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1 introduction Philosophy and Edification today’s moral philosopher operates more like a physics scholar than a physician. The physics scholar is interested in truth about the physical world, including the natural laws that give shape to a human’s experience of the world. The physics scholar, however, does not prescribe how the human ought to operate in the world, though i suppose there would be recommendations made for taking the law of gravity seriously. The physics scholar might engage in logical, inductive inquiry and draw conclusions on the basis of observations, but the conclusions derived would not serve as the basis for how humans ought to behave physically in the world. on the contrary, the physician works toward the improvement or correction of one constituent of the physical world, namely the human. The physician is also concerned with truth, for example, a true diagnosis of a human ailment. But the work of the physician goes further than inquiry. it extends to prescription, to counsel or recommendation. a physician who knows only what is wrong with a patient but does not aim to heal the patient by prescribing a course of action fails at the work of being a physician. Perhaps among some there is a tacit assumption that moral philosophy aims to prescribe or to promote character and well-being in its audience. however, my guess is that most contemporary moral philosophers disagree and instead view as their work’s end clarity or insight about the nature of moral truth, if such a thing exists, and the moral life. after all, their audience is usually fellow philosophers, not everyday people seeking answers to challenging moral dilemmas. The contemporary moral philosopher ’s procedure might involve inquiry at the meta-ethical level and the answer might turn out to be a skeptical one. or it might involve applied questions and investigate 2 | Introduction the morality of meat eating or euthanasia. in either case—even in applied or normative cases—moral philosophy aims not to be moralistic. it can perhaps instruct one whether, when acting in some way, one is justified in doing so, but it cannot preach that one ought actually to act in that way. it might defend the view that abortion is morally impermissible, but it does not take the additional step and suggest one ought not have an abortion. Bernard Williams echoes this view when calling us to acknowledge the limits of moral philosophy and to avoid the absurd conclusion that seems to follow if we do not: that philosophers are uniquely informed about the moral life.1 The contemporary approach can also be seen in how ethics courses are taught in college. The typical method is to draw up the standard list of ethical theories, apply these theories to the same ethical problem, and see what the output of each one is. following this the professor assists students in discovering the fatal flaws of each theory, and as a (perhaps unintended) consequence, many are left thinking that the moral feelings and convictions they had are without rational support, or at least no better-off than any number of other views. The last thing a professor wants to do is to encourage a student to live a particular way, or at least encourage any other obligation than that of subjecting the moral life to rational scrutiny. i am not convinced that the distinction drawn from the analogy above would be so clear to the ancient greeks. When Socrates runs into euthyphro on his way to prosecute his father, Socrates’ subsequent inquiry into piety is one and the same as his wish to become pious. Knowledge and virtue are equivalent. even though the interaction with euthyphro drips with irony, Socrates’ stated expectation that euthyphro might be able to instruct him on piety nevertheless points to the union of inquiry and improvement . This oversimplified contrast between ancient and contemporary approaches to morality emerges sharply when one juxtaposes aristotle’s “mission statement” in Book two of Nicomachean Ethics with the pointed opinion of henry Sidgwick. The former writes, “[W]e are not inquiring into what excellence is for the sake of knowing it, but for the sake of becoming good, since otherwise there would be no benefit in it at all.”2 and Sidgwick: “i have thought that the predominance in the minds of moralists of a desire to edify has impeded the real progress of ethical science: and that this would be benefited by an application to it of the...

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