Jeremy Koons
Georgetown University, SFS-Qatar, Faculty Member
- Philosophy, Ethics, Philosophy of Mind, Epistemology, Meta-Ethics, Philosophy Of Religion, and 12 moreWilfrid Sellars and post-Sellarsian philosophy, Metaphysics, Analytic Philosophy, Divine Command Theory, Wittgenstein, Problem of Evil, Free Will and Moral Responsibility, Theodicy, Alvin Plantinga, Wittgenstein's On Certainty, Anti-Theodicy, and Moral Philosophyedit
Wilfrid Sellars’s ethical theory was rich and deeply innovative. On Sellars’s view, moral judgments express a special kind of shared intention. Thus, we should see Sellars as an early advocate of an expressivism of plans and intentions,... more
Wilfrid Sellars’s ethical theory was rich and deeply innovative. On Sellars’s view, moral judgments express a special kind of shared intention. Thus, we should see Sellars as an early advocate of an expressivism of plans and intentions, and an early theorist of collective intentionality. He supplemented this theory with a sophisticated logic of intentions, a robust theory of the categorical validity of normative expressions, a subtle way of reconciling the cognitive and motivating aspects of moral judgment, and much more—all within a strict nominalism that preserves Sellars’s commitment to naturalism. The Ethics of Wilfrid Sellars offers the first systematic treatment of this sadly-neglected aspect of Sellars’s work, and demonstrates that his ethical theory—just like his more widely-discussed epistemology—has much to contribute to current debates.
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We daily classify actions by their morality and their voluntariness, and beliefs by their rationality. But in light of persistent skepticism about morality, free will, and (to a lesser extent) epistemology, we must ask what justifies us... more
We daily classify actions by their morality and their voluntariness, and beliefs by their rationality. But in light of persistent skepticism about morality, free will, and (to a lesser extent) epistemology, we must ask what justifies us in making these various claims. This book defends a sophisticated version of pragmatism, resting on a novel account of strategy-based (as opposed to act-based) cooperative rationality. It shows that we can give a genuinely pragmatist account of morality and epistemology, while denying that truth is mere usefulness and maintaining the connection between truth and objectivity. The sophisticated pragmatist approach is shown to be particularly fruitful in that we can justify a range of important practices, including our practices of moral and epistemic evaluation, as well as our practice of making judgments regarding free will and moral responsibility.
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Wilfrid Sellars (b. 1912–d. 1989) did some of the most interesting and challenging work in Western philosophy in the 20th century. At a time when most philosophers were moving toward increasingly narrow specialization in their... more
Wilfrid Sellars (b. 1912–d. 1989) did some of the most interesting and challenging work in Western philosophy in the 20th century. At a time when most philosophers were moving toward increasingly narrow specialization in their scholarship, he produced a large corpus that was both systematic and extensive in scope. Sellars is also a difficult philosopher to read, however. “I revise my papers until only I can understand them,” he is rumored to have said, “and then I revise them once more.” His prose is both idiosyncratic and ambitious, striking out in novel directions while striving to address the concerns of the past on every page. This article strives to address his most significant contributions to epistemology, metaphysics, philosophy of language, philosophy of mind, and ethics. Most of the details of his work in the history of philosophy, particularly his work on Kant, are passed over. Wherever possible, original dates and sources of publication are included to give the reader a ...
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Picturing is a poorly understood element of Sellars's philosophical project. We diagnose the problem with picturing as follows: on the one hand, it seems that it must be connected with action in order for it to do its job. On the... more
Picturing is a poorly understood element of Sellars's philosophical project. We diagnose the problem with picturing as follows: on the one hand, it seems that it must be connected with action in order for it to do its job. On the other hand, the representational states of a picturing system are characterized in descriptive and seemingly static terms. How can static terms be connected with action? To solve this problem, we adopt a concept from recent work in Sellarsian metaethics: the idea of a material practical inference, which (we argue) features centrally in how we picture. The key distinction is that the picturing of nonhuman animals involves only Humean material practical inference, in which representational states are corrected only by feedback from the environment and not from discursive interactions. The resulting view shows that Sellars's contributions to practical philosophy (especially theory of action and metaethics) cannot be separated from his contributions to philosophy of mind, language, and cognitive science. Further, the view makes it clear that picturing is neither a version of the Given, nor is it a fifth wheel to inferential role in explaining representation, but is essential to Sellars's model of how animalsincluding humans-represent their environment.
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Picturing is a poorly understood element of Sellars's philosophical project. We diagnose the problem with picturing as follows: on the one hand, it seems that it must be connected with action in order for it to do its job. On the other... more
Picturing is a poorly understood element of Sellars's philosophical project. We diagnose the problem with picturing as follows: on the one hand, it seems that it must be connected with action in order for it to do its job. On the other hand, the representational states of a picturing system are characterized in descriptive and seemingly static terms. How can static terms be connected with action? To solve this problem, we adopt a concept from recent work in Sellarsian metaethics: the idea of a material practical inference, which (we argue) features centrally in how we picture. The key distinction is that the picturing of nonhuman animals involves only Humean material practical inference, in which representational states are corrected only by feedback from the environment and not from discursive interactions. The resulting view shows that Sellars's contributions to practical philosophy (especially theory of action and metaethics) cannot be separated from his contributions to philosophy of mind, language, and cognitive science. Further, the view makes it clear that picturing is neither a version of the Given, nor is it a fifth wheel to inferential role in explaining representation, but is essential to Sellars's model of how animals including humans-represent their environment.
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The divine purpose theory (DPT)—according to which that human life is meaningful to the extent that it fulfills some purpose or plan to which God has directed us—encounters well-known Euthyphro problems. Some theists attempt to avoid... more
The divine purpose theory (DPT)—according to which that human life is meaningful to the extent that it fulfills some purpose or plan to which God has directed us—encounters well-known Euthyphro problems. Some theists attempt to avoid these problems by appealing to God’s essential goodness, à la the modified divine command theory (DCT) of Adams and Alston. However, recent criticisms of the modified DCT show its conception of God’s goodness to be incoherent; and these criticisms can be shown to present an analogous set of problems for the DPT. Further, the argument can be extended to any account of meaningfulness according to which the value of what humans do can only be conferred by God. Thus, it would seem that there is no tenable version of the view that meaningfulness is conferred on human life by some act or attitude of God’s.
No contemporary compatibilist account of free will can be complete unless it engages with the consequence argument. I will argue that Wilfrid Sellars offered an ingenious version of compatibilism that can be used to refute the consequence... more
No contemporary compatibilist account of free will can be complete unless it engages with the consequence argument. I will argue that Wilfrid Sellars offered an ingenious version of compatibilism that can be used to refute the consequence argument. Unfortunately, owing to the opacity of Sellars’s writings on free will, his solution has been neglected. I will reconstruct his view here, demonstrating how it represents a powerful challenge to the consequence argument and tying it to some recent developments in the compatibilist literature.
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I turn in Chapter 9 to address a second concern about rules, specifically, Wittgensteinian concerns that we cannot understand intelligent behavior in terms of following rules. The argument of this chapter attempts to establish two... more
I turn in Chapter 9 to address a second concern about rules, specifically, Wittgensteinian concerns that we cannot understand intelligent behavior in terms of following rules. The argument of this chapter attempts to establish two points. First, Sellars’s account of pattern-governed behavior (behavior that is not rule-following, but which must be understood in relation to rules) responds to Wittgensteinian worries, while preserving an essential role for rules, a role to be explored at length in this chapter. Second, I demonstrate that the social practices at the bottom of Sellars’s account, and the rules that govern them, must be understood in terms of collective attitudes—both we-intentions and collective beliefs—and that therefore individual rational agency strongly presupposes collective attitudes. This latter point is particularly important, because it allows us to build toward the ultimate Sellarsian goal of proving the reality—and indeed, the necessity—of the community of rational beings, which will bring us (in Chapter 13) to the final goal of establishing the categorical reasonableness of the formal end of morality.
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While social epistemology is a diverse field, much of it still understands knowledge as an individual status—albeit an individual status that crucially depends on various social factors (such as testimony). Further, the literature on... more
While social epistemology is a diverse field, much of it still understands knowledge as an individual status—albeit an individual status that crucially depends on various social factors (such as testimony). Further, the literature on group knowledge until now has primarily focused on limited, specialized groups that may be said to know this or that as a group. I wish to argue, to the contrary, that all knowledge-attributions ascribe a collective status; and that this follows more or less directly from an essential function of entitlement-ascriptions: Ascriptions of knowledge and entitlement serve a primarily social function in that they facilitate coordination by maintaining consensus around true beliefs, true theories, and truth-producing methodologies. This conclusion will shed light on ways in which traditional theories of knowledge (such as foundationalism and coherentism) fail to capture a central function of our epistemic practice.
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Sellars exploits a distinction between I-intentions and we-intentions in his ethical theory. While one might think that this is merely a distinction between the singular and the plural, I will argue that the distinction between these two... more
Sellars exploits a distinction between I-intentions and we-intentions in his ethical theory. While one might think that this is merely a distinction between the singular and the plural, I will argue that the distinction between these two types of intention goes much deeper than mere logical form. Rather, these two types of intention involve two different types of reasoning—individual reasoning and cooperative reasoning—and the latter cannot be reduced to the former. Elaborating these two types of intention in terms of these two types of reasoning provides us with an excellent tool for further developing a truly Sellarsian ethics. Next, after briefly elaborating the notion of the logic of intentions in terms of material inference, I will conclude with some comments on the categorical force of moral imperatives.
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Acknowledgements Introduction PART I: PRAGMATISM AND NORMATIVITY Pragmatism, Causal Explanation, and Normative Facts Pragmatism and Rationality Pragmatism, Relativism, and Normative Discourse PART II: PRAGMATISM AND MORALITY Interests and... more
Acknowledgements Introduction PART I: PRAGMATISM AND NORMATIVITY Pragmatism, Causal Explanation, and Normative Facts Pragmatism and Rationality Pragmatism, Relativism, and Normative Discourse PART II: PRAGMATISM AND MORALITY Interests and Morality Pragmatism, Freedom, and Responsibility PART III: PRAGMATISM AND EPISTEMOLOGY Pragmatism and Epistemology Pragmatism, Internalism, and Externalism Bibliography Index
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The free will theodicy (a standard theistic response to the problem of evil) places significant value on free will: free will is of such substantial value, that God’s gift of free will to humans was justified, even though this gift... more
The free will theodicy (a standard theistic response to the problem of evil) places significant value on free will: free will is of such substantial value, that God’s gift of free will to humans was justified, even though this gift foreseeably (and regularly) results in the most monstrous of evils. I will argue that when a state criminalizes sin (by punishing producers of sinful materials such as illicit drugs, or punishing consumers), it can restrict or eliminate citizens’ exercise of metaphysical free will with respect to choosing to partake in or refrain from these activities. Given the value placed on free will in the free will theodicy, theists who endorse this theodicy should thus oppose the criminalization of what I will call Millian sins—that is, actions which are immoral, but which do not directly harm another person. In other words, such theists should oppose legal moralism.
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Many contextualist accounts in epistemology appeal to ordinary language and everyday practice as grounds for positing a low-standards knowledge (knowledgeL) that contrasts with high-standards prevalent in epistemology (knowledgeH). We... more
Many contextualist accounts in epistemology appeal to ordinary language and everyday practice as grounds for positing a low-standards knowledge (knowledgeL) that contrasts with high-standards prevalent in epistemology (knowledgeH). We compare these arguments to arguments from the height of “ordinary language” philosophy in the mid 20th century and find that all such arguments face great difficulties. We find a powerful argument for the legitimacy and necessity of knowledgeL (but not of knowledgeH). These appeals to practice leave us with reasons to accept knowledgeL in the face of radical doubts raised by skeptics. We conclude by arguing that by relegating knowledgeH to isolated contexts, the contextualist fails to deal with the skeptical challenge head-on. KnowledgeH and knowledgeL represent competing, incompatible intuitions about knowledge, and we must choose between them. A fallibilist conception of knowledge, formed with proper attention to radical doubts, can address the skept...
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Recent defenders of the divine command theory like Adams and Alston have confronted the Euthyphro dilemma by arguing that although God’s commands make right actions right, God is morally perfect and hence would never issue unjust or... more
Recent defenders of the divine command theory like Adams and Alston have confronted the Euthyphro dilemma by arguing that although God’s commands make right actions right, God is morally perfect and hence would never issue unjust or immoral commandments. On their view, God’s nature is the standard of moral goodness, and God’s commands are the source of all obligation. I argue that this view of divine goodness fails because it strips God’s nature of any features that would make His goodness intelligible. An adequate solution to the Euthyphro dilemma may require that God be constrained by a standard of goodness that is external to Himself – itself a problematic proposal for many theists.
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Recent critics of Sellars’s argument against the Given attack Sellars’s (purported) conclusion that sensations cannot play a role in the justification of observation beliefs. I maintain that Sellars can concede that sensations play a role... more
Recent critics of Sellars’s argument against the Given attack Sellars’s (purported) conclusion that sensations cannot play a role in the justification of observation beliefs. I maintain that Sellars can concede that sensations play a role in justifying observation reports without being forced to concede that they have the foundational status of an epistemic Given. However, Sellars’s own arguments that observation reports rest, in some sense, on other empirical beliefs are not sufficiently well-developed; nor are his comments concerning internalism, which is crucial to his attack on the Given. As a result, both of these aspects of Sellars’s epistemology have been attacked, and their significance has gone unrecognized by many philosophers. In this paper, I will try to fill in some of the missing pieces, so that we can see that not only are Sellars’s theses concerning internalism and epistemic priority correct, but they represent a devastating attack on the Given, even if Sellars concedes that sensation can play a role in justifying observation beliefs. In short, we will see that these recent arguments in support of the Given have not succeeded in reviving it. The Given remains a myth.
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The conclusion of Chapter 3 is that morality is justified directly by instrumental rationality, and that it is rational to be moral. Questions of whether it is rational to be moral have often been cast in terms of the relation between... more
The conclusion of Chapter 3 is that morality is justified directly by instrumental rationality, and that it is rational to be moral. Questions of whether it is rational to be moral have often been cast in terms of the relation between morality and prudence, where ‘prudence’ is taken to be synonymous with ‘self-interest’. But we have many interests, and not all of them are self-directed. Some of our interests are other-directed (i.e., altruistic). Thus, if rationality consists of promoting our interests, then a strategy to promote all of our interests—self-directed and otherdirected—will be rational. As noted in Chapter 2, we can continue to say that morality is prudentially rational, as long as we always keep firmly in mind that we are not using ‘prudential’ in an egoistic sense, but instead to refer to the satisfaction of all of our interests—both self- and otherregarding; indeed I will use the word ‘prudential’ in this way throughout this chapter. And, of course, when we speak of morality as being rational, we must keep in mind the notion of strategic cooperative rationality defended in Chapter 3. Pragmatism is not rational egoism.
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Many discussions of rationality start with the assumption that all rationality must be conceived of as individual: individual agents are acting on intentions with contents that might at most be parallel (in Sellars’ terminology), but... more
Many discussions of rationality start with the assumption that all rationality must be conceived of as individual: individual agents are acting on intentions with contents that might at most be parallel (in Sellars’ terminology), but cannot be shared. Drawing on the work of Gilbert, Sugden, Tuomela, and others, I argue in Chapter 7 that there is a notion of cooperative rationality, which is not reducible to individual rationality; and that the moral point of view can only be justified from the standpoint of cooperative rationality—not individual rationality. Further, Sellars’s account of we-intentions goes hand-in-hand with an account of cooperative rationality to present a cohesive picture of the moral point of view. I conclude by discussing what rationality requires when individual and team rationality conflict, and make some brief comments on relativism and supererogation.
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Sellars’s account of moral judgment is broadly expressivist; and such accounts face well-known problems such as the embedding problem. Sellars develops a very sophisticated logic of intentions, which foreshadows similar attempts by... more
Sellars’s account of moral judgment is broadly expressivist; and such accounts face well-known problems such as the embedding problem. Sellars develops a very sophisticated logic of intentions, which foreshadows similar attempts by authors like Mark Schroeder by half a century. In Chapter 5, I explain the key features of Sellars’s logic of intentions, and demonstrate how it provides us the tools to solve not only classical problems for expressivism (such as the embedding problem and the problem of negation), but also contemporary challenges to expressivist accounts (such as Schroeder’s challenge that such accounts cannot handle tense and modal operators). I argue that while the basic insights of Sellars’s account are sound, various modifications and extensions are required to his account so that we can have a fully satisfying intentional logic, one that is able to reconstruct all of the required deontic notions and relations.
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Sellars does too little to explain what, precisely, a we-intention is. In Chapter 4, I draw on recent accounts (like those of Gilbert and Tuomela) to enrich the Sellarsian account of we-intentions. The resulting account rejects... more
Sellars does too little to explain what, precisely, a we-intention is. In Chapter 4, I draw on recent accounts (like those of Gilbert and Tuomela) to enrich the Sellarsian account of we-intentions. The resulting account rejects singularism—it denies that group intentions are reducible to personal intentions—but argues that this move is consistent Sellars’s strict naturalism. Various elements of these more recent accounts are adapted to comport with various other features of Sellars’s project, such as his pragmatism and his view that an individual can express a we-intention not shared by the larger group. I conclude with some remarks on how Sellars’s account, while lending itself easily to a social practice account of rules and norms, offers a defense against relativism.
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On the assumption that most philosophers interested in ethics are not conversant with Sellars’s larger philosophical project, Chapter 1 (“Sellars’s Synoptic Vision”) gives a very brief overview of some of his chief aims and methods.... more
On the assumption that most philosophers interested in ethics are not conversant with Sellars’s larger philosophical project, Chapter 1 (“Sellars’s Synoptic Vision”) gives a very brief overview of some of his chief aims and methods. Sellars’s chief philosophical goal is to reconcile the framework of normativity (and of persons more generally) with a hard-nosed scientific realism. His method for doing this is to understand distinctly philosophical expressions—moral, epistemic, intentional, modal, semantic, and so on—not as attempting to describe the world, but rather as non-descriptive expressions in the metalanguage.
Sellars presents practical reasoning as based on nomologicals of the form, “Doing Ai if Cj is causally necessary to the realization of Ek” (SM 7.VIII.§51/p. 195). This, however, misrepresents practical reasoning, as there is often more... more
Sellars presents practical reasoning as based on nomologicals of the form, “Doing Ai if Cj is causally necessary to the realization of Ek” (SM 7.VIII.§51/p. 195). This, however, misrepresents practical reasoning, as there is often more than one way of achieving an end; and hence, the performance of no one means is in general a necessary condition on the achievement of one’s end. In Chapter 6, I introduce the notion of a material inference, which is central to Sellars’s philosophical project, and argue that the notion of a material practical inference gives us a more flexible model of practical reasoning. This, combined with Bratman’s notion of intentions as elements of partial plans, allows us to develop an account of practical reasoning which (a) more accurately represents practical reasoning (and the role of intention in practical reasoning) than does Sellars’s original, extremely rigid nomological-based model; and (b) is consistent with other elements of Sellars’s philosophy (such as his views on theoretical or causal-explanatory material inference, and on the role and status of desires).
In Chapter 14, I try to reconcile an inconsistency between Sellars’s ethical theory and his larger philosophical project. Sellars rejects formalism in theoretical reasoning, arguing that This dry, well-made match is struck Therefore,... more
In Chapter 14, I try to reconcile an inconsistency between Sellars’s ethical theory and his larger philosophical project. Sellars rejects formalism in theoretical reasoning, arguing that
This dry, well-made match is struck
Therefore, the match will light
is a good inference, and doesn’t depend for its validity on the insertion of a major premise. In ethics, though, Sellars seems to embrace this formalism, arguing that
I am in Ci
Therefore, Shallwe [I do Ai]
is good qua instantiation of the intermediate moral principle
Shallwe [I do Ai, if in Ci]
which in turn is good only if derived from the supreme principle of morality
Shallwe be [Our welfare is maximized]
This formalism is inconsistent with Sellars’s other commitments. We should recognize that intermediate moral principles have original (but not foundational) authority; they are ‘auxiliary moves’ as described in SRLG. But there is still a role for the supreme principle of morality: It is a theoretical postulate which serves a dialectical role to resolve disputes among mid-level intermediate moral principles and to bring consistency into our moral practice. Thus, we can preserve the formal structure of Sellars’s ethical theory, while preserving his opposition to formalism per se.
This dry, well-made match is struck
Therefore, the match will light
is a good inference, and doesn’t depend for its validity on the insertion of a major premise. In ethics, though, Sellars seems to embrace this formalism, arguing that
I am in Ci
Therefore, Shallwe [I do Ai]
is good qua instantiation of the intermediate moral principle
Shallwe [I do Ai, if in Ci]
which in turn is good only if derived from the supreme principle of morality
Shallwe be [Our welfare is maximized]
This formalism is inconsistent with Sellars’s other commitments. We should recognize that intermediate moral principles have original (but not foundational) authority; they are ‘auxiliary moves’ as described in SRLG. But there is still a role for the supreme principle of morality: It is a theoretical postulate which serves a dialectical role to resolve disputes among mid-level intermediate moral principles and to bring consistency into our moral practice. Thus, we can preserve the formal structure of Sellars’s ethical theory, while preserving his opposition to formalism per se.
A persistent problem in metaethics is the question of how to reconcile the cognitive and motivational elements of moral judgment. The lynchpin to the ‘moral problem’ is the Humean philosophy of mind, which holds that belief and desire... more
A persistent problem in metaethics is the question of how to reconcile the cognitive and motivational elements of moral judgment. The lynchpin to the ‘moral problem’ is the Humean philosophy of mind, which holds that belief and desire are ‘distinct existences.’ With the help of McDowell, I try in Chapter 10 to undermine allegiance to the Humean model, arguing that moral judgment doesn’t involve sterile cognition of a realm of facts, but is a type of judgment which already embodies our concerns, attitudes, and normative commitments. Again, though, this doesn’t mean we are cognizing ‘queer’ facts, because moral judgment isn’t in the first instance (for Sellars) a type of belief, and normative utterances aren’t descriptive—even though they are very much in the space of reasons.
In Chapter 14, I try to reconcile an inconsistency between Sellars’s ethical theory and his larger philosophical project. Sellars rejects formalism in theoretical reasoning, arguing that This dry, well-made match is struck Therefore,... more
In Chapter 14, I try to reconcile an inconsistency between Sellars’s ethical theory and his larger philosophical project. Sellars rejects formalism in theoretical reasoning, arguing that
This dry, well-made match is struck
Therefore, the match will light
is a good inference, and doesn’t depend for its validity on the insertion of a major premise. In ethics, though, Sellars seems to embrace this formalism, arguing that
I am in Ci
Therefore, Shallwe [I do Ai]
is good qua instantiation of the intermediate moral principle
Shallwe [I do Ai, if in Ci]
which in turn is good only if derived from the supreme principle of morality
Shallwe be [Our welfare is maximized]
This formalism is inconsistent with Sellars’s other commitments. We should recognize that intermediate moral principles have original (but not foundational) authority; they are ‘auxiliary moves’ as described in SRLG. But there is still a role for the supreme principle of morality: It is a theoretical postulate which serves a dialectical role to resolve disputes among mid-level intermediate moral principles and to bring consistency into our moral practice. Thus, we can preserve the formal structure of Sellars’s ethical theory, while preserving his opposition to formalism per se.
This dry, well-made match is struck
Therefore, the match will light
is a good inference, and doesn’t depend for its validity on the insertion of a major premise. In ethics, though, Sellars seems to embrace this formalism, arguing that
I am in Ci
Therefore, Shallwe [I do Ai]
is good qua instantiation of the intermediate moral principle
Shallwe [I do Ai, if in Ci]
which in turn is good only if derived from the supreme principle of morality
Shallwe be [Our welfare is maximized]
This formalism is inconsistent with Sellars’s other commitments. We should recognize that intermediate moral principles have original (but not foundational) authority; they are ‘auxiliary moves’ as described in SRLG. But there is still a role for the supreme principle of morality: It is a theoretical postulate which serves a dialectical role to resolve disputes among mid-level intermediate moral principles and to bring consistency into our moral practice. Thus, we can preserve the formal structure of Sellars’s ethical theory, while preserving his opposition to formalism per se.
Research Interests: Philosophy and Mind
I turn in Chapter 9 to address a second concern about rules, specifically, Wittgensteinian concerns that we cannot understand intelligent behavior in terms of following rules. The argument of this chapter attempts to establish two... more
I turn in Chapter 9 to address a second concern about rules, specifically, Wittgensteinian concerns that we cannot understand intelligent behavior in terms of following rules. The argument of this chapter attempts to establish two points. First, Sellars’s account of pattern-governed behavior (behavior that is not rule-following, but which must be understood in relation to rules) responds to Wittgensteinian worries, while preserving an essential role for rules, a role to be explored at length in this chapter. Second, I demonstrate that the social practices at the bottom of Sellars’s account, and the rules that govern them, must be understood in terms of collective attitudes—both we-intentions and collective beliefs—and that therefore individual rational agency strongly presupposes collective attitudes. This latter point is particularly important, because it allows us to build toward the ultimate Sellarsian goal of proving the reality—and indeed, the necessity—of the community of rational beings, which will bring us (in Chapter 13) to the final goal of establishing the categorical reasonableness of the formal end of morality.
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In Chapter 2 I turn to Sellars’s claim that the normative is causally reducible, but logically irreducible to the natural. This means that while (for example) the behavioral or neurological information conveyed by a belief-ascription can... more
In Chapter 2 I turn to Sellars’s claim that the normative is causally reducible, but logically irreducible to the natural. This means that while (for example) the behavioral or neurological information conveyed by a belief-ascription can in principle be wholly captured by an (ideal) scientific theory, such a theory wouldn’t say what intentional language said (in that it wouldn’t ascribe beliefs per se). What normative expressions say, can only be said using normative language, even if what they convey can be reduced to empirical psychology, or neurology, or some other branch of science. Serious objections have been raised against the tenability of Sellars thesis of the “causal reducibility, but logical irreducibility” of the normative. Just as critically, Sellars’s powerful argument for scientific realism can be turned against his argument for the causal reducibility of the normative, so that the normative turns out to be both logically and causally irreducible. I will demonstrate that this conclusion leads to a more complicated naturalism, but one that is still compatible with Sellars’s austere nominalism. The thesis of causal irreducibility will turn out to be helpful in explaining, among other things, moral motivation (as we will see in chapter 10).
In Chapter 9 we build on the theme of contribution from Chap. 8. We demonstrate that there are many ways in which different forms of normative discourse and non-normative discourse contribute fruitfully to each other; specifically, in... more
In Chapter 9 we build on the theme of contribution from Chap. 8. We demonstrate that there are many ways in which different forms of normative discourse and non-normative discourse contribute fruitfully to each other; specifically, in ways that unify the various discourse regions making up our world-view.
We illustrate this by demonstrating how ethical theory (and other types of normative theory) can be empirically informed by work in various scientific theories without, thereby themselves, just becoming descriptive projects. We then examine complementary examples of how different kinds of normative discourse contribute to theoretical projects in the sciences without turning those scientific theories into normative ones.
We illustrate this by demonstrating how ethical theory (and other types of normative theory) can be empirically informed by work in various scientific theories without, thereby themselves, just becoming descriptive projects. We then examine complementary examples of how different kinds of normative discourse contribute to theoretical projects in the sciences without turning those scientific theories into normative ones.
In Chapter 8 We return to a theme introduced in Chap. 4: normative discourse not being descriptive or fact-stating does not mean a commitment to a doctrine of ‘non-overlapping magisteria.’ We deny that different types of discourse can... more
In Chapter 8 We return to a theme introduced in Chap. 4: normative discourse not being descriptive or fact-stating does not mean a commitment to a doctrine of ‘non-overlapping magisteria.’ We deny that different types of discourse can be insulated from each other, and instead argue that our commitments must be reconciled across all types of discourses. Many philosophers committed to naturalism have assumed that this reconciliation would force us either (a) to introduce normative facts or properties to legitimize normative discourse, or (b) to downgrade normative discourse so that normative claims are no more than expressions of emotion or opinion, and not really objective or truth-apt.
We argue that there is a third option open to us: one type of discourse region can be said to contribute to another in various fruitful ways. This has a way of unifying various discourse regions (such as normative discourse and scientific or social-scientific discourse) while preserving the unique identify of each, and not simply attempting to reduce one to the other.
Although this contribution relation will often be unique between two types of discourse, there are some general features we describe in this chapter. Numerous historical and contemporary illustrations from the philosophy of science demonstrate well this third option of contribution.
We argue that there is a third option open to us: one type of discourse region can be said to contribute to another in various fruitful ways. This has a way of unifying various discourse regions (such as normative discourse and scientific or social-scientific discourse) while preserving the unique identify of each, and not simply attempting to reduce one to the other.
Although this contribution relation will often be unique between two types of discourse, there are some general features we describe in this chapter. Numerous historical and contemporary illustrations from the philosophy of science demonstrate well this third option of contribution.
We introduce the theoretical notion of an interest. This is a theme that appears often in pragmatist accounts, although often by other names—values, concerns, goals, and so on. Chap. 5 shows how interests serve the important function of... more
We introduce the theoretical notion of an interest. This is a theme that appears often in pragmatist accounts, although often by other names—values, concerns, goals, and so on. Chap. 5 shows how interests serve the important function of explaining how, even though we don’t appeal to normative objects or properties in the world, normative discourse can nevertheless be truth-apt and objective.
Interests provide a connection to the world because interests (such as an interest in health) are matters that are impressed on us by how the world is. Interests are not merely a matter of social consensus, but are concretely shaped by how we are embodied in the world. Nevertheless, Chap. 5 explains that to talk of interests is still not to talk of things or properties in the world; it is still not to describe some non-normative reality. Thus, introducing interests into our account does not introduce some sort of object that needs reconciling with naturalism.
Interests, which are constrained by the world and our embodiment in it, will further constrain our normative judgments and discourse in a way that will deliver accounts of the objectivity and truth-aptness of normative discourse. We develop this them further in Chaps. 6 and 7.
Interests provide a connection to the world because interests (such as an interest in health) are matters that are impressed on us by how the world is. Interests are not merely a matter of social consensus, but are concretely shaped by how we are embodied in the world. Nevertheless, Chap. 5 explains that to talk of interests is still not to talk of things or properties in the world; it is still not to describe some non-normative reality. Thus, introducing interests into our account does not introduce some sort of object that needs reconciling with naturalism.
Interests, which are constrained by the world and our embodiment in it, will further constrain our normative judgments and discourse in a way that will deliver accounts of the objectivity and truth-aptness of normative discourse. We develop this them further in Chaps. 6 and 7.
In the previous chapter, we argued that not even moderate naturalism could do away with normativity altogether. In Chap. 3, we address a large swath of the naturalist literature that attempts to place properties of normative discourse... more
In the previous chapter, we argued that not even moderate naturalism could do away with normativity altogether. In Chap. 3, we address a large swath of the naturalist literature that attempts to place properties of normative discourse within the terrain of entities posited by the natural sciences. Two dominant naturalist approaches to fitting normativity within a naturalist worldview are reduction and supervenience. In Chap. 3 we explain both approaches and why they are both ultimately unsatisfactory.
Reduction simply tries to equate normative properties with some scientific or social-scientific property. For example, just like water is H2O, a normative property (like moral goodness) will just turn out to be some measurable thing like preference satisfaction. Chap. 3 explains how these reductive accounts fail to do justice to the central feature of the normative, which is its prescriptive element: the central point of normative claims is not to describe something, but to prescribe or proscribe.
Supervenience simply claims that if two cases differ morally, then there also must be some non-moral difference between the two cases. For example, if one lie is morally wrong and one is morally permissible, there must be some difference between the two situations, a difference we can identify in non-moral terms. In Chap. 3 we show that supervenience accounts fall into one of two traps. Either they are too weak to do any actual work in explaining the relation between normative claims and the non-normative world; or if the relation is made stronger, such accounts simply collapse into reductionism (which we rejected for the reasons stated above).
In rejecting both reduction and supervenience accounts, we pave the way for our account, in which normative claims are not in the business of describing the natural world, or of stating facts, in the first place.
Reduction simply tries to equate normative properties with some scientific or social-scientific property. For example, just like water is H2O, a normative property (like moral goodness) will just turn out to be some measurable thing like preference satisfaction. Chap. 3 explains how these reductive accounts fail to do justice to the central feature of the normative, which is its prescriptive element: the central point of normative claims is not to describe something, but to prescribe or proscribe.
Supervenience simply claims that if two cases differ morally, then there also must be some non-moral difference between the two cases. For example, if one lie is morally wrong and one is morally permissible, there must be some difference between the two situations, a difference we can identify in non-moral terms. In Chap. 3 we show that supervenience accounts fall into one of two traps. Either they are too weak to do any actual work in explaining the relation between normative claims and the non-normative world; or if the relation is made stronger, such accounts simply collapse into reductionism (which we rejected for the reasons stated above).
In rejecting both reduction and supervenience accounts, we pave the way for our account, in which normative claims are not in the business of describing the natural world, or of stating facts, in the first place.