James Laing

In this article, I consider the prospects for ‘Naturalism’, the view that our nature as social animals precludes us from being able to cultivate a state of indifference to social esteem. Despite its philosophical interest and intuitive appeal, Naturalism has received little in the way of detailed philosophical elaboration. Drawing on work by Bernard Williams, I develop a version of Naturalism which prioritises the idea that human beings characteristically have a natural commitment to a life lived in community with others, and that it is this commitment which precludes us from being able to intentionally cultivate indifference to social esteem.

In this paper, I argue that we face a challenge in understanding the relationship between the ‘value-oriented’ and ‘other-oriented’ dimensions of shame. On the one hand, an emphasis on shame's value-oriented dimension leads naturally to ‘The Self-Evaluation View’, an account which faces a challenge in explaining shame's other-oriented dimension. This is liable to push us towards ‘The Social Evaluation View’. However The Social Evaluation View faces the opposite challenge of convincingly accommodating shame's ‘value-oriented’ dimension. After rejecting one attempt to chart a middle course between these extremes, I argue that progress can be made if we reject the widespread assumption that the other-oriented dimension of shame is best understood primarily terms of our concern with the way we appear to others. Instead, I outline an account which treats shame as manifesting our desire primarily for interpersonal connection and which elucidates the property of shamefulness in terms of merited avoidance.