Introduction

Summary

Our thoughts about our moral thinking are Janus-faced. On the one hand, we intuitively and pre-theoretically think as moral ‘realists’ – we take our moral convictions to be beliefs in just the way that our convictions about the weather are beliefs, and of course we take our convictions to be true. Indeed, we take some of them to be self-evidently true. On the other hand, we find ourselves facing intuitively significant challenges that can make moral realism seem problematic or even completely implausible. Ordinary reflection tells us that our moral convictions are different in nature from most other beliefs, such as our beliefs about the weather. Moral judgments are directly relevant to decisions and choices in a way that differs from the way that beliefs about the weather might be relevant to decisions and choices. Intuitively, moreover, a moral judgment speaks to what ‘ought to be the case’ rather than to what ‘is the case.’ We can introduce a term to talk about this. We can say that, unlike judgments about the likelihood of rainfall or the like, moral judgments are ‘normative.’ Unfortunately, however, it can easily seem dubious that there could be something in the world as it is that makes true a judgment about what ought to be the case. There is an obvious tension between these two sides to our thinking.