Internal and External Reasons: Williams's Challenge to Moral Theory

Catherine Wilson (University of York, UK)

Wed 11 Jun, 12.30pm IPLunchtime Seminar: Room 246, Senate House, Malet Street, WC1

Internal and External Reasons: Williams's Challenge to Moral Theory

Catherine Wilson (IP/York)

Abstract:
One of Bernard Williams’s dominant themes was the relationship of the individual, with his or her extendible but limited motivational set of the moment, to moral theory, or the ‘morality system,’ or what he once referred to as the ‘peculiar institution.’  This talk will explore several distinct aspects of the (age-old) problem of providing an acceptable account of that relationship, with reference to the current debate over so-called external reasons.  In Moral Animals ( OUP 2003) I was inclined to take a somewhat harsh view of Williams’s antinomianism, but I want to give it a second--and more sympathetic—look.

Admission Free. All welcome.
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