Definitional Issues

Moral relativism is a theory that can be applied to individuals, to cultures, or to moral theories themselves. At the individual level, individual moral relativism would argue that whatever an individual thinks is right or wrong really is right or wrong for that individual. A popular expression of this view is, “What's right for me is right for me and what's right for you is right for you.” In philosophical discussions of ethical theory, this view is either identical with or closely allied to the doctrine of ethical subjectivism. Since most philosophers think that ethical subjectivism results in the very denial of the possibility of ethics as the term is normally understood, it will not be discussed further here. At the level of moral ...