We can infer moral conclusions from nonmoral evidence using a three-step procedure. First, we distinguish the processes generating belief so that their reliability in generating true belief is statistically predictable. Second, we assess the processes’ reliability, perhaps by observing how frequently they generate true nonmoral belief or logically inconsistent beliefs. Third, we adjust our credence in moral propositions in light of the truth ratios of the processes generating beliefs in them. This inferential route involves empirically discovering truths of the form (...) “Process P, which generates belief in moral proposition M, has truth ratio T", and using them to discover probabilities for moral propositions. The inferential route is noncircular, and progress along it is driven fundamentally by induction. (shrink)

Egoism can be a descriptive or a normative position. Psychological egoism, the most famous descriptive position, claims that each person has but one ultimate aim: her own welfare. Normative forms of egoism make claims about what one ought to do, rather than describe what one does do. Ethical egoism claims that it is necessary and sufficient for an action to be morally right that it maximize one's self-interest. Rational egoism claims that it is necessary and sufficient for an action to (...) be rational that it maximize one's self-interest. (shrink)

Evolutionary accounts of the origins of human morality may lead us to doubt the truth of our moral judgments. Sidgwick tried to vindicate ethics from this kind of external attack. However, he ended The Methods in despair over another problem—an apparent conflict between rational egoism and universal benevolence, which he called the “dualism of practical reason.” Drawing on Sidgwick, we show that one way of defending objectivity in ethics against Sharon Street’s recent evolutionary critique also puts us in a position (...) to support a bold claim: the dualism of practical reason can be resolved in favor of impartiality. (shrink)

Many people believe that human interests matter much more than the like interests of non-human animals, and this “speciesist belief” plays a crucial role in the philosophical debate over the moral status of animals. In this paper, I develop a debunking argument against it. My contention is that this belief is unjustified because it is largely due to an off-track process: our attempt to reduce the cognitive dissonance generated by the “meat paradox”. Most meat-eaters believe that it is wrong to (...) harm animals unnecessarily, yet they routinely and deliberately behave in ways that cause great unnecessary suffering to animals. As recent research suggests, this practical inconsistency puts them in an unpleasant state of dissonance, which they try to escape by resolving the paradox. And they do so in part by adopting the speciesist belief—if animal suffering matters much less than human suffering, then harming animals cannot be so wrong after all. Since this belief-forming process does not track moral truth, I conclude that we are not justified in believing that human interests matter more than the similar interests of non-humans. (shrink)

The idea of reflective equilibrium remains the most popular approach to questions about method in ethics, despite the masses of criticism it has been faced with over the years. Is this due to the availability of compelling responses to the criticisms or rather to factors that are independent of its reasonableness? The aim of this paper is to provide support for the first answer. I particularly focus on the recent discussion. Some recent objections are related to general arguments against the (...) possibility of moral knowledge, such as so-called “evolutionary debunking arguments.” I argue that nothing that has come to light in that debate, or in the recent discussion about IRE more generally, decisively strengthens the case against it. If anything, the recent developments show that IRE deserves its present status. (shrink)

The fact that debunkers can turn to the argument from disagreement for help is ofcourse not a surprise. After all, both types of challenge basically pursue the same,skeptical conclusion. What I have tried to show, however, is that they are related in amore intimate way.

How can we figure out what’s right or wrong, if moral truths are neither self-evident nor something we can perceive? Very roughly, the method of reflective equilibrium (RE) says that we should begin moral inquiry from what we already confidently think, seeking to find a a match between our initial convictions and general principles that are well-supported by background theories, mutually adjusting both until we reach a coherent outlook in which our beliefs are in harmony (the equilibrium part) and we (...) know why and how they support each other (the reflective part). It has been central to the self-understanding of normative ethics and other branches of philosophy in the last half a century. In this chapter, we examine the history of the idea of RE and introduce a schema for generating 256 variants. We explain why RE is subject to serious objections insofar as it purports to yield epistemic justification in virtue of achieving coherence. However, we also develop a new argument to the effect that RE is the best feasible method for us to achieve moral understanding and the ability to justify our judgments to others. It may thus be crucial for responsible moral inquiry, even if coherence among considered judgments and principles is neither sufficient nor necessary for justified moral belief. (shrink)

Ever since the introduction of reflective equilibrium in ethics, it has been argued that reflective equilibrium either leads to moral relativism, or that it turns out to be a form of intuitionism in disguise. Despite these criticisms, reflective equilibrium remains the most dominant method of moral justification in ethics. In this paper, I therefore critically examine the most recent attempts to defend the method of reflective equilibrium against these objections. Defenders of reflective equilibrium typically respond to the objections by saying (...) that either reflective equilibrium can in fact safeguard moral objectivity or alternatively, even if it cannot, that there simply are no reasonable alternatives. In this paper, I take issue with both responses. First, I argue that given the non-foundationalist aspirations of reflective equilibrium, moral objectivity cannot be maintained. Second, I argue that reflective equilibrium is not the only game in town once intuitionism has been discarded. I argue that given their own normative ambitions, combined with their rejection of intuitionism, proponents of reflective equilibrium have reason to take alternative methods of moral justification, and more specifically transcendental arguments, more seriously than they have done so far. I end by sketching the outlines of what this alternative methodology might look like. (shrink)

Journal of Political Philosophy, EarlyView.

This article explores the respective roles that medical and technological cognitive enhancements, on the one hand, and the moral and epistemic virtues traditionally understood, on the other, can play in enabling us to lead the good life. It will be shown that neither the virtues nor cognitive enhancements (of the kind we have access to today or in the foreseeable future) on their own are likely to enable most people to lead the good life. While the moral and epistemic virtues (...) quite plausibly are both necessary and sufficient for the good life in theory, virtue ethics is often criticised for being elitist and unachievable in practice for the vast majority. Some cognitive enhancements, on the other hand, might be necessary for the good life but are far from sufficient for such an existence. Here it will be proposed that a combination of virtue and some cognitive enhancements is preferable. (shrink)

Crashes involving self-driving cars at least superficially resemble trolley dilemmas. This article discusses what lessons machine ethicists working on the ethics of self-driving cars can learn from trolleyology. The article proceeds by providing an account of the trolley problem as a paradox and by distinguishing two types of solutions to the trolley problem. According to an optimistic solution, our case intuitions about trolley dilemmas are responding to morally relevant differences. The pessimistic solution denies that this is the case. An optimistic (...) solution would yield first-order moral insights for the ethics of self-driving cars, but such a solution is difficult to come by. More plausible is the pessimistic solution, and it teaches us a methodological lesson. The lesson is that machine ethicists should discount case intuitions and instead rely on intuitions and judgments at a higher level of generality. (shrink)

According to the dual-process account of moral judgment, deontological and utilitarian judgments stem from two different cognitive systems. Deontological judgments are effortless, intuitive and emotion-driven, whereas utilitarian judgments are effortful, reasoned and dispassionate. The most notable evidence for dual-process theory comes from neuroimaging studies by Joshua Greene and colleagues. Greene has suggested that these empirical findings undermine deontology and support utilitarianism. It has been pointed out, however, that the most promising interpretation of his argument does not make use of the (...) empirical findings. In this paper, I engage with recent attempts by Greene to vindicate the moral significance of dual-process theory and the supporting neuroscientific findings. I consider their potential moral significance with regard to three aspects of Greene’s case against deontology: the argument from morally irrelevant factors, the functionalist argument and the argument from confabulation. I conclude that Greene fails to demonstrate how neuroscience and dual-process theory in general can advance moral theorizing. (shrink)

In a recent paper, Peter Singer suggests that some interesting new findings in experimental moral psychology support what he has contended all along—namely that intuitions should play little or no role in adequate justifications of normative ethical positions. Not only this but, according to Singer, these findings point to a central flaw in the method (or epistemological theory) of reflective equilibrium used by many contemporary moral philosophers. In this paper, we try to defend reflective equilibrium from Singer’s attack and, in (...) part, we do this by discussing Singer’s own favoured moral methodology as outlined in his Practical Ethics . Although basing ethics solely on (certain kinds of) intuitions certainly is problematic, we argue, basing it solely on ‘reason’ gives rise to similar problems. The best solution would arguably be one which could strike a balance between the two—but, we suggest, this is precisely what reflective equilibrium is all about. (shrink)

This paper examines a constellation of ethical and editorial issues that have arisen since philosophers started to conduct, submit and publish empirical research. These issues encompass concerns over responsible authorship, fair treatment of human subjects, ethicality of experimental procedures, availability of data, unselective reporting and publishability of research findings. This study aims to assess whether the philosophical community has as yet successfully addressed such issues. To do so, the instructions for authors, submission process and published research papers of 29 main (...) journals in philosophy have been considered and analyzed. In light of the evidence reported here, it is argued that the philosophical community has as yet failed to properly tackle such issues. The paper also delivers some recommendations for authors, reviewers and editors in the field. (shrink)

Reflective equilibrium has been criticized for various reasons ever since the publication of Rawls’ A Theory of Justice. Recent empirical research into moral decision-making poses new challenges to RE because it questions the reliability of moral intuitions. This research might discredit moral intuitionism in general and RE in particular insofar as it ascribes epistemic value to moral intuitions. These findings suggest, for instance, that moral intuitions vary with cultural background, gender or framing. If it could be shown that all or (...) certain kinds of moral intuitions are unreliable, this would diminish the plausibility of the claim that they provide good reasons to believe in the truth of their content, especially given the growing evidence that professional philosophers are just as biased and susceptible to distorting factors as lay people. In this paper I critically discuss three recent defenses of RE against this unreliable intuitions objection. Two of these defenses argue that the UIO misses its target, because RE does not depend on intuitions, or because the relevant considered judgments in RE are not intuitions. The third defense grants that RE depends on intuitions and that some Rawlsian considered judgments are intuitions. But it argues that the notion of considered judgments can be revised, and that wide reflective equilibrium has the means to adopt the criticism because it can use information about unreliable intuitions and exclude those from further consideration. I argue that the first two defenses do not succeed. The third defense is the most promising one. However, I argue that this defense also fails. In this defense, RE is not a distinctive moral epistemic theory: different versions of RE would be conceivable, all of which are deeply problematic. I conclude with a discussion of the broader philosophical implications of the UIO, specifically whether or not accepting the UIO would warrant skepticism regarding moral knowledge. (shrink)

Illness severity is a priority setting criterion in several countries. Age seems to matter when considering severity, but perhaps not small age differences. In the following article we consider Small Differences : small differences in age are not relevant when considering differential illness severity. We show that SD cannot be accommodated within utilitarian, prioritarian or egalitarian theories. Attempting to accommodate SD by postulating a threshold model becomes exceedingly complex and self-defeating. The only way to accommodate SD seems to be to (...) accept some form of relevance view, where some age differences are irrelevant. This view can accommodate SD, but at the expense of consistent priority orderings. Severity thus becomes unsuitable for systematic decision-making. We argue that SD should be dismissed and that we should accept a continuous relationship between severity of illness and age. (shrink)

In attempting to debunk moral realism through an appeal to evolutionary facts, debunkers face a series of problems, which we label the problems of scope, corrosiveness, and post‐hoc justification. To overcome these problems, debunkers must assume certain metaphysical or epistemological positions, or otherwise pre‐establish them. In doing so, they must assume or pre‐establish the very conclusion they seek in advancing the argument. This means that such debunking arguments either beg the question against the moral realist or are undermined as standalone (...) metaethical arguments. (shrink)

This paper examines a constellation of ethical and editorial issues that have arisen since philosophers started to conduct, submit and publish empirical research. These issues encompass concerns over responsible authorship, fair treatment of human subjects, ethicality of experimental procedures, availability of data, unselective reporting and publishability of research findings. This study aims to assess whether the philosophical community has as yet successfully addressed such issues. To do so, the instructions for authors, submission process and published research papers of 29 main (...) journals in philosophy have been considered and analyzed. In light of the evidence reported here, it is argued that the philosophical community has as yet failed to properly tackle such issues. The paper also delivers some recommendations for authors, reviewers and editors in the field. (shrink)

Debunking arguments are arguments that seek to undermine a belief or doctrine by exposing its causal origins. Two prominent proponents of such arguments are the utilitarians Joshua Greene and Peter Singer. They draw on evidence from moral psychology, neuroscience, and evolutionary theory in an effort to show that there is something wrong with how deontological judgments are typically formed and with where our deontological intuitions come from. They offer debunking explanations of our emotion-driven deontological intuitions and dismiss complex deontological theories (...) as products of confabulatory post hoc rationalization. Through my discussion of Greene and Singer’s empirically informed debunking of deontology, I introduce the distinction between two different types of debunking arguments. The first type of debunking argument operates through regular undercutting defeat, whereas the second type relies on higher-order evidence. I argue that the latter type of debunking argument, of which the argument from confabulation is an example, is objectionably sloppy and therefore inadmissible in academic discussion. (shrink)

Joshua Greene and Peter Singer argue, on the basis of empirical evidence, that deontological moral judgments result from emotional reactions while dispassionate reasoning leads to consequentialist judgments. Given that there are good reasons to doubt these emotionally driven intuitions, they argue that we should reject Kantian ethics. I argue that the evidence does not support the claim that consequentialism is inherently more reason-based or less emotion-based than Kantian ethics. This is partly because the experiments employ a functional definition of ‘deontological’ (...) that is so broad as to include any non-consequentialist theory, including virtue ethics, divine command theory, and even rule-utilitarianism. Thus the experiments failed to capture the reasons behind the judgments. Also, the results of the experiments are partly due to the extensive use of moral dilemmas like the footbridge version of the trolley scenario. The options in these dilemmas involve different levels of moral thinking. The consequ.. (shrink)

A debunking argument contends that some target moral judgments were produced by unreliable processes and concludes that such judgments are unjustified. Debunking arguments face a regress challenge: to show that a process is unreliable at tracking the moral truth, we need to rely on other moral judgments. But we must show that these relied-upon judgments are also reliable, which requires yet a further set of judgments, whose reliability needs to be confirmed too, and so on. Some argue that the debunker (...) faces an insurmountable regress, which disables the debunking conclusion. In this paper, I explore and defuse this regress challenge. (shrink)

Several authors believe that metaethicists ought to leave their comfortable armchairs and engage with serious empirical research. This paper provides partial support for the opposing view, that metaethics is rightly conducted from the armchair. It does so by focusing on debunking arguments against robust moral realism. Specifically, the article discusses arguments based on the possibility that if robust realism is correct, then our beliefs are most likely insensitive to the relevant truths. These arguments seem at first glance to be dependent (...) on empirical research to learn what our moral beliefs are sensitive to. It is argued, however, that this is not so. The paper then examines two thought experiments that have been thought to demonstrate that debunking arguments might depend on empirical details and argues that the conclusion is not supported. (shrink)

This paper provides a discussion of the role that emotions may play in the justification of punishment. On the expressivist account of punishment, punishment has the purpose of expressing appropriate emotional reactions to wrongdoing, such as indignation, resentment or guilt. I will argue that this expressivist approach fails as these emotions can be expressed other than through the infliction of punishment. Another argument for hard treatment put forward by expressivists states that punitive sanctions are necessary in order for the law (...) to be valid. But this justification of punishment, too, is unconvincing. There are no good reasons to assume that we have to resort to punitive measures in order to vindicate the law. I will then raise the more general worry whether there is any intelligible link at all between moral emotions such as indignation, resentment or guilt and retributive behaviour. I will finally conclude with some sceptical remarks on the moral worth of retribution. (shrink)

Evolutionary debunking arguments in ethics aim to use facts about the evolutionary causes of ethical beliefs to undermine their justification. Global Evolutionary Debunking Arguments (GDAs) are arguments made in metaethics that aim to undermine the justification of all ethical beliefs. Local Evolutionary Debunking Arguments (LDAs) are arguments made in first‐order normative ethics that aim to undermine the justification of only some of our ethical beliefs. Guy Kahane, Regina Rini, Folke Tersman, and Katia Vavova argue for skepticism about the possibility of (...) LDAs. They argue that LDAs cannot be successful because they over‐extend in a way that makes them self‐undermining and yield a form of moral skepticism. In this paper I argue that this skepticism about the possibility of LDAs is misplaced. (shrink)

Ordinary Language Philosophy has largely fallen out of favour, and with it the belief in the primary importance of analyses of ordinary language for philosophical purposes. Still, in their various endeavours, philosophers not only from analytic but also from other backgrounds refer to the use and meaning of terms of interest in ordinary parlance. In doing so, they most commonly appeal to their own linguistic intuitions. Often, the appeal to individual intuitions is supplemented by reference to dictionaries. In recent times, (...) Internet search engine queries for expressions of interest have become quite popular. Apparently, philosophers attempt to surpass the limits of their own linguistic intuitions by appealing to experts or to factual uses of language. I argue that this attempt is commendable but that its execution is wanting. Instead of appealing to dictionaries or Internet queries, philosophers should employ computer-based linguistic corpora in order to confirm or falsify hypotheses about the factual use of language. This approach also has some advantages over methods employed by experimental philosophers. If the importance of ordinary language is stressed, the use of linguistic corpora is hardly avoidable. (shrink)

Is it fair for employers to select candidates partly based on how the employers think customers react to the candidates' appearances, that is, based on candidates' reaction qualifications? Both philosophically (in the literature on wrongful discrimination) and empirically, this question has recently been getting attention. Here, we focus on a theory of unfair disadvantages emphasizing (i) whether the possession of the appearance feature in question reflects choices on the part of the candidate and (ii) whether the appearance feature in question (...) reflects values or convictions of importance to the candidate. We scrutinize the theory by evaluating how well these factors map on to folk intuitions about wrongful discrimination using an experimental-philosophical approach and data from the United States. We do so on the presumption that coherence with folk intuitions is one desideratum for a philosophical theory and that attention should be given to potential discrepancies between philosophical theories and folk intuitions. Our central finding is that there is only general support for factor (i), not (ii), in the American population. Our study also adds to the extant empirical literature on reaction qualifications that tend to focus on the employer's side of the matter, not the candidate's as we do. (shrink)

According to act-consequentialism the right action is the one that produces the best results as judged from an impersonal perspective. Some claim that this requirement is unreasonably demanding and therefore consequentialism is unacceptable as a moral theory. The article breaks with dominant trends in discussing this so-called Overdemandingness Objection. Instead of focusing on theoretical responses, it empirically investigates whether there exists a widely shared intuition that consequentialist demands are unreasonable. This discussion takes the form of examining what people think about (...) the normative significance of consequentialist requirements. In two experiments, the article finds that although people are sensitive to consequentialist requirements and, on average, find more extreme demands less reasonable, the level of disagreement with consequentialism falls short of qualifying as a widely shared intuition, even when demands are the highest. The article then ends with a general discussion of possible objections to its methods and its findings. (shrink)

Some think that recent empirical research has shown that peoples' moral intuitions vary in a way that is hard to reconcile with the supposition that they are even modestly reliable. This is in turn supposed to generate skeptical conclusions regarding the claims and theories advanced by ethicists because of the crucial role intuitions have in the arguments offered in support of those claims. I begin by trying to articulate the most compelling version of this challenge. On that version, the main (...) problem is the absence of a believable positive account of the reliability of the intuitions . I then consider the response to this challenge that, in my view, holds most promise. It differs from others by invoking substantive moral assumptions. Such a strategy may appear problematically circular, in that the justification of those assumptions seems to presuppose the very thesis that is challenged . However, although I think that objection can be met, I argue that there are other problems with the strategy. On the basis of a set of conditions that a successful defense of the pertinent kind plausibly must satisfy, I argue that the prospects of developing such an account are bleak. (shrink)

We aim to develop a form of debunking argument according to which an agent’s belief is undermined if the reasons she gives in support of her belief are best explained as rationalizations. This approach is a more sophisticated form of what Shaun Nichols has called best-explanation debunking, which he contrasts with process debunking, i.e., debunking by means of showing that a belief has been generated by an epistemically defective process. In order to develop our approach, we identify an example of (...) such a best-explanation debunking argument in Joshua Greene’s attack on deontology. After showing that this argument is not an instance of process debunking, we offer our best-explanation approach as a generalization of Greene’s argument. Finally, we defend our approach by showing that it is not susceptible to some criticisms that Nichols has leveled against a less sophisticated form of best-explanation debunking. (shrink)

Examining folk intuitions about philosophical questions lies at the core of experimental philosophy. This requires both a good account of what intuitions are and methods allowing to assess them. We propose to combine philosophical and psychological conceptualisations of intuitions by focusing on three of their features: immediacy, lack of inferential relations, and stability. Once this account of intuition is at hand, we move on to propose a methodology that can test all three characteristics without eliminating any of them. In the (...) final part of the paper, we propose implementations of the new methodology as applied to the experimental investigation of the so-called overdemandingness objection to consequentialism. (shrink)

Radical realists criticise the role that moral intuitions play in moralist political philosophy. However, radical realists may also rely on certain epistemic intuitions when making use of their theories of ideology critique. Hence, one might wonder whether radical realists’ criticism of moralists’ intuition-dependence is hypocritical. Call this the intuition asymmetry objection. My aim in this article is to show that the intuition asymmetry objection fails. After examining the basis of objections by radical realists to the role of moral intuitions in (...) moralist political philosophy, I show that the presence of intuitions in radical realist theories of ideology critique is consistent with their criticism of moralism. (shrink)

Debunking arguments aim at defeating the justification of a belief by revealing the belief to have a dubious genealogy. One prominent example of such a debunking argument is Richard Joyce’s evolutionary debunking explanation of morality. Joyce’s argument targets only our belief in moral facts, while our belief in prudential facts is exempt from his evolutionary critique. In this paper, I suggest that our belief in prudential facts falls victim to evolutionary debunking, too. Just as our moral sense can be explained (...) in evolutionary terms, so presumably can our tendency to judge our actions in prudential terms. And if the evolutionary explanation of our moral sense has an undermining effect, then so does the evolutionary explanation of our belief in prudential facts. This also undermines moral fictionalism, the view that we have prudential reasons to maintain moral discourse as a fiction. I consider and refute four possible objections to the suggested debunking of our belief in prudential normativity. (shrink)

Debunking arguments use empirical evidence about our moral beliefs - in particular, about their causal origins, or about how they depend on various causes - in order to reach an epistemic conclusion about the trustworthiness of such beliefs. In this thesis, I investigate the scope and limits of debunking arguments, and their implications for what we should believe about morality. I argue that debunking arguments can in principle work - they are based on plausible epistemic premises, and at least some (...) of them avoid putative problems concerning regress and redundancy. However, I also argue that some debunking arguments fall short because they are insufficiently supported by the empirical evidence. By considering different objections, analyses, and a case study, I explore the conditions for a successful debunking argument. (shrink)

Cílem článku je prozkoumat otázku po epistemickém statusu morálních intuic. Empirické výzkumy na poli morální psychologie ukazují, že intuice hojně využíváme při morálním hodnocení. Spoléháme se na ně však i jako morální filosofové při testování našich teorií – má-li některá normativní teorie proti-intuitivní důsledky, chápeme to jako její vadu a vice versa. V článku se snažím zodpovědět otázku, zda je taková praxe odvolávání se na morální intuice jako na evidenci ospravedlnitelná – je morální intuice spolehlivým epistemickým kanálem? Nejprve se budu (...) opírat o příbuznou debatu zaměřenou na epistemické intuice, představím tzv. restrikcionistickou výzvu a vysvětlím, z jakého důvodu se zaměřuji na morální intuice. V následující sekci předložím dle mého názoru nejsilnější linii útoku na epistemickou spolehlivost morálních intuic – argument z intuitivní nestability. Dříve jsme nevycházeli z úžasu nad zprávami o masivních rozdílech mezi námi Zápaďany a obyvateli exotických krajin, kterými nás ze svých terénních výzkumů zásobovali etnografové a antropologové. Dnes to jsou především morální psychologové a experimentální filosofové, kteří nás udivují ještě více odhalováním značné variability v intuicích – tentokrát však nejen mezi civilizovanými a domorodými lidmi, nýbrž i v srdci naší vlastní kultury. V další části tak předložím jednoduchou typologii intuitivní nestability a představím v současnosti již značně rozsáhlý soubor dat, který dokumentuje právě tuto neblahou vlastnost morálních intuic. Na jejich základě pak ve finální sekci dospěji k závěru, že morální intuice nejsou schopné dostát epistemickým nárokům, které klademe na jiné informační zdroje (např. smyslové vnímání), a jako takové nemohou sehrávat svou domnělou evidenční roli. V úplném závěru předložím předběžné poznámky týkající se možnosti využívat morálních intuic spíše jako zdroje motivace a za tím účelem navrhnu obrátit filosofickou praxi testování normativních teorií naruby. (shrink)

Is it fair for employers to select candidates partly based on how the employers think customers react to the candidates' appearances, that is, based on candidates' reaction qualifications? Both philosophically (in the literature on wrongful discrimination) and empirically, this question has recently been getting attention. Here, we focus on a theory of unfair disadvantages emphasizing (i) whether the possession of the appearance feature in question reflects choices on the part of the candidate and (ii) whether the appearance feature in question (...) reflects values or convictions of importance to the candidate. We scrutinize the theory by evaluating how well these factors map on to folk intuitions about wrongful discrimination using an experimental-philosophical approach and data from the United States. We do so on the presumption that coherence with folk intuitions is one desideratum for a philosophical theory and that attention should be given to potential discrepancies between philosophical theories and folk intuitions. Our central finding is that there is only general support for factor (i), not (ii), in the American population. Our study also adds to the extant empirical literature on reaction qualifications that tend to focus on the employer's side of the matter, not the candidate's as we do. (shrink)

This dissertation is a discussion of the challenge that cases of over-determination pose to Act-Consequentialism. Although there are many realistic examples of such cases – for example, pollution, overfishing, or the election of an inappropriate politician – I consider structurally purer examples, one of which I call “Case One.” Suppose that you and I independently shoot and kill a third person called “Victim.” Our bullets arrive at the same time and each shot would have killed Victim by itself. Finally, Victim (...) would not have been killed, if neither of us had pulled the trigger. According to the Standard Version of Act-Consequentialism, an action is wrong if and only if it has an alternative whose consequences would be intrinsically better. Case One challenges the Standard Version because there does not seem to be such an alternative to my action: Victim would have died by your shot if I had not shot him, and similar remarks apply to your action. The dissertation is structured as follows. After Chapter One, which briefly introduces the main issues of the dissertation, I turn to Chapter Two – “Preliminaries” – where I outline the Standard Version and highlight the main characteristics of over-determination cases. These cases are divided into cases of redundant difference making and cases of redundant causation. Cases of redundant causation are subdivided further into cases of causal over-determination and pre-emption. I make an important stipulation in this chapter. I say that our actions in Case One and similar cases are “redundant negative difference makers.” In Chapter Three – “Replies” – I consider whether the proponent of Act-Consequentialism might question the intuition that you and I, respectively, act wrongly in Case One. The proponent might accept that we have this intuition but explain it away, or she might deny that we have the intuition and instead point to something else that is wrong in this kind of case. For example, she could suggest that although neither you nor I act wrongly individually, we act wrongly together. I argue that these replies are problematic. For instance, explaining away this intuition might also force us to explain away intuitions that support the Standard Version. In Chapter Four – “Causal Consequences” – I discuss an alternative version of Act-Consequentialism that might seem to fare better. The Standard Version interprets the term “outcome of an action” as referring to the entire possible world that would obtain, if the action were performed. The version I have in mind, the “Causal Consequences Version of Act-Consequentialism,” understands “outcome of an action” as instead referring to the causal consequences of the action. It seems clear that you and I, respectively, cause the state of affairs that Victim dies in Case One. However, I show that the Causal Consequences Version has a number of unattractive implications. In Chapter Five – “the Non-Standard Version” – I suggest another alternative version of Act-Consequentialism. This version – the Non-Standard Version – implies that you and I act wrongly in Case One. Roughly, the Non-Standard Version says that an action is wrong if and only if it has an alternative whose consequences would be intrinsically better, or is a redundant negative difference maker. The Non-Standard Version is similar to a principle suggested by Derek Parfit. However, I shall argue that the Non-Standard Version is preferable to Parfit’s principle. In Chapter Six – “Further Cases” – I discuss a number of cases that challenge the Non-Standard Version. For example, what would the Non-Standard Version imply in a case very similar to Case One but where I would have killed another person, if I had not shot Victim? I argue that the Non-Standard Version handles this and other problematic cases, and that it is therefore a plausible alternative to the Standard Version. (shrink)