Skip to content
Coordinates of ThoughtHome of Philosophy
Join

Card 3.1.2 · Root III — Ethics and Axiology

Moral Semantics

Does "wrong" describe an act, or do something to the listener?

This node asks what moral words mean — what kind of content "wrong" carries, and whether moral sentences describe or do something else.

From The Coordinates of Thought by Syed Raheel Shahzad, card 3.1.2, page 133

On this card
  1. Where it sits
  2. The rival answers
  3. Key figures
  4. Connections
  5. On Coordinates of Thought

Where it sits

Under 3.1 Meta-ethics. Borders 6.10 Philosophy of language, 3.1.1.

The rival answers

PositionMoral sentences
CognitivismExpress beliefs; they can be true or false
NaturalismMean something statable in non-moral terms
Non-naturalismHave irreducible moral content
EmotivismExpress feeling; no truth value
PrescriptivismFunction as universalised imperatives
ExpressivismExpress attitudes, while behaving grammatically like descriptions
Hybrid viewsDo both — describe and express at once

Key figures

FigureDatesTraditionContribution
G. E. Moore1873–1958AnalyticThe open question argument
A. J. Ayer1910–1989AnalyticMoral statements as expressions of emotion
R. M. Hare1919–2002AnalyticPrescriptivism; universalisability
Peter Geach1916–2013AnalyticThe embedding problem

Connections

→ 3.1, 3.1.1 · ↔ 6.10, 6.10.1, 4.2 · ◇ cognitivism, emotivism, prescriptivism, expressivism · ○ Modern; Table 5

→ narrower questions · ↔ questions it borders · ◇ the positions, mapped in Part III of the book · ○ the eras and comparison tables (Parts IV and V)

The full card is in the book

In The Coordinates of Thought this card goes on to a worked example that sets the answers against one case, and to where the question touches daily life — page 133.

About the book Get the book

On Coordinates of Thought

Conversations about this question in Meta-ethics:

Join free to ask about it Everything in Meta-ethics