This book brings integrity to the center of philosophical conversations about morality and traces its roots as a philosophical idea to the American pragmatist tradition.

Environmental ethicists do not often notice the power of stories to shape attitudes about our environment and its inhabitants. I argue that a pragmatist understanding of morality enables stories—and narratives generally—to shape attitudes and beliefs that have objective moral legitimacy. The Lorax, as well as other stories and narrative accounts, are not just children’s stories, but are essential tools for expressing objective moral concern about our environment. Michael Sandel’s book Justice expresses a pragmatist perspective about justice and the good that (...) accords with this conclusion. The Lorax demands justice for the human environment. (shrink)

Essays discuss active and passive euthanasia, the right to die, and the care of the terminally ill.

Essays cover the abortion situation before Roe v. Wade, Christians and abortion, abortion and the Constitution, abortion and moral philosophy, and the feminist perspective.

Book reviewed in this article: Animal Experimentation: The Moral Issues. Edited by Robert M. Baird and Stuart E. Rosenbaum.

This paper continues the discussion of the theory of eliminative materialism. The argument of the paper is that there is a simple principle about denotation--Called "the principle of the use of inter-Denoting terms"--Which can be seen to be clearly and necessarily true, And also to be inconsistent with the theory of eliminative materialism.

In what follows I want to endorse and to reinforce what seems to me a pragmatic, and more specifically a Deweyan, account of the dim prospects for traditional moral theory. I want further to describe a role for moral philosophy that accepts the demise of moral theory, a role exemplified by Dewey himself in his insistence on the place of intelligence and reflection in a satisfactory life. Dewey’s insistence on intelligence and reflection in the good life gives rise to a (...) large–scale moral ideal, the ideal of the reflective life; I describe that ideal and contrast it with some others. (shrink)

In what follows I want to endorse and to reinforce what seems to me a pragmatic, and more specifically a Deweyan, account of the dim prospects for traditional moral theory. I want further to describe a role for moral philosophy that accepts the demise of moral theory, a role exemplified by Dewey himself in his insistence on the place of intelligence and reflection in a satisfactory life. Dewey’s insistence on intelligence and reflection in the good life gives rise to a (...) large–scale moral ideal, the ideal of the reflective life; I describe that ideal and contrast it with some others. (shrink)

Talks about American pragmatism that is a fertile soil for growth in Western religious thought.

Pragmatism and the Reflective Life explains the moral perspective embedded in the pragmatist tradition of American philosophy and offers pragmatist moral thought as an alternative to analytic moral theory. By contrasting the commitments of pragmatism with most Western philosophical traditions, this book brings into focus the inclusive idealism that informs the American intellectual tradition.

Pragmatism and the Reflective Life explains the moral perspective embedded in the pragmatist tradition of American philosophy and offers pragmatist moral thought as an alternative to analytic moral theory. By contrasting the commitments of pragmatism with most Western philosophical traditions, this book brings into focus the inclusive idealism that informs the American intellectual tradition.

This paper seeks to find a middle way between the views of hume and kant on the issue of the motivation of action-hume holding reason to be important in the production of action, and kant holding action in accord with reason alone to be possible. it further suggests that sustaining the middle way requires insisting on an account of the nature of values different from that held by either hume or kant.

Some American intellectual traditions, although pristine in appearance, are racist at their core. This book reveals the racism inherent in those Platonist and Enlightenment moral traditions that motivate much contemporary rhetoric. Part One contains five chapters of substantial critique, while Part Two contains four chapters of constructive suggestion explaining how indigenous American traditions of thought about morality avoid the racism of conventional Western moral thought that dominates political rhetoric. This book, because of its focus, thesis, and brevity, will be useful (...) in a number of academic contexts, including political science, American studies, philosophy, sociology, and also to the larger educated public. (shrink)

The charge of relativism is regularly leveled against pragmatists. The best response to this charge appears in the work of John Dewey. Contemporary pragmatists such as Richard Rorty and Hilary Putnam frequently bear the brunt of that charge, although they do not rebut the charge as effectively as does Dewey himself. This essay brings focus to the charge of relativism against pragmatists and turns it aside by recourse to an essay of Dewey’s from 1908 that specifically focuses on issues of (...) knowledge. This essay also explains how what we think of as a priori arts—logic, mathematics, ethics, ontology, etc.—appear differently from the humanizing perspective of pragmatism. (shrink)