In a very nicely constructed recent paper (“Are ethical judgments intrinsically motivational? Lessons from ‘acquired sociopathy’”, Philosophical Psychology 16 (2003),) Adina Roskies offers a compelling argument against the position she dubs “motive internalism” (others have called it “belief internalism” or “judgment internalism”). Motive internalism states: […] Read More
A Conference at Bowling Green State University April 7-9, 2006
Satisficing consequentialism (SC) is the view that an act is morally right iff its consequences are “good enough.” Michael Slote came up with a few well-known examples in support of SC. One involves a fairy-tale hero who, when rewarded by the gods with whatever he […] Read More
The program for the Utilitarianism 2005 conference (Aug. 11-14 at Dartmouth) has now been posted. Participants include Peter Singer, Shelly Kagan, Frank Jackson, David Brink, Gerald Postema, Lori Gruen, Fred Feldman, Garrett Cullity, Alastair Norcross, Kryster Bykvist, Michael Zimmerman, and many others, including several PEA […] Read More
I hereby shamlessly plug a new journal with which I am associated, Studies in the History of Ethics. Studies is a new web-based, peer reviewed journal dedicated to publishing high quality articles and reviews in the history of ethics. We’ve just published our first batch […] Read More
Consequentialism, many philosophers have claimed, asks too much of us to be a plausible ethical theory. Indeed, consequentialism’s severe demandingness is often claimed to be its chief flaw. I will try to show that consequentialism’s demandingness cannot be the theory’s downfall. I do not here […] Read More
Sometimes moral philosophers engage in genuine debate. Sometimes, however, it turns out the apparent debate is merely verbal; the philosophers do not disagree about the fundamental normative facts. When this happens, let us say that the apparently conflicting normative theories are normatively equivalent. It seems […] Read More
The program for the Second Annual Metaethics Workshop, Sept. 16-18, has been announced. It’s below the fold. Congratulations to frequent PEA Soup commentor Robert Johnson for getting on the program!
Actualist Utilitarianism (AU) is, roughly stated, the view that we ought to act so as to maximise the sum total of actual people’s utilities. (By utility is here meant a numerical representation of a person’s level of wellbeing, or welfare.) It is distinguished from regular […] Read More