Ethics and Explanation

Philosophers of ethics seek both to explain the nature of moral thought and talk (so-called ‘meta-ethics’) and explain the rightness/wrongness of particular actions (so-called ‘normative ethics’). In both contexts, these philosophers tend to make assumptions about the nature of (good) explanations. Philosophers of science, on the other hand, have long investigated the nature of explanation itself.  

The aim of the conference is to begin a cross-fertilisation of these sub-disciplines of philosophy. In particular, the conference (and the larger research project) will address the following three questions.

• What type of explanation(s) is ethics susceptible to and how are these explanatory projects related?
• What are the consequences for ethics of the (un)availability of explanations of these various types?
• Is there a unique type of ‘moral explanation’ that needs to be considered as ‘data’ when attempting to give general theories of the nature of explanation?

The conference aims, therefore, to bring together meta-ethicists, normative ethicists and philosophers of science.