The truth about value and the value of truth

[摘要] ENGLISH ABSTRACT:In this thesis an attempt is made to sketch the outlines of a cognitive theory of ethics,i.e. a theory in which ethical statements are a subset of descriptive statements. It isargued that the good is a quale, and that this quale roughly corresponds to what isoften referred to as pleasure. If this conceptualisation of the good is correct, then theresulting ethical theory is a cognitive, egoist version of ethical hedonism. The thesisproceeds by relating this conceptualisation of the good to economic phenomena. Aninvestigation is then made of the conditions under which the following of a boundedlyrational rule is preferable to calculating which one of the possible options available tothe actor to follow. It is argued that one such rule is that truth should serve as anorm of inquiry. Next the issue of altruism is considered. It is argued that ourintuitions regarding what egoist action should be are radically untrustworthy.Considerations from evolutionary biology and game theory make it clear that anegoist actor might well be best advised to perform a number of actions that wouldnormally be termed altruistic. The next topic concerns the relation between fact andvalue. Arguments that claim to undermine the distinction between fact and value areargued to be fallacious. It is also argued that the correct view of the relation betweenfact and value can help to clarify some of the problems surrounding theconceptualisation of objectivity. The thesis ends by considering the gains that arisefrom adopting the position argued for.

[发布机构] Stellenbosch University