MANY COMMENTATORS HAVE SAID THAT KANT'S DOCTRINE OF THE HIGHEST GOOD - AS EXPRESSED IN THE SECOND CRITIQUE, FOR EXAMPLE - IS SERIOUSLY FLAWED BOTH IN ITSELF AND IN THAT IT CONTRADICTS OTHER IMPORTANT CLAIMS OF KANT'S MORAL PHILOSOPHY. I ADVANCE AN INTERPRETATION OF KANT'S DOCTRINE ON WHICH IT SUFFERS FROM NONE OF THESE ALLEGED FLAWS.

Hill and Levine offer alternative explanations of these conceivabilities, concluding that these conceivabilities are thereby defeated as evidence. However, this strategy fails because their explanations generalize to all conceivability judgments concerning phenomenal states. Consequently, one could defend absolutely any theory of phenomenal states against conceivability arguments in just this way. This result conflicts with too many of our common sense beliefs about the evidential value of conceivability with respect to phenomenal states. The general moral is that the application of such (...) principles of explanatory defeat is neither simple nor straightforward. (shrink)

‘…one might easily wonder why no one has ever pointed out the mince pie syllogism…” (G. E. M. Anscombe, Intention, 2nd edition 1969, sec. 33).