THE ARGUMENT
We like to think we clearly know what principles of morality, justice, compassion, charity etc look like or should be. While we think they are clear, we admit that at times it is hard to apply them in complex situations. While we diverge on what is the best or most moral response, we do not diverge on the principles being valid and clear.
By the way, everybody does have at least some moral rules which they insist are clear. For example, while we may disagree on the most honest thing our community can do, we do not agree that its member's may commit adultery for any reason.
But who says that objective morality as in principles or moral rules has to be clear? Objective morality is comparable to math. If math could only say 6 and 6 are 11 or 12 or 13 so what? It would not stop life from going on.
REPLY:
That is saying objective morality doesn’t need to be perfectly precise in order to be objective. And it is compared to math where sometimes we can’t tell whether 6 + 6 should be 11 or 12 or 13—but that wouldn’t stop there from being a correct answer, even if we haven’t figured out which one.
The uncertainty in our measurements would not mean there isn’t a single true answer.
Likewise for morality. So there may be objective moral facts. But humans often have limited cognitive, emotional, and cultural tools. So we might get “moral measurements” of an action that differ.
BUT: Math and morality make an analogy and need precision. That analogy only works if you assume there is a precise underlying truth in the first place.
If there is not, then moral truths wouldn’t be like 6+6 at all—they’d be more like “When does blue become green?” “How tall is ‘tall’?” Inherently vague things don’t have a hidden exact boundary we simply haven’t found—they’re indeterminate by nature.
It is possible for morality to be objective without being precise in the same way that arithmetic is. Saying morality could be objective only means that moral facts, if they exist, would not depend solely on individual opinions or cultural preferences. It does not follow that those facts must have sharp boundaries or exact measurements. Some objective domains, such as concepts involving categories or thresholds, are inherently vague even though they are not subjective. The classic “heap” example shows that there can be real facts about the world while still lacking a clear cutoff point. In the same way, moral truths could be grounded in objective features of reality—such as harm, well-being, or fairness—while still allowing for borderline cases where it is unclear whether a specific action crosses a moral line.
Separate two ideas that are often confused:
Objectivity: whether something is independent of personal opinion.
Precision: whether it has sharp, exact boundaries.
It would be philosophically awkward to identify God with morality if that morality were genuinely imprecise. Saying that God is morality usually implies that God’s nature is perfectly definite and not subject to borderline cases. Imprecise morality, by contrast, involves real vagueness about where moral boundaries lie, not merely uncertainty from a human perspective. If morality itself were vague, then identifying it with God would suggest that God’s nature contains indeterminacy, which conflicts with standard conceptions of God as fully determinate and omniscient. For this reason, views that equate God with morality typically hold that any moral imprecision lies in human understanding, not in morality itself.