Hostname: page-component-7dd5485656-wxk4p Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2025-10-31T08:37:29.288Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

A Moral Argument for Substance Dualism

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  12 January 2016

GERALD K. HARRISON
GERALD K. HARRISON*
Affiliation:
MASSEY UNIVERSITYg.k.harrison@massey.ac.nz
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract:

This paper presents a moral argument in support of the view that the mind is a nonphysical object. It is intuitively obvious that we, the bearers of conscious experiences, have an inherent value that is not reducible to the value of our conscious experiences. It remains intuitively obvious that we have inherent value even when we represent ourselves to have no physical bodies whatsoever. Given certain assumptions about morality and moral intuitions, this implies that the bearers of conscious experiences—the objects possessing inherent value—are not physical objects. This moral evidence is corroborated by introspective evidence.

Keywords

substance dualismmindmoral realismintuitionsinherent value

Information

Type
Articles
Information
Journal of the American Philosophical Association , Volume 2 , Issue 1 , Spring 2016 , pp. 21 - 35
Copyright
Copyright © American Philosophical Association 2016 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Article purchase

Temporarily unavailable

References

Audi, Robert. (2004) The Good in the Right: A Theory of Intuition and Intrinsic Value. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Audi, Robert. (2015) ‘Intuition and its Place in Ethics’. Journal of the American Philosophical Association, 1, 57–77.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Blackburn, Simon. (1993) Essays in Quasi-Realism. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Churchland, Paul M. (1996) Matter and Consciousness. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Coons, Christian. (2011) ‘How to Prove That Some Acts Are Wrong (Without Using Substantive Moral Premises)’. Philosophical Studies, 155, 83–98.Google Scholar
Gibbard, Allan. (1990) Wise Choices, Apt Feelings. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Golding, William. (1964) The Spire. London: Faber and Faber.Google Scholar
Huemer, Michael. (2005) Ethical Intuitionism. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.Google Scholar
Huemer, Michael. (2001) Skepticism and the Veil of Perception. Lanham: Rowan and Littlefield.Google Scholar
Hume, D. ([1739/40] 1978) A Treatise of Human Nature. Edited by Selby-Bigge, L. A.. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Joyce, Richard. (2006) The Evolution of Morality. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Killoren, David. (2010) ‘Moral Intuitions, Reliability and Disagrement’. Journal of Ethics and Social Philosophy, 4, 1–34.Google Scholar
Murphy, Mark C. (2011) God and Moral Law. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Regan, Tom. (1983) The Case for Animal Rights. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Rodrigues, José Gusmão. (2014) ‘There Are no Good Objections to Substance Dualism’. Philosophy, 89, 199–222.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Smith, Michael. (1994) The Moral Problem. Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell.Google Scholar
Timmons, Mark. (1999) Morality without Foundations. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar