Derek Parfit has recently circulated an argument against what he calls Non-Analytical Naturalism, which he understands as the thesis that normative truths are reducible to natural truths. He begins by stipulating that he will use ‘normative’ as an abbreviation for ‘irreducibly normative’: When some normative […] Read More
Many philosophers draw a distinction between moral and non-moral reasons for action, or motives, such that questions like, “Are moral reasons always overriding?” and “Can I have reason to do what I morally ought not do?” make sense. Not all philosophers draw this distinction: Aristotle […] Read More
I’m curious what people think of the following principle: (RIP): Suppose that some person x has intrinsic feature F; suppose that x has a moral right to have F. Suppose that some other person y can bring it about that y has F without violating […] Read More
Timed with the current national release of Michael Moore’s Sicko, I have a (fairly) honest question: why do political libertarians reject the idea of state-financed universal health care? Now I know why they say they do: it would interfere with our individual liberty to do […] Read More
A shameless plug/invitation: I’ve created a new blog on the teaching of philosophy, In Socrates’ Wake. Please come visit, offer comments, etc. I’d also be interested if anyone would like to join up as a contributor. Thanks!
I was reading Dancy’s nonnaturalism entry to Copp’s Oxford Handbook of Ethical Theory. Dancy discusses two arguments against naturalism which Parfit has presented in some of his unpublished writings. The first one is called the triviality objection against analytic versions of naturalism. Initially, I did […] Read More
Below the fold are a few things going on around the net. If you have any other announcements that folks at PEA Soup might be interested in, please feel free to add them in the comments section.
One venerable objection against the principle that all motivation derives from desire points to the motive of duty, or practical necessity, as phenomenological evidence of its falsity. Supposedly, the experience of doing something because you have to (or, per Kant, the experience of being able […] Read More
Like many other philosophers, I reject consequentialism in favour of a more deontological approach to ethics. That is, I favour a moral theory that implies that in certain cases, one ought to refrain from harming people in certain ways – even if, from an impartial […] Read More