Master of Arts (MA), Ohio University, 2023, Philosophy (Arts and Sciences)

In the meta-ethical debates about moral knowledge, there are many theoretical positions to consider. If one is to have an account of moral knowledge, that will inevitably be affected by how one thinks about knowledge in general. I will be transferring a general theory of knowledge and epistemic justification to the more specific domain of ethics, through the lens of epistemic fallibilism. My goal, in applying this epistemic framework to moral discourse, is to outline how moral fallibilism (my theory) can provide a unique and attractive account of moral knowledge. I will accomplish the application of epistemology to ethical theory by implementing Stewart Cohen's account of fallibilism (with its central notion of “relevance”), and by highlighting the aim and position of moral fallibilism by contrasting it with Mackie's error theory. Finally, I will illustrate moral fallibilism by applying it to contemporary moral concerns; the debate about abortion, in particular. Ultimately, I propose a fresh theory of moral knowledge that emphasizes the varying degrees of justification for our ethical beliefs while defending, at the same time, a moderate account of moral objectivity.

Committee: Christoph Hanisch (Advisor) Subjects: Epistemology; Ethics; Philosophy

Master of Arts (MA), Ohio University, 2022, Philosophy (Arts and Sciences)

I articulate a realist and objectivist conception of metaethics which is objectivist not in spite of our subjective attitudes and desires, but because of them. I name this conception “subjectivity objectified,” a phrase I take from Peter Railton's classic work in metaethics. My paper has three parts. First, I interpret Railton as an objectivist and argue that his core conception of value is the conception of subjectivity objectified. I then draw on critiques first made by David Sobel to argue that Railton's proposal assumes a problematic notion of essential personality traits. Finally, I show that this problematic notion need not be assumed for the conception of subjectivity objectified, and I do so by articulating a version of it which is inspired by the work of Kate Manne.

Committee: Christoph Hanisch (Advisor); James Petrik (Committee Member); Yoichi Ishida (Committee Member) Subjects: Ethics; Philosophy

Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.), Bowling Green State University, 2020, Philosophy, Applied

Global normative error theorists argue that there are no authoritative normative reasons of any kind. Thus, according to the error theory, the normative demands of law, prudence, morality, etc. are of no greater normative significance than the most absurd standards we can conceive of. Because the error theory is a radically revisionary view, theorists who accept it only do so because they maintain the view is supported by the best available arguments. In this dissertation, I argue that error theory entails that it is impossible that there are successful arguments for anything, thus defenses of error theory are in tension with the view, itself. My argument begins with the observation that it is natural to think a successful argument is one that gives us an authoritative normative reason to believe its conclusion. Error theory entails that there are no authoritative reasons to believe anything. What are arguments for error theory even supposed to accomplish? Error theorists may respond that their arguments are solely intended to get at the truth. I argue that this reply fails. One problem is that it cannot make sense of why in practice even error theorists still want evidence for the premises of sound arguments. Error theorists may try to capture the importance of evidence by appeal to our social norms or goals. I argue that this answer is indistinguishable from the view that our social practices or goals generate authoritative normative requirements. Thus, attempts to defend the coherence of arguing for error theory are either unacceptably revisionary or they are inconsistent with error theory. While this result is a problem for error theory, it seems consistent with highly relativistic accounts of normative authority. In the future, I plan to explore whether my core arguments can be extended to defend authoritative, universal scope normative requirements (e.g. of prudence and morality).

Committee: Michael Weber Dr (Advisor); Verner Bingman Dr (Other); Christian Coons Dr (Committee Member); Molly Gardner Dr (Committee Member); Sara Worley (Committee Member) Subjects: Philosophy

MA, Kent State University, 2020, College of Arts and Sciences / Department of Philosophy

Meliorism is the belief in the possibility of progress—a possibility whose actualization is dependent on, but not guaranteed by, both our efforts and our belief regarding the possibility of the success of those efforts. In this thesis, I have two joint goals: first, to explicate the philosophy of meliorism and its justifications; and second, through this elucidation, to demonstrate why and how one is to become a meliorist. To this end, I undertake the development of the intellectual, moral, and existential organization of meliorism. In the first chapter, concerning meliorism's intellectual organization, I develop and justify the definition of meliorism as the belief in progress. In the second chapter, I extend this to meliorism's moral organization—the issue of what counts as “progress” or “betterment”—by expounding John Dewey's ethics. In the third chapter, in regard to meliorism's existential organization, I attempt to estimate what I call the existential weight of meliorism and sketch out ways in which meliorists can go about managing this weight. Throughout this undertaking I relate the various aspects of meliorism to the issues of our contemporary society to establish a concrete sense of the ways in which I believe this philosophy can help us in our lives as we grapple with challenges such as climate change, corruption in politics, and navigating competing ideals and values in political discourse.

Committee: Frank Ryan (Advisor) Subjects: Philosophy

Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.), Bowling Green State University, 2018, Philosophy, Applied

If we grant that some moral claims are true, what is it that makes them true? Throughout the vast majority of history, it was believed that God was the source of morality. But the twentieth century saw a shift in ethics. Influenced by logical positivism and a broadly naturalistic worldview, scholars sought to develop a theory of ethics that did not depend on God's existence. One leading approach was moral naturalism, the view that moral properties are natural and thus can be investigated by scientific methods. But this view was plagued with problems, leading many to conclude that moral and natural facts were just too different to be one and the same. Having rejected a divine conception of ethics and moral naturalism, some scholars turned to moral non-naturalism - the view that moral properties are not natural. One particular form of moral non-naturalism entails that moral properties are sui generis. I call this view Moorean realism. The current trend suggests that Moorean realism is preferable to divine command theory, a competing form of moral non-naturalism wherein moral properties are reducible to supernatural properties. But, as far as the salient objections go, divine command theory is at least as plausible as Moorean realism. Indeed, if we look closely at the traditional versions of these views and the common objections to them, divine command theory offers compelling responses and Moorean realism has a difficult time meeting many of these challenges. In chapter one, I argue that divine command theory is as plausible as Moorean realism. In chapter two, I consider the viability of a non-traditional form of Moorean realism - the view that moral truths are conceptual truths. I argue that the thesis that moral truths are conceptual faces a serious dilemma which renders the view in question implausible. In chapter three, I argue that it is indeed the traditional divine command theory and not the intriguing deflationary one whereby God need not exist, th (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Christian Coons PhD (Advisor); Michael Weber PhD (Committee Member); Sara Worley PhD (Committee Member); Alfred DeMaris PhD (Other) Subjects: Ethics; Philosophy

Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.), Bowling Green State University, 2018, Philosophy, Applied

We all say that certain moral views – true or false, agreed to or not – are reasonable, rational or justified. When we say this, we mean, roughly, that the agent who has come to these views has answered her ethical questions in a responsible way and that her beliefs are defensible from her own perspective. Whether or not these beliefs turn out true, they have some epistemic merit. This work is an investigation into that notion of epistemic merit. It asks, "What makes a moral belief justified?"

Committee: Christian Coons (Advisor); Michael Weber (Committee Member); Michael Bradie (Committee Member); Daniel Fasko (Committee Member) Subjects: Epistemology; Ethics; Philosophy

PhD, University of Cincinnati, 2011, Arts and Sciences: Philosophy

Naturalism is an ambiguous philosophical term that refers to one of two general philosophical theses: the metaphysical thesis that all facts, including moral facts, are natural facts, and the epistemological thesis that the methods of philosophical inquiry, including moral inquiry, are continuous with those of the empirical sciences. The metaphysical thesis has long been the default form of naturalism in ethics. The thesis of this dissertation is that, first, despite the convention, it the epistemological thesis—which I call “methodological naturalism”—that is genuinely naturalistic; and second, that existing forms of epistemological naturalism in contemporary ethics have largely failed to develop genuine continuity between moral inquiry and scientific inquiry and hence are not genuine forms of methodological naturalism. The argument proceeds in two parts. First, I examine a growing trend in moral philosophy toward the use of scientific data, especially from cognitive science, psychology, and psychiatry, for resolving longstanding philosophical disputes about the nature of morality and moral agency. This empirical strategy is widely regarded as naturalistic. I argue that many of these approaches fail to satisfy a fundamental requirement on genuine naturalism, namely the development of continuity with scientific inquiry, either because they wrongly take the metaphysical thesis rather than the methodological thesis as primary, or because despite rightly privileging the latter they nevertheless seek to resolve traditional philosophical disputes that are founded on an outmoded psychological framework, namely the framework of commonsense folk psychology. The traditional philosophical disputes in question are those that jointly constitute what Michael Smith (1994) calls the “Moral Problem,” the central organizing problem in metaethics. I focus in particular on the dispute surrounding the so-called Humean theory of moral motivation, according to which an agent's being mot (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Valerie Hardcastle PhD (Committee Chair); Vanessa Carbonell PhD (Committee Member); John Bickle PhD (Committee Member); Lawrence Jost PhD (Committee Member) Subjects: Philosophy

Doctor of Philosophy, The Ohio State University, 2003, Philosophy

In order to have genuine disagreement, interlocutors must share terms, meanings, and concepts. Without this, their dispute is merely verbal; it rests on linguistic confusion. This is true of all conversation, but many philosophers have thought that moral discourse poses special problems. Moral discourse seems to contain intractable disagreements and lacks the sorts of authority and deference relations that are typical in straightforward empirical disagreement. This yields a potent philosophical puzzle: how is it that moral evaluators can share a subject matter while thinking such different things? I argue that noncognitivist attempts to make sense of disagreement fail. The noncognitivist is obliged to provide an account of the mental states at work in moral discourse. These accounts either fail to identify a distinct species of moral evaluation, or to provide for genuine incompatibility between competing moral judgments, or to avoid circularity. Thus one of the most important motivations for noncognitivist accounts is undermined. I show how naturalistic moral realism can be defended against popular arguments against its ability to make sense of univocity. This criticism has been revived in recent work by Terence Horgan and Mark Timmons. I develop three objections to their so-called ‘Moral Twin Earth' argument, and conclude that it has no force against moral realism. I then show that naturalistic realism faces a different problem accounting for univocity. This problem results from the fact that the path of moral inquiry is underdetermined: there is no fact of the matter about the referents of speakers' terms. I argue that common realistic appeals to the resolution of moral dispute are not sufficient, because they fail to note a distinction between different readings of the convergence claim. The most plausible ways of understanding that claim are of no help to the realist's semantic requirements. Finally, I consider a rejoinder suggested by recent work in the philoso (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Justin D'Arms (Advisor) Subjects: Philosophy

Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.), Bowling Green State University, 2012, Philosophy, Applied

Broadly and somewhat roughly speaking, metanormative theorists who maintain that there is normative truth fall into one of three camps: non-naturalist, naturalist and expressivist. I am interested in the prospects for normative truth, and thus in which, if any, of these positions offers hope for the discovery of such truth. In each of three chapters, I address one of these views. I conclude that our best hope is a view most closely related to naturalism (though I reject this classification for one that I believe better captures what is at stake in the literature I focus on). In Chapter 1, I target expressivism, according to which normative thought and language express non-cognitive attitudes. I explain why it will be difficult, if not impossible, for expressivists to account for a kind of commonplace nihilistic doubt that, I argue, is a symptom of the widely accepted “objective” nature of normativity. I conclude that an inability to account for such doubt should be considered a serious problem for expressivism. In Chapter 2, I address a prominent form of non-naturalism, according to which the normative is “metaphysically autonomous”—neither identical with, nor constituted by, nor constitutive of anything non-normative. I examine several important explanatory challenges non-naturalists face in normative epistemology, metaphysics and semantics. I argue that it will be difficult, if not impossible, to develop their view such that it meets these challenges while remaining plausible. The Open Question Argument and its contemporary cousin, Normative Twin Earth, are the most prominent objections to naturalism. In Chapter 3, I argue that because these arguments rely on semantic rather than metaphysical intuitions, they should be understood as targeting semantic rather than metaphysical views (e.g., not naturalism). I propose that the appropriate targets are views committed to a particular class of reference-fixing relations for normative terms. I then examine the prospects (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: David Shoemaker Ph.D. (Committee Chair); Christian Coons Ph.D. (Committee Member); David Copp Ph.D. (Committee Member); Anne Gordon Ph.D. (Committee Member); Tristram McPherson Ph.D. (Committee Member); Sara Worley Ph.D. (Committee Member) Subjects: Ethics; Philosophy

Master of Arts (MA), Ohio University, 2013, Philosophy (Arts and Sciences)

I critically examine and evaluate the cogency of four kinds of evolutionary debunking arguments in the literature. Specifically, I focus on Alvin Plantinga's Evolutionary Argument Against Naturalism, an argument aimed at establishing the conclusion that naturalism and evolution lead to an epistemic defeater that renders the conjoined belief in both irrational; Michael Ruse's Evolutionary Ethics, aimed at establishing that an evolutionary genealogy of our moral sentiments proves morality to be an illusion; Sharon Street's Darwinian Dilemma Against Realist Theories of Value, which aims to establish the implausibility of natural selection having produced cognitive faculties that accurately track the sort of moral facts posited by moral realists; and Richard Joyce's Evolutionary Debunking of Morality, an argument to show that our moral judgments are unjustified and we ought to therefore adopt moral agnosticism. I argue that Alvin Plantinga fails to prove that the conjunction of naturalism and evolution lead to radical skepticism. Second, I argue that Michael Ruse draws the wrong conclusions from his evolutionary genealogy of morals and as a consequence fails to give a compelling argument against moral realism. By contrast, I defend Richard Joyce's and Sharon Street's arguments against various criticisms and conclude that they present a compelling epistemic challenge to justifications for moral realism.

Committee: James Petrik (Advisor); John Bender (Committee Member); Alfred Lent (Committee Member) Subjects: Epistemology; Ethics; Philosophy

MA, Kent State University, 2013, College of Arts and Sciences / Department of Philosophy

In this paper I examine Peter Railton's theory of moral realism. I begin with his account of non-moral value and continue with his account of moral rightness. Railton's theory is a version of reductive naturalistic moral realism. I next examine some objections applicable to this theory raised by Derek Parfit and Connie Rosati. Parfit argues that an acceptable account of value most invoke non-natural irreducibly normative reasons. Rosati argues that Railton's theory of non-moral value fails as an account of the good for a person. I defend Railton's theory and ultimately conclude that Railton's theory has the resources to overcome these objections.

Committee: Michael Byron (Advisor); Frank Ryan (Committee Member); Kim Garchar (Committee Member); Tammy Clewell (Committee Member) Subjects: Philosophy

Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.), Bowling Green State University, 2013, Philosophy, Applied

Many ethical theories depend on the existence of natural teleology as a source of normativity. Natural Teleology, the purposive goal-directedness of non-conscious biological processes, is also embraced to some degree by a majority of philosophers of biology who agree that the teleological concepts of purpose, goal, defect, proper function and malfunction are legitimate, perhaps necessary, in biological explanations. In my dissertation I provide a substantive argument against the reduction of teleology to natural facts and argue that ethical theories that rely on it cannot be naturalistic. Several ethical theories could be my target, but I focus on the most overt example: neo-Aristotelian ethics. The project is in two sections, one in ethical theory and the other in philosophy of biology. In the first section of the dissertation, primarily using Philippa Foot and Judith Jarvis Thomson as models, I illustrate how Neo-Aristotelian theories rest on natural teleology. I offer a metaethical analysis of teleology, arguing that it does not belong to the good nor the right nor mere description, but rather the proper. I call this category of concept protonormativity. I claim that protonormativity, of which teleology is a paradigmatic example, does not yield normative facts and is not reducible to natural facts; it is a distinct conceptual category. In the second section I give a novel argument for why natural teleology cannot be reduced to natural facts. Teleological concepts such as design and proper function imply standards of correctness for phenotypic outcome. They entail norms for the way an item is to be in the end: functional or malfunctional, good or defective. However, since a phenotype is the result of a genotype in some set of environmental conditions, there can only be a proper phenotype if there exists a proper environment for the item to inhabit. Regarding artifacts, a designer is capable of setting a proper environment, but I argue science does not admit of pro (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Daniel Jacobson PhD (Committee Chair); William Mathis PhD (Committee Member); Michael Bradie PhD (Committee Member); Christian Coons PhD (Committee Member); John Basl PhD (Committee Member) Subjects: Philosophy