Abstract

The Ethics of Writing suggests that some neglected ethical dimensions of writing can be probed by studying strategic deception, which in turn requires a sketch of moral psychology, particularly the interaction between reason and the emotions. And in order to appreciate properly that moral psychology, we must worry over the reach of our actions, and the extent to which they are under our control. The chapters bring together strands from literary criticism, rhetoric, composition, philosophy, cognitive psychology, ethology, and biology to yield the following claim: deception, emotion, and luck are essential to the moral life. This claim is supported by examining the ethical burdens of writing, a complex ethical event that has not been the focus of much traditional philosophical inquiry, though we may be in the midst of an "ethical turn" in humanistic disciplines that focus on the writing process and the writing product. The relationship between writing and the moral life is reciprocal: as we reconsider the moral life, we reconsider the nature of writing itself. ;Since texts have derived value---their value is a function of human concerns, projects, or motives---we can turn our attention back to writers, if not as helmsmen completely in control of their ships, then at least as real human beings who expect something for their writing, who want, to use the flexible metaphor of John Austin's How to Do Things with Words, to see their writing in action, flowing through the world, making things happen. For writers, words flow along while tethered to values, however vague or poorly articulated. A study of ethics and writing helps clarify and articulate some of those values