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1105Moral WorthJournal of Philosophy 99 (5): 223. 2002.I argue that a right action has moral worth if and only if it is done for the right reasons - that is, for its right-making features. The reasons the agent acts on have to be identical to the reasons for which the action is right. I argue that Kantians are wrong in thinking that a right action has moral worth iff it is done because the agent thinks it is right, giving examples of morally worthy actions that are done by agents who think they are wrong (Huckleberry Finn) and right actions done "…Read more
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746On Acting Rationally Against One's Best JudgmentEthics 110 (3): 488-513. 2000.I argue that akrasia is not always significantly irrational. To be more precise, I argue that an agent is sometimes more rational for being akratic then she would have been for being enkratic or strong-willed.
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683How it is not "just like diabetes": Mental disorders and the moral psychologistPhilosophical Issues 15 (1). 2005.Many psychiatrists tell their clients that any mental disorder is ‘‘a disease, just like diabetes’’. This slogan appears to suggest that mental states and behavior that are classified ‘‘mental disorders’’ are somehow radically different from other mental states and behaviors—both when it comes to simply understanding people and when it comes to moral assessments of mental states and of actions. After all, mental illness is just like diabetes, while other human conditions are not. That sounds lik…Read more
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607Praise, Blame and the Whole SelfPhilosophical Studies 93 (2): 161-188. 1999.What is that makes an act subject to either praise or blame? The question has often been taken to depend entirely on the free will debate for an answer, since it is widely agreed that an agent’s act is subject to praise or blame only if it was freely willed, but moral theory, action theory, and moral psychology are at least equally relevant to it. In the last quarter-century, following the lead of Harry Frankfurt’s (1971) seminal article “Freedom of the Will and the Concept of a Person,” the in…Read more
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520Deliberation and Acting for ReasonsPhilosophical Review 121 (2): 209-239. 2012.Theoretical and practical deliberation are voluntary activities, and like all voluntary activities, they are performed for reasons. To hold that all voluntary activities are performed for reasons in virtue of their relations to past, present, or even merely possible acts of deliberation thus leads to infinite regresses and related problems. As a consequence, there must be processes that are nondeliberative and nonvoluntary but that nonetheless allow us to think and act for reasons, and these pro…Read more
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404Unprincipled virtue: an inquiry into moral agencyOxford University Press. 2003.Nomy Arpaly rejects the model of rationality used by most ethicists and action theorists. Both observation and psychology indicate that people act rationally without deliberation, and act irrationally with deliberation. By questioning the notion that our own minds are comprehensible to us--and therefore questioning much of the current work of action theorists and ethicists--Arpaly attempts to develop a more realistic conception of moral agency.
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285What is it Like to Have a Crappy Imagination?In John Schwenkler & Enoch Lambert (eds.), Becoming Someone New: Essays on Transformative Experience, Choice, and Change, Oxford University Press. pp. 122-133. 2020.I argue that when it comes to understanding other people, humans have a problem that involves a combination of poor imagination and excessive trust in this imagination. Often, the problem has to do with what I call "runaway simulation" - clinging to the assumption that another person resembles you despite glaring counter-evidence. I then argue that the same type of problem appears intra-personally, as we fail miserably to imagine potential and future selves. Finally, I argue that this fact goes …Read more
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284Why Epistemic Partiality is OverratedPhilosophical Topics 46 (1): 37-51. 2018.Epistemic partialism is the view that friends have a doxastic duty to overestimate each other. If one holds that there are no practical reasons for belief, we will argue, one has to deny the existence of any epistemic duties, and thus reject epistemic partialism. But if it is false that one has a doxastic duty to overestimate one’s friends, why does it so often seem true? We argue that there is a robust causal relationship between friendship and overestimation that can be mistaken for a constitu…Read more
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281I—On BenevolenceAristotelian Society Supplementary Volume 92 (1): 207-223. 2018.It is widely agreed that benevolence is not the whole of the moral life, but it is not as widely appreciated that benevolence is an irreducible part of that life. This paper argues that Kantian efforts to characterize benevolence, or something like it, in terms of reverence for rational agency fall short. Such reverence, while credibly an important part of the moral life, is no more the whole of it than benevolence.
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264Practical reasons to believe, epistemic reasons to act, and the baffled action theoristPhilosophical Issues 33 (1): 22-32. 2023.I argue that unless belief is voluntary in a very strict sense – that is, unless credence is simply under our direct control – there can be no practical reasons to believe. I defend this view against recent work by Susanna Rinard. I then argue that for very similar reasons, barring the truth of strict doxastic voluntarism, there cannot be epistemic reasons to act, only purely practical reasons possessed by those whose goal is attaining knowledge or justified belief.
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245Duty, Desire and the Good Person: Towards a Non‐Aristotelian Account of VirtuePhilosophical Perspectives 28 (1): 59-74. 2014.This paper presents an account of the virtuous person, which I take to be the same as the good person. I argue that goodness in a person is based on her desires. Contra Aristotelians, I argue that one does not need practical wisdom to be good. There can be a perfectly good person with mental retardation or autism, for example, whether or not such conditions are compatible with the Aristotelian kind of wisdom. Contra Kantians, I argue that the sense of duty - which does exist! - is compatible wit…Read more
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220In Praise of DesireOxford University Press. 2013.Joining the debate over the roles of reason and appetite in the moral mind, In Praise of Desire takes the side of appetite. Acting for moral reasons, acting in a praiseworthy manner, and acting out of virtue are simply acting out of intrinsic desires for the right or the good
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187Desire and Meaning in Life: Towards a TheoryIn Iddo Landau (ed.), Oxford Handbook of Meaning in Life, Oxford University Press. 2022.
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186The Constitution of Agency: Essays on Practical Reason and Moral Psychology (review)Philosophical Review 120 (4): 607-609. 2011.
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176It Ain't Necessarily SoOxford Studies in Metaethics 13. 2018.While Neo-Aristotelians argue quite plausibly that it is hard to get to eudaemonia if one is wicked, I argue that they fail to show that the seeker of flourishing has a reason to become virtuous (as opposed to morally mediocre).
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165Quality of Will and (Some) Unusual BehaviorIn Matt King & Joshua May (eds.), Agency in Mental Disorder: Philosophical Dimensions, Oxford University Press. 2022.This chapter explores how far one can go accounting for the moral responsibility implications of several unusual mental conditions using a parsimonious quality-of-will account that relies on the way we talk about moral responsibility in more mundane situations. By contrasting situations involving epistemic irrationality versus cognitive impairment, it becomes clear that the presence of those often (but not always) excuses actions performed by unusual agents. The discussion turns to cases of clin…Read more
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152Alienation and ExternalityCanadian Journal of Philosophy 29 (3): 371-387. 1999.Harry Frankfurt introduces the concept of externality. Externality is supposed to be a fact about the structure of an agent's will. We argue that the pre-theorethical basis of externality has a lot more to do with feelings of alienation than it does with the will. Once we realize that intuitions about externality are guided by intuitions about feelings of alienation surprising conclusions follow regarding the structure of our will.
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149Review: Comments on "Lack of Character" by John Doris (review)Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 71 (3): 643-647. 2005.
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141Consciousness and Moral Responsibility, by Levy, Neil: Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014, pp. xv + 157, £27.50 (review)Australasian Journal of Philosophy 93 (4): 829-831. 2015.
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130Review: Reply to Harman, Stroud and Mason: Nomy Arpaly (review)Philosophical Studies 134 (3). 2007.
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109Responsibility, applied ethics, and complex autonomy theoriesIn Personal autonomy: New essays on personal autonomy and its role in contemporary moral philosophy, Cambridge University Press. pp. 162-180. 2005.I argue that despite it being said often that the concept of personal autonomy is important for grounding moral responsibility and in applied ethics, a certain type of theories of autonomy and identification, descended from the work of Harry Frankfurt starting 1971, are not relevant in an obvious way to either moral responsibility or applied ethics.
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102Merit, Meaning, and Human Bondage: An Essay on Free WillPrinceton University Press. 2006.Perhaps everything we think, feel, and do is determined, and humans--like stones or clouds--are slaves to the laws of nature. Would that be a terrible state? Philosophers who take the incompatibilist position think so, arguing that a deterministic world would be one without moral responsibility and perhaps without true love, meaningful art, and real rationality. But compatibilists and semicompatibilists argue that determinism need not worry us. As long as our actions stem, in an appropriate way,…Read more
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94Which autonomyIn and D. Shier M. O.’Rourke J. K. Campbell (ed.), Freedom and Determinism, Mit Press. pp. 173--188. 2004.
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83Reply to PippinPhilosophical Explorations 10 (3). 2007.I argue that in his response to me Robert Pippin misrepresents my view of akrasia (partially because of what looks like his strong disbelief in the existence of akrasia) as well as expresses a false view of the way a generalizing moral theory is supposed to apply to specific cases. The last issue is related to particularism, which I turn to discuss, arguing that one familiar way in which it seems attractive is a misleading one
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70Comments on CullityPhilosophy and Phenomenological Research 104 (2): 502-504. 2022.Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, Volume 104, Issue 2, Page 502-504, March 2022.
Areas of Specialization
Value Theory |
Areas of Interest
Value Theory |
Philosophy of Action |
Normative Ethics |