The Sentimentalists' Test of

Reflective Endorsement

"The reflective endorsement method has its natural home in theories that reject realism and ground morality in human nature"(50).

The question is not whether the dictates of morality are true, but "whether we have reason to be glad that we have such sentiments, and to allow ourselves to be governed by them. The question is whether morality is a good thing for us"(50).

Do our sentiments approve of our having those very sentiments?

"The threat is that the various claims that nature makes on us will tear us apart"(61).

Hume's Moral Theory

Moral sentiments are sentiments of approval or disapproval of character traits (virtues).

The "natural" and "artificial" virtues (or sentiments or dispositions): Benevolence and Justice

Hume's Two-Fold Reflective Endorsement Test

(1) Does self-interest approve of our moral sentiments?

The problem of the sensible knave.

Is this argument persuasive. Would it be persuasive to someone who was facing a hard moral choice?

(2) Does our moral sense approve of itself?

What does this show?

Williams' Absolute Conception of the World

A conception of the world as it is for any investigator with any perceptual equipment, from any point of view. (Compare with Nagel's impersonal point of view.)

Williams believes that science gives us an absolute conception of the world; ethics does not.

Values not as an approximation of truth, but as a way of living.

What is the reflective endorsement test for Williams? That a certain kind of life is best for human beings.

Hume's first test is whether morality is congruent with self-interest; Williams' test is whether it is congruent with human flourishing.

Mill and Reflective Endorsement

Mill's "Proof" of the Utilitarian Principle.

Mill does not think that a "proof" can provide motivation (or normativity).

Where does normativity come from?

Mill identifies "two kinds of sanctions to moral practice, external and internal"(79).

What is the "dissolving force of analysis"?

How does utilitarianism avoid "the dissolving force"? What, according to Mill, is the ultimate sanction of the utilitarian principle?

Why does Korsgaard think that Mill misses his target? Is she correct?

The return of the sensible knave

What does this example show?

Korsgaard's diagnosis of a problem with Hume's account: He applies the reflective endorsement test to dispositions or character traits, understood in terms of "general rules", which do not hold in every case. So exceptions are possible.

THREE QUESTIONS TO THINK ABOUT AS KORSGAARD DEVELOPS HER OWN ANSWER TO THE NORMATIVE QUESTION

(1) When Korsgaard says that we apply the test of reflective endorsement to our moral dispositions or motives from the first-person perspective, who are "we"? Does the answer to the normative question vary with who "we" are?

Consider Talbott's sensible misanthrope.

(2) What does reflective endorsement show?

Key claim: "There is no place outside of our normative points of view from which normative questions can be asked"(65).

This sounds like an argument against moral realism, but is it? Is there any place outside of our descriptive points of view from which descriptive questions can be asked? Is this an argument against descriptive realism?

It is true that we cannot step outside of our human nature, but can we conceive of systematic blindness induced by human nature?

(3) According to Korsgaard, reflective endorsement grounds normativity in human nature. What does this mean?

Does morality only extend to other human beings (or to other beings with whom we share moral sentiments)?

Consider an extension of Williams' idea of the absolute conception—the moral truth that all inquirers would be expected to converge on. Are there any such moral norms?

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