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Robert Audi, The Good in the Right: A Theory of Intuition and Intrinsic Value. Princeton: Princeton University Press 2004. Pp. 244.

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Robert Audi, The Good in the Right: A Theory of Intuition and Intrinsic Value. Princeton: Princeton University Press 2004. Pp. 244.

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2020

Anthony Skelton
Anthony Skelton*
Affiliation:
University of Western Ontario, London, ONN6A 3K7, Canada
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Type
Critical Notice
Information
Canadian Journal of Philosophy , Volume 37 , Issue 2 , June 2007 , pp. 305 - 325
Copyright
Copyright © The Authors 2007

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References

1 Frankena, William Ethics (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall 1963), 86–7Google Scholar

2 For example, Frankena endorsed something akin to normative intuitionism, despite his misgivings about the meta-ethical elements of ethical intuitionism.

3 Rawls, John A Theory of Justice (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press 1971), 41Google Scholar

4 See, for example, several of the essays in Ethical Intuitionism: Re-evaluations, Stratton-Lake, Philip ed. (Oxford: Oxford University Press 2002),Google Scholar Shafer-Landau, Russ Moral Realism: A Defense (Oxford: Oxford University Press 2003)CrossRefGoogle Scholar and Huemer, Michael Ethical Intuitionism (New York: Palgrave Macmillan 2006).Google Scholar

5 All bare parenthetical references in the text are to this work.

6 Hurka, Thomas ‘Normative Ethics: Back to the Future’, The Future for Philosophy, Leiter, Brian ed. (Oxford: Oxford University Press 2004) 246–64, at 246.Google Scholar

7 It is important to keep these two elements distinct. Rawls, for example, defends (1) but not (2). See Rawls, A Theory of Justice, 42–4 & 61.Google Scholar He thinks that the plural principles he defends can be lexically or lexicographically ordered. This reminds us that not all pluralists are normative intuitionists.

8 Sidgwick, Henry The Methods of Ethics, 7th ed. (London: Macmillan 1907). Hereafter ME.Google Scholar

9 Moore, G.E. Principia Ethica (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 1903)Google Scholar & Rashdall, Hastings The Theory of Good and Evü, vols. I & II (Oxford: Clarendon Press 1907)Google Scholar

10 Broad, CD. Five Types of Ethical Theory (London: Kegan Paul 1930)Google Scholar & ‘Seif and Others’, Broad's Critical Essays in Moral Philosophy, Cheney, D. ed. (London: George Allen and Unwin 1971), 262–82,Google Scholar and Ross, W.D. The Right and the Good (Oxford: Oxford University Press 1930).Google Scholar

11 See 21, 74, and 76.

12 See 29 and 32.

13 See 161-96.

14 Audi Claims that he does not take ‘non-naturalism as basic in an intuitionist ethics as such’ (21; italics in original). His view is that the elements of MI and NI that he sets out to defend are compatible with naturalism, empiricism and non-cognitivism (2, 34, 54-6, & 151). This explains why he spends no time defending 4 & 5 of MI, though he Claims to favor a rationalist version of the view (54-5).

15 This is something that Ross and other intuitionists, e.g., Sidgwick, failed to see. For Ross's mistake, see The Right and the Good, chap. 2. For Sidgwick's mistake, see ME, 373 and ‘Professor Calderwood on Intuitionism in Morals’, Mind 1 (1876), 563-6.

16 This is the sense in which for Audi self-evident propositions are not ‘strongly axiomatic.'

17 This is his ‘comprehension requirement.’

18 Except of course the three other f eatures of intuitions specified above. These are not relevant here since they are assumed to be present in the case of intuitions of self-evident propositions as well.

19 One referee argues that the Charge of speciesism here is dubious because ‘the claim that we should contribute to the good of other people — where… this does not imply that we should contribute only to the good of other people — cannot reflect speciesist ideas.’ True, but this is not my point. I am arguing that perhaps the reason why this principle seems to have a greater claim to self-evidence is because of speciesist tendencies humans typically have.

20 One referee contends that it is not correct to think that the ‘only propositions suitable for self-evident knowledge are ones completely without vagueness in their concepts.’ I do not claim this against Audi. Instead, my contention is that Audi's are so vague that they do not seem even on the face of it to be self-evident.

21 For a more in-depth discussion of this matter, see Crisp, Roger ‘Intuitionism and Disagreement’, Rationality and the Good: Critical Essays on the Ethics and Epistemology of Robert Audi, Timmons, Mark Greco, John Mele, Alfred R. eds. (Oxford: Oxford University Press 2007).Google Scholar

22 Griffin, James Value Judgement: Improving Our Ethical Reliefs (Oxford: Oxford University Press 1996), 13Google Scholar

23 Hooker, Brad Ideal Code, Real World: A Rule-Consequentialism Theory of Morality (Oxford: Oxford University Press 2001), 16Google Scholar

24 McMahan, Jeff ‘Moral Intuition’, The Blackwell Guide to Ethical Theory, La-Follette, Hugh ed. (Oxford: Blackwell 2000) 92–110, at 94Google Scholar

25 Rawls, A Theory of Justice, 46-53, esp. 51; and Daniels, Norman ‘Wide Reflective Equilibrium and Theory Acceptance in Ethics’, Journal of Philosophy 76 (1979) 256-82CrossRefGoogle Scholar

26 Moore, 222

27 Moore, 222

28 Ross, 23

29 Ross, 23; see also 19.

30 Broad, CD. Five Types of Ethical Theory, 223;Google Scholar see also Broad, CD. ‘Some of the Main Problems of Ethics’, Broad's Critical Essays in Moral Philosophy, Cheney, D. ed. (London: George Allen and Unwin 1971) 223–46.Google Scholar

31 Five Types, 223; see also 283-4.

32 Sidgwick, ME, 6. How much deviation Sidgwick allows from common-sense morality is a matter of dispute. For discussion, see Shaver, Robert Rational Egoism (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 1999)Google Scholar and my ‘Schultz's Sidgwick’, Utilitas 19 (2007) 91-103.

33 Sidgwick, ME, 406

34 Hence, he explicitly rejects (2) of NI above.

35 He notes that this version is not identical to those found in Kanf s ethical writings, but since his aim is to defend some kind of Kantianism rather than Kant himself, this does not worry him.

36 Miu, J.S. Utilitarianism, Crisp, Roger ed. (Oxford: Oxford University Press 1998)Google Scholar, chap. 1, paragraph 5. See also ME, Sidgwick Book IV, chapter II and ‘The Establishment of Ethical First Principles’, Mind 4 (1879) 106–11.Google Scholar

37 The appeal here to Ross seems to make his view circular, but let us ignore this complication for the moment.

38 Ross, 27&39

39 This follows from the fact that, as Ross puts it, ‘the tendency of acts to promote general good is one of the main factors in determining whether they are righf (39).

40 Ross,22

41 Peter Singer, ‘The Singer Solution’, The New York Times Magazine (5 September 1999), 60-3. See also Peter Singer, ‘What Should a Billionaire Give — and What Should You Give?’ New York Times Magazine (17 December 2006).

42 See Railton, Peter ‘Alienation, Consequentialism, and the Demands of Morality’, Phüosophy and Public Affairs 13 (1984), 134-71,Google Scholar and Hare, R.M. Moral Thinking (Oxford: Oxford University Press 1981).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

43 See the references in the previous note.

44 I would like to thank two anonymous ref erees f rom the Canadiern Journal of Phüosophy and Anne Skelton for helpful comments on an earlier version of this paper; Roger Crisp for extremely beneficial conversations about the matters that I take up in this article; and the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada for funding.