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Hokkaido University Collection of Scholarly and Academic Papers >
Graduate School of Humanities and Human Sciences / Faculty of Humanities and Human Sciences >
Journal of Applied Ethics and Philosophy >
vol. 9 >
How Applied Should Applied Ethics Be?
| Title: | How Applied Should Applied Ethics Be? |
| Authors: | Davis, Michael Browse this author |
| Keywords: | moral experts | | biomedical ethics | | applied ethics | | moral expertise | | judgment |
| Issue Date: | Sep-2017 |
| Publisher: | 北海道大学大学院文学研究科応用倫理研究教育センター(CAEP) |
| Journal Title: | Journal of Applied Ethics and Philosophy |
| Volume: | 9 |
| Start Page: | 1 |
| End Page: | 9 |
| Abstract: | How applied should applied ethics be? I take up that question not because it belongs to the past of applied ethics (though it does), but because, given the present, it seems likely to be a part of the future of applied ethics as well. Consider, for example, a recent debate in the journal Bioethics: One of the four papers was titled, “Why Moral Philosophers Are Not and Should Not Be Moral Experts”; another, “Moral Philosophers Are Moral Experts!” In that debate, a “moral expert” was a philosopher who used his knowledge of philosophy to speak with authority on practical questions. In the course of answering my question, I make a number of distinctions: between ethics-as-practice and ethics-as-theory; between ethics-as-morality, ethics-as-afield-of-philosophy, and ethics-as-special standards; and so on. Having thereby narrowed my question to:what can ethics-as-a-field-of-philosophy properly contribute to moral practice? I answer that ethics-as-a-field-of-philosophy can contribute much to moral practice, but only by maintaining a certain distance from it. For example, experts in ethics-as-a-field-of-philosophy—or even experts in all of philosophy—should not on that basis alone undertake to advise on questions of ethics-as-morality or ethics-as-special-standards. Practical experience has something to teach that is not philosophy—sensitivity to context, know-how, judgment, or the like. |
| Type: | bulletin (article) |
| URI: | http://hdl.handle.net/2115/68209 |
| Appears in Collections: | Journal of Applied Ethics and Philosophy > vol. 9
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