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The good fit1.

Authors :
Yao, Vida
Source :
Philosophy & Phenomenological Research. Mar2024, Vol. 108 Issue 2, p414-429. 16p.
Publication Year :
2024

Abstract

Philosophers are now wary of conflating the "fittingness" or accuracy of an emotion with any form of moral assessment of that emotion. Justin D'Arms and Daniel Jacobson, who originally cautioned against this "conflation", also warned philosophers not to infer that an emotion is inaccurate from the fact that feeling it would be morally inappropriate, or that it is accurate from the fact that feeling it would be morally appropriate. Such inferences, they argue, risk committing "the moralistic fallacy", a mistake they claim is widespread throughout the work of contemporary and historical moral philosophers. I argue that many basic and familiar forms of moral assessment of the emotions are not subject to these arguments. I illustrate this by reconsidering the idea that to assess an emotion as "fitting" is to assess it as what a virtuous person would feel. After showing how assessments akin to this "virtue‐theoretical" notion of fit may be prevalent even outside of the Aristotelian tradition, I suggest some more charitable and philosophically productive interpretations of the philosophical views of the emotions that D'Arms and Jacobson criticize, and argue that we cannot coherently theorize about the fittingness conditions of the emotions in a morally neutral way. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Details

Language :
English
ISSN :
00318205
Volume :
108
Issue :
2
Database :
Academic Search Index
Journal :
Philosophy & Phenomenological Research
Publication Type :
Academic Journal
Accession number :
176295388
Full Text :
https://doi.org/10.1111/phpr.12981