Pekka Väyrynen

Some theorists of normative explanation argue that we can make sense of debates between first-order moral theories such as consequentialism and its rivals only if we understand their explanations of why the right acts are right and the wrong acts are wrong as generative (e.g. grounding) explanations. Others argue that the standard form of normative explanation is, instead, some kind of unification. Neither sort of explanatory monism can account for all the explanations of particular moral facts that moral theorists seek to state and defend. This paper argues that we can do better if we accept normative explanatory pluralism, the view that at least some particular explananda in normative inquiry have more than one type of correct complete explanation. Such pluralism is supported by what goes on in actual moral inquiry, parallels an independently plausible form of pluralism about scientific explanation, and can offer principled responses to central objections.

[First published 09/2016; substantive revision 02/2021.] Evaluative terms and concepts are often divided into “thin” and “thick”. We don’t evaluate actions and persons merely as good or bad, or right or wrong, but also as kind, courageous, tactful, selfish, boorish, and cruel. The latter evaluative concepts are "descriptively thick": their application somehow involves both evaluation and a substantial amount of non-evaluative description. This article surveys various attempts to answer four fundamental questions about thick terms and concepts. (1) A “combination question”: how exactly do thick terms and concepts relate evaluation and non-evaluative description? (2) A “location question”: is evaluation somehow inherent to thick terms and concepts, such as perhaps an aspect of their meaning, or merely a feature of their use? (3) A “delineation question”: how do thick terms differ from the thin and from other kinds of evaluative terms? (4) Given answers to these questions, what broader philosophical significance and applications might thick concepts have?

In addition to thin concepts like the good, the bad and the ugly, our evaluative thought and talk appeals to thick concepts like the lewd and the rude, the selfish and the cruel, the courageous and the kind -- concepts that somehow combine evaluation and non-evaluative description. Thick concepts are almost universally assumed to be inherently evaluative in content, and many philosophers claimed them to have deep and distinctive significance in ethics and metaethics. In this first book-length treatment of thick concepts, Pekka Väyrynen argues that all this is mistaken. Through detailed attention to the language of thick concepts, he defends a novel theory on which the relationship between thick words and evaluation is best explained by general conversational and pragmatic norms. Drawing on general principles in philosophy of language, he argues that many prominent features of thick words and concepts can be explained by general factors that have nothing in particular to do with being evaluative. If evaluation is not essential to the sort of thinking we do with thick concepts, claims for the deep and distinctive significance of the thick are undermined. The Lewd, the Rude and the Nasty is a fresh and innovative treatment of an important topic in moral philosophy and sets a new agenda for future work. It will be essential reading to anyone interested in the analysis and the broader philosophical significance of evaluative and normative language.

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.