Making room for going beyond the call

TLDR

Ethical theory has two largely separate strands—superogation and common‑sense morality—since the mid‑20th century. The study aims to unify these strands by reflecting on doing more than required, offering a heuristic framework for deriving substantive ethical theories and bridging formal and informal moral studies. An interpreted model‑theoretic framework is presented that generates truth‑conditions for core concepts and explains their logical connections. The framework identifies a coherent set of core concepts and their logical links, reveals natural moral issues and a productive definition of doing more, and proposes two expanded traditional theories and two justice‑oriented theories.

Abstract

In the latter half of this century, there have been two mostly separate threads within ethical theory, one on 'superogation', one on 'common-sense morality'. I bring these threads together by systematically reflecting on doing more than one has to do. A rich and coherent set of concepts at the core of common-sense morality is identified, along with various logical connections between these core concepts. Various issues in common-sense morality emerge naturally, as does a demonstrably productive definition of doing more than one has to do. I then present an interpreted model-theoretic framework with the expressive power to generate truth-conditions for the core concepts, and the explanatory power to predict and explain the independently motivated logical connections between these concepts. The framework also has a certain heuristic power for 'discovering' substantive ethical theories that can derivatively generate the model-theoretic framework for the core concepts. Two theories discussed are expansions of traditional theories; two others, each giving pride of place to justice, are devised to resonate with more recent concerns. Methodologically, it is hoped that the approach within might suggest the possibility of bridging another gap: that between formal and informal studies of moral notions.