Thesis
The metaphysics of moral responsibility: Strawson, Nagel, and realism
Washington State University
Master of Arts (MA), Washington State University
2011
Handle:
https://hdl.handle.net/2376/100120
Abstract
In Skepticism and Naturalism, P. F. Strawson discusses four distinct philosophical topics (traditional skepticism, skepticism about moral responsibility, the mind-body problem, and the matter of meaning), and considers the methods of approach that dominate each topic in philosophical debate. His hope in discussing these topics is to expose certain parallels among them and the approaches to them, and thereby elucidate some of the philosophical tensions that persist in them. In The View from Nowhere, Thomas Nagel discusses a wider range of philosophical topics with the similar intention of identifying a common conceptual thread that relates all issues and the methods of approach that dominate them. Drawing from additional sources including Strawson’s “Freedom and Resentment,” and Nagel’s Mortal Questions, my aim in this project is to compare Strawson’s and Nagel’s analyses of the issue of skepticism about moral responsibility in particular. In the first chapter, I explicate the parallels that Strawson exposes between traditional (epistemological) skepticism and skepticism about moral responsibility. I offer a brief description of his proposal to reconcile the latter skeptical problem with a “relativizing move,” and while such a proposal has inspired two interpretations that require further analysis, I reserve this for the third chapter. In the second chapter, I likewise explain the parallels that Nagel exposes between epistemological skepticism and skepticism about moral responsibility, highlighting the role of objectivity and realism in both skeptical issues. In the third and last chapter, I consider the similarities and differences between Strawson’s and Nagel’s analyses of the issue of skepticism about moral responsibility. I then refer back to Strawson’s relativizing move from the first chapter and, appealing to Nagel’s use of realism in understanding the skeptical problem, offer an interpretation of this relativizing move that is distinct from and superior to the two interpretations preceding it.
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Details
- Title
- The metaphysics of moral responsibility
- Creators
- Alethea Nicole Brunson
- Contributors
- Joseph Keim Campbell (Degree Supervisor)
- Awarding Institution
- Washington State University
- Academic Unit
- Politics, Philosophy and Public Affairs, School of
- Theses and Dissertations
- Master of Arts (MA), Washington State University
- Publisher
- Washington State University; Pullman, Wash. :
- Identifiers
- 99900525198501842
- Language
- English
- Resource Type
- Thesis