Richard, you say, "my criticisms are instead limit...

tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6642011.post-47866139789759468872007-11-08T12:27:00.000-05:002007-11-08T12:27:00.000-05:00Richard, you say, "my criticisms are instead limit...Richard, you say, "my criticisms are instead limited to the branch of experimental philosophy that would have us do conceptual analysis by means of surveying the folk". But your criticism extend to my claims about the partly-empirical work needed to resolve the argument from moral disagreement. I don't understand that to be (in its most common versions, at least) an argument about how best to understand moral concepts, nor do most others who discuss it. Anyway, one central focus of the debate has been whether there is disagreement of a sort that threatens our claim to have epistemic access to moral truth. If some disagreements would disappear when there is agreement on the non-moral facts, for example, then that disagreement shouldn't worry those who claim that we do have such access. Likewise if apparent disagreement is really simply that (because the same principles are being applied to very different situations--as in the now cliche case of Eskimos putting the elderly out to die) it isn't a problem either. Unfortunately, in my view, we too often put forward a few stock examples of apparent moral disputes that can be resolved (or shown to not really be disputes at all) in these ways, and that doesn't settle the issue. Boyd, for example, says that he believes MOST moral disputes would vanish if there were agreement on the non-moral facts. How does he know THAT? It seems to me that he's making a claim that's at least partly empirical--one that we'd have to test to evaluate properly. But even conceptual analysis seems to me to need SOME empirical backing. As I said in the paper from which Doris and Stich quote: "Our language has no bearing on the question of what properties or entities exist. What exists exists whether we talk about it or not, and there are undoubtedly many things for which we have no words. But our language is relevant to the question of whether certain existent properties and entities are the ones we have been talking about when using a certain vocabulary." We can (and certainly should) refine the "folk" concepts. But we should be wary of refining too much, lest we change the subject! To find out what the folk concepts are, we need to get out of our comfy armchairs (or better yet, talk some psychologists into doing it!)Don Loebnoreply@blogger.com