Journal article
The Moral Irrelevance of Constitutive Luck
Erkenntnis, Vol.88(3), pp.1331-1346
03/01/2023
DOI: 10.1007/s10670-021-00404-x
Abstract
One's constitution-whether one is generous or miserly, temperate or intemperate, kind or mean, etc.-is beyond one's control in significant respects. Yet one's constitution affects how one acts. And how one acts affects one's moral standing. The counterintuitive inference-the so-called problem of constitutive moral luck-is that one's moral standing is, to some significant extent, beyond one's control. This article grants the premises but resists the inference. It argues that one's constitution should have no net impact on one's moral standing. While a bad constitution lowers the chance that one will act morally, it offers significant gains to moral standing should that chance materialize. A good constitution increases one's chance of performing good acts but for correspondingly more modest gains. This effect should smooth out, and possibly eliminate, the expected impact of constitution on moral standing.
Details
- Title: Subtitle
- The Moral Irrelevance of Constitutive Luck
- Creators
- Mihailis E. Diamantis - College of Law and Department of Philosophy, University of Iowa, Iowa City, USA
- Resource Type
- Journal article
- Publication Details
- Erkenntnis, Vol.88(3), pp.1331-1346
- DOI
- 10.1007/s10670-021-00404-x
- ISSN
- 0165-0106
- eISSN
- 1572-8420
- Publisher
- Springer Nature
- Number of pages
- 16
- Language
- English
- Date published
- 03/01/2023
- Academic Unit
- Law Faculty; Philosophy
- Record Identifier
- 9984397174802771
Metrics
35 Record Views