The Role of Practical Reason in an Empirically Informed Moral Theory

Empirical research paints a dismal portrayal of the role of reason in morality. It suggests that reason plays no substantive role in how we make moral judgments or are motivated to act on them. This paper explores how it is that an empirically oriented philosopher, committed to methodological naturalism, ought to respond to the skeptical challenge presented by this research. While many think taking this challenge seriously requires revising, sometimes dramatically, how we think about moral agency, this paper will defend the opposite reaction. Contrary to what recent discussions lead us to expect, practical reason is not simply a philosophical fiction lacking empirical roots. Empirical research does not exclude the possibility that practical reason can play a substantive role; rather, there is evidence that it can help us both to determine our first personal moral judgments and to motivate us to act on them.     

部分呈现条件下类别分类学习中的信息表征机制

先前研究者普遍认为, 类别推理学习条件下可以同时表征诊断性信息和非诊断性信息, 而类别分类学习条件下中只能表征诊断性信息, 不能表征非诊断性信息。而最近又有研究者发现部分呈现条件下的类别分类学习可以表征非诊断性信息。本研究通过两个实验系统比较了全部呈现和部分呈现条件下类别分类学习的结果, 进一步探讨了分类学习条件下信息的表征情况, 并进一步探讨了部分呈现条件下的分类学习能够表征非诊断性信息的原因。实验1发现全部呈现6个特征、缺失1个特征(即部分呈现5个特征)、缺失2个特征(即部分呈现4个特征)3种条件下都能表征诊断性信息, 但只有部分呈现条件下能表征非诊断性信息。实验2发现全部呈现7个特征、缺失2个特征(即部分呈现5个特征)、全部呈现5个特征3种条件下都能表征诊断性信息, 但只有部分呈现条件下能表征非诊断性信息。总的实验结果表明：全部呈现条件下的分类学习只能表征诊断性信息, 而部分呈现条件下的分类学习能够同时表征诊断性信息和非诊断性信息, 并且部分呈现条件下表征非诊断性信息的原因是被试进行了推理学习, 而非注意广度的变化。     

样例在理解时间相关事件中的作用

该文的两个实验探讨了人们理解自己和熟悉的人物日常惯例事件的方式。实验1在中文条件下验证了Coleombe等（2002）的研究,即人们不利用已经形成的原型去理解和袁征自己或熟悉人物的日常惯例事件;实验2证明了出现这一结果是因为人们在理解这些事件时利用了过去生活中与当前描述相同的具体样例。实验2还发现,即使不存在上述样例,被试仍然没有启用相关的原型。     

Fostering Contact After Historical Atrocities: The Potential of Moral Exemplars

Intergroup contact is a known remedy for complicated intergroup relations. At the same time, contact is rare in postconflict settings. In the present article, we examine whether exposure to narratives about moral exemplars (i.e., members of a perpetrator group who acted morally and in opposition to the passivity or aggression displayed by majority) could increase openness to contact among historical adversaries. In Study 1 (N = 73), presenting members of a historical perpetrator group with information about ingroup moral exemplars led to a decrease of prejudice towards individuals from a historical victim group, which, in turn, resulted in higher openness to contact with them. In Study 2 (N = 100) and 3 (N = 92), exposure to narratives about outgroup moral exemplars in a historically victimized group increased openness to contact with members of a perpetrator group. These effects were mediated by a decrease in prejudice (Studies 2 and 3) and by an increase in trust towards historical perpetrators (Study 2).     

The Rationality of Ultimate Concern: Moral Exemplars,Theological Ethics,and the Science of Moral Cognition

This paper argues that consideration of moral exemplars may provide a means for integrating insights across philosophical ethics, theological ethics, and the scientific study of moral cognition. Key to this endeavor is an understanding of the relation of cognition and emotion in ethical decision-making, a relation that is usually understood to be oppositional but which in proper circumstances may be understood to be quite the opposite. Indeed, a distinctive feature of moral exemplarity may consist in the ability to properly integrate the emotions into the moral life, and reference to and imitation of exemplars may involve a referencing and imitating of the emotions of the exemplar.     

Practical Reason and the Stability Standard

Practical reasoning, reasoning about what to do, is a very familiar activity. When we think about whether to cook or to go out for dinner, to buy a house or rent, or to study law or business, we are engaged in practical reasoning. If the kind of reasoning we engage in is truly a rational process, there must be some norms or standards that govern it; the process cannot be arbitrary or random. In this paper I argue that one of the standards that governs practical reasoning is the stability standard. The stability standard, I argue, is a norm that is constitutive of practical reasoning: insofar as we do not take violations of this norm to be relevant considerations, we do not count as engaged in reasoning at all. Furthermore, I argue that it is a standard we can explicitly employ in order to deliberate about our ends or desires themselves. Importantly, this standard will not require that some ends are prescribed or determined by reason alone. The stability standard, therefore, allows us to retain some of the attractive features of instrumentalism without accepting the implication that there is no rational way to evaluate ends.     

主观道德强度对企业道德决策的预测作用

本研究基于Jones(1991)的问题权变模型,采用情景研究法,考察主观道德强度的结构以及主观道德强度对企业道德决策的预测作用.研究选取137名MBA学生为被试,要求被试基于所提供情景中假想参与者的行为,回答随后关于道德决策(道德识别、道德判断和道德意图阶段)的问题.结果表明:1)主观道德强度是1维结构;2)主观道德强度对道德识别、道德判断和道德意图有显著预测作用 ;3)结果大小对道德识别、道德判断和道德意图有显著预测作用,而社会舆论对道德识别和道德意图有显著预测作用.     

The Spiritual,Moral, Social and Cultural Values of Students in a Jewish and a Catholic Secondary School

What do students who have attended a Jewish or a Catholic secondary school have to say about the influences on their development, the values they hold and their future goals? Based on responses from more than a hundred students, in two faith-based schools, the article shows that there is no strong commitment to institutional religion or school worship but many refer to the impact on their lives of shared time away together and are willing to be of service to others. Students from both schools value diversity and openness to others. Some of the similarities and the differences between the two schools are explored, comparisons are made with relevant international research, and four possible implications of the findings are indicated.     

Practical Reason and Ethics Above the Line

In John McDowell's recent Woodbridge Lectures at Columbia University, he characterizes Wilfrid Sellars's master thought, in Empiricism and the Philosophy of Mind, as drawing a line between two types of characterizations of states that occur in people's mental lives: Above the line are placings in the logical space of reasons, and below it are characterizations that do not do that (McDowell, 1998, p. 433). In this essay, I ask what would be required for ethics to be above the line. More precisely, what would be necessary to characterize episodes as actions, and persons as agents, so as for them to be answerable to moral criticism in light of rationally relevant considerations. The requirements are twofold: that practical reason motivate in virtue of the content of its deliverances; and that there be a will which is sensitive to those deliverances, and which chooses freely. A widespread procedural account of practical reason is examined and found insufficient to place ethics above the line; and a suspicion is raised that McDowell himself, and Jonathan Dancy, do not have a robust enough conception of will to avoid the below the line ethics they accuse their opponents of defending.     

Teaching and Learning Theology and Religion at the University of Botswana

This essay is part of a collection of short essays solicited from authors around the globe who teach religion courses at the college level (not for professional religious training). They are published together with an introduction in Teaching Theology and Religion 18:3 (July 2015). The authors were asked to provide a brief overview of the curriculum, student learning goals, and pedagogical techniques employed in their courses.