Curse Moral Relativism!
Practical Stoicism
Tanner Campbell
4.7 • 723 Ratings
🗓️ 19 February 2026
⏱️ 19 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
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In this episode, I respond to a short clip discussing incest as an example of emotivism in meta-ethics. Emotivism claims that when we say something is wrong, we are not stating a fact but expressing disapproval. The suggestion in the clip is that incest may ultimately be “wrong” only because we feel that it is wrong.
I take that seriously. It is true that many people struggle to articulate why incest is objectively wrong beyond saying it feels disgusting. And philosophers should care about that. If something is wrong, we should be able to explain why in rational terms.
Using Stoic role ethics, I outline a clear argument. In Stoicism, some roles are grounded in nature. These roles are not arbitrary. They come with built-in functions and ends. The sibling role is ordered toward familial care, trust, and cooperative development within the household. It is explicitly non-erotic because its function is to stabilize kinship bonds. The lover role, by contrast, is ordered toward erotic partnership and exclusivity.
When a person attempts to merge these roles, they introduce incompatible aims into a single relationship. Stoic role ethics holds that voluntarily chosen roles must not contradict natural ones. If they do, one role must be abandoned. Because the sibling role is grounded in nature, it cannot be abandoned without corrupting its function. Adopting the lover role toward a sibling therefore represents a rational error. It makes both roles impossible to fulfil properly.
This means the wrongness is not based on disgust. It is based on contradiction within the structure of human roles and the failure to live coherently within them. Stoicism does not reduce morality to feeling. It grounds moral judgment in reason, nature, and the proper fulfilment of roles within the human community.
I also explain why this matters more broadly. If moral claims are reduced to preference or emotion, then they shift with culture, fashion, or mood. Stoicism resists that instability by anchoring ethics in a rational framework. That framework may be debated, refined, or defended, but it is not merely expressive.
The point is simple: saying something “feels wrong” is not the same as explaining why it must be wrong. Philosophy should move us from reaction to reason.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Welcome back, Precoptan. I hope you are well. Right at the top of this episode, I need to put a content warning. |
| 0:06.5 | Now, I don't usually do content warnings, but in this case, I think it's important because the topic is not clearly stated in the title of the episode. |
| 0:15.0 | And the reason that I didn't put the topic right in the episode, at least plainly, is because algorithms have a tendency to |
| 0:22.9 | take certain keywords and maybe suppress them a bit because they may well be really |
| 0:27.7 | disgusting content. And we're trying to do something to make sure that like little kids |
| 0:32.6 | don't come across content that shouldn't come across. So for reasons like that, and maybe |
| 0:37.0 | probably other reasons, I am not being as clear in the title as I come across. So for reasons like that, and maybe probably other reasons, |
| 0:38.4 | I am not being as clear in the title as I could be. So the topic of this episode is incest. |
| 0:45.2 | Now, obviously, what we are doing here is arguing against such a thing. Let's make sure we're |
| 0:51.3 | all on the same page there. And the reason that I'm arguing it will |
| 0:54.6 | become apparent as the episode progresses. But most importantly, what I want you to take away from |
| 0:59.8 | this is an understanding of why it is important to have philosophical doctrine. Now, that could be |
| 1:07.9 | religious doctrine or just non-religious philosophical doctrine, but it is important to understand why you do and don't like certain things. |
| 1:17.7 | Because when all we do is position ourselves relative to something that we're passionate about, emotionally, we are not only not living our stoic life, our best stoic life. |
| 1:29.5 | We are kind of weak in arguing for or against the things that we're for or against. |
| 1:36.0 | So this episode, as uncomfortable and unsettling as the topic is, and again, it will be clear |
| 1:41.2 | why I'm doing this topic in a moment, as unsettling and uncomfortable as it is, I think it is worthwhile to explore for the reasons that I just mentioned. |
| 1:50.6 | It's going to help you to understand why having philosophical doctrine and understanding it is important. |
| 1:56.3 | Thank you. I will begin by telling you that a couple of weeks ago, a friend brought up in conversation a content creator who I had never |
| 2:18.1 | heard of. This individual's name was Alex, and still is, Alex O'Connor. Apparently, and the |
| 2:23.7 | reason that he was being brought up, he had interviewed John Sellers. Like I said, I didn't know |
| 2:28.6 | who Alex O'Connor was, and the fact that I didn't know who he was really confused my friend. |
... |
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