Journal of Philosophical Investigations

There is no doubt that “lying” is an unethical practice. But, in some situations, such as; where the life of an innocent person to be at risk, it is considered permissible ... Read More

چگونه استراوسن میان معرفت‏شناسی، هستی‏شناسی و منطق وحدت ایجاد می کند؟

Mohammad Reza Abdollahnejad

Volume 6, Issue 11 , November 2012, , Pages 1-14

Abstract

تحلیل استراوسن نوعی «تحلیل زبانی پیوندگرا» است. او بر پایه این نوع تحلیل به گستره وسیعی از مفاهیم ... Read More

Descartes' Doubt as a 'Theory'

Masoud Omid

Volume 5, Issue 9 , November 2011, , Pages 1-16

Abstract

This article investigates the problem of doubt in Descartes' philosophy from a different viewpoint. I tried to answer the question that if it is possible to have a maximal sight to ... Read More

Lukasiewicz’s Symbolic System for Aristotle’s Logic

Davud Heidari

Volume 4, Issue 216 , July 2010, , Pages 1-29

Abstract

This article deals with Lukasiewicz’s view of Aristotle's syllogistic. His fundamental work on the syllogism is Aristotle's Syllogistic from the Standpoint of Modern Formal Logic. ... Read More

Heidegger on Language in the”Holderlin and the Essence of Poetry”

Marzieh Piravi Vanak

Volume 4, Issue 219 , November 2010, , Pages 1-16

Abstract

Heidegger considered the history of methaphysics as the history of disregarding the Thruth (altheia,disclosedness) and Being. He believed that in this needy time (modern time) ... Read More

Author as a Text’s Guest not as a Text’s Ghost (According to the Barthes's Approach)

Marziyeh Piravi vanak; Azam Hakim

Volume 7, Issue 13 , December 2013, , Pages 1-17

Abstract

Roland Barthes in 1968 in an essay – that is considered as a famous and well known text now a day –announced the death of the author. Candor of this fearless theory causes ... Read More

The Methodological Limitations of Popper's Research program on "Open Society"

ALIREZA ISMAILZAD

Volume 3, Issue 214 , February 2009, , Pages 1-28

Abstract

K. R. Popper, because of his standpoints on philosophy and methodology of science and also his attitudes on political thought, has gained a dignity in history of ideas of the twentieth ... Read More

Symblic Language in Paul Tilieh

mohammad elkhani; seyyed mehdi mir hashemi esfahlan

Volume 3, Issue 210 , September 2009, , Pages 1-26

Abstract

Paul Tillich (1886-1965) is a German-American Christian theologianwho suggests that language of religion is symbolic; it means that therealm of the religion is full of religious symbols. ... Read More

Karl Popper and Evolutionary Concept of Epistemology

Ebrahim Ashni Alvandi; Majid Akbari Dehagi

Volume 2, Issue 205 , December 2008, , Pages 1-22

Abstract

Epistemology and its formational trend have been always one of the discussions in various parts of science; and nowadays modern sciences have plentiful effects on the process of epistemological ... Read More

A Critic on two models about the world coming to be (Avicenna and Sohravardi’s models)

zohre Tavaziani; Sahar Kavandi

Volume 2, Issue 203 , September 2008, , Pages 1-29

Abstract

This article has attempted to clarify two of the models that depict the system in which the Universe came into existence. Within the domain of Islamic thought, Avicennian and Ishraqi ... Read More

Plato's Ta mathematica and its Relevance to the Life of the World

Monireh Palangi

Volume 1, Issue 202 , December 2007, , Pages 1-15

Abstract

This article is an attempt to confirm what Leon Robin, the well-known Platonist, asserts that Plato believes in relevance between ta mathematica and the soul. That is, it tries to prove ... Read More

The Competence of the existent world and the problem of evil in Ibn Sina and Molla Sadra

Mansour Imanpour

Volume 1, Issue 199 , September 2006, , Pages 1-20

Abstract

The main question of our paper is: how Ibn-sina and Mulla-Sadra demonstrate the completeness of the existent world, despite the evils which we see clearly in that? Our answer is that ... Read More

Five Answers on Pragmatism

Susan Hacck

Volume 12, Issue 24 , October 2018, , Pages 1-14

Abstract

Prof. Haack answers a series of questions on pragmatism, beginning with the origins of this tradition in the work of Peirce and James, its evolution in the work of Dewey and Mead, and ... Read More

Christine Korsgaard’s Constructivism

Hossein Atrak

Volume 12, Issue 25 , February 2019, , Pages 1-20

https://doi.org/10.22034/jpiut.2019.8014

Abstract

Abstract Constructivism is a theory that believes moral judgments are not real things but they are constructed by practical reason in a rational procedure for resolving practical problems ... Read More Abstract Constructivism is a theory that believes moral judgments are not real things but they are constructed by practical reason in a rational procedure for resolving practical problems in front of us. Christine Korsgaard, a contemporary American philosopher, is a Kantian constructivist, whose theory I consider in this paper. She is a radical constructivist and disagrees with moral realism and denies moral truths even as abstract facts. According to Korsgaard moral judgments are constructed by rational agents. She believes moral and political principles are generally solutions to human practical problems. She justifies the normativity of moral obligations from this point that they are constructed by agent for resolving his problems. There are some objections to Korsgaard’s constructivism; one of them is to place humanity as the source of value. Keywords: Korsgaard, constructivism, practical problem, humanity. Introduction One of the traditional problems in moral philosophy is the nature and entity of moral truths and judgments. Do humans themselves make and construct them or are they facts and truths in the world which humans just discover? Are moral truths and values subjective or objective? Subjectivism and objectivism have been two old rivals in this question. But some philosophers have proposed a new theory between them that is called Constructivism. According to this theory, moral truths are not real and objective, but are constructed by human practical reason. In this view, an action is morally right when there is a sufficient reason to perform it. In this paper I will discuss Korsgaard's constructivism. 1. Definition of Constructivism Constructivism is a theory about the justification of moral principles. It is the view that moral principles are the ones agents would agree with or endorse if they were to engage in a hypothetical or idealized process of rational deliberation. The differences about related criteria for this rational process and deliberation have produced several varieties of constructivism like Humean, Aristotelian, and Kantian (Bagnoli, 2011). 2. Korsgaard’s Constructivism 1-3. Normative Question Korsgaard’s Constructivism is an answer to the main question in history of moral philosophy which she calls normative question. That is a central question about moral requirements. We see that they are inescapable in the sense that they provide reasons to act regardless of an agent’s desires and interests. So the question is: from where do they get their authority and obligatory force on us? Why do we make ourselves observe moral duties and principles? What is the origin of moral obligations? What are our reasons for justifying moral obligations? (Korsgaard, 1996: 9-10( 2-3. procedural moral realism Korsgaard is an anti-realist philosopher. This thought that “human beings simply have unconditional or intrinsic value” is a realistic one standing in contrast to Korsgaard's constructivist thought that claims “we must confer value even upon ourselves” through certain allegedly necessary uses of ethical concepts. She distinguishes two kinds of realism: substantive moral realism and procedural moral realism. “What distinguishes substantive from procedural realism is a view about the relationship between the answers to moral questions and our procedures for arriving at those answers. The procedural moral realist thinks that there are answers to moral questions because there are correct procedures for arriving at them. But the substantive moral realist thinks that there are correct procedures for answering moral questions because there are moral truths or facts which exist independently of those procedures and which those procedures track” (Korsgaard, 1996: 36-37). She disagrees with the former and agrees with the latter. 3-3.proceduralism The constructivism Korsgaard embraces is a form of proceduralism according to which the rightness of answers to normative questions is grounded in the fact that these answers are yielded by principles deriving from procedures with some special status. Evaluative and normative facts are not there as abstract facts to be met with or discovered through theoretical investigation of the nature and structure of rational agency, but are constructed through our actual practical activities. “Values are constructed by a procedure, the procedure of making laws for ourselves.” (Korsgaard, 1996: 112) For Korsgaard, the relevant procedures at the source of normativity are procedures involved with willing, and what gives them their special status is that they are practically necessary for us—formal procedures rational beings must employ simply to function as agents at all. Everything starts with the nature of the will and the procedures according to which it must operate if it is to function as a will at all (FitzPatrick, 2005: 654-655(. 4-3. Constructivist and resolving problems In Korsgaard's opinion when we are faced with a practical problem in our life and we don't know what the right action is, the solution is not in looking after a normative moral reality in the world and expecting to discover it, but it is in constructing a practical solution for that problem. She thinks this solution depends on an adequate conception of that problem. For a constructivist, ethical or political principles are solutions to practical problems we are already stuck with (FitzPatrick, 2005, p. 657-658), and this is how normative force is explained: “If you recognize the problem to be real, to be yours, to be one you have to solve, and the solution to be the only or the best one, then the solution is binding upon you.” (Korsgaard, 1996: 114) According to Korsgaard, the source of normativity in moral obligations is in our humanity and moral identity. Because of self-consciousness, human beings do not do something just out of their desires; rather they ask themselves whether it is right to act on the basis of desire. Korsgaard agrees with Kant that humanity is a value in itself and says that our reasons to do something determine our identity and nature. She says: “we must therefore take ourselves to be important” and “humanity, as the source of all reasons and values, must be valued for its own sake” (Korsgaard, 1996: 122). Our human identity imposes unconditional obligations to us, whether we are women or men, of this or that ethnic group, of this or that religious or social group, and so on. Therefore, our human identity is the source of our moral norms and obligations. The violation of these obligations amounts to the loss of our identity. Humanity is a significant part of us. 3. Conclusion There are strong and weak points in Korsgaard theory. One of the strong points, we think, is a successful justification of moral differences in applied ethics. On the other hand, it seems that, in addition to certain objections to Korsgaard’s moral theory, it is also subject to objections to Kant’s moral theory, such as the objection that humanity and human practical identity cannot always serve as a successful criterion for the recognition of moral actions. References 1. FitzPatrick, William J. (July 2005) "The Practical Turn in Ethical Theory: Korsgaard’s Constructivism, Realism, and the Nature of Normativity", Ethics, Vol. 115, No. 4, pp. 651-691. 2. Lenman, James and Shemmer, Yonatan (2012) Constructivism in Practical Philosophy, Oxford University Press. 3. Nagel, Thomas (1996) "Universality and the reflective self", in the Sources of Normativity, edited by Onora O'Neill, Cambridge University Press. 4. Korsgaard, Christine M. (1996) the Sources of Normativity, edited by Onora O'Neill, Cambridge University Press. 5. Korsgaard, Christine M. (1996b) Creating the Kingdom of Ends, Cambridge: Cambridge University. 6. Korsgaard, Christine M. (2008) The Constitution of Agency: Essays on Practical Reason and Moral Psychology, New York: Oxford University Press. 7. Korsgaard, Christine M. (2009) Self-Constitution, Agency, Identity, and Integrity, New York: Oxford University Press. 8. Watkins, Eric, and Fitzpatrick, William (2002) O’Neill and Korsgaard on the Construction of Normativity, The Journal of Value Inquiry 36: 349–367.

Critique and Investigation of the Evolutionary Ethical Behavior Explanations based on Francisco Ayala’s Theories

Haleh Abdollahi Rad; Hassan Miandari

Volume 14, Issue 32 , December 2020, , Pages 1-20

https://doi.org/10.22034/jpiut.2020.8041

Abstract

Ayala (American philosopher and biologist) has presented new theories on the evolutionary ethical explanations. Due to the large scope of Ayala’s discussion on evolutionary ethics, ... Read More

Herder and the Emergence of Philosophy of Culture

Mohammad Mehdi Ardebili

Volume 13, Issue 27 , September 2019, , Pages 1-22

https://doi.org/10.22034/jpiut.2019.28555.2055

Abstract

Though thinking about culture returns to ancient Greece, "culture" as understood today is a modern concept influenced more by the speculations of the German thinkers of the 18th and ... Read More

Theodicy or Divine Justice in Leibniz

shahin Avani

Volume 14, Issue 30 , May 2020, , Pages 1-19

https://doi.org/10.22034/jpiut.2019.34194.2349

Abstract

An examination of the history of the development of the philosophical issues in the West indicates that since the Demiurge (Demiourgos) of Plato in the Timaeus created the ... Read More

Nietzsche: A philosopher of Culture or Anti-Culture?

Mohammad mehdi Ardebili

Volume 14, Issue 33 , February 2021, , Pages 1-16

https://doi.org/10.22034/jpiut.2020.39921.2558

Abstract

The title of the present article describes its main problematic. The text begins with Nietzsche's various uses of culture (cultivation, education, civilization, etc.). From his first ... Read More

‘Liberal Democracy’ in the ‘Post-Corona World’

Shirzad Peik Herfeh

Volume 14, Issue 31 , July 2020, , Pages 1-29

https://doi.org/10.22034/jpiut.2020.40506.2606

Abstract

A new ‘political philosophy’ is indispensable to the ‘post-Corona world,’ and this paper tries to analyze the future of ‘liberal democracy’ in it. ... Read More

The Social Constitution of Self for Fichte

Arash Abazari

Volume 15, Issue 34 , May 2021, , Pages 1-22

https://doi.org/10.22034/jpiut.2021.40769.2618

Abstract

What I call in this paper “the sociality of subjectivity thesis” lies at the very center of what is now called “Continental philosophy”. According to this thesis, ... Read More

Volume 17 (2023)

Volume 16 (2022)

Volume 15 (2021)

Volume 14 (2020)

Volume 13 (2019)

Volume 12 (2018)

Volume 11 (2017)

Volume 10 (2016)

Volume 9 (2015)

Volume 8 (2014)

Volume 7 (2013)

Volume 6 (2012)

Volume 5 (2011)

Volume 4 (2010)

Volume 3 (2009)

Volume 2 (2008)

Volume 1 (2007)

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