Why Moral Error Theorists Should Become Revisionary Moral Expressivists

New Content is Available for Journal of Moral Philosophy (1):48-72 (2015)
  Copy   BIBTEX

Abstract

_ Source: _Page Count 25 Moral error theorists hold that morality is deeply mistaken, thus raising the question of whether and how moral judgments and utterances should continue to be employed. Proposals include simply abolishing morality, adopting some revisionary fictionalist stance toward morality, and conserving moral judgments and utterances unchanged. I defend a fourth proposal, namely revisionary moral expressivism, which recommends replacing cognitivist moral judgments and utterances with non-cognitivist ones. Given that non-cognitivist attitudes are not truth apt, revisionary expressivism does not involve moral error. Moreover, revisionary expressivism has the theoretical resources to retain many of the useful features of morality, such as moral motivation, moral disagreement, and moral reasoning. Revisionary expressivism fares better than the three major alternatives in both avoiding moral error and preserving these useful features of morality. I also show how this position differs from the “revolutionary expressivism” of Sebastian Köhler and Michael Ridge.

Links

PhilArchive



    Upload a copy of this work     Papers currently archived: 91,386

External links

Setup an account with your affiliations in order to access resources via your University's proxy server

Through your library

Similar books and articles

Hybridizing Moral Expressivism and Moral Error Theory.Toby Svoboda - 2011 - Journal of Value Inquiry 45 (1):37-48.
What is the Problem with Fundamental Moral Error?Sebastian Köhler - 2015 - Australasian Journal of Philosophy 93 (1):161-165.
Moral Error Theory and the Belief Problem.Jussi Suikkanen - 2013 - In Russ Shafer-Landau (ed.), Oxford Studies in Metaethics: Volume 8. Oxford University Press. pp. 168-194.
A Defense of Descriptive Moral Content.Jeff Wisdom - 2009 - Southern Journal of Philosophy 47 (3):285-300.
The 'Now What' Problem for error theory.Matt Lutz - 2014 - Philosophical Studies 171 (2):351-371.
After Moral Error Theory, After Moral Realism.Stephen Ingram - 2015 - Southern Journal of Philosophy 53 (2):227-248.
The possibility of morality.Phil Brown - 2013 - Philosophical Studies 163 (3):627-636.
Elaborating Expressivism: Moral judgments, Desires and Motivation.John Eriksson - 2014 - Ethical Theory and Moral Practice 17 (2):253-267.
The Nature of Moral Judgments: Expressivism Vs. Descriptivism.Xiaomei Yang - 1999 - Dissertation, The University of Nebraska - Lincoln
The subjectivist consequences of expressivism.Jussi Suikkanen - 2009 - Pacific Philosophical Quarterly 90 (3):364-387.

Analytics

Added to PP
2015-10-21

Downloads
29 (#538,668)

6 months
6 (#512,819)

Historical graph of downloads
How can I increase my downloads?

Citations of this work

Sorting Out Solutions to the Now-What Problem.François Jaquet - 2020 - Journal of Ethics and Social Philosophy 17 (3).
Utilitarianism for the Error Theorist.François Jaquet - 2020 - The Journal of Ethics 25 (1):39-55.
The belief problem for moral error theory.Wouter Floris Kalf - 2023 - Inquiry: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Philosophy 66 (4):492-513.
Which answers to the now what question collapse into abolitionism (if any)?Wouter Kalf - forthcoming - Inquiry: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Philosophy.
Tiantai Metaethics.Jason Dockstader - 2022 - Australasian Journal of Philosophy 100 (2):215-229.

View all 10 citations / Add more citations

References found in this work

What is the Frege-Geach problem?Mark Schroeder - 2008 - Philosophy Compass 3 (4):703-720.
Meta‐ethics and the problem of creeping minimalism.James Dreier - 2004 - Philosophical Perspectives 18 (1):23–44.
Can We Believe the Error Theory?Bart Streumer - 2013 - Journal of Philosophy 110 (4):194-212.
Moral fictionalism versus the rest.Daniel Nolan, Greg Restall & Caroline West - 2005 - Australasian Journal of Philosophy 83 (3):307 – 330.
Meta‐Ethics and The Problem of Creeping Minimalism.James Dreier - 2004 - Philosophical Perspectives 18 (1):23-44.

View all 11 references / Add more references