Mill was receptive to all sorts of ideas, both plausible and implausible, which did not fit well with utilitarianism. He was, for example, inclined to think of equality, not just pleasure, as. He was able to think of himself as a utilitarian only by grossly expanding that notion to cover any doctrine which did not entirely rely, without the possibility of further explanation, on or God's commands. It is even doubtful whether he was a consequentialist in any sense. Mill's account (...) of moral obligation is not a maximizing, nor even a satisficing, one. And the account emphasizes the place of supererogation. There is no suggestion in Mill that one is obliged to do something merely because a teaching to that effect would be felicific. Far from there being an obligation to maximize, it would sometimes be wrong merely to make Pareto-improvements. Sympathetically understood, the account of obligation in Mill is more or less the same as one finds in Hobbes, with his theorems. (shrink)

Isaiah Berlin and Stuart Hampshire's early engagements with logical positivism and ordinary language philosophy are examined as historical and philosophical reference points for locating an alternative – interpretive and humanist – tradition that developed within analytic philosophy at Oxford in the 20th C. Berlin and Hampshire's writings show the legacy of an enduring Idealist philosophy, one that nonetheless had to be revised and reinvented against the new empiricist challenges brought on by the rise of analytic philosophy. Berlin and Hampshire rejected (...) idealism's metaphysical pretensions of the Absolute in favor of the new empiricism's insistence on grounding philosophy in experience, but staunchly opposed applying the latter's narrowly ‘scientistic’ view of knowledge to human experience, re-affirming the indivisible connections between epistemological issues and moral and political issues. The idealist themes they expounded are most clearly evident in their arguments for an interpretive philosophy in opposition to the reductivist tendencies of logical positivism, and in their defense of humanist liberalism against the drive of analysis toward naturalism where inquiry into human life is concerned. Such themes include: (i) an anti-naturalist, vitalist, philosophy of human sciences, (ii) an insistence on the intrinsic force and importance of human values against moral relativism, and (iii) the recognition of the political significance of the plurality of human values. As such, Berlin and Hampshire reveal the strong interpretive and humanist ways of reasoning from within the analytic tradition itself. Moreover, these interpretive and humanist themes continue to have strong echoes, this paper argues, in the development of post-analytic political theory in the latter half of the 20th century through today, as further evinced in the ideas of Bernard Williams (1929–2003) and Charles Taylor (b. 1931). By calling attention to such continuities, this paper reveals how moral and political philosophy in the Anglophone world lay not moribund but continued to develop in the heyday of analytic philosophy from the late ‘30s to the ‘50s and onward, thereby challenging the commonplace of the ‘death’ of normative political theorizing until Rawls reinvigorated it in the ‘70s. ☆ Special thanks are owed to Amy McCready, an astute reader of a preliminary draft of this paper. Also, the fearless members of the Contemporary Histories of Political Theory Working Group and participants of the Post-Analytic Political Theory Workshop at University of California, Berkeley provided useful insights and even more useful criticisms. (shrink)

This article explores the limits of secular philosophy and philosophical reason. It argues that once one abandons God, philosophical reason is unable to establish any particular bioethics or understanding of morality as canonical; that is, as definitively true and binding. Philosophy simply cannot secure the truth of any particular account of the right, the good, the just, or the virtuous. Once one abandons God, all is approached as if it were without ultimate meaning. Throughout, the article explores H. Tristram Engelhardt (...) Jr’s arguments in After God: Morality and Bioethics in a Secular Age, which confronts this major intellectual and cultural crisis. As Engelhardt remind us, traditional Christianity is not a life-style choice, much less another meta-narrative that one chooses and writes for oneself. It is an encounter with God, Who changes everything. Christian bioethics must be appreciated in terms of an encounter with and an authentic experience of God, Whose commands will routinely conflict with the moral dictates of secular morality. (shrink)

This paper critically explores key aspects of the gulf between traditional Christian bioethics and the secular moral reflections that dominate contemporary bioethics. For example, in contrast to traditional Christian morality, the established secular bioethics judges extramarital sex acts among consenting persons, whether of the same or different sexes, as at least morally permissible, affirms sexual freedom for children to develop their own sexual identity, and holds the easy availability of abortion and infanticide as central to the liberty interests of women. (...) Secular bioethics seeks to separate children from the authority of their parents, placing children themselves as in authority to make their own judgments about appropriate lifestyle choices, including sexual behaviors. As I argue, however, absent God, there exists no standpoint outside of our own cultural sociohistorically conditioned understanding from which to communicate any deeper perspective of reality or the bioethics that such a perspective would secure. Consequently, rather than discerning moral truth, secular bioethics merely affirms its own particular cultural sociohistorically conditioned ideological perspective. It is a social and political worldview bereft of definitive moral foundation, independent moral authority, or unambiguous content. (shrink)

1. ‘Reason is and ought only to be the slave of the passions, and can pretend to no other office, but to serve and obey them.’ 2.3.3) Unfortunately, Hume uses ‘reason’ to mean ‘discovery of truth or falsehood‘ as well as discovery of logical relations. So suppose we avoid, as Hume I think does not, prejudging the question of how many ingredients are requisite for action, by separating these two claims out:A. Reason is and ought only to be the slave (...) of the passions.B. Reason ) is and ought only to be the slave of the passions. (shrink)

I discuss Bernard Williams’ ‘integrity objection’ – his version of the demandingness objection to unreasonably demanding ‘extremist’ moral theories such as consequentialism – and argue that it is best understood as presupposing the internal reasons thesis. However, since the internal reasons thesis is questionable, so is Williams’ integrity objection. I propose an alternative way of bringing out the unreasonableness of extremism, based on the notion of the agent’s autonomy, and show how an objection to this proposal can be outflanked by (...) a strategy that also outflanks the ‘paradox of deontology.’. (shrink)

[About the book] Although this collection of articles is not formally a commentary on Elizabeth Anscombe's famous article of the same title, in which she criticised the moral philosophy prevalent in 1958, a number of the contributors do take Anscombe's work as a starting point. Taken together the collection could be seen as a demonstration of the extent to which moral philosophers have since attempted to answer Anscombe's challenge, and to develop an approach to their subject which, while psychologically plausible, (...) is neither based on divine law nor permissive of the impermissible. (shrink)

We critically review themushrooming literature addressing the neuralmechanisms of moral cognition (NMMC), reachingthe following broad conclusions: (1) researchmainly focuses on three inter-relatedcategories: the moral emotions, moral socialcognition, and abstract moral reasoning. (2)Research varies in terms of whether it deploysecologically valid or experimentallysimplified conceptions of moral cognition. Themore ecologically valid the experimentalregime, the broader the brain areas involved.(3) Much of the research depends on simplifyingassumptions about the domain of moral reasoningthat are motivated by the need to makeexperimental progress. This is a (...) valuablebeginning, but as more is understood about theneural mechanisms of decision-making, morerealistic conceptions will need to replace thesimplified conceptions. (4) The neuralcorrelates of real-life moral cognition areunlikely to consist in anything remotely like a``moral module'' or a ``morality center.'' Moralrepresentations, deliberations and decisionsare probably highly distributed and notconfined to any particular brainsub-system. Discovering the basic neuralprinciples governing planning, judgment anddecision-making will require vastly more basicresearch in neuroscience, but correlatingactivity in certain brain regions withwell-defined psychological conditions helpsguide neural level research. Progress on socialphenomena will also require theoreticalinnovation in understanding the brain'sdistinctly biological form of computationthat is anchored by emotions, needs, drives,and the instinct for survival. (shrink)

En este trabajo se analizan dos modos paradigmáticos en que en la actualidad se comprende la relación entre las disciplinas que se encuentran implicadas en la tarea de la neuroética, en su carácter de neurociencia de la ética. Particularmente se critica la forma que toma la interdisciplinariedad en estos dos modelos. En el primer caso se señala que la tarea de reflexión filosófica no da lugar a que la evidencia neurocientífica pueda modificar de modo importante los presupuestos teóricos en que (...) se funda tal reflexión. En el segundo caso, por el contrario, el papel dado al componente empírico, necesario a la neuroética, obtura la reflexión ético-filosófica.In this paper, I analyze two paradigmatic contemporary ways of understanding the relation between the disciplines involved in neuroethics. In particular, I criticize the form interdisciplinarity takes in these two models. It is pointed out that, according to one of these, the philosophical reflection does not allow neuroscientific evidence to influence in any significant way the theoretical presupositions of that reflection. According to the second model, on the contrary, the role of the empirical component, essential to neuroethics, rather blocks the ethical and philosophical reflection. (shrink)

Technology has become one of the main channels through which people engage in most of their everyday activities. When working, learning, or socializing, the affordances created by technological tools determine the way in which users interact with one another and their environment, thus favoring certain actions and behaviors, while discouraging others. The ethical dimension behind the use of technology has been already studied in recent works, but the question is often formulated in a protective way that focuses on shielding the (...) users from potential detrimental effects. Nevertheless, when considering collateral ethical benefits that the use of technology could bring about, virtue ethics and the notions of “practice” and “practical wisdom” present new opportunities to harness this potential. By understanding the combination of technology, its users and their interactions as a system, technology can be seen as the space where most of its users’ daily practice happens. Through this practice, users can get the chance to collaterally develop and enhance their ethical awareness, sensitivity and reasoning capabilities. This work is shaped as a manifesto that provides the background, motivations and directions needed to ask a complementary question about the ethics of technology that aims towards the potentiality behind the use of technology. Instead of focusing on shielding the users, the proposed _ethical idealist_ approach to the ethics of technology aims to empower them by understanding their use of technology as the space where the development of their practical wisdom, understood in the virtue ethics’ sense, takes place. (shrink)

This essay argues that there are concrete emotion regulation practices described, but not developed, in Kierkegaard’s Christian Discourses. These practices—such as attentiveness to emotion, attentional deployment, and cognitive reappraisal—help the reader to regulate her emotions, to get rid of negative, unwanted emotions such as worry, and to cultivate and nourish positive emotions such as faith, gratitude, and trust. An examination of the Discourses also expose Kierkegaard’s understanding of the emotions; his view is akin to a perceptual theory of the emotions (...) that closely connects emotions and concerns. In particular, this analysis unearths two main regulatory strategies located in the Discourses, strategies that closely resemble present-day psychological accounts of emotion regulation. I conclude that contemporary research reinforces Kierkegaard’s philosophical analysis of emotions and emotion-regulation strategies. Drawing on this research provides the most persuasive interpretation of Kierkegaard’s understanding of the emotions and emotion-regulation strategies. Additionally, present-day research clarifies the otherwise elusive, opaque strategies he describes. Finally, my analysis demonstrates that Kierkegaard’s work can uniquely contribute to the present-day psychological research by emphasizing the need for diachronic regulation strategies, while the contemporary literature overwhelmingly focuses on synchronic strategies. (shrink)

While the modern revival of virtue ethics largely looks back to Aristotle, most, if not all, versions of this trend continue to be much indebted to and/or based upon specific mid‐twentieth‐century neo‐naturalist and descriptivist critiques of prevailing antinaturalist trends of that time: specifically, upon Anscombe's critique of the ethics of duty and utility and of the so‐called modern moral ought, and Geach's robust defence of the descriptive character of moral and other goodness. However, in the wake of further critical attention (...) to these neo‐naturalist claims, this paper argues that there can ultimately be no reliable or secure logical or empirical grounding of the virtues of inherently normative human moral life and conduct in the goods or virtues of effective or even beneficial natural function. (shrink)

Despite the 'progressive' influence of the English Plowden Report and Scottish Primary Memorandum on British primary curricula from the 1960s onwards, secondary education has generally continued to follow a more traditional subject-centred route and post-war educational theorists have not generally been favourably inclined to other than subject-based modes of curriculum planning and organisation. However, in the light of current curriculum reviews on both sides of the Scottish border-callingfor more educationally meaningful curricula-the perennial issue of how school knowledge might best be (...) ordered for the coherent educational experience of pupils seems worth revisiting. To this end, this paper examines some of the influential post-war philosophical arguments against integrated and interdisciplinary approaches to the curricular organisation of knowledge, concluding that they are not as compelling as they might formerly have seemed. (shrink)

Nauczanie etyki w szkole uznawane jest za ważne i potrzebne. Ale czy etyki można się nauczyć? I czy nauczanie jej powinno polegać na przekazywaniu wiedzy o koncepcjach etycznych, ewentualnie dyskusji wokół nich, czy raczej na kształtowaniu moralnych postaw uczniów i właściwych zachowań? Artykuł podejmuje namysł nad tymi problemami w nawiązaniu do różnych tradycji myśli etycznej i teorii moralności. Za główny punkt odniesienia i podstawę praktyki edukacyjnej proponuje przyjąć odnowioną współcześnie Arystotelesowską etykę cnót. Koncepcja phronesis jako rozumności praktycznej, pozwalającej tworzyć sądy (...) moralne wrażliwe na kontekst i uwzględniające złożoność trudnych do uzgodnienia interesów i dóbr, wydaje się dla edukacji moralnej wciąż aktualnym modelem. Nauczanie i dyskusja nastawione na rozważanie konkretnych przypadków i opowieści, czyli kształcenie umiejętności tego typu osądu, pozwala uniknąć zagrożeń, jakie niesie nauka skupiona na zagadnieniach teoretycznych: uwikłania w definicyjne niejasności w określaniu wartości moralnych, czy myślenia oderwanego od emocji i od doświadczenia. Nauka polegająca na analizie filozoficznej tradycji wiąże się z ryzykiem, iż przekazywana wiedza okaże się nieadekwatna do wieku i poziomu osobistego rozwoju ucznia, generując moralny subiektywizm i relatywistyczny sceptycyzm. Argument ten nie jest jednak skierowany przeciwko teoretyzowaniu i wprowadzaniu abstrakcyjnych rozważań w procesie kształcenia, nawet na najwcześniejszych etapach: teoretyzowanie i budowanie racjonalnych uzasadnień jest potrzebne, ale powinno wynikać z inspiracji i rozwoju intelektualnych predyspozycji, a nie z przekazu gotowej wiedzy. (shrink)

In this paper I propose that Adam Smith’s Theory of Moral Sentiments provides a solution to a well-known problem in contemporary ethical debate, i.e. the incompatibility between classic virtue ethics which is particularistic and informed by an ideal of virtue on the one hand, and modern principle-based ethics which attributes a prominent place to universal rules on the other. Smith acknowledges the incompatibility of these two paradigms. But, in order to preserve the advantages of both kinds of theories, he proposes (...) a third kind of moral theory: This theory can account for ancient-like virtues and judgments sensitive to the particularities of a specific context as well as for a limited set of universal rules, namely the ‘rules of justice’. The clue to this move is a change of the point of view from which moral judgments are assessed to what I call a ‘sympathetic-impartial perspective’. With this original approach Smith succeeds in articulating in a single and coherent theory the apparently irreconcilable elements of ancient and Modern accounts of morality. (shrink)

I address a family of objections I label the _So What?_ objection to robust non-naturalist realism (or, just non-naturalism). This objection concludes that non-naturalism fails to identify the _moral properties_ in virtue of failing to explain why non-natural properties would have all the features we expect _moral properties_ to have and can be extended to provide the conclusion that the non-naturalist is therefore immoral. I argue that _So What?_ is question-begging because it disallows non-naturalists their central theoretical claim: there are (...) ethical properties iff they are fundamental properties (and, in virtue of that, non-natural). I then diagnose the error anti-non-naturalists make explicitly: those who object to non-naturalism along the lines of _So What?_ either fail to understand precisely what the theory claims or fail to understand non-naturalist motivations for going in for that theory. (shrink)

La imaginación literaria y su relación con la vida moral ocupa un lugar destacado dentro del proyecto filosófico de Martha Nussbaum. Desde sus años de estudios doctorales en Harvard, la filósofa encontró importantes eslabonamientos entre las tramas narrativas y un sentido normativo de la vida que emerge al contemplar diversos personajes que actúan en la contingencia, y que ponen al descubierto nuestra radical vulnerabilidad. De acuerdo con esto, en este artículo se reconstruyen aspectos importantes de la herencia cultural que Martha (...) Nussbaum recibe de la literatura y la filosofía griega antiguas, haciendo un énfasis en la manera como la autora establece innovadoras conexiones entre la imaginación literaria y la filosofía práctica de Aristóteles para cimentar un proyecto filosófico que hoy en día brinda luces para comprender aspectos de nuestra vida emocional, y de nuestra aspiración a construir sociedades más justas y solidarias. (shrink)

Argues that truth, moral right, political right, and aesthetic value may be understood as arising out of a naturalist account of humanity, if naturalism is rightly conceived.

Is it particularly human to feel coerced into fulfilling moral obligations, or is it particularly human to enjoy them? I argue for the importance of taking into account how culture promotes prosocial behavior, discussing how Confucian heritage culture enhances the satisfaction of meeting one's obligations.

This paper develops themes addressed in an article by Eric Wiland in the Journal of Medical Ethics 2000;26:466–8, where he aims to contribute to the debate concerning the moral status of abortion, and to emphasise the importance of analogies in moral argument. In the present paper I try to secure more firmly a novel understanding of why analogy is an essential component in the attempt to justify moral beliefs. I seek to show how analogical argument both encapsulates and exercises the (...) notions of rationality and imagination and that the construction, development, and comparison of analogies fundamentally underpins ethical argument. In so doing, it enables us to adopt imaginative and ethically illuminating perspectives but in a manner that does not relinquish any claims to intellectual rigour. I present a critique of a brand of “moral particularism” by showing how it cannot, if construed in a certain way, adequately conceive of how we use analogies and imaginary cases in ethics. Although such a particularism is thus impotent with regard to ethical debate, I show that the wider motivation behind particularism that can be extracted is of clear relevance and importance to medical practitioners. (shrink)

Though moral relativism has had its supporters over the years, it is not a dominant position in philosophy. I will argue here, though, that the view is an attractive position. It evades some hardcore challenges that face absolutism, and it is reconcilable with an appealing emotivist approach to moral attitudes. In previous work, I have offered considerations in favor of a version of moral relativism that I call “perspectivalism.” These considerations are primarily grounded in linguistic data. Here I offer a (...) self-standing argument for perspectivalism. I begin with an argument against moral absolutism. I then argue that moral terms, such as ‘wrong’ and ‘right’, require for their application that the moral judge instantiate particular affective states, and I use this claim to provide further defense of moral relativism. (shrink)

Dietrich Bonhoeffer and Knud Ejler Løgstrup were WWII contemporaries: Lutheran theologians and religious figures in their respective German and Danish communities; both active in the anti-Nazi resistance. Being involved in the resistance, Bonhoeffer and Løgstrup were required to rethink what it meant to be ethical, in particular in relation to disclosure and the telling of truth, in a situation of war. In this paper, we consider the grounds on which both Løgstrup and Bonhoeffer acted, their belief in a duty or (...) requirement to resist, in light of the more general problem presented by resistance as action undertaken in a state of exception. We investigate the distinction between the normativity of ordinary or stable time, and action required in a state of exception, using the specific example of truth-telling as a normative demand and its conflict with the exceptional imperative to lie. The example of truth-telling raises important questions about the role of agency and phronetic judgment in a state of exception. In order to determine a foundation for such judgment, we turn to the framework adapted by both Bonhoeffer and Løgstrup to ground their requirement to lie: Luther’s concept of three estates. We consider how their respective concepts of mandates and laws of life/sovereign expressions of life both illuminate and highlight the more general problem of the relation between norm and exceptional action. (shrink)

Dietrich Bonhoeffer and Knud Ejler Løgstrup were WWII contemporaries: Lutheran theologians and religious figures in their respective German and Danish communities; both active in the anti-Nazi resistance. Being involved in the resistance, Bonhoeffer and Løgstrup were required to rethink what it meant to be ethical, in particular in relation to disclosure and the telling of truth, in a situation of war. In this paper, we consider the grounds on which both Løgstrup and Bonhoeffer acted, their belief in a duty or (...) requirement to resist, in light of the more general problem presented by resistance as action undertaken in a state of exception. We investigate the distinction between the normativity of ordinary or stable time, and action required in a state of exception, using the specific example of truth-telling as a normative demand and its conflict with the exceptional imperative to lie. The example of truth-telling raises important questions about the role of agency and phronetic judgment in a state of exception. In order to determine a foundation for such judgment, we turn to the framework adapted by both Bonhoeffer and Løgstrup to ground their requirement to lie: Luther’s concept of three estates. We consider how their respective concepts of mandates and laws of life/sovereign expressions of life both illuminate and highlight the more general problem of the relation between norm and exceptional action. (shrink)

David Furley has suggested that we think of Callicles’ immoralism as attacking a thick concept. I take up this suggestion and apply it to the argument of Plato’s Gorgias more generally. I show that the discussion between Socrates, Gorgias and Polus, which prepares the ground for Callicles, is precisely addressing the thickness of the concept of justice: it reveals that this concept is both descriptive and evaluative and that formulating a revisionist position about justice is therefore extremely difficult. Callicles’ strategy (...) is best read as a response to this difficulty, which sets the stage for Socrates’ revisionist account of justice. (shrink)

While education in ethics and the responsible conduct of research is widely acknowledged as an essential component of graduate education, particularly in the STEM disciplines, little consensus exists on how best to accomplish this goal. Recent years have witnessed a turn toward the use of games in this context. Drawing from two NSF-funded grants, this paper takes a critical look at the use of games in ethics and RCR education. It does so by: setting the development of research and engineering (...) ethics games in wider historical and theoretical contexts, which highlights their promise to solve important pedagogical problems; reporting on some initial results from our own efforts to develop a game; and reflecting on the challenges that arise in using games for ethics education. In our discussion of the challenges, we draw out lessons to improve this nascent approach to ethics education in the STEM disciplines. (shrink)

Selfhood requires sufficient rationality, the capacities for self-reflection and self-knowledge, the capacity for autonomous action, temporal situatedness and an awareness of this, and psychological continuity and an awareness of this. Contemporary philosophers have more or less reached a consensus regarding NS, and the lion's share of discourse regarding the self seems to center on making sense of this constellation.While certainly having their own respective places within such discussions, value and commitment too often take a back seat. Here, I return attention (...) to these aspects of the self, specifically, in revisiting one of the more... (shrink)

Em Modern Moral Philosophy, Elisabeth Anscombe aponta para uma atitude tipicamente wittgensteiniana que corresponde a uma crítica e, ao mesmo tempo, uma rejeição às formas tradicionais de pensar a ética. A consequência mais radical dessa crítica rompe de maneira original na exigência de “tornar-se um ser humano melhor”, realizando uma atividade sobre si mesmo, com a finalidade de se constituir enquanto sujeito ético. Tendo essa perspectiva como fundamento, esta pesquisa defende a existência de um itinerário – indicativo, não prescritivo – (...) que conduz para a constituição do sujeito ético na filosofia de Wittgenstein, do qual o gênio resulta como figura central. Para tornar plausível e sustentar essa afirmação, propomos uma aproximação entre o pensamento de Wittgenstein e o pensamento moral de Otto Weininger, registrado nas linhas de Sexo e Caráter. Palavras-chave : Ética. Gênio. Dever. Sujeito ético. (shrink)

This essay explicates and assesses Yeshayahu Leibowitz's axiology, and its relation to the value he claims halakhic practice instantiates: service of God. It argues that, while Leibowitz often affirms a relativist “polytheism of values,” he sometimes implies that the religious value is the “most valuable value.” However, this is not due to its material content, because serving God is objectively best; rather it is because, consonant with his negative theology, it most fully instantiates the formal properties of a value. The (...) essay concludes by assessing the tenability of Leibowitz's metaethics as well as the argument for positing this contentless value as an intention and reason for halakhic practice. (shrink)

Over the last decades the traditional emphasis on moral rules, or principles, has been attacked by particularists like Jonathan Dancy. I argue that particularists are correct in rejecting traditional attempts at moral codification, but that it is still possible to have a rule-oriented approach to morality if we distinguish between different ways in which features can be morally relevant. I suggest that there are first a limited number of features that can serve as basic moral reasons for action, and then (...) a class of relational features that can change the relevance of these features. I then argue that while particularists do well in drawing attention to the fact that sometimes our basic moral duties are put out of play by other relevant features, they fail to make sense of the exceptional nature of such situations. Only a rule-oriented understanding of morality can do this. (shrink)

Against the backdrop of emerging medical technologies that promise transgression of temporal limits, this paper aims to show the importance that an individual lifetime’s finitude and fugacity have for the question of the good life. The paper’s first section examines how the passing of an individual’s finite lifetime can be experienced negatively, and thus cause “suffering from the passing of time.” The second section is based on a sociological analysis within the conceptual framework of individualization and capitalism, which characterizes many (...) modern individualized and consumerist societies and explains how the described problem of time’s passage is particularly relevant today. The paper then proceeds to show and discuss how individuals employ various, primarily medical, enhancement-technologies like social egg freezing, anti-aging-medicine and physical- and neuro-enhancement in an attempt to overcome time’s passing. Finally, the paper seeks to explain why such attempts fail and, moreover, why it is exactly the awareness of time’s passing that can constitute a prerequisite for a good life. (shrink)

In this short response to Peter Clarke's thorough and interesting tracing of the developments in Richard McCormick's approach to moral questions, I take a perspective external to the concerns of Clarke's paper. I propose to look at the developments in McCormick's approach not so much from the perspective of contemporary Catholic moral theology but from that of the impact on the practices and beliefs of the Catholic community. From that perspective, the really important events in McCormick's theological development are his (...) rejection of the received teaching on contraception and his closely connected embracing of a moral theory that implies that there are no moral absolutes, namely, proportionalism. (shrink)

Many engineering ethics classes and textbooks introduce theories such as utilitarianism and Kantianism (and most others draw from these theories without mentioning them explicitly). Yet using ethical theories to teach engineering ethics is not devoid of difficulty. First, their status is unclear (should one pick a single theory or use them all? does it make a difference?) Also, textbooks generally assume or fallaciously ‘prove’ that egoism (or even simply accounting for one’s interests) is wrong. Further, the drawbacks of ethical theories (...) are underestimated and the theories are also otherwise misrepresented to make them more suitable for engineering ethics as the authors construe it, viz. the ‘moral reasoning’ process. Stating in what various theories disagree would allow the students to frame the problem more productively in terms of motive–consequence or society–individual dichotomies rather than in terms of Kant–utilitarian. (shrink)

The Darwinian theory of evolution is itself evolving and this book presents the details of the core of modern Darwinism and its latest developmental directions. The authors present current scientific work addressing theoretical problems and challenges in four sections, beginning with the concepts of evolution theory, its processes of variation, heredity, selection, adaptation and function, and its patterns of character, species, descent and life. The second part of this book scrutinizes Darwinism in the philosophy of science and its usefulness in (...) understanding ecosystems, whilst the third section deals with its application in disciplines beyond the biological sciences, including evolutionary psychology and evolutionary economics, Darwinian morality and phylolinguistics. The final section addresses anti-Darwinism, the creationist view and issues around teaching evolution in secondary schools. The reader learns how current experimental biology is opening important perspectives on the sources of variation, and thus of the very power of natural selection. This work examines numerous examples of the extension of the principle of natural selection and provides the opportunity to critically reflect on a rich theory, on the methodological rigour that presides in its extensions and exportations, and on the necessity to measure its advantages and also its limits. Scholars interested in modern Darwinism and scientific research, its concepts, research programs and controversies will find this book an excellent read, and those considering how Darwinism might evolve, how it can apply to the human sciences and other disciplines beyond its origins will find it particularly valuable. Originally produced in French (Les Mondes Darwiniens), the scope and usefulness of the book have led to the production of this English text, to reach a wider audience. This book is a milestone in the impressive penetration by Francophone scholars into the world of Darwinian science, its historiography and philosophy over the last two decades. Alex Rosenberg, R. Taylor Cole Professor of Philosophy, Duke University Until now this useful and comprehensive handbook has only been available to francophones. Thanks to this invaluable new translation, this collection of insightful and original essays can reach the global audience it deserves. Tim Lewens, University of Cambridge. (shrink)

Roger Silverstone proposed media hospitality as an important element of media ethics. I agree that media hospitality can make a valuable contribution to media ethics. However, I have doubts about grounding media hospitality in what has been referred to as the “deductive abstractions and absolutist language of much media ethics theorizing” founded on Enlightenment assumptions. Despite his own reservations about Enlightenment theorizing, I propose that Silverstone's account ultimately suffers from these problems of abstraction and absolutism, as seen most clearly from (...) the vantage point of Alasdair MacIntyre's neo-Aristotelian theory of virtue ethics. (shrink)

Revisionists claim that the retributive intuitions informing our responsibility-attributing practices are unwarranted under determinism, not only because they are false, but because if we are all victims of causal luck, it is unfair to treat one another as if we are deserving of moral and legal sanctions. One revisionist strategy recommends a deflationary concept of moral responsibility, and that we justify punishment in consequentialist rather than retributive terms. Another revisionist strategy recommends that we eliminate all concepts of guilt, blame and (...) punishment, and treat dangerous criminals as we treat people with contagious diseases. I argue against both strong and moderate revisionism that it is not unfair to hold persons desert -entailingly responsible insofar as they take an interest in being treated as appraisable, and that it is unfair to persons not to treat them as desert -entailingly responsible contrary to their interests in being treated as such. The interest-based argument, I conclude, give us a justification for communicating retributive attitudes, but may still require a weak revision of our retributive practices, in the direction of a communicative theory of punishment. (shrink)

According to a widespread view, Kant's claim that moral wrongness has its ground in a contradiction underlying every immoral action is a “bluff” rooted in “dogmatic moralism”. Ever since Benjamin Constant's exchange with Kant, counterexamples have played a crucial role in showing why Kant's “universalization procedure” fails to determine the moral validity of our judgments. Despite recent attempts to bring Kant's ethics closer to Aristotle's, these counterexamples have prevailed. Most recently, Jesse Prinz has launched another attack along the same lines. (...) Prinz insists that Kant's universalization procedure fundamentally begs the question and fails to generate plausible results. Even authors who are very sympathetic to Kant, such as Allen Wood, have tried to downplay universalization, focusing instead on other formulations of the categorical imperative. In this paper, I respond directly to four of the most prominent counterexamples. In each case, I aim to show how we can uphold Kant's fundamental claim that the universal law formulation of the categorical imperative articulates the form of our particular moral judgments. (shrink)

According to the work of Alasdair MacIntyre, there is an incommensurability between different theories of normative ethics. MacIntyre’s view on the incommensurability of ethical discourse casts doubt upon the pluralistic proposal of Magelssen and colleagues, since the insights gained from the various theories will themselves be incommensurate with one another. However, since there are obvious benefits provided both by arguments for pluralism and the insights of Magelssen and colleagues, I utilize some later work of MacIntyre to offer an alternative means (...) of conceiving of the role of ethical theories not as providing direct insights, but rather as imagined perspectives which will give rise to practical knowledge for the clinical ethicists, which can be used in developing their conclusions. (shrink)

A basic challenge to naturalistic moral realism is that, even if moral properties existed, there would be no way to naturalistically represent or track them. Here, the basic structure for a tracking account of moral epistemology is given in empirically respectable terms, based on a eudaimonist conception of morality. The goal is to show how this form of moral realism can be seen as consistent with the details of evolutionary biology as well as being amenable to the most current understanding (...) of representationalist or correspondence theories of truth. (shrink)

(No abstract is available for this citation).

Error theories about morality often take as their starting point the supposed queerness of morality, and those resisting these arguments often try to argue by analogy that morality is no more queer than other unproblematic subject matters. Here, error theory (as exemplified primarily by the work of Richard Joyce) is resisted first by arguing that it assumes a common, modern, and peculiarly social conception of morality. Then error theorists point out that the social nature of morality requires one to act (...) against one's self-interest while insisting on the categorical, inescapable, or overriding status of moral considerations: they argue that morality requires magic, then (rightly) claim that there is no such thing as magic. An alternate eudaimonist conception of morality is introduced which itself has an older provenance than the social point of view, dating to the ancient Greeks. Eudaimonism answers to the normative requirements of morality, yet does not require magic. Thus, the initial motivation for error theory is removed. (shrink)

In this paper I draw on some of the work of John McDowell in order to develop a realist account of normative reasons for action. On the view defended here, there can be correct moral judgments that capture the reasons there are for acting in certain ways; and the reasons themselves are just some of the morally relevant facts of the situation about which the judgment is made. Establishing this account relies crucially, I argue, on an appeal to substantive ethical (...) theory, to a theory that allows for the attribution of truth to the judgments in question. The account defended here can in fact be equally well supported by ethical theories as otherwise diverse as those of Aristotle and Kant. The resulting account is a version of moral realism, but one that is not committed to defending a realist account of the nature of moral value. (shrink)

A quasi-sequel to "Epistemic Teleology and the Separateness of Propositions." Covers some of the same ground, but also extends the basic argument in an important way.

Philosophical Investigations, Volume 45, Issue 1, Page 21-39, January 2022.