Jason Kawall Abstract
Title: Virtue Ethics and Revisionary Concepts of Rightness
Abstract: In response to certain recent criticisms and
counterexamples, several virtue ethicists have argued that virtue
ethics should be seen as defending a very different conception of
rightness than consequentialist or deontological moral theories; with
this different conception in place, they argue, the objections and
counterexamples fail. In this paper I argue that virtue ethicists are
ill-served by this proposal. The alternative conception of rightness
seems quite strange, and of limited value to moral theory.
Furthermore, even with this alternative conception of rightness,
standard virtue ethical accounts of rightness would be open to
important objections and counterexamples. Finally, I propose that an
alternative response on behalf of virtue ethics to the criticisms and
objections at stake.