Abstract

Resolution of the long-standing debates concerning the possibility of truth and objectivity in ethics requires critical evaluation of the conceptions of truth and objectivity brought to the discussion. In this dissertation particular attention is given to the arguments for a moderate cognitivism based on the conceptions of truth and objectivity that a contemporary essentialist would bring to the question of true and objective practical propositions. Despite the renewed interest in essentialist thought little attention has yet been directed to the implications of contemporary essentialism for problems in moral epistemology. ;I argue that the non-naturalistic natural law theory of ethics proposed by John Finnis should be understood to constitute an essentialist critique of the non-cognitivist conception of objectivity. A number of assumptions implicit in his arguments can be reinforced by consideration of the work of such contemporary essentialists as David Wiggins and Saul Kripke. I suggest that Finnis' and Wiggins' writings point to the possibility of metaphysically necessary practical propositions. ;The conceptions of objectivity and truth applicable to practical propositions argued for by Finnis and Wiggins are compared with those advanced by Hilary Putnam and Sabina Lovibond. Their disparate conceptions are rooted in the shared view that the belief that the non-cognitivist criteria of objectivity and truth are necessary and exhaustive rests on a misunderstanding of correspondence theories of truth as well as objective perspective. ;After considering Finnis' and Wiggins' arguments for the truth and objectivity of basic valuations, I turn to the arguments for the truth and objectivity of practical judgments. Finnis and Wiggins each argue that the truth and objectivity of practical judgments are not threatened by either the presence of free-choice in these judgments or the fact that there may be more than one true judgment in any given situation