Grounds of Goodness

Journal of Philosophy 120 (7):368-391 (2023)
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Abstract

What explains why we are subjects for whom objects can have value, and what explains which objects have value for us? Axiologicians say that the value of humanity is the answer. I argue that our value, no matter what it is like, cannot perform this task. We are animals among others. An explanation of the value of objects for us must fit into an explanation of the value of objects for animals generally. Different objects have value for different animals. Those differences depend on differences in animal natures and, in particular, on the diverse characteristic capacities of different animals. Once we invoke animal natures, there is nothing for the value of animality, including the value of humanity, to explain.

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Jeremy David Fix
University of Oxford

Citations of this work

The Unity of the Moral Domain.Jeremy David Fix - forthcoming - European Journal of Philosophy.
The Morality in Intimacy.Jeremy David Fix - 2021 - In Uriah Kriegel (ed.), Oxford studies in philosophy of mind. Oxford, United Kingdom: Oxford University Press.

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References found in this work

Coming to terms with contingency : Humean constructivism about practical reason.Sharon Street - 2012 - In James Lenman & Yonatan Shemmer (eds.), Constructivism in Practical Philosophy. Oxford, GB: Oxford University Press.
Transcendental Philosophy As Capacities‐First Philosophy.Karl Schafer - 2021 - Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 103 (3):661-686.
Objective and unconditioned value.Rae Langton - 2007 - Philosophical Review 116 (2):157-185.
The Error Condition.Jeremy David Fix - 2020 - Canadian Journal of Philosophy 50 (1):34-48.
Beyond Price.J. David Velleman - 2008 - Ethics 118 (2):191-212.

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