Moore’s Open Question Phenomenon Explained—Naturalistically

Bibliographic Data

ID21293729
AuthorsJean-Paul Vessel (0000-0003-0527-0088, New Mexico State University, corresponding author)
Year2021
Volume99
Issue2
Pages241-256
Publication date2021-04-03
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueAustralasian Journal of Philosophy (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0004-8402 • E-ISSN: 1470-6828
PublisherInforma UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/00048402.2020.1774627
OpenAlexW3037528603
LanguageEN
Citations received1
References cited32

G.E. Moore’s open question arguments (OQAs) have been targeted by unsympathetic philosophers for close to a century. Perhaps the most serious criticism directed towards Moore’s OQAs is that they beg the question against targeted theories. After presenting an OQA extracted from §13 of Principia Ethica, I lodge this question-begging objection before articulating Moore’s autobiographical efforts to mitigate its force. I then suggest that Moore’s OQAs are incomplete, awaiting the final stage of construction, an explanation of the ‘open question’ phenomenon—the inclination of many philosophers to endorse the central premises of Moore’s OQAs. After a brief investigation of noncognitivist attempts to explain the phenomenon, I propose a semantic explanation, a cognitivist explanation that commits its proponents neither to mysterious nonnatural properties nor to perilous positions regarding the paradox of analysis. I conclude by arguing that Moore’s completed OQAs are successful, but his deployment of them in efforts to refute metaethical naturalism, even analytic or semantic versions, is not

Begging · Criticism · Epistemology · Literature · Naturalism · Phenomenon · Philosophy of science · Theology · Epistemology, Ethics, and Metaphysics · Philosophy · Philosophy and Theoretical Science · Psychology of Moral and Emotional Judgment

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