Abstract
In From Rationality to Equality, James Sterba (From rationality to equality. New York: Oxford University Press, 2013) argues that the non-moral, and non-controversial, principle of logic, the principle that good arguments do not beg-the-question, provides a rationally conclusive response to egoism. He calls this “the principle of non-question-beggingness” and it is supposed to justify a conception of “Morality as Compromise.” Sterba’s basic idea is that principles of morality provide a non-question-begging compromise between self-interested reasons and other-regarding reasons. I will focus, first, on Sterba’s rejection of the alternative Kantian rationalist justification of morality, and second, I discuss the logical principle of non-question-beggingness and I argue that Sterba is wrong to assume that there is a formal, logical requirement that a rational egoist must provide a non-question-begging defense of egoism. I argue that, like the Kantian, Sterba needs a more substantial conception of practical reason to derive his conclusion. My third focus is the problem of reasonable pluralism and public reason (Rawls in Political liberalism. Columbia University Press, New York, 1996; The law of peoples with the idea of public reason revisited. Harvard University Press, Cambridge, 1999). The Rawlsian principle of public reason is analogous to Sterba’s principle of non-question-beggingness. Sterba recognizes that public policies should respect competing perspectives and that a public conception of justice must be justifiable to all reasonable people. The problem is that that reasonable people disagree about fundamental moral questions. Rawls calls this the fact of reasonable pluralism. I argue that an intercultural conception of justice is necessary to provide a response to reasonable pluralism and a shared basis for public reason.
Similar content being viewed by others
Notes
This paper was first drafted for a Symposium sponsored by the American Philosophical Association Committee on Public Philosophy: “Can Philosophy Provide a Foundation for Public Policy or Is It Question-Begging All the Way Down?” at the American Philosophical Association, Atlanta, December 2013.
On begging questions, also see Joshua Gert’s discussion of Sterba’s book in the following contribution to this book symposium in The Journal of Ethics.
Sterba focuses instead on Kant’s conception of freedom and rejection of compatibilist conceptions of freedom. Sterba’s argument here is interesting, but it does not address contemporary Kantians or Kant’s main point that the form of willing and necessary ends are required to capture the idea of duty and acting on principles. Whatever be the metaphysics of free rational action, according to Kant, the impulse of inclination alone cannot capture the concept of duty and ground moral responsibility. For a detailed reconstruction of Kant’s argument, see Korsgaard (1996, Chapter 2), and for Kant’s conception of freedom, see Korsgaard (1996, Chapter 6).
See Cummiskey (1996, Appendix) on Kantian Internalism.
I thank Paul Schofield for this suggestion.
For a substantial discussion of Sterba’s argument against libertarianism and for eco-socialism, see Richard Miller’s contribution to this book symposium in this issue of The Journal of Ethics.
References
Cummiskey, David. 1996. Kantian Consequentialism. New York: Oxford University Press.
Cummiskey, David. 2011. The law of peoples and the right to war: From Islamic Jihad to Buddhist Pacifism. In The morality and global justice reader, ed. Michael Boylan. Boulder: Westview Press.
Cummiskey, David. 2013. Comparative reflections on buddhist political thought: Asoka, Shambhala and the general will. In A companion to Buddhist philosophy, ed. Steven Emmanuel. Oxford: Wiley.
Darwall, Stephen. 2009. The second-person standpoint: Morality, respect, and accountability. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
Gauss, Gerald. 2011. The order of public reason: A theory of freedom and morality in a diverse and bounded world. Cambridge: Cambridge University of Press.
Hartley, Christie, and Lori Watson. 2009. Feminism, religion, and shared reasons: A defense of exclusive public reason. Law and Philosophy 28(5): 493–536.
Haidt, Jonathan. 2013. The righteous mind: Why good people are divided by politics and religion. New York: Vintage Books Random House.
Hume, David. 1983. Enquiry concerning the principles of morals, ed. by J. B. Schneewind. Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing.
Ihara, Craig. 1998. Why there are no rights in Buddhism: A response to Damien Keown. In Buddhism and Human Rights, ed. Keown et al. Surrey: Curzon Critical Studies in Buddhism, Psychology Press.
Ihara, Craig. 2004. Are Individual Rights Necessary? In Confucian Ethics: A Comparative Study of Self, Autonomy and Community, ed. Shun & Wong. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Korsgaard, Christine. 1996. Creating the kingdom of ends. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Nussbaum, Martha. 1999. Sex and social justice. New York: Oxford University Press.
Rawls, John. 1996. Political liberalism. New York: Columbia University Press.
Rawls, John. 1999. The law of peoples with the idea of public reason revisited. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
Rawls, John. 2001. The Idea of Public Reason Revisited. In Collected Papers, ed. Samuel Freeman. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. First published 1997 in The University of Chicago Law Review 64: 765–807.
Sen, Amartya. 2006. Identity and violence: The illusion of destiny. New York: W.W. Norton.
Sterba, James. 2001. Three challenges to ethics: Environmentalism, feminism, and multiculturalism. New York: Oxford University Press.
Sterba, James. 2013. From rationality to equality. New York: Oxford University Press.
The Dalai Lama. 1999. Ethics for the new millennium. New York: Riverhead Books.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Cummiskey, D. Reasonable Pluralism, Interculturalism, and Sterba on Question-Beggingness. J Ethics 18, 265–278 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10892-014-9177-y
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10892-014-9177-y