Sidgwick's theses that "if I judge any action to be right for myself, I implicitly judge it to be right for any other person whose nature and circumstances do not differ from my own in certain important respects" fails to differentiate moral judgments of importantly different kinds and, In particular, Overlooks peculiarities of a kind of judgment, Made by a prospective agent, About what "he" ought to do. The court-Martial in melville's "billy budd" is closely examined as an example. Although (...) we can speak of such an agent "finding out" what he ought to do, He is not finding out what "anyone" ought to do in such a situation, But something "about himself": something, However, Which can only be expressed in moral categories. (shrink)

Analytic particularism claims that judgments of moral wrongness are about particular acts rather than general principles. Metaphysical particularism claims that what makes true moral judgments true is not general principles but nonmoral properties of particular acts. Epistemological particularism claims that studying particular acts apart from general principles can justify beliefs in moral judgments. Methodological particularism claims that we will do better morally in everyday life if we look carefully at each particular decision as it arises and give up the search (...) for a complete moral theory. This paper raises problems for each of these versions of particularism. (shrink)

I defend moral generalism against particularism. Particularism, as I understand it, is the negation of the generalist view that particular moral facts depend on the existence of a comprehensive set of true moral principles. Particularists typically present "the holism of reasons" as powerful support for their view. While many generalists accept that holism supports particularism but dispute holism, I argue that generalism accommodates holism. The centerpiece of my strategy is a novel model of moral principles as a kind of "hedged" (...) principles that incorporate an independently plausible "basis thesis" concerning the explanation of moral reasons. The model implies that moral reasons requires the existence of a comprehensive set of true hedged principles, and so it captures generalism. But the model also offers an alternative explanation of holism, and so it undercuts much of the motivation for particularism. I defend this moderate (because holism-tolerating) form of generalism against a number of objections, and show how it can be used to defeat three distinct arguments from holism to particularism. (shrink)

I take the debate between the particularists and the principlists to be centered on the issue of whether there are true moral principles. One argument the principlists often appeal to in support of their claim that there are true moral principles is the argument from supervenience. Roughly, the argument is made up of the following three statements: (P1) If the thesis of moral supervenience holds, then there are true moral principles. (P2) The thesis of moral supervenience holds. (C) There are (...) true moral principles, and hence particularism is false. In this paper, I argue that the above argument is not sound by attacking (P1). I hold that no general supervenient/resultance base has a robust enough configuration of contextual features as to ground the existence of true moral principles. If I am right about this, I think it would be indicative of a reason to be less confident about the truth of principlism and more confident about the truth of particularism. (shrink)

Moral principles play important roles in diverse areas of moral thought, practice, and theory. Many who think of themselves as ‘moral generalists’ believe that moral principles can play these roles—that they are capable of doing so. Moral generalism maintains that moral principles can and do play these roles because true moral principles are statements of general moral fact (i.e. statements of facts about the moral attributes of kinds of actions, kinds of states of affairs, etc.) and because general moral facts (...) explain particular moral facts (i.e. facts about the moral attributes of particulars). Moral holism maintains that what is a moral reason to φ in one case may not be one in another, and may even be a moral reason not to φ given suitable circumstances. Some ‘moral particularists’ maintain that moral holism motivates scepticism about the existence of and need for moral principles, along with scepticism about the viability of principle-based approaches to ethics and moral theory. But I argue that moral holism is itself a form of moral generalism, one that takes facts about the right- and wrong-making powers of (generic) moral factors to explain certain particular moral facts—namely, the rightness and wrongness of particular actions. I also argue that a moral-theoretic version of dispositionalism—the view that dispositions, powers, or capacities are the fundamental units of explanation—explains both why moral holism is true and why moral generalism is true. (shrink)

Particularism's model of explanation is challenged on the ground that a sensible intelligibility principle requires that there must be an explanation for the difference between a good and a bad action. Raz is concerned with what it is to be guided by reason, as well as with the results of the fact that reason can often undermine particular outcomes. What determines the moral status of an action must extend beyond what the agent's reason for acting is. It is argued that (...) there is a clear distinction between the evaluative and guiding functions of reasons. (shrink)

Particularism denies that invariant valence is always possible and that it is needed in sound moral theorising. It relies on variabilism, namely the idea that the relevant features of a given situation can alter their moral valence even across seemingly similar cases. An alternative model is defended (the “disappearing model”), in which changes in the overall relevance of complex cases are explained by re-individuation of the constituent features: certain features do not alter their relevance in consequence of contextual changes, but (...) rather they disappear, either because they are embedded within larger complexes or are substituted by different features. This view is shown to be compatible with the main premises of variabilism and explanatorily superior to it. Nevertheless, it does not involve particularism, but rather a peculiar form of generalism. (shrink)

This volume brings together Nussbaum's published papers on the relationship between literature and philosophy, especially moral philosophy.

This volume brings together Nussbaum's published papers on the relationship between literature and philosophy, especially moral philosophy. The papers, many of them previously inaccessible to non-specialist readers, explore such fundamental issues as the relationship between style and content in the exploration of ethical issues; the nature of ethical attention and ethical knowledge and their relationship to written forms and styles; and the role of the emotions in deliberation and self-knowledge. Nussbaum investigates and defends a conception of ethical understanding which involves (...) emotional as well as intellectual activity, and which gives a certain type of priority to the perception of particular people and situations rather than to abstract rules. She argues that this ethical conception cannot be completely and appropriately stated without turning to forms of writing usually considered literary rather than philosophical. It is consequently necessary to broaden our conception of moral philosophy in order to include these forms. Featuring two new essays and revised versions of several previously published essays, this collection attempts to articulate the relationship, within such a broader ethical inquiry, between literary and more abstractly theoretical elements. (shrink)

The recent production of major treatises devoted to elaborating normative ethical theories and the eruption of lively debates concerning the merits of opposed normative systems have been greeted with applause. This reaction is an historical about-face, since for forty or fifty years “ethical” treatises had been attacking the pretensions of traditional moral philosophy, calling for its demise or at the least severely limiting its claims. These skeptical attacks had succeeded in seriously undermining the academic status of moral philosophy and consequently (...) moral philosophy was transformed into “metaethics,” a highly abstract and technical discipline considered much less necessary to the general education of students than what it replaced and with a diminished role in the curriculum. The recent resurgence of interest in normative ethics has generally been lauded as a sign that philosophy has rededicated itself to its proper and time-honored tasks. There is a widespread feeling that the overblown claims of twentieth century skepticism have been whittled down to innocuous proportions and thus that nothing stands in the way of proceeding to construct ethical theories. The study of normative ethical theory now enjoys such respectability and popularity that it is difficult to raise once more the uncomfortable ideas that the ideal of normative ethical theory is a false one, that vanquishing the spectre of noncognitivism is not sufficient for legitimizing it, and that the popular new justifications for the enterprise fail in mischievous ways. (shrink)

Particularism takes an extremely ecumenical view of what considerations might count as reasons and thereby threatens to ‘flatten the moral landscape’ by making it seem that there is no deep difference between, for example, pain, and shoelace color. After all, particularists have claimed, either could provide a reason provided a suitable moral context. To avoid this result, some particularists draw a distinction between default and non-default reasons. The present paper argues that all but the most deflationary ways of drawing this (...) distinction are either implausible or else insufficient to help the particularist avoid flattening the moral landscape. The difficulty can be avoided, however, if we reject particularism's extremely ecumenical view of reasons. (shrink)

1. Presumably the point of, say, inculcating a moral outlook lies in a concern with how people live. It may seem that the very idea of a moral outlook makes room for, and requires, the existence of moral theory, conceived as a discipline which seeks to formulate acceptable principles of conduct. It is then natural to think of ethics as a branch of philosophy related to moral theory, so conceived, rather as the philosophy of science is related to science. On (...) this view, the primary topic of ethics is the concept of right conduct, and the nature and justification of principles of behaviour. If there is a place for an interest in the concept of virtue, it is a secondary place. Virtue is a disposition to behave rightly; the nature of virtue is explained, as it were, from the outside in. (shrink)

This chapter sets out to distinguish the sorts of claims have been advanced under the rubric of “moral particularism,” and to sort through the insights and costs of each. In particular, it distinguishes those who are animated by suspicion of theory itself from those who aim to reconfigure — sometimes radically — the nature of theory. It defends as key the particularist insight that exceptions to substantive moral explanations are ubiquitous. It argues that the lesson of this insight is not (...) to abandon moral generalizations, but to change the picture of what they must look like to do their work. (shrink)

In this article, we present an analysis of defeasible generalizations -- generalizations which are essentially exception-laden, yet genuinely explanatory -- in terms of various notions of privileged conditions. We argue that any plausible epistemology must make essential use of defeasible generalizations so understood. We also consider the epistemic significance of the sort of understanding of context that is required for understanding of explanatory defeasible generalizations on any topic.

In this paper, I concentrate on the notion of default valency, drawing on some of the distinctions made and thoughts given in my Introduction. I motivate why the notion is important for particularists to have up their sleeves by outlining a recent debate between particularists and generalists. I then move to the main aim of the piece which is to discuss how anyone, particularist and generalist alike, might seek to distinguish reason-generating features into different types. My main aim is not (...) to argue for a specific way of dividing such features into types but to present various taxonomical options. Key Words: ethics • features • generalism • particularism • valency. (shrink)

In this brief response I argue that Sinnott‐Armstrong has underestimated the complexities that moral principles will have to circumvent if they are to survive particularist criticism. I also argue that we cannot yet accept Gert's accounts of moral relevance and of how a sound moral rule can survive exceptions.

Can someone be reasonable or justified in accepting a specific moral judgment not based on the prior acceptance of a general exceptioness moral principle, where acceptance of a general principle might be tacit or implicit and might not be expressible in language? This issue is an instance of a wider issue about direct or transductive inference. Developments in statistical learning theory show that such an inference can be more effective than alternative methods using inductive generalization and so can be reasonable. (...) This result carries over to moral transduction, although it is a difficult empirical issue whether people actually engage in any sort of transduction, including moral transduction. (shrink)

In this paper I consider what might be my best response to various difficulties and challenges that emerged at a conference held at the University of Kent in December 2004, the contributions to which are given in the same volume. I comment on Crisp's distinction between ultimate and non-ultimate reasons, and reply to McKeever and Ridge on default reasons, and to Norman on the idea of a reason for action. I don't here consider what other particularists might want to say; (...) I certainly don't think that my way of doing these things is the only possible one, but not surprisingly I am interested in seeing what resources it might have to defend itself. (shrink)

Weak particularism about reasons is the view that the normative valency of some descriptive considerations varies, while others have an invariant normative valency. A defence of this view needs to respond to arguments that a consideration cannot count in favour of any action unless it counts in favour of every action. But it cannot resort to a global holism about reasons, if it claims that there are some examples of invariant valency. This paper argues for weak particularism, and presents a (...) framework for understanding the relationships between practical reasons. A central part of this framework is the idea that there is an important kind of reason-a 'presumptive reason'-which need not be conclusive, but which is neither pro tanto nor prima facie. (shrink)

Moral particularists argue that because reasons for action are irreducibly context-dependent, the traditional quest in ethics for true and exceptionless moral principles is hopelessly misguided. In making this claim, particularists assume a general framework according to which reasons are the ground floor normative units undergirding all other normative properties and relations. They then argue that there is no cashing out in finite terms either (i) when a given non-normative feature gives rise to a reason for or against action, or (ii) (...) how the reasons that are present in a given context play off each other to determine one’s overall duties. However, the conjunction of these two theses leaves particularists without a coherent notion of a reason for action: posit too much irreducible context-dependence in the behavior of reasons, and the reasons-based framework breaks down. One upshot is that the particularists’ challenge to principle-based approaches to ethics has not, at present, been successfully made out; another upshot is that perhaps the best way to formulate that challenge involves renouncing the reasons-based framework all together. (shrink)

This paper is an attempt to answer the charge that extreme moral particularism is unable to explain the possibility of moral concepts and our ability to acquire them. This charge is based on the claim that we acquire moral concepts from experience of instances, and that the sorts of similarities that there must be between the instances are ones that only a generalist can countenance. I argue that this inference is unsound.

The central concern of McKeever & Ridge’s paper is with whether or not the moral particularist can formulate a defensible distinction between default and non-default reasons. [McKeever & Ridge 2004] But that issue is only of concern to the particularist, they argue, because it allows him or her to avoid a deeper problem, an unacceptable “flattening of the normative landscape”. The particularist ought, McKeever & Ridge claim, to view this corollary of his or her position as a serious embarrassment. Unpacking (...) the metaphor somewhat, the putative problem is that certain moral reasons seem, at their face value, directly to exhibit their relevance to moral decision and others, equally clearly, do not. Examples of the former class are, for example, the fact that an action 2 would inflict pain seems directly to indicate that this is a reason against carrying out the action. McKeever & Ridge cite as an example of an implausible candidate for direct moral relevance the fact that a person’s shoelace is a certain colour. [Little 2000, p. 291] They explain direct relevance as dependent on the content of a moral reason. It is the triviality of the content of this reason, namely, the fact that the colour of a person’s shoelaces is a certain way that makes it seem utterly implausible as a moral reason. McKeever & Ridge further argue that, “there surely is an important difference between considerations of shoelace colour and considerations of pain, pleasure, promising and the like.” [McKeever & Ridge 2004 p.2] They approvingly cite Lance & Little’s observation that an aspect of moral wisdom is that a morally wise person understands “that there is a deep difference in moral status between infliction of pain and shoelace colour”. [Lance & Little, forthcoming]. (shrink)

There may be as much philosophical controversy about how to distinguish naturalism from non-naturalism as there is about which view is correct. In spite of this widespread disagreement about the content of naturalism and non-naturalism there is considerable agreement about the status of certain historically influential philosophical accounts as non-naturalist. In particular, there is widespread agreement that G.E. Moore's account of goodness in.

In this paper, I will examine the debate between the principlists and the particularists with special focus on the question of whether there is any true and coherent set of moral principles that codifies the moral landscape metaphysically speaking. My stance on this issue is an extreme sort of particularism which gives a ‘no’ answer to the above question. Yet it is significantly different from the positions of other extremists like John McDowell, Jonathan Dancy and Margaret Little. In section 2, (...) I will explain how my position is distinguished from theirs and why it is worth exploring. In section 3, I elucidate the meaning of ‘codify’. In section 4, I examine four types of principlism that claim to codify morality and argue that none of them succeeds. In section 5, I distinguish between four models of virtue and explore what implications the failure of principlism has for normative ethics and applied ethics. (shrink)

Moral particularism denies that moral reasons present in particular cases depend on any suitable provision of moral principles. If they did, there should be invariable reasons. But reasons are holistic: whether a consideration is a reason may vary with the context. This work responds to particularism with a moderate form of generalism, according to which it is compatible with reasons holism that moral reasons are fundamentally determined by moral principles. The holism of reasons is explained by construing moral principles as (...) hedged: they determine reasons that are invariable, but only given the presence of certain suitable conditions. Both what may function as a reason and what may function as a suitable condition is determined by the given principle's normative basis---the basis on which we attribute to reasons normative force capable of justifying action. Such determinations don't happen fundamentally on a case-by-case basis, but instead set on the holism of reasons the sorts of antecedent constraints that particularism cannot accept. So, although the view rules out standard forms of generalism, it doesn't collapse into particularism. The moderate generalist view of moral metaphysics is argued also to ground better explanations of the relevant sorts of moral facts than its particularist rivals. It is also argued that generalism can regard moral principles as necessary for good moral deliberation without requiring that the deliberator represent them to herself in explicit propositional form. Psychologically, the grasp of moral principles that is required for proper responsiveness to reasons determined by principles may simply structure one's capacity to be responsive to reasons. Finally, on moderate generalism, overall moral verdicts about particular cases are a function of the relative strengths of the reasons present in them. It is argued, from the structure of value and evaluative comparisons, that the relative strengths of reasons are determined not by priority principles that order competing principles but by evaluative comparisons of the alternatives for which the competing principles specify reasons. A plausible moral epistemology is sketched on which the context-sensitivity of such comparisons doesn't make them too weak to justify moral verdicts. (shrink)