Hostname: page-component-8448b6f56d-mp689 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-24T20:10:44.471Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Meta-ethical pluralism: A cautionary tale about cohesive moral communities

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  08 September 2015

Jennifer Cole Wright*
Affiliation:
Department of Psychology and Department of Philosophy, College of Charleston, Charleston, SC 29412. wrightjj1@cofc.eduhttp://wrightjj1.people.cofc.edu

Abstract

Meta-ethical pluralism gives us additional insight into how moral communities become cohesive and why this can be problematic (even dangerous) – and in this way provides support for the worries raised by the target article. At the same time, it offers several reasons to be concerned about the proposed initiative, the most important of which is that it could seriously backfire.

Type
Open Peer Commentary
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2015 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Blackburn, S. (1984) Spreading the word: Groundings in the philosophy of language. Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Brink, D. O. (1989) Moral realism and the foundations of ethics. Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Crano, W. D. (2012) The rules of influence: Winning when you are in the minority. St. Martin's Press.Google Scholar
Darwall, S. (1998) Philosophical ethics. Westview Press.Google Scholar
Dreier, J. (1999) Transforming expressivism. Noûs 33:558–72.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Foer, J. S. (2010) Eating animals. Back Bay Books.Google Scholar
Gibbard, A. (1990) Wise choices, apt feelings: A theory of normative judgment. Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Gill, M. (2008) Indeterminacy and variability in meta-ethics. Philosophical Studies 145:215–34.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Goodwin, G. & Darley, J. (2008) The psychology of meta-ethics: Exploring objectivism. Cognition 106:1339–66.Google Scholar
Goodwin, G. & Darley, J. (2010) The perceived objectivity of ethical beliefs: Psychological findings and implications for public policy. Review of Philosophy and Psychology 1:128.Google Scholar
Goodwin, G. & Darley, J. (2012) Why are some moral beliefs perceived to be more objective than others? Journal of Experimental Social Psychology 48:250–56.Google Scholar
Harman, G. (1996) Moral relativism. In: Moral relativism and moral objectivity, ed. Harman, G. & Thomson, J. J., pp. 319. Blackwell.Google Scholar
Loeb, D. (2008) Moral incoherentism: How to pull a metaphysical rabbit out of a semantic hat. In: Moral psychology: The cognitive science of morality: Intuition and diversity, vol. 2, ed. Sinnott-Armstrong, W., pp. 355–85. Bradford Books.Google Scholar
Mackie, J. L. (1977) Ethics: Inventing right and wrong. Penguin.Google Scholar
Pew Research Center. (2014) Political Polarization in the American Public. Pew Research Center Report, June 12, 2014. [U.S. Politics & Policy Series]. Available at: http://www.people-press.org/files/2014/06/6-12-2014-Political-Polarization-Release.pdf.Google Scholar
Sarkissian, H., Parks, J., Tien, D., Wright, J. C. & Knobe, J. (2011) Folk moral relativism. Mind & Language 26(4):482505.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Shafer-Landau, R. (2003) Moral realism: A defence. Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Smith, M. (1994) The moral problem. Blackwell.Google Scholar
Wong, D. B. (1984) Moral relativity. University of California Press.Google Scholar
Wright, J. C. (2012) Children's and adolescents' tolerance for divergent beliefs: Exploring the cognitive and affective dimensions of moral conviction in our youth. British Journal of Developmental Psychology 30(4):493510.Google Scholar
Wright, J. C. (in press) Meta-ethical pluralism: Examining the evidence. In: Empirical dimensions of metaethics, ed. Cuneo, T. & Loeb, D..Google Scholar
Wright, J. C., Cullum, J. & Schwab, N. (2008) The cognitive and affective dimensions of moral conviction: Implications for attitudinal and behavioral measures of interpersonal tolerance. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin 34(11):1461–76.Google Scholar
Wright, J. C., Grandjean, P. & McWhite, C. (2013) The meta-ethical grounding of our moral beliefs: Evidence for meta-ethical pluralism. Philosophical Psychology 26(3):336–61.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wright, J. C. McWhite, C. & Grandjean, P. (2014) The cognitive mechanisms of intolerance: Do our meta-ethical commitments matter? In: Oxford studies in experimental philosophy, vol. 1, ed. Lombrozo, T., Knobe, J. & Nichols, S.. Oxford University Press.Google Scholar