Is morality objective or just opinion?

Welcome to the debate arena! Today's topic: "Is morality objective or just opinion?". Your opponent's style: Devil's advocate

Morality is only an opinion. We use "morality" and "ethics" to only describe our own emotions. If I say "murder is wrong," it eventually just ties back to the fact that it makes me feel bad. If I draw a picture of a scientist torturing an innocent kid, and I ask someone to point out the immorality, they wouldn't be able to, because it is only our opinions and our emotions seeping through us.

Wrong. Your own argument destroys itself. If morality is just emotion, then a psychopath who feels *nothing* torturing that kid is acting perfectly morally by your logic. But you won't accept that—you'll say he's actually *wrong*. That means you already believe in something beyond emotion. You're appealing to an objective standard even while denying it exists. Either morality is real and binds everyone, or you have to say the psychopath's torture is as valid as your disgust. Which is it?

I never said that morality truly exists, my claim is that morality is opinion. Morality doesn't truly exist, it is solely our OWN emotion, ergo, the psychopaths actions aren't immoral or moral to anyone, it is their own emotions that are considered by the public to be "moral" or "immoral." Your entire argument is based upon the idea that morality exists, but that was never my claim, it was that "it is only our opinions and our emotions seeping through us."

You're equivocating. You said "murder is wrong"—that's a moral claim, not just reporting your emotions. If you meant "I feel bad about murder," say that. But you didn't. You said it's *wrong*, which implies a standard beyond your feelings that applies to others too. The psychopath doesn't get to torture because his emotions are *his*—you clearly think he should be stopped. That's you asserting an objective moral truth. You can't have it both ways: make moral claims while denying morality exists.

That's not what I am saying. I am saying that the "immorality" behind the sentence "murder is wrong" isn't true, it's just our own emotions. The words moral, immoral, right, and wrong are just hosts for our own feelings. This "wrongness" that I implied in my example is an example of a standard for one's OWN opinion. I never said that he should or shouldn't be stopped, I claim that morality never exists. You are beating around the bush and moving the goalposts and still being wrong. This objective morality that you argue about isn't objective, but just the representation of an individuals own emotions.

You're hiding behind semantics. When you say "murder is wrong," you're making a claim about *reality*—that murder has the property of wrongness. If it's purely your emotion, then calling it "wrong" is just mislabeling your feelings as facts. But here's what breaks your whole position: you're trying to convince *me* that subjectivism is true. Why? If morality is just my opinion, why should I care about yours? You're arguing as if truth matters. That contradiction is fatal to your case.

The labeling of one's feelings as facts is exactly my point: that "moral objectivity" is the representation of feelings. It isn't a question of feelings being considered "true" or not, as my claim is that morality isn't real and that it is really just feelings disguised as a claim. The "truths" of feelings is different from the validity of them; feelings can be false while still being valid. Your position isn't a feeling, it is a hard set claim, not a subjective idea, but an objective and actual declaration.

You're contradicting yourself. You say feelings can be "false" but "valid"—that's incoherent. False means not true. If my claim about objectivity is "hard" and "objective," then there ARE objective facts. You just admitted it. You can't say "morality isn't real" while simultaneously saying some claims are objectively true and others objectively false. Pick one: either nothing is objectively true, or objectivity exists. You're sneaking it in the back door while denying the front.

There are objective and subjective truths: there can be some objectivity and some subjectivity. I cannot make any statement without my emotions being shown. For example, "I walked my dog." I didn't say that "I took my foot, lifted it up approximately six inches, moved it forward three feet, then lowered it while holding a piece of rope eight feet long that is tied around the upper portion of the canis familiaris." This is because there are subjective feelings that exist, for example, I say dog instead of canis familiaris because it is familiar and endearing, which turns into subjective morality. This is still only our SUBJECTIVE emotions becoming SUBJECTIVE "morality," aka opinion.

You just proved objectivity exists. "I walked my dog" is factually true regardless of your feelings about it. The dog existed. You walked it. Those are objective facts. Your *language choice* is subjective, sure—but the underlying reality isn't. Same with morality: torturing children causes objective suffering. That suffering is real whether you feel bad about it or not. You're conflating "my description uses subjective language" with "the reality described is subjective." They're not the same thing. Can you name one moral claim that *wouldn't* be true even if everyone disagreed?