I argue that an evaluational conception of love collides with the way we value love. That way allows that love has causes, but not reasons, and it recognizes and celebrates a love that refuses to justify itself. Love has unjustified selectivity, due to its arbitrary causes. That imposes a non-tradability norm. A love for reasons, rational love or evaluational love would be propositional, and it therefore allows that the people we love are tradable commodities. A moralized conception of love is (...) no less committed to treating those we love as tradable commodities; it is just that they are tradable moral commodities. An evaluative criterion of adequacy, I suggest, encourages the opposite view ? a non-rational and non-evaluational concept of love. Such a love can set up partial obligations, which may even demand that one sacrifice one's life. Only a love that has causes but not reasons can have the kind of value that we think love has, and thus it would only be rational to pursue and foster such a love. (shrink)

Many discussions of love and the family treat issues of justice as something alien. On this view, concerns about whether one's family is internally just are in tension with the modes of interaction that are characteristic of loving families. In this essay, we challenge this widespread view. We argue that once justice becomes a shared family concern, its pursuit is compatible with loving familial relations. We examine four arguments for the thesis that a concern with justice is not at home (...) within a loving family, and we explain why these arguments fail. We develop and defend an alternative conception of the justice-oriented loving family, arguing that justice can—and, for the sake of justice, should—be seen as a family value. (shrink)

In this paper, I argue against certain dogmas about ambivalence and alienation. Authors such as Harry Frankfurt and Christine Korsgaard demand a unity of persons that excludes ambivalence. Other philosophers such as David Velleman have criticized this demand as overblown, yet these critics, too, demand a personal unity that excludes an extreme form of ambivalence (“radical ambivalence”). I defend radical ambivalence by arguing that, to be true to oneself, one sometimes needs to be radically ambivalent. Certain dogmas about alienation are (...) even more entrenched. Allen Wood’s entry on “alienation” in the Oxford Companion to Philosophy begins as follows: “A psychological or social evil, characterized by one or another type of harmful separation, disruption or fragmentation, which sunders things that belong together.” I think that it is not true that self-alienation is necessarily “harmful.” I argue that radical ambivalence is a form of self-alienation. Thus, because faithfulness to oneself sometimes requires radical ambivalence, to be true to oneself, one sometimes needs to be alienated from oneself. (shrink)

A survey of the notion of intention as it relates to debates in the philosophy of action, moral psychology, and ethics.

This paper addresses the issue of paternalism in child-rearing. Since the parent–child relationship seems to be the linguistic source of the concept, one may be tempted to assume that raising a child represents a particularly appropriate sphere for paternalism. The parent–child relationship is generally understood as a relationship that is supposed to promote the development and autonomy-formation of the child, so that the apparent source of the concept is a form of autonomy-oriented paternalism. Far from taking paternalism to be overtly (...) unproblematic in such paradigmatic, pedagogical settings, this article analyzes how an effort should be made to understand a child’s capacities and which standards parents should be held to when deciding whether interference truly serves the child’s interests. (shrink)

It seems better to love virtue than vice, pleasure than pain, good than evil. Perhaps it's also better to love virtuous people than vicious people. But at the same time, it's repugnant to suggest that a mother should love her smarter, more athletic, better looking son than his dim, clumsy, ordinary brother. My task is to help sort out the conflicting intuitions about what we should love. In particular, I want to address a problem for the no-reasons view, the theory (...) that love cannot be rationally justified. Since it seems better to love good people rather than evil villains, it appears that there are indeed reasons for (or, at least, against) love. Is it coherent to talk this way and deny that love can be justified? I think so and will explain how. (shrink)

The question of how well we need to be known, to be loved, is considered. A ‘second-person’ model is argued for, on which love requires that the beloved’s demands to be known be respected. This puts pressure on the idea that lovers need to make a beloved’s interests their own, taking that to require comprehension of the beloved’s interests: a lover would have to appreciate the normative intelligibility and motivating force of an interest. The possibility of love with failure of (...) comprehension is defended, using illustrations from Marilynne Robinson’s novel Gilead. (shrink)

Are there normative reasons for love? More specifically, is it possible to rationally justify love? Or can we at best provide explanations for why we love? In Part I of this entry, I discuss the nature of love, theories of emotion, and what it takes to justify an attitude. In Part II, I provide an overview of the various positions one might take on the rational justification of love. I focus on the debate between defenders of the no-reasons view and (...) the reasons view. Along the way, I discuss the significance of falling in love, the problem of trading up, and the notion of irreplaceability. I evaluate attempts to justify love based on the intrinsic and the relational properties of the beloved. (shrink)

The temporal period between the moment of deliberation and the execution of the intention varies widely—from opening an umbrella when one feels the first raindrops hit to planning and writing a book. I investigate the distinctive ability that adult human beings have to deliberate for their far future selves exhibited at the latter end of this temporal spectrum, which I term prospective deliberation. What grounds it when it is successful? And, why does it fail in some cases? I shall argue (...) that an agent is warranted in deliberating for a future self when her reasons give her the right kind of cross-temporal authority. I argue that this authority is distinctive and cannot be accounted for by theories of agential authority that take desires, value judgments, or willings as the ground of authority in standard cases of deliberation. According to the theory I propose having the right kind of cross-temporal agential authority is not only a matter of having epistemic access to a future self’s reasons or being the same metaphysical person as a future self, it requires confidence that the agent’s reasons support undertaking such a normative commitment and that that future self will see the normative force of those reasons as the agent sees them. In other words, cross-temporal agential authority requires that the past self and the future self share a normative perspective. I show that this further condition only obtains if the agent sees her reasons in deliberation as having certain features. (shrink)

On a naive reading of the major accounts of love, love is a kind of mental event. A recent trend in the philosophical literature on love is to reject these accounts on the basis that they do not do justice to the historical dimension of love, as love essentially involves a distinctive kind of temporally extended pattern. Although the historicist account has advantages over the positions that it opposes, its appeal to the notion of a pattern is problematic. I will (...) argue that an account of love as disposition, suitably construed, is superior to the historicist account in that it has the advantages the historicist account has without its problems. In addition, the dispositional account has advantages of its own. (shrink)

A defence of the idea that there are sui generis duties of love: duties, that is, that we owe to people in virtue of standing in loving relationships with them. I contrast this non-reductionist position with the widespread reductionist view that our duties to those we love all derive from more generic moral principles. The paper mounts a cumulative argument in favour of the non-reductionist position, adducing a variety of considerations that together speak strongly in favour of adopting it. The (...) concluding section connects this debate with larger issues in moral theory concerning the general idea of obligation. (shrink)

Recent studies in psychosocial oncology that seek to address the social, psychological, emotional, spiritual, quality of life, and functional impacts of cancer, report positive findings for meaning-making interventions designed to help cancer patients cope with their illness experience. These interventions are successful in decreasing depression among cancer patients and increasing life satisfaction, self-esteem, coping, physical functioning, and optimism. Yet, despite these positive findings meaning-making interventions and, more generally psychosocial care, are not well integrated into hospital or healthcare organization routine cancer (...) patient care.This thesis explores practical, theoretical, and bioethical barriers to integrating psychosocial care, focusing primarily on the latter considerations. I will argue that meaning-making interventions fall within the bounds of healthcare professionals’ capacities and duty to care, more to the point, as necessary for quality cancer patient care. The bioethical principle of respect for autonomy, when reconsidered from a feminist standpoint, morally requires the intervention’s inclusion in routine care. (shrink)

Many think that love would be a casualty of free will skepticism. I disagree. I argue that love would be largely unaffected if we came to deny free will, not simply because we cannot shake the attitude, but because love is not chosen, nor do we want it to be. Here, I am not alone; others have reached similar conclusions. But a few important distinctions have been overlooked. Even if hard incompatibilism is true, not all love is equal. Although we (...) have only minimal control over love, it can be more or less authentic. I develop my position by considering the fictional trope of love potions and the implications of a futuristic psychotropic, Lovezac—Viagra for the heart. But I am not as optimistic as some. Even though free will skepticism would not jeopardize love-the-feeling, there are reasons to think that loving relationships might not be immune. (shrink)

Here it is argued that in order for something someone “does” to count as a genuine action, the person needn’t have been able to refrain from doing it. If this is right, then two recent defenses of the principle of alternative possibilities, a version of which says that a person is morally responsible for what he has done only if he could have refrained from doing it, are unsuccessful.

Although we can try to explain why we love, we can never justify our love. Love is neither based on reasons, nor responsive to reasons, nor can it be assessed for normative reasons. Love can be odd, unfortunate, fortuitous, or even sadly lacking, but it can never be appropriate or inappropriate. We may have reasons to act on our love, but we cannot justify our loving feelings. Shakespeare's Bottom is right: "Reason and love keep little company together now-a-days." Indeed, they (...) keep none and they never kept any: there are no justifying reasons for love. (shrink)

People with cognitive disabilities are equal citizens, and law ought to show respect for them as full equals. To do so, law must provide such people with equal entitlements to medical care, housing, and other economic needs. But law must also go further, providing people with disabilities truly equal access to education, even when that is costly and involves considerable change in current methods of instruction. The central theme of this essay is what is required in order to give such (...) people political and civil rights on a basis of genuine equality. (shrink)

The notion of autonomy commonly employed in medical ethics literature and practices is inadequate on three fronts: it fails to properly identify nonautonomous actions and choices, it gives a false account of which features of actions and choices makes them autonomous or nonautonomous, and it provides no grounds for the moral requirement to respect autonomy. In this paper I offer a more adequate framework for how to think about autonomy, but this framework does not lend itself to the kinds of (...) practical application assumed in medical ethics. A general problem then arises: the notion of autonomy used in medical ethics is conceptually inadequate, but conceptually adequate notions of autonomy do not have the practical applications that are the central concern of medical ethics. Thus, a revision both of the view of autonomy and the practice of “respect for autonomy” are in order. (shrink)

This paper takes as its starting point a debate between Harry Frankfurt and J. David Velleman. Frankfurt argues that we need to resolve ambivalence since it necessarily threatens autonomy. Velleman challenges this claim, arguing that a desire to resolve ambivalence threatens autonomy when it prompts repression. I argue that the relationship between ambivalence and autonomy is more ambiguous than either theorist tends to acknowledge. In doing so, I recommend three features relevant for assessing whether or not ambivalence threatens autonomy.

Just how care moves us is the subject of Katherine Gardiner’s thesis. Gardiner wants to know how care moves us – or in philosophical terms, how it motivates us. She describes caring as a morally ‘necessary’ activity, which means that we cannot escape responding to the care appeal. However, Gardiner uses the example of ‘Pim’, who cannot care and feels really bad about it - not because he is incapable of caring, but who just can’t. She reviews several versions of (...) care ethics that might persuade him to care, containing concepts like ‘engrossment’, ‘responsibility’, ‘solidarity’, ‘virtue’ and ‘reason’. According to Gardiner, none will do, because they are not compelling enough. She concludes that we need to understand how morality has effect, how it works. Christine Korsgaard’s concept of ‘normativity’ does just this. Korsgaard makes necessary links between making moral decisions and having an identity and being human and argues that acting contrary to any of these will make one “feel worse than death”. Caring for and about others is an important human activity and for some people is a crucial part of their practical identity. Without Korsgaard, we would have to reject Pim as a moral deviant (someone insensible to moral reason); with Korsgaard we can understand Pim’s pain, according to Gardiner. (shrink)

In this essay, I argue that a proper understanding of the historicity of love requires an appreciation of the irreplaceability of the beloved. I do this through a consideration of ideas that were first put forward by Robert Kraut in “Love De Re” (1986). I also evaluate Amelie Rorty's criticisms of Kraut's thesis in “The Historicity of Psychological Attitudes: Love is Not Love Which Alters Not When It Alteration Finds” (1986). I argue that Rorty fundamentally misunderstands Kraut's Kripkean analogy, and (...) I go on to criticize her claim that concern over the proper object of love should be best understood as a concern over constancy. This leads me to an elaboration of the distinct senses in which love can be seen as historical. I end with a further defense of the irreplaceability of the beloved and a discussion of the relevance of recent debates over the importance of personal identity for an adequate account of the historical dimension of love. (shrink)

With the waves of reform occurring in mental health legislation in England and other jurisdictions, mental capacity is set to become a key medico-legal concept. The concept is central to the law of informed consent and is closely aligned to the philosophical concept of autonomy. It is also closely related to mental disorder. This paper explores the interdisciplinary terrain where mental capacity is located. Our aim is to identify core dilemmas and to suggest pathways for future interdisciplinary research. The terrain (...) can be separated into three types of discussion: philosophical, legal and psychiatric. Each discussion approaches mental capacity and judgmental autonomy from a different perspective yet each discussion struggles over two key dilemmas: whether mental capacity and autonomy is/should be a moral or a psychological notion and whether rationality is the key constitutive factor. We suggest that further theoretical work will have to be interdisciplinary and that this work offers an opportunity for the law to enrich its interpretation of mental capacity, for psychiatry to clarify the normative elements latent in its concepts and for philosophy to advance understanding of autonomy through the study of decisional dysfunction. The new pressures on medical and legal practice to be more explicit about mental capacity make this work a priority. (shrink)

Genuine agents are able to engage in activity because they find it worth pursuing—because they care about it. In this respect, they differ from what might be called “mere intentional systems”: systems like chess-playing computers that exhibit merely goal-directed behavior mediated by instrumental rationality, without caring. A parallel distinction can be made in the domain of social activity: plural agents must be distinguished from plural intentional systems in that plural agents have cares and engage in activity because of those cares. (...) In this paper, I sketch an account of what it is for an individual to care about things in terms of her exhibiting a certain pattern of emotions. After extending this account to make sense of an individual's caring about other agents, I then show how a certain sort of emotional connectedness among a group of people can make intelligible the group's having cares and thereby constitute that group as a plural agent. Alternative accounts of social action, by ignoring the difference between mere intentional systems and genuine agents, and so by leaving out these emotional entanglements from their accounts of social action, thereby fail to capture a whole range of social phenomena involving plural agents. (shrink)

It has been argued - most prominently in Harry Frankfurt's recent work - that the normative authority of personal commitments derives not from their intrinsic worth but from the way in which one's will is invested in what one cares about. In this essay, I argue that even if this approach is construed broadly and supplemented in various ways, its intrasubjective character leaves it ill-prepared to explain the normative grip of commitments in cases of purported self-betrayal. As an alternative, I (...) sketch a view that focuses on intersubjective constraints of intelligibility built into social practices and on the pragmatics of how those norms are contested in an ongoing fashion. (shrink)

Philosophers often suggest that their theories of free will are supported by our phenomenology. Just as their theories conflict, their descriptions of the phenomenology of free will often conflict as well. We suggest that this should motivate an effort to study the phenomenology of free will in a more systematic way that goes beyond merely the introspective reports of the philosophers themselves. After presenting three disputes about the phenomenology of free will, we survey the (limited) psychological research on the experiences (...) relevant to the philosophical debates and then describe some pilot studies of our own with the aim of encouraging further research. The data seem to support compatibilist descriptions of the phenomenology more than libertarian descriptions. We conclude that the burden is on libertarians to find empirical support for their more demanding metaphysical theories with their more controversial phenomenological claims. (shrink)

Drawing on recent cognitive theories of the emotions, this article develops an account of critical reflection as requiring emotional flexibility and involving the ability to envisage alternative reasons for action. The focus on the role of emotions in critical reflection, and in agents' resistance to reflection, suggests the need to move beyond an introspective to a more social and relational conception of the process of reflection. It also casts new light on the intractable problem of explaining how oppressive socialisation impairs (...) the capacity for autonomy. (shrink)

What do we ordinarily mean when we describe people as authentic or inauthentic? We describe friends, enemies, acquaintances, and colleagues as authentic and inauthentic, as well as politicians, celebrities, and other public figures. What are we saying about someone, when we say that they are authentic or inauthentic? I argue that authenticity is transparency: that you are authentic to the extent that you are transparent and inauthentic to the extent that you are opaque. I contrast my account with three alternative (...) accounts of authenticity: the view that authenticity is fidelity to your true self, the view that authenticity is a species of selfknowledge, and the view that authenticity is a species of non-conformity. I will argue that my proposed account, unlike its rivals, can explain a basic intuition about personal authenticity: that people who are fakes – i.e. phonies or poseurs – are inauthentic people. (shrink)

The aim of this paper is to provide a detailed characterisation of some ways in which our preferences reflect our reasons. I will argue that practical reasons can be characterised along two dimensions that influence our preferences: their balance and their weight. This is analogous to a similar characterisation of the way in which probabilities reflect the balance and weight of evidence in epistemology. In this paper, I will illustrate the distinction between the balance and weight of reasons, and show (...) how this is crucial for an adequate account of preference and choice. The upshot is a more complete picture of a particular kind of decision, labelled by Isaac Levi and, more recently, Ruth Chang as ‘hard choices’. These are choices in which one option is better than another in some ways, the other is better than the first in some ways, but neither seems better overall. The distinction between the balance and weight of reasons presents a new way of understanding how hard choices vary by degree and what it is that makes them so hard. (shrink)

Nudging works through dispositions to decide with specific heuristics, and has three component parts. A nudge is a feature of an environment that enables such a disposition; a person is nudged when such a disposition is triggered; and a person performs a nudged action when such a disposition manifests in action. This analysis clarifies an autonomy-based worry about nudging as used in public policy or for private profit: that a person’s ability to reason well is undermined when she is nudged. (...) Reasoning well is a component of self-guidance, which is an aspect of autonomy and so something there is reason to promote, preserve, or respect. However, a person can reason well when she is nudged: Many of these heuristics are good rules to reason with, and she can be flexible with respect to them when she takes there to be a better way to reason. Along the way, this paper uncovers several design specifications for responsible nudging, and discusses open empirical questions. However, nudging’s being compatible with reasoning well crystallizes a distinct worry about manipulation: that nudge designers can rely on nudged people guiding themselves toward the designers’ own ends. Manipulation of this sort exploits one aspect of autonomy (namely, self-guidance) to undermine autonomy in other respects. (shrink)

While love and personal relationships are the subjects of rich and sophisticated literatures, philosophical writing about the end of special relationships is much harder to come by. However, the end of special relationships is a significant part of our lives and gives rise to a number of philosophical questions. In this article, I explore the normative significance of the end of special relationships, with a particular focus on the case of breaking up in the context of committed romantic relationships. Specifically, (...) I address three questions. First, what does A do when A breaks up with B? Second, what normative effect will A’s breaking up with B have on the relationship-based duties, reasons, and permissions that are partly constitutive of A and B’s relationship? Third, how is the ability to break up consistent with the commitment that many longer-term romantic relationships involve? In response to the first and second questions, I argue that breaking up is a neglected example of a normative power and develop a tripartite account of the normative effects of exercising this power. In response to the third question, I develop an account of the nature and value of commitment within romantic relationships and show how the power to exit a relationship by breaking up is consistent with this form of commitment. (shrink)

This chapter presents arguments for two slightly different versions of the thesis that the value of persons is incomparable. Both arguments allege an incompatibility between the demands of a certain kind of practical reasoning and the presuppositions of value comparisons. The significance of these claims is assessed in the context of the “Numbers problem”—the question of whether one morally ought to benefit one group of potential aid recipients rather than another simply because they are greater in number. It is argued (...) that many of the popular approaches to this problem—even ones that avoid the aggregation of personal value—are imperiled by the incomparability theses. -/- . (shrink)

Some people want their lives to possess importance on a large scale. Some crave fame, or at least wide recognition. And some even desire glory that will only be realised after their death. Such desires are either ignored or disparaged by many philosophers. However, although few of us have a real shot at importance and fame on any grand scale, these can be genuine personal goods when they meet certain further conditions. Importance that relates to positive impact and reflects our (...) agency answers a distinctive existential concern for one's life to matter. And since what is important merits wide appreciation, the step from wanting to be significant and wanting that significance widely appreciated is small. Still, desires for importance and fame can take a more vicious character when they are not properly structured, and when they are not dominated by more impartial aims. If we accept the personal value of importance and fame, it is hard to see why that value cannot extend beyond our death. The temporal distribution of glory is actually irrelevant to its value. But it is also a mistake to identify a concern with posthumous glory with the wish to leave a trace after our death. (shrink)

The Southern Journal of Philosophy, EarlyView.

A multitude of scholars have recently argued that inherently ambivalent reactions ought to be accepted, and our drive toward overcoming them resisted, in order to preserve a reflectively accurate account of oneself. By contrast, I argue that a genuine commitment to overcome ambivalence aims less at avoiding than acknowledging and understanding, as well as possibly resolving, whatever conflicts led us to become ambivalent in the first place. On the other hand, certain forms of ‘reflective ambivalence’ are especially vulnerable to the (...) very kind of self‐deception they aim to prevent. (shrink)

This paper takes a constitutivist approach to self-deception, and argues that this phenomenon should be evaluated under several dimensions of rationality. The constitutivist approach has the merit of explaining the selective nature of self-deception as well as its being subject to moral sanction. Self-deception is a pragmatic strategy for maintaining the stability of the self, hence continuous with other rational activities of self-constitution. However, its success is limited, and it costs are high: it protects the agent’s self by undermining the (...) authority she has on her mental life. To this extent, self-deception is akin to alienation and estrangement. Its morally disturbing feature is its self-serving partiality. The self-deceptive agent settles on standards of justification that are lower than any rational agent would adopt, and thus loses grip on her agency. To capture the moral dimension of self-deception, I defend a Kantian account of the constraints that bear on self-constitution, and argue that it warrants more discriminating standards of agential autonomy than other contemporary minimalist views of self-government. (shrink)

After describing the disorder of psychopathy, I examine the theories and the evidence concerning the psychopaths’ deficient moral capacities. I first examine whether or not psychopaths can pass tests of moral knowledge. Most of the evidence suggests that they can. If there is a lack of moral understanding, then it has to be due to an incapacity that affects not their declarative knowledge of moral norms, but their deeper understanding of them. I then examine two suggestions: it is their deficient (...) practical reason or their stunted emotions that are at fault. The evidence supports both explanations. I conclude with an overview of the debate concerning whether they are morally or legally responsible for their actions. (shrink)

Recent developments in cosmology indicate that every history having a non-zero probability is realized in infinitely many distinct regions of spacetime. Thus, it appears that the universe contains infinitely many civilizations exactly like our own, as well as infinitely many civilizations that differ from our own in any way permitted by physical laws. We explore the implications of this conclusion for ethical theory and for the doomsday argument. In the infinite universe, we find that the doomsday argument applies only to (...) effects which change the average lifetime of all civilizations, and not those which affect our civilization alone. 1. Introduction2. Physics background2.1The number of possible histories is finite2.2The universe is infinite2.3Every possible history occurs an infinite number of times3. Frequency and probability4. Inflation contrasted4.1Modal realism4.2Actualism4.3Eternal recurrence5. Ethical implications6. Universal doomsday6.1Application to our civilization in particular6.2Universal vs. particular dooms6.3Practical applications7. Concluding remarks. (shrink)

This paper proposes a reconciliation between libertarian freedomand causal indeterminism, without relying on agent-causation asa primitive notion. I closely examine Peter van Inwagen's recentcase for free will mysterianism, which is based in part on thewidespread worry that undetermined acts are too chancy to befree. I distinguish three senses of the term ‘chance’ I thenargue that van Inwagen's case for free will mystrianism fails,since there is no single construal of the term ‘change’ on whichall of the premises of his argument for (...) free will–causalindeterminism incompatibilism are true. By use of a particularevent-causal indeterminist account of free action, I support thecase for free will–indeterminism compatibilism. (shrink)

The contemporary philosophical debate over practical reasoning---over how one ought to figure out what to do---has been almost entirely focused on whether there is more to it than means-ends reasoning. But a prior and very difficult question has to do with why instrumental deliberation is so important an aspect of our cognitive life. I consider an answer broached by Harry Frankfurt, that having ends is the alternative to being literally bored out of one’s mind, and adapt an argument from John (...) Stuart Mill’s political and psychological writings to show what more there is to not being bored than just having something to aim for. (shrink)

In this paper I argue that to understand minded agency – the capacity we typically find instantiated in instances of human behaviour that could sensibly be questioned by asking “What did you do?” – one needs to understand childhood, i.e. the trajectory of learning to act. I discuss two different types of trajectory, both of which seem to take place during childhood and both of which might be considered crucial to learning to act: a growth of bodily control (GBC) and (...) a growth in taking responsibility (GTR). The discussion of GTR takes up about half of the entire paper. In the final two sections I argue that GTR is the most promising trajectory in terms of which to understand a child’s process of learning to act. (shrink)

According to the view we may term “strong cognitivism”, all reasons for action are rooted in normative features that the motivated subject takes objects to have independently of her attitudes towards these objects. The main concern of this paper is to argue against strong cognitivism, that is, to establish the view that conative attitudes do provide subjects with reasons for action. The central argument to this effect is a top-down argument: it proceeds by an analysis of the complex phenomenon of (...) love and derives a conclusion regarding the nature of more basic mental phenomena—particular desires. More specifically, its starting point is the crude intuition that the significance conferred by love upon its objects is of a distinctively personal kind—an intuition that is expressed by the apparent non-substitutability of two similar subjects only one of whom is loved with respect to their importance for the lover. I argue that the initial notion of non-substitutability can be refined and modified so as to form a real challenge to all versions of strong cognitivism and to establish the existence of attitude-dependent reasons. (shrink)

In recent years, neuroscience has been a particularly prolific discipline stimulating many innovative treatment approaches in medicine. However, when it comes to the brain, new techniques of intervention do not always meet with a positive public response, in spite of promising therapeutic benefits. The reason for this caution clearly is the brain’s special importance as “organ of the mind”. As such it is widely held to be the origin of mankind’s unique position among living beings. Likewise, on the level of (...) the individual human being, the brain is considered the material substrate of those traits that in combination render each person unique. In view of this preeminent significance of the brain, it is understandable that, in general, interventions into the brain are considered a delicate issue and that new techniques of intervention are scrutinised with particular care. However, in doing so it is important not to go to the opposite extreme and shy away from promising new therapeutic approaches for debilitating disorders of the brain. With respect to the new techniques of brain intervention a broad interdisciplinary perspective is required to discern irrational fear from justified concern. Hence, the Europäische Akademie established a project group consisting, on the one hand, of experts from different fields of medicine who have got first-hand experience of applying the techniques at issue and, on the other hand, of philosophers and a legal expert. The task of this team was to review the state of the art with respect to each single technique of intervening in the brain, to indicate future developments, and to address the ethical and legal issues common to all of them. The project’s outcome is the book at hand. (shrink)

In this dissertation I examine the topics of ethics, religion, and their relationship in the work of Charles Taylor. I take Taylor's attempt to confront modern disenchantment by seeking a kind of re-enchantment as my guiding thread. Seeking re-enchantment means, first of all, defending an `engaged realist' account of strong evaluation, i.e., qualitative distinctions of value that are seen as normative for our desires. Secondly, it means overcoming self-enclosure and achieving self-transcendence, which I argue should be understood in terms of (...) transcending a `lower' mode of selfhood for a `higher' one in concern for `strong goods'. One of the main issues that Taylor raises is whether re-enchantment requires theism for its full adequacy. He advances - often as `hunches' - controversial claims regarding the significance of theism (1) for defending strong evaluative realism and (2) for motivating an ethic of universal human concern. I seek to fill out his hunches in terms of a theistic teleological perspective that is centered on the `telos of communion'. I argue that such a view is important for overcoming the problem of what Bernard Williams calls the `radical contingency' of ethical beliefs, which seems to undermine their normative authority. However, I argue that if a non-theistic view of cosmic purpose (e.g., Thomas Nagel's view) can be regarded as a viable option, then it could also help to address this problem and support a kind of re-enchantment. Taylor also advances the controversial view that (3) there is an ineradicable draw to `transcendence' in human life in connection to the quest for the meaning of life. Here he opposes certain mainstream theories of secularization that see it as a process involving the ineluctable fading away of the relevance of religion. I seek to fill out and defend Taylor's view in this matter. Besides providing a reading of Taylor's work as a whole and advancing further some of the issues he raises, I also examine his general evaluative framework based on his account of strong evaluation. In doing so I show how he provides a distinct and important perspective among contemporary moral philosophers. (shrink)

We argue that the value of authenticity does not explain the value of self-knowledge. There are a plurality of species of authenticity; in this paper we consider four species: avoiding pretense (section 2), Frankfurtian wholeheartedness (section 3), existential self-knowledge (section 4), and spontaneity (section 5). Our thesis is that, for each of these species, the value of (that species of) authenticity does not (partially) explain the value of self-knowledge. Moreover, when it comes to spontaneity, the value of (that species of) (...) authenticity conflicts with the value of self-knowledge. (shrink)

Ever since Kant asked: “How am I to develop the sense of freedom in spite of the restraint?” in his lecture on education, the tension between necessary educational influence and unacceptable restriction of the child’s individual development and freedom has been considered an educational paradox. Many have suggested solutions to the paradox; however, this article endorses recent discussions in educational philosophy that pursue the need to fundamentally rethink our understanding of education and upbringing. In this article it is argued that (...) it is incomprehensible to describe an intervention of an educator as a constraint on a child’s actions and that such an intervention would be in need of justification; as Kant and many others after him have done. Educational intervention should not be understood as a restriction of a child’s endeavour to learn, because any educational intervention is educational. Furthermore, it is argued that the notion of restraint is based on the concept of human beings as radically separated which lead to the assumption that education is restrictive per se. In contrast, this article argues that indoctrination, manipulation, and coercion are rather phenomena within our educational forms of life. Recognizing the interrelations between human beings should play a constitutive part in the conceptualisation of individual freedom. A bond with others is the foundation upon which a child develops its own identity and an understanding of itself as an agent who can express its own will and takes responsibility for its words and actions. (shrink)

A number of philosophers have become convinced that the best way of trying to understand human agency is by arriving at an account of identification. My goal here is not to criticize particular views about identification, but rather to examine several assumptions which have been widely held in the literature and yet which, in my view, render implausible any account of identification that takes them on board. In particular, I argue that typically identification does not involve either reflective consideration of (...) our mental states or endorsement of those states. If it did, we would rarely be agents. (shrink)

In current American medical practice, autonomy is assumed to be more valuable than human life: if a patient autonomously refuses lifesaving treatment, the doctors are supposed to let him die. In this paper we discuss two values that might be at stake in such clinical contexts. Usually, we hear only of autonomy and best interests. However, here, autonomy is ambiguous between two concepts—concepts that are tied to different values and to different philosophical traditions. In some cases, the two values (that (...) of agency and that of authenticity) entail different outcomes. We argue that the comparative value of these values needs to be assessed. (shrink)

By meeting needs for individualized love and relatedness, the care we receive deeply shapes our social and economic chances and therefore represents a form of luck. Hence, distributive justice requires a fair distribution of care in society. I look at different ways of ensuring this and argue that full redistribution of care is beyond our reach. I conclude that a strong individual morality informed by an ethics of care is a necessary complement of well-designed institutions.

Harry Frankfurt's conception of care and love has largely been considered a seductive theory of personality, but an untenable and irresponsible theory of moral normativity. Contrary to that interpretation, this article aims at showing that it is possible to remain faithful to Frankfurt's metaphysical premises while not falling into some moral relativism. First, by comparing Frankfurt's and Heidegger's conceptions of care, I show that Frankfurt's subordination of ethics to carology apparently commits him to a neutral foundationalism. In the next step, (...) I argue that his calling into question of the relation between rationality and morality does indeed subject moral normativity to some subjective and contingent limits. And finally, I show that the objections raised against such a conclusion can be answered by shifting Frankfurt's frontier between contingency and necessity and by exploiting his concept of wholeheartedness. (shrink)