Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-gbm5v Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-26T17:26:32.003Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Representing ethical reality: a guide for worldly non-naturalists

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2020

William J. FitzPatrick
William J. FitzPatrick*
Affiliation:
Department of Philosophy, University of Rochester, Rochester, NY, USA
*
Email: william.fitzpatrick@rochester.edu
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Ethical realists hold (i) that our ethical concepts, thoughts, and claims are in the business of representing ethical reality, by representing evaluative or normative properties and facts as aspects of reality, and (ii) that such representations are at least sometimes accurate. Non-naturalist realists add the further claim that ethical properties and facts are ultimately non-natural, though they are nonetheless worldly. My aim is threefold: to elucidate the sort of representation involved in ethical evaluation on realist views; to clarify what exactly is represented and how non-naturalism comes into the picture for non-naturalists; and to defend worldly non-naturalism against some objections. The first question addressed is how we should model evaluation on any realist view, which should in turn guide the identification of which properties and facts are credibly regarded as ‘evaluative’ ones. Then the question is: what role might non-natural properties and facts play, and how are they related to what is represented in ethical evaluation? Once that is clear, we will be in a position to answer certain objections to non-naturalist realism from Jackson, Gibbard, Bedke, and Dreier. I argue that the objections all mischaracterize the role played by non-natural properties and facts on plausible versions of non-naturalist realism.

Keywords

Ethical realismnon-naturalismmetaethicsrepresentationevaluationnormativity
Type
Article
Information
Canadian Journal of Philosophy , Volume 48 , Issue 3-4: Special issue: Representation and Evaluation , 2018 , pp. 548 - 568
Copyright
Copyright © Canadian Journal of Philosophy 2018

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Bedke, Matthew. 2014. “A Menagerie of Duties? Normative Judgments are not Beliefs about Non-Natural Properties.” American Philosophical Quarterly 51(3): 189–201.Google Scholar
Brink, David. 2001. “Realism, Naturalism and Moral Semantics.” Social Philosophy and Policy 18(2): 154–176. 10.1017/S0265052500002946CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Copp, David. 1995. Morality, Normativity and Society. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Dancy, Jonathan. 2004. “On the Importance of Making Things Right.” Ratio 17: 229–237. 10.1111/rati.2004.17.issue-2CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dancy, Jonathan. 2006. “Nonnaturalism.” In The Oxford Handbook of Ethical Theory, edited by Copp, David, 122–145. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Darwall, Stephen. 2003. “Moore, Normativity, and Intrinsic Value.” Ethics 113(3): 468–489. 10.1086/345623CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dreier, Jamie. 2015. “Can Reasons Fundamentalism Answer the Normative Question?” In Motivational Internalism, edited by Bjornsson, Gunnar, Strandberg, Caj, Olinder, Ragnar Francen, Eriksson, John, and Bjorklund, Fredrik.Oxford Scholarship Online. doi: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199367955.003.0009.Google Scholar
FitzPatrick, William. 2008. “Robust Ethical Realism, Non-Naturalism and Normativity.” In Oxford Studies in Metaethics. vol. 3, edited by Shafer-Landau, Russ, 159–205. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
FitzPatrick, William. 2011. “Ethical Non-Naturalism and Normative Properties.” In New Waves in Metaethics, edited by Brady, Michael, 7–35. New York: Palgrave MacMillan. 10.1057/9780230294899CrossRefGoogle Scholar
FitzPatrick, William. 2014. “Skepticism about Naturalizing Normativity: In Defense of Ethical Non-naturalism.” Res Philosophica 91(4): 559–588. 10.11612/resphil.2014.91.4.1CrossRefGoogle Scholar
FitzPatrick, William. 2016. “Ontology for an Uncompromising Ethical Realism.” Topoi. http://rdcu.be/m3x3.Google Scholar
FitzPatrick, William. Forthcoming. “Open Question Arguments and the Irreducibility of Ethical Normativity.” In The Naturalistic Fallacy, edited by Sinclair, Neil. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Gibbard, Allan. 2003. Thinking How to Live. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Gibbard, Allan. 2006. “Normative Properties.” In Metaethics After Moore, edited by Horgan, Terence and Timmons, Mark, 319–338. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Horgan, Terry and Timmons, Mark. Forthcoming. “Gripped by Authority.” Canadian Journal of Philosophy.Google Scholar
Jackson, Frank. 1998. From Metaphysics to Ethics. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Joyce, Richard. 2001. The Myth of Morality. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 10.1017/CBO9780511487101CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Moore, G. E. (1903) 1994. Principia Ethica. Ed. and with an introduction by Thomas Baldwin. Revised ed. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Parfit, D. 2011. On What Matters. 2 vols. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Scanlon, Thomas. 2014. Being Realistic about Reasons. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199678488.001.0001CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sturgeon, Nicholas. 2003. “Moore on Ethical Naturalism.” Ethics 113(3): 528–556. 10.1086/345627CrossRefGoogle Scholar