Description |
1 online resource (xv, 289 pages). |
Physical Medium |
polychrome |
Description |
text file |
Series |
Foundational questions in science
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Foundational questions in science.
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Bibliography |
Includes bibliographical references and index. |
Summary |
Why efforts to create a scientific basis of morality are neither scientific nor moral In this illuminating book, James Davison Hunter and Paul Nedelisky trace the origins and development of the centuries-long, passionate, but ultimately failed quest to discover a scientific foundation for morality. The "new moral science" led by such figures as E.O. Wilson, Patricia Churchland, Sam Harris, Jonathan Haidt, and Joshua Greene is only the newest manifestation of that quest. Though claims for its accomplishments are often wildly exaggerated, this new iteration has been no more successful than its predecessors. But rather than giving up in the face of this failure, the new moral science has taken a surprising turn. Whereas earlier efforts sought to demonstrate what is right and wrong, the new moral scientists have concluded, ironically, that right and wrong don't actually exist. Their (perhaps unwitting) moral nihilism turns the science of morality into a social engineering project. If there is nothing moral for science to discover, the science of morality becomes, at best, a feeble program to achieve arbitrary societal goals. Concise and rigorously argued, Science and the Good is a definitive critique of a would-be science that has gained extraordinary influence in public discourse today and an exposé of that project's darker turn |
Contents |
Our Promethean longing -- Early formulations -- Three schools of enlightenment thinking: and one lingering and disturbing worry -- The new synthesis -- What has science found? -- The proclivity to overreach -- Intractable challenges -- The quest, redirected -- The Promethean temptation: and the problem of unintended consequences |
Local Note |
eBooks on EBSCOhost EBSCO eBook Subscription Academic Collection - North America |
Subject |
Ethics.
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Ethics. |
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Science.
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Science. |
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Science -- Moral and ethical aspects.
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Science -- Moral and ethical aspects. |
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Right and wrong.
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Right and wrong. |
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ethics (philosophy) |
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sciences (philosophy) |
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PHILOSOPHY -- Ethics & Moral Philosophy. |
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PHILOSOPHY -- Social. |
Genre/Form |
Electronic books.
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Added Author |
Nedelisky, Paul, author.
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Other Form: |
Print version: Hunter, James Davison, 1955- Science and the good. New Haven : Yale University Press ; [West Conshohocken, PA] : Templeton Press, [2018] 9780300196283 (DLC) 2018947847 (OCoLC)1054933717 |
ISBN |
9780300240405 (electronic book) |
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0300240406 (electronic book) |
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9780300196283 (hardcover ; alkaline paper) |
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0300196288 (hardcover ; alkaline paper) |
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