1. What Would a Satisfactory Moral Theory Look Like?
PHIL 2525
Lec 23

2. Derek Parfit
Some people believe that there cannot be progress in Ethics, since everything has already been said... I believe the opposite..

3. 13.1 Morality without Hubris
Timothy Vermeulen 2002

4. “Ah, but a man's reach should exceed his grasp, or what's a heaven for

5. Carl Sagan

6. Carl Sagan’s Cosmic Time Charts Pre December Dates (approximate, of course)
January 1 Big Bang May 1 Origin of the Milky Way September 9 Origin of the Solar System September 14 Formation of the Earth September 25 Origin of life on Earth October 2 Formation of the oldest rocks known on Earth October 9 Date of oldest fossils (bacteria and blue-green algae November 1 Invention of sex (by micro-organisms) November 12 Oldest fossil photosynthetic plants November 15 Eukaryotes (first cells with nuclei) flourish
From The Dragons of Eden by Carl Sagan
If the age of the earth from its origin to the present time is imagined as equivalent to a single day, then man appeared less than a minute before midnight at the day's end.
In the life of the earth we are a very new experiment
Only for the last 5000 years or so has man left written records.
Records which help us know those early people
Not always accurate picture
Accident of preservation
Not always most important
Archaeologists can’t know for certain
Function
Importance
Representativeness
Joke about it has religious or cult significance
It must be a cult object

7. December

8. “The life of man is of no greater importance to the universe than that of an oyster.” David Hume ( )

9. Charles Darwin

10. We are rational beings... We consider options We weigh consequences
We choose to behave one way rather than another
We articulate the reasons for our choices

11. Ethical Egoism: prescriptive
Psychological Egoism: descriptive

12. Rachels says that psychological egoism is not true...

13. 13.2 Treating People as They Deserve...
Remember Kant’s ‘respect for persons’
If we don’t adjust our actions to reflect our judgments of others’ actions we may be denying their status as free agents...
But...

14. 13.3 Multiple-Strategies Utilitarianism
Our lives will go better if...we love our children, enjoy our friends, take pride in our work, keep our promises.....

15. The Moral Community

16. The Trolley Problem...

17. Harvard’s Moral Sense Test

18. Bertrand Russell
If when a man writes a poem or commits a murder, the bodily movements involved in his act result solely from physical causes, it would seem absurd to put up a statue to him in the one case and to hang him in the other.

19. Decisions…

20. Decisions… Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;
Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
……….
I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I-
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.

21. Carl Jung…
Without freedom there can be no morality.

22. Challenges to the existence of free will
The challenge from Logic
The challenge from Theology
The challenge from Science

23. Daniel Dennett: Elbow Room: The Varieties of Free Will Worth Wanting
Nature has played a devious trick on us.
Dennett’s book suggests we should grin and bear it.