A response to Street’s debunking argument from moral realism

Abstract

In this article, we advance a realist response to Sharon Street’s debunking argument, which appeals to evolutionary theory to argue that natural selection and moral realism are incompatible. Our aims are three. First, we describe the debate on this topic by distinguishing between a modal argument, a parsimony argument, and Street’s Darwinian Dilemma. Secondly, we focus on her reasoning, one of the most relevant arguments in the recent metaethical debate against moral realism. To mount a defense of that, we will point at three fundamental characteristics of moral realism: its cognitive character, the nature of its representative language, and the relationship between evaluative judgements and their truthmakers (facts). Finally, we will argue, against Street, that moral realism is not scientifically inferior to moral antirealism, thus, the former is not debunked