Are there many philosophers who seriously try to argue that there are no objective moral truths? If so, how would they refute the proposition that "it is always wrong to torture people purely for pleasure." ? Thank you for your consideration!

Is landlording—understood as “fulfilling on one’s own property the housing needs of, and receiving rent from, another person/party”—a fundamentally unethical practice? I ask because it seems to me, at this point, that a landlord puts at risk the most inelastic needs of human beings, placing them behind more-or-less arbitrary paywalls. Sure, there is no shortage of “ethical landlording” articles/podcasts, and I am willing to do research (look for disconfirmation of the above hunch) myself. But asking philosophers never hurts! Thank you.

I am not a mind-independent moral realist. When I have a child, I am concerned that teaching them that certain actions are "good" or "bad" will instill an erroneous concept of objective moral realism that might have harmful consequences to their happiness in later life (for example not taking actions that will make them happy because they think they are somehow "wrong"). On the other hand, I am also concerned that explaining why not to take certain actions solely because of the possible social consequences (e.g. "if you are caught stealing then you may go to prison") will not instill a strong enough framework in their mind to prevent them from committing crimes or otherwise taking actions that could harm them. It can be difficult, for example, to predict the possible risks associated with certain actions when you are a child. So it is easier to teach that the action is "wrong" rather than explain the possible consequences, their liklihood and their impact. What do you recommend? Should I teach my...

Hi philosophers , recently a friend of mine said “it’s always best to tell the truth “ until I pointed out examples where this is obviously not true, this lead me to wondering what if we as humans had not the ability to lie ? Would the world be a better or a worse place to live? I think complete honesty amongst humans would create chaos as although admirable in many ways offence would still be taken and consequences could be dire. I imagine the anguish most men would have attempting to truthfully answer that awkward question from the wife as in “ do you think I look fat in this dress dear “?

Suppose I am closed in a room with an unconscious man who drank too much. It is a hot day and I try to keep the window open, to get some air, but it does not stay so. Case 1: I use this man's body (one of his feet) to prevent the window from getting closed. Case 2: I get sexually aroused and I have sex with this man. In both cases, he does not wake up, and he gets some bruises from my acting, but he comes to know what I did only some days later. Morally speaking, it seems that what I did in Case 1 was a minor offence (if it is an offence at all), but what I did in Case 2 was a serious crime, it was rape. But what difference between the cases justifies these different moral judgments? In both cases I used a man as a tool to advance my interests, I did something that he would probably not want, and I caused him some bruises. The difference, I suppose, is that he would *see* or *feel* that my action in Case 2 was more serious, more offensive. And that "society" would see or feel the same. But, morally...

I've been having a moral conflict about whether I should serve in the military or not and I came to the conclusion that it would be immoral for me to serve. But then I thought to myself, if I think it's immoral to serve I'm basically saying that anyone with the choice to not serve shouldn't serve, and if everyone who has the choice to not serve does that the military will collapse and since the country has no defenses a war will likely ensue that would cause many more deaths than if people had served. So does that falsify my claim that it is immoral to serve in the military?

There have been some excellent questions about whether moral claims can be objectively true or not. Isn't there an unspoken presupposition to that argument, however? "Moral claims can only exist in situations where there are beings who are subject to morality present in the first place." or perhaps you can word it better to capture what I am trying to say. In other words, if there were no sentient beings, then the concept of morality could not even exist, as only sentient beings are capable of moral reflection in the first place.

Aside from so-called "moral intuition," what evidence is there for the existence of moral facts?

Is disregarding normative claims (epistemic like "you ought to believe true things" or moral like "you ought to donate to Oxfam") with full knowledge and understanding of them irrational? Is rationality grounded in other way than that we just all seem to participate in "rationality project" from the get-go (question of "why be rational" seems to be self-defeating as we look for reasons to be rational..)?

An inventor creates a life-saving drug for disease X, which has no other cure. Worldwide, death by disease X among white people has been eliminated because of his drug; however, the death rate remains at pre-drug levels among non-whites because he has contractually restricted its sale and use to white people. For non-whites who die from disease X, is this inventor a causal factor in their death? My friend and I have debated this. I argue YES. The actions the inventor has taken to restrict the sale of his drug demonstrate intent with full knowledge of the consequences of the actions he has taken. I think his actions are not only causal, but in a world where this medicine is readily available everywhere, he becomes the primary cause of death. My friend argues NO. The inventor has done nothing with respect to non-whites. There is no causal relationship. Pulling a man from a burning building saves a life, but not doing so doesn't cause a death. Where I see actions that cause harm, my friend sees...