Ethics 122 (2):313-340 (2012)
Authors |
|
Abstract |
It is commonly suggested that evolutionary considerations generate an epistemological challenge for moral realism. At first approximation, the challenge for the moral realist is to explain our having many true moral beliefs, given that those beliefs are the products of evolutionary forces that would be indifferent to the moral truth. An important question surrounding this challenge is the extent to which it generalizes. In particular, it is of interest whether the Evolutionary Challenge for moral realism is equally a challenge for mathematical realism. It is widely thought not to be. In this paper, I argue that the Evolutionary Challenge for moral realism is equally a challenge for mathematical realism. Along the way, I substantially clarify the Evolutionary Challenge, discuss its relation to more familiar epistemological challenges, and broach the problem of moral disagreement. The paper should be of interest to ethicists because it places pressure on anyone who rejects moral realism on the basis of the Evolutionary Challenge to reject mathematical realism as well. And the paper should be of interest to philosophers of mathematics because it presents a new epistemological challenge for mathematical realism that bears, I argue, no simple relation to Paul Benacerraf's familiar challenge.
|
Keywords | ethics mathematics evolution benacerraf street joyce field reliability evolutionary debunking disagreement |
Categories | (categorize this paper) |
DOI | 10.1086/663231 |
Options |
![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() |
Download options
References found in this work BETA
No references found.
Citations of this work BETA
What is the Benacerraf Problem?Justin Clarke-Doane - 2017 - In Fabrice Pataut (ed.), New Perspectives on the Philosophy of Paul Benacerraf: Truth, Objects, Infinity. Springer Verlag.
The Moral Fixed Points: New Directions for Moral Nonnaturalism.Terence Cuneo & Russ Shafer-Landau - 2014 - Philosophical Studies 171 (3):399-443.
Does Evolutionary Psychology Show That Normativity Is Mind-Dependent?Selim Berker - 2014 - In Justin D'Arms & Daniel Jacobson (eds.), Moral Psychology and Human Agency: Philosophical Essays on the Science of Ethics. Oxford University Press. pp. 215-252.
Modal Security.Justin Clarke-Doane & Dan Baras - 2021 - Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 102 (1):162-183.
View all 84 citations / Add more citations
Similar books and articles
Could Evolution Explain Our Reliability About Logic?Joshua Schechter - 2013 - In Tamar Szabo Gendler & John Hawthorne (eds.), Oxford Studies in Epistemology 4. pp. 214.
Reassessing the Epistemological Challenge to Mathematical Platonism.William J. Melanson - 2011 - Croatian Journal of Philosophy 11 (3):295-304.
The Epistemological Challenge to Metanormative Realism: How Best to Understand It, and How to Cope with It.David Enoch - 2009 - Philosophical Studies 148 (3):413-438.
Evolution, Naturalism, and the Worthwhile: A Critique of Richard Joyce's Evolutionary Debunking of Morality.Christopher Toner - 2011 - Metaphilosophy 42 (4):520-546.
Philosophy of Mathematics: Prospects for the 1990s.Penelope Maddy - 1991 - Synthese 88 (2):155 - 164.
Crossing the Milvian Bridge: When Do Evolutionary Explanations of Belief Debunk Belief?Paul E. Griffiths & John S. Wilkins - 2015 - In Phillip R. Sloan, Gerald McKenny & Kathleen Eggleson (eds.), Darwin in the Twenty-First Century: Nature, Humanity, and God. University of Notre Dame Press. pp. 201-231.
Reconstruction in Moral Philosophy?Matthew Braddock & Alexander Rosenberg - 2012 - Analyse & Kritik 34 (1):63-80.
Analytics
Added to PP index
2011-06-06
Total views
528 ( #16,608 of 2,506,517 )
Recent downloads (6 months)
11 ( #68,237 of 2,506,517 )
2011-06-06
Total views
528 ( #16,608 of 2,506,517 )
Recent downloads (6 months)
11 ( #68,237 of 2,506,517 )
How can I increase my downloads?
Downloads