a  critique of Dasgupta's normative argument against moral non-naturalism

Lotfi, Marziye

doi:10.30465/os.2023.36689.1725

Document Type : Research Paper

Author

Marziye Lotfi

Ph.D. in Philosophy, Fundamental Knowledge Research Institute

https://doi.org/10.30465/os.2023.36689.1725

Abstract

According to moral non-naturalism, moral notions like “goodness” are sui generis. They are not reducible to any natural or metaphysical notions. One of the pivotal arguments raised against the view is the normative argument. The main idea is that these sui generis properties would have no “normative authority” over us. In this paper, I will consider an external construal of the argument developed by Dasgupta. Dasgupta, in his external normative argument, grants for the sake of argument that there is a sui generis property P. However, he holds that there is still the unanswered question: Why the sui generis property P should be promoted? He claims that there is no answer to this question; hence P, if there is such a property, cannot be the property “goodness”. In this paper, I will examine the argument at length. I will try to clarify that the argument is based on the wrong supposition.

Keywords

References

References

Chappell, Richard Yetter (forthcoming), ‘Why Care about Non-Natural Reasons?’, American Philosophical Quarterly.

Darwall, Stephen, Allan Gibbard, and Peter Railton (1992), “Toward Fin de siècle Ethics: Some Trends”, The Philosophical Review, vol. 101, no. 1.

Dasgupta, Shamik (2017), ‘Normative Non-Naturalism and the Problem of Authority’, the Aristotelian Society, vol. cxvii, Part 3.

Enoch, David (2011), Taking Morality Seriously: a Defense of Robust Realism, Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Enoch, David (2018), “Non-Naturalistic Realism in Metaethics”, in Tristram McPherson and David Plunkett (eds.), The Routledge Handbook of Metaethics, New York and London: Routledge.

FitzPatrick, William J. (2008), “Robust Ethical Realism, Non-Naturalism, and Normativity”, in Russ Schafer-Landau (ed.), Oxford Studies in Metaethics: Volume III, Oxford: OUP.

FitzPatrick, William J. (2014). “Skepticism about Naturalizing Normativity: In Defense of Ethical Nonnaturalism”, Res Philosophica 91 (4).

Frankena, W. (1939), “The Naturalistic Fallacy”, Mind, vol. 48.

Oddie, Graham (2005), Value, Reality, and Desire, Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Miller, Alexander (2003), an Introduction to Contemporary Metaethics, Polity Press and Blackwell.

Moore, G. E. (1903), Principia Ethica, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Parfit, Derek (2006), ‘Normativity’, in: Russ Shafer-Landau (ed.), Oxford Studies in Metaethics, 1, Oxford: Clarendon Press.

Parfit, Derek (2011), On What Matters, vol. 2, Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Ridge, Michael (2019), “Moral Non-Naturalism”, The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Fall 2019 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.), <https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/fall2019/entries/moral-non-naturalism/>.

Scanlon, T. M. (2014), Being Realistic about Reasons, Oxford: Oxford University Press.

van Roojen, Mark (2015), Metaethics: A Contemporary Introduction, New York and London: Routledge.

Wedgwood, Ralph. (2007), The Nature of Normativity, Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Occidental Studies

a critique of Dasgupta's normative argument against moral non-naturalism

References

References

Volume 13, Issue 2 - Serial Number 26
February 2023
Pages 75-91

a critique of Dasgupta's normative argument against moral non-naturalism

References

References

Volume 13, Issue 2 - Serial Number 26February 2023Pages 75-91

Volume 13, Issue 2 - Serial Number 26
February 2023
Pages 75-91