Explaining our Moral Reliability

Pacific Philosophical Quarterly 98 (S1):71-86 (2016)
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Abstract

I critically examine an evolutionary debunking argument against moral realism. The key premise of the argument is that there is no adequate explanation of our moral reliability. I search for the strongest version of the argument; this involves exploring how ‘adequate explanation’ could be understood such that the key premise comes out true. Finally, I give a reductio: in the sense in which there is no adequate explanation of our moral reliability, there is equally no adequate explanation of our inductive reliability. Thus, the argument that would debunk our moral views would also, absurdly, debunk all inductive reasoning.

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Sinan Dogramaci
University of Texas at Austin

References found in this work

Taking Morality Seriously: A Defense of Robust Realism.David Enoch - 2011 - Oxford, GB: Oxford University Press UK.
Thinking how to live.Allan Gibbard - 2003 - Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press.
A Darwinian dilemma for realist theories of value.Sharon Street - 2006 - Philosophical Studies 127 (1):109-166.
Mathematical truth.Paul Benacerraf - 1973 - Journal of Philosophy 70 (19):661-679.

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