理性的自由和自由的理性

本文认为近代西方道德哲学都是以利己的人性为基础,将人的道德同人的理性紧密相连.英国道德哲学家们强调的是理性对于自由的限制.这就突出了理性的自由思想.这便是社会自由的理论基础;大陆道德哲学家们认为人的理性具有绝对性、普遍性和自由性.因此,照他们看来,所谓道德的生活,就是符合理性的生活,就是一种必然的应当生活.因而自由的理性就是道德.这便是思想自由的理论基础.不过,到了休谟和莱布尼茨,西方道德哲学家们已经开始认识到道德问题应该从普遍的人性,即人的主体性上或生活实践上去反思.这一思想对后来的西方哲学产生了非常深刻的影响.     

论道德理性

人们为了生存和发展 ,通过实践建构起了各种各样的关系 ,其中最主要的有人与自然的关系、人与人的关系和身心关系 ,当这些关系中的主、客体处于彼此适合的状态且最有利于人的生存、发展和完善时 ,就是所谓的“合理状态” ,理性就是对这种合理状态的观念把握和实现。与三类关系相对应 ,理性分为工具理性、规范理性和人格理性。道德理性包含了规范理性和人格理性 ,决定于工具理性。道德理性的实质内容在规范理性层面表现为权利平等、公平分配和人民主权。在人格理性层面则难有通约的实质标准 ,因为这是一个安身立命、终极关怀的私德领域。通过理性要把握的“合理状态”是一个价值事实 ,所以它不是认知的 ,而是反省的 ,并把通过反思的“价值事实”作为道德推理和证明的逻辑起点     

马克思实践哲学视阈下理性批判的当代价值探析

理性在西方文化中一直居于主导地位,但是,传统理性观把理性局限于认识论和科学技术活动当中.20世纪以来,人们对这种理性观进行了反思和批判,开始了理性文化重建的历程.理性是一个总体,是使人成为可能的存在方式,它包括属于人的一切生命活动;它应当是一种合理性、合情合理性和合人性,而不是像近代理性现那样仅仅理解为知性理性和技术理性.马克思实践哲学对近代主体形而上学、资本主义制度以及技术异化的批判为我们重新理解理性的价值和建设和谐理性文化具有重要的理论和现实意义.     

高蒂尔:协议而致道德的契约理论

高蒂尔协议而致道德的契约理论是继罗尔斯之后西方又一重要的契约理论。它以追求个人效用最大化的理性为基本指向,并将道德建立在此种理性之上,从而解释了个人间合作行为得以产生的基本逻辑和相应的制约     

从制度伦理的发展看道德主体人格的成长

制度作为人类设计的制约人们相互行为的约束条件,是人类在共同体生活中博弈的内在规则。制度伦理从根本上说是为人的道德性存在立法。传统社会封建皇权制度下道德强调的是个人的依附性,个人权利缺位,是外在强加的形式化的道德;近现代工业文明背景下的制度伦理中个人主体性加强,但市场经济中"理性经济人"假设彰显的是"工具理性"和"个人理性",必然带来"价值理性"的退隐,引起个人与社会的冲突;当代社会公共领域扩大,在"政治国家"、"公民社会组织"、"市场"、"公民个人"四种力量博弈均衡之下的制度伦理,是个人发挥道德权利参与建构生成的,这种制度伦理作为新的道德规制范型,才是真实合理的实质化的道德。     

后现代主义对理性批判的悖论

海德格尔、德里达、阿多尔诺和富科等后现代主义思想家对理性的批判突出了哲学探求的新的和交叉领域的论题,如现代性的合理性,启蒙思潮、界限,意义和西方理性的价值;理性和批判间的联系,现代社会的病状,以及后现代替代现代的可能性等等。然而后现代理性批判中蕴含着自我参照性的悖论。这里所提的问题是,能否给出批判的理由而又不陷入行为和旨义,操作和陈述之间的操作矛盾。就是说,能够不用理性方法而进行理性批判吗?这种理性方法在某种程度上包括、蕴含或使用证明、论据、概念以及概念间     

伦理学上的休谟及休谟主义

按照康德所代表的理性道德主义标准,美德和善行为理性,邪恶和歹行则为无理性。休谟及现代休谟派反对这种学说,他们否认道德判断是理性原则。本文先考查休谟的论点及论证的失败,再分析现代休谟派所作的修正及其缺陷。休谟认为,理性的功能在于发现观念之间的关系和事实,道德上的区分不是理性的产物,因此,行善不为理性所需,作恶也不悖干理性。他的理由概括为论证m:前提1:纯理性不能使我们行动;前提2:道德判断能使我们行动;结论:道德判断不是纯理性的产物。     

选择可能性原则和法兰克福式的反例

一自由论者认为 ,行动者的自由是建立在“拥有选择的能力”之基础上的 ,作出一个选择是对所拥有的选择能力的练习 ,既不是被因果确定了的 ,又有解释其产生的原因。现在让我们看一下选择可能性原则 (ＰＡＰ)的明确规定 :行动者只有在他可以自由地作出彼种选择的情况下 ,才对他所作出的此种选择负道德责任。传统上自由论者坚持认为 ,对一个选择所负的道德责任需以可以作出别样选择的自由为前提。这样 ,如果一个行动者出于理由Ｒ1的考虑选择进行了行为Ａ ,他只有在可以自由的选择由于理由Ｒ2不去做Ａ或者由于理由Ｒ3而选择作出另一个完全不同于…     

马克思实践理性批判的理论旨趣及其现实意义探析

传统理性观把理性局限于认识论和科学技术活动当中.20世纪以来,人们对这种理性观进行了反思和批判,开始了理性文化重建的历程.理性是一个总体,是使人成为可能的存在方式,它包括属于人的一切生命活动;它应当是一种合理性、合情合理性和合人性,而不是像近代理性观那样仅仅理解为知性理性和技术理性.马克思实践哲学对资本主义制度、近代主体形而上学以及技术异化的批判为我们重新理解理性的价值和建设和谐理性文化具有重要的理论和现实意义.     

论麦金太尔的道德叙事理论

麦金太尔在近著《现代性冲突中的伦理学:欲望、实践推理与叙事》中对其道德叙事思想进行了系统化、理论化的阐释。具体而言,在伦理学的话语体系中,我们反思自己为了满足某些欲望或者因为何种理由选择这样做而非那样做时,也就是试图解释我作为一个理性行为者的行动是合理的。我们通过这类解释能够发展出一种关于人类行为的结构性叙事,从而获得透彻理解人类幸福意味着什么的方式。这一叙事不仅是文本的,也是历史的、实践的,我们对自己的选择、行动、人生的理解和解释都体现着叙事的作用,这一叙事又是所属传统与社会背景下的宏观叙事的一部分。     

社会学与伦理学的争执:涂尔干的道德科学

要把握社会学的根本问题,对其基本思维方式进行辩护和反思,我们应将它置于它曾经努力挣脱的学科体系中,并把它视为对现代伦理学的一种回应。本文通过检讨涂尔干和列维-布留尔的道德科学对伦理学的两点批评来触及社会学的基本主张。针对伦理学把自己理解为一门立法科学的定位,社会学强调只有从对道德事实的实证研究入手,才能为人们的社会生活提供有效的规范。针对伦理学把实现人的本性作为道德的目的的观点,社会学主张从社会功能出发来界定道德。可以从这场争论中看到社会学如何试图通过对经验现实,特别是非西方民族的宗教和社会形态中的合理性的把握,突破西方人文主义传统的典范地位,进而为人们构想现代社会和道德提供不同的思想资源。     

Is the Disposition of Constrained Maximization Chosen Rationally?

One of the most important issues in moral philosophy is whether morality can be justified by rationality. The purpose of this study is to examine Gauthier’s moral theory, focusing on the disposition of constrained maximization, which is the main thrust of his project to justify morality rationally. First of all, I shall investigate Gauthier’s assumption and condition for the rationality of the disposition of constrained maximization so as to disclose that the disposition of constrained maximization is not necessarily chosen by rational agents. Then I shall explore his other arguments including ones for the reinterpretation of rationality and the self-critical reflection of rational beings, which can be considered as his further efforts to make the disposition of constrained maximization a rational choice. By exploring them, I shall attempt to indicate that those arguments are not valid so long as he clings to the maximizing conception of rationality and thereby this conception of rationality itself is not enough to provide morality with a basis.     

Living in a Wittgensteinian World: Beyond Theory to a Poetics of Practices

As human beings, we share many historically developed, language-game interwoven, public forms of life. Due to the joint, dialogically responsive nature of all social life within such forms, we cannot as individuals just act as we please; our forms of life exert a normative influence on what we can say and do. They act as a backdrop against which all our claims to knowledge are judged as acceptable or not. As a result, it is not easy to articulate their inadequacies in a clear and forceful manner. However, within most of our forms of life, we have a first-person right to express how our individual circumstances seem to us. And by the use of special forms of poetic, gestural talk—talk that can originate new language-games—we can offer to make our own 'inner lives' public. In this paper, I want to claim that this is just what Wittgenstein is attempting to do in his later philosophy: by use of the self-same methods that anyone might use to express aspects of their own world picture, he is offering us his attempts to make the background 'landscape' of our lives more visible to us. These methods are explored below.     

Rational preference: Decision theory as a theory of practical rationality

In general, the technical apparatus of decision theory is well developed. It has loads of theorems, and they can be proved from axioms. Many of the theorems are interesting, and useful both from a philosophical and a practical perspective. But decision theory does not have a well agreed upon interpretation. Its technical terms, in particular, utility and preference do not have a single clear and uncontroversial meaning.How to interpret these terms depends, of course, on what purposes in pursuit of which one wants to put decision theory to use. One might want to use it as a model of economic decision-making, in order to predict the behavior of corporations or of the stock market. In that case, it might be useful to interpret the technical term utility as meaning money profit. Decision theory would then be an empirical theory. I want to look into the question of what utility could mean, if we want decision theory to function as a theory of practical rationality. I want to know whether it makes good sense to think of practical rationality as fully or even partly accounted for by decision theory. I shall lay my cards on the table: I hope it does make good sense to think of it that way. For, I think, if Humeans are right about practical rationality, then decision theory must play a very large part in their account. And I think Humeanism has very strong attractions.     

Dutch books and agent rationality

According to the Dutch Book Argument (DBA), if an agent's subjective probabilities fail to satisfy the axioms of the probability calculus and so make the agent vulnerable to a Dutch Book, the agent's subjective probabilities are incoherent and the agent is therefore irrational. Critics of DBA have argued, however, that probabilistic incoherence is compatible with various kinds of rationality – logico-semantic, epistemic, instrumental and prudential. In this paper, I provide an interpretation of DBA on which it is true that probabilistic incoherence entails agent irrationality. Articulating this interpretation requires the specification of some of the connections among the varieties of rationality. Once this is done, it becomes possible to vindicate a modest version of DBA.     

Kant — A decision theorist?

This paper is concerned with the role of scientific method in decision making. Essentially, it is the examination of what Immanuel Kant called the prudential imperative and what we would today call a strategic plan. The purpose of the imperative or the plan is to maximize a set of social values. It is argued that the empiricist and rationalist paradigms of scientific method do not successfully apply to the scientific study of decisionmaking. Instead it is essential that the scientist make strong judgments about the whole system before he can legitimately use any available information. This point suggests that judgments themselves are strategies of the scientist. Several alternative strategies of scientific method in decision making are discussed.     

规范美德伦理学

人们通常认为美德伦理学并不能告诉我们应该做什么。任何认为美德伦理学可以替代道义论和功利主义伦理学的人都会发现自己面对这样一个人们普遍接受的诘难 :“美德伦理学并没有告诉我们应该做什么 ,因为它无法告诉应该怎么做。因此 ,它无法成为替代道义论和功利主义的规范性理论。”文章的目的就是要反驳这一诘难 ,为美德伦理学辩护     

道德冷漠感剖析

"道德冷漠感"一词在现今的社会中正为人们所知,它是社会道德的一种消极现象,是人们道德感的麻木和冷漠,也是人们的道德行为畸形发展的一种状态。道德冷漠感产生的原因在于文化、社会制度及个体等诸多层面。面对这样一种消极现象,应从个人、政府和社会三个层面进行矫治。