Chapter abstracts:

Chapter 1. Mackie’s Arguments for Error Theory
Moral error theory is a form of skepticism about morality according to which when people make moral judgments (e.g., “Stealing is morally wrong”), although they purport to say true things about the world, in fact the world does not contain the properties or relations that would be necessary to render any of these judgments true. This chapter introduces this view and outlines the case offered in its support by J. L. Mackie in his well-known 1977 book Ethics: Inventing Right and Wrong. Mackie’s arguments for moral error theory include the Argument from Diversity, the Argument from Strangeness, and the Argument from Objectification. The chapter does not aim in particular to defend these arguments, but analyzes them in turn while emphasizing that they are intended to work in conjunction with each other, building a case for moral skepticism. Mackie’s attempt to establish error theory is shown, ultimately, to be inconclusive.

Chapter 2. Argument by Elimination
According to the moral error theorist, moral judgments aim at the truth but systematically fail to secure it. This chapter pursues a strategy of arguing by elimination: building toward establishing moral error theory by refuting some alternative views. First, a case is offered against noncognitivism, the view that moral judgments do not even aim to say true things about the world and therefore cannot be convicted of erroneously doing so. Second, a case is advanced against non-objectivism, the view that moral facts exist but are not objective. Third, a two-part case is pressed against moral non-naturalism: that non-naturalism in general is implausible and that the moral non-naturalist struggles to account for how humans would have epistemological access to a realm of non-natural moral facts. If all these arguments are sound, then moral facts are objective and naturalistic or they don’t exist at all.

Chapter 3. The Naturalist’s Case for Error Theory
Moral naturalists maintain that moral properties (such as moral goodness, wrongness, evil, and praiseworthiness) can be accommodated within the scientific worldview. This chapter claims that moral naturalism is false, because moral normativity has features that the naturalistic worldview cannot deliver. It examines some kinds of normativity that pose no problem for the ontological naturalist, including hypothetical imperatives and categorical imperatives that are derived from human-made institutions. But these are not good contenders for providing moral normativity. Many basic moral properties are fundamentally treated as reason-supplying: when one says “Don’t do X because it’s morally wrong,” the moral wrongness of X is supposed to inherently provide a reason for refraining. No naturalistic property has this feature, however, and thus there is no place for moral wrongness in the natural world.

Chapter 4. The Argument from Moral Responsibility
Of the philosophers who are skeptical of the existence of moral responsibility, many remain optimistic that morality could carry on healthily with all reference to responsibility abolished. This chapter casts doubt on this optimism. Various arguments against moral responsibility are briefly outlined and accepted for the sake of argument to succeed. The chapter examines the effect that skepticism about moral responsibility should have on other kinds of moral judgment, such as axiological judgments (good and bad), deontological judgments (obligatory and permissible), and aretaic judgments (virtue and vice). Consideration is also given to what the abolition of responsibility would mean for the practices of apologizing and forgiving and for the emotion of guilt. It is concluded that the abolition of moral responsibility would have a far-reaching impact throughout the rest of moral discourse, such that being an error theorist about responsibility commits one to a more general moral error theory.

Chapter 5. Defenses of Moral Error Theory
This chapter runs through several arguments that have been mounted against moral error theory. (1) It is incoherent to class all moral judgments as false, because if it false that φ is morally prohibited then φ must be morally permissible. (2) The moral error theorist must hold that love is a mistake. (3) The companions in guilt argument: if there are no moral reasons, then there would be no epistemological reasons either, but that would be absurd. (4) The moral error theorist is on a slippery slope to rejecting all normative claims. (5) The challenge from Moorean epistemology: we are more confident of certain basic moral claims than we are in any argument offered by a moral skeptic. (6) The moral indispensability argument: moral facts are essential to our lives and thus we must accept them into our ontology. It is argued that all six of these objections fail.

Chapter 6. After Error Theory: The “What Next?” Question
If the error theorist is correct about morality, then what should we do with moral discourse? This is the “what next?” question. The abolitionist’s answer is that we should just do away with morality. The fictionalist advocates the less obvious answer that we should retain moral discourse even though we know that it is false. This chapter outlines some familiar ways that we already say false things for practical purposes, such as using metaphors, acting, joking, and telling lies. The principal goal of the chapter, however, is to investigate the nature of the “what next?” question. Should we think of it as being asked by an individual error theorist (surrounded by moral believers), or being asked by a group of error theorists? What kind of normativity does the question involve? It turns out that there are really many legitimate “what next?” questions.

Chapter 7. A Theory of Moral Fictionalism
Having accepted moral error theory, moral fictionalists claim that we nevertheless should retain our faulty moral discourse but stripped of erroneous ontological commitments, which can be achieved by adopting a nondoxastic and nonassertoric stance toward moral judgments. This chapter describes and defends an ambitious version of moral fictionalism. One of the principal uses of moral judgments is to function as “conversation-stoppers”: considerations that brook no further discussion and require no further justification. But how could a moral judgment continue to serve this function if it is no longer believed? The answer models moral fictionalism on Coleridge’s notion of the “suspension of disbelief” and on Mill’s solution to the paradox of happiness. Nondoxastic acceptance allows for a degree of flexibility and recalibration of one’s moral commitments in a way that belief does not, and thus the former attitude is a practically better one to adopt toward conversation-stoppers than the latter.

Chapter 8. Defenses of Moral Fictionalism
This chapter defends moral fictionalism from several objections, with discussion structured around the critical appraisal of three alternative views: metaphorist fictionalism, abolitionism, and conservationism. Metaphorist fictionalism recommends eliminating erroneous ontological commitment by modeling moral discourse on metaphorical language, by which we say false things in order to convey truths. Metaphorist fictionalism is ultimately rejected as the best form of moral fictionalism, but its discussion helps to show that certain common objections to moral fictionalism are misguided. The moral abolitionist maintains that morality does more harm than good, generally speaking, and that it should therefore be eliminated. The moral conservationist maintains that morality does more good than harm, generally speaking, and that it should therefore be retained; but the conservationist thinks that these benefits are available only if moral judgments remain items of belief. Arguments are offered against both abolitionism and conservationism, in favor of moral fictionalism.

Epilogue: Meta-metaethics—Are There Many Right Ways?
David Lewis claims that “strictly speaking” no moral properties exist, but that one may instead opt to speak “loosely,” referring to naturalistic properties that satisfy most but not all of what we might ordinarily think about moral properties. Thus although Lewis defends a version of moral naturalism, he allows that the moral error theorist might be warranted in maintaining their skepticism. This chapter-length epilogue explores this kind of ecumenical approach to metaethics. Along the way, two historical comparisons are examined: how the evolution of the word “magician” followed a different trajectory from that of “witch.” According to the ecumenical view, we should choose between moral naturalism and moral error theory on practical grounds (or “temperament,” as Lewis says). But this pragmatic approach would not automatically favor the naturalist, and, ultimately, practical considerations still speak in favor of taking an attitude of nondoxastic acceptance toward morality.