Shelly Kagan’s Answering Moral Skepticism (2023, Oxford University Press) belongs to the rare category of excellent books that are difficult to recommend to anyone. After briefly outlining the book’s content, this review will first offer high praise for it. It will then explain why the book is nevertheless difficult to recommend to anyone.
Kagan’s main aim is not to show that moral realism is true, but rather merely to establish that, from the point of view of the realist, the standard sceptical arguments against realism are not especially troubling (p. 246). He makes the case for this conclusion in 14 chapters. Chapter 1 first suggests that, for morality to be objective, it would at least have to be action-guiding, its content connected to wellbeing and respect for persons, moral claims would need to be truth apt, we would need to have at least some moral knowledge, and morality would need to provide reasons for action and be able to motivate us. Furthermore, objective morality would perhaps also need to be universal, necessary, and mind-independent.
Chapter 2 then provides a general map of the basic positions in metaethics. After this, Chapters 3 and 4 focus on nihilism and noncognitivism, which Kagan identifies as the most prominent forms of moral scepticism. Chapter 3 suggests that nihilists have the burden of proof in the debate because their view, that there are no moral facts, is so remarkable. It also warns that many of the arguments for moral nihilism overgeneralise to support general normative nihilism, which would be a difficult position to accept. Similarly, Chapter 4 raises several objections to noncognitivism, including the moral attitude problem, the embedding problem, and concerns about whether noncognitivists can adequately account for moral argumentation.
Chapter 5 focuses on arguments for scepticism based on the prevalence of moral disagreement. Kagan points out that such arguments threaten to lead to scepticism about all philosophical questions, including the truth of nihilism itself. He also argues that moral realists can rely on the same psychological explanations for the existence of moral disagreement as the sceptics and so are no worse off. Chapter 6 is then a detailed discussion of moral relativism and how the view should be best formulated. It also contains an interesting exploration of whether relativism should be understood as a form of realism and a detailed critical evaluation of the main motivations for relativism.
The central Chapter 7 defends the idea that our moral intuitions, as rational seemings, provide a defeasible justification for our moral beliefs. It thus defends the so-called principle of phenomenal conservationism and metaethical intuitionism. In response to the sceptic, this chapter argues that we have no good reasons to think that our moral intuitions are any less reliable than our empirical observations or mathematical intuitions. Relatedly, Chapter 8 defends our moral intuitions by outlining a version of the so-called third factor response to the recently much-discussed evolutionary debunking arguments.
Chapter 9 responds to the sceptical argument according to which we should not believe that moral facts exist because they are not needed to explain anything. It first points out that this metaphysical test is not a problem for reductivist moral realists, as they can argue that moral facts inherit their explanatory and causal powers from the reduction bases. Kagan also suggests that a more plausible way to understand the previous test is to think that existing things must be able to explain the obtaining of some genuine facts, but these facts need not necessarily be empirical facts. This revised test allows moral realists to defend the existence of moral facts by insisting that they are required for explaining at least some other moral facts, which, from their perspective, qualify as genuine facts.
Chapter 10 argues that moral scepticism cannot be supported by Humean arguments, which rely on motivational internalism. It casts doubt on very close internal connections between moral beliefs and motivation and suggests that moral realists can explain the connections that do obtain by taking moral beliefs to be both belief- and desire-like. Similarly, Chapter 11 challenges the sceptical arguments according to which genuine moral properties do not exist because their existence would require that we have categorical reasons (which, according to the sceptics, do not exist). It argues both (i) that perhaps hypothetical reasons are all we need for universal moral requirements, and (ii) that categorical reasons are no more mysterious than hypothetical reasons, because our beliefs about them alone can motivate us due to their dual nature, explained in the previous chapter.
Chapter 12 responds to Open Question Argument-type objections to reductive naturalism by developing a plausible reductive account of normative reasons based on the deliberation of an ideal reasoner. Likewise, Chapter 13 addresses many of the metaphysical concerns many sceptics have had about the nonnatural normative properties to which simple realists are committed. Chapter 14 finally concludes that there are plausible answers to the main sceptical challenges in metaethics, and thus ‘there is nothing intellectually disreputable about believing in morality’ (p. 368).
Let me then praise the many virtues of this excellent book. First, it covers a lot of technical and difficult ground in metaethics in a way that is impressively accessible and engaging. I also love the book’s clear structure and its use of ordinary plain English, free from unnecessary technical jargon. Kagan’s book, furthermore, provides a comprehensive overview of the metaethical landscape – all the main positions and key arguments are explored in sufficient detail. In addition, the way in which Kagan places himself in a constructive dialogue with the sceptic is especially helpful. By first objecting to simple versions of the sceptical arguments and then considering responses to those objections, Kagan is able to develop more charitable and plausible versions of those initial arguments in a way that is highly illuminating. For example, I learned a lot from the detailed and informative discussion of the issues which reductions raise in metaethics.
I also liked how Kagan manages to be both balanced and measured when presenting his own views, even though the book is a highly opinionated defence of moral realism. In addition to showing thorough knowledge and understanding of the metaethical debates, Kagan furthermore excels in connecting the relevant metaethical debates to important discussions in both normative ethics and other areas of philosophy.
Given all these virtues, why is this book then so difficult to recommend to anyone? First, as a textbook, it has one fundamental flaw. For the sake of readability, Kagan has chosen not to provide any references in the main text of the book. Rather, he uses relatively sparse notes at the end to provide a few key readings for each chapter, and after that, there is only a short, page-and-a-half bibliography containing those texts. However, at least for me, it is important that our students also learn the history of who came up with the discussed ideas and arguments. For example, I definitely want my students to know about Bernard Williams’s contributions to the debates concerning the relation between reasons and motivation. The previous choice also means that, currently, from the reader’s perspective, it is impossible to know when Kagan is presenting his own ideas and when explaining the contributions of others.
I also hesitate to recommend this volume to professional metaethicists interested in moral scepticism. For them, the book covers too many basic debates of metaethics in a way that is too introductory. I likewise worry that many metaethicists are likely to stop reading the book when expressivism is presented as the sceptical view according to which there are no moral truths, facts, or beliefs, or when the existence of the so-called ‘besires’ is defended (‘besire’ is a derisive name in metaethical debates for the alleged unitary mental states with both desire-like and belief-like directions of fit). At this level, there are also concerns about how successful Kagan’s response to the sceptic ultimately is. It, for example, overlooks the recent empirical work which directly challenges the reliability of our moral intuitions and fails to discuss the alternative views in moral epistemology according to which our moral beliefs are justified by the social and rational processes of co-deliberation in which our intuitions are subjected to critical scrutiny from different perspectives. In addition, I worry that Kagan’s book is fighting the previous wars against the sceptics. The most powerful forms of scepticism in metaethics today no longer seem to challenge the existence of moral facts. Rather, their concern is the opposite: the potential abundance of moral properties – the possibility that there might be moral properties corresponding to any conception of the moral reality one might have (see, e.g. Justin Clarke-Doane, Morality & Mathematics, 2020), which would seriously undermine morality’s ability to guide action.
Thus, perhaps the only group left to recommend this book to are those members of the general audience who are worried that their moral beliefs are, for some reason, less justified than their other beliefs. I do not know how many people are in this position, but if they are open-minded and willing to put in the considerable effort required, Kagan’s book will offer them an insightful guide to the problems of many traditional sceptical arguments in metaethics.
