Connie Rosati

Proponents of numerous recent theories of a person's good hold that a plausible account of the good for a person must satisfy existence internalism. Yet little direct defense has been given for this position. I argue that the principal intuition behind internalism supports a stronger version of the thesis than it might appear--one that effects a "double link" to motivation. I then identify and develop the main arguments that have been or might be given in support of internalism about a person's good, showing how these arguments support this stronger version of internalism.

In this engagingly written book, Colin McGinn advances a number of related theses, most prominent among them, that moral philosophy is in need of new methodologies in order to get at neglected questions about moral character. The methodology McGinn urges involves drawing upon literature for its deep and intricate portrayals of ethical themes. This would seem a natural approach given McGinn’s substantive views about ethics. He contends that our ethical knowledge is aesthetically mediated ; he speculates that the “innateness” of ethics may be “a by-product of our innate grasp of folk psychology” which comes into play when we interpret literature; and he defends an “aesthetic theory of virtue” according to which virtue coincides with beauty of soul.

The idea that normativity and agency are importantly connected goes back at least as far as Kant. But it has recently become associated with a view called “constitutivism.” Perhaps the best-known critique of constitutivism appears in David Enoch’s article, “Agency, Shmagency,” which is the focus of this chapter. His critique of my article, “Agency and the Open Question Argument,” is briefly addressed, explaining why, contrary to his claims, I do not therein defend a form of constitutivism. It is then explained why his “shmagency challenge” does not effectively expose the real challenge faced by those who might wish to develop constitutivist theories. Finally, the chapter considers why we should take seriously the idea that normativity and agency are importantly connected, an idea that neither Enoch’s challenge nor the challenge articulated for constitutivism here does anything to defeat. Enoch has not shown that normativity won’t come from what is constitutive of agency.

As persons, beings with a capacity for autonomy, we face a certain practical task in living out our lives. At any given period we find ourselves with many desires or preferences, yet we have limited resources, and so we cannot satisfy them all. Our limited resources include insufficient economic means, of course; few of us have either the funds or the material provisions to obtain or pursue all that we might like. More significantly, though, we are limited to a single life and one of finite duration. We also age, and pursuits that were possible at earlier points within a life may become impossible at later stages; we thus encounter not only an ultimate time limit but episodic limits as well. Because we must live our lives with limited resources—material and temporal—we are pressed to choose among and to order our preferences. Without some selection and ordering, few if any of them would be satisfied, and we would be unable to live lives that are recognizably good at all. Moreover, we would be unable to function well as the autonomous beings that we are. Our practical task then is to form a coherent, stable, and attractive ordering of aims—to develop a conception of our good.