Fall 2019

October 3 – Julian Young, Honorary Research Associate, University of Auckland and Kenan Professor of Humanities Emeritus, Wake Forest University

“Scheler, Nietzsche, Christian Love and Ressentiment”

Christian morality, according to Nietzsche, is ‘slave morality’, the product of the ‘ressentiment’ of the slaves of the Roman Empire against their oppressive masters. The Catholic phenomenologist Max Scheler, argues that while Nietzsche is wrong about the morality of ‘Christian love’ he is right about something into which Christian morality can easily degenerate which he calls ‘modern morality’. I argue that while Scheler is not entirely right about modern morality, he is not entirely wrong either.

November 7 – Michelle Maiese, professor of philosophy, Emmanuel College

“Are Psychopaths Autonomous Agents?”

Two central conditions for autonomous agency that are highlighted by many existing accounts include (1) reasons-responsivity, and (2) authenticity. However, available evidence indicates that psychopaths are inadequately responsive to reasons, and also seem to lack a set of enduring concerns that might reveal which desires and attitudes are truly theirs. This renders them impulsive and also leads them to disregard the interests and concerns of others. Drawing from the enactivist approach in philosophy of mind, I will argue that both their prudential deficits and apparent moral failings result from a disruption to autonomous agency, and that this disruption is rooted, at a deeper level, in a lack of well-developed affective framing patterns.

November 20 – Eric Schwitzgebel, professor of philosophy, University of California, Riverside

“Aiming for Moral Mediocrity”

Most people aim to be about as morally good as their peers—not especially better, not especially worse. We do not aim to be good, or non-bad, or to act permissibly rather than impermissibly, by fixed moral standards. Rather, we notice the typical behavior of our peers, then calibrate toward so-so. This is a somewhat bad way to be, but it’s not a terribly bad way to be. We are somewhat morally criticizable for having low moral ambitions. Typical arguments defending the moral acceptability of low moral ambitions—the So-What-If-I’m-Not-a-Saint Excuse, the Fairness Objection, the Happy Coincidence Defense, and the claim that you’re already in The-Most-You-Can-Do Sweet Spot—do not survive critical scrutiny.