The paper introduces the “Contest Paradox”: on the one hand, rational competitors employ the most effective means to achieve the constitutive end of games - winning; On the other hand, apparently rational competitors often employ means that are sub-optimal for winning, e.g., playing beautifully or fairly. Nevertheless, the actions of such competitors are viewed as rational. Are such competitors rational? I reject the possibility of resolving the paradox by appealing to additional ends or norms to winning, such as playing sportingly. (...) Instead, I argue that the constitutive end of games is not a win simpliciter, but a type of win, such as winning-beautifully or winning-fairly. This interpretive framework is theoretically advantageous because it accounts better for the ‘unity of action’ or ‘flow’ competitors experience, better deals with various cases, and accommodates different traditions of competing. (shrink)

John McDowell argued that the virtuous person (VP) knows no temptation: her perception of a situation silences all competing motivations – be it fear in the face of danger or a strong desire. The VP cannot recognize any reason to act non-virtuously as a reason, and is never inclined to act non-virtuously. This view rests on the requirement that the VP rationally respond, and not merely react, to the environment – it rests on the requirement that the relation between the (...) VP and the world (ethical requirements) must rule out the possibility that the VP is a brain in a vat. I will argue that the opposite is true: virtue requires a sensitivity to temptation. The VP, as such, must be able to recognize reasons for performing non-virtuous actions as reasons, and be inclined to perform them. She must find nothing human alien. This is so because the VP must possess the ability to understand non-virtuous agents, and understanding necessarily involves vulnerability to temptation. Otherwise, it will be argued, the VP views the actions of others as determined from outside the space of reasons. But the VP, like any other person, must have the ability to view the actions of others as rational responses to the environment, not only as reactions to it. Put differently, the VP’s view of others must rule out the possibility that they are brains in a vat – the possibility that their actions are merely caused, rather than justified, by the facts. Finally, it will be suggested that an amended conception of the VP can meet both requirements: view others as rationally responsive to the world, without relinquishing its relation to the facts. (shrink)

Our primary aim in this paper is to sketch the account of virtue that we think most amenable to virtue measurement. Our account integrates Whole Trait Theory from psychology with a broadly neo-Aristotelian approach to virtue. Our account is ‘ecumenical’ in that it has appeal for a wide range of virtue ethicists. According to WTT, a personality trait is composed of a set of situation-specific trait-appropriate responses, which are produced when certain “social-cognitive” mechanisms are triggered by the perception of trait-relevant (...) stimuli in a person’s external and/or internal environment. Moving from this starting point, we discuss our conception of a virtue and respects in which it both aligns with and diverges from Aristotle’s conception. We discuss roles for practical wisdom and motivation in our conception of virtue, and highlight respects in which WTT provides an amenable empirical framework into which key Aristotelian elements can be integrated. We conclude with brief remarks about our conception as an empirically adequate and measurable account. (shrink)

Our primary aim in this paper is to sketch the account of virtue that we think most amenable to virtue measurement. Our account integrates Whole Trait Theory from psychology with a broadly neo-Aristotelian approach to virtue. Our account is ‘ecumenical’ in that it has appeal for a wide range of virtue ethicists. According to WTT, a personality trait is composed of a set of situation-specific trait-appropriate responses, which are produced when certain “social-cognitive” mechanisms are triggered by the perception of trait-relevant (...) stimuli in a person’s external and/or internal environment. Moving from this starting point, we discuss our conception of a virtue and respects in which it both aligns with and diverges from Aristotle’s conception. We discuss roles for practical wisdom and motivation in our conception of virtue, and highlight respects in which WTT provides an amenable empirical framework into which key Aristotelian elements can be integrated. We conclude with brief remarks about our conception as an empirically adequate and measurable account. (shrink)

The practice-dependent approach to justice has received a lot of attention in post-millennium political philosophy. It has been developed in different directions and its normative implications have been criticized, but little attention has been directed to the very distinction between practice-dependence and practice-independence and the question of what theoretically differentiates a practice-dependent account from mainstream practice-independent accounts. The core premises of the practice-dependent approach, proponents argue, are meta-normative and methodological. A key feature is the presumption that a concept of justice (...) is dependent on the function or aim of the social practices to which it is supposed to be applied. Closely related to this meta-normative thesis is an interpretive methodology for deriving principles of justice from facts about existing practices, in particular regarding their point and purpose. These two premises, practice-dependent theorists claim, differentiate their account since they are not accepted by practice-independent accounts and they justify different principles of justice than practice-independent accounts. Our aim in this article is to refute both and, demonstrating that practice-independent accounts may indeed accept the meta-normative and methodological premises of the practice-dependent accounts, and that we are given no theoretical reason to think that practice-dependent accounts justify other principles of justice for a practice than do practice-independent accounts. In other words, practice-dependent theorists have not substantiated their claim that practice-dependence is theoretically differentiated from mainstream accounts. When practice-dependent proponents argue for other principles of justice than mainstream theorists, it will be for the usual reason in normative theory: their first-order normative arguments differ. (shrink)

Philosophy Compass, Volume 17, Issue 6, June 2022.

Philosophy Compass, Volume 17, Issue 6, June 2022.

A central debate in the philosophy of love is whether people can love one another for good reasons. Reasons for love seem to help us sympathetically understand and evaluate love or even count as loving at all. But it can seem that if reasons for love existed, they could require forms of love that are presumably illicit. It might seem that only some form of wishful thinking would lead us to believe reasons for love could never do this. However, if (...) we focus on why reasons for love as such motivate us to love, we find evidence that reasons for love as such do not require or even justify it: all they do is favor it. This result is fine, however, since love never stands in need of justification. We would think otherwise only if we somehow conflate reasons and justifications, or value and permissibility. We must give up such background assumptions if we are to appreciate reasons for love. (shrink)

Discussions about the permissibility of students using enhancements in education are often framed by the question, “Is a student who uses cognitive-enhancing drugs cheating?” While the question of cheating is interesting, it is but only one question concerning the permissibility of enhancement in education. Another interesting question is, “What kinds of students do we want in our academic institutions?” I suggest that one plausible answer to this question concerns the ideals of human excellence or virtues. The students we want in (...) our academic institutions are virtuous or, at least minimally, possess certain virtues. I argue that a virtuous student may choose to use cognitive-enhancing drugs for reasons of self-improvement. That a virtuous student may choose to use cognitive-enhancing drugs for reasons of self-improvement illustrates that under certain conditions motivation can determine the permissibility of using enhancements. Building upon this I suggest a virtues-based institutional rule for governing and guiding student-use of cognitive enhancers in an academic institution to be for the right reasons. This ideals of human excellence or virtues approach offers interesting and unique insights for issues of enhancement in education, as it might turn out, that uneasiness many people have about students using cognitive-enhancing drugs has less to do with issues of enhancement and more to do with the motivations and character of students. (shrink)

Many theorists hold that there is, among value concepts, a fundamental distinction between thin ones and thick ones. Among thin ones are concepts like good and right. Among concepts that have been regarded as thick are discretion, caution, enterprise, industry, assiduity, frugality, economy, good sense, prudence, discernment, treachery, promise, brutality, courage, coward, lie, gratitude, lewd, perverted, rude, glorious, graceful, exploited, and, of course, many others. Roughly speaking, thick concepts are value concepts with significant descriptive content. I will discuss a number (...) of problems having to do with how best to understand the notion of a thick concept. Thick concepts have been widely discussed in the .. (shrink)

Virtue ethics (VE), due to its eudaimonistic character, is very anthropocentric; thus the application of VE to environmental ethics (EE) seems to be in contradiction with EE’s critical opinion of human centeredness. In the paper, I prove the claim that there is a possibility of elaborating an environmental virtue ethics (EVE) that involves others (including nonhuman beings). I prove that claim through analyzing Ronald Sandler’s EVE, especially his concept of pluralistic virtue and a pluralistic approach to the aim of ethical (...) endeavor which is not only focused on personal flourishing but also helps others (including nonhumans) to flourish. I start my analysis with a close look at the application of anthropocentrism in VE, beginning by discerning the three types of anthropocentrism that are most often used in discussion on EE and EVE, namely ontological, epistemological, and ethical. Subsequently, I analyze the concept of personal flourishing, which is responsible for the anthropocentric/egoistic nature of VE, proving that VE is anthropocentric/egoistic only formally, not in its content, and as such is only a rational theory, not a moral one. (shrink)

Beginning with an anecdote from the Zhuangzi about a wheelwright who is unable to pass on his knack for wheel-making to his son, this article goes on to argue that the process of teaching and learning in this context should not be understood as one of transmitting knowledge but instead as one of cultivating habits. According to Zhuangzi, learning does not mean attaining truths given to one by another, but means familiarizing oneself with concepts by applying them in different situations. (...) To clarify these arguments, I compare Zhuangzi’s position to that of Wittgenstein, who I attempt to show has similar views on teaching and learning. Most significantly, I argue that both Zhuangzi and Wittgenstein see language as logically and phenomenally groundless, and that this view influences their endorsement of exemplification and practice over explanation and definition with regard to meaning and understanding. Given their perspectives on language and practice, any pedagogical process developed from the philosophies of these two thinkers would not be concerned with imparting knowledge or principles but with cultivating skills through emulation and habituation. Consequentially, before teachers can actually teach efficiently, they must themselves possess habits appropriate to what they are teaching. (shrink)

Following a brief summation of the phenomenological method, the paper considers three metaethical positions adopted by phenomenologists and the implications of those positions for a normative ethics. The metaethical positions combine epistemological and ontological viewpoints. They are non-intellectualism and strong value realism as represented by the axiological views of phenomenologists such as Scheler, Meinong, Reinach, Stein, Hartmann, von Hildebrand, and Steinbock; non-intellectualism and anti-realism as represented by the freedom-centered phenomenologies of Sartre, Beauvoir, and Merleau-Ponty; and weak intellectualism and weak value (...) realism as represented by Husserl and Drummond. The paper argues that only the third metaethical view can support a normative ethics that is consistent with the essential features of the phenomenological method, that allows for freedom in an agent’s choosing from a multiplicity of first-order goods, including vocational goods, practical identities, and life plans, available in the agent’s factical circumstances, and that provides norms governing the correctness of our actions and our obligations to others. The normative dimension is introduced, first, by the requirement that the fulfillment of first-order evaluations and choices be truthful, that is, that the evaluations be appropriate and the actions right. Second, transcendental considerations revealed in the phenomenological analysis of intentional experience disclose a notion of second-order goods of agency that universally bind agents in their exercise of freedom and their dealings with others. (shrink)

This essay defends moral expertise against the skeptical considerations raised by Gilbert Ryle and others. The core of the essay articulates an account of moral expertise that draws on work on expertise in empirical moral psychology, and develops an analogy between moral expertise and linguistic expertise. The account holds that expertise is contrastive, so that a person is an expert relative to a particular contrast. Further, expertise is domain specific and characterized by “automatic” behavior and judgment. Some disagreements in the (...) literature regarding moral expertise are diagnosed as being due to failures to adequately distinguish different ways in which someone can be a moral expert. For example, expertise in action does not imply expertise in judgment or analysis. (shrink)

Can we accept John McDowell’s Kantian claim that perception is conceptual “all the way out,” thereby denying the more basic perceptual capacities we seem to share with prelinguistic infants and higher animals? More generally, can philosophers successfully describe the conceptual upper floors of the edifice of knowledge while ignoring the embodied coping going on on the ground floor? I argue that we shouldn’t leave the conceptual component of our lives hanging in midair and suggest how philosophers who want to understand (...) knowledge and action can profit from a phenomenological analysis of the nonconceptual embodied coping skills we share with animals and infants, as well as the nonconceptual immediate intuitive understanding exhibited by experts. (shrink)

Voyeurism seems creepy. This paper considers whether these feelings are well-founded. It identifies a variety of ethically troubling features, including harmful consequences, deceit, and the violation of various religious, legal, and conventional norms. Voyeurism is something of a moral misdemeanor that seems worrisome when associated with these other failings. However, because voyeurism remains troubling even in the absence of harm or deceit, we must pay special attention to the ways complex social conventions can be used to show disrespect for others. (...) The discussion centers on the famous case of Lady Godiva and Peeping Tom, but much of the analysis applies to voyeurism more generally. (shrink)

Motivational Internalism is the thesis that, necessarily, moral beliefs are accompanied by motivational states. It is plausible to suppose that while another’s testimony might transmit information and justification, it can’t transmit motivational states such as moral emotions. Thus, Internalism provides a compelling explanation of “Pessimism”, the view that there is something illicit about forming moral beliefs by testimony. This paper presents a nonconstitutive reading of the Internalist thesis and then argues that it supports Pessimism in the form of a defeasible (...) presumption against moral deference. It also argues against views which explain Pessimism by appeal to requirements on moral belief formation. (shrink)

A central point of contention in the ongoing debate between Humean and anti-Humean accounts of moral motivation concerns the theoretical credentials of the idea of mental states that are cognitive and motivational at the same time. Humeans claim that this idea is incoherent and thereby unintelligible (M. Smith, The Moral Problem, Blackwell 1994). I start by developing a linguistic argument against this claim. The semantics of certain ‘learning to’ and ‘knowing to’ ascriptions points to a dispositional state that has both (...) motivational and cognitive properties: habitual knowledge, as we may call it. But there is nothing unintelligible or incoherent about such ascriptions as they figure in the explanation and assessment of action. This suggests that the idea of a state that has both cognitive and motivational properties is not an artefact of philosophical speculation. Moreover, I suggest that action explanations that appeal to habitual knowledge, which are a variety of habit explanation, present distinctive problems for Humean accounts. The discussion bears on the relationship between habitual knowledge and knowing-how, and its possible significance for anti-Humean accounts of moral motivation. (shrink)

For Julia Driver, some virtues involve ignorance. Modesty, for example, is a disposition to underestimate self-worth, and blind charity is a disposition not to see others’ defects. Such “virtues of ignorance,” she argues, serve as counterexamples to the Aristotelian view that virtue requires intellectual excellence. But Driver seems to face a dilemma: if virtues of ignorance involve ignorance of valuable knowledge, then they do not merit virtue status; but if they involve ignorance of trivial knowledge, then they do not preclude (...) intellectual excellence. So, either there are no _virtues_ of ignorance, or there are no virtues of _ignorance_ – at least not the sort of ignorance that precludes intellectual excellence. Virtues of ignorance therefore fail as counterexamples to Aristotelian virtue theory. (shrink)

This article discusses the encounter between virtue ethics and environmental ethics and the ways in which environmental virtue ethics confronts nonhuman axiology and the controversial theme of moral anthropocentrism. It provides a reasoned review of the relevant literature and a historical–conceptual rendition of how environmental and virtue ethics came to converge as well as the ways in which they diverge. It explains that contrary to important worries voiced by some non-anthropocentric environmental ethicists, environmental virtue ethics enables and requires a rich (...) and nuanced engagement with nonhuman values of all sorts—intrinsic as well as extrinsic, moral as well as nonmoral, anthropocentric as well as non-anthropocentric—and neither presupposes nor implies moral anthropocentrism in its normativity. Finally, the article considers the fortunes of, and some challenges for, environmental virtue ethics in its application to the ethics of climate change, an increasingly central topic in environmental ethics. This article proceeds as follows: the first section introduces virtue ethics; the second section looks at axiological and normative themes in environmental ethics; the third section discusses environmental virtue ethics; and the fourth section considers its application to climate change. The fifth section draws some conclusions. (shrink)

In recent years there has been growing attention paid to a kind of human action or activity which does not issue from a process of reflection and deliberation and which is described as, e.g., ‘engaged coping’, ‘unreflective action’, and ‘flow’. Hubert Dreyfus, one of its key proponents, has developed a phenomenology of expertise which he has applied to ethics in order to account for ‘everyday ongoing ethical coping’ or ‘ethical expertise’. This article addresses the shortcomings of this approach by examining (...) the pre-reflective ethical know-how individuals first develop and on which all later forms of ethical expertise are dependent. In the first section an account is given of the ‘ethical second nature’ which every individual develops from childhood onwards and which forms the basis of pre-reflective ethical know-how. The acquisition of an ethical second nature early on opens up the very domain of ‘the ethical’ for us in the first place and is constitutive of our sensitivity to it. The second section turns to pre-reflective ethical know-how and whether it is conceptual in nature. Just as sensorimotor understanding forms the basis of our reflective perceptual concepts, pre-reflective ethical know-how is similarly proto-conceptual and is the source of our reflective ethical and moral concepts. Finally, the third section examines the process whereby ethical second nature and pre-reflective ethical know-how are actually acquired, namely, through immersion in an ‘ethical world’. This world consists of both the web of ethical meanings and significances which has evolved in a particular society or community as well as its members whose actions and interactions continually reproduce that web. (shrink)

McDowell’s minimal empiricism holds that experience, understood as providing conceptually articulated contents, plays a role in the justification of our beliefs. We question this idea by contrasting the role of perceptual experience in moral and non-moral judgments and conclude that experience per se is irrelevant in the former case and should also be so in the latter one: only with the help of adequate beliefs experience can provide a connection with the world. We conclude with some remarks concerning the importance (...) of experience. (shrink)

In this article, the authors examine and debate the categories of emotions, moods, temperaments, character traits and sentiments. They define them and offer an account of the relations that exist among the phenomena they cover. They argue that, whereas ascribing character traits and sentiments (dispositions) is to ascribe a specific coherence and stability to the emotions (episodes) the subject is likely to feel, ascribing temperaments (dispositions) is to ascribe a certain stability to the subject's moods (episodes). The rationale for this (...) distinction, the authors claim, lies in the fact that, whereas appeal to character traits or sentiments in explanation is tantamount to making sense of a given behaviour in terms of an individual's specific evaluative perspective - as embodied in this individual's emotional profile - appeal to temperaments makes sense of it independently of any such evaluative perspective. (shrink)

The recent discussions on the unity of virtue suffer from a lack of reference to the processes through which we interpret each other as moral agents. In the present paper it is argued that much light can be thrown on that crucial issue by appealing to a version of Donald Davidson’s Principle of Charity, which we call “Principle of Phronetic Charity”. The idea is that in order to treat somebody as a moral agent, one has first to attribute to them, (...) at least pro tempore, a significant degree of practical wisdom and, then, to assess and rationally adjust such attribution of competence via actual engagement with them – a process that may lead to different responses on the part of the interpreter. After expounding and defending the Principle of Phronetic Charity and the interpretive practices connected with it, we discuss the repercussions of our account on the issue of the epistemic access to virtue. We will show, in particular, that some important components of both disunitarianism and unitarianism have to be retained: in accordance with the former, we stress the role of concrete experience over pure speculation and, up to a point, the idea that virtues tend to form variegated ensembles; in accordance with the latter, we accept the claim that virtues are not attributed to moral agents in isolation. Ultimately, however, the account developed here rejects both the atomism of the disunitarian view and the holism of the “Unity of the Virtues”, since it is in fact a form of molecularism, according to which virtues come neither individually nor as a whole, but rather as clusters. (shrink)

In contemporary philosophy, the will is often regarded as a sheer philosophical fiction. In Will as Commitment and Resolve , Davenport argues not only that the will is the central power of human agency that makes decisions and forms intentions but also that it includes the capacity to generate new motivation different in structure from prepurposive desires. The concept of "projective motivation" is the central innovation in Davenport's existential account of the everyday notion of striving will. Beginning with the contrast (...) between "eastern" and "western" attitudes toward assertive willing, Davenport traces the lineage of the idea of projective motivation from NeoPlatonic and Christian conceptions of divine motivation to Scotus, Kant, Marx, Arendt, and Levinas. Rich with historical detail, this book includes an extended examination of Platonic and Aristotelian eudaimonist theories of human motivation. Drawing on contemporary critiques of egoism, Davenport argues that happiness is primarily a byproduct of activities and pursuits aimed at other agent-transcending goods for their own sake. In particular, the motives involved in virtue and in its practice as understood by Alasdair MacIntyre are projective rather than eudaimonist. This theory is supported by analyses of radical evil, accounts of intrinsic motivation in existential psychology, and contemporary theories of identity-forming commitment in analytic moral psychology. Following Viktor Frankl, Joseph Raz, and others, Davenport argues that Harry Frankfurt's conception of caring requires objective values worth caring about, which serve as rational grounds for projecting new final ends. The argument concludes with a taxonomy of values or goods, devotion to which can make life meaningful for us. (shrink)

The central purpose of this essay is to consider some of the more prominent reasons why realists have rejected the Humean theory of motivation. I shall argue that these reasons are not persuasive, and that there is nothing about being a moral realist that should make us suspicious of Humeanism.

Are there good grounds for thinking that the moral values of action are to be derived from those of character? This virtue ethical claim is sometimes thought of as a kind of normative ethical theory; sometimes as form of opposition to any such theory. However, the best case to be made for it supports neither of these claims. Rather, it leads us to a distinctive view in moral epistemology: the view that my warrant for a particular moral judgement derives from (...) my warrant for believing that I am a good moral judge. This view seems to confront a regress-problem. For the belief that I am a good moral judge is itself a particular moral judgement. So it seems that, on this view, I need to derive my warrant for believing that I am a good moral judge from my warrant for believing that I am a good judge of moral judges; and so on. I show how this worry can be met, and trace the implications of the resulting view for warranted moral judgement. (shrink)

Adorno's moral philosophy has often been accused of making aporetic prescriptions that are too taxing for moral agents. In this article, I defend his approach in terms of a theory of moral dilemmas. My guideline is Adorno's famous sentence that wrong life cannot be lived rightly. I argue that this claim is not distinctly prescriptive, as most of Adorno's critics believe, but is a claim about moral reality. Emphasizing realist aspects of his moral theory, I suggest that wrong life is (...) neither inconceivable nor an amoral or skeptical trope. Instead, Adorno's sentence about wrong life can be interpreted as a claim about the salience of particular moral facts. This, I conclude, allows Adorno to envisage moral reasons that motivate moral conduct case by case, although they are blocked overall. (shrink)

Recent years have witnessed a rehabilitation of early German Romanticism in philosophy, including a renewed interest in Romantic ethics. Friedrich Schlegel (1772–1829) is acknowledged as a key figure in this movement. While significant work has been done on some aspects of his thought, his views on ethics have been surprisingly overlooked. This essay aims to redress this shortcoming in the literature by examining the core themes of Schlegel’s ethics during the early phase of his career (1793–1801). I argue that Schlegel’s (...) position stands out against both the dominant Kantianism of his era, as well as against some of fellow Romantics. I show how Schlegel anticipates contemporary philosophers such as Bernard Williams, Harry Frankfurt, John McDowell, and Stanley Cavell in both his criticisms of traditional moral theory and in his attempts to develop a positive position. (shrink)

In a recent thought-provoking piece, Peter Roberts argues against the central role of happiness as a guiding concept in education, and argues for more attention to be paid to despair. This does not mean cultivating despair in young people, but allowing them to make sense of their own natural occasional despair, as well as the despair of others. I agree with Roberts about happiness, and about the need for more attention to despair, but I argue that focusing too much on (...) despair is dangerous without paying simultaneous attention to goodness. Roberts argues that students must be helped to face the despair born of the realisation that we can never be sure of the moral grounds on which our actions are based, we can never fully know ourselves, and that education should make us more appreciative of what we don't know. I argue against all three claims: there are some moral truths that we can know; we can know enough of ourselves in certain contexts; education should not only teach intellectual humility, it should also give us confidence in appreciating the sources of meaning that are ordinarily available, e.g. personal relationships. The paper concludes with a response to the objection that my position is little more than old-fashioned moralism and conservatism. (shrink)

In a recent thought-provoking piece, Peter Roberts argues against the central role of happiness as a guiding concept in education, and argues for more attention to be paid to despair. This does not mean cultivating despair in young people, but allowing them to make sense of their own natural occasional despair, as well as the despair of others. I agree with Roberts about happiness, and about the need for more attention to despair, but I argue that focusing too much on (...) despair is dangerous without paying simultaneous attention to goodness. Roberts argues that students must be helped to face the despair born of the realisation that we can never be sure of the moral grounds on which our actions are based, we can never fully know ourselves, and that education should make us more appreciative of what we don't know. I argue against all three claims: there are some moral truths that we can know; we can know enough of ourselves in certain contexts; education should not only teach intellectual humility, it should also give us confidence in appreciating the sources of meaning that are ordinarily available, e.g. personal relationships. The paper concludes with a response to the objection that my position is little more than old-fashioned moralism and conservatism. (shrink)

Proponents of “the affective appeal” :787–812, 2014; Zagzebski in Philos Phenomenol Res 66:104–124, 2003) argue that we can make progress in the longstanding debate about the nature of moral motivation by appealing to the affective dimension of affective episodes such as emotions, which allegedly play either a causal or constitutive role in moral judgements. Specifically, they claim that appealing to affect vindicates a version of Motivational Internalism—roughly, the view that there is a necessary connection between moral judgment and motivation—that is (...) both more empirically respectable and less theoretically controversial than non-affective versions. We here argue that the affective appeal fails: versions of Internalism which appeal to affect are neither more empirically supported, nor clearly less controversial, than versions of Internalism which make no such appeal. Although affect doubtless has an important role to play in explaining moral motivation, we are sceptical that establishing any such role advances the debate. (shrink)

The idea that there is a distinctively practical use of reason, and correspondingly a distinctively practical form of knowledge, unites many otherwise diverse voices in the history of practical philosophy: from Aristotle to Kant, from Rousseau to Marx, from Hegel to G.E.M. Anscombe, and many others. This volume gathers works by scholars who take inspiration from these and many other historical figures in order to deepen our systematic understanding of questions raised by their work that still are, or ought to (...) be, at the center of contemporary philosophical debate: the form and nature of practical reasoning, agential self-consciousness or practical knowledge, how knowledge of the good relates to our motivational capacity, and the shape of philosophical thinking about sound forms of living together. Accordingly, the volume is divided into three parts: action theory, meta-ethics, and political philosophy. This fusion of perspectives delivers novel possibilities not only for answering the systematic questions outlined above, but also for understanding both what unifies and distinguishes those historical voices that have sought to articulate the concept of practical reason. “This fascinating volume brings out the richness and profundity of an oft-neglected approach to understanding human agency, one that foregrounds action as itself an exercise of reason. Essays on ethics, mind, action, and political philosophy explore the history, substance, and implications of this idea, cutting across while also revealing the unity underlying various parts of philosophy that are typically treated separately.” – Eric Marcus, Auburn University. (shrink)

Elizabeth Anscombe and Mary Midgley discussed Aristotle's ethics as an alternative to modern moral philosophy. This idea is best known from Anscombe's 1958 paper ‘Modern Moral Philosophy’. The main...

I offer an argument for why torture, as an act of state-sponsored force to gain information crucial to the well-being of the common good, should be considered as a tactic of war, and therefore scrutinized in terms of just war theory. I argue that, for those committed to the justifiability of the use of force, most of the popular arguments against all acts of torture are unpersuasive because the logic behind them would forbid equally any act of mutilating or killing (...) in battle. I will also argue that looking at torture through the perspective of the just war tradition forces us to place strictures on the practice that make it hard to justify, helps us to see why torture should never be legalized, helps us to clarify when circumstances might justify torture, and suggests what sort of character is required to recognize when those circumstances have occurred. (shrink)

Meu objetivo central nesse artigo é procurar refletir sobre uma concepção específica de responsabilidade moral que pode ser derivada de uma ética das virtudes que tem como foco central da avaliação moral os traços de caráter do agente. Para tal, eu ressaltarei inicialmente algumas características centrais do modelo da ética das virtudes em contraposição aos modelos deontológico e consequencialista. Posteriormente, ressaltarei o aspecto internalista da ética das virtudes, com destaque para as características de motivação e deliberação. Por fim, identificarei e (...) problematizarei sobre um tipo de responsabilidade moral abrangente que estaria pressuposta nesse modelo ético. (shrink)

Dans un célèbre article de 1998, John Doris avance que la psychologie situationniste remet en question l’éthique de la vertu aristotélicienne, laquelle présuppose l’existence de vertus qui sont à la fois fixes et indépendantes d’une situation. Son argument prend la forme d’un dilemme. Le présent article, qui a pour but de répondre à ce dilemme, s’appuie sur des recherches récentes menées dans les domaines de la psychologie et des sciences cognitives afin de démontrer que l’éthique de la vertu, en tant (...) que théorie dispositionnaliste et non-codifiable, constitue une psychologie morale plus adéquate au plan empirique que les autres approches reconnues. (shrink)

It is a common assumption that lack of autonomy is incompatible with decisional capacity and mental health. However, there are two general conceptions of autonomy, one value-neutral and the other value-laden, which imply different notions of mental health. I argue that the value-neutral notion of autonomy is independently inadequate and that it also provides an inadequate foundation for judging whether someone is decisionally incapable or mentally disordered. I propose an alternative, value-laden account which posits ten capabilities required for basic human (...) functioning. I then defend this account against objections and highlight its practical utility in designing optimal treatment. (shrink)

The book provides a rich understanding of the role that family has in one's psychological development with respect not only to other people, but also to the ...

_Investigates the role of family in Hegel’s phenomenology._.