A number of philosophers from Hobbes to Mill to Parfit have held some combination of the following views about the Golden Rule: (a) It is the cornerstone of morality across many if not all cultures. (b) It affirms the value of moral impartiality, and potentially the core idea of utilitarianism. (c) It is immune from evolutionary debunking, that is, there is no good naturalistic explanation for widespread acceptance of the Golden Rule, ergo the best explanation for its appearance in different (...) traditions is that people have perceived the same non-natural moral truth. De Lazari-Radek and Singer employ all three of these claims in an argument meant to vindicate Sidgwick's ‘principle of universal benevolence’. I argue that the Golden Rule is the cornerstone of morality only in Christianity, it does not advocate moral impartiality, and there is a naturalistic explanation for why versions of the Golden Rule appear in different traditions. (shrink)

The golden rule says: ‘Treat others as you want to be treated’. This article organizes contemporary interpretations of the rule into three groups: the ‘material’ golden rule, the ‘relativistic’ golden rule, and the ‘formal’ golden rule. The article also argues that (a) the relativistic golden rule is the weakest, (b) the formal golden rule is virtually irrefutable, (c) the material golden rule is less evident than the formal one, but not necessarily false and (d) the formal golden rule and the (...) material golden rule are not incompatible—they can complement each other. This assumes that the substantive assumptions of the material golden rule are real. (shrink)