Article contents
Needs and Rights
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 13 April 2010
Extract
It is not difficult to sympathize with the strong impulse among philosophers to attempt to explain, justify, and even define moral concepts in factual terms. For without some kind of grounding in the facts of human nature, we may be quite perplexed concerning what relevance moral concepts have to our actual decisions, actions, and social relationships. Put another way, without grounding moral concepts in facts we may be quite puzzled as to the connections between principles and practice, between the ideal and the actual. The history of ethical theory contains several serious efforts by various philosophers to provide factual grounding for moral concepts, efforts which we cannot here take up.
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- Information
- Dialogue: Canadian Philosophical Review / Revue canadienne de philosophie , Volume 26 , Issue 1 , Spring 1987 , pp. 43 - 54
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- Copyright © Canadian Philosophical Association 1987
References
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5 Ibid.
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