Barresi John
J Psychohist. 2017 Winter;44(3):200-20.
The development of John Woolman’s views on slavery plays an important evidentiary role in Philip Kitcher’s recent book, The ethical project (Kitcher 2011). In this work Kitcher takes what he calls a “pragmatic naturalist” approach to ethics and claims that the discovery of ethical truth plays no role in the emergence of ethical progress. To support his view, he argues that Woolman’s contribution was not due to his discovery of an ethical truth about slavery, not previously known, but due to his sensitivity to slavery and his influence on others, which contributed to collective progressive change in moral norms involving slavery. While not disputing Kitcher’s ethical theory, I argue that personal discoveries of a moral psychological nature made by Woolman served both as insights and motivations for his contribution. Thus, even if there are no such things as independent ethical truths that can be discovered by individuals, a fully naturalistic approach to ethical progress requires that we make room not only for group-level progressive evolution of norms, but also for individual discoveries of a moral psychological nature that can sometimes cause an individual to play a significant initiating role in progressive ethical transitions that occur at a group level.
约翰·伍尔曼对奴隶制看法的发展在菲利普·基切尔最近的著作《道德工程》（基切尔，2011年）中起着重要的证据作用。在这部作品中，基切尔采用了他所谓的“实用自然主义”伦理学方法，并声称道德真理的发现对道德进步的出现没有作用。为了支持他的观点，他认为伍尔曼的贡献并非源于他发现了关于奴隶制的此前不为人知的道德真理，而是源于他对奴隶制的敏感以及他对他人的影响，这促成了涉及奴隶制的道德规范的集体渐进变化。虽然我不质疑基切尔的伦理理论，但我认为伍尔曼个人在道德心理方面的发现既是他做出贡献的见解，也是其动机。因此，即使不存在个人能够发现的独立道德真理，一种完全自然主义的道德进步方法要求我们不仅要为规范在群体层面的渐进演变留出空间，也要为个人在道德心理方面的发现留出空间，这些发现有时会使个人在群体层面发生的渐进性道德转变中发挥重要的发起作用。
