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The Meaning of ‘Good’ and the Possibility of Value

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Abstract

Moore held that to call something good is to ascribe a property to it. But he denied that the property could be expressed in non-evaluative terms. Can one accept this view of the meaning of ‘good’ without falling into skepticism about whether anything can be, or be known to be, good? I suggest a way of doing this. The strategy combines the idea that ‘good’ is semantically entangled, as opposed to semantically isolated, with the idea that rational agents have a generic disposition to follow reasons.

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Clark, P. The Meaning of ‘Good’ and the Possibility of Value. Philosophical Studies 108, 31–38 (2002). https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1015703929318

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1015703929318

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