Defining what is right seemingly came easy to the Sophists. They basically concluded, embracing moral relativism, that morals are dependent upon the practices and norm accepted by a social group at a specific time and place. They believed that all social groups are related in their understanding of what is right and moral, and thus, there is no absolute criteria from which the morals of a specific group can be criticized. To support this claim, the Sophists would use such anthropological evidence as cultural diversity, both historical and geographical, and argued the similarities among the social groups.
Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle challenged the philosophic basis of the Sophists' teaching, and Plato and Aristotle further condemned them for taking money. Additionally, their skeptical view on absolute truth and morality provoked sharp criticism. Socrates taught that every person has full knowledge of ultimate truth contained within the soul and needs only to be spurred to conscious reflection in order to become aware of it. Knowledge, according to Socrates, was innate rather than learned from experience, and thus the philosopher's task was to provoke people into thinking for themselves, rather than to teach them anything they did not already know. Plato held that trees, stones, human bodies, and other objects that can be known through the senses are unreal, shadowy, and imperfect copies of the Ideas. For him the real world was indeed the world of ideas, and not the concrete matter that the objects themselves are.
I do believe that moral relativism is a reasonable and self-consistent position to hold on today’s moral issues. For starters, like the theory of relativism, I too believe that there is commonality among all people. All people share the hope for a life that is fulfilling, all people seek a measure of joy from this life experience, and all people understand the hurt of pain and sorrow. Indeed, there are some aspects of life that are universal among all people. Just as all people are guided by law that has been constructed by society to set parameters on behavior, in conjunction with this law there are moral belief and practices that are adopted by society which are understood to be necessary and beneficial in maintaining order in a civilized society. One of the ways relativism can be used to examine today’s moral issues is in the question of euthanasia, or assisted suicide. It is a common belief and understanding among all people that no one wishes to experience unbearable or undue pain for any reason. Those who have argued for assisted suicide to end the misery of loved ones argue that it should be a personal right for someone to choose to end their life rather than face an indeterminate length and amount of excruciating pain. In another example, while all people don’t embrace the same sentiment regarding the practice of homosexuality, it would be morally beneficial as a way of addressing homosexuality to apply a principle of relativism that shows the related need of all persons to give and receive love and be in relationship with another human being. This would be a way of agreeing to respect, if not totally accept, another human being’s right to make such a choice for his or her life.
