Does Sam Harris’ book The Moral Landscape flout Hume’s ‘is-ought’ distinction?
Details
Workshop # 3, Sam Harris' Ethics, Series 11,
This event begins 7.30 pm S'pore & WA time, 11.30 am UK, 6.30 am NY.
You will need to view the relevant podcast below on YouTube before joining the meeting in order to participate in the discussion.
https://youtu.be/YxSDJPg_KYA
I know it's stupid, but please click 'like', as it promotes circulation.
Join this group at meetup.com/philosophy-of-value-workshops
The workshops include of a prior presentation of the topic by myself on YouTube that you need to watch. The meeting itself consists of a brief review of the topic followed by questions and discussion. The weekly topic is posted a week before the event, together with a suggested reading from my work The Pursuit of Value, available through Amazon Books or myself. Transcripts of the Youtube presentation are available by email.
THIS WEEK: Sam Harris’ view that “Science Can Determine Human Values” is hugely controversial. It rejects both the fact-value and is-ought distinctions in claiming that scientific facts can determine how we ‘ought’ to act. Harris has 250 years of philosophical argument to overcome, enjoined by critics of his work such as Blackford, Horgan, Jollimore, Nagel, and Robinson. Do his ideas like the “worst possible misery for everyone” add anything to existing arguments, or are they just misleading generalizations? Reading, The Pursuit of Value, Ch. 4, Scn. iii.