A Case for Moral Anti-realism Since we can build on the simple fact of our agreement. We can discourage puppy kicking, try to avoid the temptation provided by puppies, or introduce sanctions against puppy kickers. All the bits we need for a moral practice still follow, without a grounding in deontology or consequentialism, and with precious little metaethics. — Banno
Can we tease this out a bit further?
Would you agree with my saying that we need no 'rule giver', 'enforcer', and/or judge aside from ourselves if for no other reason than strictly because we are all we have? Since that's the case, then the mantra of "practice makes perfect" is the best approach we have. If that's all we have, then it's best for us to accept the facts and begin openly discussing which sorts of behaviours are better than others and why... without appealing to external judges and rule makers aside from ourselves.
At some point we must discuss consequences lest we have no other basis upon which to ground our belief about what and/or which behaviour is best in some set of circumstances.
Seems a brute fact to me. There is no need for an external judge, especially one of supernatural origin. Occam's razor applies. It is almost certainly the case that we humans 'make up the rules' governing our own behaviour. We are the ones who decide what is acceptable/unacceptable.
That's the natural progression of human thought. We act. We reflect upon actions. Then, we reflect upon those reflections, ad infinitum. In this way, morality and moral discourse emerges.
So, we arrive at not so much as
admitting that codes of conduct are subject to influence by individual particulars, but insisting upon keeping
that fact in mind and building upon it.