“If killing the innocent is wrong, then abortion is wrong.

Killing the innocent is wrong, so

abortion is wrong”. What would the expressivist say about this inference? Is it logically
valid?

If assertive claims are stating actual facts about the state of the universe, then how
is it that two people can make conflicting assertions on moral issues? Does this lead us to
conclude that moral claims are not truth apt? This essay will examine the expressivist
account of moral statements and what problems arise if we agree with the expressivist
theory that normative statements are not factual statements but merely relative to
individual and subjective emotive beliefs. Firstly we will establish the main idea behind
simple expressivism, and its standpoint on the subjectivity of normative statements.
Secondly, we will discuss the Frege-Geach problem and how it collaborates with
expressivism instead of being in discord with it. Having explored the restraints that the
Frege-Geach problem imposes on modus ponens, we will see how the Frege-Geach
problem makes it imperative that the simple expressivist rejects the idea that normative
statements are truth-apt.

Both Error Theorists and Realists have concluded that the truth of atomic
declarative sentences for the subject matter in question require the existence of the
relevant sort of objects or properties. However, they disagree on whether those objects
and properties do in fact exist. Whilst the error theorist says that they don’t (and therefore
normative statements are systematically and uniformly false), the realist claims that they
do exist in at least some instances. Expressivism, another alternative, disagrees with the
realist view of the truth-aptness of normative statements. Sentences in the declarative
mood (for example, “the sandwich is in the fridge”) are usually used for making
assertions which can either be true or false, depending on whether the fact that is being
asserted to obtain does in fact actually obtain. The expressivists claim that the realist is
misled by the syntax of the sentences of that area into thinking that they are truth-apt. For
example, “stealing is wrong” is in fact no more truth apt than “put the sandwich in the
fridge”. The lack of truth-aptness in the latter is blatant, whereas in the former it is
masked by its surface syntax. So what then, are moral sentences conventionally used for

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if they aren’t for assertions? According to Expressivism, the primary function of ethical
sentences is the expressions of emotions, attitudes and beliefs that they make, or the
pressure that they apply on action and the issuing of commands. Moral talk, according to
expressivists, is not “truth apt” in the way that verifiable facts (like “the moon is made of
limestone”) can be. We can check whether or not the moon is made of limestone by
obtaining and analyzing a sample, making the statement “the moon is made of limestone”
a statement that is capable of being either true or false, and is thus “truth-apt”, or has the
aptitude to be true. Expressivists argue that when a moral declarative statement such as
“murder is wrong” is said, there is no “fact” being stated that can be considered “true”.
They believe that moral language is used to express when we approve of a certain
position, not whether we consider the position to be true. That is, if I utter “murder is
wrong”, I am not stating that “murder is wrong” is true, I am merely asserting that I
approve of the statement “murder is wrong.”

The Frege-Geach problem explains why simple expressivism rejects the truth
aptness of normative claims by proving that the inference contained in the essay title
statement is not logically valid. When someone, for example, says “Murder is wrong”, he
is not expressing a belief or an assertion but rather some non-cognitive sentiment or
feeling, incapable of being true or false. That is to say, there is no truth-aptness in a
statement like “murder is wrong” or “killing innocent people is wrong”. The emotivist (a
type of expressivist) would argue that the phrase “murder is wrong” is used to express a
sentiment of disapproval towards murder, instead of being a truth-apt normative
statement. But what happens when we consider a statement like “murder is wrong” when
it isn’t being used to make an assertion, for instance: “If murder is wrong, then getting
my little brother to murder people is wrong”? Here “murder is wrong” is not being used
to make an assertion at all; it is functioning as the antecedent of a conditional. It isn’t
used to express the speaker’s disapproval towards murder (like the expressivist would
argue). The semantic function therefore must be different from the one given for the
straightforward assertion expressed by “murder is wrong”. That is to say, if we have the
premises laid out:
1) Murder is wrong

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 2) If murder is wrong, then getting your little brother to murder is wrong
3) Therefore getting your little brother to murder is wrong
How do we account for the apparently valid inference? Herein lays the crux of the Frege-
Geach problem. For the argument to be considered valid, the occurrence of “murder is
wrong” in premise 1 must mean the same thing as the occurrence of “murder is wrong” in
premise 2. But if we examine the semantic functions of each statement, we see they are
different, and therefore “murder is wrong” in 1 and 2 do not in fact mean the same thing.
The example of premises 1-3 would really be no more valid than arguing:
4) my lager has a head on it
5) if something has a head on it, then it must have eyes and ears
6) therefore my lager has eyes and ears
Here it is easy to see that there are different meanings of the word “head” used in 4 and 5.
Similarly, there are different meanings of “Murder is wrong” being used in 1 and 2. In 1
it is an assertion and in 2 it is merely the antecedent or a conditional. But let us consider
another example of modus ponens which is non-moral:
7) it is raining
8) if it is raining then the streets are wet
9) therefore the streets are wet
Why is this argument not similarly invalid? The argument holds because “it is raining”
means the same thing in premise 7 as it does in premise 8. That is, in 7, “it is raining” is
asserting that a state of affairs obtains; in 8 it is asserting that if the state of affairs obtains
then so does another (the streets being wet).
So if we consider the statement “If killing the innocent is wrong, then abortion is
wrong. Killing the innocent is wrong, so abortion is wrong”, we can see how it is
logically invalid. “Killing the innocent is wrong” is not a moral assertion, but rather the
antecedent part of the conditional “If killing the innocent is wrong, then abortion is
wrong”. Not only is it a statement without truth-aptitude, but it also faces the problem of
having different semantic meanings in each premise. Because “Killing the innocent is
wrong” is not verifiable (we cannot prove that it obtains), then it is not logically valid to
imply that if it does obtain, then the second premise (“abortion is wrong”) is true.

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 Another argument for why the statement is invalid also aids in proving that
normative statements are not truth apt. If we consider the statement “If killing the
innocent is wrong, then abortion is wrong. Killing the innocent is wrong, so abortion is
wrong” and reword it into the following premises:
10) Killing the innocent is wrong
11) If killing the innocent is wrong then abortion is wrong
12) Abortion is wrong.
We see that the any individual can agree to premise 10 but disagree with premise 12, due
to any number of factors ranging from social conditioning to personal experience or
personal sentiments. That is to say, person X could “hurrah” (internally agree with) the
statement that “killing is wrong” but simultaneously “boo” (internally disagree with) the
statement that “abortion is wrong”, and the person would be perfectly justified in doing
this as according to the expressivist this is the full capability of morality. The Frege-
Geach problem points out that when person x considers the connection between premise
10 and premise 12 in premise 11, it becomes evident that neither 10 nor 11 can be truth
apt, hence simple expressivism must reject that moral claims can have truth aptitude.

The Frege-Geach problem is thus verifying simple expressivism in so much that it

proves that it is impossible for moral statements to be truth apt. Moral claims are
supported to be personal reflections about assertions and as such cannot be used as
verifiable facts-of-the-matter. Ayer’s Verification Principle, which purports that there are
three types of statements: those which are true, those which are false, and those which are
neither and are literally meaningless shows how moral claims are of the third group. Ayer
asks of all statements “is it true by definition?” and “is it in principle verifiable?”, and in
the case of moral claims we find that moral claims cannot be true by definition, and
cannot be verified (tested with empirical data) either, rendering them meaningless. He
explains that making a moral statement such as “you acted wrongly in breaking into my
house” is the equivalent of saying “you broke in to my house” in a particular tone of
voice. The “wrongly” is merely an expression of an emotional attitude towards house-
breaking. The burglar could easily reply “there is nothing wrong with housebreaking”,
and we would find that there is no fact-of-the-matter that could decide between the two

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statements. To conclude, when we consider what the expressivist would say about the
title statement (“If killing the innocent is wrong, then abortion is wrong. Killing the
innocent is wrong, so abortion is wrong”) we find that he would argue, using the Frege-
Geach point and the Verification Principle that it is logically invalid, and that moral
claims lack truth aptitude making the statement completely subjective and reflective
merely of the speakers opinion and sentiments. There is no moral weight in the statement,
and it also does not follow that if “killing the innocent is wrong” abortion must also be
wrong, as it is impossible to verify that killing the innocent is wrong in the first place, as
well as the possibility of agreeing with the first premise but disagreeing with the second
due to cultural relativity and social upbringing.

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Bibliography
Warburton, Nigel. Philosophy; The Classics (2nd Edition). Routeledge 2000
Mackie, J.L. Ethics: Inventing Right and Wrong (from course pack)
Blackburn, Simon. The Oxford Dictionary of Philosophy. Oxford University Press 1994
Philosophy of Value Lecture and Tutorial Notes on Expressivism and the Frege-Geach
Problem.