Disgust as Heuristic

Suppose that disgust can provide evidence of moral wrongdoing. What account of disgust might make sense of this? A recent and promising theory is the social contagion view, proposed by Alexandra Plakias. After criticizing both its descriptive and normative claims, I draw two conclusions. First, we s...

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主要作者: Fischer, Bob 198X- (Author)
格式: 電子 Article
語言:English
Check availability: HBZ Gateway
Interlibrary Loan:Interlibrary Loan for the Fachinformationsdienste (Specialized Information Services in Germany)
出版: [2016]
In: Ethical theory and moral practice
Year: 2016, 卷: 19, 發布: 3, Pages: 679-693
IxTheo Classification:NCA Ethics
VA Philosophy
ZB Sociology
ZD Psychology
Further subjects:B MORAL HEURISTICS
B Disgust
B Leon Kass
B social contagion
B Alexandra Plakias
在線閱讀: Volltext (Publisher)
Volltext (doi)
實物特徵
總結:Suppose that disgust can provide evidence of moral wrongdoing. What account of disgust might make sense of this? A recent and promising theory is the social contagion view, proposed by Alexandra Plakias. After criticizing both its descriptive and normative claims, I draw two conclusions. First, we should question the wisdom of drawing so straight a line from biological poisons and pathogens to social counterparts. Second, we don’t need to explain the evidential value of disgust by appealing to what the response tracks. These lessons point toward an alternative: namely, that disgust is a moral heuristic. On the heuristic view, disgust is a trigger for the subconscious use of a particular rule: < If x is disgusting, and we wouldn’t do x, then x is morally wrong. > I show how this view fits with a plausible hypothesis about the social function of disgust, and then apply it to Leon Kass’s famous use of repugnance to criticize cloning.
ISSN:1572-8447
Contains:Enthalten in: Ethical theory and moral practice
Persistent identifiers:DOI: 10.1007/s10677-015-9673-6