One of the central questions of ethical education is the role that moral theory could or should play within it. This concerns not only the issue of pedagogical work with children, but also the establishment of professional education and training for teachers and other educators. Contemporary approaches to ethical education emphasise the importance of integrative models and methods, but the issue of moral theory within them has not been explicitly addressed at length. The aim of this paper is thus reflected (...) in the following building blocks and steps. In the first part, I present the concept of ethical education and the field of moral theory. In the second part, I synthetically illuminate the importance of moral theory for ethical education. Jedno od središnjih pitanja etičkog obrazovanja uloga je koju bi u njemu mogla ili trebala imati moralna teorija. To se ne tiče samo problema pedagoškog rada s djecom, nego i ustanove profesionalnog obrazovanja i obuke učitelja i drugih obrazovnih radnika. Suvremeni pristupi etičkom obrazovanju naglašavaju važnost integrativnih modela i metoda, no unutar toga nije se eksplicitno i dostatno bavilo problemom moralne teorije. Cilj ovoga rada tako se odražava u sljedećem: u prvom dijelu, predstavljamo koncept etičkog obrazovanja i polja moralne teorije; u drugome, sintetički rasvjetljavamo važnost moralne teorije za etičko obrazovanje. (shrink)

Although theorists disagree about precisely how to characterize the link between anger and moral judgment, that they are linked is routinely taken for granted in contemporary metaethics and philosophy of emotion. One problem with this assumption is that it ignores virtues like patience, which thinkers as different as Cassian, Śāntideva, and Maimonides have argued are characteristic of mature moral agents. The patient neither experience nor plan to experience anger in response to (at least some) wrongs. Nevertheless, we argue, they remain (...) capable of judging such actions to be wrong. This indicates that a different account of the relationship between anger and moral judgment is required. We conclude by proposing one such account, showing how a metaethicist who was more attentive to the normative ethics of anger might set about reconstructing her position. (shrink)

This paper draws on the 'Fitting Attitudes' analysis of value to argue that we should take the concept of fittingness (rather than value) as our normative primitive. I will argue that the fittingness framework enhances the clarity and expressive power of our normative theorising. Along the way, we will see how the fittingness framework illuminates our understanding of various moral theories, and why it casts doubt on the Global Consequentialist idea that acts and (say) eye colours are normatively on a (...) par. We will see why even consequentialists, in taking rightness to be in some sense determined by goodness, should not think that rightness is conceptually reducible to goodness. Finally, I will use the fittingness framework to explicate the distinction between consequentialist and deontological theories, with particular attention to the contentious case of Rule Consequentialism. (shrink)

This thesis defends a hedonistic theory of value consisting of two main components. Part 1 offers a theory of pleasure. Pleasures are experiences distinguished by a distinct phenomenological quality. This quality is attitudinal in nature: it is the feeling of liking. The pleasure experience is also an object of this attitude: when feeling pleasure, we like what we feel, and part of how it feels is how this liking feels: Pleasures are Internally Liked Experiences. Pleasure plays a central role in (...) the motivational system such that pleasure tends to influence, and in turn be influenced by, other motivational, dispositional and evaluative states of the agent. While this connection is strong, it is often indirect and contingent - the necessary attitudinal connection is a matter of how pleasure feels, not of how it functions. -/- Part 2 is concerned with the nature of value. What kind of problem is it that value poses, and what ought a theory of value to do? In face of the fundamental disagreements that persist over these questions, we try to gather and systemize what we can agree upon about value, and then develop a theory that accounts for (enough of) those things. Meta-ethical naturalism, as developed here, is the view that value is a natural property, identified via the role “value” plays according to the best systematization of moral and evaluative thought. The theory engaging meta-ethics with the scientific investigation of matters relevant to value: we need to understand the causal processes behind our beliefs in order to make an informed decision about which of the competing theories offers the best explanation of value. Finally, the argument is made that the nature and function of pleasure shows it to play the kind of explanatory role necessary for a sound naturalistic reduction of value: it makes many of our beliefs about value true, and it is causally responsible for most of our attributions and beliefs about value. (shrink)

This dissertation is a defence of metaphysical ethical naturalism according to which there is a moral reality which is part of the natural world. The implication of this view is that moral properties, such as moral goodness, justice, compassion and so forth are part of the natural world, and inquiries concerning these moral entities are conducted in similar empirical ways of reasoning to that in which scientific inquiries are conducted. I defend metaphysical ethical naturalism by a variety of explanationist argument (...) in the tradition of Cornell realism. I examine preceding proposals for this argument, and focus on one version of it, which I call ‘the abductive argument for moral realism’. Although there was a suggestion about the abductive argument, the argument has not been discussed enough in the literature. This dissertation is a defence and discussion about the abductive argument which has not been properly examined. The defence of the argument requires the examination of how first-order ethical theory can be developed in the similar empirical ways scientific theories are developed. This will be an attempt to show the analogy between scientific inquiries and ethical inquiries. Describing the analogy between science and ethics, I will argue that the analogy can be best explained in terms of the approximate truth of normative theory which implies the existence of mind-independent natural moral properties. (shrink)

Eine der Herausforderungen, die aus der Globalisierung als einem multidimensionalen Phänomen hervorgehen, ist die Möglichkeit einer moralischen Weltintegration, oder geringstenfalls die Möglichkeit zur Entdeckung einer glaubwürdigen gemeinsamen Grundlage für den sinnreichen ethischen Dialog. Die Überwindung moralischer Fragmentationen der Gegenwartswelt wird noch schwieriger im Lichte der Ansichtsvielfalt in der moralischen Theorie. Ist eine globale Ethik überhaupt noch möglich, behält man die vielerlei Unstimmigkeiten über metaethische sowie normative Fragen im Auge? Die Moraltheorie steht vor der Herausforderung zur Lieferung eines nutzbaren Rahmens für (...) die Moraldiskussion als Vorbedingung der Moralintegration. In seinem jüngsten Buch schlägt Robert Audi das Modell des pluralistischen Universalismus vor – als eine Kombination aus dem Großteil historisch einflussreicher Moraltheorien, genau genommen aus der Wertethik, kantischen Ethik sowie dem Utilitarismus. Die drei befürworteten Zentralwerte heißen Freiheit, Gerechtigkeit und Glück. In meiner Arbeit greife ich diesen Vorschlag auf und deute auf die Rolle hin, die darin der pluralistische Intuitionismus spielt. (shrink)