Ethical Inquiry as Problem-Resolution: Objectivity, Progress, andDeliberation.

[摘要] Claims of progress in our ethical or moral beliefs and practices—as well as claims to ethical or moral regression—are commonplace in American social and political conversation.Often, such commentary involves a lamenting of the decline of ;;traditional” values in contemporary society or alternatively a rejoicing in the ways that we appear to have overcome prior prejudicial values.In this dissertation, I am concerned with the notions of progress and improvement that underlie such commonsense judgments.At a minimum, ethical progress requires the idea that some values or practices are better than others and hence that replacing some beliefs or practices with others can be a genuine improvement.Taking inspiration from the ethical works of John Dewey, I sketch an account of evaluative progress that conceives of this sort of improvement in ethical beliefs or practices in terms of problem-resolving.On my view, resolving a problem involves both offering an adequate conception of the problem and finding a problem-solution which lives up to the world and to the values we reflectively endorse.On my account, resolving problems is not simply a matter of finding the best means to a fixed end; rather, I conceive of problem-resolving as a dynamic process in which ends themselves are typically in flux.The sort of ;;dynamic deliberation” I have in mind, then, goes beyond mere instrumental reasoning, by not only allowing us to recognize conflicts between ends or means to ends, but in also providing a way to rationally revise or reject ends.Finally, in order for this sort of problem-resolving to make good on the idea of genuine improvement or progress, the process of solving problems must involve some sense of objectivity.I offer a procedural account of objectivity that emphasizes the role of the world in constraining our inquiry, involves a naturalization of ethical epistemology, and allows for objective inquiry to be undertaken by an individual or a community.

[发布机构] University of Michigan

[效力级别] Ethical Inquiry As Problem-resolving

[关键词] Moral Progress;Ethical Inquiry As Problem-resolving;Dewey"s Ethics;Moral Objectivity;Deliberation of Ends;Philosophy;Humanities;Philosophy