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One distinctive feature of contemporary ethics is its interest in the connection between moral
judgment and emotion. At the heart of this contemporary discussion is a view known as
\sentimentalism," which claims that moral judgments just are, in some sense, expressions
of emotion or sentiment. The view itself, however, is not new. Scottish Enlightenment
philosophers, and David Hume, in particular, articulated something like it in the eighteenth
century. However, existing scholarly efort to understand Humes account of \moral senti-
ment" is critically underdeveloped. The problem stems from a failure to address seriously
the fact that Hume lays at the heart of his ethical argument in A Treatise of Human Na-
ture not just any sentiment, but a peculiar sentiment. Although most commentators notice
the peculiar sentiment argument, no one has yet tried to determine exhaustively what this
argument amounts to for Hume. There is no dedicated and systematic study of the nature
of this \peculiarity"; the import of the argument for Humes general ethical theory; the con-
sistency of that argument with his greater philosophical system; and the supposed source of
the peculiar sentiment in the human psyche. This paper attempts to correct this oversight.
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Posted:
4/27/2012
Originator:
Debrajean Wheeler Wheeler
Email:
debrajean.wheeler@ttu.edu
Department:
Philosophy
Event Information
Time: 7:30 PM - 9:30 PM
Event Date: 4/27/2012
Location:
ENG/PHIL 106
Categories
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