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Conservatism Reconsidered

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 August 2021

DAVID O'BRIEN Open the ORCID record for DAVID O'BRIEN [Opens in a new window]
DAVID O'BRIEN*
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TULANE UNIVERSITY dobrien10@tulane.edu
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Abstract

G. A. Cohen has argued that there is a surprising truth in conservatism—namely, that there is a reason for some valuable things to be preserved, even if they could be replaced with other, more valuable things. This conservative thesis is motivated, Cohen suggests, by our judgments about a range of hypothetical cases. After reconstructing Cohen's conservative thesis, I argue that the relevant judgments about these cases do not favor the conservative thesis over standard, nonconservative axiological views. But I then argue that there is a Mirrored Histories case that is such that, if one shares Cohen's conservative attitude, judgments about this case favor Cohen's conservative thesis over a wide range of non-conservative axiological views. Reflection on this case also suggests a different explanation of apparently conservative judgments that merits consideration in its own right.

Keywords

axiologyG. A. Cohenconservatismvalue
Type
Article
Information
Journal of the American Philosophical Association , Volume 8 , Issue 1 , Spring 2022 , pp. 149 - 168
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Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s), 2021. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of the American Philosophical Association

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Footnotes

I am deeply grateful to Julia Boles, Harry Brighouse, Anca Gheaus, Dan Hausman, Charitie V. Hyman, Josh Mund, and Ben Schwan for written comments and discussion. A rich set of comments from an anonymous reviewer for this journal was invaluable in improving the essay. I am also grateful to audiences and commentators at the 2018 Wisconsin Philosophical Association annual meeting in Oshkosh, Wisconsin, and the 2020 Eastern Division meeting of the American Philosophical Association in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Special thanks to the students of Harry Brighouse's political philosophy class at the University of Wisconsin–Madison in spring 2017 for discussion that originally inspired this essay.

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