Unexceptional Moral Knowledge

Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society (Hardback), 2011

Moral properties are widely held to be response-dependent properties of actions, situations, events and persons. There is controversy as to whether the putative response-dependence of these properties nullifies any truthclaims for moral judgements, or rather supports them. The present paper argues that moral judgements are more profitably compared with theoretical judgements in the natural sciences than with the judgements of immediate sense-perception. The notion of moral truth is dependent on the notion of moral knowledge, which in turn is best understood as a possible endpoint of theory change for the better.

Phenomenology and the Cognitive Sciences

In this paper, I defend the view that we can literally perceive the morally right and wrong, or something near enough. In defending this claim, I will try to meet three primary objectives: 1) to clarify how an investigation into moral phenomenology should proceed, 2) to respond to a number of misconceptions and objections that are most frequently raised against the very idea of moral perception, and 3) to provide a model for how some moral perception can be seen as literal perception. Because I take ‘moral perception’ to pick out a family of different experiences, I will limit myself (for the most part) to a discussion of the moral relevance of the emotions.

The Southern Journal of Philosophy, 1991

Science, thanks to its link with observation, retains some title to a correspondence theory of truth; but a coherence theory is evidently the lot of ethics. --W. V. Quine

«Studi di Estetica» 1/2017 , 27-44. DOI: 10.7413/18258646003

In this paper, I defend the epistemic role of moral emotions. After some introductory remarks, by making use of an attitudinal theory of emotions, I claim that emotions are to be conceived as intentional states directed towards evaluative properties in the world, and have therefore both correctness conditions and justification conditions. Then, I define and list moral emotions, and I defend the objective status of evaluative and moral properties. Such preliminary moves allow me to make my main point. Firstly, when discussing the standards to assess if moral emotions' formal object can be counted as an epistemic one, I propose a threefold intentionality theory of moral emotions, which allows me to equate their secondary formal objects to those of epistemic emotions. Secondly, when considering the roles moral emotions must play in order to be counted as epistemically relevant, I defend both the direct justificatory role and the indirect motivational role of moral emotions.

Croatian Journal of Philosophy, 2020

To begin to answer the question of whether every moral truth could be known by any one individual, this paper examines David Chalmers’ views on the scrutability of moral truths in Constructing the World. Chalmers deals with the question of the scrutability of moral truths ecumenically, claiming that moral truths are scrutable on all plausible metaethical views. I raise two objections to Chalmers’ approach. The fi rst objection is that he confl ates the claim that moral truths are scrutable from PQTI with the claim that moral truths are scrutable from nonmoral truths. The upshot of this objection is that Chalmers has not in fact shown the scrutability of moral truths from the scrutability base from which he proposed to do so, PQTI. The second objection concerns his handling of moral sensibility theory, which fails to take into account certain features of the emotions—features which generate what I term synchronic and diachronic emotional co-instantiation problems. The upshot of this ...

Oxford Studies in Metaethics, 2017

This paper concerns the epistemology of difficult moral cases where the difficulty is not traceable to ignorance about non-moral matters. The paper first argues for a principle concerning the epistemic status of moral beliefs about difficult moral cases. The basic idea behind the principle is that one’s belief about the moral status of a potential action in a difficult moral case is not justified unless one has some appreciation of what the relevant moral considerations are and how they bear on the moral status of the potential action. The paper then argues that this principle has important ramifications for moral epistemology and moral metaphysics. It puts pressure on some views of the justification of moral belief, such as ethical intuitionism and reliabilism. It puts pressure on some antirealist views of moral metaphysics, including simple versions of relativism. It also provides some direct positive support for broadly realist views of morality.

This is Chapter 9 from my 2007 monograph The Rediscovery of Common Sense Philosophy. It contains an illustration of the metaphilosophy of common sense at work, in this case in defense of moral realism.

Synthese, 2020

Do we perceptually experience moral properties like rightness and wrongness? For example, as in Gilbert Harman’s classic case, when we see a group of young hoodlums pour gasoline on a cat and ignite it, can we, in the same robust sense, see the action’s wrongness? (Harman 1977). Many philosophers have recently discussed this question, argued for a positive answer and/or discussed its epistemological implications. This paper presents a new case for a negative answer by, first, getting much clearer on how such experience could be possible at all, second, responding to the only argument for a positive answer, and, finally, arguing that postulation of such experience is explanatorily redundant.

Philosophia, 1994