On G.E. Moore's Principia Ethica, ch. 1 (1903); Charles Leslie Stevenson's "The Emotive Meaning of Ethical Terms" (1937), and Alasdair MacIntyre's After Virtue, ch. 1-2. Is there such a thing as moral intuition? Is "good" a simple property that we all recognize but can't explain like yellow? G.E. Moore thinks that any attempt to define good in terms of properties like Continue Reading …
PREVIEW-Episode 58: What Grounds Ethical Claims? (Moore, Stevenson, MacIntyre)
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Topic for #58/#59: Is vs. Ought (G.E. Moore, C.L. Stevenson, Alasdair MacIntyre)
These two episodes cover some related approaches in 20th century ethics: First, we read Chapter 1 of G.E. Moore's Principia Ethica(1903), which argues against utilitarianism and other ethical philosophies by exposing the "naturalistic fallacy," which equates "good" with some natural property like pleasure or people's actual desires. This error, says Moore, also extends to Continue Reading …
Sam Harris Derives Ought from Is
Via OpenCulture.com, Sam Harris seems to think he has come across oughts in the wild. We just needed a big enough microscope to see them. As physicist Sean Carroll notes, there once was a man named Hume: Morality and science operate in very different ways. In science, our judgments are ultimately grounded in data; when it comes to values we have no such recourse. If I Continue Reading …