Simon Fraser University
Engaging the World

Department of Philosophy

Department of Philosophy / Courses / Archives / Spring 2014 (1141) / PHIL 823 Evening Harbour Centre
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PHIL 823:  Selected Topics in Meta-Ethics:  Normativity

Spring Semester 2014 | Evening | Harbour Centre

 

INSTRUCTOR: Evan Tiffany (etiffany@sfu.ca)

REQUIRED TEXTS

Note:  these are not on order at the bookstore.  You will have access to the readings, but you may consider purchasing these books for yourself.  (We will read almost all of Self Constitution):

  • J.B. Schneewind (Ed.), Moral Philosophy from Montaigne to Kant, Vol. I
  • C.M. Korsgaard, Sources of Normativity
  • C.M. Korsgaard, Self Constitution

COURSE DESCRIPTION

Both humans and animals act.  There may even be a sense in which animals act for reasons.  But for self-reflective beings such as ourselves, action also gives rise to a distinctive set of normative questions.  Of any given action, we can inquire whether it is something we ought to be doing, whether it is obligatory of us.  Our desires may move us to action, but we can always stop and consider whether it is a desire one ought to be acting on, at that time, in this way.  We may feel the force of social norms, but we can also step back and question the authority of those norms.   This is a course about the nature and source of normativity.  Is there really such a thing as normative authority?  What characterizes it?  What is its source?  We begin with a historical look at the natural law tradition, briefly considering Cicero, but focusing on its development in the early modern period through such writers as Suarez, Grotius, Hobbes, Pufendorf, and Locke.  Of central importance to these thinkers was how to account for the distinctive force of Law or command as opposed to mere counsel.  We then move on to look at contemporary accounts of normativity, focusing on the view developed by Christine Korsgaard in The Sources of Normativity and Self Constitution.  And underlying question will be to what extent the concept of ‘normativity’ or the practical ‘ought’ in use in the contemporary literature derives from that of the natural law tradition.  If one rejects the underlying metaphysical and religious motivations of that tradition, what does that imply about normativity?  We close by looking at some deflationary accounts of normativity, including pluralism, non-cognitivism, and Pyrrhonism.


COURSE REQUIREMENTS

  • Participation -20%              
  • Term paper -80%