Who Am I to Judge? Politics and the Problem of Moral Relativism | Prof. Francis Beckwith
The Thomistic Institute
The Thomistic Institute
4.8 • 873 Ratings
🗓️ 14 March 2025
⏱️ 37 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Prof. Francis Beckwith explores the arguments for moral relativism, particularly the argument from disagreement and the argument from tolerance, and offers critiques, emphasizing that disagreement does not necessarily entail relativism and highlighting the common moral ground underlying many disagreements.
This lecture was given on October 9th, 2023, at University of Alabama at Birmingham.
For more information on upcoming events, visit us at thomisticinstitute.org/upcoming-events
About the Speaker:
Francis J. Beckwith is Professor of Philosophy & Church-State Studies at Baylor University, where he also serves as Associate Director
of the Graduate Program in Philosophy. Among his over one dozen books are Defending Life: A Moral and Legal Case Against Abortion Choice (Cambridge University Press, 2007), Politics For Christians: Statecraft As Soulcraft (IVP, 2010), and Taking Rites Seriously: Law, Politics, and the Reasonableness of Faith (Cambridge University Press, 2015), winner of the American Academy of Religion's prestigious 2016 Book Award for Excellence in the Study of Religion in Constructive-Reflective Studies. He is a graduate of the Washington University School of Law, St. Louis (MJS) as well as Fordham University (PhD, MA, philosophy).
Keywords: Argument From Disagreement, Argument From Tolerance, Catholic, Ethics, Marriage, Moral Objectivism, Moral Relativism, Natural Law, Plagiarism, Politics
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | Welcome to the Tomistic Institute podcast. |
| 0:06.2 | Our mission is to promote the Catholic intellectual tradition in the university, the church, and the wider public square. |
| 0:12.7 | The lectures on this podcast are organized by university students at Temistic Institute chapters around the world. |
| 0:19.3 | To learn more and to attend these events, visit us at |
| 0:22.5 | to mystic institute.org. So why are people more relativists? I want to focus on two main reasons |
| 0:32.1 | why someone may be a relativist. There are other reasons, but we only have so much time, and these are the ones that I hear |
| 0:42.0 | the most frequently and are most found in the literature. |
| 0:47.2 | One is that there's just too much diversity on moral issues both in and across cultures, |
| 0:53.5 | and secondly, it is intolerant to believe that one's moral view is universally true |
| 0:59.0 | and others wrong. |
| 1:01.0 | We'll call the first one the argument from disagreement, and the second one, the argument from tolerance. |
| 1:09.0 | So first, the argument from disagreement. So first, the argument from disagreement. |
| 1:11.6 | So disagreement on moral issues is everywhere. |
| 1:16.6 | In the United States alone, there is an array of questions |
| 1:21.6 | over which sincere citizens hold contrary views, |
| 1:24.6 | and they feel very strongly about those views. I mean we can |
| 1:28.2 | recite them nearly by heart. Right. Abortion, marriage, physician-assisted suicide, |
| 1:35.3 | the scope of religious liberty, animal rights, you know, these are the questions |
| 1:42.1 | about our culinary practices. |
| 1:44.8 | Is vegetarianism the right view? |
| 1:47.4 | Is it morally permissible to eat animals? |
| 1:50.6 | All these issues we're aware of. |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from The Thomistic Institute, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of The Thomistic Institute and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.