The Normative/Descriptive Decision

a descriptive judgment

makes an assertion that is offered as a statement of the facts that pertain in reality

Words can have normative meaning based on all sorts of values:

he values of art, the values of good food, etc.But here were going to use the term 'normative' to refer specifically to moral values.

a general moral principle

if were talking about a judgment that states some value or rule as a standard for other judgments we are talking about a principle. It has to be NORMATIVE

A word has descriptive mean if it is used

in the context of a judgment to refer to facts or putative facts

A word has normative meaning if it is used

in the context of a judgment, makes an explicit reference to some standard of conduct

A descriptive judgment does not make any claim about whether something is

is good or bad in some respect, but simply states facts

a normative judgment

is one that states some value or evaluative rule as a standard of other judgments, or applies such a value or rule to specific cases.

Morality

is simply a set of beliefs accepted by a given culture concerning what a moral agent ought or ought not to do in moral situations, whether these beliefs are a product of critical reflection or not.

If we are talking about a judgment that applies such a value then we have a judgment that

is talking about some particular thing.

By looking at the context one can

know the meaning of the words have

Here are two examples of Normative judgments

"the Mona Lisa is a beautiful painting," and "all paintings should be harmonious and graceful." These two judgments are saying that certain things are good in a certain respect.

Here are two examples of descriptive judgments

"the Mona Lisa is a rectangular painting," and "all paintings in Western art have been influenced by Greek art." These are not evaluating paintings, not saying that paintings or works of art are good or bad, but are simply stating facts about works of art..

Moral arguments have three components

a general moral principle (GMP), a factual claim(FC) , and a derivative moral judgment (DMJ) .

words such as: 'red', 'green', 'square'.

are used purely descriptively

Words w/ double meaning

can be used either normatively or descriptively.

"Morality"

can be used normatively or descriptively

Also known as the

fact value distinction

Reflective Morality, or the moral point of view

on takes the moral p.o.v. in the discussion of moral issues when one is able and willing to offer normative judgments, to support them, to defend them against significant objections, etc.

In our case a word has normative meaning if it's saying that

some form of conduct, some form of action, is good or bad in a moral sense.

Words that are sued strictly for normative statements are

such words as 'good' and 'bad', 'right' or 'wrong'.

Basically a normative judgment says

that something is good or bad in some respect. It assesses the value of something

if we're simply describing what somebody is doing, a word used

to describe what somebody's doing simply has descriptive meaning.

Saying "the soup is too salty" is an evaluation making it a normative statement

while saying " the soup is salty. " is a descriptive statement, because one is not making a judgment on whether it is good or bad. it could be salty and very good, or it could be salty and very bad