Moral realism

The view that moral claims state facts, and that some of them are actually true.

Also: moral realist, ethical realism, moral objectivism

What it means

Moral realists take statements such as 'cruelty is wrong' at face value: they aim to report facts, and some succeed. Naturalist realists think moral facts are natural facts or fit within the natural world; non-naturalists, following G. E. Moore, think they are a distinct kind of fact. Anti-realists disagree in two main ways. Error theorists such as J. L. Mackie accept that moral claims aim at facts but argue that no such strange, action-guiding facts exist, so all such claims are false. Expressivists hold that moral claims express attitudes rather than beliefs. Persistent moral disagreement across cultures is often cited against realism; realists reply that much disagreement stems from non-moral facts or distorting emotions.

The questions it belongs to

• 3.1.1 Moral Realism vs Anti-RealismIf everyone approved of torturing children, would it still be wrong?
• 3.1 Meta-EthicsWhen you say cruelty is wrong, what kind of statement are you making?

Thinkers

• G. E. Moore
• J. L. Mackie
• Richard Boyd
• Simon Blackburn

Traditions

• Analytic

To read

• Being Good: A Short Introduction to Ethics — Simon Blackburn
• Ethics: Inventing Right and Wrong — J. L. Mackie
• Principia Ethica — G. E. Moore

Sources and further reading

• Moral Realism (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)
• Moral Relativism (Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy)

Written by the Coordinates of Thought editors and checked against the sources above on 29 October 2026. Not peer-reviewed. How we write and check.

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