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1Hume on the Artificial VirtuesIn Paul Russell (ed.), The Oxford Handbook of David Hume, Oxford University Press. 2016.In the Treatise, Hume offers a detailed account of what he calls the artificial virtues: of justice, of fidelity to promises, and of allegiance to political authority, among others. According to virtually everyone, Hume’s discussion of these artificial virtues—and especially of the conventions on which he argues they depend—is inspired, rich, and subtle. At the same time, also according to virtually everyone, Hume’s discussion is deeply puzzling. Indeed, many have thought the puzzles so deep as …Read more
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Rationality, Rules, and Ideals: Critical Essays on Bernard Gert’s Moral Theory (edited book)Rowman and Littlefield. 2002.
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3ContractarianismIn Hugh LaFollette & Ingmar Persson (eds.), The Blackwell Guide to Ethical Theory, Blackwell. pp. 332-353. 2013.As a general approach to moral and political thought, contractarianism has had a long and distinguished history – its roots are easily traced as far back as Plato's Republic, where Glaucon advanced it as a view of justice, and its influential representatives include Grotius, Pufendorf, Hobbes, Locke, Rousseau, Hume, and Kant. In various ways, to various purposes, and against the background of various assumptions, each of these philosophers offered contractarian arguments for the views they defen…Read more
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2PPE as an intellectual enterpriseIn Chris Melenovsky (ed.), Routledge Handbook of Philosophy, Politics, and Economics, Routledge. 2022.
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Hume on Practical Morality and Inert ReasonIn Russ Shafer-Landau (ed.), Oxford Studies in Metaethics: Volume Iii, Oxford University Press. 2008.
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58Real world theory, complacency, and aspirationPhilosophical Studies 178 (7): 2365-2384. 2020.Just how realistic about human nature and real possibilities must a theory of justice, or a moral theory, more generally, be? Lines have been drawn, with some holding that idealizing away from reality is indispensable and others maintaining that utopian thinking is not just useless but irrelevant. In Utopophobia David Estlund defends the value of utopian theory. At his most modest, Estlund claims that it is a legitimate approach, not ruled out of court by anti-idealists on entirely inadequate gr…Read more
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40Do normative facts matter... To what is feasible?Social Philosophy and Policy 33 (1-2): 434-456. 2016.
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49On ‘Cooperation’Analyse & Kritik 40 (1): 107-130. 2018.The term ‘cooperation’ is widely used in social and political and biological and economic theory. Perhaps for this reason, the term takes on a variety of meanings and it is not always clear in many settings what aspect of an interaction is being described. This paper has the modest aim of sorting through some of this variety of meanings; and exploring, against that background, when and why cooperation might be of value, or be required, or constitute a virtue.
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31The Natural Philosophy of Leibniz. K. Okruhlik, J. Brown (review)Philosophy of Science 56 (1): 173-174. 1989.
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1Realism and Moral EpistemologyDissertation, University of Pittsburgh. 1986.From Plato to G. E. Moore, moral theorists commonly and confidently embraced moral realism: they simply assumed that at least some moral claims were true. Until this century, their shared assumption was relatively unproblematic. Recently, however, moral realism has come under severe attack, and along the way moral theory itself has become suspect. Against moral realism anti-realists have maintained that all moral claims are cognitively empty , or that all moral claims are false . These positions…Read more
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13Coherence and Models for Moral TheorizingPacific Philosophical Quarterly 66 (1-2): 170-190. 1985.
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Leibniz, Materialism, and the Relational Account of Space and TimeStudia Leibnitiana 16 (n/a): 204. 1984.Leibniz' Verteidigung einer relationalen Auffassung von Raum und Zeit im Briefwechsel mit Clarke nimmt in keiner Weise Bezug auf Monaden. Infolgedessen haben einige Leibniz-Interpreten angenommen, Leibniz' relationale Auffassung von Raum und Zeit könne -wenn man sie hinreichend abstrakt versteht -von seiner außerordentlich mentalistischen Ontologie losgelöst werde. In der Tat hat der Gedanke einer Trennung der beiden Lehren etwas Bestechendes, da die relationale Auffassung plausibler erscheint a…Read more
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112Functional explanations and reasons as causesPhilosophical Perspectives 3 137-164. 1989.If we assume that a conceptual connection does hold between reasons and action, the arguments for both theses are strikingly simple. In defense of the first thesis, all that need be added is Hume's Principle: between cause and effect only a (logically) contingent relation holds. For given Hume's Principle, and the conceptual connection (which after all is not a contingent one), it follows that no causal connection holds. In defense of the second thesis, all that need be added is one assumption a…Read more
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ContractarianismIn Hugh LaFollette - (ed.), The Blackwell Guide to Ethical Theory, Blackwell. pp. 247-267. 1999.
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17Hume: Moral Philosophy (edited book)Hackett Publishing Company. 2006.A genuine understanding of Hume's extraordinarily rich, important, and influential moral philosophy requires familiarity with all of his writings on vice and virtue, the passions, the will, and even judgments of beauty--and that means familiarity not only with large portions of _A Treatise of Human Nature, but also with An Enquiry Concerning the Principles of Morals_ and many of his essays as well. This volume is the one truly comprehensive collection of Hume's work on all of these topics. Geoff…Read more
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70Contractarianism, as a general approach to moral and political thought, has perspective I offer, however, is not scrupulously historical. I smooth over a good deal of the twists and turns that due care to the historical record would had a long and distinguished history -- its roots are easily traced as far back as..
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252Mill's “Proof” of the Principle of Utility: A More than Half-Hearted DefenseSocial Philosophy and Policy 18 (2): 330. 2001.How many serious mistakes can a brilliant philosopher make in a single paragraph? Many think that Mill answers this question by example—in the third paragraph of Chapter IV of Utilitarianism. Here is the notorious paragraph: The only proof capable of being given that an object is visible, is that people actually see it. The only proof that a sound is audible, is that people hear it: and so of the other sources of our experience. In like manner, I apprehend, the sole evidence it is possible to pr…Read more
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28Desires... and Beliefs... of One's OwnIn Manuel Vargas (ed.), Rational and Social Agency: The Philosophy of Michael Bratman, Oxford University Press. pp. 129-151. 2014.On one influential view, a person acts autonomously, doing what she genuinely values, if she acts on a desire that is her own, which is (on this account) a matter of it being appropriately ratified at a higher level. This view faces two problems. It doesn’t generalize, as it should, to an account of when a belief is an agent’s own, and does not let one distinguish between desires (and beliefs) happening to be one's own and their being the ones a person would need to have in order to be autonomou…Read more
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340Being a realist about relativism (in ethics)Philosophical Studies 61 (1-2): 155-176. 1991.How should a moral realist respond to the (seemingly) abundant evidence diversity provides for relativism? Many think there is only one reasonable response: abandon moral realism. Against them, I argue that moral realists can stand their ground in the face of moral diversity without relying on excessively optimistic arguments or unrealistic assumptions. In the process, I defend two theses: (i) that, far from being incompatible with moral realism, many plausible versions of relativism are _versio…Read more
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44On the relevance of ignorance to the demands of moralityIn Rationality, Rules, and Ideals: Critical Essays on Bernard Gert’s Moral Theory, Rowman and Littlefield. pp. 51-70. 2002.In Morality, Bernard Gert argues that the fundamental demands of morality are well articulated by ten distinct, and relatively simple, rules. These rules, he holds, are such that any person, no matter what her circumstances or interests, would be rational in accepting, and guiding her choices by, them. The rules themselves are comfortably familiar (e.g. “Do not kill,” “Do not deceive,” “Keep your promises”) and sit well as intuitively plausible. Yet the rules are not, Gert argues, to be accepted…Read more
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University of North Carolina, Chapel HillDepartment of PhilosophyMorehead-Cain Alumni Distinguished Professor
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University of EdinburghRegular Faculty (Part-time)
Chapel Hill, North Carolina, United States of America
Areas of Interest
Epistemology |
Meta-Ethics |
17th/18th Century Philosophy |