Evolving Moral Knowledge
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Scanlon on the Metaphysics of Reasons
Against Quietist Normative Realism Forthcoming in Philosophical Studies Tristram McPherson University of Minnesota Duluth [email protected] Note: This is the author’s penultimate manuscript of this paper (ms. of March 1, 2010). The final publication is available at www.springerlink.com. Abstract: Recently, some philosophers have suggested that a form of robust realism about ethics, or normativity more generally, does not face a significant explanatory burden in metaphysics. I call this view metaphysically quietist normative realism. This paper argues that while this view can appear to constitute an attractive alternative to more traditional forms of normative realism, it cannot deliver on this promise. I examine T. M. Scanlon’s attempt to defend such a quietist realism, and argue that rather than silencing metaphysical questions about normative reasons, his defense at best succeeds only in shifting the focus of metaphysical enquiry. I then set aside the details of Scanlon’s view, and argue on general grounds that that the quietist realist cannot finesse a crucial metanormative task: to explain the contrast between the correct normative system and alternative putatively normative standards. Keywords: metaethics, metanormative quietism, metanormative realism, normativity, reasons, Scanlon McPherson Against quietist normative realism MS 1 Introduction Philosophers interested in normative domains such as ethics or epistemology face a persistent challenge: to understand how our practices of normative judgment and discourse fit within our best general account of the world. I will call this the metanormative project.1 (Contrast the more familiar metaethical project, which addresses similar questions about specifically moral or practical norms.) Roughly, metanormative realists think that normative claims are made true by their correspondence to the normative facts.2 Metanormative realists appear to face a daunting metaphysical challenge, which can be partially characterized by noting three central desiderata for a metanormative theory. -
The Evidential Weight of Considered Moral Judgments
San Jose State University SJSU ScholarWorks Master's Theses Master's Theses and Graduate Research 2009 The evidential weight of considered moral judgments Christopher Michael Cloos San Jose State University Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarworks.sjsu.edu/etd_theses Recommended Citation Cloos, Christopher Michael, "The evidential weight of considered moral judgments" (2009). Master's Theses. 3352. DOI: https://doi.org/10.31979/etd.28pf-kx6u https://scholarworks.sjsu.edu/etd_theses/3352 This Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by the Master's Theses and Graduate Research at SJSU ScholarWorks. It has been accepted for inclusion in Master's Theses by an authorized administrator of SJSU ScholarWorks. For more information, please contact [email protected]. THE EVIDENTIAL WEIGHT OF CONSIDERED MORAL JUDGMENTS A Thesis Presented to The Faculty of the Department of Philosophy San José State University In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Master of Arts by Christopher Michael Cloos December 2009 © 2009 Christopher Michael Cloos ALL RIGHTS RESERVED THE EVIDENTIAL WEIGHT OF CONSIDERED MORAL JUDGMENTS by Christopher Michael Cloos APPROVED FOR THE DEPARTMENT OF PHILOSOPHY SAN JOSÉ STATE UNIVERSITY December 2009 Dr. William H. Shaw Department of Philosophy Dr. Anand J. Vaidya Department of Philosophy Dr. Richard L. Tieszen Department of Philosophy ABSTRACT THE EVIDENTIAL WEIGHT OF CONSIDERED MORAL JUDGMENTS by Christopher Michael Cloos The input objection to reflective equilibrium (RE) claims that the method fails as a method of moral justification. According to the objection, considered moral judgments (CMJs) are not truth-conducive. Because the method uses inputs that are not credible, the method does not generate justified moral beliefs. -
Moral Theories Course Leader
PHIL 101: Conceptual Foundations of Bioethics: Moral Theories Course Leader: Stavroula Tsinorema Semester: 1st (7 ECTS) Course Type: Required Objectives: The aims of this course unit are (a) to bring students in contact with the theoretical basis of Bioethics, through training in the methodologies and analytical tools of moral reasoning, (b) to provide them with the basic categories which show the conceptual links between the frameworks of moral philosophy and normative bioethical reasoning, (c) to equip them with the appropriate theoretical frameworks in order to be able to investigate critically and, where possible, to resolve specific moral problems deriving in biomedical research, its application in clinical contexts, health care and environmental policy. The overall aim is to enable students to develop core skills for the conduct of normative analysis and reasoning in Bioethics. Content: The normative resources for moral argument and justification in Bioethics are found in moral philosophy and philosophical theories of ethics. This course unit will survey some of the principle philosophical approaches in addressing a number of bioethical controversies and bring appropriate perspectives from ethical theories to bear on case studies in Bioethics. Topics include: 1) Philosophical ethics and its relation to Bioethics. 2) Classical approaches. Ethics and metaphysics. Ontological approaches to ethics. 3) Modern classical approaches to ethics. Theories of Scottish Enlightenment. Moral sentiments and the ethics of work: David Hume and Adam Smith. 4) Immanuel Kant: The ethics of form. 5) Jeremy Bentham and John Stuart Mill. Utilitarianism. 6) Contemporary moral theories: - Contractarian and constructivist theories. John Rawls, Jurgen Habermas, Onora O’ Neill Postgraduate Prospectus 17 - Virtue ethics, ethics of care, feminism, communitarianism 7) Theories of a deflatory kind and moral scepticism. -
Moral Fallibility and Moral Smugness
This is a repository copy of Gibbardian Humility: Moral Fallibility and Moral Smugness. White Rose Research Online URL for this paper: http://eprints.whiterose.ac.uk/93155/ Version: Accepted Version Article: Lenman, J.W. (2014) Gibbardian Humility: Moral Fallibility and Moral Smugness. Journal of Value Inquiry, 48 (2). 235 - 245. ISSN 0022-5363 https://doi.org/10.1007/s10790-014-9420-6 Reuse Unless indicated otherwise, fulltext items are protected by copyright with all rights reserved. The copyright exception in section 29 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 allows the making of a single copy solely for the purpose of non-commercial research or private study within the limits of fair dealing. The publisher or other rights-holder may allow further reproduction and re-use of this version - refer to the White Rose Research Online record for this item. Where records identify the publisher as the copyright holder, users can verify any specific terms of use on the publisher’s website. Takedown If you consider content in White Rose Research Online to be in breach of UK law, please notify us by emailing [email protected] including the URL of the record and the reason for the withdrawal request. [email protected] https://eprints.whiterose.ac.uk/ 1 1 Gibbardian Humility: Moral Fallibility and Moral Smugness This is my version of a paper published in The Journal of Value Inquiry 48, 2014, pp. 235-245. DOI 10.1007/s10790-014-9420-6. Please refer to the latter when quoting or citing Abstract Andy Egan objects to quasi-realism that quasi-realists are committed to a form of smugness: when confronted with cases of fundamental disagreement, the quasi-realist must see him/herself as immune to moral error in a way that others are not. -
Sense and Sensibility
Nils Franzén Sense and Sensibility Four Essays on Evaluative Discourse Dissertation presented at Uppsala University to be publicly examined in Geijersalen, Thunbergsvägen 3H, Uppsala, Thursday, 20 September 2018 at 15:00 for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. The examination will be conducted in English. Faculty examiner: Professor Pekka Väyrynen (University of Leeds, Faculty of Arts, Humanities and Cultures ). Abstract Franzén, N. 2018. Sense and Sensibility. Four Essays on Evaluative Discourse. 37 pp. Uppsala: Department of Philosophy. ISBN 978-91-506-2717-6. The subject of this thesis is the nature of evaluative terms and concepts. It investigates various phenomena that distinguish evaluative discourse from other types of language use. Broadly, the thesis argues that these differences are best explained by the hypothesis that evaluative discourse serves to communicate that the speaker is in a particular emotional or affective state of mind. The first paper, “Aesthetic Evaluation and First-hand Experience”, examines the fact that it sounds strange to make evaluative aesthetic statements while at the same time denying that you have had first-hand experience with the object being discussed. It is proposed that a form of expressivism about aesthetic discourse best explains the data. The second paper, “Evaluative Discourse and Affective States of Mind”, discusses the problem of missing Moorean infelicity for expressivism. It is argued that evaluative discourse expresses states of mind attributed by sentences of the form “Nils finds it wrong to tell lies”. These states, the paper argues, are non-cognitive, and the observation therefore addresses the problem of missing infelicity. The third paper, “Sensibilism and Evaluative Supervenience”, argues that contemporary theories about why the moral supervenes on the non-moral have failed to account for the full extent of the phenomenon. -
Metaethics and the Autonomy of Morality
Philosophers’ volume8,no.6 july2008 Imprint 1. Introduction SincethepublicationofG.E.Moore’sPrincipia Ethicaithasbecome commonplace for philosophers to distinguish between questions in metaethics and those in normative ethics.1 A sympathetic character- Metaethics izationofthecenturyofself-consciouslymetaethicalresearchthatfol- lowedwouldemphasizetheextraordinarydevelopmentbothinour understandingofthecentralmetaethicalproblemsandinthesophis- ticationofthetheorieselaboratedtomeetthem.However,someare & notsosympathetic.Inthispaper,Iexamineonesourceofdistrustin metaethicalresearch:itsapparenttensionwiththenotionthatmoral- ityisautonomous. Tobegin,IbrieflysketchhowIamthinkingofmetaethics,ofthe the Autonomy of autonomyofmorality,andofthetensionthatcanappeartoexistbe- tweenthem.Onetraditionalconceptionofmetaethicstakesittocon- cern only the analysis of moral language.2 However, contemporary philosophers typically use the term more expansively.3 Here, I use Morality the term to pick out elements common to these contemporary dis- cussions.Thiscommoncoreencompassesmoralontologyandmoral psychologyaswellasmoralsemantics.Bycontrast,normativeethics (sometimesalsocalled‘substantiveethics’)concernsthestructureand contentofthecorrectmoralevaluationofagents,statesofaffairs,and actions.Normativeethicaltheoriestypicallyofferaccountsofmoral valueandmoralreasons,ofvirtuouscharactertraits,ofrightness,and Tristram McPherson oftherelationshipsbetweenthese. 1. The word ‘metaethics’ came into regular philosophical usage much later. University of Minnesota Duluth -
Gibbard, Allan
ThinkingH ow to Live with Each Other ALLAN GibbARD The Tanner Lectures on Human Values Delivered at TheU niversity of California, Berkeley February 28–March 2, 2006 Allan Gibbard is Richard Brandt Distinguished University Professor of Philosophy at the University of Michigan. He graduated from Swarth- more College and received his Ph.D. from Harvard University. He taught at Achimota School in Ghana while in the Peace Corps, and at the Uni- versity of Chicago and the University of Pittsburgh. He has also been a visiting professor at Stanford University. He is a member of the American Philosophical Society and a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. He has served as president of the Central Division of the Ameri- can Philosophical Society. His many publications include Manipulation of Voting Schemes: A General Result (1973); Wise Choices, Apt Feelings: A Theory of Normative Judgment (1990); Moral Discourse and Practice (co- editor with Stephen Darwall and Peter Railton, 1997); and ThinkingH ow to Live (2003). I. INSight, CONSISTENCY, AND PLANS FOR LiviNG Jonathan Haidt, the social psychologist, entitles a fascinating article “The Emotional Dog and Its Rational Tail.” His topic is moral judgment, and the emotional dog is what he calls “intuition.” Mostly, he argues, we don’t arrive at our moral conclusions by reasoning. We jump to them with emo- tional judgments, with “affectively valenced intuitions,” as he puts it. We will often be firmly convinced that our moral judgments rest on sound reasoning, and that unless others are driven by bias, they will appreciate the force of our arguments. -
Normative Ethics
Philosophy 34: Normative Ethics Matthew Silverstein Spring 2008 Contact Information Office: 204 Cooper House Office Hours: Tuesday, 2:00–5:00 pm, and by appointment Email: [email protected] Phone: (413) 542-8310 Course Description Is anything to be said in a principled way about right and wrong, or good and bad? We will examine a number of positive and negative answers to this question. Our primary focus will be on three of the central traditions of Western ethical philosophy, typified by Aristotle, Immanuel Kant, and John Stuart Mill. We will also study one of modern morality’s harshest critics: Friedrich Nietzsche. Along the way, we will look at contemporary discussions of the relation between the demands of morality and those personal obligations that spring from friendships, as well as recent views about the nature of well-being. Course Requirements There will be one short expository paper (2–3 pages) and two longer critical papers (6–8 pages). Preparation and active participation also count towards your grade. Your final grade will be determined as follows: 20% Short Paper 35% Long Paper 1 35% Long Paper 2 5% Preparation 5% Participation Your preparation grade will be a function of unannounced, in-class ten-minute essay assignments. There will be several such assignments over the course of the semester. Their purpose is to ensure that everyone has studied the assigned reading and to encourage thoughtful discussion in class. Though they will not be graded, I will collect them at the end of class. These essays cannot be made up, and unsatisfactory work will receive no credit. -
A Consequentialist Response to the Demandingness Objection
1 A CONSEQUENTIALIST RESPONSE TO THE DEMANDINGNESS OBJECTION Nicholas R. Baker, Lee University INTRODUCTION We usually believe that morality has limits; that is, that there is some limit to what morality may reasonably demand of moral agents. We suppose that there are supererog atory actions that are just that, supererogatory. We often think that while morality may require some positive and negative obligations, there are at least some actions that are simply permissible.1 This is what the demandingness objection to consequentialism is about; it draws upon our intuitions on these issues in order to show how counter-intuitive the implications of some versions of normative ethics can be. In this paper I will outline and defend the demandingness objection as it applies to act-consequentialism (hereafter AC), then I will argue that rule-consequentialism (hereafter RC), as conceived of by Brad Hooker, is also susceptible to this objection; finally, I will attempt to amend RC so that it may escape the demandingness objection. THE DEMANDS OF ACT CONSEQUENTIALISM Shelly Kagan states in the early parts of his text, The Limits of Morality, that, “[T]here are [. .] what we might think of as limits imposed on morality – for it is typically believed that there are limits to what morality can demand of us.”2 He goes on to further suggest that, “[I]t is generally held that although morality does sometimes require us to make sacrifices, we are not morally required to make our greatest possible contributions to the overall good. There is a limit to moral requirement.”3 While Kagan himself argues for a withholding of judgement as to whether or not these limits do exist, I will be arguing that these limits do, in fact, exist. -
Truth and Metaethics
TRUTH AND METAETHICS THE POSSIBILITY OF METAETHICS RUSS SHAFER-LANDAU∗ INTRODUCTION ............................................................................................... 479 I. SECOND-ORDER QUESTIONS ............................................................... 480 II. EXTERNAL SKEPTICISM AND HUME’S PRINCIPLE ................................ 483 III. EXTERNAL SKEPTICISM: ERROR THEORETIC ARGUMENTS ................. 487 A. Morons ......................................................................................... 487 B. Characterizing Error Skepticism ................................................. 488 C. The Missing Arguments ............................................................... 491 IV. EXTERNAL STATUS SKEPTICISM .......................................................... 493 CONCLUSION ................................................................................................... 495 INTRODUCTION I found the first few chapters of Ronald Dworkin’s Justice for Hedgehogs1 very disconcerting. True, the manuscript is written in Dworkin’s lovely style. It is wide-ranging and provocative throughout. The book pulls no punches and advances a challenging thesis. It is very ambitious and full of interesting observations and arguments. There is much for everyone to admire, and something for everyone to question. In my case, two distinct sources of worry kept pressing. My initial unease grew steadily to something approaching panic as I assimilated the underlying message of these chapters – metaethics is largely a sham; -
Allan Gibbard Reviews ‘On What Matters’ by Derek Parfit · LRB 7 June 2012 9/27/12 1:15 PM
Allan Gibbard reviews ‘On What Matters’ by Derek Parfit · LRB 7 June 2012 9/27/12 1:15 PM This site uses cookies. By continuing to browse this site you are agreeing to our use of × cookies. (More Information) Back to article page Five Girls on a Rock Allan Gibbard On What Matters by Derek Parfit Oxford, 540 pp. and 825 pp, £30.00, May 2011, ISBN 978 0 19 926592 3 Morality can’t just be a system of arbitrary taboos. We want its protections, and others want those same protections against us. A morality worth heeding must have a rationale. A chief task of moral philosophers is to discern such a rationale and to shape it by criticism and argument. Derek Parfit’s On What Matters looks to two great moral philosophers, Immanuel Kant in the late 18th century and Henry Sidgwick, whose treatise The Methods of Ethics first appeared in 1874. Kant, Parfit writes, ‘is the greatest moral philosopher since the ancient Greeks’, but Sidgwick’s Methods ‘is, I believe, the best book on ethics ever written’. Kant and Sidgwick are normally taken to stand for the two great opposing moral visions: Sidgwick for utilitarianism, which concerns itself with how to maximise happiness, and Kant for a moral law grounded in reason. Parfit finds, however, that Kant and Sidgwick are ‘climbing the same mountain’ by different routes. We are still far from the summit by either route, but as Parfit said a quarter-century ago, ‘compared with the other sciences, non-religious ethics is the youngest and the least advanced.’ As with any science, a mature ethics might take generations to formulate. -
Disparate Goods and Rawls' Difference Principle: a Social Choice Theoretic Treatment
ALLAN GIBBARD DISPARATE GOODS AND RAWLS' DIFFERENCE PRINCIPLE: A SOCIAL CHOICE THEORETIC TREATMENT ABSTRACT. Rawls' Difference Principle asserts that a basic economic structure is just if it makes the worst off people as well off as is feasible. How well off someone is is to be measured by an 'index' of 'primary social goods'. It is this index that gives content to the principle, and Rawls gives no adequate directions for constructing it. In this essay a version of the difference principle is proposed that fits much of what Rawls says, but that makes use of no index. Instead of invoking an index of primary social goods, the principle formulated here invokes a partial ordering of prospects for opportunities. i. PRIMARY SOCIAL GOODS AND THE INDEXING PROBLEM In A Theory of Justice, Rawls claims as one of the virtues of his theory that it does not require interpersonal comparisons of utility. Instead, the interpersonal comparisons needed for the theory are based on an 'index of primary social goods'. Primary goods are goods useful toward widely disparate ends, "things which it is supposed a rational man wants what- ever else he wants" (p. 92). 1 The primary social goods include rights and liberties, powers and opportunities, income and wealth (pp. 62, 92). In Rawls' theory, then, the basis of interpersonal comparisons is overt: the compari- sons are to be made on the basis of who gets how much of what. Why might this be an advantage? To anyone who denies that interpersonal comparisons of utility are meaningful, the advantage will seem obvious: by not invoking such comparisons, the theory avoids a pseudo-concept.