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Cover -- Copyright and Use -- Title Page -- Contents -- A Note on the Author -- Acknowledgements -- Chapter 1. Introducing the Issues -- 1.1 Some Everyday Moral Utterances -- 1.2 What are they about? -- 1.3 The Attractions of a Popular Picture -- 1.4 Rules: A Patch on Morality's Surface? -- 1.5 From Angry Young Men and Women to …? -- 1.6 Metaethics and Normative Ethics Revisited -- 1.7 Summary and Reflection -- Chapter 2. Cognitivism and Noncognitivism -- 2.1 The Basic Distinction -- 2.2 Moral Realism and Moral Irrealism -- 2.3 Error and Success Theories -- 2.4 Moral Knowledge Again -- 2.5 The Truth Conditions of Moral Statements -- 2.6 Critical Reflections on the Proposed Truth Conditions of Moral Statements -- 2.7 Divine Command Theory of Morality -- 2.8 Kantianism -- Chapter 3. Objectivist Realism under Siege -- 3.1 A Philosophical Health Warning -- 3.2 David Hume -- 3.3 Hume's Arguments Considered -- 3.4 Mackie's Argument from Queerness -- 3.5 So Where are We? -- 3.6 Emotivism -- Chapter 4. Out on the Street -- 4.1 The Death of God -- 4.2 The Death of Deference -- 4.3 Moral Disagreement -- 4.4 Multiculturalism -- 4.5 Rejection of Specific Moral Beliefs -- 4.6 Seedy Underbelly of Conventional Morality -- 4.7 Decline in Communal and Symbolic Life -- 4.7 Reluctance to be Judgemental -- 4.8 Postmodern Irony -- Chapter 5 A Naturalist Objectivist Realism? -- 5.1 The Basic Features -- 5.2 Moore's Open Question Argument -- 5.3 Empirical Reasoning and Moral Facts -- 5.4 Morality and Objectivist Naturalism -- 5.5 Ethics and Natural Disciplines -- Bibliography.

Oxford Studies in Metaethics is the only periodical publication devoted exclusively to original philosophical work on the foundations of ethics. It provides an annual selection of much of the best new scholarship in the field. Its broad purview includes work at the intersections of ethical theory with metaphysics, epistemology, philosophy of language, and philosophy of mind. OSME provides an excellent basis for understanding recent developments in the field; those. who would like to acquaint themselves with the current state of play in metaethics would do well to start here. - ;The contents of

Oxford Studies in Metaethics is the only periodical publication devoted exclusively to original philosophical work on the foundations of ethics. It provides an annual selection of much of the best new scholarship in the field. Its broad purview includes work at the intersections of ethical theory with metaphysics, epistemology, philosophy of language, and philosophy of mind. OSME provides an excellent basis for understanding recent developments. in the field; those who would like to acquaint themselves with the current state of play in metaethics would do well to start here. - ; Oxford Studies

The central philosophical challenge of metaethics is to account for the normativity of moral judgment without abandoning or seriously compromising moral realism. In Morality in a Natural World, David Copp defends a version of naturalistic moral realism that can accommodate the normativity of morality. Moral naturalism is often thought to face special metaphysical, epistemological, and semantic problems as well as the difficulty in accounting for normativity. In the ten essays included in this volume, Copp defends solutions to these problems. Three of the essays are new, while seven have previously been published. All of them are concerned with the viability of naturalistic and realistic accounts of the nature of morality, or, more generally, with the viability of naturalistic accounts of reasons

Those familiar with Ayn Rand's ethical writings may know that she discusses issues in metaethics, and that she defended the objectivity of morality during the heyday of early non-cognitivism. But neither her metaethics, in general, nor her views on moral objectivity, in particular, have received wide study. This article elucidates some aspects of her thought in these areas, focusing on Rand's conception of the way in which moral values serve a biologically based human need, and on her account of moral values as both essentially practical and epistemically objective in a sense fundamentally continuous with the objectivity of science. The bearing of her epistemological writings on her ethical thought is emphasized throughout, and her epistemology is defended against a line of criticism inspired by John McDowell's criticism of the so-called "myth of the given."

Papers in philosophy of law by some of the younger cutting-edge contributors to the field. Two sets of issues of crucial current importance are taken up. The first part deals with issues of meaning and objectivity in the metaphysics of law. The second part is about rights theory. This volume will be required reading for anyone interested in philosophy of law, and also of use for those with broader interests in ethics, metaethics, and social and political philosophy

Trained by some of the most eminent philosophers of the twentieth century, Richard Rorty has come to be one of the strongest critics of the philosophical tradition. In this book G. Elijah Dann takes seriously Rorty''s writings, showing how, contrary to what many philosophers believe, he actually helps to enhance and enliven both the philosophy of religion and the chances for moral progress. Dann goes on to discuss Rorty''s metaethics and reviews Rorty''s well-known article, ""Religion as Conversation-stopper,"" showing how the private/public distinction, though well-placed, needs adjustment. C

In the debate that aims at justifying constitutionalism from the acceptance of the value of democracy some arguments ascribe some normative importance to the body or the procedure that creates a constitution, deeming the mere appeal to a right-based moral theory to be incomplete or incorrect. Even though the arguments have heterogeneous origins, it is possible to reconstruct some of the underlying premises in the following: primacy of democracy over rights, by virtue of which they take on complete meaning in the popular sovereignty principle; a dualistic strategy that does not assign equal quality to every political decision but gives priority to constitutional policies over ordinary legislative policies; a lack of confidence in ordinary representation and the need for a different and more complex procedure for constitutional creation and amendment; and, finally, metaethics neutrality and irrelevance of an ontologically objectivist theory. From these premises two types of argumentative instruments have been mainly employed to give priority to the constituent decision and to found on it the supremacy of constitution. On the one hand, analogy of weakness of individual will with constitutional democracy is considered to justify the extension of precommitment to constitutional restraints as self-imposed ties. On the other hand, it has been argued that a legal concept of constituent power can be used to give precedence to "popular" decisions adopted in a broad deliberative practice against parliamentary decisions. ; Algunos de los argumentos que pretenden justificar el constitucionalismo desde la asunción del valor de la democracia atribuyen alguna relevancia normativa al sujeto o al procedimiento de elaboración de la constitución, considerando incompleta o incorrecta la mera apelación a una teoría de la justicia basada en derechos. Aunque los argumentos tienen orígenes heterogéneos es posible reconstruir algunos de los presupuestos que están en su base y que pueden reconducirse a los siguientes: la primacía de la democracia sobre los derechos, conforme a la que éstos cobran su sentido pleno en el principio de soberanía popular; una estrategia dualista para la que no todas las decisiones políticas son cualitativamente iguales y que prima la política constitucional sobre la política legislativa ordinaria; una actitud de desconfianza hacia la representación ordinaria y la exigencia de un procedimiento diferente y más exigente para la creación y la reforma constitucional; y, por último, la neutralidad metaética y la irrelevancia de una teoría ontológicamente objetivista. A partir de estos presupuestos se han empleado principalmente dos tipos de instrumentos argumentativos para dar prioridad a la decisión constituyente y fundar en ella la supremacía de la constitución. Por una parte, se ha considerado que la analogía de las situaciones de debilidad de la voluntad individual con la democracia constitucional justifica la extensión del instrumento del precompromiso para dar cuenta de las restricciones constitucionales como vínculos autoimpuestos. Por otro lado, se ha planteado que un concepto jurídico de poder constituyente sirve para dar prevalencia a las decisiones "populares" adoptadas en una práctica deliberativa amplia frente a las decisiones parlamentarias.