INTUITIONS AND SEMANTIC THEORY

Abstract: While engaged in the analysis of philosophically central concepts, analytic philosophers have traditionally relied extensively on their own intuitions about when such concepts can be correctly applied. Intuitions have, however, come under increasingly critical scrutiny of late, and if they turned out not to be a reliable tool for the proper analysis of our concepts, then a radical reworking of analytic philosophy's methodology would be in order. One influential line of criticism against the use of intuitions argues that they only tell us about our conceptions of things, and not the things themselves. This venerable line of criticism can seem considerably strengthened if one endorses “externalist” accounts of meaning. Nevertheless, the move from semantic externalism to the rejection of intuitions will be shown to be illegitimate if one has a constitutive rather than expressive understanding of the relation between our intuitions and our concepts.     

Moral judgment and self-reported moral events in adulthood

As part of a 13-year study of the development of reasoning about the Good Life and moral judgment, 29 middle-class, well-educated adults, ranging in age from 18 to 80 years, were interviewed twice, 4 years apart on Standard Form Moral Judgment interviews and were asked to describe their own moral events that occurred recently. Both times, the average moral judgment score on the hypothetical dilemmas was about stage 4. The reasoning in the spontaneously reported moral events was significantly lower, although the two scores were highly correlated. Difference scores between the two were not related to scores on the hypothetical dilemmas. While there were no significant gender differences in scores on the hypothetical dilemmas, there were in scores on spontaneously reported events favoring males. The philosophic quality of the reported events could be easily categorized by traditional moral-philosophic categories; about half of the events contained traditional deontic moral content (moral right); the other half contained material defined as the moral good. The context of most events was interpersonal as opposed to societal. The most frequent issue discussed concerned honesty about financial issues, particularly income tax evasion. Ways to expand the research on adult moral experience are discussed.     

当代道德教育指向:从道德顺从到道德选择的理路

我国的道德教育有着悠久的历史,其主体流质是道德顺从教育,原因有:伦理本位的思想传统;群体本位的教育倾向和道德教育的政治统治功能强化。当代道德教育的时代背景的变迁即社会结构的转型和多元化社会的形成以及当代道德教育人本倾向和生活世界的实践回归,标示着道德选择教育成为了道德教育的内在要求和指向。     

牟宗三"实践的智慧学"探求诠论

对哲学作为“实践的智慧学”的探求是牟宗三后期哲学思考的核心。这一探索,开启了牟宗三中国哲学与康德哲学双向诠释的基本视域,也拓出了道德形而上学体系建构的理论地平。“实践的智慧学”诠释具有独特的理论内涵,也隐含了牟氏道德形上学自我批判与超越的思想线索。     

Adolescents' emotion attributions and expectations of behavior in situations involving moral conflict

This study examined the idea that expectations of behavior in hypothetical situations involving potential moral transgressions are related to emotion attributions relating to both moral and cost-benefit considerations. We asked younger (14 years 5 months) and older (16 years 1 month) female and male adolescents (a) to make predictions about the probability that an adolescent placed in a hypothetical situation where a payoff could be obtained by acting in a nonmoral way would choose to do so and (b) to evaluate adolescents' attributions of moral (guilt) and cost-benefit-related emotions (satisfaction and fear) to the nonmoral action. Two different situations were examined; one looked at the possibility of stealing money from a lost wallet, and the other examined a situation where a contract with another peer could be broken for personal reasons. Results showed that expectations that the nonmoral action would be taken were positively related to the degree of satisfaction and negatively related to the degree of guilt and fear. However, the pattern of relations between emotion attributions and behavioral expectations differed between the two situations. Female and male adolescents had different levels of emotion attributions and behavioral expectations, but the relation between the two was similar for both. Finally, developmental comparisons indicated that older adolescents put more weight on guilt and were more internally consistent in the way that emotions were integrated into behavioral expectations.     

Damned If You Do; Damned If You Don’t!

This paper discusses the Principle of Normative Invariance: ‘An action’s moral status does not depend on whether or not it is performed.’ I show the importance of this principle for arguments regarding actualism and other variations on the person-affecting restriction, discuss and rebut arguments in favor of the principle, and then discuss five counterexamples to it. I conclude that the principle as it stands is false; and that if it is modified to avoid the counterexamples, it is gutted of any interest or power.

The hedgehog and the Borg: Common morality in bioethics

In this commentary, I critically discuss the respective views of Gert and Beauchamp–Childress on the nature of so-called common morality and its promise for enriching ethical reflection within the field of bioethics. Although I endorse Beauchamp and Childress’ shift from an emphasis on ethical theory as the source of moral norms to an emphasis on common morality, I question whether rouging up common morality to make it look like some sort of ultimate and universal foundation for morality, untouched by the dialectics of time and reflective equilibrium, was an equally good move. As for Gert’s magisterial conception of common morality, I conclude that certain elements of his system are controversial at best and woefully inadequate at worst. He has a tendency to find in common morality what he himself put there, and his highly restricted conception of duties of assistance strikes this reader as ad hoc, inadequately defended, and unworthy of a project whose goal is to lessen the amount of misery in the world.

A Communicative Conception of Moral Appraisal

I argue that our acts of moral appraisal should be communicative. Praise and blame should communicate, to the appraised, information about their status and competences as moral agents; that they are recognised by the appraiser as a competent moral agent, and thus a legitimate candidate for appraisal. I argue for this thesis by drawing on empirical data about factors that can affect motivation. On the basis of such data, I formulate a constraint, and argue that two prominent models of moral appraisal – a consequentialist model and Wallace’s ‘evaluative response’ model – violate this constraint. The model that I propose – the communicative conception of appraisal – does not violate this constraint. This conception, I argue, can provide a fuller picture of the role of appraisals in deepening agents’ commitment to moral norms. On this model, praise and blame has not only an evaluative component, but also communicates to the agent competence affirming information.

Gain or non‐loss: The message matching effect of regulatory focus on moral judgements of other‐orientation lies

Previous studies found that individuals with promotion focus are more likely to be persuaded by messages framed in terms of gain‐related words; individuals with prevention focus are more likely to be persuaded by messages framed in terms of loss‐related words. This is known as the message matching effect of regulatory focus. The present study extended this effect into the field of moral judgement of other‐orientation lies. Two experiments were conducted, revealing that (a) individuals with promotion focus judged gain‐framed other‐orientation lies to be more moral, while individuals with prevention focus judged non‐loss‐framed other‐orientation lies to be more moral; and (b) the subjective processing fluency had a partial mediating role in the message matching effect. Theoretical implications and future research directions were discussed.     

Two Models of Moral Judgment

This paper compares two theories and their two corresponding computational models of human moral judgment. In order to better address psychological realism and generality of theories of moral judgment, more detailed and more psychologically nuanced models are needed. In particular, a motivationally based theory of moral judgment (and its corresponding computational model) is developed in this paper that provides a more accurate account of human moral judgment than an existing emotion‐reason conflict theory. Simulations based on the theory capture and explain a range of relevant human data. They account not only for the original data that were used to support the emotion – reason conflict theory, but also for a wider range of data and phenomena.