In philosophical ethics, the naturalistic fallacy was introduced by British philosopher G. E. Moore in his 1903 book Principia Ethica. Moore argues it would be fallacious to explain that which is good reductively, in terms of natural properties such as "pleasant" or "desirable".
The naturalistic fallacy is close to but not identical with the fallacious appeal to nature, the claim that what is natural is inherently good or right, and that what is unnatural is inherently bad or wrong. The fallacious appeal to nature would be the reverse of a moralistic fallacy: that what is good or right is thus natural.
Furthermore, Moore's naturalistic fallacy is very close to (and even confused with) the is–ought problem, which comes from Hume's Treatise. However, unlike Hume's view of the is–ought problem, Moore (and other proponents of ethical non-naturalism) did not consider the naturalistic fallacy to be at odds with moral realism.
Read more about Naturalistic Fallacy: Criticism
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