Truth and Acceptance Conditions for Moral Statements Can Be Identical: Further Support for Subjective Consequentialism

Scott Forschler

Utilitas, 2009, vol. 21, issue 3, 337-346

Abstract: One of Peter Railton's arguments against subjective consequentialism is that it would erase the distinction between truth conditions and acceptance conditions for moral statements. It is assumed that if moral statements describe objective facts, as do scientific facts, then there should be times when, as in science, we are wholly justified via our currently available evidence in accepting a statement which is actually false. This analogy does not hold, because ethics is about the justifiability of our responses to situations, not about facts which entail evidence we may not have complete access to, as is the case in science. For this and other reasons, objective versions of consequentialism should be abandoned, and subjective versions developed.

Date: 2009
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