Sunday Mammalfest, Episode 4

Pangolins, I have to say, are quite awesome. Let’s go through why.

1) They decided to have scales. People told them – you can’t do that! You’re a mammal, mammals don’t have scales, only reptiles and fish do that. But the pangolins said: fuck you! I’m a scaly anteater!

2) These scales not only protect them, especially when they roll up into a ball, but are really sharp and will cut you up. Like a hardcore football covered in razor blades. With a big flicky tail. Covered in razor blades.

3) They decided they were so hardcore, they didn’t need teeth. Instead, they would create a mouth-system as powerful and complex as this new laser. You have a tongue attached to your mouth and throat? Fuck that. Pangolins have tongues attached to their hips. You have saliva glands in your mouth? Pangolins have basically a swimming pool in their chest to coat their enormous tongues with saliva when they shoot it out like a long, thin, sticky bullet.

4) But then, they decided that instead of the teeth they were doing without, they would get enormous claws for tearing up buildings*. These claws are so hardcore on their front feet, that when walking, they have to curl their hands up to avoid killing the ground.

That’s what pangolins are like.

*Buildings made by ants.

‘Moral Relativism’ is Equivocal

In yesterday’s post I suggested that there are two quite distinct sources for ‘moral’ judgements: value-egalitarianism (whatever matters to one person matters to everyone) and value-authoritarianism (a judgement made intuitively by one person is invested with the force to overrule all competing judgements).

In a form of ‘morality’ mainly associated with the political right and with religious or traditional systems, the two are blurred together; in a form of ‘morality’ mainly associated with the political left and with modern-era rationalism, value-egalitarianism is maintained on its own, in ‘pure form’.

Now having these two quite different things both being called ‘morality’ is tricky, especially when it comes to the idea of ‘moral relativism’. I’ve experienced this personally in that I know a lot of people with whom I agree on most things, but who identify as ‘moral relativists’; I very much don’t, and yet in discussing it I often feel that we’re arguing at cross purposes.

(I should warn readers, this post makes a lot of distinctions of meaning, and weird terminology abounds. Hopefully it is all adequately explained.)

So the idea I’m going for here is that ‘moral relativism’ can mean either the rejection of value-authoritarianism (a reasonable and sensible position, which fits very neatly with the acceptance of value-egalitarianism), or the rejection of value-egalitarianism as well (a chaotic position that makes a lot of discussions very difficult to have).