This chapter discusses the prospects for logical, semantic, metaphysical, and epistemic characterisations of the autonomy of ethics.

There are various ways of characterising Hume’s dictum that ‘you can’t get an ought from an is.’ Contributors to the literature directly addressing this question focus on logical characterisations of autonomy theses. Such theses maintain that certain logical relations do not obtain between ethical and non-ethical sentences, for instance that no non-ethical sentences logically entail an ethical sentence. I argue that this focus on logical autonomy is a mistake. The thesis so important to our metaethicists is not a (...) logical thesis but a metaphysical one. The relevant metaphysical autonomy thesis maintains that ethical facts are not fully grounded just in non-ethical facts. I defend this characterization. I also defend the converse thesis that all facts partly grounded in ethical facts are ethical facts. I then argue that this pair of theses can help with debates about the plausibility of nihilism and the classification of revisionary metaethical theses. (shrink)

My first paper on the Is/Ought issue. The young Arthur Prior endorsed the Autonomy of Ethics, in the form of Hume’s No-Ought-From-Is (NOFI) but the later Prior developed a seemingly devastating counter-argument. I defend Prior's earlier logical thesis (albeit in a modified form) against his later self. However it is important to distinguish between three versions of the Autonomy of Ethics: Ontological, Semantic and Ontological. Ontological Autonomy is the thesis that moral judgments, to be true, (...) must answer to a realm of sui generis non-natural PROPERTIES. Semantic autonomy insists on a realm of sui generis non-natural PREDICATES which do not mean the same as any natural counterparts. Logical Autonomy maintains that moral conclusions cannot be derived from non-moral premises.-moral premises with the aid of logic alone. Logical Autonomy does not entail Semantic Autonomy and Semantic Autonomy does not entail Ontological Autonomy. But, given some plausible assumptions Ontological Autonomy entails Semantic Autonomy and given the conservativeness of logic – the idea that in a valid argument you don’t get out what you haven’t put in – Semantic Autonomy entails Logical Autonomy. So if Logical Autonomy is false – as Prior appears to prove – then Semantic and Ontological Autonomy would appear to be false too! I develop a version of Logical Autonomy (or NOFI) and vindicate it against Prior’s counterexamples, which are also counterexamples to the conservativeness of logic as traditionally conceived. The key concept here is an idea derived in part from Quine - that of INFERENCE-RELATIVE VACUITY. I prove that you cannot derive conclusions in which the moral terms appear non-vacuously from premises from which they are absent. But this is because you cannot derive conclusions in which ANY (non-logical) terms appear non-vacuously from premises from which they are absent Thus NOFI or Logical Autonomy comes out as an instance of the conservativeness of logic. This means that the reverse entailment that I have suggested turns out to be a mistake. The falsehood of Logical Autonomy would not entail either the falsehood Semantic Autonomy or the falsehood of Ontological Autonomy, since Semantic Autonomy only entails Logical Autonomy with the aid of the conservativeness of logic of which Logical Autonomy is simply an instance. Thus NOFI or Logical Autonomy is vindicated, but it turns out to be a less world-shattering thesis than some have supposed. It provides no support for either non-cognitivism or non-naturalism. (shrink)

There has recently been a revival of interest in ‘naturalizing’ ethics. A naturalization seeks to vindicate ethical realism — the idea that ethical judgments can be true reflections of a moral reality — without violating the naturalist constraint that science sets the limits of ontology. The recent revival has been prompted by examples of successful scientific reduction, and by the emergence of new, nonreductive naturalist strategies. In this paper, I argue against such naturalist approaches to ethics. My argument (...) builds on the traditional one offered by G.E. Moore, namely that a naturalization would fail to respect an existing difference between the meanings of moral and naturalistic terms. I defend this line of argument against the common claim that it cannot block ‘synthetic’ property identities, ones grounded not in meaning equivalences but in empirical discoveries. I then go on to show that the Moorean argument can make trouble even for recent revisionist and nonreductive naturalist approaches. (shrink)

In Ethics and the Autonomy of Philosophy, Bernard Walker sets out with two objectives. First, Walker argues that ethics is autonomous as a discipline. Oftentimes ethics books, from a Christian perspective, lean toward grounding ethics in theology or in biblical proof texting. Walker departs from this tradition. Ethics grounded in theology entails a limited scope for those doing ethics in that the Christian God must be assumed for both Christian and non-Christian when at (...) the table of ethical dialogue. For the non-Christian, this loads the dice and shuts down ethical consensus and dialogue, if not ethical truth. With that said, this book does not depart from Christian ethical views on such issues as the sanctity of life, antiracism, the death penalty, the objectivity of ethics, and the importance of integrating faith into ethics; however, Walker does so from a common denominator of philosophy rather than theology. Second, Walker ventures into the streets and engages the man/woman on the streets approach to ethics and ethical decision-making. He points out the shortcomings of the ubiquitous views of the man/woman on the streets, viz., cultural relativism, skepticism, and the attitude that ethics is merely a matter of personal choice. (shrink)

This article considers the value of adopting a code of professional ethics for teachers. After having underlined how a code of ethics stands to benefits a community of educators – namely, by providing a mechanism for regulating autonomy and promoting a shared professional ethic – the article examines the principal arguments against codes of ethics. Three arguments are presented and analyzed in light of the codes of teacher ethics in place elsewhere in Canada. We conclude (...) that a code of ethics must meet three conditions in order for it to be favorable to autonomous judgment rather than blind adhesion to pre-established norms: openness of meaning, space for dissidence, and avoidance of moralistic language. (shrink)

Are there good arguments from Is to Ought? Toomas Karmo has claimed that there are trivially valid arguments from Is to Ought, but no sound ones. I call into question some key elements of Karmo’s argument for the “logical autonomy of ethics”, and show that attempts to use it as part of an overall case for moral skepticism would be self-defeating.

Thomas Reid has the unusual distinction of arriving at a metaethical position very much like G. E. Moore’s via a route very similar to that employed by the Kantians. That is, Reid embraces a version of nonnaturalist moral realism by appeal not to open question-style considerations but to a particular account of agency. In this essay, we reconstruct Reid’s agency-centered argument for his constitutivist version of moral nonnaturalism, highlighting its commitments. Having presented Reid’s argument, we close by considering a prominent (...) contemporary Kantian view, namely, Christine Korsgaard’s, and identifying where, despite their common commitments, Reid and Korsgaard part company. The comparison, we suggest, is instructive because it allows us to see more clearly why the link between agency-centered approaches to ethical theorizing and nonrealist, constitutivist views of morality, such as Korsgaard’s, is deeply contingent. (shrink)

Among different types of autonomy of ethics, semantic autonomy seems to be the most interesting. It is a thesis about irreducibility of meaning of ethical terms to some other types of discourse. The paper proposes an argument for the semantic autonomy of ethics, based on a detailed interpretation of the Open Question Argument by G.E. Moore, and followed up by the reading of Philippa Foot's argument about weak objectivity of evaluative meaning of ethical terms. The (...) result of investigation gives the two-fold picture of modern understanding of morality: irrevisability of moral demands as attempted by any theoretical armchair endeavors, which are external to the moral practice, and democratic intersubjectivity of moral discourse. (shrink)

Since the time of Hume, many philosophers have thought it impossible to deduce an ‘Ought’ from an ‘Is,’ or in general to deduce ‘ethical sentences’ from purely ‘factual sentences.’ This is the thesis of the logical autonomy of ethics. I consider a more recent argument by Toomas Karmo in support of the autonomism, but show its limitations in the context of justification skepticism about ethics.

Toomas Karmo claims that his taxonomy of ethical sentences has the result that there does not exist a sound argument with all non-ethical premises and an ethical conclusion. In a recent paper, Mark T. Nelson argues against this claim. Nelson presents a sound argument that he takes to be such that (i) Karmo’s taxonomy classifies that argument’s single premise as non-ethical and (ii) Karmo’s taxonomy classifies that argument’s conclusion as ethical. I attempt to show that Nelson is mistaken about (ii). (...) For any possible world at which the premise of Nelson’s argument is true, Karmo’s taxonomy classifies the conclusion of Nelson’s argument as non-ethical. (shrink)

Algorithms influence every facet of modern life: criminal justice, education, housing, entertainment, elections, social media, news feeds, work… the list goes on. Delegating important decisions to machines, however, gives rise to deep moral concerns about responsibility, transparency, freedom, fairness, and democracy. Algorithms and Autonomy connects these concerns to the core human value of autonomy in the contexts of algorithmic teacher evaluation, risk assessment in criminal sentencing, predictive policing, background checks, news feeds, ride-sharing platforms, social media, and election interference. (...) Using these case studies, the authors provide a better understanding of machine fairness and algorithmic transparency. They explain why interventions in algorithmic systems are necessary to ensure that algorithms are not used to control citizens' participation in politics and undercut democracy. This title is also available as Open Access on Cambridge Core. (shrink)

This paper formulates a kind of divine command ethical theory intended to comport with two major views: that basic moral principles are necessary truths and that necessary truths are not determined by divine will. The theory is based on the possibility that obligatoriness can be a theological property even if its grounds are such that the content of our obligations has a priori limits. As developed in the paper, the proposed divine command theory is compatible with the centrality of God (...) in practical ethics; it provides an account of a divine command morality as a set of internalized moral standards; and it is consistent with the autonomy of ethics conceived as a domain in which knowledge is possible independently of reliance on theology or religion. (shrink)

The bioethical principle of respect for a person’s bodily autonomy is central to biomedical and healthcare ethics. In this article, we argue that this concept of autonomy is often annulled in the maternity field, due to the maternal two-in-one body (and the obstetric focus on the foetus over the woman) and the history of medical paternalism in Western medicine and obstetrics. The principle of respect for autonomy has therefore become largely rhetorical, yet can hide all manner (...) of unethical practice. We propose that large institutions that prioritize a midwife–institution relationship over a midwife–woman relationship are in themselves unethical and inimical to the midwifery philosophy of care. We suggest that a focus on care ethics has the potential to remedy these problems, by making power relationships visible and by prioritizing the relationship above abstract ethical principles. (shrink)

Antidepressant medication and evidence-based psychotherapy have largely equivalent efficacy in the management of the common, less severe grades of depression. As a result, several national guidelines recommend that either can be used in the treatment of this disorder. Psychotherapy, however, differs in that it assists insight into how the depressed person appraises and manages the stressors that frequently trigger depressive episodes. I argue that the self-knowledge achieved through psychotherapy has moral value in that it promotes the autonomy of stressor-related (...) decisions. I further argue that such an effect comprises a compelling moral reason for doctors to see evidence-based psychotherapy not as merely optional, but as a necessary treatment for their patients with depression. (shrink)

Due to the domain characteristics of business ethics, a contractarian theory for business ethics will need to be essentially different from the contract model as it is applied to other domains. Much of the current criticism of contractarian business ethics (CBE) can be traced back to autonomy, one of its three boundary conditions. After explaining why autonomy is so important, this article considers the notion carefully vis à vis the contracting partners in the contractarian approaches (...) in business ethics. Autonomy is too demanding a condition for the realm of CBE. But a less stringent version of the contract may be possible, a version which uses the contract as a heuristic device, which merely requires moral responsibility. Furthermore, it is argued that views of (human) agency and the moral subject should be made explicit in such a theory. (shrink)

In The Autonomy of Morality Charles Larmore challenges two ideas that have shaped the modern mind. The world, he argues, is not a realm of value-neutral fact, nor does human freedom consist in imposing principles of our own devising on an alien reality. Rather, reason consists in being responsive to reasons for thought and action that arise from the world itself. Larmore shows that the moral good has an authority that speaks for itself. Only in this light does the (...) true basis of a liberal political order come into view, as well as the role of unexpected goods in the makeup of a life lived well. (shrink)

The purpose of this study was to test a causal model of ethical conflict in practice and autonomy in a sample of 254 nurse practitioners working in the primary care areas of family health, pediatrics, adult health and obstetrics/gynecology in the state of Maryland. A test of the model was conducted using a path analytic approach with LISREL 8.30 hypothesizing individual, organizational and societal/market factors influencing ethical conflict in practice and autonomy. Maximum likelihood estimation was used to estimate (...) the parameters most likely to have generated the data. Forty-five percent of the total variance in ethical conflict was explained by the variables of ethical environment and ethical concern. Ethical concern, idealistic philosophy, ethics education in continuing education, percentage of client population enrolled in managed care, and market penetration explained 15% of the total variance in autonomy. The findings of this study indicate that the causal model of ethical conflict in practice and autonomy is consistent with the data and contributed to a fuller understanding of clinical decision making associated with practicing in a managed care environment. The final model supported a conceptual framework that is inclusive of three domains: individual, organizational and societal/market variables. (shrink)

In this paper, I summarize the medical evidence regarding the auditory and non-auditory effects of noise and analyse the ethics of noise and personal autonomy in the social environment using a variety of case studies. Key to this discussion is the fact that, contrary to the traditional definition of noise, sound can be noise without being annoying, as the evidence shows that some sounds can harm without being perceived. Ultimately, I develop a theory of ‘noisy autonomy’ with (...) which to guide us in discussing the public health ethics of noise and other sounds. (shrink)

Das ethische Prinzip des Respekts vor der Autonomie des Patienten/Probanden hat in der modernen Medizin mittlerweile weltweit Bedeutung erlangt. Die Betonung der Autonomie des Patienten und Probanden in allen in der letzten Zeit verabschiedeten internationalen Deklarationen gibt dieser Tendenz unmissverständlich Ausdruck. Doch wenngleich diese Entwicklung unstrittig positiv ist, wirft sie dennoch eine Reihe von Fragen auf, die mit der Kodifizierung, Interpretation, Reichweite und Anwendung dieses universalen Prinzips verbunden sind. Die Antworten auf diese Fragen entscheiden darüber, ob Autonomie als hilfreiches, emanzipatorisches (...) oder als überforderndes, gar hegemoniales Prinzip begriffen wird. Diese normativen Probleme werden anhand von Beispielen aus der globalen Medizinethik verdeutlicht. Was in modernen Gesellschaften als Autonomie bezeichnet und für die Praxis fruchtbar gemacht wird, ist als ein soziales Konstrukt zu verstehen, nicht im Sinne einer Schimäre, sondern im Sinne einer soziokulturellen Leistung, die auf komplexen, historisch gewachsenen und kulturell geprägten Interaktionen von Gesellschaften, Institutionen und Individuen beruht. (shrink)

Das ethische Prinzip des Respekts vor der Autonomie des Patienten/Probanden hat in der modernen Medizin mittlerweile weltweit Bedeutung erlangt. Die Betonung der Autonomie des Patienten und Probanden in allen in der letzten Zeit verabschiedeten internationalen Deklarationen gibt dieser Tendenz unmissverständlich Ausdruck. Doch wenngleich diese Entwicklung unstrittig positiv ist, wirft sie dennoch eine Reihe von Fragen auf, die mit der Kodifizierung, Interpretation, Reichweite und Anwendung dieses universalen Prinzips verbunden sind. Die Antworten auf diese Fragen entscheiden darüber, ob Autonomie als hilfreiches, emanzipatorisches (...) oder als überforderndes, gar hegemoniales Prinzip begriffen wird. Diese normativen Probleme werden anhand von Beispielen aus der globalen Medizinethik verdeutlicht. Was in modernen Gesellschaften als Autonomie bezeichnet und für die Praxis fruchtbar gemacht wird, ist als ein soziales Konstrukt zu verstehen, nicht im Sinne einer Schimäre, sondern im Sinne einer soziokulturellen Leistung, die auf komplexen, historisch gewachsenen und kulturell geprägten Interaktionen von Gesellschaften, Institutionen und Individuen beruht. (shrink)

J. B. Schneewind's "The Invention of Autonomy" has been hailed as a major interpretation of modern moral thought. Schneewind's narrative, however, elides several serious interpretive issues, particularly in the transition from late medieval to early modern thought. This results in potentially distorted accounts of Thomas Aquinas, Hugo Grotius, and G. W. Leibniz. Since these thinkers play a crucial role in Schneewind's argument, uncertainty over their work calls into question at least some of Schneewind's larger agenda for the history of (...) ethics. (shrink)

The theist thesis that any true ethics must be a religious one is criticized from two different angles; it is shown that: (i) in order to avoid divine voluntarism, theism uses a supposition the acceptance of which makes arguments against autonomous ethics un- acceptable, for they inevitably beg the question; (ii) it assumes a kind of moral foun- dationalism which is, according to some Wittgensteinean arguments, utterly superfluous; the idea that any authoritative ethics needs the absolute authority (...) of God can thus be shown to be unjustified. (shrink)

In this article, I consider recent debates on the notion of procreative liberty, to argue that reproductive freedom can be understood as a form of positive freedom—that is, the freedom to make oneself according to various ethical and aesthetic principles or values. To make this argument, I draw on Michel Foucault’s later work on ethics. Both adopting and adapting Foucault’s notion of ethics as a practice of the self and of liberty, I argue that reproductive autonomy requires (...) enactment to gain meaning within the life contexts of prospective parents. Thus, I propose a shift away from the standard negative model of freedom that sees it solely as a matter of noninterference or nonimpedance, a view advocated by major commentators such as John Harris and John Robertson. Instead, reproduction should be understood as a deeply personal project of self-making that integrates both negative and positive freedom. (shrink)

Background Respect for patients’ autonomy is usually considered to be an important ethical principle in Western countries; privacy is one of the implications of such respect. Healthcare professionals frequently encounter ethical dilemmas during their practice. The past few decades have seen an increased use of courts to resolve intractable ethical dilemmas across both the developed and the developing world. However, Chinese and American bioethics differ largely due to the influence of Chinese Confucianism and Western religions, respectively, and there is (...) a dearth of comparative studies that explore cases of ethical dilemmas between China and the United States. Methods This paper discusses four typical cases with significant social impact. First, it compares two cases concerning patient privacy: the “Shihezi University Hospital Case”, in which a patient was used as a clinical teaching object without her permission, and the “New York-Presbyterian Hospital Case”, in which the hospital allowed the filming of a patient’s treatment without his consent. Second, it compares two cases regarding patient autonomy and potentially life-saving medical procedures: the “Case of Ms. L”, concerning a cohabitant’s refusal to sign a consent form for a pregnant woman’s caesarean, and the “Case of Mrs. V”, concerning a hospital’s insistence upon a blood transfusion for a dissenting patient. This paper introduces the supporting and opposing views for each case and discusses their social impact. It then compares and analyses the differences between China and the United States from cultural and legislative perspectives. Conclusions Ethical dilemmas have often occurred in China due to the late development of bioethics. However, the presence of bioethics earlier in the US than in China has not spared the US of ethical dilemmas. This paper highlights lessons and inspiration from the cases for healthcare professionals and introduces readers to the role and weight of privacy and autonomy in China and in the US from the perspectives of different cultures, religions and laws. (shrink)

We join McCarthy and Howard (2023) in advocating supported decision-making for patients with diminished mental capacity that meaningfully expands the role of trustees beyond merely channeling the i...

THE PROBLEM: MOTORCAR MORALITY AND AUTOMOBILE AGEINGAdvances in modern technology mean that cars are living longer than ever before. This raises important end-of-road-life issues, as it becomes increasingly difficult to provide leaded fuel and shelter for our hydraulically challenged, ageing automobile population. The garage is full, and off-street parking is beyond the financial scope of most low and middle income families. It is a case of rust or bust.NATURAL LAW THEORY, TRAFFIC, AND THE TRUTHSociety has long been reluctant to countenance (...) the concept of actively ending the road-life of motor vehicles, preferring to allow Nature to take its course. Simpler to let the natural phenomena of corrosion and inbuilt obsolescence take their inevitable toll, until the head gasket blows and the piston rods seize up for the last time.But can we afford to allow elderly cars to simply choke and splutter as our roads become increasingly over populated and our atmosphere ever more polluted? Old bangers demand our attention, as their paint peels, their balding tyres leave their tread at every T-junction, their suspension sags, and their chrome corrodes. Is there an alternative to the ailing alternator and the carbonised carburettor?EQUAL ROAD RIGHTSPrinciples of distributive …. (shrink)

Accounting professionals play an important role in the generation and auditing of financial statements and, given their understanding of business processes, may be relied upon in the development of organizations’ ethical infrastructures (i.e., the formal aspects of an organization’s ethical environment that are explicitly under the control of the organization). Thus, understanding and improving the work environments of accounting professionals is crucial to improving organizational ethical culture and reducing fraud. In this study, we extend prior research that documents the prevalence (...) of ethical infrastructure programs by assessing how accounting professionals, a key employee group, perceive their organizations’ ethical infrastructures. In addition, we examine whether perceptions of the effectiveness of the ethical infrastructure and professional autonomy influence accountants’ ethical judgments. Based on the responses of 378 CPAs in the United States, we find the perceived state of the ethical infrastructure across accounting work environments—both public accounting firms and other organization types—is relatively strong. However, of the five ethical infrastructure components we examine (i.e., ethics code, ethics training, ethics-based punishments and incentives, ethics reporting system, and ethics review system), only 35% of respondents indicate that their organizations have more than three of these components. Importantly, we find that perceived ethical infrastructure effectiveness and professional autonomy influence both perceptions of the ethical culture and the ethical judgments of accounting professionals. We also contribute to practice by highlighting opportunities for improvement in ethics training formats, ethics-based incentives, and ethics review systems. (shrink)

The development of modern science, as everybody knows, has come largely through naturalizing domains of inquiry that were traditionally parts of philosophy – a process that philosophers have, by and large, applauded. But could this worthwhile endeavor now move on to include critical thinking? Here we argue that critical thinking, a discipline devoted principally to the study of the normative aspects of reasoning, cannot be assimilated to purely naturalistic, descriptive studies of reasoning of the sort now prevalent in the social (...) sciences and in what is now called „experimental philosophy.‟ Critical thinking, on our view, is a discipline whose central task is not that of constructing a catalogue of common patterns of reasoning, but instead of accounting for the normative worth of such patterns. Plainly, it is an enterprise that raises philosophical questions about the nature of such normativity and requires an evaluation of possible answers. The normativity issues at stake in critical thinking are parallel in significant ways to those arising in normative ethics and traditional epistemology. And this is why successful arguments offered against attempts at eliminating or reducing the latter disciplines to the sciences could be adapted to support the philosophical autonomy of critical thinking. A glance at the naturalistic approaches to reasoning currently on offer reveals that there is so far no naturalistic account of the normativity of reasoning in the offing. Not surprisingly, naturalistic studies of reasoning concerned with such normativity either fail to account for it or simply rehash traditional philosophical accounts. In a recent study, Sripada and Stich (2005) 1 seem to assume that all there is to explaining what moral judgments are can be captured by some results of experimental tests about what people standardly make of moral norms in general (e.g., Turiel‟s moral/conventional task experiments) – perhaps together with some psychological account of the role of emotions and motivation in normative judgment.. (shrink)

It is a common view that artificial systems could play an important role in dealing with the shortage of caregivers due to demographic change. One argument to show that this is also in the interest of care-dependent persons is that artificial systems might significantly enhance user autonomy since they might stay longer in their homes. This argument presupposes that the artificial systems in question do not require permanent supervision and control by human caregivers. For this reason, they need the (...) capacity for some degree of moral decision-making and agency to cope with morally relevant situations (artificial morality). Machine ethics provides the theoretical and ethical framework for artificial morality. This article scrutinizes the question how artificial moral agents that enhance user autonomy could look like. It discusses, in particular, the suggestion that they should be designed as moral avatars of their users to enhance user autonomy in a substantial sense. (shrink)

J. B. Schneewind's The Invention of Autonomy has been hailed as a major interpretation of modern moral thought. Schneewind's narrative, however, elides several serious interpretive issues, particularly in the transition form late medieval to early modern thought. This results in potentially distorted accounts of Thomas Aquinas, Hugo Grotius, and G. W. Leibniz. Since these thinkers play a crucial role in Schneewind's argument, uncertainty over their work calls into question at least some of Schneewind's larger agenda for the history of (...) ethics. (shrink)