Joanna Demaree-Cotton

This chapter evaluates arguments that findings from experimental studies into our moral psychology debunk moral intuitions i.e. show that they cannot, in fact, provide a basis for justified moral belief. After offering an overview of different types of psychological debunking arguments, the rest of the chapter focuses on analysing so-called “Irrelevant Factors Debunking”. I highlight some important recent developments in the debate. This includes recent scientific evidence that certain irrelevant factors are much less likely to influence moral intuitions than philosophers have previously thought. I also discuss recent attempts to provide more reliable estimates of how strong the influence of irrelevant factors on moral intuitions really is. Ultimately, I argue that the influence of irrelevant factors like “framing” may not be strong enough to defeat epistemic justification. Moreover, I argue, even strong dependence on irrelevant factors may not be troubling so long as those intuitions are sensitive to good reasons.

Suppose that a person is asked for consent. However--either due to cognitive disability, or because she is intoxicated, or because she is a child--she is not able to think through this question in the way most of us would. When this person says ‘yes,’ does she thereby consent? We suggest intuitions about such cases can reflect two different senses of consent--one more superficial sense of consent, and one deeper sense. We provide empirical evidence that apparent disagreement or ambivalence about such cases in fact reflects complex reactions of simultaneously thinking that there is a sense in which the agent consents (superficial sense), but also thinking that there is an important sense in which she did not consent at all (deeper sense). We argue that these findings carry important implications for researching and discussing consent in philosophy and public discourse.