Ethical Project

Name: Ethical Project
Availability: OutOfStock
ISBN: 9780674061446

ISBN-10: 0674061446

ISBN-13: 9780674061446

Edition: 2011

Authors: Philip Kitcher

List price: $55.00

30 day, 100% satisfaction guarantee!

Out of stock

We're sorry. This item is currently unavailable.

what's this?

Rush Rewards U
Members Receive:

You have reached 400 XP and carrot coins. That is the daily max!

Description:

Principles of right and wrong guide the lives of almost all human beings, but we often see them as external to ourselves, outside our own control. In a revolutionary approach to the problems of moral philosophy, Philip Kitcher makes a provocative proposal: Instead of conceiving ethical commands as divine revelations or as the discoveries of brilliant thinkers, we should see our ethical practices as evolving over tens of thousands of years, as members of our species have worked out how to live together and prosper. Elaborating this radical new vision, Kitcher shows how the limited altruistic tendencies of our ancestors enabled a fragile social life, how our forebears learned to regulate…

Book details

List price: $55.00
Copyright year: 2011
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Publication date: 11/7/2011
Binding: Hardcover
Pages: 420
Size: 6.50" wide x 9.50" long x 1.25" tall
Weight: 1.650
Language: English

Philip Kitcher is John Dewey Professor of Philosophy at Columbia University.



Introduction



The Shape of Things to Come



Methodological Preliminaries



An Analytical History



The Springs of Sympathy



Psychological Altruism: Basics



The Varieties of Altruistic Reactions



Some Dimensions of Altruism



Maternal Concern



Broader Forms of Altruism?



Possibilities of Evolutionary Explanation



The Coalition Game



Normative Guidance



The Limits of Altruism



Following Orders



Punishment



Conscience



Social Embedding



Experiments of Living



From There to Here



Cultural Competition



The Unseen Enforcer



Some Dots to Be Connected



Divisions of Labor



Roles, Rules, and Institutions



Altruism Expanded



One Thing after Another?



Mere Change?



Three Ancient Examples



Second-Sex Citizens



Repudiating Chattel Slavery



The Withering of Vice



The Divine Commander



A Metaethical Perspective



Troubles with Truth



Taking Stock



Prima Facie Problems



Truth, Realism and Constructivism



The Sources of the Troubles



Possibilities of Progress



The Centrality of Ethical Progress



Generalizations from History



Problems, Functions and Progress



Modes of Refinement



Functional Generation



Local and Global Progress



Ethical Truth Revisited



Residual Concerns



Naturalistic Fallacies?



Hume's Challenge



Authority Undermined?



Troublesome Characters



Settling Disputes



A Normative Stance



Progress, Equality, and the Good



Two Visions of Normative Ethics



Dynamic Consequentialism



Failures and Successes



From the Local Community to the Human Population



Equality and the Good Life



Population Size



Aspects of the Good Life



Method in Ethics



Varieties of Ethical Change



Method and the Good



Mutual Engagement



Ethical Debate



Dissent and the Limits of Tolerance



The Challenger Revisited



Renewing the Project



Philosophical Midwifery



Scarce Resources



Habits and Their Limits



Conflicting Roles



Ethically Insulated Spheres



Maintaining Equality



The Challenges of Technology


Conclusion



Summing Up


Acknowledgments


Index