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Cultural and Moral Relativism

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  • First Online:
Encyclopedia of Evolutionary Psychological Science

Synonyms

Descriptive relativism; Metaethical relativism; Normative relativism

Definition

Moral relativism refers to three distinct but related philosophical positions (Brandt 2001, pp. 25–28). Descriptive relativism is the hypothesis that there are pervasive and irresolvable moral disagreements between individuals or cultures. Metaethical relativism holds that moral claims can only be evaluated as true or false relative to a particular individual or culture’s moral standards. Metaethical relativism thus denies that there are objective standards of moral truth that are universally applicable to all people and societies. Normative relativismis the prescriptive position that we should tolerate individuals or cultures with different moral standards. Such tolerance prohibits people from judging or imposing their moral standards on people or cultures with different moral standards. Each form of relativism can be cast at the individual level, i.e., that there are fundamental disagreements...

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, 14853, USA

    Lance Bush

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  1. Lance Bush
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Correspondence to Lance Bush .

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  1. Oakland Univ Dept of Psycholgy, Rochester, Michigan, USA

    Viviana Weekes-Shackelford

  2. Department of Psychology, Oakland University, Rochester, Michigan, USA

    Todd K. Shackelford

  3. Rochester, Michigan, USA

    Viviana A. Weekes-Shackelford

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  1. Department of Psychology, Oakland University, Rochester, MI, USA

    Lisa L M Welling

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Bush, L. (2016). Cultural and Moral Relativism. In: Weekes-Shackelford, V., Shackelford, T., Weekes-Shackelford, V. (eds) Encyclopedia of Evolutionary Psychological Science. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-16999-6_518-1

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