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1798Moral Realism and ArbitrarinessSouthern Journal of Philosophy 43 (1): 109-129. 2005.In this paper I argue (i) that choosing to abide by realist moral norms would be as arbitrary as choosing to abide by the mere preferences of a God (a difficulty akin to the Euthyphro dilemma raised for divine command theorists); in both cases we would lack reason to prefer these standards to alternative codes of conduct. I further develop this general line of thought by arguing in particular (ii) that we would lack any noncircular justification to concern ourselves with any such realist normati…Read more
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1612Autonomy, agency, and the value of enduring beliefsCanadian Journal of Philosophy 40 (1). 2010.My central thesis is that philosophers considering questions of epistemic value ought to devote greater attention to the enduring nature of beliefs. I begin by arguing that a commonly drawn analogy between beliefs and actions is flawed in important respects, and that a better, more fruitful analogue for belief would be desire, or a similarly enduring state of an agent. With this in hand, I argue that treating beliefs as enduring, constitutive states of agents allows us to capture the importance …Read more
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310Ronald Sandler and Philip Cafaro, Environmental Virtue Ethics (review)Environmental Ethics 28 (4): 429-32. 2006.A short review of "Environmental Virtue Ethics" (2005), a collection edited by Ronald Sandler and Philip Cafaro.
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29Alan Thomas, Value and Context: The Nature of Moral and Political Knowledge (review)Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews 2007 (9). 2007.This is, surprisingly enough, a review of Alan Thomas' "Value and Context: The Nature of Moral and Political Knowledge". A very nice book. More details in the review itself.
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1260Other–regarding epistemic virtuesRatio 15 (3). 2002.Epistemologists often assume that an agent’s epistemic goal is simply to acquire as much knowledge as possible for herself. Drawing on an analogy with ethics and other practices, I argue that being situated in an epistemic community introduces a range of epistemic virtues (and goals) which fall outside of those typically recognized by both individualistic and social epistemologists. Candidate virtues include such traits as honesty, integrity (including an unwillingness to misuse one’s status as …Read more
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1594Friendship and epistemic normsPhilosophical Studies 165 (2): 349-370. 2013.Simon Keller and Sarah Stroud have both argued that the demands of being a good friend can conflict with the demands of standard epistemic norms. Intuitively, good friends will tend to seek favorable interpretations of their friends’ behaviors, interpretations that they would not apply to strangers; as such they seem prone to form unjustified beliefs. I argue that there is no such clash of norms. In particular, I argue that friendship does not require us to form beliefs about our friends in the …Read more
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303Peter Heinegg, ed., Mortalism: Readings on the Meaning of Life (review)Philosophy in Review 24 (1): 22. 2004.
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868Moral response-dependence, ideal observers, and the motive of duty: Responding to ZangwillErkenntnis 60 (3): 357-369. 2004.Moral response-dependent metaethical theories characterize moral properties in terms of the reactions of certain classes of individuals. Nick Zangwill has argued that such theories are flawed: they are unable to accommodate the motive of duty. That is, they are unable to provide a suitable reason for anyone to perform morally right actions simply because they are morally right. I argue that Zangwill ignores significant differences between various approvals, and various individuals, and that mora…Read more
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226Inner DiversityPhilosophy in the Contemporary World 8 (2): 27-35. 2001.I propose a modified virtue ethics, grounded in an analogy between ecosystems and human personalities. I suggest that we understand ourselves as possessing changing systems of inter-related sub personalities with different virtues, and view our characters as flexible and evolving.
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178Bernard E. Rollin, The Unheeded Cry: Animal Consciousness, Animal Pain, and Science Reviewed by (review)Philosophy in Review 19 (4): 281-282. 1999.
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126The handbook of virtue ethics (edited book)Acumen Publishing. 2014.Virtue ethics has emerged as a distinct field within moral theory - whether as an alternative account of right action or as a conception of normativity which departs entirely from the obligatoriness of morality - and has proved itself invaluable to many aspects of contemporary applied ethics. Virtue ethics now flourishes in philosophy, sociology and theology and its applications extend to law, politics and bioethics. 'The handbook of virtue ethics' brings together leading international scholars …Read more
Hamilton, New York, United States of America
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Epistemology |
Normative Ethics |
Environmental Ethics |
Value Theory |
Meta-Ethics |
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Epistemology |
Aesthetics |
Applied Ethics |
Meta-Ethics |
Normative Ethics |
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