Is there such as thing as absolute right and wrong?
For instance is it always wrong to rape and murder an infant just for fun?
Yes, of course. There must be, as man must live in reality and reality itself is absolute.
Well murder can be justified, although not in the example you gave. Rape can’t be, so that’s one thing which is wrong no matter what the circumstances… I can’t think of any others.
But are morals not subjective? If they are then a person who would rape and murder an infant obviously does not think it is wrong. And therefore not everyone believes it is wrong and therefore its not absolute.
Killing in self-defense or in defense of another is justified, yes. But then it’s not murder. It’s an act of homicide, sure–because homicide is simply “killing of a human being”, without any qualifiers. But (at least by any legal definition) it wouldn’t be murder.
Your reasoning’s somewhat faulty.
There’s an object sitting next to me. I see it as a clock. Let’s say, just for the sake of argument, that my perception is correct and it is in fact a clock. Now, someone else could perceive it as a television remote control. However, that doesn’t make the nature of the clock subjective, because regardless of how he perceives it, it is still a clock and it will not let me switch between “King of the Hill” and “Saturday Night Live” while sitting on my couch.
Now, if my perception is wrong and his is right, then try as I might I will not be able to use it to figure out when it’s time to watch “King of the Hill” and “Saturday Night Live”.
And if we’re both wrong, then we’re both screwed over as it is something else entirely and there is no way it can fulfill the purposes for which he and I attempt to use it.
So just because someone does not accept the absolute nature of something doesn’t mean that its nature then becomes subjective.
The difference is that a clock/remote is a real object and hence not relative. An idea/moral is not. You can change your perspective alot easier then you can change the physicality of an inadimate object.
For example, think of cannibalism. In yours and my eyes, it’s quite disgusting, even evil to some. But to certain African tribes, or religeous cults it’s quite the oposite. To them, it’s as normal as eating chicken, or usually considered an act of holiness to eat their enemy’s flesh.
Sacrificing a lamb is alot different to religeous fanatics then it is to green peace activists.
My point is that it’s a matter of perspective. It’s easy to say yours is the absolute right because it’s yours, but remember it’s just as easy for somone else to say their’s is.
So I don’t think anything is absolute, especially not morals. All we can do is find out which morals are our own and follow them. That’s why i don’t eat people or sacrifice lambs.
The exception to this rule, of course, is anything I say tends to be absolute right. 
Is morality just something trivial…?
Is Justice possible without Morality?
Above are a couple of other discussion topics on this subject. It’s normally a good idea to spend a little time looking through the forum, as you will find that most, if not, all of the questions have been discussed previously. I’m not saying this to discourage new topics. Only that sometimes a lot of ideas and opinions have already been covered, so it’s a good place to start reading. As you’ll be able to learn a lot from other members of the community who have spent a great deal of time and effort in exploring this question, who mightn’t reply to this post as they feel they’ve already said everything that needs to be said in that previous discussion. This way you can also get the general idea and thought on a subject and then start to explore in more detail different facets or nuances of the question at hand.
Also work is underway on trying to make an FAQ of the most common philosophic questions and then linking to topics on this forum that cover some of the possible answers that the community have found agreeable. But because this is quite a large undertaking no time frame has been set for the completion of this FAQ.
BillWaltonSexUniversity said:
“For instance is it always wrong to rape and murder an infant just for fun?”
my friend, this statement makes me think that maybe you should get some psychiatric help before you will be able to comprehend morality.
To deprive another of any of their rights is always wrong – absolutely. Kurt Webers analogy of the clock/remote is applicable to morals. That which negates our ability to survive is always wrong & therefore immoral. If this were not a objective fact then we would cease to exist & the issue/question would disappear with us.
Regards,
That’s crap. Are you in favour of locking up criminals or not? I’m in favour of a social contract; if you obey the (preferably minimal) rules of society you have your rights respected. If not, your rights are forfeit in your punishment.
Why is it crap Disorder? What makes you think I disagree with your thoughts on rights?
Certainly I understand that things follow the order of cause to effect. When one initiates through force a infringement on another’s rights there will be consequences. Whether or not this means the forfeiture of the perpetrators rights or not (or to what extent) really doesn’t matter to me. If you take a shot at me make sure you don’t miss because you are already dead in my eye’s 
.
Regards,
"To deprive another of any of their rights is always wrong – absolutely. "
That doesn’t square with what I just said (and you agreed with a bit too enthusiastically). If it’s right under some circumstances, i.e. self-defence, then it’s not an absolute wrong.
Time moves forward, cause then effect. Self-defense is not the act of depriving another of their rights it is “Self-defenseâ€.
Regards,
What methods of self-defence are there which do not deprive your attacker of one right or another?
You have to define rights, and in our society the right to life or liberty does not apply to every person in every situation. If I wake up in the middle of the night to find a stranger with a knife in my room, I’m not depriving him of his right to life if I shoot him; he has already forfeited it through attempting to deprive me of mine. In our legal system, self-defense is justified precisely because the attacker is no longer considered to have the same rights as a law-abiding citizen. Notice, the list of rights given to criminals upon arrest is much different to the list of rights attributed to “all men” in America’s Declaration of Independence (and of course attributed also to all women these days); the right to liberty is not on that list because the criminal has forfeited it .
logos, you just assume that its a negative right, that the inruder has forfeited his/her rights, rather than a positive right, that the defender has a right to kill him/her. No matter what the law exactly states, by logical progression, it is still in a sense both. The right to kill and be killed.
You’re just proving my point, that no right can be accepted without being qualified.
One cannot remove a issue from its context without replacing it after deliberation. It is at that point where a contradiction is spotted (or not). One may consider the removal of another’s rights during a situation of self-defense but this is only an IMAGINED (abstract) point of view to promote analysis of the situation. Imagining the attacker “losing†rights would be rudimentary & over simplified. It would be far more useful to imagine such aspects as the attackers future possible contribution to society if they were reprimanded but not eliminated & so forth. Regardless the defenders right to defend is the only “actual†right in the situation & must be protected absolutely.
Regards,