Valentin Salein
Humboldt Universität Berlin
Traditionally, T. M. Scanlon’s moral contractualism has been understood in terms of what has become known as ‘principle contractualism’. According to this view, an action is morally required just in case any principle for the general regulation of behavior that permitted people not to perform that action is one that someone could reasonably reject. Importantly, for a principle to be reasonably rejectable in this sense means that the personal reasons that those who would be affected by the principle’s general acceptance have for objecting to it are stronger than the reasons speaking against any of its alternatives.
While principle contractualism is widely regarded as a plausible moral theory, it is threatened by the so-called ‘ideal world objection’. What this objection draws attention to is that the appeal to principles that are generally accepted causes the view to overlook whenever acting in the relevant way would be very bad under more realistic circumstances with lower acceptance-levels. Due to the implausible moral judgements that seem to follow from this shortcoming, it has been suggested in the more recent literature that contractualists would be better off if they were not concerned with the rejectability of principles anymore but would instead shift their evaluative focal point to actions or maxims.
As I will argue in the first half of my talk, however, the very feature that allows both of these suggestions to respond to the ideal world objection also prevents them from accounting for considerations that are of clear intuitive relevance to how we are permitted to act in certain cases. For contractualists, this finding brings about the following dilemma: While principle contractualism faces the ideal world objection, avoiding this objection via a shift in the theory’s evaluative focal point encounters serious difficulties of its own. In the second half of my talk, I will then go on to suggest that the most promising way out of this dilemma is by adopting what I will call a ‘responsive’ version of principle contractualism. Importantly, this version not only retains principles as contractualism’s evaluative focal point but also manages to respond to the ideal world objection by showing responsiveness to the different degrees to which it is likely for the relevant principles to be accepted in the world we live in.
Chair: Triston Hanna
Time: September 13th, 14:00-14:30
Location: SR 1.007
SOPhiA 2026 