德性伦理与规范伦理在生命伦理中的契合

在生命伦理领域中,规范伦理与德性伦理都曾发挥重要作用,然而,德性伦理没有受到人们足够的重视,重新厘定传统德性伦理的现代价值显得尤为重要.初步探究在生命伦理迅速发展的情况下,德性伦理与规范伦理相结合的模式.     

德性与伦理规范刍议

道德都是历史的、具体的,但并不意味着人类不存在某种道德的普适性,也不表明当今社会毋须对普适伦理的寻求.康德的道德既是德性又是规范性;既是道德主体之自觉,又含有道德本体之意味,两者是内在统一的.然而,西方社会因历来政治、法律重于伦理道德,更多的表现为外在的规范伦理.中国传统伦理思想与之不同,是以内在规范和道德自觉之统一为其特征.传统的规范性道德理论,面临现代社会纷繁复杂的价值观和道德无序的局面,已无能为力.德性伦理的复兴,并不排斥伦理规范,而是要在新的历史条件下化外在规范为内在规范,使德性和规范在更高的层面得到内在统一.     

化德性为规范:西方的理论尝试及其批评

德性伦理学是古希腊伦理学的传统.但自近代以来,德性伦理学先后发生了两次规范化运动.一次是以功利主义和康德伦理学为代表的规范伦理学取代了德性伦理学的主导地位;一次是20世纪50年代以来兴起的德性伦理学复归运动中,德性伦理学内部阵营中出现的规范化的理论动向.德性伦理学的两次规范化运动都不可避免地面临着理论上的批评.德性伦理规范化引致的理论思考是:在现代社会中,德性伦理是否必要,如何可能.     

略论制度伦理与德性伦理的关系

制度伦理的核心是伦理 ,其对德性伦理起作用的方式也应该是制度中的伦理因素而不是强制性规范。制度伦理以其内涵的伦理精神以及作为一种社会存在来影响个人德性。制度伦理与德性伦理相互作用并相互转化     

德性伦理和临终关怀

源于古希腊哲学的德性伦理在当代道德哲学中开始复兴。它关注道德行为者品性,而不是具体行为对错,但也被批评为乌托邦、相对主义、循环论述和个人主义。辩护后的德性伦理仍需结合现实分析,以得到临终关怀的德目结构。对人格德性的内容和结构讨论,更深层次涉及至今被忽略的政治德性或制度德性,揭示医生、患者和政治应有的德性,回应具体伦理问题：接受或拒绝可能延长生命的治疗,是否以姑息镇静方式减轻痛苦,如何面对死亡本身的挑战。     

当代西方德性伦理视野中的德性教化及其启示

自古以来,德性教化是西方伦理学中的重要课题。尤其进入20世纪50、60年代之后,西方德性伦理的复兴使人们重新审视德性教化。在当代西方德性伦理学家看来,德性已然失落。他们从实践教化和理论教化两个方面展开研究,深化了人们对德性教化的认识,为现代社会中德性教化的研究提供了有益的启示。     

德性伦理及其现当代价值

现当代是否只适合发展规范伦理,而德性伦理注定趋向衰落?本文在分析德性伦理与道德特质、中国古代与西方德性伦理传统、马克思主义如何对待德性伦理以及如何应对德性伦理所面临的挑战和冲击等问题的基础上,认为德性伦理在现当代仍有重要的价值意义,仍是伦理学研究与道德建设具有重要理论意义和实践意义的课题。     

规范·德性·德行

外在道德规范何以内化为内在德性?内在德性在怎样的条件影响下表现出与德性一致的道德行为?这构成了我们对伦理道德研究从理论走向实践、从静态走向动态的关键所在.为此,在化规范为德性、化德性为德行的基本原则下,将伦理道德践履的可能性推向可实证的具体道德行为实践之中.     

当代托马斯·阿奎那德性伦理研究的视阈

20世纪八九十年代以来,随着麦金太尔等人对德性伦理的复兴,托马斯.阿奎那的德性伦理作为西方中古时代德性伦理的一大传统受到了学术界的瞩目。鉴于阿奎那德性伦理的神哲学渊源和当代复兴背景,对它的研究应当基于西方德性伦理发展的历史脉络、神学背景和形而上架构以及当代德性伦理复兴这三个视阈,通过这三个视阈的综合或交融,阿奎那德性伦理的理论渊源、神学旨趣以及当代意义得以澄清和展现。     

企业伦理的德性主义进路及其条件——以所罗门的亚里士多德方式为例

理解企业伦理的德性主义进路不可或缺。美国当代著名经济伦理学家罗伯特·C．所罗门成功地将亚里士多德德性论引入企业伦理学,为人们把握企业伦理提供了一条德性主义的诠释进路。而亚里士多德德性论强调实践、团体、人对幸福的追求和追求卓越等也为企业伦理的德性主义进路提供了思想资源。而美德自身也能够使人们正确地理解商业和商业伦理、使经济交易成为可能、使经济的运行更为成功。但德性主义进路不是没有条件的,它需要个体或企业具有良好的道德价值观念和良好的判断力,也需要规范伦理与之匹配,以及一个尊重美德的社会环境和相关的制度安排。     

德性伦理论要

德性伦理强调以人类自身的内在品质作为人的一切生活的出发点,这不仅使德性伦理在人类伦理思想的起源处规避着人类伦理生活的方向,而且在现代人类遭遇道德困境的形势下,又指示着人类伦理生活所应该采取的态度。德性伦理最终的理论指向便是将成就德性与明其规范统一起来,从而真正实现人自身的价值。在现代社会价值多元化的背景下,对传统德性伦理资源的挖掘,显得尤为重要。无论是亚里士多德的德性传统,还是原始儒家的德性传统,都可以为现代伦理理论的建设提供丰富的智性资源。     

Common-Sense Virtue Ethics and Moral Luck

Moral luck poses a problem for out conception of responsibility because it highlights a tension between morality and lack of control. Michael Slote’s common-sense virtue ethics claims to avoid this problem. However there are a number of objections to this claim. Firstly, it is not clear that Slote fully appreciates the problem posed by moral luck. Secondly, Slote’s move from the moral to the ethical is problematic. Thirdly it is not clear why we should want to abandon judgements of moral blame in favour of judgements of ethical deplorability. Finally this paper defends an alternative solution to the problem of moral luck, which focuses on judgements of probability, but which has been rejected by Slote.     

Virtue Ethics, The Analects, and the Problem of Commensurability

In support of the thesis that virtue ethics allows for a more comprehensive and consistent interpretation of the Analects than other possible models, the author uses a structural outline of a virtue ethic (derived from Alasdair MacIntyre's account of the Aristotlelian tradition) to organize a discussion of the text. The resulting interpretation focuses attention on the religious aspects of Confucianism and accounts for aspects of the text that are otherwise difficult to explain. In addition, the author argues that the structural similarities between the Aristotelian and Confucian conceptions of self-cultivation indicate a dimension of commensurability between the two traditions, despite very real variations in specific content. Finally, the author suggests how crosscultural commensurability, in general, can be understood on a theoretical level.     

Virtue Ethics, Theory, and Warrant

Are there good grounds for thinking that the moral values of action are to be derived from those of character? This ‘virtue ethical’ claim is sometimes thought of as a kind of normative ethical theory; sometimes as form of opposition to any such theory. However, the best case to be made for it supports neither of these claims. Rather, it leads us to a distinctive view in moral epistemology: the view that my warrant for a particular moral judgement derives from my warrant for believing that I am a good moral judge. This view seems to confront a regress-problem. For the belief that I am a good moral judge is itself a particular moral judgement. So it seems that, on this view, I need to derive my warrant for believing that I am a good moral judge from my warrant for believing that I am a good judge of moral judges; and so on. I show how this worry can be met, and trace the implications of the resulting view for warranted moral judgement.     

Social Psychology and Virtue Ethics

Several philosophers have recently claimed to have discovered a new and rather significant problem with virtue ethics. According to them, virtue ethics generates certain expectations about the behavior of human beings which are subject to empirical testing. But when the relevant experimental work is done in social psychology, the results fall remarkably short of meeting those expectations. So, these philosophers think, despite its recent success, virtue ethics has far less to offer to contemporary ethical theory than might have been initially thought. I argue that there are plausible ways in which virtue ethicists can resist arguments based on empirical work in social psychology. In the first three sections of the paper, I reconstruct the line of reasoning being used against virtue ethics by looking at the recent work of Gilbert Harman and John Doris. The remainder of the paper is then devoted both to responding to their challenge as well as to briefly sketching a positive account of character trait possession.     

The Virtues in their Place: Virtue Ethics in Medicine

Theoretical Medicine and Bioethics - We are currently in the midst of a revival of interest in thevirtues. A number of contemporary moral philosophers havedefended a virtue-based approach to...     

New Directions in Ethics: Naturalisms, Reasons and Virtue

This paper discusses three topics in contemporary British ethical philosophy: naturalisms, moral reasons, and virtue. Most contemporary philosophers agree that 'ethics is natural' - in Section 1 I examine the different senses that can be given to this idea, from reductive naturalism to supernaturalism, seeking to show the problems some face and the problems others solve. Drawing on the work of John McDowell in particular, I conclude that an anti-supernatural non-reductive naturalism plausibly sets the limits on what we can do in ethics. Moral reasons are widely discussed - in Section 2 I describe some of the criteria that used to distinguish moral practical reasons, and note possibilities and problems. Drawing on the work of Elizabeth Anscombe in particular, I suggest that an inclusive, minimalist account of moral reasons may be most fruitful. There has been a revival of philosophical interest in virtue ethics, which I take to be linked to the emergence of non-reductive naturalisms - in Section 3 I describe three points where virtue ethics has an especially significant contribution to make: learning, motivational self-sufficiency, and the question of whether virtues can be reasons. The naturalism of Section 1 constrains the accounts of moral reasons considered in Section 2, and depends upon an account of virtue as learned second nature, discussed in Section 3.     

Towards a Confucian Virtue Bioethics: Reframing Chinese Medical Ethics in a Market Economy

This essay addresses a moral and cultural challenge facing health care in the People’s Republic of China: the need to create an understanding of medical professionalism that recognizes the new economic realities of China and that can maintain the integrity of the medical profession. It examines the rich Confucian resources for bioethics and health care policy by focusing on the Confucian tradition’s account of how virtue and human flourishing are compatible with the pursuit of profit. It offers the Confucian account of the division of labor and the financial inequalities this produces with special attention to China’s socialist project of creating the profession of barefoot doctors as egalitarian peasant physicians and why this project failed. It then further develops the Confucian acknowledgement of the unequal value of different services and products and how this conflicts with the current system of payment to physicians which has led to the corruption of medical professionalism through illegal supplementary payments. It further gives an account the oblique intentionality of Confucian moral psychology that shows how virtuous persons can pursue benevolent actions while both foreseeing profit and avoiding defining their character by greed. This account of Confucian virtue offers the basis for a medical professionalism that can function morally within a robustly profit-oriented market economy. The paper concludes with a summary of the characteristics of Confucian medical professionalism and of how it places the profit motive within its account of virtue ethics.