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Artifactual normativity

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Abstract

A central tension shaping metaethical inquiry is that normativity appears to be subjective yet real, where it’s difficult to reconcile these aspects. On the one hand, normativity pertains to our actions and attitudes. On the other, normativity appears to be real in a way that precludes it from being a mere figment of those actions and attitudes. In this paper, I argue that normativity is indeed both subjective and real. I do so by way of treating it as a special sort of artifact, where artifacts are mind-dependent yet nevertheless can carve at the joints of reality. In particular, I argue that the properties of being a reason and being valuable for are grounded in attitudes yet are still absolutely structural.

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Notes

  1. Though, for a wrinkle, see Rosati (1996).

  2. Therefore, I depart from Michael Devitt’s conception of realism (1984), where he understands realism about x as holding that x exists and x is mind-independent. Certainly pain is real.

  3. I thank a reviewer for pointing out the example from Fine.

  4. I thank a reviewer for pressing me to say more on how grounded properties can be absolutely structural.

  5. I thank a reviewer for posing the question as to whether intentions cause but don’t ground artifactual properties. I get into these issues in more detail in my (manuscript a).

  6. An artifact is only successfully created when the agent’s intention imposes or utilizes the artifact-relevant features in the ‘right sort of way’. This condition rules out deviant causation, such as someone’s forming an intention to make a statue that thereby causes them to be distracted and accidentally knock a mold of a statue onto a lump of clay. I don’t have a great account of this ‘right sort of way’, but no one does. For discussion of non-deviant causation about intention in relation to action, see Davidson (1973, p. 79).

  7. For views in this vicinity, see Wilsch (2015), Martin Glazier (2016), Schaffer (2017), and Bennett (2013). However, against Bennett and with Schaffer, I assume that connections play a role in every case of metaphysical grounding. Yet, against Schaffer and with Bennett, I don’t require that these connections be fundamental.

  8. I thank a reviewer for raising this question and suggesting the example from Leslie below.

  9. As I discuss in more detail in (Frugé forthcoming b), I hold that the attitude of valuing is a distinctive mental state that orients the person toward the world such that things are presented in a prudentially valuable way (see Scanlon, 1998; Street, 2008). Personally valuing is an affective state that orients one toward the world such that there are good-for-me-seemings and bad-for-me-seemings. I take the attitude of taking something to be a reason to be a similarly distinctive mental state that orients one toward the world such that there are reason-for-me-seemings. Thus, I deny, for instance, that it is simply the same as the attitude of desire.

  10. I thank an anonymous reviewer for pushing me to say more about this.

  11. This goes against a variety of views as to what grounds the grounding facts. It rejects Bennett (2013) and deRossett’s (2013) view that what grounds the grounding facts just are the grounds. Moreover, it rejects Dasgupta (2014) and Rosen’s (2010) appeal to essences of the constituents of the grounded facts. Finally, it rejects the appeal to metaphysical laws of Wilsch (2015), Glazier (2016), and Schaffer (2017).

  12. I thank a reviewer for pressing me on this point. I hope in later work to develop a conception of how a broadly subjectivist view can still have constraints on which attitudes correspond to genuine normative facts.

  13. This quote is from an anonymous reviewer. I thank them for the objection.

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  1. Rutgers University, New Brunswick, USA

    Christopher Frugé

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For their help on distant drafts of this paper, I want to thank Sam Carter, Michael Glanzberg, Verónica Gómez Sanchez, Frances Kamm, Ezra Rubenstein, Larry Temkin, and the audience at Social Ontology 2020. For their help on both distant and recent drafts, I especially want to thank Karen Bennett, Jonathan Schaffer, and Ted Sider.

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Frugé, C. Artifactual normativity. Synthese 200, 126 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11229-022-03621-1

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