Rightness as Fairness (eBook)

A Moral and Political Theory

Marcus Arvan (Autor)

eBook Download: PDF

2016
271 Seiten
Palgrave Macmillan UK (Verlag)
978-1-137-54181-9 (ISBN)

Infos

Moral philosophy today is marked by profound, systematic disagreement. In Rightness as Fairness, Marcus Arvan argues that moral philosophy must adapt scientific principles of theory-selection in order to reliably uncover moral truth. Arvan then argues that our best empirical evidence and naturalistic observation reveal morality to be a type of prudence requiring us to act in ways that our present and future selves can rationally agree upon across time. Arvan shows that this agreement-Rightness as Fairness-requires us to be fair to ourselves and to others, including animals. Further, the Four Principles of Fairness comprising this agreement reconcile a variety of traditionally opposed moral and political frameworks. Finally, provides a uniquely fruitful method for resolving applied moral and political issues: a method of 'principled fair negotiation' that requires merging principled debate with real-world negotiation.

Marcus Arvan is Assistant Professor of Philosophy at the University of Tampa, US. He works primarily in ethics and social-political philosophy, as well as metaphysics and philosophy of science. His work has appeared in various journals including Journal of Ethics and Social Philosophy, Philosophical Psychology, and The Philosophical Forum.

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Rightness as Fairness provides a uniquely fruitful method of 'principled fair negotiation' for resolving applied moral and political issues that requires merging principled debate with real-world negotiation.

Inhalt

Cover 1
Half-Title 2
Title 3
Copyright 4
Dedication 5
Contents 6
Acknowledgments 10
Introduction 11
1 Ethics for the Twenty-First Century 19
1 Distinguishing truth from seeming truth 20
2 Seven principles of theory selection 23
2.1 Firm Foundations 24
2.2 Internal Coherence 27
2.3 External Coherence 28
2.4 Explanatory Power 30
2.5 Unity 31
2.6 Parsimony 31
2.7 Fruitfulness 33
3 The case for instrumentalism 34
3.1 The firmest foundation 34
3.2 The promise of parsimony, unity, explanatory power, and fruitfulness 37
3.3 Advantages over alternatives 40
3.3.1 Advantages over intuitionism 40
3.3.2 Advantages over reflective equilibrium 41
3.3.3 Advantages over moral language analysis 42
3.3.4 Advantages over constitutivism 43
3.3.5 Advantages over second- and third-personalism 43
3.3.6 Advantages over Sterba’s dialecticalism 44
3.3.7 Conclusion 45
4 Disarming initial concerns 46
4.1 The wrong kinds of reasons? 46
4.2 Not a firm foundation? 46
4.3 Unconvincing and artificial? 47
4.4 Three promissory notes 48
4.4.1 Not the wrong kinds of reasons? 48
4.4.2 Firm foundations after all? 50
4.4.3 Intuitive and convincing? 50
5 Conclusion 51
2 The Problem of Possible Future Selves 52
1 Our capacities to care about our past and future 54
2 The problem of possible future selves 57
2.1 Possible futures 61
2.2 Possible psychologies 63
2.3 Possible choices 66
2.4 A very real problem 74
3 Morality as the solution? 75
4 Is the problem too contingent? 77
5 Two nonsolutions 81
5.1 Nonsolution 1: probable futures 81
5.2 Nonsolution 2: diachronic motivational consistency 82
6 Conclusion: an unsolved problem 84
3 The Categorical-Instrumental Imperative 85
1 Interests in diachronic cooperation 89
2 Three types of interests 95
2.1 Involuntary interests 96
2.2 Semivoluntary interests 98
2.3 Voluntary interests 100
3 The Categorical-Instrumental Imperative 101
4 Just conscience? 120
5 An intuitive solution to the problem of possible future selves? 121
6 Conclusion 125
4 Three Unified Formulations 126
1 The Humanity and Sentience Formulation 128
1.1 Possible other-human-regarding interests 131
1.2 Possible nonhuman-animal-regarding interests 134
1.3 Possible sentient-being-regarding interests 136
1.4 Derivation of the Humanity and Sentience Formulation 137
2 The Kingdom of Human and Sentient Ends Formulation 138
3 Advantages over Kantian ethics 140
3.1 Firmer foundations 141
3.2 Greater internal coherence 143
3.3 Greater external coherence 143
3.4 Greater explanatory power, unity, and parsimony 147
3.5 Greater fruitfulness 147
4 Conclusion 148
5 The Moral Original Position 150
1 Rawls’ Original Position 151
1.1 Rawls’ Kantian rationale 152
1.2 Rawls’ reflective equilibrium rationale 153
1.3 Rawls’ public reason rationale 154
2 Some common critiques 154
2.1 Kantian critiques 154
2.2 Reflective equilibrium critiques 155
2.3 Public reason critiques 155
3 The case for a Moral Original Position 156
4 Corroborating the critiques 159
4.1 Corroborating Kantian critiques 159
4.2 Corroborating reflective equilibrium critiques 160
4.3 Corroborating public reason critiques 161
5 Conclusion 161
6 Rightness as Fairness 163
1 Derivation of Four Principles of Fairness 165
1.1 The Principle of Negative Fairness 165
1.2 The Principle of Positive Fairness 176
1.3 The Principle of Fair Negotiation 178
1.4 The Principle of Virtues of Fairness 186
2 Rightness as Fairness: a unified standard of right and wrong 188
3 Rightness as Fairness in practice: principled fair negotiation 194
3.1 Kant’s four cases 196
3.2 How numbers should count: trolleys, torture, and organ donors 198
3.3 World poverty 204
3.4 Distribution of scarce medical resources 206
3.5 The ethical treatment of animals 208
4 Conclusion 210
7 Libertarian Egalitarian Communitarianism 212
1 Libertarianism, Egalitarianism, and Communitarianism 213
1.1 Libertarianism: attractions and critiques 213
1.2 Egalitarianism: attractions and critiques 214
1.3 Communitarianism: attractions and critiques 215
2 The case for Libertarian Egalitarian Communitarianism 216
3 Additional advantages 222
3.1 (Qualified) fair negotiation over divisiveness 222
3.2 Resolving the scope and requirements of justice 224
3.3 Resolving the ideal-nonideal theory distinction 226
4 Conclusion 227
8 Evaluating Rightness as Fairness 228
1 Firmer foundations 228
2 Greater internal coherence 230
3 Greater external coherence 232
4 Greater explanatory power 234
5 Greater unity 236
6 Greater parsimony 236
7 Greater fruitfulness 237
8 Conclusion 239
E1 240
Notes 241
Bibliography 254
Index 270

Produkt-Details

• Erscheint lt. Verlag: 29.3.2016
• Zusatzinfo: XI, 271 p.
• Verlagsort: London
• Sprache: englisch
• Themenwelt: Geisteswissenschaften ► Geschichte
• Themenwelt: Geisteswissenschaften ► Philosophie ► Allgemeines / Lexika
• Themenwelt: Geisteswissenschaften ► Philosophie ► Ethik
• Themenwelt: Sozialwissenschaften ► Politik / Verwaltung ► Politische Theorie
• Schlagworte: Categorical imperative • Communitarianism • ethics • Fairness • John Rawls • Kant • Morality • political theory • Politics • Prudence • Psychology • Rationality
• ISBN-10: 1-137-54181-4 / 1137541814
• ISBN-13: 978-1-137-54181-9 / 9781137541819