In a classroom the other day I put it to the vote. Are you a relativist or an absolutist? Almost everyone described themselves as a relativist.  That has lead me to a big re-think, and a conclusion: absolutism has had a bad press.

Although relativism appears at face value to be the default position for most of us, as it is close to the idea of democracy – where we vote for what is right and wrong and take a majority decision, I nonetheless agree with Richard Rorty when he argues that the opposite to relativism is fundamentalism, not absolutism.

After all, Kant was an absolutist, and the great D.D. Raphael describes Kantian ethics as the “ethics of democracy”.

Part of the problem lies in the definition of terms.  Relativism implies that we consider the circumstances, absolutism does not. Common sense suggests that we must consider circumstances if we are to do the right thing.  But this is only relativism in a fairly trivial sense.  The question is still an open one: is there such a thing as a universal truth.

So here’s the case for absolute naturalism.  Naturalism says moral goodness is a natural property of the world, or perhaps, of the way human beings are made up.  Are there some universal goods, which, if we don’t act on them, our lives will be morally bad?

One candidate for a universal good is agape love. Agape love is unconditional love for the stranger which respects their otherness, their difference but also accepts the common core humanity which we all share.  This was one of Kant’s great insights when he argues for a principle of absolute equality – the ethics of democracy – which takes the interests of others into account and asks us to stand in their shoes.  This involves a leap of the imagination in a process called universalisability.  I universalise my understanding of your position and ask – how would I like to be treated if I was you?

The agape principle finds it’s reflection not just in Kant’s universalisability but in every great religion of the world and many of the lesser ones.  Jesus states the famous golden rule in Matthew 7 – “do to others as you would have them do to you”, almost word for word the same as Confucius' teaching in 500BC: "Do not do to others what you would not like yourself" (Analects 12.2). The Old Testament says something similar: “love your neighbour as yourself” (Leviticus 19:18), better translated “love your neighbour as if they were yourself”.

In what does the goodness of agape consist?  It is a life-affirming, humanity-affirming principle.  It has a humility behind it.  The young girl on the streets of Rochdale is as important as the young girl found this week in Bordeaux, and both are equal in importance to the Queen.

This is an exalted principle, and incidentally, it shows the ambiguity which puts people off absolutism.  For in this sense, Kant shot himself in the foot when he argued you should never tell a lie – that you should always tell the absolute truth, even to a crazy knifeman.

For absolutism is about absolute principles, like agape love, not absolute rules, like thou shalt never lie.  And principles always have to be applied in real world situations. Actually, the golden rule is not a rule at all, but a principle – herein lies the nature of confusion of ideas.

It's an interesting thought that Jesus was not the first teacher to come up with the golden rule – Confucius, for example, was teaching 500 years before Christ. Click here for all versions fo the golden rule in religions and philosophies of the world.