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Full Idea
An insight formulated by me: that there are no moral facts whatever. Moral judgement has this in common with religious judgement that it believes in realities which do not exist.
Gist of Idea
There are no moral facts, and moralists believe in realities which do not exist
Source
Friedrich Nietzsche (Twilight of the Idols [1889], 6.1)
Book Ref
Nietzsche,Friedrich: 'Twilight of the Idols and The Anti-Christ', ed/tr. Hollingdale,R.J. [Penguin 1972], p.55
A Reaction
Not only a slogan for non-cognitivism, but also a clear statement of the error theory about morality, a century before John Mackie.
| 4867 | Whether nature is beautiful or orderly is entirely in relation to human imagination [Spinoza] |
| 7163 | Morality is merely interpretations, which are extra-moral in origin [Nietzsche] |
| 18311 | Philosophers hate values having an origin, and want values to be self-sufficient [Nietzsche] |
| 18324 | There are no moral facts, and moralists believe in realities which do not exist [Nietzsche] |
| 22485 | Non-cognitivists give the conditions of use of moral sentences as facts about the speaker [Foot] |
| 4761 | The 'error theory' of morals says there is no moral knowledge, because there are no moral facts [Mackie, by Engel] |
| 22454 | We tolerate inconsistency in ethics but not in other beliefs (which reflect an independent order) [Williams,B, by Foot] |
| 22453 | Moral conflicts have a different feeling and structure from belief conflicts [Williams,B, by Foot] |
| 22450 | If moral systems can't judge other moral systems, then moral relativism is true [Williams,B, by Foot] |
| 23688 | Noncognitivism tries to avoid both naturalism and mysterious morality [Hacker-Wright] |