Letter: Moral maze

From Joshua Schwieso

Morality is uniquely human, because no other species can spell out its “moral reasoning” or choose to change its morality (24 May, p 48).

Tigers undoubtedly have innate constraints on their behaviours, at least towards other tigers, but this is not the same as having morality.

There are no vegetarian tigers, not just because tigers are “built” to eat meat, but also – and more importantly – because tigers do not have the sort of minds that would enable them to decide that eating meat was wrong.

Mark Johnson is entitled to his views but I would suggest that they are largely speculation dressed up as science.

And as a final point, surely Johnson’s provocative challenge that “moral absolutism is immoral” is itself an example of moral absolutism.
Spaxton, Somerset, UK