George Grant's Justice

Dialogue ◽  
1988 ◽  
Vol 27 (1) ◽  
pp. 121-134 ◽  
Author(s):  
David Gauthier
Keyword(s):  
Moral Theory ◽  
Alasdair Macintyre ◽  
Bernard Williams ◽  
Moral Thought ◽  
George Grant ◽  
English Speaking

In 1974, George Grant delivered the Josiah Wood lectures at Mount Allison University on the theme English-Speaking Justice. The lectures, first published in 1978, have been republished, and a volume of later essays on somewhat related themes has recently appeared. Grant's work offers an impressionistic but deep challenge to the conception of justice in modern moral thought and practice, a challenge paralleled, in interesting and important ways, by concerns about morality raised in the writings of such persons as Alasdair MacIntyre, Bernard Williams, and, perhaps more surprisingly, J. L. Mackie. In this review, I want briefly to expound Grant's treatment of justice, to exhibit its relationships to other disquieting accounts, and to suggest some of the resources available to contractarian moral theory for lightening what for Grant is a terrifying darkness.

Two Concepts of Community or Moral Theory and Canadian Culture

Dialogue ◽  
1986 ◽  
Vol 25 (1) ◽  
pp. 31-52 ◽  
Author(s):  
Wesley Cragg
Keyword(s):  
John Rawls ◽  
Moral Theory ◽  
Applied Ethics ◽  
Substantial Impact ◽  
Ethical Problems ◽  
George Grant ◽  
English Speaking ◽  
English Speaking World ◽  
Canadian Culture ◽  
The Impact

One of the striking characteristics of contemporary moral philosophy is the speed with which philosophers in the English-speaking world have jettisoned their reluctance to address concrete ethical problems and dilemmas and have plunged into the field of applied ethics. No less interesting is the impact that the work of some of the more noted of them has had outside of strictly philosophical circles. One need only to mention John Rawls or H. L. A. Hart to make the point. It is no longer difficult to prove that these same trends are deeply entrenched amongst Canadian philosophers. A further parallel is suggested by the fact that a Canadian philosopher, George Grant, has also had a substantial impact on recent Canadian thought. The appearance of a parallel, however, is illusory. For while applied ethics certainly has its practitioners in Canada today, and while it is widely recognized that both American and British philosophers have had a substantial and philosophically respectable impact on their respective societies, there seems widespread resistance to the idea that philosophical reflection has a role to play in the development of a distinctive understanding of Canadian society. And there is widespread scepticism in professional philosophical circles in Canada that the work of George Grant is of genuine philosophical interest, whatever his popular reputation.

SUBSTANTIVE MORAL THEORY

2007 ◽  
Vol 25 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-27 ◽  
Author(s):  
Philip Pettit
Keyword(s):  
Philosophy Of Science ◽  
Moral Theory ◽  
Moral Obligations ◽  
Moral Issues ◽  
Moral Thinking ◽  
Scientific Thought ◽  
Moral Thought ◽  
Present Essay ◽  
Self Interest ◽  
The Common

Philosophy can serve two roles in relation to moral thinking: first, to provide a meta-ethical commentary on the nature of moral thought, as the methodology or the philosophy of science provides a commentary on the nature of scientific thought; and second, to build on the common presumptions deployed in people's moral thinking about moral issues, looking for a substantive moral theory that they might support. The present essay addresses the nature of this second role; illustrates it with substantive theories that equate moral obligations respectively with requirements of nature, self-interest, benevolence, reason and justifiability; and outlines a novel competitor in which the focus is shifted to requirements of co-reasoning and respect.

Alasdair MacIntyre, After Virtue

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
John R. Wallach
Keyword(s):  
Moral Theory ◽  
Local Communities ◽  
Alasdair Macintyre ◽  
The Political ◽  
History Of ◽  
Liberal Individualism

This essay discusses the contribution of Alasdair MacIntyre’s After Virtue (1981) to a generation of moral theory. Pitched as a critique of liberal individualism (e.g., Rawls), modernity (e.g., amoral bureaucracies), and the antagonism toward the history of moral theory evinced by analytical philosophers, MacIntyre’s book urges a return toward moral traditions embedded in local communities as the best route to avoid what he regards as the soullessness of modernity and the abyss of Nietzschean philosophy. But his failure to reflect on the political valence of traditions in general or the Aristotelian and Thomist ones he values, seriously compromises his complaints about modernity and his suggestions for ways out.

Respect

2021 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Moral Theory ◽  
Applied Ethics ◽  
Practical Application ◽  
Moral Thought ◽  
Historical Essay ◽  
New Directions ◽  
Different Types ◽  
Basis Part ◽  
Moral Notion

Respect is one of the central concepts in contemporary moral thought. It plays a prominent role in everyday, pre-philosophical moral thinking, as well as in recent moral theory and applied ethics. Yet basic questions about the concept and role of respect have received less attention than might be expected. This volume takes up some of these basic questions. The book is not meant to be a comprehensive handbook that covers all aspects of the topic of respect, nor is the focus of the book mainly historical. Rather, the aim is to give leading experts in the field a chance to present their latest ideas and point the research on respect in new directions. Following an introductory historical essay, Part I addresses questions of what respect is, its nature and basis. Part II examines questions in moral theory, for example what exactly ought to be respected, what role respect plays in morality, and which different types of respect are appropriate and morally significant. Part III deals with the practical application of requirements of respect. The essays in this volume will be of interest both to scholars and students working on issues of respect and to anyone interested in this central moral notion.

Reid on the first principles of morals

2014 ◽  
Vol 41 (S1) ◽  
pp. 102-121
Author(s):  
Terence Cuneo
Keyword(s):  
Recent Work ◽  
First Principles ◽  
Moral Theory ◽  
Moral Thought

What role do the first principles of morals play in Reid's moral theory? Reid has an official line regarding their role, which identifies these principles as foundational propositions that evidentially ground other moral propositions. I claim that, by Reid's own lights, this line of thought is mistaken. There is, however, another line of thought in Reid, one which identifies the first principles of morals as constitutive of moral thought. I explore this interpretation, arguing that it is a fruitful way of understanding much of what Reid wants to say about the role of moral first principles and drawing some connections between it and recent work on moral nonnaturalism.

How Bernard Williams Constructed his Critique of Kant's Moral Theory

1999 ◽  
Vol 3 ◽  
pp. 106-113 ◽  
Author(s):  
Roger J. Sullivan
Keyword(s):  
Moral Theory ◽  
Bernard Williams ◽  
John Mcdowell ◽  
Moral Theories

One of the more striking developments in contemporary philosophic discussions about morality has been the rise of anti-theory — the rejection of moral theories as ‘unnecessary, undesirable, and/or impossible’. Among those associated with this view have been Bernard Williams, John McDowell, Edmund Pincoffs and James Wallace.

Buddhist Moral Thought and Western Moral Philosophy

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christopher W. Gowans
Keyword(s):  
Virtue Ethics ◽  
Moral Philosophy ◽  
Moral Theory ◽  
Moral Pluralism ◽  
Moral Particularism ◽  
Moral Thought ◽  
Moral Principles ◽  
Moral Phenomenology

This essay discusses interpretations of Indian Buddhist moral thought in terms of common categories of Western moral philosophy. Problems are raised for interpretations of Buddhism as being committed to a theory of what makes an action morally right (specifically deontology, consequentialism, and virtue ethics). Following the lead of the poison arrow simile, a nontheoretical understanding of Buddhist moral thought is proposed: it was implicitly supposed that we do not need to act on the basis of universal moral principles but simply need to overcome the roots of unwholesome actions (greed, hatred, and delusion) and act skillfully. This interpretation is compared with other nontheoretical interpretations of Buddhist moral thought by reference to moral particularism, moral phenomenology, moral pluralism, and a nontheoretical conception of virtue ethics. It is also suggested that we should not be perplexed by the absence of explicit moral theory in Buddhism. Featured figures include Aristotle and Śāntideva.

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