In Defense of Kitcher’s Pragmatic Naturalism
Philip Kitcher, in his book The Ethical Project (2011), outlined an ethical theory built on the foundation of pragmatic naturalism. In it, he tries to merge the pragmatism of John Dewey and the philosophy of naturalism. Despite its notability as an extensive contribution to naturalistic ethics, few...
Zapisane w:
| Wydane w: | URI:https://journals.openedition.org/ejpap, |
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| Główni autorzy: | , |
| Format: | Article ou chapitre numérique |
| Język: | Anglais |
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European Journal of Pragmatism and American Philosophy
2025
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| Hasła przedmiotowe: | |
| Dostęp online: | Accès Université d'Orléans et IFPM Accès Université d'Orléans et IFPM |
| Streszczenie: | Philip Kitcher, in his book The Ethical Project (2011), outlined an ethical theory built on the foundation of pragmatic naturalism. In it, he tries to merge the pragmatism of John Dewey and the philosophy of naturalism. Despite its notability as an extensive contribution to naturalistic ethics, few criticisms against his ethical theory have been made on the basis that it fails to avoid the naturalistic fallacy (Derpmann et al. 2013). Others like Barresi (2017) observe that pragmatic naturalism does not give its proper due to individual moral contribution by stressing social-level phenomena too extensively. This paper will review these criticisms. Firstly, it will argue that alleging pragmatic naturalism of committing a naturalistic fallacy would miss the point of Kitcher’s methodology, since its aim is not to invalidate the fact and value dichotomy by offhandedly deriving one from the other, but to show that a big chunk of observable moral knowledge is lost when we completely try to avoid it. Secondly, we will try to argue that focusing on social-level phenomena does not amount to discrediting individual agency. |
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