Abstract
In this article, I investigate how we may include investigations of actual context in the investigation of moral problems in philosophy. The article has three main parts. The focus of the first is a survey of the dominant view of how to incorporate context into moral philosophy and to exemplify this view, I investigate examples from influential introductions to moral philosophy, identifying what I call the assumption of abstraction. In the second part I present three traditions which attribute a more prominent place to context in philosophical work and which therefore offer resources for thinking about context: moral contextualism, particularism and contextualism in political philosophy. Unconvinced that these resources are sufficient for an understanding of how actual context may be of importance in philosophy, I in the third part turn to a systematic investigation of three suggestions for how to incorporate actual context onto philosophy: the application approach, the bottom-up approach and the contextual approach. Furthermore, I argue that the third and most radical approach develops a superior understanding of how to include context in moral philosophy, reflecting the impossibility of making normatively neutral investigations of context in moral philosophy.
References
Annas, J. 2006. “Virtue Ethics.” In The Oxford Handbook of Ethical Theories, edited by D. Copp, 515–36. Oxford: Oxford University Press.10.1093/0195147790.003.0019Search in Google Scholar
Bader, V., and S. Saharso. 2004. “Contextualized Morality and Ethno-Religious Diversity.” Ethical Theory & Moral Practice 7 (2): 107–15, https://doi.org/10.1023/b:etta.0000032758.77152.0a.10.1023/B:ETTA.0000032758.77152.0aSearch in Google Scholar
Baier, A. C. 1985. “What Do Women Want in a Moral Theory?” Noûs 9 (1): 53–63, https://doi.org/10.2307/2215117.Search in Google Scholar
Baier, A. C. 1989. “Doing without Moral Theory.” In Anti-Theory in Ethics and Moral Conservatism, edited by S. G. Clarke, and E. Simpson. Albany, NY: State University of New York Press.Search in Google Scholar
Beauchamp, T. L., and J. F. Childress. 1979. Principles of Biomedical Ethics. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Birnbacher, D. 1999. “Ethics and Social Science: Which Kind of Co-operation?” Ethical Theory & Moral Practice 2 (4): 319–36, https://doi.org/10.1023/a:1009903815157.10.1023/A:1009903815157Search in Google Scholar
Björnsson, G., and S. Finlay. 2010. “Metaethical Contextualism Defended.” Ethics 121 (1): 7–36, https://doi.org/10.1086/656304.Search in Google Scholar
Brink, D. O. 2006. “Some Forms and Limits of Consequentialism.” In The Oxford Handbook of Ethical Theory, edited by D. Copp, 380–423.10.1093/0195147790.003.0015Search in Google Scholar
Brogaard, B. 2008. “Moral Contextualism and Moral Relativism.” The Philosophical Quarterly 58 (232): 385–409, https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9213.2007.543.x.Search in Google Scholar
Carroll, N. 2000. “Art and Ethical Criticism: An Overview of Recent Directions of Research.” Ethics 110 (2): 350–87, https://doi.org/10.1086/233273.Search in Google Scholar
Cavell, S. 1979. The Claim of Reason. Wittgenstein, Skepticism, Morality and Tragedy. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Chappell, T. 2009. Ethics and Experience: Ethics beyond Moral Theory. Durham: Acumen.10.1017/UPO9781844654161Search in Google Scholar
Chappell, S. G. 2014. Knowing what to Do. Imagination, Virtue and Platonism in Ethics. Oxford: Oxford University Press.10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199684854.001.0001Search in Google Scholar
Christensen, A-M. S. 2018. “What Is Ethical Cannot Be Taught’ – Understanding Moral Theories as Descriptions of Moral Grammar.” In Wittgenstein’s Moral Thought, edited by R. Agam-Segal, and E. Dain. New York: Routledge.10.4324/9781315180762-8Search in Google Scholar
Christensen, A-M. S. 2020. Moral Philosophy & Moral Life. Oxford: Oxford University Press. In press.10.1093/oso/9780198866695.001.0001Search in Google Scholar
Copp, D. 2006. The Oxford Handbook of Ethical Theories. Oxford: Oxford University Press.10.1093/0195147790.001.0001Search in Google Scholar
Crary, A. 2007. Beyond Moral Judgment. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Crary, A. 2016. Inside Ethics. On the Demands of Moral Thought. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.10.4159/9780674089075Search in Google Scholar
Dancy, J. 1991. “An Ethic of Prima Facie Duties.” In A Companion to Ethics, edited by P. Singer, 219–30. Oxford: Wiley Blackwell.Search in Google Scholar
Dancy, J. 1993. Moral Reasons. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing.Search in Google Scholar
Dancy, J. 2017. “Moral Particularism.” In The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, edited by E. N. Zalta. Also Available at: https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/moral-particularism/ (accessed 28 November, 2020).Search in Google Scholar
Darwall, S. 2006. “Morality and Practical Reason: A Kantian Approach.” In The Oxford Handbook of Ethical Theories, edited by D. Copp, 282–320. Oxford: Oxford University Press.10.1093/0195147790.003.0012Search in Google Scholar
Diamond, C. 1991. The Realistic Spirit. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.10.7551/mitpress/5797.001.0001Search in Google Scholar
Diamond, C. 1997. “Moral Differences and Distances: Some Questions.” In Commenality and Particularity in Ethics, edited by S. Heinämaa, and T. Wahlgren. London: Macmillan Press.10.1007/978-1-349-25602-0_10Search in Google Scholar
Diamond, C. 2009. “The Difficulty of Reality and the Difficulty of Philosophy.” In Philosophy and Animal Life, edited by S. Cavell, C. Diamond, J. McDowell, I. Hacking, and C. Wolfe. New York: Columbia University Press.10.1353/pan.0.0090Search in Google Scholar
Dohn, N. B., S. B. Hansen, and S. H. Klausen. 2018. “On the Concept of Context.” Education Sciences 8 (3): 111, https://doi.org/10.3390/educsci8030111.Search in Google Scholar
Evers, D. 2014. “Moral Contextualism and the Problem of Triviality.” Ethical Theory & Moral Practice 17 (2): 285–97, https://doi.org/10.1007/s10677-013-9437-0.Search in Google Scholar
Hämäläinen, N. 2016. Descriptive Ethics. What Does Moral Philosophy Know about Morality? New York: Palgrave Macmillan.10.1057/978-1-137-58617-9_1Search in Google Scholar
Hertzberg, L. 2002. “Moral Escapism and Applied Ethics.” Philosophical Papers 31 (3): 251–70, https://doi.org/10.1080/05568640209485105.Search in Google Scholar
Herzog, L., and B. Zacka. 2019. “Fieldwork in Political Theory: Five Arguments for an Ethnographic Sensibility.” British Journal of Political Science 49 (2): 763–84, https://doi.org/10.1017/s0007123416000703.Search in Google Scholar
Hill, T. E. 2006. “Kantian Normative Ethics.” In The Oxford Handbook of Ethical Theories, edited by D. Copp, 480–514. Oxford: Oxford University Press.10.1093/0195147790.003.0018Search in Google Scholar
Hoffmaster, B. 2017. “From Applied Ethics to Empirical Ethics to Contextual Ethics.” Bioethics 32: 119–25.10.1111/bioe.12419Search in Google Scholar
Kierkegaard, S. 1843. Either/Or. Part II, edited and translated by H. V. Hong, and E. H. Hong. Princeton, Princeton University Press 1990.Search in Google Scholar
Kierkegaard, S. 1846. Concluding Unscientific Postscript to Philosophical Fragments, ed. and translated by H. V. Hong, and E. H. Hong. Princeton, Princeton University Press 1980.Search in Google Scholar
Lægaard, S. 2019. “Contextualism in Normative Political Theory and the Problem of Critical Distance.” Ethical Theory & Moral Practice 22 (4): 953–70, https://doi.org/10.1007/s10677-019-10026-6.Search in Google Scholar
McNaughton, D., and P. Rawling. 2006. “Deontology.” In The Oxford Handbook of Ethical Theories, edited by D. Copp, 424–58. Oxford: Oxford University Press.10.1093/0195147790.003.0016Search in Google Scholar
Montminy, M. 2007. “Moral Contextualism and the Norms for Moral Conduct.” American Philosophical Quarterly 44 (1): 1–13.Search in Google Scholar
Musschenga, A. W. 2005. “Empirical Ethics, Context-Sensitivity, and Contextualism.” Journal of Medicine and Philosophy 30 (5): 467–90, https://doi.org/10.1080/03605310500253030.Search in Google Scholar
Nussbaum, M. 1990. Love’s Knowledge. Essays on Philosophy and Literature. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Rudd, J. A. 2000. “On Straight and Crooked Readings: Why the Postscript does not Self-Destruct.” In Authority and Anthropology: Essays on Søren Kierkegaard, edited by G. D. Marino, P. Houe, and S. H. Rossel, 119–27. Amsterdam: Editions Rodopi.10.1163/9789004456167_015Search in Google Scholar
Rysiew, P. 2016. “Epistemic Contextualism”. In The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, edited by E. N. Zalta. Also available at https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/win2016/entries/contextualism-epistemology/.10.1007/978-981-287-532-7_694-1Search in Google Scholar
Silverbauer, G. 1991. “Ethics in Small-Scale Societies.” In A Companion to Ethics, edited by P. Singer, 14–28. Oxford: Wiley Blackwell.Search in Google Scholar
Singer, P, ed. 1991. A Companion to Ethics. Oxford: Wiley Blackwell.Search in Google Scholar
van der Stoep, J. 2004. “Towards a Sociological Turn in Contextualist Moral Philosophy.” Ethical Theory & Moral Practice 7 (2): 133–46, https://doi.org/10.1023/b:etta.0000032756.53525.55.10.1023/B:ETTA.0000032756.53525.55Search in Google Scholar
Walker, M. U. 2003. Moral Contexts. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield.Search in Google Scholar
Weirich, P. 2013. “Causal Decision Theory.” Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (accessed 28 September, 2013).10.1093/obo/9780195396577-0207Search in Google Scholar
Williams, B. 1985. Ethics and the Limits of Philosophy. London: Fontana.Search in Google Scholar
Wittgenstein, L. 1953. Philosophical Investigations/Philosophische Untersuchungen, revised 3rd ed. Oxford: Blackwell 2001.Search in Google Scholar
© 2020 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston
Articles in the same Issue
- 10.1515/sats-2020-frontmatter2
- Editorial
- Contextual Ethics – Developing Conceptual and Theoretical Approaches
- Invited Paper
- Against Ethical Exceptionalism – Through Critical Reflection on the History of Use of the Terms ‘Ethics’ and ‘Morals’ in Philosophy
- Articles
- What Makes Life a Lie? Love, Truth and the Question of Context
- Ethical Concepts ‘in Search of a Meaning’: G.H. von Wright’s Broad Framework for (Contextual) Ethics
- Contextual Ethics: Taking the Lead from Wittgenstein and Løgstrup on Ethical Meaning and Normativity
- How to Work with Context in Moral Philosophy?
- Moral Context, Moral Complicity And Ethical Theory
- In Search of the Context of a Question
Articles in the same Issue
- 10.1515/sats-2020-frontmatter2
- Editorial
- Contextual Ethics – Developing Conceptual and Theoretical Approaches
- Invited Paper
- Against Ethical Exceptionalism – Through Critical Reflection on the History of Use of the Terms ‘Ethics’ and ‘Morals’ in Philosophy
- Articles
- What Makes Life a Lie? Love, Truth and the Question of Context
- Ethical Concepts ‘in Search of a Meaning’: G.H. von Wright’s Broad Framework for (Contextual) Ethics
- Contextual Ethics: Taking the Lead from Wittgenstein and Løgstrup on Ethical Meaning and Normativity
- How to Work with Context in Moral Philosophy?
- Moral Context, Moral Complicity And Ethical Theory
- In Search of the Context of a Question