Morality in a Natural World

Morality in a Natural World PDF Author: David Copp
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1139466135
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 325

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Book Description
The central philosophical challenge of metaethics is to account for the normativity of moral judgment without abandoning or seriously compromising moral realism. In Morality in a Natural World, David Copp defends a version of naturalistic moral realism that can accommodate the normativity of morality. Moral naturalism is often thought to face special metaphysical, epistemological, and semantic problems as well as the difficulty in accounting for normativity. In the ten essays included in this volume, Copp defends solutions to these problems. Three of the essays are new, while seven have previously been published. All of them are concerned with the viability of naturalistic and realistic accounts of the nature of morality, or, more generally, with the viability of naturalistic accounts of reasons.

Morality in a Natural World

Morality in a Natural World PDF Author: David Copp
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1139466135
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 325

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Book Description
The central philosophical challenge of metaethics is to account for the normativity of moral judgment without abandoning or seriously compromising moral realism. In Morality in a Natural World, David Copp defends a version of naturalistic moral realism that can accommodate the normativity of morality. Moral naturalism is often thought to face special metaphysical, epistemological, and semantic problems as well as the difficulty in accounting for normativity. In the ten essays included in this volume, Copp defends solutions to these problems. Three of the essays are new, while seven have previously been published. All of them are concerned with the viability of naturalistic and realistic accounts of the nature of morality, or, more generally, with the viability of naturalistic accounts of reasons.

From Psychology to Morality

From Psychology to Morality PDF Author: John Deigh
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0190878614
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 411

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Book Description
The essays in this collection belong to the tradition of naturalism in ethics. The tradition goes back to the beginnings of moral philosophy in ancient Greek thought. Its program is to explain moral thought and action as wholly natural phenomena. Its aim, in other words, is to explain such thought and action without recourse to either a reality separate from that of the natural world or volitional powers that operate independently of natural forces. Its greatest exponent in ancient thought was Aristotle. In modern thought Hume and Freud stand out as the most influential contributors to the tradition. All three thinkers made the study of human psychology fundamental to their work in ethics. All three built their theories on studies of human desires and emotions and assigned to reason the role of guiding the actions that spring from our desires and emotions toward ends that promise self-fulfillment and away from ends that are self-destructive. The collection's essays draw inspiration from their ideas. Its twelve principal essays are arranged to follow the lead of Aristotle's and Hume's ethics. The first three survey and examine general theories of emotion and motivation. The next two focus on emotions that are central to human sociability and that contemporary Anglo-American philosophers discuss under the rubric of reactive attitudes. Turning to distinctively cognitive powers necessary for moral thought and action, the sixth and seventh essays discuss the role of empathy in moral judgment and defend Bernard Williams's controversial account of practical reason. The final five essays use the studies in moral psychology of the previous chapters to treat questions in ethics and social philosophy. The treatment of these questions exemplifies the implementation of a naturalist program in these disciplines.

Morality: A Natural History

Morality: A Natural History PDF Author: Roger V. Moseley
Publisher: FriesenPress
ISBN: 152553730X
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 404

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Book Description
What is morality and what is the source of our moral ideas? Philosophers have explored these questions for centuries, suggesting that both emotion and reason play roles but failing to explain how and why Homo sapiens developed these ideas. Author Roger Moseley argues that evolutionary forces that optimize human welfare provide the missing explanation. Morality: A Natural History presents a multi-disciplinary analysis of the topic and reveals a common thread among the seemingly diverse fields of religion, neuroscience, experimental psychology and game theory, child development, evolution and animal behavior, and anthropology and sociology. When humans first appeared, a simple self-interested survival morality sufficed. As societies became more complex, however, rules of behavior became necessary to limit conflict and promote cooperation. The brain evolved, producing language that allowed the articulation of moral ideas which were codified and enforced by religion and social forces. No species lasts forever, and it is at our peril today that we neglect those evolved moral values of cooperation, altruism, truthfulness, and empathy. Rooted in scientific evidence and interspersed with personal anecdotes and humorous observations, Moseley provides a unique perspective on the natural history of morality – how it appeared, evolved, and continues to evolve today. Morality: A Natural History is essential reading for academics and laypersons alike who seek to understand the origin and essence of human morality.

God and Morality

God and Morality PDF Author: R. Keith Loftin
Publisher: InterVarsity Press
ISBN: 0830863451
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 193

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Book Description
Is morality dependent upon belief in God? Is there more than one way for Christians to understand the nature of morality? Is there any agreement between Christians and atheists or agnostics on this heated issue? In God and Morality: Four Views four distinguished voices in moral philosophy ariticulate and defend their place in the current debate between naturalism and theism. Christian philosophers, Keith Yandell and Mark Linville and two self-identified atheist/agnostics, Evan Fales and Michael Ruse clearly and honestly represent their differing views on the nature of morality. Important differences as well as areas of overlap emerge as each contributor states their case, receives criticism from the others and responds. Of particular value for use as an academic text, these four essays and responses, covering the naturalist moral non-realist, naturalist moral realist, moral essentialist and moral particularist views, will foster critical thinking and contribute to the development of a well-informed position on this very important issue.

Environmental Ethics

Environmental Ethics PDF Author: Holmes Rolston
Publisher: Temple University Press
ISBN: 1439903913
Category : Nature
Languages : en
Pages : 408

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Book Description
A systematic account of values carried by the natural world.

The Moral Landscape

The Moral Landscape PDF Author: Sam Harris
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 143917122X
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 322

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Book Description
Sam Harris dismantles the most common justification for religious faith--that a moral system cannot be based on science.

A Natural History of Human Morality

A Natural History of Human Morality PDF Author: Michael Tomasello
Publisher: Harvard University Press
ISBN: 0674088646
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 207

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Book Description
Michael Tomasello offers the most detailed account to date of the evolution of human moral psychology. Based on experimental data comparing great apes and human children, he reconstructs two key evolutionary steps whereby early humans gradually became an ultra-cooperative and, eventually, a moral species capable of acting as a plural agent “we”.

The Birth of Ethics

The Birth of Ethics PDF Author: Philip Pettit
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0190904933
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 401

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Book Description
Imagine a human society, perhaps in pre-history, in which people were generally of a psychological kind with us, had the use of natural language to communicate with one another, but did not have any properly moral concepts in which to exhort one another to meet certain standards and to lodge related claims and complaints. According to The Birth of Ethics, the members of that society would have faced a set of pressures, and made a series of adjustments in response, sufficient to put them within reach of ethical concepts. Without any planning, they would have more or less inevitably evolved a way of using such concepts to articulate desirable patterns of behavior and to hold themselves and one another responsible to those standards. Sooner or later, they would have entered ethical space. While this central claim is developed as a thesis in conjectural history or genealogy, the aim of the exercise is philosophical. Assuming that it explains the emergence of concepts and practices that are more or less equivalent to ours, the story offers us an account of the nature and role of morality. It directs us to the function that ethics plays in human life and alerts us to the character in virtue of which it can serve that function. The emerging view of morality has implications for the standard range of questions in meta-ethics and moral psychology, and enables us to understand why there are divisions in normative ethics like that between consequentialist and Kantian approaches.

In the Light of Evolution

In the Light of Evolution PDF Author: National Academy of Sciences
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 388

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Book Description
The Arthur M. Sackler Colloquia of the National Academy of Sciences address scientific topics of broad and current interest, cutting across the boundaries of traditional disciplines. Each year, four or five such colloquia are scheduled, typically two days in length and international in scope. Colloquia are organized by a member of the Academy, often with the assistance of an organizing committee, and feature presentations by leading scientists in the field and discussions with a hundred or more researchers with an interest in the topic. Colloquia presentations are recorded and posted on the National Academy of Sciences Sackler colloquia website and published on CD-ROM. These Colloquia are made possible by a generous gift from Mrs. Jill Sackler, in memory of her husband, Arthur M. Sackler.

Aristotelian Naturalism

Aristotelian Naturalism PDF Author: Martin Hähnel
Publisher: Springer Nature
ISBN: 3030375765
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 454

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Book Description
This book features many of the leading voices championing the revival of Neo-Aristotelian Ethical Naturalism (AN) in contemporary philosophy. It addresses the whole range of issues facing this research program at present. Coverage in the collection identifies differentiations, details standpoints, and points out new perspectives. This volume answers a need: AN is quite new to contemporary philosophy, despite its deep roots in the history of philosophy. As yet, there are many unanswered questions regarding its relation to contemporary views in metaethics. It is certainly not equivalent to dominant naturalistic approaches to metaethics in Anglophone philosophy. Indeed, it is not obviously incompatible with some approaches identified as nonnaturalistic. Further, there are controversies regarding the views of the first wave of virtue revivalists. The work of G.E.M. Anscombe and Philippa Foot is frequently misunderstood, despite the fact that they are important figures in the contemporary revival. This volume details a robust approach to ethics by situating it within the context of human life. It will help readers to better understand how AN raises deep questions about the relation of action and its evaluation to human nature. Neo-Aristotelians argue that something like the traditional cardinal virtues, practical wisdom, temperance, justice and courage, are qualities that perfect human reason and desire.