Moral Relativism is an erroneous ethical theory.

Although my opponent constantly tried to beat a dead horse, I suppose this argument still went somewhere, at least. "YES. Descriptive ethics describes what people believe to be moral; it doesn't purport to argue what should be moral. There is nothing in the resolution "Abortion is wrong" to denote it's talking about human attitudes towards abortion - this is actually more for the fields of social sciences and statistics. The is in "abortion is wrong" implies an obligation, and thus a prescriptive analysis. " My opponent fails the realize a vital point. Things that should be moral, CAN have basis in tradition as well as philosophical arguments. For example, since the start of recordable history, most major countries have outlawed murder. Therefore, murder SHOULD NOT be moral BECAUSE every generation before this, and more importantly, every society that has ever THRIVED long enough to do anything has OUTLAWED murder in some form or another. This is the most important aspect of determining whether something is moral or not. Understanding WHY people believed in a certain way leads us to conclude what SHOULD be the norm in our society. " ----> As I've explained, the definitions usage of abstract terms such as ethical standard in exclusion of any indicator such as "an individual ethical standard" would infer it's referring to prescriptive ethics. " As ive explained, the definition can include both because both can be applicable to moral standards. ========================================= Prescriptive moral relativism results in a logical contradiction ========================================= "----> This betrays SERIOUS lack of understanding on your part. It seems you don't understand the fundamental distinction between a descriptive theory and a prescriptive one. Here, I will quote from an informative source that lays bear the important difference between the two - yes, both DMR and PMR can be categorized under moral relativism but I've evidently centered the focus on PMR:" The problem here, is that the paragraph, or the site, discuss nothing as to whether or not a specific ethical theory can or cannot be both prescriptive and descriptive. Nowhere in the paragraph or the website, does it say that one cannot discuss both points of view from the same ethical theory. As you have admitted yourself, the topic alone is descriptive, yet clearly you want to talk about prescriptive ethics. If my opponent wanted to center his argument around PMR, that is(was, i suppose, now that we are on the last round) fine. Again, this is why my opponent was beating a dead horse. " ----> There is no such thing as a subjective truth value; this would be an oxymoron. If you mean subjective values (such as liking ice cream), then this is true but thus IRRELEVANT TO THIS DISCUSSION. Subjective values =/= truth values, this is such a fundamental distinction I'm not sure how you confuse the two. This can be demonstrated when my opponent asks what is the truth statement of "Star wars was the best movie ever made". This counterexample horribly fails on two accounts - the usage of best is ambiguous and thus the statement can't properly be evaluated, and if it were to be interpreted in terms such as "most entertaining" then this would NOT be a statement and thus NOT have a truth value. " I disagree, and so does these people(1)(2). First, since morality itself cannot have truth values, it is obvious that the things that morality point to, have truth values. Take the moral view of "Murder is wrong". That is something that has a truth value. However, Murder is only wrong, if the goal of society is to coexist peacefully. If the goal of society were to differ, the moral view of "Murder is wrong" could change. What does this mean, in terms of truth values? Clearly something that has conflicting truth values cannot be a truth value, according to my opponent. Therefore, either this completely decimates my opponents original proposition in P2, since Morality no longer has truth values, or things can have subjective truths, and therefore the truth values associated with those subjective truths can change. "A truth value is "the truth or falsity of a proposition or statement[2]", whereas propositions are "expressions in language or signs of something that can be believed, doubted, or denied or is either true or false; the objective meaning of a proposition[3]. " As you can see from these definitions, my opponent can't be more wrong. " No. First, youll notice that the Dictionary separates the two, calling one as "expressions in language or signs of something that can be believed, doubted, or denied or is either true or false", and the second, simply "Objective truths". The reason the dictionary does this, is because there is a clearly distinction between these two. Subjective propositions can and do exist, and this is the point. I shall address this in more detail in the concluding remarks. ===================== Conclusion and a few remarks ===================== This is the problem with my opponent. First, he does not understand the existance of subjective propositions, and the truth values associated with said propositions. Second, he fails to realize that morals will be subjective depending on the outcome desired. Although my opponent claims that there is no truth value associated to subjective things, this means that P2 in my opponents argument, fails, because morals by their very definition, have conflicting truth values depending on the desired conclusion. My opponent, although constantly trying to revive a dead argument despite my claims that i was willing to forgoe any future discussion based on the descriptive ethical theories, also has no understanding of what i was trying to discuss. I am in the position that no such objective morals could exist, and therefore the PMR theory is correct. It is sad to see that my opponent keeps refering to my arguments as straw men, despite my multiple attempts at asking what exactly I misrepresented to produce the straw man argument in the first place. Although i have not received any rebuttle as to how exactly i misrepresented his arguments, as this is the final round, i suppose I cannot ask anymore. source: 1. . http://blogs.myspace.com... 2. . http://johnmacfarlane.net...