Common-sense ethics

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Charlotte R. Brown
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Common Sense ◽  
Moral Theory ◽  
David Hume ◽  
Human Mind ◽  
Moral Judgments ◽  
Ordinary People ◽  
Moral Principles ◽  
Moral Agents ◽  
Main Figure

‘Common-sense ethics’ refers to the pre-theoretical moral judgments of ordinary people. Moral philosophers have taken different attitudes towards the pre-theoretical judgments of ordinary people. For some they are the ‘facts’ which any successful moral theory must explain and justify, while for others the point of moral theory is to refine and improve them. ‘Common Sense ethics’ as a specific kind of moral theory was developed in Scotland during the latter part of the eighteenth century to counter what its proponents saw as the moral scepticism of David Hume. Thomas Reid, the main figure in this school, and his followers argued that moral knowledge and the motives to abide by it are within the reach of everyone. They believed that a plurality of basic self-evident moral principles is revealed by conscience to all mature moral agents. Conscience is an original and natural power of the human mind and this shows that God meant it to guide our will. A deeply Christian outlook underwrites their theory.

Logic of ethical discourse

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mark Timmons
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Moral Reasoning ◽  
David Hume ◽  
Deontic Logic ◽  
Moral Judgments ◽  
Inference Rules ◽  
Moral Concepts ◽  
Moral Principles ◽  
Ethical Discourse ◽  
The Subject

Logic, as a discipline, is largely concerned with discovering principles and methods for evaluating the evidential strength between the premises and conclusions of arguments. Because the meanings of terms (and the concepts they express) that occur in arguments bear importantly on questions about evidential relations, much of the work on the topic of logic and ethics has been preoccupied with questions about the meanings of moral terms and concepts, and with the correct linguistic analysis of sentences that contain them. Taking logic to include issues about meaning (which has commonly been done by those who refer to the so-called ‘logic of moral discourse’) is to construe the subject broadly. But the field of logic is often construed quite narrowly to refer to the study of formal languages whose syntax, axioms and inference rules are sufficiently determinate to allow decisions about what counts as the theorem in such a language. On the narrower understanding of logic, the intersection of logic and ethics has mainly to do with work in deontic logic. This article takes up issues concerning the intersection of ethics and logic broadly construed. The intersection of logic and ethics concerns questions about the nature of moral reasoning. Some philosophers have attempted to deduce substantive moral conclusions from factual statements – in particular, to derive ‘ought’ statements from ‘is’ statements. If one can successfully carry out such deductions, then moral reasoning is guided properly by consideration of nonmoral facts from which moral conclusions can be derived. However, the eighteenth-century philosopher David Hume is often credited with arguing that no such deductions are correct; that there is a gap between factual ‘is’ statements and moral ‘ought’ statements. There is disagreement over whether or not Hume’s negative claim is correct; but even if it is, there may still be logical features of moral concepts that impose constraints on proper moral reasoning. One such widely discussed constraint is the thesis of universalizability, according to which relevantly similar cases must receive the same moral evaluation. One implication of this thesis is that moral judgments about particular cases entail universal moral principles and so some have argued that all correct moral reasoning must be understood in terms of subsuming particular cases under general moral principles. Although many philosophers have accepted this subsumptive model of moral reasoning, it has come under attack by philosophers who argue that proper moral reasoning is primarily a matter of sensitively discerning the morally relevant details of a case under consideration and rendering a moral judgment about it without the guidance of principles.

Reid, Thomas (1710–1796)

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Roger Gallie
Keyword(s):  
Common Sense ◽  
First Principles ◽  
David Hume ◽  
Private Property ◽  
Natural Philosophy ◽  
Laws Of Nature ◽  
Human Mind ◽  
Mental Images ◽  
George Campbell ◽  
Five Senses

Thomas Reid, born at Strachan, Aberdeen, was the founder of the Scottish school of Common Sense philosophy. Educated at Marishal College, Aberdeen, he taught at King’s College, Aberdeen until appointed professor of moral philosophy at Glasgow. He was the co-founder of the Aberdeen Philosophical Society or ‘Wise Club’, which counted among its members George Campbell, John Stewart, Alexander Gerard and James Beattie. His most noteworthy early work, An Inquiry into the Human Mind: Or the Principles of Common Sense attracted the attention of David Hume and secured him his professorship. Other important works are Essays on the Intellectual Powers of Man (1785) and Essays on the Active Powers of the Human Mind (1788). Reid is not the first philosopher to appeal to common sense; Berkeley and Butler are notable British predecessors in this respect, in the discussions of perception and of free will respectively. It fell to Reid, however, to collect and systematize the deliverances of common sense – the first principles, upon the acceptance of which all justification depends – and to provide adequate criteria for that status. Reid insists we rightly rely on our admittedly fallible faculties of judgment, including the five senses, as well as memory, reason, the moral sense and taste, without need of justification. After all, we have no other resources for making judgments, to call upon in justification of this reliance. We cannot dispense with our belief that we are continually existing and sometimes fully responsible agents, influenced by motives rather than overwhelmed by passions or appetites. In Reid’s view major sceptical errors in philosophy arise from downgrading the five senses to mere inlets for mental images – ideas – of external objects, and from downgrading other faculties to mere capacities for having such images or for experiencing feelings. This variety of scepticism ultimately reduces everything to a swirl of mental images and feelings. However we no more conceive such images than perceive or remember them; and our discourse, even in the case of fiction, is not about them either. Names signify individuals or fictional characters rather than images of them; when I envisage a centaur it is an animal I envisage rather than the image of an animal. In particular the information our five senses provide in a direct or non-inferential manner is, certainly in the case of touch, about bodies in space. Reid thus seems to be committed to the position that our individual perceptual judgments are first principles in spite of his admission that our perceptual faculties are fallible. Moreover, moral and aesthetic judgments cannot be mere expressions of feeling if they are to serve their purposes; a moral assessor is not a ‘feeler’. Reid is therefore sure that there are first principles of morals, a view that scarcely fits the extent and degree of actual moral disagreement. Reid offers alternative direct accounts of perception, conception, memory and moral and aesthetic judgment. He stoutly defends our status as continuing responsible agents, claiming that the only genuine causality is agency and that although natural regularities are held to be causes they cannot be full-blooded causes. Continuing persons are not reducible to material entities subject to laws of nature, (pace Priestley); nor does the proper study of responsible agents belong within natural philosophy. Morals may be adequately systematized on a human rights basis according to which private property is not sacrosanct, once moral judgment is recognised to be based on first principles of morals. Judgments of beauty likewise rest on a body of first principles, even though Reid readily allows that there are no properties that all beautiful objects must have in common.

Moral Agency, Commitment, and Impartiality

1996 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-26 ◽  
Author(s):  
Neera K. Badhwar
Keyword(s):  
Moral Theory ◽  
Moral Agency ◽  
Moral Identity ◽  
Moral Norms ◽  
Moral Principles ◽  
Moral Agents ◽  
Political Morality ◽  
Principles Of Justice ◽  
Conception Of The Good ◽  
The Right

Liberal political philosophy presupposes a moral theory according to which the ability to assess and choose conceptions of the good from a universal and impartial moral standpoint is central to the individual's moral identity. This viewpoint is standardly understood by liberals as that of a rational human (not transcendental) agent. Such an agent is able to reflect on her ends and pursuits, including those she strongly identifies with, and to understand and take into account the basic interests of others. From the perspective of liberalism as a political morality, the most important of these interests is the interest in maximum, equal liberty for each individual, and thus the most important moral principles are the principles of justice that protect individuals' rights to life and liberty.According to the communitarian critics of liberalism, however, the liberal picture of moral agency is unrealistically abstract. Communitarians object that moral agents in the real world neither choose their conceptions of the good nor occupy a universalistically impartial moral standpoint. Rather, their conceptions of the good are determined chiefly by the communities in which they find themselves, and these conceptions are largely “constitutive” of their particular moral identities. Moral agency is thus “situated” and “particularistic,” and an impartial reflection on the conception of the good that constitutes it is undesirable, if not impossible. Further, communitarians contend, the good is “prior” to the right in the sense that moral norms are derived from, and justified in terms of, the good. An adequate moral and political theory must reflect these facts about moral agency and moral norms.

Common Sense and First Principles in Sidgwick's Methods

1994 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
pp. 179-201 ◽  
Author(s):  
David O. Brink
Keyword(s):  
Common Sense ◽  
First Principles ◽  
Moral Judgments ◽  
First Principle ◽  
Moral Intuitions ◽  
Moral Beliefs ◽  
Moral Principles ◽  
The One ◽  
Considered Moral Judgments ◽  
Moral Convictions

What role, if any, should our moral intuitions play in moral epistemology? We make, or are prepared to make, moral judgments about a variety of actual and hypothetical situations. Some of these moral judgments are more informed, reflective, and stable than others (call these our considered moral judgments); some we make more confidently than others; and some, though not all, are judgments about which there is substantial consensus. What bearing do our moral judgments have on philosophical ethics and the search for first principles in ethics? Should these judgments constrain, or be constrained by, philosophical theorizing about morality? On the one hand, we might expect first principles to conform to our moral intuitions or at least to our considered moral judgments. After all, we begin the reflection that may lead to first principles from particular moral convictions. And some of our moral intuitions (e.g., that genocide is wrong) are more fixed and compelling than any putative first principle. If so, we might expect common moral beliefs to have an important evidential role in the construction and assessment of first principles. On the other hand, common moral beliefs often rest on poor information, reflect bias, or are otherwise mistaken. We often appeal to moral principles to justify our particular moral convictions or to resolve our disagreements. Insofar as this is true, we may expect first principles to provide a foundation on the basis of which to test common moral beliefs and, where necessary, form new moral convictions.

HUME AND SMITH ON SYMPATHY, APPROBATION, AND MORAL JUDGMENT

2013 ◽  
Vol 30 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 208-236 ◽  
Author(s):  
Geoffrey Sayre-McCord
Keyword(s):  
Moral Judgment ◽  
Moral Theory ◽  
David Hume ◽  
Adam Smith ◽  
Moral Judgments ◽  
Affective Reactions ◽  
Adequate Account ◽  
Moral Thought

AbstractDavid Hume and Adam Smith are usually, and understandably, seen as developing very similar sentimentalist accounts of moral thought and practice. As similar as Hume's and Smith's accounts of moral thought are, they differ in telling ways. This essay is an attempt primarily to get clear on the important differences. They are worth identifying and exploring, in part, because of the great extent to which Hume and Smith share not just an overall approach to moral theory but also a conception of what the key components of an adequate account of moral thought will be. In the process, I hope to bring out the extent to which they both worked to make sense of the fact that we do not merely have affective reactions but also, importantly, make moral judgments.

Possible Theological Perspectives in Thomas Reid's Common Sense Philosophy

1990 ◽  
Vol 41 (3) ◽  
pp. 425-442 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nicholas J. Griffin
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Common Sense ◽  
Human Mind ◽  
Human Experience ◽  
Thomas Reid ◽  
Philosophical Foundations ◽  
The Common ◽  
Philosophical Writings ◽  
Theological Thinking ◽  
The Way

It is well known that Thomas Reid, premier exponent of the Common Sense school of Scottish philosophy, was an ordained and active minister. Less clear is the role played by theology in the deve opment ofthat philosophy as it matured slowly under his pen, particularly in me most prominent of his works, the Essays on the Intellectual Powers of Man (1785) and the Essays on the Active Powers of the Human Mind (1788), works which range widely over the field of human experience and the nature of reality. When philosophy and theology assumed more distinct and separate identities in the generations which succeeded Reid, it became common for critics of the Common Sense school to base their analyses solely on philosophical foundations and to neglect the theological underpinning which is essential to a fuller and clearer grasp of Keid s position. It would be a useful contribution to more than one discipline were Thomas Reid's philosophy linked more closely to the development and extent of his theological thinking. While his philosophical writings are strewn with theological references in the way typical of the eighteenth century, there is more substance in these references than is usually the case, when divines ofthat age wrote philosophy. That they are much more than casual, conventional embellishments becomes apparent from a careful reading of his works.

Enlightenment, Scottish

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paul Wood
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Common Sense ◽  
David Hume ◽  
First Generation ◽  
Scottish Enlightenment ◽  
Church Of Scotland ◽  
Modern Learning ◽  
Intellectual Revolution ◽  
The Mind ◽  
The Church

Rooted in the intellectual revolution of the seventeenth century, the Scottish Enlightenment was a branch of the Moderate Enlightenment that dominated the Atlantic world in the eighteenth century. Enlightenment in Scotland crystallized c.1690 and was the creation of three groups: the virtuosi led by Sir Robert Sibbald, clergymen in the Presbyterian and Episcopalian churches who promoted religious moderation and modern learning, and the first generation of Scottish Newtonians. All three helped to remodel Scotland’s five universities and, by the 1720s, Scottish academics were in the vanguard of Enlightenment across Europe In the 1730s Francis Hutcheson's work on moral theory and aesthetics gave a new impetus to Scottish philosophy. Later, during the heyday of the Scottish Enlightenment c.1745-c.1783, David Hume transformed the study of the science of man through his writings on the anatomy of the mind, politics, economics, history and religion. But because Hume’s work was regarded as irreligious, he was denied an academic post in 1745 and attempts to have him excommunicated from the Church of Scotland in the mid-1750s gained broad support.Hume’s irreligious scepticism provided the stimulus for the rise of Thomas Reid’s school of common sense philosophy, which to some extent revivified Scottish intellectual life from the 1760s onwards. Nevertheless, the Scottish Enlightenment went into decline c.1783 and, by the time of Dugald Stewart’s death in 1828, had largely faded from view.

Fichte, Eberhard, and the Psychology of Religion

2010 ◽  
Vol 104 (1) ◽  
pp. 93-110 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ben Crowe
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Common Sense ◽  
Moral Theory ◽  
Philosophy Of Religion ◽  
Affective States ◽  
Johann Gottfried Herder ◽  
Marked Contrast ◽  
Perceptual Knowledge ◽  
The Common

In marked contrast to much of twentieth-century psychology and philosophy, prevailing accounts of affect, emotion, and sentiment in the eighteenth century took these phenomena to be rational and, to a certain extent, cognitive.1 Because of a combination of disciplinary diffusion and general lack of physicalist assumptions, accounts of affectivity in the eighteenth century also tended to be quite flexible and nuanced. This is particularly true of an influential stream of Anglo-Scottish and German thought on morality, aesthetics, and the philosophy of religion. Following Shaftesbury, many of the most prominent philosophers of the century regarded affective states and processes as playing a crucial role in accounts of value. In most cases, this tendency was combined with a sort of anti-rationalism, that is, with a tendency to minimize the role of reason in everything from common sense perceptual knowledge to religious belief. Hutcheson's moral sense theory and his well-known and influential criticisms of moral rationalism exemplify this trend.2 It is perhaps more pronounced in Lord Kames, who followed the lead of Shaftesbury and Hutcheson in aesthetics, moral theory, philosophy of religion, anthropology, and history.3 In Germany, this stream of thought was quite well-received by philosophers both inside and outside the dominant Wolffian tradition.4 Particularly important and influential in this respect were Johann Georg Hamann, who drew upon Hutcheson, Hume, and the “Common Sense” school to defend a conception of faith as “sentiment (Empfindung),” and Johann Gottfried Herder, a polymath and philosophical pioneer whose work in psychology, anthropology, history, aesthetics, biblical criticism, and theology consistently stresses the fundamental role of passion, affect, and sensibility in every aspect of human culture.5

scholarly journals Ethical intuitionism and the linguistic analogy

2018 ◽  
Vol 48 (2) ◽  
pp. 292-311
Author(s):  
Philipp Schwind
Keyword(s):  
Empirical Research ◽  
Moral Theory ◽  
Normative Theory ◽  
Moral Judgments ◽  
Moral Obligations ◽  
Adequate Account ◽  
Moral Agents ◽  
Ethical Intuitionism ◽  
Central Tenet ◽  
Considered Moral Judgments

AbstractIt is a central tenet of ethical intuitionism as defended by W. D. Ross and others that moral theory should reflect the convictions of mature moral agents. Hence, intuitionism is plausible to the extent that it corresponds to our well-considered moral judgments. After arguing for this claim, I discuss whether intuitionists offer an empirically adequate account of our moral obligations. I do this by applying recent empirical research by John Mikhail that is based on the idea of a universal moral grammar to a number of claims implicit in W. D. Ross’s normative theory. I argue that the results at least partly vindicate intuitionism.

The Problem of the Criterion and Coherence Methods in Ethics

1988 ◽  
Vol 18 (1) ◽  
pp. 67-86 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael R. Depaul
Keyword(s):  
John Rawls ◽  
Moral Theory ◽  
Reflective Equilibrium ◽  
Moral Epistemology ◽  
Moral Judgments ◽  
Moral Inquiry ◽  
Theory Construction ◽  
Moral Principles ◽  
The Past ◽  
Problem Of The Criterion

The resurgence of interest in systematic moral theory over the past ten to fifteen years has brought to the fore debates concerning issues in moral epistemology, in particular, questions regarding the correct method for moral inquiry. Much of the controversy has focused on John Rawls’ method of reflective equilibrium. One merit claimed for this coherence method is that it transcends the traditional two tiered approach to moral inquiry according to which one must choose as one's starting points either particular moral judgments or general moral principles. Several of Rawls’ prominent critics have charged that Rawls’ loosely assembled rabble of starting points are not epistemically hefty enough to hoist a moral theory upon their shoulders. Perhaps unwittingly, these critics cling to the two level conception of theory construction, for they both defend general principles as the only appropriate starting points for theory construction and insist upon viewing Rawls as one working within the two tiered conception who opts for more particular judgments as starting points.

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