Real Rationality and Real Morality

Dear Colleagues,

The question with which moral philosophy begins is a question of how to live. Typically, this is seen as a practical question: a real question that needs a real answer: The question concerns how to live in the world we actually live in, the world of here and now. We grapple with questions about how people should live because we can. For any normal human being, to have the capacity is to have a need to use it, at least in quiet moments. Grappling with how we should treat each other and how we should treat ourselves is what made us philosophers. Philosophers, needless to say, have pondered such questions for thousands of years, and Plato's Republic remains a point of departure. Those familiar with Plato's dialogue may view Thrasymachus as exemplifying the person who has the soul of a tyrant and is therefore at war with himself: torn by appetites, seduced by vainglory, incapable of internal harmony. Glaucon, too, is at war with himself, although in a different way. Glaucon embraces morality, but also embraces prudence, and sincerely worries that the two may be incompatible. When Glaucon asks whether the moral life is profitable, he wants the truth. Where shall he find it? Is he looking for a Socratic trick that makes it seem that he cannot acknowledge conflict without contradicting himself? Does he need to be reassured that, although conflicts with rationality are real on a day to day basis, the fact remains that the moral life is a life worth wanting? Or does he need more of a guarantee than that?

Prof. Dr. David Schmidtz
Guest Editor

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• Rationality
• Morality
• Incentive
• Character
• Virtue
• Self-inspection
• Trust
• Ideals
• Expectations
• Coordination