In defence of good simpliciter

Philosophical Studies 173 (5):1371-1391 (2016)
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Abstract

Many including Judith Jarvis Thomson, Philippa Foot, Peter Geach, Richard Kraut, and Paul Ziff have argued for good simpliciter skepticism. According to good simpliciter skepticism, we should hold that there is no concept of being good simpliciter or that there is no property of being good simpliciter. I first show that prima facie we should not accept either form of good simpliciter skepticism. I then show that all of the arguments that good simpliciter skeptics have proposed for their view fail to show that we have good reason to accept good simpliciter skepticism. So, I show that we do not have good reason to accept good simpliciter skepticism

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Author's Profile

Rach Cosker-Rowland
University of Leeds

Citations of this work

Intrinsic vs. extrinsic value.Michael J. Zimmerman - 2019 - Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
The Authoritative Normativity of Fitting Attitudes.R. A. Rowland - 2022 - Oxford Studies in Metaethics 17:108-137.
Might anything be plain good?Thomas Byrne - 2016 - Philosophical Studies 173 (12):3335-3346.
The Worthwhileness of Meaningful Lives.David Matheson - 2020 - Philosophia 48 (1):313-324.

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References found in this work

What we owe to each other.Thomas Scanlon - 1998 - Cambridge: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press.
On What Matters: Two-Volume Set.Derek Parfit - 2011 - New York: Oxford University Press.
Slaves of the passions.Mark Andrew Schroeder - 2007 - New York: Oxford University Press.
Philosophical explanations.Robert Nozick - 1981 - Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
Ethics without principles.Jonathan Dancy - 2004 - New York: Oxford University Press.

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