if historically we had observed more and more, let’s say, oppression and violence, maybe people wouldn’t even talk about moral progress and simply acknowledge a trend of oppression, without saying that their values got better over time.
In a (imaginary) world where oppression has been increasing, somebody could still write an article about moral progress. Such an article would NOT say “Hey look at this moral progress—there’s more oppression than ever before!!”, because “oppression” is a word you use when you want it to sound bad. Instead, such an article would make it sound good, which is how they themselves would see it. For example, the article might say “Hey look at this moral progress—people are more deeply loyal to their family / race / country / whatever than ever before!”
As another example, one presumes that the people leading honor killing mobs see themselves as heroic defenders of morality, and could presumably describe what they’re doing in a way that sounds really morally great to their own ears, and to the ears of people who share their moral outlook.
I get what you mean, but I also see some possibly important differences between the hypothetical example and our world. In the imaginary world where oppression has increased and someone writes an article about loyalty-based moral progress, maybe many other ethicists would disagree, saying that we haven’t made much progress in terms of values related to (i), (ii) and (iii). In our world, I don’t see many ethicists refuting moral progress on the grounds that we haven’t made much progress in terms of e.g. patriotism or loyalty to the family or desert.
Moreover, in this example you managed to phrase oppression in terms of loyalty, but in general you can’t plausibly rephrase any observed trend as progress of values: would an increase in global steel production count as an improvement in terms of… object safety and reliability, which leads to people feeling more secure? For many trends the connection to moral progress becomes more and more of a stretch.
In a (imaginary) world where oppression has been increasing, somebody could still write an article about moral progress. Such an article would NOT say “Hey look at this moral progress—there’s more oppression than ever before!!”, because “oppression” is a word you use when you want it to sound bad. Instead, such an article would make it sound good, which is how they themselves would see it. For example, the article might say “Hey look at this moral progress—people are more deeply loyal to their family / race / country / whatever than ever before!”
As another example, one presumes that the people leading honor killing mobs see themselves as heroic defenders of morality, and could presumably describe what they’re doing in a way that sounds really morally great to their own ears, and to the ears of people who share their moral outlook.
I get what you mean, but I also see some possibly important differences between the hypothetical example and our world. In the imaginary world where oppression has increased and someone writes an article about loyalty-based moral progress, maybe many other ethicists would disagree, saying that we haven’t made much progress in terms of values related to (i), (ii) and (iii). In our world, I don’t see many ethicists refuting moral progress on the grounds that we haven’t made much progress in terms of e.g. patriotism or loyalty to the family or desert.
Moreover, in this example you managed to phrase oppression in terms of loyalty, but in general you can’t plausibly rephrase any observed trend as progress of values: would an increase in global steel production count as an improvement in terms of… object safety and reliability, which leads to people feeling more secure? For many trends the connection to moral progress becomes more and more of a stretch.