The Ethical Project by Philip Kitcher

by Philip Kitcher

Principles of right and wrong guide the lives of almost all human beings, but we often see them as external to ourselves, outside our own control. In a revolutionary approach to the problems of moral philosophy, Philip Kitcher makes a provocative Instead of conceiving ethical commands as divine revelations or as the discoveries of brilliant thinkers, we should see our ethical practices as evolving over tens of thousands of years, as members of our species have worked out how to live together and prosper. Elaborating this radical new vision, Kitcher shows how the limited altruistic tendencies of our ancestors enabled a fragile social life, how our forebears learned to regulate their interactions with one another, and how human societies eventually grew into forms of previously unimaginable complexity. The most successful of the many millennia-old experiments in how to live, he contends, survive in our values today.Drawing on natural science, social science, and philosophy to develop an approach he calls "pragmatic naturalism," Kitcher reveals the power of an evolving ethics built around a few core principles-including justice and cooperation-but leaving room for a diversity of communities and modes of self-expression. Ethics emerges as a beautifully human phenomenon-permanently unfinished, collectively refined and distorted generation by generation. Our human values, Kitcher shows, can be understood not as a final system but as a project-the ethical project-in which our species has engaged for most of its history, and which has been central to who we are.

Genres: Philosophy, Nonfiction, Spirituality, History

Hardcover

First published November 7, 2011

About the author

Philip Kitcher is John Dewey Professor of Philosophy at Columbia University. He was the first recipient of the American Philosophical Association's Prometheus Prize for his work to expand the frontiers of science and philosophy.

Reviews

[Paul · Rating 4 out of 5]

Dr. Kitcher takes a brilliant approach to ethics! I have approached ethics in a similar way in the past. My less intelligent-sounding version has been "we are social animals who are have to live together. So, we need to have some rules to live by." I appreciate Dr. Kitcher's approach to the naturalistic fallacy. He sees ethics as a sort of technology that humans developed due to their need to live together in small groups where "altruism-failures" sometimes occurred many years ago. This technology evolved as people's needs and desires changed after other human developments that allowed us to grow in population size, material prosperity and division of roles.

Ethics aren't some magical things existing in a special realm that we discovered. They also weren't handed down by a divine force. Nevertheless, they are crucial if you're a human. He argues that ethical progress can come in the form of not basing ethics on false beliefs (e.g. "a supernatural being or force said so"), being internally consistent and making changes that address the problem of altruism-failures. Ethical truths are tentative and perhaps contingent, but there are some ethical truths that probably apply in most situations for the foreseeable human future. People could maybe come up with an alternative in theory, but it is unlikely in certain cases. This is only problematic if people practice ethics the way they have been practiced for ages: looking for principles that are somehow completely absolute and looking for special authority somewhere or in someone.

[Vince · Rating 4 out of 5]

In The Ethical Project, Kitcher offers a plausible, defensible theory for a naturalistic origin of ethical systems and values.

Be warned: this text is aimed at professional philosophers and those well-versed in the theoretical debates. Many passages address what appear to be expected arguments from different perspectives, much of which will fly over the heads of the casual reader (among whom I class myself).

For an accessible summary of these ideas, I recommend Kitcher's Life After Faith: The Case for Secular Humanism, chapter 2.

The Ethical Project is an important work, one I found strikingly thought-provoking, despite my difficulties accessing some of the arguments. Four stars.

[James Mcbain · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was a "I wish I had wrote this" books for me. Insightful is not saying enough.

[Dan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fantastic. The kind of book that makes you think more clearly.

[Landon Mitchell · Rating 5 out of 5]

Phillip Kitcher's "The Ethical Project" is essential reading for anybody who is interested in naturalistic ethics. While many naturalists turn to moral relativism, Kitcher offers a convincing alternative by grounding morality in a pragmatic project to promote altruism. By working from a pragmatic and naturalistic perspective, Kitcher cuts through unnecessary postulates commonly found in discussions about religion and ethics, like so-called "moral intuition" and "objective morality." Kitcher's pragmatic naturalism is grounded in the facts about human psychology and history, not abstract metaphysical speculation.

[Reuben HF · Rating 4 out of 5]

Kitcher tries to do a lot in this book - perhaps too much. While there are some fantastic ideas (mainly chapter 7) making the whole thing worthwhile, you have to wade through a lot of faff to get them.

[Matt · Rating 3 out of 5]

Each third of this book is really of work of its own. The first 2/3 are great; the last third is unfocused and not at all convincing. An necessary read for anyone working on contemporary metaethics.

[Soren Wenstop · Rating 5 out of 5]

Human morality down to its naturalistic nature; a continuous, never-ending process of co-evolution between forces of nature and nurture.