Herman Philipse: Global Evolutionary Debunking Arguments in (Meta-) Ethics Revisited

Lecture by Herman Philipse ( University of Utrecht, The Netherlands), organized by the Department of Ethics, Social and Political Philosophy

In the wake of Sidgwick and Moore, most philosophers seemed to agree that “Evolution has very little indeed to say to Ethics” (Moore 1903: 109). In recent years, however, so-called evolutionary debunking arguments (“EDAs”) have become popular among moral philosophers. According to some, evolutionary explanations of our moral intuitions are “highly significant for normative ethics” (Singer 2005: 343). In this paper, ... (continue reading)...