By contrast to the metaethical views that Ruse considers, science thoroughly explains morality naturalistically . The traditional application of evolutionary theory to ethics was beset by the seeming contradiction of selfish 'survival of the fittest' behavior with observed examples of altruism. Phenomenology and Ontology Ruse considers an objection from a moral realist. Ruse unsuccessfully answers this objection because he mixes together phenomenology, i.e. the 'objectivity' of ethics, with ontology. The existence of high unemployment is not necessary for our belief in high unemployment.
High unemployment is redundant to our inquiry.
So my phenomenological feel of ethics may lead me to an ill-founded belief in the foundations of ethics, but because this may be the case does not mean that it is the case and it certainly doesn't make it redundant to our inquiry. When inquiring into the nature of ethics we must take our moral phenomenology into account as simply one piece of data . Or, put in another way, phenomenological considerations alone cannot establish ontological considerations, one way or another. The redundancy of the objectivity of ethics does not follow from Ruse's argument. The argument simply shows that we cannot answer this question solely by examining our present belief system.