Many students are fond of the insight that everyone has different morals. But, is this really true? What is the evidence for this claim? Could it possibly be true? Let’s look at it.

While it’s not clear who the “everyone” is in this claim let’s examine it in two ways. First, let’s look to our own culture in the United States. With roughly 300 million people could everyone have different morals? It seems impossible that there could be 300 million different moral codes! Even more so when we look at the world at large. Could there really be over 6 billion moral codes? This semester we have examined roughly a dozen ethical theories including subjectivism, relativism, emotivism, egoism, utilitarianism, deontology, virtue ethics, feminism, and social contract theory. The vast majority of ethical codes are simply variations on these theories. Could we really have overlooked so many more? It seems unlikely!

Perhaps the belief in this claim that everyone has different morals is the fact that people disagree about moral issues. But, we need to look at this disagreement closer to see if it is really a disagreement about moral principles or the facts concerning the issue. A good example can be seen in the abortion debate. This is an especially good example in that I am sure it is one that people think of as validating this claim that everyone has different morals. After all what could be more different than the position of pro-life versus pro-choice.

But, how much do they really disagree with each other about fundamental moral principles? The pro-life advocate may say that innocent human lives should not be taken. Innocent children should not be murdered. Would a pro-choice person disagree with this? I doubt it. The question is not whether we should kill innocent children or not (that would represent a major difference in moral principles) but instead whether the fetus constitutes such an innocent child. Like it or not, this is a question of certain facts or definitions, not moral principles.

On the other hand, a pro-choice advocate may claim that a woman has the right to choose what happens to her own body and ought not to be told what to do with her own body. Would a pro-choice advocate disagree with this? Again, I doubt it. While this would represent another example of a difference in moral principles, the pro-choice advocate is not saying that woman should be stripped of their autonomy with regard to their own body. No, they are making a claim about the status of the fetus (i.e. that it is different from the woman’s body). Again, like it or not this is not a moral claim but a factual or definitional claim. While I am not saying that this disagreement is easily resolved I am saying that it is not a disagreement over fundamental moral principles.

I suspect that this analysis could be done with most other issues as well. If we only look closer and examine the claims made we could see that there is much agreement in moral principles even among people who differ on such issues as euthanasia, abortion, capital punishment, etc.

But, why does the belief still persist that everyone has different morals? It could be a simple misunderstanding of what agreement really looks like. Let’s suppose that everyone operates on the exact same moral principle: the Golden Rule. Do unto others as you would have them do unto you. If everyone acted in accordance with this moral principle (most religions have this as a moral principle and I suspect many secular moral codes also include it) would we all agree about abortion, euthanasia, and the countless other issues facing us? I doubt it. Why not?

Well, look at the principle itself. It is universal (based on our assumption) in the same way that everyone must eat is universal. But, it does not specify what each individual would have done unto them even as everyone needing to eat doesn’t specify what they need to eat. If I act such that I do unto others as I would have them do unto me and you act that way as well, we could still act differently simply because I prefer different things done to me than you do! Of course these differences are not necessarily differences in our moral preferences though they could be. The point I am making is that even if everyone acted in accordance with the same moral principle we could still end up with major disagreements.

So, where does that leave us? In truth it seems that if we examine our own reasoning on ethical questions and closely compare it with others we’ll see that we have much in common with respect to our moral principles. But, if we only look out the outcome we may mistake this disagreement for something much deeper. I suspect that this is the major cause of the belief that we all have different morals. We are not willing to take the time to ask ourselves and others why we believe what we do with regard to morality. It is not sufficient to simply say we all have different morals and leave it at that. At it’s best this is simply false and at worst precludes any chance for moral consensus.