It seems intuitive that human development and environmental protection should go hand in hand. But some have worried there is no framework within environmental ethics that suitably conjoins them. I...

Journal of Social Philosophy, Volume 53, Issue 1, Page 59-75, Spring 2022.

Characterizations of the Anthropocene often indicate both the challenges that our new epoch poses for human well-being and a sense of loss that comes from a compromised environment. In this paper I explore a deeper problem underpinning both issues, namely, that decoupling humanity from the world with which we are familiar compromises human flourishing. The environmental conditions characteristic of the Anthropocene do so, I claim, by compromising flourishing on two fronts. First, the comparatively novel conditions of the Anthropocene risk rupturing (...) our narratives, putting at risk our sense of self and connections to familiar environments. Second, by undermining the connections between our environmental background and the sense of well-being conditioned by that background our ability to exercise options that constitute a recognizable good life are compromised. This paper argues that to the extent humanity is decoupled from their environments humans are not only less able to access opportunities our understanding of who we are, our identities, and our capacity to make sense of the world around us through those identities is compromised. I conclude that the Anthropocene does more than challenge our ability to utilize resources, it challenges our understanding of who we are in the world. (shrink)

T. M. Scanlon has alleged that the social practice of promising fails to capture the sense in which when I break my promise I have wronged the promisee in particular. I suggest the practice of promising requires the promisee to have a normatively significant status, a status with interpersonal authority with respect to the promisor, and so be at risk of a particular harm made possible by the social practice of promising. This formulation of the social practice account avoids Scanlon’s (...) concern without collapsing into what Elinor Mason has recently referred to as deflationism about promising. (shrink)

Anthropogenic climate change poses a direct and imminent threat to the stability of modern society. Recent reports of the probable consequences of climate change paint a grim picture; they describe a world environmentally much less stable than the world to which we have become accustomed. As we begin to adapt to our changing climate, we will need to identify new sources for the stability necessary for a flourishing society. I suggest that this stability should come from the ideals of the (...) good life we seek to promote when we focus on capabilities, on the substantial freedoms humans need to flourish. These ideals serve as a stable foundation for well-being in a time of great environmental and social instability; they should serve as guides for our policies, practices and institutions. I conclude by appealing to capabilities as a means of integrating well-being into our adaptation strategies, and show how doing so may well provide a way of formulating a powerful moral justification for adaptation strategies appropriate for both the developed and the developing world. (shrink)

Sustainable Development Goals, which serve as the primary feature of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, and Nationally Determined Contributions, which serve as a vital instrumental of the UNFCCC’s Paris Agreement, have clear synergies. Both are focused, in part, on responding to challenges presented to human well-being. There are good practical reasons to integrate development efforts with a comprehensive response to climate change. However, at least in their current form, these two policy instruments are ill-suited to this task. Where SDGs (...) are focused on supporting considerations of human flourishing to which policy needs to respond, NDCs, in their current form, are dependent on the determinations of the nations that generate them. I conclude that the best means of integrating these two policy initiatives require moving past the subjective foundations of NDCs. (shrink)

In recent decades, changes in climate have caused impacts on natural and human systems on all continents and across the oceans. Impacts are due to observed climate change, irrespective of its cause...

NIMBY claims have certainly been vilified. But, as Feldman and Turner point out, one cannot condemn all NIMBY claims without condemning all appeals to partiality. This suggests that any moral problem with NIMBY claims stems not from their status as NIMBY claims but from an underlying illegitimate appeal to partiality. I suggest that if we are to distinguish illegitimate from legitimate appeals to partiality we should look to what might morally justify the sort of agent-relative reasons that can be expressed (...) as a part of public morality. However, if this serves to distinguish legitimate from illegitimate appeals to partiality, the scope for justifiable NIMBY claims is significantly reduced. NIMBY claims require special justification, just as do appeals to the appropriate form of agent-relative reasons. NIMBY appeals to the value of a particular place may very well be morally acceptable, but not merely in virtue of being significant to someone. (shrink)

In December 2014, 196 Parties convened in Lima for the 20th session of the Conference of the Parties. The meeting in Lima was, in many respects, a turning point in the history of climate n...

For a view which grounds norms in the practices of a particular group, determining who is in that group will determine the scope of those norms. Such a view requires an account of what it is to be a member of the group subject to that practice. In this article, the author presents the beginnings of such an account, limiting his inquiry to discursive practices; we might characterize such practices as those which require, as a condition of participation, participants both (...) to exchange reasons with one another and to recognize that practice as a common source of reasons. The author argues that membership in such groups is constituted by the conjunction of shared discursive practices, common recognition of the authority of that practice, and commitments between members. In the case of discursive practices, these features of membership are inseparable. Key Words: practice • commitment • membership • discursive stance. (shrink)

While Quine clearly states his position regarding the difference between the methodology of ethics and that of science, he is less clear on the nature of ethical language. Variously, he treats ethical sentences as cognitive and noncognitive. If ethical “sentences” are noncognitive, they do not admit of truth or falsity and therefore have no claim to be occasion sentences or observation sentences. And moral theory is thereby clearly demarcated from science. If ethical sentences are cognitive, however, we could have ethical (...) occasion sentences. It would be easier, on this interpretation, to make sense of Quine's insistence that ethics is subject to a coherency theory of truth, and that we may have real derivative and ultimate moral conflicts. I argue that, as Quine's system now stands, there are good reasons to take either interpretation. I do not demonstrate that one of these two positions is incorrect, but rather that Quine has yet to clearly state his position on the matter. I then consider some of the ramifications of taking a cognitivist interpretation of Quine's system by sketching a role empathy, newly emphasized in Quine's work, might play with respect to the cognitive status of ethical sentences. If we accept that ethical sentences are cognitive, empathy may allow us to learn moral occasion sentences from our fellow language users and justify or modify those moral occasion sentences through the use of social evidence. (shrink)

When Aldo Leopold claimed that “a thing is right when it tends to preserve the integrity, stability, and beauty of the biotic community,” he made a conceptual connection between descriptive features of the biotic community and a normative judgment. In conjoining descriptive and normative elements within a single concept Leopold seemed to have been invoking what are now referred to as thick evaluative concepts. Two interpretations of thick concepts that have received increasing attention in environmental ethics are considered here. On (...) one interpretation, the “particularist interpretation,” thick concepts are used to point to the way in which particular features of our environment move us to act. On the other, the “generalist interpretation,” thick concepts are used to invoke a default evaluative standing inseparable from a descriptively characterized kind. Although these interpretations are complementary, without the general interpretation we cannot make ethical sense of the particular instance that moves us to act. Even if particular instantiations of thick concepts have a central and crucial place in environmental ethics, they are only normatively significant within a framework shaped by comparatively thin concepts. Thus, appeals to particularity and locality must be tempered by a broader evaluative context, and the costs of failing to do so are not merely theoretical. As we address global problems through locally motivated action, we need an environmental ethic that makes sense of local values in broad global terms. (shrink)

In response to what has been called the discursive dilemma, Christian List has argued that the nature of the public agenda facing deliberative bodies indicates the appropriate form of decision procedure or deliberative process. In this paper I consider the particular case of environmental policy where we are faced with pressures not only from deliberators and stakeholders, but also in response to dynamic changes in the environment itself. As a consequence of this dilemma I argue that insofar as the focus (...) of a policy forming body is on the formation of viable environmental policy, rather than on a set of pre-existent ideological commitments, deliberative agents should be responsive as a unified body to the pressures of precedent, the best available science, and their own best individual judgments. In the case of environmental policy the dilemma pressures deliberative bodies to display what Ronald Dworkin has called integrity even in cases where this requires those deliberative bodies to sacrifice being maximally responsive to the preferences of individual deliberators. (shrink)

Ethics, Policy & Environment, Volume 14, Issue 3, Page 291-295, October 2011.

It is both a moral tragedy and a travesty of social justice that responses to present unacceptable levels of Greenhouse Gases often involve constraining development, and that the burden of t...

Members of some social groups hold other members to have special obligations in virtue of their membership. But is this justified? And if so, how? I argue that there is a deep connection between the structure of certain social groups and some special obligations. The issue, then, is to determine how one might have obligations in virtue of one's membership in a particular group. In this dissertation I argue that groups capable of collective action have, as elements of their structure, (...) interpersonal relations that generate commitments and these commitments, in turn, constitute special obligations. ;I begin by arguing that groups capable of collective action must be able to coordinate or monitor the coordination of the members, and to do so within certain normative constraints. To coordinate members according to these constraints, groups must implement some form of decision procedure, a scheme by which the intentions and actions of individual members of a group are coordinated toward some collective purpose or goal. This coordination requires that in groups capable of collective action, there must be some authority system by which the members are coordinated. This authority system must be able to authorize the implementation of norms through members' practices, endorsements, or sanctions, and to adjudicate conflicts that might arise between constraints. I argue that these authority systems may be largely tacit. ;Members of groups capable of collective action do not, however, acquire obligations because of their commitments to the group per se. Rather, members of such groups acquire obligations because of the nature of the relationships they cannot help but form with one another. Their obligations form because of the commitments they have to one another in virtue of being a part of a group capable of collective action. While these obligations may not constitute all-things-considered normative requirements, they do constitute normative considerations that members of groups need to acknowledge when they determine what they ought or ought not to do. I conclude that insofar as a group is capable of collective action, members of those groups have at least these limited obligations toward one another. (shrink)

Directed reasons are reasons that rely for their normative significance on the authority one individual has with respect to another. Acts such as promising seem to generate such reasons. These reasons seem paradigmatically agent relative: they do not hold for all agents. This paper provides a defense of the claim that theform of agent relativism seemingly required by directed reasons is innocuous, and poses no general problem for a practice dependent account of directed reasons, and, therefore, for consequentialism. While the (...) position I present does not constitute a complete teleological account of value, it points toward a way of integrating directed reasons into a practice-based account of value. The position presented also remains consistent with the so called Compelling Idea that often motivates consequentialism: it is always permissible for an agent to do what will lead to the outcome that is best. (shrink)

Ethics, Policy & Environment, Volume 14, Issue 2, Page 247-250, June 2011.

At the beginning of his Metaphysics, Aristotle attributed several strange-sounding theses to Plato. Generations of Plato scholars have assumed that these could not be found in the dialogues. In heated arguments, they have debated the significance of these claims, some arguing that they constituted an 'unwritten teaching' and others maintaining that Aristotle was mistaken in attributing them to Plato. In a prior book-length study on Plato's late ontology, Kenneth M. Sayre demonstrated that, despite differences in terminology, these claims correspond (...) to themes developed by Plato in the Parmenides and the Philebus. In this book, he shows how this correspondence can be extended to key, but previously obscure, passages in the Statesman. He also examines the interpretative consequences for other sections of that dialogue, particularly those concerned with the practice of dialectical inquiry. (shrink)

It is widely agreed among broadly Anselmian theists that God is in some sense the 'delimiter of possibilities.' In other words, the scope of possibility is explained by the manner in which the universe emanates from God. However, existing accounts of God's role here—in terms of freedom, choice, or power—face serious difficulties. The present paper provides a new account of God's role as the delimiter of possibilities in terms of the different manner in which the non-actuality of non-actual states of (...) affairs is explained. Intuitively and metaphorically, we can think of the menu of states of affairs being 'whittled down' in successive stages of a process of divine decision-making, with the different species of impossibility corresponding to when and how the states of affairs are ruled out. I argue that this approach provides genuine contingency while also preserving the Principle of Sufficient Reason. (shrink)

Physicians generally recommend that patients resuscitated with naloxone after opioid overdose stay in the emergency department for a period of observation in order to prevent harm from delayed sequelae of opioid toxicity. Patients frequently refuse this period of observation despiteenefit to risk. Healthcare providers are thus confronted with the challenge of how best to protect the patient’s interests while also respecting autonomy, including assessing whether the patient is making an autonomous choice to refuse care. Previous studies have shown that physicians (...) have widely divergent approaches to navigating these conflicts. This paper reviews what is known about the effects of opioid use disorder on decision-making, and argues that some subset of these refusals are non-autonomous choices, even when patients appear to have decision making capacity. This conclusion has several implications for how physicians assess and respond to patients refusing medical recommendations after naloxone resuscitation. (shrink)

00 In this innovative analysis, Plato's four eleatic dialogues are treated as a continuous argument. In Kenneth Dorter's view, Plato reconsiders the theory of forms propounded in his earlier dialogues and through an examination of the theory's limitations reaffirms and proves it essential. Contradicted are both those philosophers who argue that Plato espoused his theory of forms uncritically and those who argue that Plato in some sense rejected the theory and moved toward the categorical analysis developed byAristotle. Dorter's reexamination (...) of Plato's insights implies an important new direction for modern philosophical inquiry. In this innovative analysis, Plato's four eleatic dialogues are treated as a continuous argument. In Kenneth Dorter's view, Plato reconsiders the theory of forms propounded in his earlier dialogues and through an examination of the theory's limitations reaffirms and proves it essential. Contradicted are both those philosophers who argue that Plato espoused his theory of forms uncritically and those who argue that Plato in some sense rejected the theory and moved toward the categorical analysis developed byAristotle. Dorter's reexamination of Plato's insights implies an important new direction for modern philosophical inquiry. (shrink)

This chapter develops and defends an account of reason: to reason is to scrutinize one’s attitudes by consulting the perspectives of other persons. The principal attraction of this account is its ability to vindicate the unique of authority of reason. The chapter argues that this conception entails that reasoning is a robustly social endeavor—that it is, in the first instance, something we do with other people. It is further argued that such social endeavors presuppose mutual respect on the part of (...) those participating in them. The account therefore yields a form of Kantian constructivism: we have an unconditional duty of respect for persons because such a duty is implicit in the very nature of reasoning. -/- . (shrink)

This Open Access book provides both a broad perspective and a focused examination of cow care as a subject of widespread ethical concern in India, and increasingly in other parts of the world. In the face of what has persisted as a highly charged political issue over cow protection in India, intellectual space must be made to bring the wealth of Indian traditional ethical discourse to bear on the realities of current human-animal relationships, particularly those of humans with cows. Dharma, (...) yoga, and bhakti paradigms serve as starting points for bringing Hindu--particularly Vaishnava Hindu--animal ethics into conversation with contemporary Western animal ethics. The author argues that a culture of bhakti--the inclusive, empathetic practice of spirituality centered in Krishna as the beloved cowherd of Vraja--can complement recently developed ethics-of-care thinking to create a solid basis for sustaining all kinds of cow care communities. (shrink)

ABSTRACT:In 2010,Business Ethics Quarterlypublished ten articles that considered the potential contributions to business ethics research arising from recent scholarship in a variety of philosophical and social scientific fields (strategic management, political philosophy, restorative justice, international business, legal studies, ethical theory, ethical leadership studies, organization theory, marketing, and corporate governance and finance). Here we offer short responses to those articles by members ofBusiness Ethics Quarterly’s editorial board and editorial team.

There is widespread consensus that present patterns of consumption could lead to the permanent impossibility of maintaining those patterns and, perhaps, the existence of the human race. While many patterns of consumption qualify as ‘sustainable’ there is one in particular that deserves greater attention: virtual consumption. We argue that virtual consumption — the experience of authentic consumptive experiences replicated by alternative means — has the potential to reduce the deleterious consequences of real consumption by redirecting some consumptive behavior from shifting (...) material states to shifting information states. (shrink)

Argues that the explanation of man's social and cultural differences is best defined by history, not human biology, maintaining that humans shape their social lives by their historical activities.

People coordinate body postures and gaze patterns during conversation. We review literature showing that (1) action embodies cognition, (2) postural coordination emerges spontaneously when two people converse, (3) gaze patterns influence postural coordination, (4) gaze coordination is a function of common ground knowledge and visual information that conversants believe they share, and (5) gaze coordination is causally related to mutual understanding. We then consider how coordination, generally, can be understood as temporarily coupled neuromuscular components that function as a collective unit (...) known as a coordinative structure in the motor control literature. We speculate that the coordination of gaze and body sway found in conversation may be understood as a cross‐person coordinative structure that embodies the goals of the joint action system. (shrink)

In some areas of cognitive science we are confronted with ultrafast cognition, exquisite context sensitivity, and scale-free variation in measured cognitive activities. To move forward, we suggest a need to embrace this complexity, equipping cognitive science with tools and concepts used in the study of complex dynamical systems. The science of movement coordination has benefited already from this change, successfully circumventing analogous paradoxes by treating human activities as phenomena of self-organization. Therein, action and cognition are seen to be emergent in (...) ultrafast symmetry breaking across the brain and body; exquisitely constituted of the otherwise trivial details of history, context, and environment; and exhibiting the characteristic scale-free signature of self-organization. (shrink)

For all contract theorists, including Kant, political legitimacy is based upon the consent of the governed. The differences amongst them begin to emerge when we inquire into the motivations and considerations which lead up to the agreement. For Kant, consent to the social contract is not based upon considerations of rational self-interest or prudence, nor upon a natural right to self-preservation and the guarantee of absolute property rights, but upon a moral obligation to institutionalize and make peremptory in a social (...) contract property rights that in the state of nature have only a provisional character. Whether this approach ultimately makes the idea of a voluntary agreement superfluous is a question I will address below. First I would like to consider the unique status Kant assigns to property rights in his theory of the social contract. This status has for the most part not been observed in the secondary literature, and Kant has even been accused of falling behind the achievements of Locke and Rousseau by grounding property rights on an element of brute force. However, since Kant himself espoused a labor theory of property rights in his earlier writings, it is important to consider carefully the basis for its subsequent rejection in the Rechtslehre. Further, since Kant’s theory of property rights constitutes an alternative to Locke, it may be possible to find within the contract tradition an alternative to the view of property rights found in some of its contemporary versions. (shrink)

In the Introduction to the Treatise concerning the Principles of Human Knowledge, Berkeley attacks the “received opinion that language has no other end but the communicating our ideas, and that every significant name stands for an idea” (PHK, Intro §19). How far does Berkeley go in rejecting this ‘received opinion’? Does he offer a general theory of language to replace it? If so, what is the nature of this theory? In this chapter, I consider three main interpretations of Berkeley's view: (...) the modified ideational theory, the speaker intentions theory, and the use theory. I argue that the use theory does, and its competitors do not, make sense of Berkeley's remarks on language in both the earlier and later works. (shrink)

About this book Mr. Burke contributes an introductory and summarizing remark, "What is involved, when we say what people are doing and why they are doing it?

As critic, Kenneth Burke's preoccupations were at the beginning purely esthetic and literary; but afterCounter-Statement(1931), he began to discriminate a ...

This paper examines Pierre Hadot’s philosophy as a way of life in the context of race. I argue that a “way of life” approach to philosophy renders intelligible how anti-racist confrontation of racist ideas and institutionalized white complicity is a properly philosophical way of life requiring regulated reflection on habits – particularly, habits of whiteness. I first rehearse some of Hadot’s analysis of the “way of life” orientation in philosophy, in which philosophical wisdom is understood as cultivated by actions which (...) result in the creation of wise habits. I analyze a phenomenological claim about the nature of habit implied by the “way of life” approach, namely, that habits can be both the cause and the effect of action. This point is central to the “way of life” philosophy, I claim, in that it makes possible the intelligent redirection of habits, in which wise habits are more the effect than simply the cause of action. Lastly, I illustrate the “way of life” approach in the context of anti-racism by turning to Linda Martín Alcoff’s whiteness anti-eliminativism, which outlines a morally defensible transformation of the habits of whiteness. I argue that anti-racism provides an intelligible context for modern day forms of what Hadot calls “spiritual exercises” insofar as the “way of life” philosophy is embodied in the practice of whites seeing themselves seeing as white and seeing themselves being seen as white. (shrink)