James F. Shekleton

Shekleton concentrates on the arrangements that people make among themselves in addressing the problems of daily life. He finds that many moral comments about particular cases are marked by the thought that when people who have entered into arrangements have no overriding reasons to quit the arrangements, they should do as they said they would do. This thought qualifies as a moral principle. Shekleton argues that any attempt to think that this principle might be wrong produces a distorted conception of human life. ;Shekleton concludes that some moral principles are immune to the epistemological troubles that philosophers have identified. He completes his study with a discussion of the epistemological classification of those principles and of their role in moral dialogue. ;Shekleton attacks this conclusion by examining the need to appeal to evidence to establish moral principles. He contends that some principles cannot be wrong. Furthermore, he argues that when moral principles cannot be wrong, the attempt to establish them by appeals to evidence is fatuous. ;Having seen, not only that moral principles are not correct by virtue of their meanings, but also the trouble in establishing their correctness by appeal to evidence, philosophers conclude that moral principles lack epistemological foundations. Then they suggest that attitudes, feelings, upbringing, or ways of life form the basis for the confidence people have in moral principles. ;The rub comes with an effort to establish the correctness of moral principles. Seeing that moral principles are not correct by virtue of their meanings, philosophers try to establish their correctness by looking for evidence which could confirm them. This project leads to trouble. ;Evidence which could confirm moral principles must be found by turning to particular cases. But the philosophical picture of moral thought has it that the manner in which specific cases are regarded is a function of moral principles. Hence, the insistence that particular cases confirm moral principles bespeaks a prior allegiance to the principles in question. Thus, it is futile to try to establish moral principles by means of evidence: moral evidence is not independent of moral principles. ;The dissertation is a critical examination of the common philosophical view that moral principles lack epistemological foundations. ;Certain consequences of a philosophical picture of moral thought often lead philosophers to suppose that moral principles lack such foundations. The picture represents moral thought as a measuring process whereby people apply moral standards or principles to the actions and events that surround them. The ways in which people regard specific cases are said to be functions of the principles they employ