We can distinguish two kinds of moral universalization tests for practical principles. One requires that the universal practice of the principle, i.e., universal conformity to it by all agents in a given world, satisfies some condition. The other requires that conformity to the principle by any possible agent, in any situation and at any time, satisfies some condition. We can call these universal practice and universal applicability tests respectively. The logical distinction between these tests is rarely appreciated, and many philosophers (...) systematically confuse them with each other. In practice, UP tests are more frequently used to defend deontological norms, while UA tests are used to defend consequentialist norms. Both conceptual argument and practical examples of their applications will show that UA tests are decisively superior to UP tests for grounding moral norms, casting greater doubt upon deontological theories which rely upon the latter unless they can reformulate their arguments using some version of a UA test. (shrink)

Intrinsic value has traditionally been thought to lie at the heart of ethics. Philosophers use a number of terms to refer to such value. The intrinsic value of something is said to be the value that that thing has “in itself,” or “for its own sake,” or “as such,” or “in its own right.” Extrinsic value is value that is not intrinsic.

University and school preparation of new teachers should include work on the ethical and policy quandries of professional work. As it is, teacher education institutions too rarely tackle questions of protocol, ethics, policy, principles, and procedures. Professors may discuss matters of protocol, especially ethical conflicts arising from school and university practices and routines. But they rarely give in-depth treatment to ethics and policy in the teaching life. Moreover, treatment of these matters is often sparse in ethical theory or in reasoned (...) analyses of protocol and policies. This leaves the new teacher without initiation into centrally important elements of teaching. The appropriate treatment of protocol, ethical, and policy matters in education programs warrants a separate course of instruction. Here, students would be encouraged to improve their ethical reasoning and to learn ethical theory. They would learn various ways to assess protocol and policy problems likely to arise in classrooms and schools. Minimally, teacher education professors should draw attention to important protocol, ethical, and policy aspects of course content and do so in vigorous, educationally sound ways. In this article, I show how my treatment of protocol, ethics, and policies would apply more widely in general postsecondary education. (shrink)

Most philosophers, I think, would hold that there is a great deal more to be noticed about moral judgments than any special connections which they may be supposed to have with displays of emotion. I strongly hold this myself. Many philosophers, however—and I am one of them—are inclined to believe that special connections of this kind do exist. Agitation counts in ethics. But just what does it count for? What is to be made of the central fact that the same (...) forms of words to which both ethical and “emotive” meaning is ascribed may sometimes be used when emotions are being manifested and sometimes when they are not? Stevenson acknowledges, “There are emotively active and emotively inactive uses of literally all the ethical terms”. But how, in view of this fact, can it be illuminating to say that some forms of words—taken to be the characteristic forms of words for expressing moral judgments—have anything like a distinctive function of expressing emotions? (shrink)

This paper proposes to test the ethical acceptability of four styles of agricultural resource management: (1) contemporary industrial integrated systems agriculture, (2) modern industrial input dependent agriculture, (3) continuous traditional agriculture and (4) non-continuous (or swidden) traditional agriculture. The test of ethical acceptability is whether or not these styles of agricultural resource management embrace or are even compatible with that pattern of practical reasoning and interaction among ethical agents which we have independent theoretic grounds for preferring. The preferred sorts of (...) practical reasoning and interaction are those which we find operating in ethical theories which are strongly committed to letting the discretion of ethical agents construct what is right for them to do. Thus the discussion distinguishes several different strengths of constructivist ethics relating them to the work of John Rawls, Immanuel Kant and Onora O'Neill. Then it argues for the theoretic preferability of one particular strength of constructivist ethic. The paper winds up by arguing that only traditional continuous agriculture embodies the preferred sort of practical reasoning and interaction among ethical agents. Further, I argue that this is the only style of agriculture which can embody such reasoning and patterns of interaction. Thus, as we consider the role of agriculture in our plans of international development, we have one reason to try to favor traditional continuous agriculture. To do otherwise would ignore the ethical superiority of the practical reasoning and patterns of interaction of traditional agriculturalists. (shrink)

This article poses two regresses for justification of moral knowledge and discusses three models for moral epistemic infinitism that arise. There are moral infinitisms dependent on empirical infinitism, what are called “piggyback” moral infinitisms. There are substantive empiricist moral infinitisms, requiring infinite chains of descriptive facts to justify normative rules. These empiricist infinitisms are developed either as infinitist egoisms or as infinitist sentimentalisms. And, finally, there are substantive rationalist moral infinitisms, requiring infinite chains of normative reasons to justify moral rules. (...) Rationalist moral infinitism is posed as a mixed view integrating moral intuitions with the demand for justifying reasons. (shrink)

Some exchanges of reasons are agonistic. Others work mutually, as in planning and adjusting divergent understanding. Mutual argumentation subconsciously yields judgment that integrates and clarifies a common vision coordinating interrelated lives. It harmonizes agents sharing a space of action and understanding. Pierre Bourdieu held that such thought generates and expresses culture, patterning a logic that reflexively constrains itself. This discussion examines Bourdieu’s views as an analysis of mutual argumentation.

In this paper I compare and contrast Rawls’s notion of reflective equilibrium with Wellman‘s notion of conductive argument. In the course of so doing I will address two key questions: Are conduc-tive argument and reflective equilibrium best understood as modes of reasoning or types of argument? and What relationship, if any, is there between them?

The creation of transgenic animals by means of modern techniques of genetic manipulation is evaluated in the light of different interpretations of the concept of intrinsic value. The zoocentric interpretation, emphasizing the suffering of individual, sentient animals, is described as an extension of the anthropocentric interpretation. In a biocentric or ecocentric approach the concept of intrinsic value first of all denotes independence of humans and a non-instrumental relation to animals. In the zoocentric approach of Bernard Rollin, genetic engineering is seen (...) as a morally neutral tool, as long as the animal does not suffer as a result of it. Robert Colwell who defends an ecocentric ethic, makes a sharp distinction between wild animals and domesticated animals. Genetic manipulation of wild species is a serious moral issue, in contrast to genetic manipulation of domesticated species which is no problem at all for Colwell. Both authors do not take the species-specific nature (or telos) of domesticated animals seriously. When domestication is seen as a process between the two poles of the wild animal and the human construct (which can be patented), the technique of genetic manipulation can only be seen as a further encroachment upon the intrinsic value of animals. At the level of molecular biology, the concept of an animal's telos loses its meaning. (shrink)