Is Moral Obligation Objective or Subjective?
- UNCG Author/Contributor (non-UNCG co-authors, if there are any, appear on document)
- Michael Zimmerman, Professor and Philosophy Pre-Law Concentration Advisor (Creator)
- Institution
- The University of North Carolina at Greensboro (UNCG )
- Web Site: http://library.uncg.edu/
Abstract: Many philosophers hold that whether an act is overall morally obligatory is an ‘objective’
matter, many that it is a ‘subjective’ matter, and some that it is both. The idea that it
is or can be both may seem to promise a helpful answer to the question ‘What ought
I to do when I do not know what I ought to do?’ In this article, three broad views are
distinguished regarding what it is that obligation essentially concerns: the maximization
of actual value, the maximization of expected value, and the perceived maximization of
actual value. The first and third views are rejected; the second view is then refined and
defended. The unfortunate upshot is that there may be no very helpful answer to the
question just mentioned. As to the question posed in the title of the article, the answer
unsurprisingly depends on what ‘objective’ and ‘subjective’ are taken to mean.
Is Moral Obligation Objective or Subjective?
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Created on 1/1/2006
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Additional Information
- Publication
- Utilitas, 18 (2006): 329-361
- Language: English
- Date: 2006
- Keywords
- moral obligation, objective, subjective, actual value, expected value