Paper short abstract:

Looking into the challenges involved in speaking about ethical realism in a clear way, accessible to laypersons, yet without demagoguery or reification; considering the nature of the referents which could give ethical debates a "factual" character.

Paper long abstract:

(This topic is something I am assigning for myself as a spring project, while my dissertation is being officially examined. My thoughts on the subject here are still quite preliminary.)

The terms “transcendent” and “transcendental” are used to relate to a particularly important topic: the nature of the sort of reality that is capable of making particular actions inherently, factually, objectively morally right or wrong. In this regard the discussion inevitably tends to drift towards the ideas of Immanuel Kant on the topic. Kant, of course, by his own admission, wrote in rather opaque German, and his translators have faced considerable challenges in trying to make sense of his concepts in English (generally using “transcendental” as their term of choice). Thus, over the generations, moral philosophers and philosophers of religion have developed a certain semi-standardized vocabulary for referring to certain important things, that may or may not exist, in a somewhat standardized manner. The problem has been most acute among those who think primarily in German, but those who philosophize in English and French have been far from innocent in the matter.

I am interested in giving a presentation regarding the challenges involved in speaking about ethical realism in a clear way, accessible to laypersons, yet without demagoguery or reification. This inevitably involves finding standardized ways of talking about concepts coming from outside of our sense perception, from beyond the realm of our personal emotional experiences, and ideally from beyond the historical social circumstances in which we find ourselves. This combination of requirements makes the topic extremely difficult to speak about with clarity, accuracy and precision; but perhaps not impossible.