Comment on What is Metaethics?

Sun, 01 May 2011 22:31:01 GMT

Judging someone else changes nothing about the state of the world unless I can persuade them to act differently.

Avoiding a person (a) does not (necessarily) persuade them to act differently, but (b) definitely changes the state of the world. This is not a minor nitpicking point. Avoiding people is also called social ostracism, and it's a major way that people react to misbehavior. It has the primary effect of protecting themselves. It often has the secondary effect of convincing the ostracized person to improve their behavior.

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