Vayrynen, P (2009) Normative Appeals to the Natural. Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, 79 (2). 279 - 314. ISSN 0031-8205
Abstract
Surprisingly, many ethical realists and anti-realists, naturalists and not, all accept some version of the following normative appeal to the natural (NAN): evaluative and normative facts hold solely in virtue of natural facts, where their naturalness is part of what fits them for the job. This paper argues not that NAN is false but that NAN has no adequate non-parochial justification (a justification that relies only on premises which can be accepted by more or less everyone who accepts NAN) to back up this consensus. I show that we cannot establish versions of NAN which are interesting in their own right (and not merely as instances of a general naturalistic ontology) by appealing to the nature of natural properties or the kind of in-virtue-of relation to which NAN refers, plus other plausible nonparochial assumptions. On the way, I distinguish different types of 'in virtue of claims. I conclude by arguing that the way in which assessment of meta-ethical hypotheses is theory-dependent predicts the failure of non-parochial justifications of NAN.
Metadata
Item Type: | Article |
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Authors/Creators: |
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Copyright, Publisher and Additional Information: | © 2009, Wiley Blackwell. This is an author produced version of a paper published in Philosophy and Phenomenological Research. Uploaded in accordance with the publisher's self-archiving policy. The definitive version is available at www3.interscience.wiley.com |
Keywords: | Supervenience; dependence; grounding; normative explanation |
Dates: |
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Institution: | The University of Leeds |
Academic Units: | The University of Leeds > Faculty of Arts, Humanities and Cultures (Leeds) > School of Philosophy, Religion and History of Science (Leeds) |
Depositing User: | Symplectic Publications |
Date Deposited: | 04 Nov 2013 11:38 |
Last Modified: | 22 Jan 2018 00:55 |
Published Version: | http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1933-1592.2009.00279.x |
Status: | Published |
Publisher: | Wley Blackwell |
Identification Number: | 10.1111/j.1933-1592.2009.00279.x |
Related URLs: | |
Open Archives Initiative ID (OAI ID): | oai:eprints.whiterose.ac.uk:76776 |