''Experiments in Ethics'' is a 2008 book by the
Princeton
Princeton University is a private research university in Princeton, New Jersey. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and one of the ni ...
philosopher Kwame Anthony Appiah
Kwame Akroma-Ampim Kusi Anthony Appiah ( ; born 8 May 1954) is a philosopher, cultural theorist, and novelist whose interests include political and moral theory, the philosophy of language and mind, and African intellectual history. Appiah ...
.
[ The book is based on a series of lectures delivered by Appiah in 2005 at ]Bryn Mawr College
Bryn Mawr College ( ; Welsh: ) is a women's liberal arts college in Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania. Founded as a Quaker institution in 1885, Bryn Mawr is one of the Seven Sister colleges, a group of elite, historically women's colleges in the United Sta ...
.
Summary
Many philosophers have been sceptical about the relevance of empirical moral psychology
Moral psychology is a field of study in both philosophy and psychology. Historically, the term "moral psychology" was used relatively narrowly to refer to the study of moral development. Moral psychology eventually came to refer more broadly to v ...
to ethics
Ethics or moral philosophy is a branch of philosophy that "involves systematizing, defending, and recommending concepts of right and wrong behavior".''Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy'' The field of ethics, along with aesthetics, concerns ...
. But Appiah points out that philosophy has almost always had an experimental side. David Hume
David Hume (; born David Home; 7 May 1711 NS (26 April 1711 OS) – 25 August 1776) Cranston, Maurice, and Thomas Edmund Jessop. 2020 999br>David Hume" ''Encyclopædia Britannica''. Retrieved 18 May 2020. was a Scottish Enlightenment phil ...
, he says, was "adamant that moral philosophy had to be grounded in facts about human nature, in psychology and history".[Morality Studies](_blank)
''The New York Times'', 3 February 2008.
The book discusses the degree to which it is possible to combine first-person ethics, such as asking 'what should I do?', with third person observations about human behaviour.
Contents
Chapter One presents a history of Western philosophy
Western philosophy encompasses the philosophical thought and work of the Western world. Historically, the term refers to the philosophical thinking of Western culture, beginning with the ancient Greek philosophy of the pre-Socratics. The wo ...
, noting that science and observation were usually an essential part of philosophy.
Chapter Two deals with the challenges presented by behavioural science to ethics.
Chapter Three covers intuition, and its role in ethics. The book notes that intuitive responses depend greatly on how a situation is framed.
Chapter Four argue for ethical realism
Moral realism (also ethical realism) is the position that ethical sentences express propositions that refer to objective features of the world (that is, features independent of subjective opinion), some of which may be true to the extent that they ...
and ethical pluralism
In ethics, value pluralism (also known as ethical pluralism or moral pluralism) is the idea that there are several values which may be equally correct and fundamental, and yet in conflict with each other. In addition, value-pluralism postulates th ...
, within certain limits.
Chapter Five, the last chapter, concludes that the purpose of ethics is to advise what he calls 'experiments in living', and that philosophy cannot proceed far without science.[https://journals.uvic.ca/index.php/pir/article/viewFile/199/215 ]
See also
*Trolley problem
The trolley problem is a series of thought experiments in ethics and psychology, involving stylized ethical dilemmas of whether to sacrifice one person to save a larger number. The series usually begins with a scenario in which a runaway tram o ...
References
Ethics books
2008 non-fiction books
Contemporary philosophical literature
Moral psychology books
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