Being Realistic about Reasons

Being Realistic about Reasons PDF Author: T. M. Scanlon
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0199678480
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 143

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Book Description
Is what we have reason to do a matter of fact? If so, what kind of truth is involved, how can we know it, and how do reasons motivate and explain action? In this concise and lucid book T.M. Scanlon offers answers, with a qualified defence of normative cognitivism - the view that there are normative truths about reasons for action.

Being Realistic about Reasons

Being Realistic about Reasons PDF Author: T. M. Scanlon
Publisher: OUP Oxford
ISBN: 019100314X
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 160

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Book Description
T. M. Scanlon offers a qualified defense of normative cognitivism—the view that there are irreducibly normative truths about reasons for action. He responds to three familiar objections: that such truths would have troubling metaphysical implications; that we would have no way of knowing what they are; and that the role of reasons in motivating and explaining action could not be explained if accepting a conclusion about reasons for action were a kind of belief. Scanlon answers the first of these objections within a general account of ontological commitment, applying to mathematics as well as normative judgments. He argues that the method of reflective equilibrium, properly understood, provides an adequate account of how we come to know both normative truths and mathematical truths, and that the idea of a rational agent explains the link between an agent's normative beliefs and his or her actions. Whether every statement about reasons for action has a determinate truth value is a question to be answered by an overall account of reasons for action, in normative terms. Since it seems unlikely that there is such an account, the defense of normative cognitivism offered here is qualified: statements about reasons for action can have determinate truth values, but it is not clear that all of them do. Along the way, Scanlon offers an interpretation of the distinction between normative and non-normative claims, a new account of the supervenience of the normative on the non-normative, an interpretation of the idea of the relative strength of reasons, and a defense of the method of reflective equilibrium.

Being Realistic about Reasons

Being Realistic about Reasons PDF Author:
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780191757976
Category : Act (Philosophy)
Languages : en
Pages :

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Book Description
Is what we have reason to do a matter of fact? If so, what kind of truth is involved, how can we know it, and how do reasons motivate and explain action? In this concise and lucid book T.M. Scanlon offers answers, with a qualified defence of normative cognitivism - the view that there are normative truths about reasons for action

The Power of Realistic Thinking

The Power of Realistic Thinking PDF Author: Donald W. McCullough
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780830813117
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 212

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Book Description
Christians need a view of life that is realistic enough to deal with its downside and big enough to include all its joys. This book provides both.

Reasonableness and Fairness

Reasonableness and Fairness PDF Author: Christopher McMahon
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1316828611
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 263

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Book Description
We all know, or think we know, what it means to say that something is 'reasonable' or 'fair', but what exactly are these concepts and how have they evolved and changed over the course of history? In this book, Christopher McMahon explores reasonableness, fairness, and justice as central concepts of the morality of reciprocal concern. He argues that the basis of this morality evolves as history unfolds, so that forms of interaction that might have been morally acceptable in the past are judged unacceptable today. The first part of his study examines the notions of reasonableness and fairness as they are employed in ordinary practical thought, and the second part develops a constructivist theory to explain why and how this part of morality can undergo historical development without arriving at any final form. His book will interest scholars of ethics, political theory, and the history of ideas.

Being Realistic Isn't Realistic

Being Realistic Isn't Realistic PDF Author: Emma van der Klift
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781773708379
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 298

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Book Description
In this engaging, humorous and provocative collection of essays, Emma Van der Klift and Norman Kunc gently prod us to rethink many taken for granted and unquestioned assumptions about the nature of disability. They begin with a challenge and an assertion; people have the right to be disabled and should be under no obligation to minimize or hide their disabilities. Disability, they contend, is not a tragic medical condition, but is an inherent part of the diversity of the human condition - an identity to be embraced with pride. They go on to explore the sometimes overlooked complexities of inclusion - both at school and in the community. In one essay, they ask us to rethink the relationship between ability and opportunity and challenge the presumption that people need to acquire abilities before they are afforded the opportunity to participate in regular schools and the broader community. In another, they ask us to consider how we might ensure that friendship between non-disabled and disabled people doesn't become contaminated by benevolence, underestimation and paternalism. Throughout this book, they playfully draw unexpected connections between disability, innovation and a number of seemingly unrelated topics - like belly dance, chess and magic. Although Norman Kunc and Emma Van der Klift are internationally known speakers, authors and disability rights advocates, they prefer to think of themselves as modern day storytellers, continuing the long held tradition of using humour and narrative to initiate self-reflection and social change. Born with cerebral palsy, Norman attended a segregated school for children with physical disabilities; then, at the age 13, argued his way into a regular school and went on to complete a Master of Science degree in Family Therapy. Recently diagnosed as Autistic, Emma has embraced the diagnosis with a sense of relief, recognition and confirmation. She is certified in both mediation and negotiation and holds a Master's degree in Conflict Analysis and Management. When Norm and Emma aren't working, they enjoy cycling, chess, good food and trying to figure out how magicians use misdirection to fool us.

What We Owe to Each Other

What We Owe to Each Other PDF Author: T. M. Scanlon
Publisher: Harvard University Press
ISBN: 067400423X
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 433

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Book Description
How do we judge whether an action is morally right or wrong? If an action is wrong, what reason does that give us not to do it? Why should we give such reasons priority over our other concerns and values? In this book, T. M. Scanlon offers new answers to these questions, as they apply to the central part of morality that concerns what we owe to each other. According to his contractualist view, thinking about right and wrong is thinking about what we do in terms that could be justified to others and that they could not reasonably reject. He shows how the special authority of conclusions about right and wrong arises from the value of being related to others in this way, and he shows how familiar moral ideas such as fairness and responsibility can be understood through their role in this process of mutual justification and criticism. Scanlon bases his contractualism on a broader account of reasons, value, and individual well-being that challenges standard views about these crucial notions. He argues that desires do not provide us with reasons, that states of affairs are not the primary bearers of value, and that well-being is not as important for rational decision-making as it is commonly held to be. Scanlon is a pluralist about both moral and non-moral values. He argues that, taking this plurality of values into account, contractualism allows for most of the variability in moral requirements that relativists have claimed, while still accounting for the full force of our judgments of right and wrong.

Morality and Metaphysics

Morality and Metaphysics PDF Author: Charles Larmore
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1108699960
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 247

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Book Description
In this book, Charles Larmore develops an account of morality, freedom, and reason that rejects the naturalistic metaphysics shaping much of modern thought. Reason, Larmore argues, is responsiveness to reasons, and reasons themselves are essentially normative in character, consisting in the way that physical and psychological facts - facts about the world of nature - count in favor of possibilities of thought and action that we can take up. Moral judgments are true or false in virtue of the moral reasons there are. We need therefore a more comprehensive metaphysics that recognizes a normative dimension to reality as well. Though taking its point of departure in the analysis of moral judgment, this book branches widely into related topics such as freedom and the causal order of the world, textual interpretation, the nature of the self, self-knowledge, and the concept of duties to ourselves.

Be Realistic

Be Realistic PDF Author: Mike Davis
Publisher: Haymarket Books
ISBN: 1608462307
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 48

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Book Description
With wit and a remarkable grasp of the political marginalization of the 99%, Mike Davis crafts a striking defense of the Occupy Wall Street movement. This pamphlet brilliantly undertakes the most pressing question facing the struggle– what is to be done next? Mike Davis is the author of more than twenty books.

From Valuing to Value

From Valuing to Value PDF Author: David Sobel
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0191021261
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 352

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Book Description
Subjective accounts of well-being and reasons for action have a remarkable pedigree. The idea that normativity flows from what an agent cares about-that something is valuable because it is valued-has appealed to a wide range of great thinkers. But at the same time this idea has seemed to many of the best minds in ethics to be outrageous or worse, not least because it seems to threaten the status of morality. Mutual incomprehension looms over the discussion. From Valuing to Value, written by an influential former critic of subjectivism, owns up to the problematic features to which critics have pointed while arguing that such criticisms can be blunted and the overall view rendered defensible. In this collection of his essays David Sobel does not shrink from acknowledging the real tension between subjective views of reasons and morality, yet argues that such a tension does not undermine subjectivism. In this volume the fundamental commitments of subjectivism are clarified and revealed to be rather plausible and well-motivated, while the most influential criticisms of subjectivism are straightforwardly addressed and found wanting.

A Good Kind of Trouble

A Good Kind of Trouble PDF Author: Lisa Moore Ramée
Publisher: HarperCollins
ISBN: 0062836706
Category : Juvenile Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 384

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Book Description
From debut author Lisa Moore Ramée comes this funny and big-hearted debut middle grade novel about friendship, family, and standing up for what’s right, perfect for fans of Angie Thomas’s The Hate U Give and the novels of Renée Watson and Jason Reynolds. Twelve-year-old Shayla is allergic to trouble. All she wants to do is to follow the rules. (Oh, and she’d also like to make it through seventh grade with her best friendships intact, learn to run track, and have a cute boy see past her giant forehead.) But in junior high, it’s like all the rules have changed. Now she’s suddenly questioning who her best friends are and some people at school are saying she’s not black enough. Wait, what? Shay’s sister, Hana, is involved in Black Lives Matter, but Shay doesn't think that's for her. After experiencing a powerful protest, though, Shay decides some rules are worth breaking. She starts wearing an armband to school in support of the Black Lives movement. Soon everyone is taking sides. And she is given an ultimatum. Shay is scared to do the wrong thing (and even more scared to do the right thing), but if she doesn't face her fear, she'll be forever tripping over the next hurdle. Now that’s trouble, for real. "Tensions are high over the trial of a police officer who shot an unarmed Black man. When the officer is set free, and Shay goes with her family to a silent protest, she starts to see that some trouble is worth making." (Publishers Weekly, "An Anti-Racist Children's and YA Reading List")