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Using and Abusing Moorean Arguments

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 August 2021

M. SCARFONE Open the ORCID record for M. SCARFONE [Opens in a new window]
M. SCARFONE*
Affiliation:
UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO mpscarf1@gmail.com
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Abstract

Metaethical Mooreanism is the view that without being able to explain how we know certain moral claims we can nevertheless be sure that we do know them. In this article I focus on the Moorean argument against moral error theory. I conclude that it fails. To show this failure, I first distinguish Moorean claims from Moorean arguments, and then so-called presumptive support from dialogical support. With these distinctions in place, I argue that the key Moorean claim requires dialogical support in order to be used within the Moorean argument against moral error theory, but metaethical Mooreans have provided only presumptive support for the Moorean claim. Not only is this presumptive support inadequate for fending off the moral error theory, it is doubtful that Mooreans can actually provide dialogical support for the key Moorean claim.

Keywords

Moorean claimsMoorean argumentsskepticismmoral error theorymoral epistemology
Type
Article
Information
Journal of the American Philosophical Association , Volume 8 , Issue 1 , Spring 2022 , pp. 52 - 71
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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

For their helpful feedback on some or other version of this work, thanks to Alice Everly, Andre Martin, Bart Streumer, Charles Côté-Bouchard, Eric Murphy, Eric Sampson, Iwao Hirose, Joey Van Weelden, Kathryn Lindeman, Martina Orlandi, Muhammad Velji, Sarah Stroud, Stephanie Leary, audiences at McGill University and the 2018 Pacific APA, and referees for this journal (and four previous ones).

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