Regular viewers of my videos might know that I call myself an ethical emotivist, by which I mean that I think ethical statements — statements like “Murder is wrong”, “Charity is good”, or “You shouldn’t steal” — are expressions of emotional attitudes, and nothing more.
They are not objective truth-claims. They are not even an indication of a subjective feeling; they are the expression of that feeling. This understanding translates such statements into something akin to “Murder! Grr!”, or “Charity :)”. Such statements clearly have expressive meaning, but are not truth-apt: they are not the kinds of statements which can be true or false. (Another example of such a class of statements is commands: “Go over there at once!” cannot be true or false.) In ethics, this is called “non-cognitivism”.
For some time, I have been regularly asked to explain this view in detail. I still plan to do that at some point on my own terms, but today I cover the subject with Simon Blackburn. Professor Blackburn has taught at both Oxford and Cambridge (among others) and is well-known both as a writer of popular philosophy introductions (like Think), and also a significant figure in non-cognitivist meta-ethics, having invented the term “quasi-realism” to describe his moral philosophy.
In this episode, we discuss emotivism, and some of its objections. We also cover the nature of truth and how it might apply to an emotivist framework. Is there really a difference between saying “The sky is blue”, and “It’s true that the sky is blue”? Professor Blackburn and I think not, us both holding to the so-called “deflationary theory of truth”.
I also present Professor Blackburn with some ideas about expanding emotivism beyond just the ethical sphere, and we discuss what that might mean for the nature of epistemology.
I hope you find it interesting, useful, or both!
TIMESTAMPS:
0:00 – Cognitivism vs Non-Cognitivism in Ethics
9:40 – Does Ethics Describe or Explain?
18:45 – What is Truth?
28:53 – Emotions vs Attitudes
34:56 – How Can We Define ‘Wrong’?
44:11 – Emotivism’s Biggest Objection: The Frege-Geach Problem
59:48 – Emotivism Outside of Ethics
