Can we ever be fully practically justified in acting contrary to moral demands? My contention is that the answer is 'no'. I argue that by adopting a 'buck-passing' account of wrongness we can provide a philosophically satisfying answer to the familiar 'why should I be moral?'. In working my way toward the buck-passing account of wrongness, I outline (and, to some degree, defend) the metaethical and 'metanormative' assumptions on which my theory stands. I also consider and reject the 'internalist' (or as it can also be described, the neo-Humean) answer to 'why should I be moral?'. The account I end up with is decidedly non-consequentialist and it is consistent with common-sense morality. It also provides a way of showing why moral considerations (in competition with non-moral considerations) are overridingly normative in a way that is consistent with our best current understanding of what practical reason requires of us.
Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:bl.uk/oai:ethos.bl.uk:741967 |
Date | January 2004 |
Creators | Hurtig, Kent |
Contributors | Skorupski, John ; Broadie, Sarah |
Publisher | University of St Andrews |
Source Sets | Ethos UK |
Detected Language | English |
Type | Electronic Thesis or Dissertation |
Source | http://hdl.handle.net/10023/13223 |
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