Theoretical Virtue Epistemology: A Common Sense Philosophy

What makes a belief justified or reasonable? We think we know many things, but we can’t always explain how we know they are true. Some of these beliefs might be self-evident, some of them are based on experience, some are “successful assumptions,” and others are unjustified prejudice. However, we have little choice but to do philosophy in the face of uncertainty and take certain beliefs as “common sense” before we can conclusively understand how we justify those beliefs.¹ This is why philosophy makes such heavy use of what’s intuitive (beliefs that do not seem to be absurd and seem compatible with our knowledge). I currently believe that the most modest form of justification is through the creation of successful assumptions similar to “working hypotheses” and that is all we usually need when we argue within the philosophical tradition. I will describe self-evidence, coherence, experience, working hypotheses, and theoretical virtues.² I will then explain my current understanding of justification (epistemological theory)—a form of common sense philosophy that I call “theoretical virtue epistemology.”³

Luke Nix’s Concerns About Atheistic Moral Absolutism

Luke Nix thinks that a satisfying sort of morality requires God. Without God, morality would be a matter of opinion, mere consensus, or cultural customs. Such an unsatisfying sort of morality is “relativism” or a form of “moral anti-realism.” He thinks a satisfying morality should be in some sense “absolute” (of a moral realist variety).¹ We both mainly agree what a satisfying morality should look like. It shouldn’t be relativistic or a form of anti-realism. However, I don’t agree that God is required for moral realism. I have already responded to his argument in “An Argument Against Atheistic Moral Realism.” However, my response doesn’t answer all his concerns. I had a discussion with him on his blog and I found out many of his concerns. I wasn’t able to post my reply on his website (perhaps because of my use of html), so I will post it here.

An Argument Against Atheistic Moral Realism

Luke Nix argues that atheistic moral realism (the view that there are moral facts) is impossible because atheistic evolution wouldn’t make it possible to know the truth about anything other than the empirical (observable) world. I will defend atheistic moral realism and object to his argument by saying that (a) atheism does not necessarily require empiricism and (b) empirical moral realism can be consistent.

Raising Children, Education, and Indoctrination

Are we educating and raising children properly or indoctrinating them? Most people seem to assume that children are educated pretty well, and they assume that they raise their own children pretty well—but almost everyone admits that at least some people indoctrinate their children by using manipulative or disrespectful tactics. Many people worry that parents or educators pass on their beliefs to children no matter how horrible the beliefs are. Many people think it’s wrong for racists to teach their children to be racists, communists to teach their children to be communists, and even religious people to teach their children to have a particular religion.

Can Morality Be Known Through Science?

Can science lead to moral knowledge? If so, moral naturalism is true.

Naturalism is the philosopher’s jargon for saying “based on natural science.” “Moral naturalism” is the view that morality is part of the reality studied by science (physical reality) and can be known by science, but “moral naturalism” has more specifically become jargon for the view that there are moral facts and they can all be studied by science.¹ “Empirical” knowledge (or justification) is knowledge attained through observation and experimentation (the scientific method).² Naturalism is almost synonymous with “empiricism,” which is the view that we can know everything from observation—and “moral empiricists” would think that all moral knowledge is attained through observation and experimentation.

Review of Nathan M. Nobis’s Truth in Ethics and Epistemology

This review is available as a free ebook (PDF file) here. (Right click/save as to download).

Terance Cuneo argued that moral realism is true (moral facts exist) based on the fact that (a) epistemic facts exist¹; and (b) if moral facts don’t exist, then epistemic facts don’t exist. Around the same time Nathan Nobis wrote his doctoral thesis, Truth in Ethics and Epistemology: A Defense of Normative Realism (2004), that contained a similar argument (and it is available for free on his website). Nobis argues the following:

What are Moral Facts?

If you merely look at the world of tables, chairs, and atoms, you won’t find moral facts anywhere. Some people have suggested that moral facts are utterly mysterious—that we have no idea what could make something right or wrong. Some people decide that moral facts can’t exist because they are too “spooky.” Other people decide that moral facts could only be true with an independently existing moral realm of Platonic forms or with the existence of God. I don’t think moral facts are utterly mysterious or offensively spooky because we do have some ideas concerning what could make something good, bad, right, or wrong without being overly spooky—and I don’t think moral facts require anything like Platonic forms or God. That’s not to say that there is no mystery surrounding moral facts. I suggest that moral facts are primarily concerned with intrinsic values, but we are also interested in alternate possibilities.

Common Sense Assumptions vs. Self Evidence

I would like to know whether or not knowledge is possible, and whether or not it’s possible for a belief to be justified without observation. If observation is the only good reason to have a belief, then it’s not clear that we can have knowledge concerning mathematics, morality, or logic—and it might even be impossible to have knowledge about anything. Perhaps we can have good reasons to believe something based on common sense assumptions or self-evidence rather than observation. I will argue that that some beliefs are justified as “common sense assumptions” that are not self-evident, and they aren’t justified through observation. These assumptions are justified by embodying various intellectual virtues better than alternatives.

Review of Robert Audi’s The Good in the Right

Robert Audi’s The Good in the Right (2004) attempts to offer a comprehensive understanding of morality that incorporates W. D. Ross’s moral intuitionism, Kant’s categorical imperative, and intrinsic valus. I will summarize Audi’s major claims and assess their plausibility. The moral realist view that morality is irreducible to non-moral properties is traditionally the “intuitionist” project, and “intuitionism” is traditionally based on the idea that we know moral facts from “intuition”—and “intuition” is traditionally viewed as a realization that something is true based on self-evidence.¹ First, Audi argues that Ross’s intuitionism is “intuitive” and can help us determine our “prima facie duties.” He defends a moderate form of intuition and argues that many arguments against self-evidence are based on misunderstandings. Second, he argues that the categorical imperative can be used as a way to ground intuitionism and help us choose between conflicting duties. Third, he argues that an understanding of intrinsic value can be used as a way to further ground our duties.

Moral Reasoning Without Moral Theories

Someone once suggested that we might not need moral theories to reason about morality. I found this to be an intriguing idea despite not fully knowing how it could be done, but I now understand why moral reasoning does not require a moral theory. There are at least four ways to reason about morality without theory:

A Review of Moral Reality by Paul Bloomfield

Paul Bloomfield presented an argument for moral realism in his book, Moral Reality (2001). He argues that it is possible (or very likely) that we don’t know everything about morality, and therefore moral reality exists beyond our moral judgments and attitudes.¹ This argument was discussed in the introduction, but then it appears to be ignored throughout the rest of the book, which turns its attention to four riddles (24):

10 Myths About Morality

Although philosophers disagree about many elements of morality, they agree about quite a bit as well. Philosophers disagree about whether capital punishment or the war on drugs are right, but they agree that slavery and torture are almost always wrong (if not always wrong). Philosophers also agree quite a bit about what views about morality are false, and for good reason. These myths are untenable views about morality, and they are often very popular among the nonphilosophers. I think it’s important that everyone find out that these views are untenable. I will discuss ten of these myths about morality:

10 Myths About Beliefs

There are many myths and misunderstandings that prevent clear thinking, good debate, and proper argumentation. I will discuss ten myths about beliefs, but first I will describe knowledge.

Intellectual Virtues, Dogmatism, Fanaticism, & Terrorism

Fanaticism can be understood as a form of irrationality, and as the worst sort of intellectual vice. Intellectual virtues include an appropriate sort of open mindedness and skepticism. Lacking open mindedness and skepticism makes a person gullible or unwilling to correct their poorly formed beliefs. Fanaticism is related to dogmatism—an unwillingness to form beliefs based on good reason. However, the fanatic is the most extreme sort of dogmatist. In order to describe my position, I will explain good reasoning, the intellectual virtues, the intellectual vices, dogmatism, and fanaticism. I will then suggest that terrorism and other horrific crimes are what we should expect from fanaticism.

A Review of Moral Realism by Torbjörn Tännsjö

One of the defenses for moral realism that makes use of common sense was given by Torbjörn Tännsjö in his book Moral Realism published in 1979 and revised in 1990. The reason that his argument makes use of common sense is because it demystifies the strangeness of morality by opening us up to the fact that moral observation is possible. Tännsjö technically mainly only defends moral realism because he argues that there is no good reason to reject moral realism of the sort he defends. If his defense succeeds and we can fully justify his beliefs, then the following argument for moral realism is implied:

1. If we have moral knowledge, then moral realism is true.
2. We have moral knowledge.
3. Therefore, moral realism is true.

Moral Absolutism, Relativism, and the Situation

I have been surprised to find out how many people are moral absolutists. Moral absolutists believe that the situation can’t be relevant to morality. Many people argue that either moral absolutism is true or relativism is true, but I reject both of these positions. Moral reasoning is possible because morality has a connection to reality (unlike moral relativism) and the situation is relevant to moral reasoning (unlike moral absolutism).

Knowledge, Justification, and Theoretical Virtues

We don’t always think about what really makes our beliefs justified or rational but we tend to be pretty good at identifying which beliefs are justified or rational anyway. We can often take a uncontroversial example of a justified belief then assess why another belief is or isn’t justified by how similar (or analogous) it is to the uncontroversial one. For example, the belief in the law of gravity is a good example of a highly justified belief. It is rational to hold such a belief (in part) because of how well it helps us predict the future. However, the belief that energy can be created or destroyed seems to be unjustified insofar as it has never helped us predict the future.

Can We Reason About Morality?

One common objection against just about any philosophical argument is considered by philosophers to be amateurish – Philosophy can’t give us the truth. The implication is supposed to be, “Philosophy can’t give us the truth, so we might as well give up on arguing about such things.” This is especially a popular objection to moral philosophy in general, but it is little more than a declaration of one’s ignorance and distrust towards philosophy. The main problem with this argument is merely that philosophical arguments are usually not intended to actually give us the truth once and for all, and even natural science fails to do so. The point of philosophy tends to be to tell us what it is most rational to believe, or what is probably true given our current information.

An Argument Against God, a Teapot, and Garvey’s Objection Part 2

Read part 1 first.

About a week ago I discussed Bertrand Russell’s teapot argument that concludes that we should disbelieve in God. In particular, I posted some objections to an essay by Brian Garvey, “Absence of Evidence, Evidence of Absence, and the Atheist’s Teapot,” which attempted to show that Russell’s argument was not a serious one. Garvey was nice enough to defend his essay and we had a short debate, which can be found here.¹ I will now attempt to explain Garvey’s response to my objections and make it clear why I am not satisfied by his response. I don’t know if the teapot argument succeeds as a sufficient reason to disbelieve in God, but I find the argument to be a threat to theism, and in need of further research. I will now explain my current position and attempt to refute Garvey’s responses.

An Argument Against God, a Teapot, and Garvey’s Objection (Part 1)

We want to know, Does God probably exist? Is the belief in god rational? Many people disbelieve in God because there isn’t enough evidence. Some people argue that this is no different than the fact that we think that there probably is no teapot in outer space revolving around the sun.¹ We have to admit that a teapot might be revolving around the sun because we haven’t done an extensive search, but we shouldn’t just abstain from judgment. It is most rational to reject the belief of such a teapot and to think such a teapot probably doesn’t exist. In the same way it might be most rational to reject the belief in God and to think that God probably doesn’t exist.²