Ethics and Political Philosophy Group Talk (Zoë A. Johnson King, Harvard)

The Ethics and Political Philosophy Research Group is pleased to welcome as guest speaker Zoë A. Johnson King, an assistant professor at Harvard who works primarily in ethics, metaethics, and epistemology. She primarily concerns herself with moral agency and moral responsibility, with a particular focus on praiseworthiness. She has written about moral motivation, moral worth, and how to evaluate those who are well-meaning but morally uncertain or mistaken, as well as about some comparisons and contrasts between praise and blame. She is also interested in epistemological notions associated with forming and maintaining one’s beliefs in a responsible manner (i.e. justification, evidence, proof), both as these notions arise within the law and in everyday contexts.

This is an in-person event, but those unable to come to campus may join online.

Talk Title

Aretaic Injustice

Talk Abstract

Philosophers have had a lot to say about blameworthiness (and excuses, and exemptions, and punishment, and the standing to blame, and . . .), but much less to say about praiseworthiness. This talk counteracts that trend by summarizing the account of praiseworthiness developed in my book manuscript and drawing out some of its implications. I offer views about the conditions under which people are praiseworthy in virtue of what we care about, what we try to do, and what we actually do, and I explain what these views jointly entail about how to deliberately increase one’s own praiseworthiness. I then describe my account’s implications regarding positive moral luck; in brief, on my account positive constitutive, circumstantial, and resultant luck are each somewhat mitigated but by no means eliminated. I end with some sobering reflections on the ways in which background injustices can affect the distribution of positive moral luck, thus placing limits on how praiseworthy it is possible for someone to become.

About the Ethics and Political Philosophy Group

The Ethics and Political Philosophy Group meets periodically throughout the year to discuss topics in value theory and related fields, including meta-ethics, normative ethics, applied ethics, social and political philosophy, philosophy of law, moral psychology, practical reason, agency, and identity.