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Gerald Dworkin’s rhetorical question (J. Stanley)

Jason Stanley

Over at left2right, Gerald Dworkin poses the following rhetorical question:

If you wanted someone to aid you in making a
difficult ethical decision about medical treatment for your child would you be
better off consulting a moral philosopher, or a physician who has dealt with
similar cases for 30 years? I know whom
I would choose.

The thought of leaving a significant personal moral decision in the hands of a moral philosopher in the analytic tradition would of course send a shudder through any professional philosopher. I myself also wouldn’t be aided a great deal with the decision by a physician who has dealt with similar cases in the past, except insofar as she could provide me with additional facts about the consequences of past decisions.

The people I would turn to for aid in such a decision are those friends of mine whom I regard as having a certain kind of wisdom and insight about the human condition. I can think of a few moral philosophers who have this quality, and I can think of a few doctors I know who have this quality. But in my experience, moral philosophers as a group do not saliently have this characteristic any more than metaphysicians do (which is to say not much at all). Moral philosophers are not even more likely to be well-informed or concerned about history and politics than any other group of philosophers. In short, moral philosophers are no more likely than other philosophers to be humanists, with all that that vague word connotes.

It’s clear to me why (say) someone working in metaphysics is not likely to have more insight into the human condition than the average mortal. It’s because many people working in metaphysics are captured principally by the problem of working out the consistencies of an abstract problem space with only dubious connections to how we live our lives. Moral philosophers tend as a whole to be exactly the same as metaphysicians, except they have chosen a somewhat different problem space to explore the logical relations between theses. There are of course also strong practical considerations in favor of choosing this problem space, as it is more likely to result in gainful employment.

This is not to deny that medical ethicists have an important role to play in hospitals. Medical ethics boards in hospitals play important roles in helping doctors and families make difficult decisions. Some of these decisions are perhaps guided by the moral philosophy done by analytic moral theorists. But I would bet a considerably larger portion are guided by the factors cited by Dworkin, namely "sympathetic feelings, experience with the subject matter, and intuitive insight". As my physician wife has pointed out, the members of these committees are often doctors who are respected for their humanity by other doctors.

The fact that we professional philosophers clearly don’t regard even those members of our community charged to reflect upon the good as exemplars of wisdom raises once again some of the issues about the relation between philosophy as currently practiced and philosophy as a humanistic tradition that we have discussed before.

UPDATE: David Velleman has some comments on the topic of this post here, which raise the issue of the responsibilities academic philosophers (not just moral philosophers, I think) have in the non-academic sphere. I hope to return to this topic later this term.

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34 responses to “Gerald Dworkin’s rhetorical question (J. Stanley)”

  1. Alan Wong

    Dear Jason,
    I sympathize to some extent with your sentiment that you would not seek advice for a significant moral decision from a moral philosopher who is analytically trained, rather than from some wise friends. However, in my reading of the current ethical literature (admittedly, metaethics), this strikes me as false. For instance, a considerable amount of discussion has centered upon precisely what moral advice amounts to. Allan Gibbard (roughly) defends the claim that it is about endorsing norms appropriate to the facts of the situation in which the advisee is located. This sounds very humanistic to me. A moral realist might object by insisting that insofar as rationality is not indexical (hence, objective), rational advice is about giving good arguments sensitive to where the advisee is at. This, at its heart, still sounds humane.

    A more substantive point is that I can think of a number of moral philosophers whose work I find is deeply humanistic (e.g. Martha Nussbaum, Simon Blackburn, Alisdair MacIntyre, Rosalind Hursthouse, Christine Korsgaard, etc.) To be sure, I doubt there is much in common in the list I just provided, especially regarding theses in moral philosophy. This might point to the vagueness of the humanist requirement that you want.

    Reply
  2. Thornton

    There's a sense in which the usefulness of moral advice is obvious–especially if one's judgment is (either momentarily or not) strained by excessive emotion, the bias of being too closely involved with the situation, or distracted by other perhaps equally serious matters. In these circumstances, appealing to a trusted friend for a second call would seem to make good sense.

    But there's another sense in which–absent these impediments to judgment–the usefulness of moral advice, especially the notion that that advice could be given by an expert, like a doctor giving advice about a medical procedure, is deeply questionable and I suspect even misleading. Given a difficult decision–say whether my child should receive a certain medical procedure that will seriously impede his quality of life while allowing him to remain alive–does anyone really think that having a theory of right action is going to make such a decision an exercise in applying the categorical imperative or performing a utility calculus? Even armed with that sort of technical apparatus, at best one would be provided with a means for rationalizing one's decisions.

    Thus, the notion that even philosophers wouldn't appeal to specialists on the good for advice doesn't necessarily undermine what those moral philosophers are doing in cognizing the good, constructing accounts of moral psychology, etc. There is no such thing as moral expertise (if by expertise you mean a teachable craft that provides unambiguous answers to questions a non-specialist would be unable to answer, for instance, like medicine). Indeed, I wonder if Dworkin's juxtaposition of doctor vs. moral philosopher simply clouds the issue, by failing to see that he is juxtaposing apples and oranges.

    Reply
  3. Jonathan Sutton

    "…I, for one, would no sooner think of consulting your average moral philosopher over a genuine moral problem than of consulting a philosopher of perception about an eye complaint."

    C. A. J. Coady, Testimony (Oxford: Clarendon 1992) p. 75

    Reply
  4. bp

    On the other hand…I can't go to the doctor anymore without the doctor pretending to be a "moral philosopher," with framed degrees from bible colleges on the wall to establish his credentials in that arena. I understand the point about moral expertise, but I wonder what kind of mess we're in when doctors are taught "morality" by underqualified, highy specialized (not to say "analytic") "ethicists" who are incorporated all too uncomfortably into the medical school curriculum. I think I'll go to the moral philosopher for a "second opinion," thank you very much.

    Reply
  5. Adam

    It seems to me that in this case a lot depends on (1) the strength of the (abstract) moral principles the philosopher is committed to holding, (2) how good the philosopher is at applying them to (general versions of) as specific issues (abortion, euthenasia, etc.), and (3) how the two above considerations come to be framed in very specific, concrete, and unique cases.

    How these factors relate to one another can be extremely complex. Comparing the advice that a doctor could give you with what a moral philosopher could offer strikes me as "philosophical" in the pejorative sense of the term. It relies on an implicit contrast between the case in which we assume the decision-maker is either clearer on the empirical outcomes of similar cases (i.e., what will probably happen to the patient), or on the abstract principles in terms of which the issue is to be settled. But, assuming one isn't a Kantian, good moral decisions should (in general) incorporate both of these, as well as a sensitivity to the (relative) uniqueness of the case under consideration.

    A lot depends on what aspect of the decision you are considering. Are the principles you're using to decide the issue coherent, solid, justifiable? Ask a philosopher. Will you regret your decision? Are there options available that you generally tend to overlook in cases like this? Ask a friend. What is likely to be the outcome of your decision? Ask a doctor. Can a general decision made out of mere principle trump whatever consequences are likely to result? Ask yourself; no one is going to give you a good answer on that one. Philosophers argue over it constantly, and we have yet to get a good answer.

    To pretend that any of these excludes the others is simply forced: good moral reasoning usually incorporates all of these, and likely much else. Just because philosophers are better at one aspect of the decision process, doctors (likely) at another, and a friend at yet another, does not mean any of these sources should be depended on exclusively for advice, or is in any respect "superior" or "more relevent" than another.

    "Yes, yes, but which is the BEST authority?" And again, my answer is, that depends entirely on which aspect of the decision you are considering.

    "But suppose you can only pick ONE person from whom to get advice." Again, this is an empty "philosophical" question, which distorts the issue by trying to weigh which aspects of the decision are more important–but all of them are important. To rule out any of these aspects a priori is already to have decided on the issue.

    Reply
  6. anon

    This is exactly why I lost interest in analytical ethics. They're of no practical use. In metaethics, perhaps there's some explanatory task whose use is to justify moral practices themselves. (Then again, maybe not.) I also once found the Rawls-Nozick debate very exciting because each was arguing for a radically different kind of society. Contemporary normative ethicists, though, are arguing about principles whose applications determine the same actions in the real world. In any real-world situation, the modern moral philosopher is pretty much useless because once there's agreement on the empirical facts, there will be agreement on what's right.

    As I see it, this is basically the old question of whether philosophy is worthwhile if it's limited to problems generated from and completely contained within philosophy, or whether philosophy ought to contribute more than answers to the problems it generates.

    Are contemporary debates in, say, philosophy of language and epistemology of any greater practical use, though? I have my doubts that "necessity", though the focus of so many debates in the last 30 years, can be of any use in increasing our knowledge. At one time, philosophers thought it was an important ingrediant in scientific theories. But the necessity that figures in the current debate surely isn't. (I also can't believe it could have any bearing on the mind-body problem.)

    Sorry, a lot of what I'm saying comes from gut feelings, and I don't have compelling arguments, but I'm very interested to hear what better philosophers have to say.

    Reply
  7. Michelle Mason

    The best moral philosophers do not treat first-order ethical questions merely as "a problem space to explore the logical relations between theses." The best of them allow "sympathetic feelings, experience with the subject matter, and intuitive insight" to inform their arguments. Rare birds? To be sure. More likely to be found in a group of *professional* moral philosophers? Doubt it. But for those who do meet the criteria and are in fact paid to profess, a plea: please own your expertise and shout your advice from the rooftops; The country desperately needs it.

    Reply
  8. Varol Akman

    I have recently worked with (if that is the right word) several excellent doctors re a difficult case I had with a very close relative of mine. These doctors were extremely accomplished in their own trade but they also impressed me as very bright individuals who were aware of all the moral repercussions of their advice and decisions. Sure, they were not analytic or otherwise ethicists but it seemed to me that they definitely had a reasonably clear view of things.

    Reply
  9. Neil

    In my experience, if you ask a physician for advice over an ethical problem, you get bad philosophy… "we shouldn't play god", "everyone's opinion is equally valid", "we can't do that because it's unnatural". Why you should go for bad philosophy is beyond me.

    Reply
  10. Jeff Helmrich

    Dworkin's question is ambiguous. Is the ethical decision “difficult” in the sense of weighty – with momentous consequences on either side? Or is it “difficult” in the sense of “close” – as in, the consequences are clear enough, if one follows one of several conflicting ethical commitments (but which one)? The former seems to favor the doctor, but only because it is straightforwardly about factual, not ethical, issues, in an area much less accessible to the non-expert than analytic moral philosophy.

    Reply
  11. Tom Hurka

    Jason's post is way too negative. To cite just one thing, when it doesn't apply principles a lot of moral deliberation uses analogical reasoning. You try to find cases similar to the one you face now and see if the judgements you make about them extend to your current situation. And moral philosophers, just because they've thought about "the logical relations between theses," are better at thinking up those analogies and assessing their relevance. To take one example, could a non-philosopher have thought up Judy Thomson's violinist analogy? Or to take a more everyday one, many people will say that capital punishment is wrong because all deliberate killing of a human being is wrong. A moral philosopher is more likely to raise the obvious question about killing in self-defence and then have intelligent things to say about the similarities and differences between punishment and self-defence. It's not advice, in the sense of telling you what to do, but it's damn useful.

    Reply
  12. Fritz Warfield

    If forced to pick between a random ethicist and a doctor with much experience in end of life medicine for this consultation, I'd pick the doctor too. But if forced to pick between that experienced MD and an ethicist *well versed in end of life medical issues*, I pick the philosopher for sure for my consultation. The best work in medical ethics, as those of us who teach it hopefully know, is written by philosophers well grounded in the relevant medical issues and attending closely to medical practice and reality in exploring medical decision making and practice. At least, that's what's true of the best work on medical ethics addressing topics where specific medical knowledge is an important part of the discussion – for some topics, the moral issues seem largely independent of complicated medical facts.

    Reply
  13. Jason Stanley

    I didn't intend my post to be negative in any way, and particularly not in the way in which Tom read it. If I'm being negative about ethics, I'm being equally negative about metaphysics, and by implication epistemology and other areas of philosophy. Nor was my purpose (absurdly) to insinuate that debates in epistemology, philosophy of language, or metaphysics were somehow more useful or relevant to pursuits outside epistemology, philosophy of language, or metaphysics. So what was my purpose? First, I wanted to call attention to Gerald Dworkin's very interesting data point, which is that professional philosophers have the very clear intuition that ethicists are not people one would go to for wisdom. People who are not professional philosophers do not have this intuition; they presumably would assume that an ethicist in a philosophy department is someone from whom they could seek practical advice and wisdom, as with priests and rabbis. It's just a datum about philosophers that we think this is absurd. Secondly, I wanted to suggest a tentative answer.

    My tentative answer is that, contrary to folk belief outside philosophy, ethicists are engaged in the same kind of pursuit as metaphysicians, philosophers of language, and epistemologists. We're all engaged in the practice of sketching plausible theories of various domains (and Judy Thomson's violinist analogy is a case in point — a beautiful piece of metaphysics). There is no reason to think someone engaged in this kind of project is the kind of person from whom one would seek moral advice about a difficult situation.

    If ethicists in general were the kind of people that went into ethics for purely humanistic interests, I doubt Dworkin's data point would hold. My (tentative) explanation of Dworkin's empirical fact is that most ethicists go into ethics because they're interested in the logical and metaphysical structure of the debates in ethics, just as metaphysicians are interested in their domains (no accident that Judy Thomson is also an eminent metaphysician!). One reason that a doctor with many years experience with life-threatening situations seems intuitively like someone from whom we would want advice is that we assume such a person is a doctor because they have the kind of personality that is more likely to be possessed of the kind of wisdom we seek from those who supply sound moral advice. Dworkin's empirical datum shows that professional philosophers do not make a similar assumption about ethicists.

    This is no more negative about ethicists than it is negative about metaphysicians, which is to say not at all (though some may take it as a negative point about analytic philosophy).

    Reply
  14. Neil

    Gerald Dworkin's very interesting data point, which is that professional philosophers have the very clear intuition that ethicists are not people one would go to for wisdom.

    What data point? I have no such intuition. I have no higher-order intuition about the intuitions of other professional philosophers.

    Reply
  15. Jason Stanley

    Neil,

    Maybe in Britain analytic philosophers are better sources of moral advice than in the USA…

    Reply
  16. Neil

    Or Australians in Britain? BTW, I wouldn't go to *me* for moral guidance.

    Reply
  17. Brian Leiter

    I am struck that Tom Hurka's case for the relevance of moral philosophy turns on skills that are equally central to law and legal reasoning. I shall refrain from further comment as to what this says about the relevance of lawyers, or moral philosophers.

    Reply
  18. Eric Chwang

    "One reason that a doctor with many years experience with life-threatening situations seems intuitively like someone from whom we would want advice is that we assume such a person is a doctor because they have the kind of personality that is more likely to be possessed of the kind of wisdom we seek from those who supply sound moral advice."

    Jason — four years of medical school have disabused me of this assumption. In other words, while it's certainly true that ethicists (and philosophers in general) might have chosen their profession for non-humanistic reasons, the same is also certainly true of doctors.

    So, I disagree with G. Dworkin. Assuming I know all the relevant empirical facts, I'd ask a philosopher over a doctor for advice, if only because philosophers are more likely to be clear thinkers than doctors are.

    Reply
  19. Tad Brennan

    "If I'm being negative about ethics, I'm being equally negative about metaphysics, and by implication epistemology and other areas of philosophy."

    Boy, you've got that right. I had a family situation where an elderly relative had to choose between a four-dimensionalist perdurantist analysis employing body-worms and an endurantist option with continuants that were property bundles. Going the second route would have been a little more expensive, but Medicare wouldn't make up the difference. So we consulted a bunch of metaphysicians, and, between you and me, they were worse than hopeless.

    Reply
  20. Robert

    I think something like what Tom Hurka is the right thing to say about this. Philosophers can help people think clearly about issues; that's at least part of what we're trained to do. And that can, in at least many situations, be very helpful. And moral philosophers spend most of their time trying to think clearly about issues of moral importance, so they should have more to say that would help someone make important distinctions in those areas. But there is a different thing that philosophers don't seem to be expert at, and that is giving advice about what to do in any given situation. That seems better left to rabbis and therapists. Many, however, assume, wrongly in my view, that philosophers have such answers. Perhaps a look at the history of the lives of moral philosophers would reveal a lot of wise, judicious choices. But I doubt it.

    Reply
  21. Tom Hurka

    I too wouldn't go to a professional philosopher for wisdom, but wisdom (or judgement) is a very specific thing: the ability to recognize morally relevant considerations when they're relevant, and to weigh different considerations against each other when they conflict. I agree that philosophers don't have more of that than non-philosophers and often have less.

    My point is only that wisdom in that sense isn't the only thing useful for resolving ethical issues. Another is the ability to specify the contours of a morally relevant consideration more precisely, and professional moral philosophers are better at that because they've done it more often. Another is the ability to see connections between one consideration and another or between one situation and another, as in the analogical reasoning I mentioned. Jason seems to think that's metaphysics — he even thinks the violinist analogy is metaphysics. But why? Are we using "metaphysical" so that any connecting of ideas, for whatever purpose, is metaphysical? Of course pointing to analogies doesn't in itself resolve ethical issues; more, including judgement, is needed to decide what to do with the analogies. But it does help, if only by clarifying an issue and allowing whatever other benefits clarification can bring.

    So professional moral philosophers aren't better at everything needed to resolve ethical issues, but they are better at some things.

    (That said, I agree that much of the interest in normative ethics is theoretical, i.e., given agreement about what is right and wrong in a variety of particular situations, what are the more general moral ideas that EXPLAIN why they are right and wrong? It's just that pursuit of that theoretical project can have practical spinoffs.)

    Reply
  22. Eric Rovie

    I'm not sure that the choice, as posed by Dworkin, isn't really a false dilemma. I'd like to take a lot more into consideration, when garnering advice (or paring down those giving the advice) than merely a person's occupation. I'm sure there are philosophically savvy physicians and morally bankrupt ethicists…I'd like to get more on the table than what someone does for a living before soliciting their advice or deciding not to take it.

    I'm not sure I'd "leave the decision" (to use Jason's terminology) in anyone's hands, however my advisors might try to sway me. If both the medical ethicist and the physician are, for instance, not parents, I might be worried that whatever 'expertise' they have as philosopher or physician isn't totally germane to my particular situation as a parent of a very ill child: I might be more interested in seeking out a medical ethicist/parent or physician/parent and ask them what they would do if they were in my shoes.

    Reply
  23. AS

    Jason, you write: "The thought of leaving a significant personal moral decision in the hands of a moral philosopher in the analytic tradition would of course send a shudder through any professional philosopher."

    It struck me that this might, perhaps, recapitulate a complaint of the so-called continental tradition. Ethics, in order to be more relevant, must embrace a more broadly-conceived "humanistic" approach, even if it comes at the expense of analytical rigor and clarity. Whether the irrelevance of ethicists is a unique failing of "analytic philosophy" — I do not know. That is a question I leave for the real philosophers.

    Reply
  24. marc moffett

    I haven't read over the other comments, because I don't have time. However, as someone who is currently in the midst of the very dilemma under consideration, I thought my experience might be useful.

    First, if there is a moral question at all, it means that the circumstances in question are not ones with an obvious, well-established medical protocol. Put differently, the case being considered is one in which either (a) the prognosis is medically unclear or (b) the prognosis on competing medical regimens is clear, but all about equally bad or (c) the prognosis is clear, but it is unclear whether or not the results are desirable (or some mixture). My own situation is (b)/(c).

    The common denominator is that, in each of these cases, current medical knowledge underdetermines the correct course of action. But at the same time, the medical information, even the details, is relevant to any decision. What the doctor has that the moral philosopher lacks (simply qua moral philosopher) is knowledge of the medical details. But equally, what the moral philosopher has that the doctor largely lacks is a sophisticated ability to analyse highly complex problem spaces.

    Now I submit that what is driving Dworkin's "intuition" that he would go with the advice of the medical practitioner is the following: becoming a doctor requires at least a modicum of analytic, problem solving ability but becoming a moral philosopher doesn't require any medical knowledge whatever. So if you just ask in the abstract who you would prefer the answer is pretty obvious–the doctor. However, if you ask after the advice of a moral philosopher with a fairly large amount of medical knowledge *specific to the case*, I think the intuition just goes away entirely or even begins to favor the moral philosopher.

    Moreover, which sub-specialist of philosopher we would look to depends on the case. In a situation like (c), moral philosophy and possibly the metaphysics of persons is most relevant. In cases like (a) and (b), an epistemologist or philosopher of science might well be more relevant. [Again, modulo the assumption that the individuals in question have a fairly substantial knowledge of the medical facts relevant to the case.]

    Regarding Jason's suggestion that he would look to intuitively wise or insightful friends. I disagree, to some extent. The people Jason might regard as intuitively wise or insightful might well be people whose ability to judge complex cases he is personally familiar with, be they doctors, philosophers or car mechanics. So he might simply feel comfortable assessing those people's abilities at least tacitly. But unless something like this explains Jason's intuition, I would take his judgment in those cases to be faulty.

    Ah well, hope that isn't too rambling–got to run off and figure out whose judgments to take seriously.

    Reply
  25. TP

    Jason,

    As an attorney and a medical-ethicist in training, I would like to humbly proffer my own decision-making calculus on your question. Bear in mind this issue is entirely personal to me, as I am devoting my life to the very question you ask.

    Namely, once I decided that I had had enough of legal practice and wished to become a medical ethicist, the question of 'how best to proceed' became, as it had been when I initially considered the issue coming out of undergraduate school, a difficult question. Then, as now, there does not exist much of a defined career track for medical ethics.

    One fairly common course is to pursue a doctorate in philosophy, with a focus on applied and clinical medical ethics. Though I ultimately chose a different path, I see nothing wrong with such an approach.

    However, in my case, once I sat down to think about the actual task of a clinical medical ethicist (which may be different from bioethicists), I became aware of a field of study known as the medical humanities. In terms of, for example, an ethics consult (a term I dislike because of the problem-solving paradigm that it implicates, when, IMO, clinical ethics is most assuredly NOT about "solving" ethical dilemma), I thought,

    "What if I walk into an ethics consult with absolutely no appreciation for one of the major prisms through which a person experiences health and illness — i.e., religion and spirituality?"

    "What if I walk into an ethics consult with absolutely no appreciation for the fact that most people, even non-Westerners, who receive health care in a Western setting, seem to relate to their experiences via the telling of stories, i.e., through narrative?"

    "What if I walk into an ethics consult with absolutely no appreciation for the extent to which the history of the doctor-patient relationship informs a current conflict between the physician and the patient or family member?"

    And so on and so forth. The rationale, then, for the medical humanities, is that a basic grounding — not expertise, of course — in the various disciplines of the humanities can actually make one a better humanist, and, the logic follows, a better clinical ethicist.

    Needless to say, I've drank the Kool-Aid on that one. I will also mention that there is vigorous debate in the clinical ethics/bioethics community over the exact concerns you raise: whether a moral philosopher, for example, is best suited to serve as a medical ethicist. Indeed, there is controversy over whether the notion of an "ethics expert" is itself deeply problematic and misguided.

    Anyway, I've hogged Professor Leiter's comment thread enough, but your query is obviously near and dear to my heart. and I agree with you that the best medical ethicists have devoted to an understanding of what it is to be a medical humanist. But, of course, I'm biased.

    Reply
  26. Seth Edenbaum

    This began as a question about what kind of specialist is better equipped to handle a specific instance of a medical and moral dilemma. J. Stanley responds by arguing commonsensically if in unphilosophical terms that specialists are not often capable of being specific enough when dealing with real world issues.
    Specialists are only specialists within the context of the wider pool of knowledge: they are by necessity generalists concerning their fields themselves. Doctors know diseases more than patients just as generals know warfare more than soldiers, though good doctors and good generals know both. Still, in our democracy we don't let generals decide when to go to war.

    "The people I would turn to for aid in such a decision are those friends of mine whom I regard as having a certain kind of wisdom and insight about the human condition"

    That begs a lot of questions.
    A 'humanist' education, referring to M. Stanley's post, has less to do with knowledge per se -and less with teaching than with learning- than with the appreciation of these varieties of scale. Works of art are works of articulate hyper-specificity, mapping out not rules but exceptions. They refer to one instance of an act, or to one response: that's why literature is forever offering up strangely sympathetic murderers. It's also why artists' attempts at philosophical generalizations are generally laughed at, as much as philosophers' attempts at art.
    A humanist education is the learning not only of medicine but of a bedside manner. That's not as simple as learning how to be nice and it's something worthy of philosophical discussion. (Good lawyers have good bedside manners too! )
    But that discussion would not be one from specialization but merely concerning it.

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  27. Ralph Wedgwood

    If I had to make such a decision, I would certainly rely on the experienced medic to tell me what all the available options are (including easily overlooked options), and what the typical consequences of these options were. But I'm also quite sure that since I have been trained as a moral philosopher (among other things), I would end up drawing extensively on the sorts of thinking are characteristic of moral philosophy to think through all the difficult issues.

    Of course, I would also ask my friends' advice; since several of my friends are moral philosophers, I would ask for their advice too — I wouldn't reject their advice on the grounds that it was influenced by their moral philospohy. (Admittedly, several moral philosophers have in my view fallen in love with some highly dubious moral theories, which might well render their judgment of such cases pretty unreliable; and so I'd take their advice with a big pinch of salt.)

    So that's how I think I would choose. But perhaps I shouldn't? Perhaps I'd make a better choice if I chose in a less self-conscious way, relying less on any explicit theorizing about the practical considerations at stake, and instead going with my "gut feelings", or perhaps deferring humbly to the gut feelings of some authoritative-sounding medical practitioner whose calm confident manner seems to suggest that his experience gives him some special reliability about such situations? Frankly, I doubt it. I would probably feel that I owed it to my child to think things through as thoroughly and scrupulously as I could; and I honestly can't think of any way of doing that that wouldn't involve the distinctive sorts of thinking that characterize moral philosophy.

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  28. Michael Otsuka

    Jason,

    I'd be interested in hearing a bit more about why you think "Thomson's violinist analogy is …a … piece of metaphysics". If Thomson's attempt to show, via her violinist analogy, that it would be permissible to have an abortion even if the fetus is assumed to have the same moral status as a full grown adult, counts as metaphysics, then what doesn't count as metaphysics in moral philosophy?

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  29. Jason Stanley

    Michael,

    Obviously, the conclusions of moral philosophy (e.g. 'abortion is permissible') are distinct from the conclusions of metaphysics (e.g. 'there are no temporal parts'). But the methods seem to be very similar. Indeed, the methodologies of most of analytic philosophy (and I include much of epistemology and philosophy of language) are so similar that one can challenge the methodology of analytic moral philosophy in the very same way as one can challenge the methodologies of analytic metaphysics and epistemology. I take it, for example, that Stephen Stich's recent work is a challenge to all of us. In his current seminar, he uses epistemology, ethics, metaphysics, and philosophy of language all as examples in which the methodology involves appeals to intuitions which he regards as conditioned by culture (and of course some of Judy Thomson's work figures prominently as a target).

    When I hear an ethics talk, I can raise objections just like an ethicist. I regularly hear ethicists raise excellent objections at metaphysics talks. We all recognize that we operate with similar methodologies, what we are unfamiliar with in other areas of philosophy is only whether we are raising an objection which is well-known (and has a well-known reply). But I'm perfectly fine with classifying areas according to their conclusions, and hence distinguishing who has the required knowledge of which positions and objections are already well-known from who doesn't. I have no objection to that.

    The point I was making in my post is that I wonder whether someone who uses, in deriving ethical conclusions, the methodology I use to derive metaphysical conclusions, is therefore more likely to be a wiser human being (someone we regard as a good source of moral advice). Dworkin's thought experiment suggests that in general philosophers don't really believe that, the protestations of various ethicists aside.

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  30. David Velleman

    I am amused to see that the notorious violinist analogy is being held up as an example of ethical wisdom on the part of analytic philosophers. In my view, that analogy is a perfect example of how tone-deaf philosophers can be. It's precisely because analytic philosophers are inclined to put their faith in such twaddle that they can be unreliable advisors in real life.

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  31. zach

    I agree with Jason et al. that the vastly predominant strain of analytic practical philosophy is and should be separate from the wisdom thing. But what do you think about possible outliers like MacIntyre, Nussbaum or Bernard Williams who do both "humanistic" work and serious analytic practical philosophy? Do they have two hats, the critic's and the philosopher's, and those hats are just different? Or is there a kind of thing that they do (because they're both wise and smart, so to speak) that involves at the same time both "wisdom" and a rigorous problem space?

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  32. Tom Hurka

    David Velleman:

    I'm the person who first mentioned the violinist analogy, and if you actually read my posts I CONTRAST the thinking that produces analogies with "wisdom" and DENY that they provide "advice," in the sense of specific guidance about what to do.

    The function of analogies is to clarify issues, and do you deny that the violinist analogy has done that, e.g. helped us think about whether a woman with a life-threatening pregnancy may have something like a right of self-defence against her fetus even though the fetus is innocent? The analogy doesn't settle the issue; judgement is needed for that. But the claim that it hasn't helped at all is pretty breath-taking.

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  33. Mike

    If I were in some desperate moral situation, I guess the sort of advice I would want is the sort that'll give me reasons for making a decision. Probably the last thing I would want is someone telling me the various different ways of looking at that situation, so causes for indeciveness. Philosophers are good at doing the latter, even when it's the former that's wanted. And for the former, I suppose the advice of just about anyone who really gave a damn about you would be preferable, philosopher or no.

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  34. M.J.

    On the questions of Thomson violinist analogy, its just not clear that it has done much to clear the ground about abortion. It has spawned much professional and student work that says less about whether abortion is permissible than whether abortion is like having a violinist plugged into one's kidneys. There are so many variations on this that my head starts spinning just thinking about it. (Some of my favorites, that I've heard on the fly: If pregancy results from delibarete avoidance of contraception, is that like going into a shooting gallery where there may be violinists? If you carry genes for some horrible disease or deformity, is this like going into a shooting gallery where there are probably violinists?)
    I doubt there are many readers on this thread who have not encountered "Brain In A Vat at the Head of a Run-Away Trolley."
    Important moral choices are often "all things considered" choices. This immediately invokes the question of what is to be considered, what counts morally. And that's one important part of normative ethics, sort out what counts, morally speaking. Some of the work, like the work on abortion cited above is doing this, but its also working at a second level, working of the consequence of what counts for moral problems. Its no surprise that such a process ends in tangled webs.
    The specific problem that I've encountered in my study of moral philosophy is that ethicists do not often pull apart the different levels of problem-solving. I've sometimes called this "piecemeal" moral theorizing. In the sorts of cases of have in mind, Philosopher sees Interesting Problem and goes to work on it. To try to solve Interesting Problem, Philosopher first tries to solve What Counts Morally? and then What Counts Morally Here?. The problem seems to me is that the What Counts Morally Problem? is a rather big problem, one likely to trip you right onto your face, if you try to tackle that problem *and then apply it* within the space of *one article*.
    The best moral philosophy I've seen, ethics that's most applicable, operates in a particular way. First, we have a deeply theorized answer to What Counts Morally. That's one self-contained work. Then one gets how to use that theory in problems. Now, going about things this way often opens up the objection to the applied work: But your background theory is wrong! I think ethicists have to resist having a glass jaw, and take the blow. It may be a valid criticsm of the final advice. But its the only way to do work of this kind that really produces results that are useful.
    This being said, this may indicate why rabbis and priests and ministers are able to deal with moral problems more confidently than the philosopher. They don't accept any attacks on their fundamental theory. Their advice is unequivocally given as a Jew, or a Catholic, or a Christian. Now their basic theories maybe as misguided as any moral theory, but they don't shrink from them.

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