European Journal of Philosophy 31 (2): 501–508. By invitation. 2023. doi:10.1111/ejop.12874
Reconstructs Reginster’s account of Nietzsche’s critique of morality as a “self-undermining functionality critique” and raise three problems for it.
functionality, function, genealogy, genealogical debunking, metaethics, morality
Download PDFPhilosophical Studies 178 (4): 1361–1379. 2021. doi:10.1007/s11098-020-01479-y
Introduces the concept of “self-effacing functionality” to reconcile two opposing views on blame. While blame serves an important regulatory function, this very functionality requires that it be justified by non-instrumental moral reasons rather than by its functionality. This approach preserves the insights of instrumentalist accounts while vindicating the authority of our moral reasons for blame.
blame, moral psychology, ethics, functionality, normativity, justification
Download PDFPhilosophers’ Imprint 18 (17): 1–20. 2018. doi:2027/spo.3521354.0018.017
Reconstructs Williams’s genealogical investigation into the social function of the norms of truthfulness and brings out its social and political implications. Develops an understanding of this “pragmatic” form of the genealogical method which reveals it to be uniquely suited to dealing with practices exhibiting what I call “self-effacing functionality”—practices that are functional only insofar as and because we do not engage in them for their functionality.
Bernard Williams, ethics, functionality, genealogy, naturalism, truth
Download PDF