Conciliating to Avoid Moral Scepticism

Bibliographic Data

ID21604227
AuthorsNick Küspert (0000-0002-6454-4571, University of St Andrews, corresponding author)
Year2023
Volume31
Issue3
Pages279-300
Publication date2023-05-27
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueInternational Journal of Philosophical Studies (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0967-2559 • E-ISSN: 1466-4542
PublisherInforma UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/09672559.2023.2263708
OpenAlexW4387456518
LanguageEN
References cited32

A common worry about moral conciliationism is that it entails at best uncertainty about many of our moral beliefs and at worst epistemological moral scepticism. Against this worry, I argue that moral conciliationism saves us from epistemological moral scepticism and enables us to be confident in many of our moral beliefs. First, I show that only taking disagreements seriously as a threat to our beliefs allows us to utilise agreements in support of our beliefs (call this symmetry). Next, I argue that utilising moral agreements as an epistemic resource allows moral conciliationism to resist the potentially worrisome reduction in confidence of our moral beliefs. Taking the relevance of moral agreement into account, I argue that it is anti-conciliationism that must meet the challenge of epistemological moral scepticism. For this, I suggest that moral inquiry is best understood as a collective endeavour. If so, then agreement on our moral judgments is required to justify the confidence we have in many of our moral beliefs. However, by symmetry, this appeal is possible only if one accepts the conciliatory attitude towards disagreements. Hence, accepting, rather than rejecting moral conciliationism, is the way out of moral scepticism

Appeal · Epistemology · Moral authority · Moral development · Moral disengagement · Moral psychology · Political science · Skepticism · Social cognitive theory of morality · Worry · Epistemology, Ethics, and Metaphysics · Ethics in medical practice · Law · Philosophy · Psychology · Psychology of Moral and Emotional Judgment · Social Psychology

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