Online research in philosophy

More than a century ago, G. E. Moore famously offered an extended inference to reject what are in effect two substantially different types of ethical naturalism. Although some naturalistic doctrines targeted by that inference make semantic claims that, if true, would entail certain metaphysical claims, it is also possible that those semantic doctrines could be false and the metaphysical ones true at the same time. For if semantic naturalism is true, then moral terms and sentences are reducible, by an analysis of what they mean, into some purely descriptive terms and sentences. But, if metaphysical naturalism is true, then the moral properties and propositions expressed by moral terms and sentences are reducible to purely natural properties and propositions. By conflating claims about meaning with claims about reference, Moore‟s original inference proved vulnerable to a number of well known objections. But we believe there is a revised Moorean inference that can succeed, and we offer that argument here. Its scope is restricted to semantic reductivist forms of ethical naturalism: those that rest on theses claiming the reducibility of expressions in the moral vocabulary to expressions in a non-moral one. A not uncommon philosophical view in Moore‟s day, such theses remain live options in metaethics (as we‟ll presently show). Although our inference is run for some putative equivalences between moral and purely descriptive terms, it could easily be adapted against ethical naturalist theses 1 involving moral concepts and thoughts as well as sentences. Like Moore, we take the successful inference to consist in an open question argument („OQA’) followed by the naturalistic-fallacy charge („NFC‟). But, unlike Moore, we identify semantic naturalism as the only naturalistic doctrine vulnerable to the inference, and we offer adequate support for the inference‟s premises. Naturalism in ethics is thus undermined, though not refuted in all its forms: semantical naturalism comes out false, but metaphysical naturalism might still be true..

In recent metaethics there has been a great deal of discussion regarding moral realism. Moral realism in the tradition of ethical naturalism has been revitalized in the form of a synthetic ethical naturalism. This brand of moral realism has interesting theoretical implications for individualistic and holistic models of environmental ethics. In this paper I argue that most theorists of environmental ethics presuppose an irrealist metaethic out of fear of violating Hume's law and Moore's naturalistic fallacy (e.g., Callicott, Taylor, Elliot, and Sterba, while Rolston is a notable exception). But if we take moral realism (in the form of synthetic ethical naturalism) seriously, then environmental ethics has more options than the conventional metaethical maxims of Hume's law and Moore's naturalistic fallacy would allow. Accordingly, I lay out various prospects for a realist environmental metaethic. Environ-moral realism is an attempt to ground nonanthropocentrism in a realist metaethic.

J. L. Mackie argued that if there were objective moral properties or facts, then the supervenience relation linking the nonmoral to the moral would be metaphysically queer. Moral realists reply that objective supervenience relations are ubiquitous according to contemporary versions of metaphysical naturalism and, hence, that there is nothing especially queer about moral supervenience. In this paper we revive Mackie's challenge to moral realism. We argue: (i) that objective supervenience relations of any kind, moral or otherwise, should be explainable rather than sui generis; (ii) that this explanatory burden can be successfully met vis-à-vis the supervenience of the mental upon the physical, and in other related cases; and (iii) that the burden cannot be met for (putative) objective moral supervenience relations.

I argue that Mencius puts forth a defensible form of ethical naturalism, according to which moral properties, moral motivation, and moral deliberation can be accounted for within the parameters of a naturalistic worldview. On this position, moral properties are the subjectively real properties which acts have in virtue of their corresponding to our most coherent set of shared desires. I give a naturalistic definition of 'right' which, I argue, is implicit in Mencius' philosophy. I address the objection that some of the contemporary-sounding views which I attribute to Mencius are positions which are alien to the ancient thinker, and I argue that the version of Mencius given here is not only quite faithful to Mencius but also a true metaethical theory.

Machine generated contents note: Introduction; 1. Naturalism in moral philosophy Gilbert Harman; 2. Normativity and reasons: five arguments from Parfit against normative naturalism David Copp; 3. Naturalism: feel the width Roger Crisp; 4. On ethical naturalism and the philosophy of language Frank Jackson; 5. Metaethical pluralism: how both moral naturalism and moral skepticism may be permissible positions Richard Joyce; 6. Moral naturalism and categorical reasons Terence Cuneo; 7. Does analytical moral naturalism rest on a mistake? Susana Nuccetelli and Gary Seay; 8. Supervenience and the nature of normativity Michael Ridge; 9. Can normativity be naturalized? Robert Audi; 10. Ethical non-naturalism and experimental philosophy Robert Shaver; 11. Externalism, motivation, and moral knowledge Sergio Tenenbaum; 12. Naturalism, absolutism, relativism Michael Smith.

This paper argues that Nonreductive ethical naturalism is a viable approach to normative ethical theory. Central to Nonreductive ethical naturalism is the identification of moral properties with natural ones. Natural properties are objective and pertain to facts. It follows that moral properties are factual in nature. In the proposed theory pain and harm are the natural properties that are also moral in nature. Pain and harm are not identical. Pain is the chief indicator of harm. The concept of harm entails injury. Injury to an individual is both a factual and moral issue. The well-being of individuals constitutes the foundation of morality. Consequently, that which runs counter to an individual's well-being is what we mean by evil. It follows that injury is evil and its intentional infliction upon other people is morally evil. The factual nature of ethical properties provides the basis for universal agreement on which forms of behavior are evil. As such, acceptance of this theory would go a long way in resolving many of the global problems that confront us all at the onset of the 2 1 s t century.

My goal in this paper is to explain what ethical naturalism is, to locate the pivotal issue between naturalists and non-naturalists, and to motivate taking naturalism seriously. I do not aim to establish the truth of naturalism nor to answer the various familiar objections to it. But I do aim to motivate naturalism sufficiently that the attempt to deal with the objections will seem worthwhile. I propose that naturalism is best understood as the view that the moral properties are natural in the sense that they are empirical. I pursue certain issues in the understanding of the empirical. The crux of the matter is whether any synthetic proposition about the instantiation of a moral property is strongly a priori in that it does not admit of empirical evidence against it. I propose an argument from epistemic defeaters that, I believe, undermines the plausibility of a priorism in ethics and supports the plausibility of naturalism.

What are the conditions on a successful naturalistic account of moral properties? In this paper I discuss one such condition: the possibility of moral concepts playing a role in good empirical theories on a par with those of the natural and social sciences. I argue that Peter Railton’s influential account of moral rightness fails to meet this condition, and thus is only viable in the hands of a naturalist who doesn’t insist on it. This conclusion generalises to all versions of naturalism that give a significant role to a dispositional characterisation of moral properties. I also argue, however, that the epistemological and semantic motivations behind naturalism are consistent with a version of naturalism that doesn’t insist on the explanatory condition. The conclusion is that those naturalists who are attracted to accounts of moral properties such as Railton’s would do better not to insist on this\break condition.

Take naturalism to be the idea that there is no such person as God or anything like God. Many philosophers hold that naturalism can accommodate serious moral realism. Many philosophers (and many of the same philosophers) also believe that moral properties supervene on non-moral properties, and even on naturalistic properties (where a naturalistic property is one such that its exemplification is compatible with naturalism). I agree that they do thus supervene, and argue that this makes trouble for anyone hoping to argue that naturalism can accommodate morality.

This paper concerns the relation between two metaethical theses: moral naturalism and moral skepticism. It is important that we distinguish both from a couple of methodological principles with which they might be confused. Let us give the label “Cartesian skepticism” to the method of subjecting to doubt everything for which it is possible to do so—usually by introducing alternative hypotheses that are consistent with all available evidence (e.g., brains in vats). Let us give the label “global naturalism” to the principle that requires of any item which we admit into our ontology that it “fits” (in some manner or cluster of manners to be specified) with our naturalistic scientific worldview. One might be both a Cartesian skeptic and a global naturalist, if the latter principle is something that has survived the former test procedure. Alternatively, one might have adopted global naturalism for some other reason, while having little patience for the Cartesian method of doubt. Moral naturalism is the metaethical view that moral entities (e.g., properties like goodness and evil) fit within the scientific image of the world. The moral naturalist will probably be a global naturalist, but need not be: It is consistent with allowing non-natural entities into one’s ontology that one happens to think that moral properties are of the natural variety. Moral skepticism denies that moral entities fit within our scientific worldview. One way of denying moral naturalism is to be a moral error theorist: to hold that our moral discourse attempts to make reference to moral properties, but these properties do not exist.1 Another way of denying moral naturalism is to be a noncognitivist: to hold that our moral discourse was never really in the business of referring to moral facts or properties in the first place, and ipso facto such facts or properties are not naturalistic. In this paper, the label “moral skepticism” denotes the disjunction of these two theses. Neither the error theorist nor the noncognitivist must be committed to global naturalism, but usually will be; indeed, this commitment will often be a motivating factor of their metaethical views..