It is sometimes argued that happiness is good and suffering is bad. (This is tentatively my own view, but explaining the meaning of “good” and “bad,” defending its truth, and expanding the view to account for the additional categories of “right” and “wrong” is beyond the scope of this comment.)
If this is true, then depending on what kind of truth it is, it may also be true in all possible worlds—and a fortiori, on all possible planets in this universe. Furthermore, if it is true on all possible planets that happiness is good and suffering is bad, this does not preclude the possibility that on some planets, murder and theft might be the best way toward everyone’s happiness, while compassion and friendship might lead to everyone’s misery. In such a case, then to whatever degree this scenario is theoretically possible, compassion and friendship would be bad, while murder and theft would be good.
Hence we can see that it might be the case that normative ethical truths differ from one planet to another, but metaethical truths are the same everywhere. On one level, this is a kind of moral relativism, but it is also based on an absolute principle. I personally think it is a plausible view, while I admit that this comment provides little exposition and no defense of it.
Similarly, an even more defensible position might be Buddhist one, or that happiness is transitory and mostly a construction of the mind, and virtually always attached to suffering, but suffering is real and worth minimizing.
It is sometimes argued that happiness is good and suffering is bad. (This is tentatively my own view, but explaining the meaning of “good” and “bad,” defending its truth, and expanding the view to account for the additional categories of “right” and “wrong” is beyond the scope of this comment.)
If this is true, then depending on what kind of truth it is, it may also be true in all possible worlds—and a fortiori, on all possible planets in this universe. Furthermore, if it is true on all possible planets that happiness is good and suffering is bad, this does not preclude the possibility that on some planets, murder and theft might be the best way toward everyone’s happiness, while compassion and friendship might lead to everyone’s misery. In such a case, then to whatever degree this scenario is theoretically possible, compassion and friendship would be bad, while murder and theft would be good.
Hence we can see that it might be the case that normative ethical truths differ from one planet to another, but metaethical truths are the same everywhere. On one level, this is a kind of moral relativism, but it is also based on an absolute principle. I personally think it is a plausible view, while I admit that this comment provides little exposition and no defense of it.
Similarly, an even more defensible position might be Buddhist one, or that happiness is transitory and mostly a construction of the mind, and virtually always attached to suffering, but suffering is real and worth minimizing.