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Henry S. Richardson is Professor of Philosophy at Georgetown University. From 2008-18, he was the editor of Ethics. His previous books include Practical Reasoning about Final Ends (1994), Democratic Autonomy (2002), and Moral Entanglements (2012). He has held fellowships sponsored by the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation, the National Endowment for the Humanities, and the University Center for Human Values at Princeton University.
List of contents
- Part I: Preliminaries
- Introduction
- Chapter 1: Constructive Ethical Pragmatism
- Part II: The Moral Authority of The Moral Community
- Chapter 2: The Idea of the Moral Community
- Chapter 3: Authoritative Input: Dyadic Duties and Rights
- Chapter 4: The Unity of the Moral Community
- Chapter 5: Introducing New Moral Norms
- Chapter 6: Working It Out Together: Joint Moral Reasoning
- Chapter 7: Ratification of New Moral Norms
- Part III: Defending and Extending the Account
- Chapter 8: Objections: Reasons, Indeterminacy, and Compromise
- Chapter 9: The Mutability of Moral Principles
- Chapter 10: Objectivity and Path-Dependence
- Conclusion
- Index
About the author
Henry S. Richardson is Professor of Philosophy at Georgetown University. From 2008-18, he was the editor of Ethics. His previous books include Practical Reasoning about Final Ends (1994), Democratic Autonomy (2002), and Moral Entanglements (2012). He has held fellowships sponsored by the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation, the National Endowment for the Humanities, and the University Center for Human Values at Princeton University.
Summary
Is morality fixed objectively, independently of all human judgment, or do we "invent" right and wrong? Articulating the Moral Community argues that neither of these simple answers is correct. Its central thesis is that, working within zones of objective indeterminacy, the moral community-the community of all persons-has the authority to introduce new moral norms.
Additional text
Morality is a social institution, created and developed over time in complex ways. At the same time, it is a rational institution, aiming at objectivity. Henry Richardson, one of the foremost moral philosophers of our time, shows how these two aspects go together from the perspective of constructive ethical pragmatism. There is moral progress and innovation, as he shows, and there is progress in philosophy, as this book proves.
