The Is/Ought Gap and The Problem for Secular Morality
Channel: TheisticScuffles
Date: 2012-08-20

Moral philosophers have struggled and battled to know whether morality has sense or meaning directly from natural events or phenomena. Without God or a transcendent source for morality, this undertaking has become quite muddled. Yet moral statements seem to have meaning and value for their listeners and have compelling implications for human life.

The video is a response to a YouTube Philosopher who wishes to see where the moral implications of the natural world will take him.

Generally, statements which attempt to derive a moral duty or even moral sense from natural events are committing the naturalistic fallacy. That is, an experience in the natural world cannot provide a meaningful ethical duty or obligation for human beings.

This video was shot on location in the Rice Lake, Wisconsin area, including the Cedar Lake Mall and St. Vincent de Paul's Thrift Store.

References:

Wiggins, David. Ethics: Twelve Lectures on the Philosophy of Morality. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 2006.