way for his existence rather I depend upon him for my existence. The same is true for the commands he issues; if right and wrong are constituted by divine commands then, it follows, right and wrong are objective properties of actions and do not depend upon us for their instantiation…”

You need more research into these ideas. Can’t remember exactly who was the first to proposed it, but I remember C.G. Jung restating that god needed man to experience humanity and balance his dark side and man needed god to forget his mortality and experience the divine. Once you start down this path you can no longer view god as the “all loving god”. Check the book of Job for more on Divine Commands relating to your ideas of right and wrong. There are plenty of early biblical references to an angry god, a jealous god, a god that destroys. There are many apparent contradictions on biblical right and wrong that require serious thought to understand. The most obvious problem is that even though god may provide a divine command on what is right, he leaves man with free will intact: he says what is required and asks man human to choose to do it. There is no gaurantee that doing what he says is right or that reward will follow, merely that the man may gain the mental stability of knowing they are acting on god’s command.

It’s a riddle and one that relies on faith to answer.

No. Neither self evident nor intellectually defensible — unless there indeed exists an ultimate reality. Thus the question again becomes one of the existence and being of God

Why do you think it is self evident? And based upon what Mark?

Who is to pass moral judgement on the sun for swallowing up the earth and obliterating all known life, and its memory. Nature does not teach us that survival is right, it simply shows that survival is a struggle, but that struggle invovles and often requires the deliberate harm, deception and destruction of other life. Nature alone gives us a tough and scary moral framework.

Social creatures have learned that cooperation can be a successful survival meachnism too, but nature does not objectviely determine whether or not this is a good thing. In fact the final outcome of nature (the eventual destruction of life) suggests that life is not ultimately valuable.

“You also mentioned “survival” as if it has some intrinsic value. Please explain how you reach that conclusion.”

Surviving, as in remaining alive, is important. I would have thought that was self evident. Do you believe that it isn’t? With the exception of the suicidal, everyone wants to remain alive and improve the quality of their lives. The drive to survive and reproduce is in built in all species. The alternative is extinction.