Reasearch on Moral Realism Without Reference to Stoicism

Moral realism is the view that there are genuine moral facts and truths that do not depend on anyone’s attitudes, beliefs, or cultural norms.[1][3] On this view, when someone says “torturing an innocent person for fun is wrong,” they are making a claim that is either true or false in virtue of how the world is, not merely expressing emotion or social convention.[2][7]

Core theses of moral realism

Most contemporary accounts analyze moral realism in terms of three connected claims:[1][3][8]

- Cognitivism: Ordinary moral sentences (e.g., “lying is wrong”) express propositions that can be true or false, rather than mere emotions or prescriptions.[1][2]

- Alethic thesis: At least some of those moral propositions are in fact true (so moral discourse is not systematically in error).[1][3]

- Metaphysical/ontological thesis: Those truths are made true by moral facts or properties that are “robust,” i.e., not relevantly different in status from ordinary facts (such as chemical or historical facts), and not reducible to attitudes alone.[1][3][7]

Together, these distinguish moral realism from error theory (which says all moral claims are false), non‑cognitivism (which denies that moral claims are truth‑apt), and subjectivist or relativist views (which make moral truth depend on minds in a much stronger way).[1][3][4]

Objectivity and mind-independence

Realists typically claim that moral truths are objective in a specific sense:[1][7][9]

- Their truth does not depend on what any particular person or culture believes or feels.  

- If “murder is wrong” is true, it remains true even if everyone comes to approve of murder.[4][7]

- Moral properties (right, wrong, good, bad) are part of the fabric of reality in roughly the way mass or charge are, though their exact metaphysical nature is disputed.[1][7]

This does not mean moral facts are easy to know or that disagreement disappears; it only means that, where there is disagreement, at least one side is mistaken rather than both being “equally right.”[1][3]

Main varieties of moral realism

Realists divide over how to understand moral facts and properties:

- Naturalist moral realism: Moral properties are (or are reducible to) natural properties that figure in scientific or broadly empirical explanations, such as facts about well-being, desire-satisfaction, or what fully informed, impartial observers would endorse.[1][2][3]

  - For example, Peter Railton’s “moral naturalism” explains moral facts in terms of an individual’s objective good, construing them as natural facts accessible in principle to empirical and rational inquiry.[1]

- Non‑naturalist moral realism Moral properties (like “wrongness”) are irreducible, sui generis normative properties that supervene on natural facts but are not identical with them.[1][3][8]

  - Contemporary non‑naturalists such as Russ Shafer‑Landau defend robust moral facts that are “intrinsically normative,” i.e., necessarily reason‑giving independently of our desires.[5]

Both views are realist because they accept that moral claims are literally true or false and that some are true in virtue of stance‑independent moral facts.[1][3][8]

Relation to objectivism and rationality

Moral realism is often associated with moral objectivism, the claim that what is right or wrong does not depend on what anyone thinks is right or wrong.[1][2] Objectivism here is a view about truth‑conditions, not about how we know those truths. Many realists also adopt some form of moral rationalism, claiming that moral facts are necessarily linked to reasons for action: if a fact is morally wrong, there is always some reason not to do it.[3][5]

Shafer‑Landau, for example, argues that moral facts are intrinsically normative and that practical rationality partly consists in being appropriately motivated by these facts.[5] Other realists are more cautious, allowing that someone might recognize a moral fact yet fail to be moved by it, but they still treat moral facts as, in principle, capable of guiding rational deliberation.[3][8]

What moral realism does not say

Importantly, moral realism by itself does not:

- Specify which actions are right or wrong; it is a thesis about the status of moral claims, not their content.[2][3]

- Guarantee that humans actually know many moral truths; a realist can be quite pessimistic about our current level of moral knowledge.[2][3]

- Commit to any specific first‑order theory like utilitarianism or deontology; utilitarianism, Kantian ethics, and virtue ethics all have realist and anti‑realist versions.[1][3]

So moral realism is best understood as an ontological and semantic backdrop: it says that when we engage in moral discourse, we are in the business of making truth‑apt claims about a mind‑independent normative reality, some of which are correct, and whose correctness does not simply reduce to our attitudes or conventions.[1][3][7]

Citations:

[1] Moral realism Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moral_realism

[2] Moral Realism | Definition & Examples - Lesson - Study.com https://study.com/academy/lesson/moral-realism-truth-reasoning.html

[3] Moral Realism | Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy https://iep.utm.edu/moralrea/

[4] What is https://study.com/academy/lesson/moral-realism-truth-reasoning.html? : r/askphilosophy - Reddit https://www.reddit.com/r/askphilosophy/comments/4bbu3z/what_is_moral_realism/

[5] Moral Realism: A Defense - Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews https://ndpr.nd.edu/reviews/moral-realism-a-defense/

[6] Moral Realism - Explained and Debated - YouTube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3pr4twpK1cM

[7] Moral realism - Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy https://www.rep.routledge.com/articles/thematic/moral-realism/v-1

[8] Moral Realism - Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/moral-realism/

[9] Ethical Realism, or Moral Realism - 1000-Word Philosophy https://1000wordphilosophy.com/2015/11/05/ethical-realism/

[10] How to define 'Moral Realism' - Richard Swinburne - PhilPapers https://philpapers.org/rec/SWIHTD-3