Part I Describing and Prescribing He to whom thou was sent for ease, being by name Legality, is the son of the Bond-woman . . . how canst thou expect by ...

For roughly the first half of this century, philosophers in the Anglo-American tradition who worked in metaethics tended to focus much of their energies on the analysis of moral language. However, like so much else, this way of doing things started to unravel in the 1960s. These days, moral philosophers are concerned to address much broader, more substantive issues having to do with how actual moral behavior, as well as normative theorizing about such behavior, can be fitted into our best (...) overall account of the way the world is and of the place of human beings within that world. Timmons’ book is not only a fine example of such theorizing but also serves, for the uninintiated, as a highly sophisticated introduction to what contemporary metaethics is all about. (shrink)

R. M. Hare; I—The Presidential Address*: Principles, Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, Volume 73, Issue 1, 1 June 1973, Pages 1–18, https://doi.org/10.10.

In this book Timmons defends a metaethical view that exploits certain contextualist themes in philosophy of language and epistemology. He advances what he calls assertoric non-descriptivism, a view that employs semantic contextualism in giving an account of moral discourse. This view, which like traditional non-descriptivist views stresses the practical, action-guiding function of moral thought and discourse, also allows that moral sentences, as typically used, make genuine assertions. Timmons then defends a contextualist moral epistemology thus completing his overall program of contextualism (...) in ethics. (shrink)

Reflecting on the right to equality, it is necessary to take into account the nature of the era in which we, the people, are located in the historical process. It is a transition. How deep and fundamental is the transition? Today, a growing number of scientists and thinkers are inclined to compare this transition, for example, with the transition from Antiquity to the Middle Ages or the Middle Ages to the Renaissance and modern times. Humanity today expects a similar transformation, (...) seeking out new life, a new type of world-attitude, relationships between people who are able to provide continuity in the development of such as these transitions. Today, try to express this idea, for example, the concept of sustainable development, in which ascent should prevail over the descent to ensure the continuity of development. (shrink)

Reflecting on the right to equality, it is necessary to take into account the nature of the era in which we, the people, are located in the historical process. It is a transition. How deep and fundamental is the transition? Today, a growing number of scientists and thinkers are inclined to compare this transition, for example, with the transition from Antiquity to the Middle Ages or the Middle Ages to the Renaissance and modern times. Humanity today expects a similar transformation, (...) seeking out new life, a new type of world-attitude, relationships between people who are able to provide continuity in the development of such as these transitions. Today, try to express this idea, for example, the concept of sustainable development, in which ascent should prevail over the descent to ensure the continuity of development. (shrink)