107 | Russ Shafer-Landau on the Reality of Morality

<p>Despite occasional and important disagreements, most people are in rough agreement about what it means to be moral, to do the right thing. There’s much less agreement about&nbsp;<em>why</em>&nbsp;we should be moral, or even what kind of answer to that question could be convincing. Philosopher Russ Shafer-Landau is one of the leading proponents of&nbsp;<a href="https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/moral-realism/" target="_blank">moral realism</a>&nbsp;— the view that objective moral truths exist independently of human choices. That’s not my own view, but ethics and meta-ethics are areas in which I think it’s wise to keep an open mind and listen to smart people who disagree. This conversation offers food for thought for people on either side of this debate.</p><p><em>Support Mindscape on&nbsp;</em><a href="https://www.patreon.com/seanmcarroll" target="_blank"><em>Patreon</em></a><em>.</em></p><p>Russ Shafer-Landau received his Ph.D. in philosophy from the University of Arizona. He is currently Professor of Philosophy at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Among his numerous books are&nbsp;<em>Moral Realism: A Defense</em>&nbsp;and&nbsp;<em>Whatever Happened to Good and Evil?</em>&nbsp;He is the editor of&nbsp;<em>Oxford Studies in Metaethics</em>, and is the founder and organizer of the annual&nbsp;<a href="https://sites.google.com/site/wiscmew/" target="_blank">Madison Metaethics Workshop</a>.</p><ul><li><a href="https://sites.google.com/site/shaferlandau/home" target="_blank">Web site</a></li><li><a href="https://philosophy.wisc.edu/staff/shafer-landau-russ/" target="_blank">UW-Madison web page</a></li><li><a href="https://philpeople.org/profiles/russ-shafer-landau" target="_blank">PhilPeople profile</a></li><li><a href="https://www.amazon.com/Russ-Shafer-Landau/e/B001IR3DQW" target="_blank">Amazon author page</a></li><li><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_M57lZ2Q5jg&amp;ab_channel=Radio-CR%C3%89" target="_blank">Talk on Moral Disagreement and Moral Intuitions</a></li><li><a href="https://en.wik