What you need to know about the basic philosophical thoughts and camps in Ethics
Moral philosophers, ever since, have been divided as to what should be the basis of morality.
Though there may be various philosophical camps concerning the issue, the factions can be primarily divided into two—those who advocate moral supernaturalism and those who promote moral secularism. In the history of Ethics, this distinction between theism and secularism has become the fundamental split.
‘Moral supernaturalism’ refers tothe theory that states that God, or Someone supernatural is the moral lawgiver or is the source of the human rules of decency. On the other hand, ‘moral secularism’ denote any theory that submits that morals come not from ‘above’ but from men themselves – human nature, needs, experience, society, culture, and the like.
There is some sort of inseparable connection between ethics and religion according to the religious or supernatural ethicists. Ethics is thus believed to be in some sense grounded in and dependent upon religion.
For the religious person, the true God constitutes the very foundation of morality that when confronted with questions concerning rightness and wrongness or goodness and badness, or with decisions about what one ought to do or ought not to do, the religionist turns to the sphere of the theological and metaphysical for answers and explanations. Christians particularly turn to God’s revelation to answer moral problems because they generally consider God to be the ultimate foundation of morality.
On the other hand, the secular ethicists contend that ethics should not be God-based but is relative to non-spiritual things like human experience and human nature. The answers to moral problems, they claim, need not be derived from theological or metaphysical foundations. Religious concepts such as God have no legitimate bearing on moral facts and principles and on ethical arguments one gives and accepts.
In short, secularist holds that there is simply no necessary connection existing between ethics and religion.
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Reasoning and Debate: A Handbook and a Textbook by Jensen DG. Mañebog
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