Bernard Williams Defusers of Subjectivism Summary Assessment

April 2011 - Second Year - Ethics

What is the view held by those Williams calls ‘defusers of subjectivism’?
Some people are unnerved (or made uncomfortable) by the philosophical doctrine of subjectivism, which has as one of its tenets that there are no objective moral facts. Defusers of subjectivism argue the discomfort arises from mistaken ideas of what follows from subjectivism. By correcting these mistakes, they seek to make subjectivism a more acceptable theory. Firstly, the defusers tell us, indifference does not logically follow from subjectivism. To think that it does would be to make the mistake of equating subjectivism with moral relativism. Secondly, the defusers make a more ambiguous claim: subjectivism ‘leaves everything where it was’ and does not encourage other practical consequences.

Williams offers some reasons that support ‘the defusers of subjectivism’. What are
those reasons?
A person could be indifferent because she believes (subjectively) that she is not justified in judging anyone else, but this would be to believe that there are some objective facts she doesn’t have access to, and objective facts are incompatible with subjectivism. Alternatively, she could be indifferent because she believes that no one is justified in judging anyone else, but this position requires that belief to be held in a ‘mid air position’, which is not compatible with subjectivism. The mid air position is a place for thought outside the individual’s subjective thoughts, and so it can feature facts, but not moral thought.

What is the argument that Williams supposes shows that ‘the defusing operation’
succeeds ‘in certain vital respects’?
In science when there are persistent disputes despite the same facts, concepts, and observation, it is rational for the disputers to acknowledge the matter is genuinely uncertain, when they cannot reach agreement. This reasoning, applied to moral disputes, would produce relativism. But the nature and extent of moral and factual disagreement are different. The defuser argues it is not a requirement of rationality that we apply this reasoning to moral disagreement. This contrast should not worry us - morality does not need to mirror the world of empirical facts, because it is normative rather than descriptive – it tells us how we ought change the world, not how the world is.

What remaining difficulties does Williams see for ‘defusers of subjectivism’?
The defusers have not succeeded in eliminating all practical consequences of subjectivism that might worry us. Firstly, in excluding the possibility of moral facts, it seems the subjectivist excludes constraints on moral thoughts. But we don’t think moral thoughts could be entirely creative, we think constraints are necessary (so we can reject attempts at moral thinking like ‘all jews ought to be killed’). Secondly, in arguing that morality comes from the will, but morality is something we decide, there seems to be a contradiction. Either we are psychologically attuned to act morally, or we must take action (like deliberation) to decide and then act morally.

How—if at all—might ‘defusers of subjectivism’ respond to Williams’ final
criticism?
I think defusers of subjectivism would appeal to facts about human nature as potential constraints on the kind of conclusions we could draw as moral conclusions. These types of appeal are to things about our psychology or biology that gear us towards sympathy, to temperance, to altruism. They would also appeal to these types of facts to argue that we are drawn to deliberate, and drawn to live an examined life. But these rely on strong empirical notions that may not have adequate foundation, and don’t give an obvious example of how we could excuse someone who (perhaps due to mental illness, or not) makes claims such as ‘all jews ought to be killed’ and claims moral legitimacy for these views, as they are views held subjectively.