A Particularist but Codifiable Virtue Ethics

Moral particularism of the kind developed by Jonathan Dancy is treated as a topic in meta-ethics. Until it is applied to a suitable type of normative theory criticisms which have assailed it are difficult to rebut. This chapter aims to apply Dancy’s particularism to target centred virtue ethics, showing how many of these criticisms are off the mark. At the core of these criticisms is that of uncodifiability. Virtue ethics is held to be codifiable through the virtue rules which encode virtue-reasons for action, reasons which are argued to be particularist in Dancy’s sense. That is it is possible even for reasons expressed through the thick virtue concepts to switch valence. In the course of the argument a virtue ethical view of right action (the target-centred view) is further developed.

Not Sufficiently Neutral?

Jonathan Dancy, Ulrike Heuer, Jonas Olson, and others have argued that there is reason to reject the buck-passing account of value (BPA) because of its implications for first-order normative ethics. Dancy argues that BPA is inconsistent with certain deontological views. Olson argues that BPA is inconsistent with an attractive way of distinguishing between consequentialism and deontology. Heuer argues that it begs the question against Williams’s internalism about reasons. This chapter argues that Dancy, Olson, and Heuer are mistaken. Others claim that certain versions of BPA are inconsistent with a consequentialist view about the reasons for pro-attitudes there are. This chapter argues that even global consequentialism should not involve a consequentialist view about the reasons for pro-attitudes that there are and because of this it is not a problem for BPA that it is inconsistent with a consequentialist view of the reasons for pro-attitudes that there are.

Too Little Value?

According to the Buck-Passing Account (BPA), for X to be good is for there to be reasons for everyone to have pro-attitudes in response to X. Suppose that there are birds that are in a great amount of pleasure in a world where there are no past, present, or future rational agents. There are no reasons for any agents to have pro-attitudes towards the birds’ pleasure, so BPA entails that their pleasure is not valuable, but it is valuable. So, BPA produces too little value. This is a problem for BPA and fitting-attitude accounts of value that has been raised and discussed by Krister Bykvist, Jonathan Dancy, and Andrew Reisner. This chapter motivates and defends two responses to this too little value problem: 1. The trans-world reasons response, according to which the birds’ pleasure is valuable because there are reasons for beings in other worlds to have pro-attitudes towards it; 2. The counterfactual response, according to which the birds’ pleasure is valuable because there would be reasons for agents to have pro-attitudes towards it if they were around.

The Buck-Passing Account and The No-Priority View

According to the No-Priority View (NPV), what it is to be a reason for a pro-attitude cannot be analysed in terms of value but neither can what it is to be good or of value be analysed in terms of reasons for pro-attitudes. NPV has been defended by Jonathan Dancy and W. D. Ross. This chapter argues that there are several reasons to accept the buck-passing account of value (BPA) over NPV. First, BPA explains striking correlations between reasons and value that NPV does not. Second, BPA explains why value does not give non-derivative reasons to have pro-attitudes; NPV cannot do this. Third, BPA is more qualitatively parsimonious than NPV, and, as explained in this chapter, there are strong reasons to prefer more to less qualitatively parsimonious theories. Fourth, BPA explains why similar theoretical debates arise about reasons and value; NPV cannot do this. Fifth, BPA is more informative than NPV.

Thick Evaluation

Having dismissed two other anti-separationist strategies, this chapter presents the best way of attacking separationism and articulating nonseparationism. It is denied that thick concepts can be split into thin evaluation and nonevaluative descriptive content by showing that thick evaluation is itself a basic and fundamental response to the world. Evaluation cannot be reduced to stances that are merely pro or con, as separationists do, because doing so results in a strange view of the world. This idea is elaborated in many ways: the proposal’s radical nature is revealed since the notion of the evaluative is shown to stretch further than one might think; it is suggested that there is no obvious clear dividing line between evaluative and nonevaluative concepts; there is a final discussion of evaluative flexibility; and two worries from Chapter Two are met. Work by Jonathan Dancy, Philippa Foot, Gilbert Ryle, and Bernard Williams is discussed.