What do you see as the difference between Emotivism, Subjectivism and Relativism?

In any event, what we need to focus on is why you can't get it through your head that relativists/subjectivists have preferences about behavior, inluding preferences about what behavior we should allow socially, and because they're preferences, they're not just going to sit on their hands and ignore them. — Terrapin Station

Okay, I'll take your word that some people who identify as emotivists/subjectivists/relativists aren't going to just sit on their hands. What would they do, instead of just sitting on their hands?

It seems to me that if one really believed that no one can be wrong about moral opinions, then one couldn't really do much of anything... Except...
1. believe that might makes right- that the strongest determine moral rules
2. vote on morality- believe that the majority determines what is moral
3. Accept that everyone has different views.

It seems to me that if one really believed that one can't be wrong about moral opinions, then one couldn't really do much of anything.. — anonymous66

I want to just focus on this for a minute, because it's frustrating that you don't seem to be able to understand it. Why do you think that someone wouldn't try to shape things--culture, legislation, etc.--so that they're closer to their preferences?

I want to just focus on this for a minute, because it's frustrating that you don't see able to understand it. Why do you think that someone wouldn't try to shape things--culture, legislation, etc.--so that they're closer to their preferences? — Terrapin Station

Is that your answer? In your opinion culture and/or legislation determines what is moral?

Is that your answer? — anonymous66

Dude, I asked you a question. I'm starting to think that you're a troll.

Okay, I'll take your word that some people who identify as emotivists/subjectivists/relativists aren't going to just sit on their hands. What would they do, instead of just sitting on their hands? — anonymous66

Do you have an answer to the above? You insist that they would do something.. what would they do?

Can you respond like you're not a telemarketer?

Here are some descriptions of subjectivism, relativism and emotivism...

Subjective relativism is the view that an action is morally right if one approves of it. A person’s approval makes the action right. This doctrine (as well as cultural relativism) is in stark contrast to moral objectivism, the view that some moral principles are valid for everyone. Subjective relativism, though, has some troubling implications. It implies that each person is morally infallible and that individuals can never have a genuine moral disagreement.

Cultural relativism is the view that an action is morally right if one’s culture approves of it. The argument for this doctrine is based on the diversity of moral judgments among cultures: because people’s judgments about right and wrong differ from culture to culture, right and wrong must be relative to culture, and there are no objective moral principles. This argument is defective, however, because the diversity of moral views does not imply that morality is relative to cultures. In addition, the alleged diversity of basic moral standards among cultures may be only apparent, not real. Societies whose moral judgments conflict may be differing not over moral principles but over nonmoral facts.

Some think that tolerance is entailed by cultural relativism. But there is no necessary connection between tolerance and the doctrine. Indeed, the cultural relativist cannot consistently advocate tolerance while maintaining his relativist standpoint. To advocate tolerance is to advocate an objective moral value. But if tolerance is an objective moral value, then cultural relativism must be false, because it says that there are no objective moral values.

Like subjective relativism, cultural relativism has some disturbing consequences. It implies that cultures are morally infallible, that social reformers can never be morally right, that moral disagreements between individuals in the same culture amount to arguments over whether they disagree with their culture, that other cultures cannot be legitimately criticized, and that moral progress is impossible.

Emotivism is the view that moral utterances are neither true nor false but are expressions of emotions or attitudes. It leads to the conclusion that people can disagree only in attitude, not in beliefs. People cannot disagree over the moral facts, because there are no moral facts. Emotivism also implies that presenting reasons in support of a moral utterance is a matter of offering nonmoral facts that can influence someone’s attitude. It seems that any nonmoral facts will do, as long as they affect attitudes. Perhaps the most far-reaching implication of emotivism is that nothing is actually good or bad. There simply are no properties of goodness and badness. There is only the expression of favorable or unfavorable emotions or attitudes toward something.

I'll take that as a no.

It does appear that morality is difficult to talk about. I acknowledge various opinions about morality.

In general, it can be said that moral objectivists believe there is an objective way to view morality... That morality is not determined by culture, or preference, or a majority. That there are objective moral principles that one can get right or wrong.

Moral subjectivists believe that the individual determines what is right or wrong. In that case, it's hard to see how anyone could be wrong about their opinion.

Moral relativists believe that one's culture determines what is right or wrong. Again, it's hard to see how a culture could be wrong about its moral views.

Emotivists believe that there is no way to determine right or wrong. that there is no truth about moral claims. . that we're all just expressing our emotional reactions when it comes to moral issues.

Is the definition of "morality" in your definitions descriptive or prescriptive? Generally, people who claim morals are not objective usually are using the word descriptively. So, when a cultural relativist states morality is determined by the culture, they are not saying that the individuals inside that culture are obligated to follow the moral norms of that culture, but rather are stating that what we call morality is determined by culture.

Generally, people who claim morals are not objective usually are using the word descriptively — Chany

I have no issue with that, except that I'm not convinced that relative morality actually does describe, in general, what people think and how they act when morality is concerned, as I mentioned in another post.
I do obviously agree that some people are correct when they describe themselves as people who believe that morality is not objective.

If we are defining moral relativism as cultural relativism, I agree that it does not adequately describe how people think and act on a personal level, but, then, I'm not sure if that is what it strives to do. I think what it aims to do is describe morality in the same terms we would discuss other cultural practices like a historian or sociologist would. The cultural relativist is stating morality is like fashion or etiquette and varies from cultural framework to cultural framework. It doesn't really work as a pure meta-ethical stance because it doesn't handle deviants or extreme minorities in moral opinions very well, but it works as a desciption of morality in a general sense.

It doesn't really work as a pure meta-ethical stance because it doesn't handle deviants or extreme minorities in moral opinions very well, but it works as a desciption of morality in a general sense. — Chany

Right! It works from the viewpoint of a sociological description, but maybe not as a means to set the moral compass.

@Chany
I agree that cultures (and individuals) disagree about morality. I can accept that without being a moral relativist (or subjectivist, or emotivist), I can accept that there are disagreements about morality without making the claim "all morals are relative to___".

I can accept that people disagree about any subject X without being a relativist about that subject.

It doesn't really work as a pure meta-ethical stance because it doesn't handle deviants or extreme minorities in moral opinions very well, but it works as a description of morality in a general sense. — Chany

It doesn't look to me like it works as a description of morality in a general sense.
It doesn't explain the idea of moral progress. Or why people listen to unpopular moral reformers. Or why people even make judgments about morality. (if people truly believed that morality was relative, then they would believe that others couldn't be wrong- if morals are relative, then the others aren't wrong. They just hold different views that are right... from the others' perspective. If they accept that the others are right, then by why would they care what they think?).

The cultural relativist is stating morality is like fashion or etiquette and varies from cultural framework to cultural framework. — Chany

People don't act like they believe that morality is like etiquette or fashion. They act like they believe that morality is something so important that differences can't just be accepted (like differences in etiquette or fashion are accepted.)

(if people truly believed that morality was relative, then they would believe that others couldn't be wrong- if morals are relative, then the others aren't wrong. They just hold different views that are right... from the others' perspective. If they accept that the others are right, then by why would they care what they think?). — anonymous66

You're assuming that everyone is going to see moral right/wrong as a statement about objective properties.

It doesn't look to me like it works as a description of morality in a general sense.
It doesn't explain the idea of moral progress. Or why people listen to unpopular moral reformers. Or why people even make judgments about morality. (if people truly believed that morality was relative, then they would believe that others couldn't be wrong- if morals are relative, then the others aren't wrong. They just hold different views that are right... from the others' perspective. If they accept that the others are right, then by why would they care what they think?). — anonymous66

As previously stated, I don't very much care for cultural relativism, though this is more because of the "cultural" part, as there are subcultures and radical individuals that the theory does not account for to be considered complete in my eyes, as well as other problems like viewing morality as purely social. Rather, it only works in the language of a sociologist, describing what groups of people consider good behavior. Since what I will say applies to the majority of nonobjective meta-ethical stances, I will stop referring to cultural relativism specifically and talk about these positions more generally.

First, none of nonobjective moral positions I am aware of state that everyone will accept the truth of their position. These positions can hold the majority of people will believe morality is objective. Second, compare morality to a similar concept in the study of value theory: aesthetics. There are a lot of groups of people who argue that aesthetic qualities are objective (in some sense of the word, "objective"), that a particular painting is objectively bad and that people ought to respond to it as bad. Beauty is a real objective property that certain objects possess. Now, there are people who dispute this notion; they claim that aesthetic values are ultimately subjective. They may say that, due to our shared nature as human beings, that we tend to find certain things pleasant, but ultimately what we get out of aesthetics is subjective. Certain people have certain tastes and that is all there is to it.

This does not stop these people from arguing over aesthetics, saying "that was a bad movie", arguing against paintings in their dorm room because they find these paintings ugly, commenting on how art affects people generally, and such. This also does not mean that whenever people see something they aesthetically disagree with, they do not shrug their shoulders and cease to care. They may, for whatever reason, try to actively or passively oppose certain artworks, particularly if the art is public in nature and they cannot avoid the art. Subjective aesthetics also does not mean that trends can change over time, that art once considered bad and unpopular becomes popular and even considered the new "normal."

The parallels to morality are obvious. The reason it is more acceptable to say aesthetics are subjective is that, at least in the present time, not as much rides on our conceptions of what is good art. However, a large amount of our lives revolves our personal morality and the moral system that is accepted by the larger society. Most people can't act like morality is subjective and take a live-and-let-live conception of morality because no matter what, people have to live under moral systems. How this world views morality, what it permits and what it allows, directly affects what we care deeply about. Moral progress can simply be viewed as moral change with general trends based on prior moral views. It should be no surprise that we see the progression from the past to the present as progress; this is not due to some continued march towards moral perfection, but rather us seeing the past historical events that chronologically lead up to the current state of affairs. Moral reformers may start the trends we call moral progress, but some (I would venture most) of what we call unpopular moral reformers simply were ignored by the larger population.

To repeat what Terrapin Station stated, you are claiming believing nonobjective moral stances necessitates not caring about morality discussions anymore. It is like expecting all nihilists to cease to perform all actions because they think their life has no objective meaning.

Would it be OK to contribute to this discussion, or has it been moved elsewhere?