Who's On First?
Oxford Studies in Metaethics 15 (forthcoming)
Abstract
“X-Firsters” hold that there is some normative feature that is fundamental to
all others (and, often, that there’s some normative feature that is the “mark of
the normative”: all other normative properties have it, and are normative in
virtue of having it). This view is taken as a starting point in the debate about
which X is “on first.” Little has been said about whether or why we should be
X-Firsters, or what we should think about normativity if we aren’t X-Firsters.
Hence the chapter’s two main goals. First, to provide a simple argument that
one shouldn’t be an X-Firster about the normative domain, which starts with
the observation that analogous views have dubious merits in analogous domains.
Second, to offer an alternative view—taking normativity to be a
determinable explained in terms of its determinates—that offers an interesting
way to think about the structure and unity of normativity.
Categories
(categorize this paper)
PhilPapers/Archive ID
WODWOF
Upload history
Archival date: 2020-04-22
View other versions
View other versions
Added to PP index
2020-04-22
Total views
133 ( #33,769 of 57,013 )
Recent downloads (6 months)
30 ( #25,526 of 57,013 )
2020-04-22
Total views
133 ( #33,769 of 57,013 )
Recent downloads (6 months)
30 ( #25,526 of 57,013 )
How can I increase my downloads?
Downloads since first upload
This graph includes both downloads from PhilArchive and clicks on external links on PhilPapers.