This is the most comprehensive book ever published on philosophical methodology. A team of thirty-eight of the world's leading philosophers present original essays on various aspects of how philosophy should be and is done. The first part is devoted to broad traditions and approaches to philosophical methodology. The entries in the second part address topics in philosophical methodology, such as intuitions, conceptual analysis, and transcendental arguments. The third part of the book is devoted to essays about the interconnections between philosophy (...) and neighbouring fields, including those of mathematics, psychology, literature and film, and neuroscience. (shrink)

In many jurisdictions, an offender’s remorse is considered to be a relevant factor to take into account in mitigation at sentencing. The growing philosophical interest in the use of neurointerventions in criminal justice raises an important question about such remorse-based mitigation: to what extent should technologically facilitated remorse be honoured such that it is permitted the same penal significance as standard instances of remorse? To motivate this question, we begin by sketching a tripartite account of remorse that distinguishes cognitive, affective (...) and motivational elements of remorse. We then describe a number of neurointerventions that might plausibly be used to enhance abilities that are relevant to these different elements of remorse. Having described what we term the ‘moral value’ view of the justification of remorse-based mitigation, we then consider whether using neurointerventions to facilitate remorse would undermine its moral value, and thus make it inappropriate to honour such remorse in the criminal justice system. We respond to this question by claiming that the form of moral understanding that is incorporated into a genuinely remorseful response grounds remorse’s moral value. In view of this claim, we conclude by arguing that neurointerventions need not undermine remorse’s moral value on this approach, and that the remorse that such interventions might facilitate could also be authentic to the recipient of the neurointerventions that we discuss. (shrink)

In this article, I aim to vindicate the belief that many teachers have that their intuitions, insights, or perceptions are legitimate—and indispensible—guides for their teaching. Perceptions can constitute knowledge. This runs counter to some number of views that emphasize ‘reflective practice’ and teachers as ‘reflective practitioners.’ I do not deny that reflection can be important, but it is a derivative task, dependent on teachers being the ‘right sort of subject,’ having the ‘right orientation’ to their work, at the service of (...) achieving that orientation. That orientation is a matter of virtue, where virtue is manifested in the capacity to read situations correctly for what is required to serve persons’ welfare, for them to do well. This entails that good teaching is more experienced-based than research-based. Ultimately, it is life experience that provides for teachers’ ability to see well. (shrink)

Wisdom is almost always associated with doing the right thing in the right way under right circumstances in order to achieve the common good. In this paper, however, we propose that wisdom is more associated with deciding between better and worse wrongs; a winless situation we define as tragic. We suggest that addressing the tragic question is something that leaders and managers generally avoid when focusing on business decisions and choices. Yet, raising and confronting the tragic question is important for (...) three main reasons. Firstly, it emphasises that wisdom is about recognising that doing the ethically responsible thing can sometimes lead to acting in ways that violate different ethical norms and values. Secondly, it foregrounds the issue of emotional perception in ethical decision-making. We argue that emotions are salient in directing attention to the tragic question and recognising morally ambiguous situations. Thirdly, the tragic question has important consequences for moral learning, accepting moral culpability for wrongdoing and organisational commitment to righting the wrong. We illustrate our arguments by drawing on three mini-cases: Arjuna’s dilemma in the Mahabharata, Gioia’s deliberations about his role in the Ford Pinto fires and the production of the abortion pill by French company Roussel-Uclaf. (shrink)

Despite this virtue's history as an instrument of women's oppression, modesty, at its most basic, means voluntary restraint of one's power, undertaken for the sake of others. It is a mechanism that modifies unequal power relationships and encourages greater compassion and fairness. I use a Christian perspective with influences from Jewish and Muslim sources to examine modesty. The modest person, I argue, must be in relationship with others, must be honestly aware of her impacts on others, must be sensitive to (...) those impacts, compassionate toward others, and willing to hold back for others' sakes. Moreover, modesty is not only a virtue that pertains to sexuality and clothing, but it also can promote virtuous environmental behavior, particularly as it leads to awareness of, and sensitivity to, the effects of everyday behaviors on vulnerable others. (shrink)

Macalester Bell urges the cultivation of apt contempt as the best response to what she calls “the vices of superiority”. In this essay, I sketch two character profiles. The first—the ideal contemnor—paradigmatically answers the vices of superiority with contempt. The second—the ideal Christian neighbor—is marked by humility and love, and answers the vices of superiority in non-contemptuous ways. I argue that the latter character rivals the former as a fitting moral response to the vices of superiority. Furthermore, I argue that (...) the two character profiles are incompatible, so one cannot jointly cultivate humble love and contempt. Given contempt's nastiness, and the alternative resources available for answering the vices of superiority, I suggest one should focus one's character-formation efforts on the cultivation of humility and love. (shrink)

Western Buddhists often believe and proclaim that metaphysical speculation is irrelevant to Buddhist ethics or practice. This view is problematic even with respect to early Buddhism, and cannot be sustained regarding later Indian Buddhists. In Śāntideva’s famous Bodhicaryāvatāra, multiple claims about the nature of reality are premises for conclusions about how human beings should act; that is, metaphysics logically entails ethics for Śāntideva, as it does for many Western philosophers. This article explores four key arguments that Śāntideva makes from metaphysics (...) to ethics: actions are determined by their causes, and therefore we should not get angry; the body is reducible to its component parts, and therefore we should neither protect it nor lust after other bodies; the self is an illusion, and therefore we should be altruistic; all phenomena are empty, and therefore we should not be attached to them. The exploration of these arguments together shows us why metaphysical claims can matter a great deal for Buddhist ethics, practice and liberation. (shrink)

The realities of human agency and decision making pose serious challenges for research ethics. This article explores six major challenges that require more attention in the ethics education of students and scientists and in the research on ethical conduct in science. The first of them is the routinization of action, which makes the detection of ethical issues difficult. The social governance of action creates ethical problems related to power. The heuristic nature of human decision making implies the risk of ethical (...) bias. The moral disengagement mechanisms represent a human tendency to evade personal responsibility. The greatest challenge of all might be the situational variation in people’s ethical behaviour. Even minor situational factors have a surprisingly strong influence on our actions. Furthermore, finally, the nature of ethics itself also causes problems: instead of clear answers, we receive a multitude of theories and intuitions that may sometimes be contradictory. All these features of action and ethics represent significant risks for ethical conduct in science. I claim that they have to be managed within the everyday practices of science and addressed explicitly in research ethics education. I analyse them and suggest some ways in which their risks can be alleviated. (shrink)

In her book Iris Murdoch, Gender and Philosophy, Sabina Lovibond argues that Iris Murdoch's philosophical and literary work is covertly dedicated to an ideology of female subordination. The most central and interesting aspect of her multifaceted argument concerns Murdoch's focus on the individual person's moral self-scrutiny and transformation of consciousness. Lovibond suggests that this focus is antithetical to the kind of communal and structural criticism of society that has been essential for the advance of feminism. She further reads Murdoch's dismissal (...) of “structuralism” as proof of Murdoch's alleged conservatism and neglect of feminist concerns. In this article I will argue that this line of argument—though not completely off-base concerning the awkwardness of Murdoch's relation to feminism— gives a misleading picture of Murdoch's philosophical and ideological position, and establishes a problematic antagonism between moral self-scrutiny and social criticism, which a closer look at Murdoch's work can help us overcome. (shrink)

This entry surveys issues at the intersection of art and morality. Particular emphasis is placed on whether, and in what way, the moral character of a work of art influences its artistic value. Other topics include the educational function of art and artistic censorship.

The purpose of this paper is to demonstrate that Francis Hutcheson’s moral sense theory offers a satisfactory account of moral perception. I introduce Hutcheson’s work in §1 and indicate why the existence of a sixth sense is not implausible. I provide a summary of Robert Cowan and Robert Audi’s respective theories of evaluative perception in §2, identifying three problematic objections: the Directness Objection to Cowan’s ethical perception and the aesthetic and perceptual model objections to Audi’s moral perception. §3 examines Hutcheson’s (...) moral sense theory, focusing on his discussion of benevolence, the desire for the happiness of others. I deal with the unresolved issues in Hutcheson’s account by recourse to Charles Darwin’s evolutionary perspective on the moral sense in §4, arguing for the moral sense as the second-order faculty for judging benevolence. I return, in §5, to the objections, showing that moral sense theory solves all three problems and therefore offers a satisfactory account of moral perception. (shrink)

The philosophy for children curriculum was specially written by Matthew Lipman and colleagues for the teaching of philosophy by non-philosophically educated teachers from foundation phase to further education colleges. In this article I argue that such a curriculum is neither a necessary, not a sufficient condition for the teaching of philosophical thinking. The philosophical knowledge and pedagogical tact of the teacher remains salient, in that the open-ended and unpredictable nature of philosophical enquiry demands of teachers to think in the moment (...) and draw on their own knowledge and experience of academic philosophy. Providing specialist training or induction in the P4C curriculum cannot and should not replace undergraduate and postgraduate degrees in academic philosophy at universities. However, although for academic philosophers the use of the P4C curriculum could be beneficial, I will argue that its use poses the risk of wanting to form children into the ideal ‘abnormal’ child, the thinking child—the adult philosopher’s child positioned as such by the Lipman novels. The notion of narrativity is central in my argument. With the help of two picturebooks—The Three Pigs by David Weisner and Voices in the Park by Anthony Browne—I illustrate my claim that philosophy as ‘side-shadowing’ or meta-thinking can only be generated in the space ‘in between’ text, child and educator, thereby foregrounding a ‘pedagogy of exposure’ rather than ‘teacher proof’ texts. (shrink)

After a brief review of the ethical judgment research, the Potter Box, a four‐step ethical judgment tool used primarily in media ethics, is introduced. The paper proposes that the Potter Box's usefulness for evaluating ethical dilemmas could be improved by re‐sequencing the steps, by incorporating philosophical intuitionism as a mechanism for structuring its inherent pluralism and by adding a post‐decision, pre‐action reflective step. The resulting modified Potter Box has five steps – analyze the situation, identify stakeholders, specify duties, weigh obligations (...) and check for universalizability – and should provide a useful structure for analyzing difficult ethical dilemmas and for creating transparency in the judgment process that accommodates improved discussion. (shrink)

Few would disagree that contemporary society is characterized by ‘pluralism’, but what this means is widely disputed. Among the many senses of pluralism current in contemporary political theory, ‘value pluralism’ is one of the most keenly contested. The classic account is found in Isaiah Berlin, who sees basic human values as irreducibly multiple, often conflicting, and sometimes incommensurable with one another.Berlin’s pluralist views are scattered throughout his work, but major statements include the Introduction and last section of ‘Two Concepts of (...) Liberty’ in Berlin (2002), Berlin (1990), and Berlin (2000). Other accounts of pluralism influenced by Berlin include Raz (1986); Hampshire (1989); Stocker (1990); Nussbaum (1992) chapter 2; Kekes (1993); Gray (1995a, b); Chang (1997); Crowder (2002, 2004); Galston (2002, 2005). In the Continental tradition the concept of value pluralism is often traced to Max Weber (1948). Berlin seems in general to have believed that the pluralist outl .. (shrink)

Non-fiction graphic novels about illness and death created by patients and their loved ones have much to teach all readers. However, the bond of empathy made possible in the comic form may have special lessons for healthcare providers who read these texts and are open to the insights they provide.

The art of medicine stimulates the attitude of mind which concedes that on certain issues the patient knows what is right for him or her, and the public senses what is best for it. Not because they are right, but because on these issues there is no absolute right. —Anthony MooreThe benefits of fine literature, narrative analysis, and the listening to and telling of stories in education are well known (Carson 2001; Guillemin and Gillam 2006; Hunter 1996; Moore 1978; Nussbaum (...) 1990). Literature must not be overlooked in the planning or the delivery of health education and care. Narrative opens readers’ minds by promoting a plethora of viewpoints about stories and life. Through the facilitation of student-centred activities students can critically mull over central points of the story. In discerning meaning, conversations between students are generated around the crucial question, “Whose story is it?” Coincidentally this question drives, or ought to drive, medical integrity.Practitioners m. (shrink)

Kazuo Ishiguro’s book Never Let Me Go is a thoughtful and provocative exploration of what it means to be human. Drawing on insights from the hermeneutic-phenomenology of Martin Heidegger, I argue that the movement of Ishiguro’s story can be understood in terms of actualising the human potential for autonomous action. Liberal theories take autonomy to be concerned with analytically and ethically isolatable social units directing their lives in accordance with self-interested preferences, arrived at by means of rational calculation. However, I (...) argue that such theories are simplistic abstractions from our human-life world, distorting the fundamental embodied, embedded, and relational nature of autonomy. When we attend closely to our concrete, lived existence we see instead that autonomy is about responding appropriately to others with whom we share a world. As we follow the path of Ishiguro’s central character Kathy H., we are shown how an awareness and acceptance of our existential finitude as precarious and fallible creatures is necessary for guiding such appropriate interactions. As Kathy grows and is affirmed into her life-world, which grounds and supports her Being, she moves from heteronomy to autonomy; from being moved by external laws to embodying those laws, thereby becoming autonomous. This is exemplified by her appropriation of the carer role, through which she responds in a fitting way to those with whom she shares her world, bearing the weight of and dwelling responsibly within our human condition. (shrink)

In this essay, I demonstrate the value of the Bildungsroman for philosophy of education on the grounds that these narratives raise and explore educational questions. I focus on a short story in the Bildungsroman tradition, Thomas Hardy’s “A Mere Interlude”. This story describes the maturation of its heroine by narrating a series of events that transform her understanding of what it means to lead a human life. I connect her conceptual shift with two paradigms for leading a human life. One (...) stresses the exercise of distinct human capacities like agency and autonomy, whereas the other stresses human vulnerability to fate or moral luck. I conclude by offering important reasons for educators to adopt the later paradigm over the former. (shrink)

Contemporary approaches to the study of suicide tend to examine suicide as a medical or public health problem rather than a moral problem, avoiding the kinds of judgements that have historically characterised discussions of the phenomenon. But morality entails more than judgement about action or behaviour, and our understanding of suicide can be enhanced by attending to its cultural, social, and linguistic connotations. In this work, I offer a theoretical reconstruction of suicide as a form of moral experience that delineates (...) five distinct, yet interrelated domains of understanding: the temporal, the relational, the existential, the ontological, and the linguistic. Attention to each of these domains, I argue, not only enriches our understanding of the moral realm but also provides a heuristic for examining the moral traditions and practices that constitute contemporary understandings of suicide. (shrink)

The embodied human subject is dynamically connected to his or her historico-sociocultural context, the soil from which a person’s psyche is nourished as multiplex meanings are absorbed and enable personal development. In each culture certain towering artistic works embody this perspective. The Dream of the Red Chamber introduces Jia Bao-yu—a scion of the prestigious Jia family—and his relationships with a large cast of characters. Bao-yu is controversial but, at the time of the family’s tragic collapse, he can be seen as (...) embodying a spiritual struggle in which his instinct, nature, sensitivity, and creativity are grounded in his transcendent relationship with a fragment of the world stone, an eternal source of energy and creativity. We are invited to draw on a metaphysical level of thought to consider his struggles with man-made hierarchies and a situated historico-sociocultural order in such a way as to live out his spiritual being. As such, the novel is closely relevant to questions of spirituality in bioethics. Through personal experiences, passions, creativity, and relationships with others, the body is inscribed, forming the soul, which may be misconstrued (for instance, through a medical or Cartesian reformulation of events) but which can be seen as the site of ethical and spiritual thought. (shrink)

In introducing the works included in this special issue, this essay identifies some general ways that these and other narratives can function in ethical explorations in the field of education. The essay not only articulates ways that narratives can be useful to education scholars, but it also provides pedagogical reasons to connect stories with ethics in classrooms. It concludes with a brief nod to the dangers that Plato, contemporary scholars and teachers have about combining narratives with ethical inquiry, and touches (...) upon some ways to temper them. (shrink)

This essay focuses on the value of self-doubt in moral inquiry and in moral education. Using John Patrick Shanley’s play, Doubt: A parable, as illustration, it shows how self-doubt initiates and extends moral inquiry, highlights one’s epistemic fallibility and connects the inquirer to the virtue of humility. The essay draws on the work of Charles Sanders Peirce, Hullett, Nussbaum, Thayer-Bacon and Elbow to support the idea that the question ‘Am I wrong?’ is important for moral inquiry and for moral education.

In this paper I explore the connection between narrative ethics and the increasing emphasis on historical consciousness as a way to cultivate moral responsibility in history education. I use Timothy Findley’s World War I novel, The Wars, as an example of how teachers might help students to see history neither simply as a collection of artefacts from the past, nor as an effort to construct an objective view about what went on in those other times and places, but rather as (...) something that makes ethical demands on us here and now. Theoretically, this paper draws on Adam Zachary Newton’s conception of narrative ethics and Roger Simon’s conception of historical consciousness, both of which rest on the Levinasian themes of irreducible difference, the face, and subjectivity as a position of ethical responsibility to and for the other. (shrink)

Editorial introduction to series of papers resulting from a European Commission Project on mental capacity.

Several philosophers think there are important analogies between emotions and perceptual states. Furthermore, considerations about the rational assessibility of emotions have led philosophers—in some cases, the very same philosophers—to think that the content of emotions must be propositional content. If one finds it plausible that perceptual states have propositional contents, then there is no obvious tension between these views. However, this view of perception has recently been attacked by philosophers who hold that the content of perception is object-like. I shall (...) argue for a view about the content of emotions and perceptual states which will enable us to hold both that emotional content is analogous to perceptual content and that both emotions and perceptual states can have propositional contents. This will involve arguing for a pluralist view of perceptual content, on which perceptual states can have both contents which are proposition-like and contents which are object-like. I shall also address two significant objections to the claim that emotions can have proposition-like contents. Meeting one of these objections will involve taking on a further commitment: the pluralist account of perceptual content will have to be one on which the contents of perception can be non-conceptual. (shrink)

Conflicts between morality and prudence are often thought to pose a special problem because the normativity of moral considerations derives from a distinctively moral point of view, while the normativity of prudential considerations derives from a distinctively prudential point of view, and there is no way to ‘put together’ the two points of view. I argue that talk of points of view is a red herring, and that for any ‘prumoral’ conflict there is some or other more comprehensive value – (...) often nameless – that accounts for the relative normative weight of conflicting moral and prudential considerations. The rational resolution of conflict is possible only in virtue of a more comprehensive value that includes the conflicting moral and prudential considerations as parts. (shrink)

This article examines individuals’ lay understandings of moral responsibilities between adult kin members. Moral sentiments and practical judgments are important in shaping kinship responsibilities. The article discusses how judgments on requests of support can be reflexive and critical, taking into account many factors, including merit, social proximity, a history of personal encounters, overlapping commitments, and moral identity in the family. In so doing, we argue that moral responsibilities are contextual and relational. We also analyze how class, gender, and capabilities affect (...) how individuals imagine, expect and discuss care responsibilities. We also offer a critique of social capital theory of families, suggesting that their versions of morality are instrumental, alienated, and restrictive. Although Bourdieu’s concept of habitus overlaps with our proposed moral sentiments approach, the former does not adequately address moral concerns, commitments, and evaluations. The article aims to contribute to a better understanding of everyday morality by drawing upon different literatures in sociology, moral philosophy, postcommunism, and development studies. (shrink)

Free and informed choice is an oft-acknowledged ethical basis for living kidney donation, including parental living kidney donation. The extent to which choice is present in parental living kidney donation has, however, been questioned. Since parents can be expected to have strong emotional bonds to their children, it has been asked whether these bonds make parents unable to say no to this donation. This article combines a narrative analysis of parents’ stories of living kidney donation with a philosophical discussion of (...) conditions for parental decision-making. Previous research has shown that parents often conclude that it is “natural” to donate. Our study shows that this naturalness needs to be understood as part of a story where parental living kidney donation is regarded as natural and as a matter of non-choice. Our study also highlights the presence of a parenthood moral imperative of always putting one’s child’s needs before one’s own. On the basis of these results, we discuss conditions for decision-making in the context of parental LKD. We argue that the presence of a parenthood moral imperative can matter with regard to the decision-making process when parents consider whether to volunteer as living kidney donors, but that it need not hamper choice. We emphasise the need for exploring relational and situational factors in order to understand parental decision-making in the context of parental LKD. (shrink)

This article provides a Taoist reading of Camus’ posthumously published novel, The first man. With its focus on the early life of the central character, Jacques Cormery, The first man is a semi-autobiographical account of learning and transformation, but it is, like so many other stories of its kind, one sustained by complex tensions: between the comfort of the familiar and the promise of the new; between possibility and despair; between resistance and acceptance. A theme that binds some of the (...) key educational elements of the book together is love: Jacques’s love of his mother and his elementary school teacher and their love for him; love of learning; and love of ‘home’. A Taoist theoretical framework is helpful in understanding the nature of this love and its pedagogical significance. In particular, the book exemplifies the importance of the figure of the mother—both in the person of Jacques’s mother and more symbolically in the notion of ‘the Great Mother’. The article concludes with thoughts on the value of literature for educational inquiry. (shrink)

The first of the following two narratives is a personal reflection by the instructor of “Narrative Approaches to Bioethics,” an elective in the PhD program at the Albert Gnaegi Center for Health Care Ethics at Saint Louis University. The author argues that perhaps the primary goal of medical ethics education should be to show how to construct plausible and defensible interpretations of human experience and sensibly resolve the problems that these happenings occasion. To that end, the author engaged the sympathetic (...) reading capacities of his students by “thwarting” their expectations for medicalized case studies to “dissect” and instead chose works that invited careful readings of morally-complex literary works. One such reading was Huckleberry Finn, which the class read on the book’s 100th anniversary. Huckleberry Finn chronicles Huck’s search for truth, goodness and justice on the Mississippi River–a location the class explored on a field trip. The second narrative is the personal reflection of one of the students in this class and attests to the moral pedagogical power of Huck Finn. He relates the insights gleaned from a particular passage where Huck confronts moralistic dogmas. (shrink)

This article draws on recent research in the medical humanities to analyze two contemporary Chinese films: Zhang Yuan's Sons (1996) and Zhou Xiaowen's The Common People (1998). By portraying psychic and physical anguish in ways that refuse to divorce biology from culture, such films offer rare moral dialogues on biomedical issues and contribute a cross-cultural perspective invaluable to the task of responding to illness and suffering.

In this paper the author challenges the prevailing view that contemporary writing in the medical humanities is serving the needs of the various health care disciplines. The current medical humanities literature assumes that physicians are the appropriate target group. This is most notably the case within health care ethics literature. There appears to be an unexamined assumption that physician-centric approaches to clinical ethical decision-making are the standard by which appropriate ethical practice is judged. The author challenges this assumption and addresses (...) the problems that this approach engenders. The medical humanities literature appears to reinforce hierarchical, patriarchal arrangements which are themselves not morally neutral. (shrink)

Rorty claims argument is inherently conservative and philosophical progress comes from "sparkling new ideas," not argument. This assumes an untenable opposition between the generation and the evaluation of ideas, with argument relegated to evaluation. New ideas that contribute to progress arise from critical reflection on problems posed by the tradition, and constrained by the criteria governing evaluation. Thinking directed toward the criticism and evaluation of ideas or products is not algorithmic; it has a generative, creative component. An overall assessment in (...) any complex circumstance requires constructing a new view from the questioning, weighing, rejecting, reconciling, and integrating of numerous divergent points of view. Thus, the process of argumentation can issue in new ideas. (shrink)

Cognitive and rational assessments of competence do not fully capture the way in which individuals normally make decisions. Human beings have always used stories to explain their experiences and values. Narrative ethics should be used to understand the perspective in context of a patient whose competence is in question, and so avoid a destructive clash. Psychiatry and professionals within it also have a narrative that may join with that of science, but there is no special privilege for these narratives unless (...) survival is at stake. The narrative approach should be used to try to make different stories compatible. This article examines the background to this approach, and indicates some ways in which it could be used in the specific cases addressed in the series. (shrink)

The debate over encumbered versus unencumbered selves that characterized the dialogue between liberalism and republicanism did not end well. Neither side seemed enlightened by its encounter with the other, as it became increasingly difficult to pin down the differences between the sides, never more so than when Michael Sandel was violently agreeing with Richard Dagger. Drawing on the work of novelist and philosopher Iris Murdoch, this essay argues that Sandel could have made a much stronger argument for his view than (...) he did. Sandel need not have conceded or concluded that encumbered selves are unable to choose freely. Freedom is a more subtle and complicated concept that either Sandel or Dagger recognize. (shrink)

Recently, moral deliberation within care institutions is gaining more attention in medical ethics. Ongoing dialogues about ethical issues are considered as a vehicle for quality improvement of health care practices. The rise of ethical conversation methods can be understood against the broader development within medical ethics in which interaction and dialogue are seen as alternatives for both theoretical or individual reflection on ethical questions. In other disciplines, intersubjectivity is also seen as a way to handle practical problems, and methodologies have (...) emerged to deal with dynamic processes of practice improvement. An example is responsive evaluation. In this article we investigate the relationship between moral deliberation and responsive evaluation, describe their common basis in dialogical ethics and pragmatic hermeneutics, and explore the relevance of both for improving the quality of care. The synergy between the approaches is illustrated by a case example in which both play a distinct and complementary role. It concerns the implementation of quality criteria for coercion in Dutch psychiatry. (shrink)

Alcune opere d'arte manifestano (o suggeriscono di assumere) prospettive morali dubbie e, in certi casi, chiaramente deprecabili. Ad esempio, il documentario propagandista Il Trionfo della Volontà di Leni Riefensthal esprime (e cerca di evocare) ammirazione nei confronti di Adolf Hitler. Nonostante ciò, Il Trionfo della Volontà è considerato un capolavoro nel genere dei documentari. Questo e molti altri esempi simili suggeriscono le seguenti domande: É possibile considerare un'opera d'arte un capolavoro artistico e, allo stesso tempo, un esempio di immoralità? La (...) valutazione morale di un'opera d'arte influisce o dovrebbe influire sulla valutazione artistica dell'opera? (shrink)

In this paper, I articulate Heidegger’s notion of Befindlichkeit and show that his phenomenological account of affective existence can be understood in terms of contemporary work on emotions. By examining Heidegger’s account alongside contemporary accounts of emotions, I not only demonstrate the ways in which key aspects of the former are present in the latter; I also explicate in detail the ways in which our understanding of Befindlichkeit and its relationship to moods and emotions can benefit from an empirically-informed study (...) of emotions. (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)

The connection between ethics and theological vision has become increasingly important for ethics as we better appreciate how the moral agent is embedded in a framework that affectively and intellectually shapes her moral reasoning. Moral reasoning is always reasoning within (that is, within a moral framework, a religious worldview, and/or a set of ideological commitments). A similar framing occurs in literature, which I refer to as its “horizon.” A literary text's horizon comprises the theological and metaphysical commitments that are implied (...) by the text and that the reader relies on to make sense of it. I suggest that there is a parallel between how moral frameworks and literary horizons operate in that both shape moral judgment. I argue that in using literature as a resource for ethics, the same contemporary currents that have led us to appreciate the embeddedness of moral reasoning should also encourage us to give more careful attention to the theological or metaphysical vision implied by a text. Such a “theo-ethical” reading of literature provides a richer understanding of particular moral goods and the interplay between those goods and ethical themes like agency, hope, and redemption. I substantiate this claim with a reading of William Blake's Jerusalem: The Emanation of the Giant Albion. (shrink)