> I suspect that having a scientific discourse about whether universal
> ethics exists and, when, what the correct universal ethics is is as
> doomed to failure than discussing the existence of God or some other
> higher entity. It's a matter of belief, I believe.

Spot on.

> Interestingly, it makes what one calls a universal thing a very personal thing.

Once you start down that line of inquiry, there are a lot of
uncomfortable realizations :)

> As long as we are aware of this, it's fine, I think. Our resources are
> limited. But we mustn't be narrow-minded.

The thing is that we are not very good at judging what is important
(neither to ourselves nor to others). And when we come up with some
principles, we are not very good at sticking to them. If we give a lot
of attention to one thing, it's at the expense of other things which may
turn out be more important (whether we realize it or not).

In my experience nobody truly thinks they are narrow-minded, and the
people most inclined to think they are narrow-minded are the least so.
"Journalism is printing what someone else does not want printed:
everything else is public relations." The same applies to
open-mindedness: you are open-minded when you can regularly entertain
opinions you find offensive.