Pub Date : 2021-12-15DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780192848536.003.0003
David Mcpherson
This chapter discusses moral limits. In a broad sense of “moral,” which is concerned with how we ought to live our lives, each of the limits explored in this book can be regarded as involving moral limits. But this chapter focuses on traditional areas of concern for moral philosophers. The first section discusses the issue of character formation and how this properly begins from learning to acknowledge restraints on our desires, which enables us to become the best of all animals, rather than the worst, that is, it enables us to become fully human (in the sense of realizing a normative ideal for humanity). The section focuses on the limiting virtues of reverence (as expressed through manners) and moderation, and it draws on Confucian and Aristotelian ethics. The next two sections are primarily concerned to argue against consequentialist forms of ethics. The second section argues in favor of absolute prohibitions by appealing again to the limiting virtue of reverence, and it critiques other proposed bases for such prohibitions. The third and final section then considers what we positively owe others in terms of assistance. While it maintains that we should have concern for all human beings qua human beings, it discusses how the limiting virtues of neighborliness (a form of human solidarity that recognizes the moral significance of proximity) and loyalty place constraints on what we can be asked to do on behalf of others.
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Pub Date : 2021-12-15DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780192848536.003.0002
David Mcpherson
In exploring the place of limits within a well-lived human life, this first chapter begins at the most general level with “existential limits,” which are limits with respect to the given, that is, to what exists. This chapter explores two fundamental existential stances, or orientations toward the given, which play a key role throughout the book. One stance is the choosing-controlling stance. All mature human beings adopt this stance to some extent in their efforts to improve their lives and the world around them through controlling, transforming, and overcoming the given. However, at the extreme, this stance can give expression to a “Promethean” project of “playing God” by seeking mastery over the given. The other basic existential stance is at odds with this Promethean project: it is referred to as the accepting-appreciating stance. By accepting and appreciating the given, this stance imposes limits on the choosing-controlling stance. While acknowledging an important role for a choosing-controlling stance in human life, this chapter argues that the accepting-appreciating stance toward the given should be regarded as primary in several ways and discusses specific limiting virtues—namely, humility, reverence, contentment, and loyalty—that give proper expression to this stance. This chapter begins with a discussion of prominent defenses of the Promethean project of mastery in the works of Friedrich Nietzsche and, more recently, Ronald Dworkin in his argument in favor of genetic engineering, and then it turns to make the case against the Promethean project.
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Pub Date : 2021-12-15DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780192848536.003.0004
David Mcpherson
This chapter explores the importance of limits in the political domain, starting with a discussion of the bonds and bounds of political community. It takes on the cosmopolitan outlook that rejects patriotism, which involves loyalty to one’s country and fellow citizens. Patriotism, it is contended, is important not only because it meets the human need for belonging but also, relatedly, because it enables democratic self-government and distributive justice. The second section argues against egalitarian views of distributive justice (with a focus on luck egalitarianism) and in favor of a sufficientarian view, where what matters is that everyone has enough. This sufficientarian view embraces the limiting virtue of contentment and with this a politics of imperfection, and so the third section argues against utopianism, including what is called “ideal theory” in political philosophy. The fourth and final section discusses the importance of the limiting virtue of moderation in politics and, in connection with this, the importance of limiting government. Many of the most important pursuits in life, it is contended, lie outside of the political domain, and politics should make space for these pursuits.
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