Plural and conflicting values are often held to be conceptually problematic, threatening the very possibility of ethics, or at least rational ethics. Rejecting this view, Stocker first demonstrates why it is so important to understand the issues raised by plural and conflicting values, focusing on Aristotle's treatment of them. He then shows that plurality and conflict are commonplace and generally unproblematic features of our everyday choice and action, and that they do allow for a sound and rational ethics.

A dirty hands case is justified, obligatory or permissible, and morally wrong. It is argued that dirty hands are conceptually unproblematic and that they are instances of ordinary evaluative phenomena. Some ordinary cases of moral conflict are like dirty hands in that they are entirely justified, yet regrettable. The analysis shows that such cases involve double counting––the disvalue is counted once and overridden in the act‐guiding evaluation, and counted again later as the object of the moral emotions and as being (...) a disvalue. In addition, dirty hands are cases in which what is morally required is also immoral, and therefore regrettable. Shows that ethical theories can and should account for the existence of moral choices involving acts that are justified, even obligatory, yet nevertheless wrong, shameful, and regrettable. (shrink)

Takes up particular issues of conflict and plurality in Aristotle's ethics and moral psychology. Argues that Aristotle explicitly allows for dirty hands as well as conflicts of values and of desires. This involves discussing issues in Aristotle's treatment of voluntariness, mixed acts, eudaimonia, and pleasure. It is argued that for Aristotle, being a good person does not mean that choices among values can be executed lightly, nor does it ensure that the good never experience lack of eudaimonia, since even they (...) have to deal with dirty hands and conflict of values. (shrink)

Looks at akrasia, monism, and pluralism. Many deem akrasia conceptually incoherent. Others, notably David Wiggins, argue that coherence is secured in so far as incommensurable values are present. Against these views, it is argued that coherent akrasia is possible, and that it requires the distinction between the cognitive and the affective, and not between comparable and commensurable values. Akrasia extends to monistic theories––a monistic theory, e.g. hedonism, is compatible with akrasia. Akratic conflict does not require plurality. An account of reasons, (...) which goes beyond value finality and value maximization, emerges. (shrink)

According to Aristotle's Doctrine of the Mean, virtue and a good life involve a mean of feeling and action. This chapter focuses on David Pear's claim that the Doctrine is conceptually incoherent. It argues that there are serious difficulties in understanding what it could be for courage and its feelings to be in a mean. Courage involves plural and incommensurable values, victory and danger, and the respective emotions, confidence and fear––it is difficult to see how these can be resolved into (...) a mean. It is argued that this problem can be solved by seeing how incommensurable value and emotions can fuse into complex wholes of disparate and incommensurable values and emotions, and can thus be assessed as lying or not lying in a mean. (shrink)

Philosophers commonly argue that conflicts of values are deeply problematic for ethical theories in so far as they force the theories into impracticality, incompleteness, or irrealism. To be complete, a theory must tell us in every case what must be done. To be practical, it must never tell us to do what is impossible. As conflict seems to involve just these features, some philosophers argue from the fact that avoiding conflict is impossible to the conclusion that ethical theories must either (...) be silent in some cases or that it requires us to do both of the jointly impossible acts. Others seek to explain the conflict away as merely apparent. Against these views, it is argued that mere incompossibility does not make for a conflict. All choice involves incompossibility, but not all choice involves conflict. Conflict must be understood in terms of what is conflicting. Understanding this requires seeing that many act evaluations are not action‐guiding. (shrink)

Considers a cognate issue, which is whether what is immoral can nevertheless be admirable. It is argued that admirable immorality, like dirty hands, does not pose special problems for ethical theories. At the heart of admirable immorality lies a conflict of moral virtues, which is unavoidable and necessitates conflict. Looks at two case studies, the painter Paul Gauguin and Winston Churchill.

Examines the proposal that value conflict generally requires plural values, and finds that it is correct, but only about a kind of rational conflict, which is rational conflict restricted to practicable options. The focus is on kinds of conflict and whether monism is apt to handle them. The discussion lays out the intricacies of conflict, and its relation to time, agency, and differential care. It is concluded that only pluralism can allow for the lack and loss involved in rational conflict (...) over practicable options. (shrink)

Examines arguments that maximization holds for conceptual reasons. Looks at maximizing theory and raises conceptual problems for evaluative maximization––difficulties in ranking mixes, problems with organic wholes, and mathematical versus internal evaluative judgments. As regards the evaluative decisions maximization is concerned with, it is argued that we are guided in our understanding of what is good by what is better. To the extent that the better is prior to the good, maximizations are parasitic on other evaluations. Concludes with a look at (...) the discussion of false pleasures in Plato's Philebus. (shrink)

Addresses the central claim of maximization that we must do what is best. It is argued that maximization is neither morally nor rationally required. Maximization cannot adequately deal with the ethical concepts of superogation, self‐regard, amusement, and friendship; furthermore, the central claims of moral and rational choice do not involve maximization. Moral and rational appraisal of a choice of action requires evaluating its contribution to a whole, where the whole need not be the best available, only good enough.

Engages with the thesis that plurality is an obstacle to choice. Tackles the worry that incommensurable values make sound comparisons and judgments impossible. It is argued that plural and incommensurable features are ubiquitous to moral life as well as ordinary practical deliberation. Despite this predicament, we are nevertheless able to make sound judgements and to bring together disparate and incommensurable values in complex wholes.

Stocker intends this book to redress the common failures of contemporary moral philosophers to see the importance of emotions for their field. His aim is not merely to point out deficiencies in current thinking about emotions and their place in ethics, however. It is also to show how emotions are important for ethics. The book is divided into ten chapters, four of which are written in collaboration with Elizabeth Hegeman, an anthropologist and psychoanalyst. The first seven present criticisms of (...) current thinking and argue for some general theses about the way emotions are related to values. The last three examine specific emotions, notably, compassion, pity, pride, shame, and anger. They serve to substantiate the general theses about the way emotions are related to values that the first seven chapters promote. In this review I will concentrate on the material in these first seven chapters. Though some of it is jointly authored, I will for convenience' sake mostly refer just to Stocker as the author. (shrink)

This 1996 book is the result of a uniquely productive union of philosophy, psychoanalysis and anthropology, and explores the complexity and importance of emotions. Michael Stocker places emotions at the very centre of human identity, life and value. He lays bare how our culture's idealisation of rationality pervades the philosophical tradition and leads those who wrestle with serious ethical and philosophical problems into distortion and misunderstanding. Professor Stocker shows how important are the social and emotional contexts of (...) ethical dilemmas and inner conflicts, and he challenges philosophical theories that try to overgeneralise and over-simplify by leaving out the particulars of each situation. In offering a realistic account of emotions and an in-depth analysis of how psychological factors affect judgments of all kind, this book will interest a broad range of readers across the disciplines of philosophy and psychology. (shrink)

We reply to Scheffler's "Doing and Allowing.".

RECENT STUDIES IN NORMATIVE ETHICS have concentrated on act evaluations, neglecting, almost ignoring, agent evaluations. A partial explanation of this defect is found in two related ones: the neglect of act evaluations other than the obligation notions, and the failure to do justice even to them. In each case, neglecting the "other" concepts is implicated in serious misunderstandings of what is considered—or more accurately, what is over-considered. Take, for example, the view that it is obligatory to obtain for oneself the (...) greatest good one can, e.g., pleasure. Even a cursory study of prudence and other primarily self-regarding notions could have saved Moore, Ross, Ewing, and many others from holding or committing themselves to this silly view. (shrink)

This comprehensive Handbook presents the major perspectives within philosophy and literary studies on the relations, overlaps and tensions between philosophy and literature. Drawing on recent work in philosophy and literature, literary theory, philosophical aesthetics, literature as philosophy and philosophy as literature, its twenty-nine chapters plus substantial Introduction and Afterword examine the ways in which philosophy and literature depend on each other and interact, while also contrasting with each other in that they necessarily exclude or incorporate each other. This book establishes (...) an enduring framework for structuring the broad themes defining the relations between philosophy and literature and organising the main topics in the field. Key Features • Structured in five parts addressing philosophy as literature, philosophy of literature, philosophical aesthetics, literary criticism and theory, and main areas of work within philosophy and literature • An Introduction setting out the main concerns of the field through discussion of the major themes along with the individual topics • An Afterword looking at the interactions between philosophy and literature through itself enacting philosophical and literary writing while examining the question of how they can be brought together The Palgrave Handbook of Philosophy and Literature is an essential resource for scholars, researchers and advanced students in philosophy of literature, philosophy as literature, literary theory, literature as philosophy, and the philosophical aesthetics of literature. It is an ideal volume for researchers, advanced students and scholars in philosophy, literary studies, philosophy and literature, cultural studies, classical studies and other related fields. (shrink)

What I have just said strikes me as not only paradoxical but true. In what follows I shall try to show that it is not all that paradoxical and that it is true. In order to show this, and in order to discuss some important and neglected features of act and duty individuation, I shall contrast the concepts of perfect duty and imperfect duty.

Does a woman's being repeatedly battered by her husband excuse her killing him while he was asleep? This and similar questions are often dealt with by asking a more general question, “Should we accept abuse excuses? ” These questions engender a lot of heat, but little light, in the media and other public forums, and even in the writings of many theorists. They have been discussed as if there is a typical abuse excuse we can examine in order to examine (...) abuse excuses in general. Similarly, the question of whether we should accept abuse excuses has often been discussed as if it is simple and straightforward. But there is no one typical abuse excuse, and the question of whether to accept such excuses is neither simple nor straightforward. There are many different abuse excuses, many different circumstances in which they are deployed, and many different sorts of concerns motivating their use. In this, abuse excuses are just like other, well-accepted excuses, such as self-defense. (shrink)