How do we know what is morally right or wrong, good or bad? There have been innumerable answers to this question in the history of philosophy. Most of these answers can be grouped under two major positions. Either moral experience is emotional, but then it must be subjective (sentimentalism); or it is objective, but then it must be rational (rationalism). This division is based on a dichotomy between reason and emotion. However, this dichotomy has long been rejected by many emotion-scholars. This book presents a new philosophical theory according to which we need intuitions and emotions in order to have objective moral knowledge, which is called affectual intuitionism. Affectual Intuitionism combines ethical intuitionism with a cognitive theory of emotions. This approach avoids a phenomenologically implausible rationalism as much as a morally problematic relativism, and it connects well with recent developments in moral psychology.
Moral Emotions and Intuitions
How do we know what is morally right or wrong, good or bad? There have been innumerable answers to this question in the history of philosophy. Most of these answers can be grouped under two major positions. Either moral experience is emotional, but then it must be subjective (sentimentalism); or it is objective, but then it must be rational (rationalism). This division is based on a dichotomy between reason and emotion. However, this dichotomy has long been rejected by many emotion-scholars. This book presents a new philosophical theory according to which we need intuitions and emotions in order to have objective moral knowledge, which is called affectual intuitionism. Affectual Intuitionism combines ethical intuitionism with a cognitive theory of emotions. This approach avoids a phenomenologically implausible rationalism as much as a morally problematic relativism, and it connects well with recent developments in moral psychology.