Reasoning about right and wrong insofar as it pertains to matters of welfare, justice, and rights. It involves evaluations as to whether a particular action, inaction, motive or person as a whole is good or bad set against some personal standard of what is ‘good’. In contrast, there is the claim for moral objectivism or moral realism: morality is not relative to anything. Thus, moral judgments are objective in the sense that their truth does not depend on who judges them or in fact whether anybody judges them. This claim originates with the writings of the British philosopher G.E. Moore (1873-1958), and in particular his Principia ethica (1903). The claim is challenged when one considers how emotions, and in particularly empathy, may influence moral judgments (an important conjunction in the context of moral development). For example consider making a judgment about whether or not it is justifiable to harm one person order to save many. According to one study, individuals classified as ‘utilitarian’ have reduced emphatic concern when confronted with having to make such a judgment.
See Conscience, Empathy, Guilt, Justice, Moral development, Morality, Normative, Obligation, Reasoning (psychology), Theory of the child’s mind (ToM)