Moral realism

Moral realism is the meta-ethical position that moral claims are factual assertions about the world, independent of human beliefs, attitudes, or conventions. Moral realists hold that statements like "torture is wrong" are true in the same way that "water is H₂O" is true: they describe objective features of reality. This position is defended through appeals to moral intuition, moral naturalism, and the apparent inescapability of moral disagreement.

Moral realism's greatest weakness is not epistemological but practical: it provides no mechanism for resolving moral disagreement between realists who disagree. If both sides claim access to objective moral facts, and those facts conflict, realism has no internal adjudication procedure. It is a theory of moral truth that fails precisely where truth is needed most.