CLA Hale Lecture Series

College of Liberal ArtsHale Lecture SeriespresentsJon TresanPhilosophy, University of RochesterWednesday, February 25, 20163:30-5:00Liberal Arts HallRoom A205 (Basement Level)Motivational internalists say, roughly, that there_s no moral thinking without moral caring. For example, an internalist might say that one cannot genuinely think that one ought to do something without being motivated to do it. If true, internalism seems to reveal something profoundly interesting about the nature of moral thinking. However, most philosophers now reject it as false because of apparent counterexamples: people who seem to have moral views but be totally unmoved by them (e.g., some psychopaths). Professor Tresan defends a fall-back position, which concedes that individuals can indeed be totally unmoved by their moral thoughts, but insists that their moral thinking is necessarily parasitic on the moral thinking of those who are moved. He defends two claims about this fall-back position. First, it is far more plausible than standard versions of internalism. Second, what it reveals about the nature of moral thinking is just as profoundly interesting as what those standard versions would reveal if they were true.