TY - BOOK AU - , Iain TI - Truth and normativity: an inquiry into the basis of everyday moral claims: Iain Brassington U1 - 170.44 PY - 2007/// CY - England PB - Ashgate N1 - Contents Preface vii 1 'There Are No Innocents': Why we Should be Worried about Moral Philosophy 1 Making Moral Arguments 1 The Moral Terrorist? 6 Other Terrorists 9 Terrorism and the Democratic State: Unelected Affinities 14 The Ship of State and its Galley Slaves 17 The Blurred Borders 20 Opening the Question 23 2 Independentism: Moral Truth and the Lack Thereof 27 Independentism and Dependentism 27 Realist Independentism 30 Realist Independentism and Queer Science 34 The Rejection of Realist Independentism 37 Idealist Independentism: Kant and his Heirs 45 The Importance of the Will 48 The Problem of Formalism 53 The Metaphysics of Reason and the Problem of Taxonomy 58 Reason and the Moral Will 64 Independentism and Commonsense Morality 67 3 Dependentism-Buying Truth and Pawning Normativity 69 If You Know What's Good for You: Eudaimonism 72 Souls, Naturally 76 Cosmology as a Moral Tool 78 In Defence of Politics 84 Eudaimonism, Cosmology and Essentialism 86 Moral Feelings 90 Instrumentalism and the a priori 98 Morality and the Snark IQI 4 The Reality of Values: Heidegger and Moral Thought 105 Morality and Commonsense 105 Heidegger versus Morality? 107 Truth and Reality in Moral Statements 110 B th SI 0 V n c n VI Tmth and Normativity How to Philosophise (with) a Hammer Appearance and Values Categorisation and Apophansis Problems with the Account Truth and the Possibility of Moral Error The Embeddedness of Norms The Problem of Caprice Publicity, Commonsense and Critique 5 Oughtobiography: Heidegger and Ethical Thought Agency and Dasein: the Break from Descartes Writing about Ethics Pondering the Abode: Authenticity and Finitude Pondering the Abode: Ethics and Infinity Morality and Authenticity: The Problem of Nazi Virtues Ethics and Krisis Self, World and Other Democracy, Terrorism and Existence What is Wrong with Terrorism(?) Bibliography Index 145 146 150 153 155 159 164 170 172 174 177 185 Preface The arguments in this book started life as a PhD thesis written at the University of Birmingham between 1999 and 2003. The thesis was, I think, reasonable, but needed alteration before it was suitable for publication; the result of this modification is an improvement, but I have no illusions that the arguments in this book are perfect. As such, this book should not be taken as articulating my definitive position on any matter. Several people deserve acknowledgement. Primarily, Iain Law deserves massive credit for his role supervising and supporting my PhD research. Nick Dent also deserves credit for this. Richard Norman and Joss Walker made valuable comments. Much of the work towards the revision of the original thesis has been done using office space at the Centre for Professional Ethics and at the School of Medicine, both at Keele University: I am particularly grateful to Steve Wilkinson for lending me his office for 18 months, and to Angus Dawson for allowing the library to think that I was a member of staff. Credit is also due to the staff and smdents at Newcastle- under-Lyme School, who tolerated me using their word processors for my work when I should have been planning lessons; it was the fact that marking would eat into research time that stopped me setting any homework at all during my spell as a teacher there. On a more personal level, I am immensely grateful for the continued support I- financial and moral - of my family and friends, without whose encouragement I /ould have abandoned the project and entered the real world ages ago ER -