Hobbes and the two faces of ethics / Arash Abizadeh, McGill University, Montreal.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Abizadeh, Arash, author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Hobbes, Thomas, 1588-1679.

Hobbes, Thomas.

Ethics, Modern--17th century.

Ethics, Modern.

Applied ethics.

Natural law.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (xi, 288 pages) : digital, PDF file(s).

Edition:

1st ed.

Place of Publication:

Cambridge : Cambridge University Press, 2018.

Summary:

Reading Hobbes in light of both the history of ethics and the conceptual apparatus developed in recent work on normativity, this book challenges received interpretations of Hobbes and his historical significance. Arash Abizadeh uncovers the fundamental distinction underwriting Hobbes's ethics: between prudential reasons of the good, articulated via natural laws prescribing the means of self-preservation, and reasons of the right or justice, comprising contractual obligations for which we are accountable to others. He shows how Hobbes's distinction marks a watershed in the transition from the ancient Greek to the modern conception of ethics, and demonstrates the relevance of Hobbes's thought to current debates about normativity, reasons, and responsibility. His book will interest Hobbes scholars, historians of ethics, moral philosophers, and political theorists.

Contents:

Cover

Half-title page

Title page

Copyright page

Contents

Preface

List of Abbreviations

Introduction

Methodological Preliminaries

On Normativity and 'Reason'

The Overarching Argument

Part I The Metaethics of Reasons

Chapter 1 Naturalism

1.1 An Error Theory

1.2 Descriptivist Reductionism

1.3 Reasoning-Based Descriptivist Reductionism

1.4 Noncognitivist Prescriptivism

1.5 A Hybrid Theory: Reasoning-Based and Prescriptivist

Chapter 2 Mind, Action, and Reasoning

2.1 Practical Deliberation Is Partly Cognitive

2.2 Is Hobbesian Reasoning Passive?

2.3 Linguistic Reasoning is Reflectively Reason-Responsive

2.4 The Failure of the Hybrid Reading

Part II Reasons of the Good

Chapter 3 Subjectivism, Instrumentalism, and Prudentialism about Reasons

3.1 Conative Subjectivism about Reasons? The Problem of Instrumental Transmission

3.2 Instrumentalism about Reasons? The Problem of Time

3.3 Prudentialism about Reasons

3.4 Cognitive Subjectivism about Reasons? Epistemically Relativized Objective Reasons

3.5 Suicide, Laws of Nature, and a Life Worth Living: Self-Preservation Is Not Survival

Chapter 4 A Theory of the Good: Felicity by Anticipatory Pleasure

4.1 Four Distinct Questions about Goodness and 'Good'

4.2 The Meaning of 'Good': The Customary versus Reforming Sense

4.3 What Makes a Life Good: Anticipatory Pleasure

4.4 Two Complications for the Meaning of 'Good': Prescriptively Subversive Circumstances

4.5 Prescriptively Self-Fulfilling Circumstances

Part III Reasons of the Right

Chapter 5 Accountability and Obligations

5.1 Three Types of Responsibility and Blame: Non-Normative, Critical, and Reactive

5.2 Directed Obligations

5.3 The Interest and the Will Theories of Direction

5.4 Owing an Obligation versus Being Held Accountable.

5.5 Legal Accountability and Punishment

5.6 No Accountability for Intentions

Chapter 6 The Laws of Nature, Morality, and Justice

6.1 The Meaning of 'Moral'

6.2 Reasons of the Right Cannot Be Derived from Reasons of the Good

6.3 The Relation between Natural Law and Obligation

6.4 The Relation between Natural Law and Civil Law

6.5 Two Puzzles about Natural Right and Natural Law

Chapter 7 Rational Agency and Personhood

7.1 Entities, Voluntary Agents, and Rational Agents

7.2 Persons: Representer or Represented?

7.3 Natural Persons Are Authors

7.4 Artificial Persons: True and By Fiction

7.5 Accountability Is Interpersonal: No Accountability to Oneself

Conclusion: Naturalism and Normativity

Works Cited

Index.

Notes:

Title from publisher's bibliographic system (viewed on 26 Oct 2018).

Includes bibliographical references.

ISBN:

1-108-27866-3

1-108-27731-4

1-108-28100-1

OCLC:

1061558931