Business ethics and firm economic performance have traditionally often been regarded as mutually exclusive ends. We challenge this “either-or” belief and analyze when and how ethical firm leadership and firm performance may harmonize well. In extension of earlier research on ethical leadership and performance at the individual and team level, we study the context–dependency of the organization level relationship between CEO ethical leadership and firm performance. We propose a moderated mediation model of the link between CEO ethical leadership and firm (...) performance, identifying mediating and moderating variables unique to the organization-level of analysis. CEO ethical leadership is argued to work through organizational ethical culture which promotes firm performance under the condition that there is a strong corporate ethics program in place. Results from a multisource cross-sectional study, in which we surveyed 145 participants from 32 organizations and validated organizational performance ratings by objective performance data, showed support for our conceptual model. (shrink)

This book investigates context-sensitivity in natural language by examining the meaning and use of a target class of theoretically recalcitrant expressions. These expressions-including epistemic vocabulary, normative and evaluative vocabulary, and vague language -exhibit systematic differences from paradigm context-sensitive expressions in their discourse dynamics and embedding properties. Many researchers have responded by rethinking the nature of linguistic meaning and communication. Drawing on general insights about the role of context in interpretation and collaborative action, Silk develops an improved contextualist theory of CR-expressions (...) within the classical truth-conditional paradigm: Discourse Contextualism. The aim of Discourse Contextualism is to derive the distinctive linguistic behavior of a CR-expression from a particular contextualist interpretation of an independently motivated formal semantics, along with general principles of interpretation and conversation. It is shown how in using CR-expressions, speakers can exploit their mutual grammatical and world knowledge, and general pragmatic reasoning skills, to coordinate their attitudes and negotiate about how the context should evolve. The book focuses primarily on developing a Discourse Contextualist semantics and pragmatics for epistemic modals. The Discourse Contextualist framework is also applied to other categories of epistemic vocabulary, normative and evaluative vocabulary, and vague adjectives. The similarities/differences among these expressions, and among context-sensitive expressions more generally, have been underexplored. The development of Discourse Contextualism in this book sheds light on general features of meaning and communication, and the variety of ways in which context affects and is affected by uses of language. Discourse Contextualism provides a fruitful framework for theorizing about various broader issues in philosophy, linguistics, and cognitive science. (shrink)

The term “normal” is culturally ubiquitous and conceptually vague. Interestingly, it appears to be a descriptive-normative-hybrid which, unnoticedly, bridges the gap between the descriptive and the normative. People’s beliefs about normality are descriptive and prescriptive and depend on both an average and an ideal. Besides, the term has generally garnered popularity in medicine. However, if medicine heavily relies on the normal, then it should point out how it relates to the concept of health or to statistics, and what, after all, (...) normal means. Most importantly, the normativity of the normal needs to be addressed. Since the apparently neutral label “normal” can exclude, stigmatize, and marginalize people who are defined in contrast to it as abnormal, health professionals should think twice before using the term with patients. The present critical perspective advocates against using the term “normal,” as long as no understanding of a person’s individual normality has been attained. It advocates for the right to autonomously determine one’s own normality. For health professionals I do not see worthwhile benefits of subscribing to the concept of “normality” and imposing it on their patients. But I do see many risks. (shrink)

In this article, the author lists three problems that make any serious discussion about the ethics of leadership a very difficult undertaking. He then proposes a new, postindustrial paradigm of leadership. Using that understanding of leadership, two different sets of ethical analyses of leadership are possible: (I) those concerned with the process of leadership and (2) those concerned with the content of leadership (the changes proposed by the leaders and collaborators). In the end, the author suggests that the industrial paradigm (...) of ethics (the 18th century liberal philosophy) is inadequate to deal with the ethical decision making that leaders and collaborators must do in the 21 st century. Thus, a postindustrial paradigm of ethics must be developed to enable leaders and collaborators to make the tough ethical choices that will be demanded in the new millennium. (shrink)

Parents frequently attempt to shield their children from distressing prognostic information. Pediatric oncology providers sometimes follow parental request for non-disclosure of prognostic information to children, invoking what we call the stability of the family argument. They believe that if they inform the child about terminal prognosis despite parental wishes, cohesion and family structure will be severely hampered. In this paper, we argue against parental request for non-disclosure. Firstly, we present the stability of the family argument in more detail. We, then, (...) set out the (conceptual, legal, systemic) entitativity of the family and the kind of value the stability of the family argument assumes, before we set on to critically evaluate the argument. Our analysis shows that disclosure of prognostic information to children does not necessarily destabilize the family to a greater extent than non-disclosure. In fact, a systemic perspective suggests that mediated disclosure is more likely to result in a (long-term) stability of the family than non-disclosure. It is in the interest of the family to resist the initial aversive reaction to delivering bad news. In the final part, we draw a set of recommendations on how to facilitate decision-making in face of parental request for non-disclosure. (shrink)

This paper addresses psychological factors that might interfere with informed consent on the part of stable patients as potential early-phase clinical trial participants. Thirty-six semistructured interviews with patients who had either diabetes or gout were conducted. We investigated stable patients’ attitudes towards participating in a fictitious first-in-human trial of a novel intervention. We focused on an in-depth analysis of those statements and explanations that indicated the existence of psychological factors impairing decision-making capacity. Three main themes emerged: insufficient comprehension of the (...) inherent logic of clinical trials (actual comprehension), the recourse to trust over comprehension (prioritization of trust), and visceral factors that override deliberative process (visceral factors). Overall, our results indicate a limited psychological capacity on the part of stable patients to meet the requirements of informed consent as set by Declaration of Helsinki. A redesigned informed consent procedure should take account of these psychological realities. (shrink)

The key objective of this study is to revisit selected education reforms and interventions by central government during the period c.1918–1950 in order to evaluate their impact on the development o...

Starting from the metaphor of “playing chamber music at a rock festival” used by Peter L. Berger in 1992 to describe the impact of The Social Construction of Reality on US sociology, this article works out how the book’s somewhat puzzling legacy as a bestseller and a classic with remarkably rare direct follow-ups in the US discourse can indeed be conceived. I argue that one needs to take into account the theoretical-historical context in which Berger and Luckmann developed their ideas, (...) including the specific forms of knowledge production in US sociology at the time, the institutional background of the book’s emergence at the New School for Social Research and the author’s biographical trajectories. On this basis, on can explain why Berger and Luckmann’s reformulation of the sociology of knowledge both perfectly met the 1960s Zeitgeist and at the same time remained theoretically marginal. (shrink)

Current literature on ethical leadership and unethical leadership reflects a Western-based private sector perspective, pointing toward a compliance-oriented understanding of ethical and unethical leadership. As today’s executives increasingly have to ethically lead across different cultures and sectors, it becomes vitally important to develop a more holistic picture how ethical and unethical leadership is perceived in the Western and Eastern cultural cluster and the private and the public/social sector. Addressing this issue, the present study aims to identify cross-cultural and cross-sectoral commonalities (...) and differences in international executives’ perceptions of ethical and unethical leadership. Findings from in-depth interviews (N = 36) with executives from Western and Eastern cultures working in the private or the public/social sector reveal collectively held perceptions of ethical leadership (including leader honesty, integrity, concern for responsibility/sustainability, and people orientation) and of unethical leadership (referring to leader dishonesty, corruption, egocentrism, and manipulation). Results indicate limited support for a compliance-oriented perspective on ethical and unethical leadership but yield a much greater trend toward a value-oriented perspective. Concrete practice examples illustrate these different perspectives. Cultural and sectoral particularities of executive perceptions of ethical and unethical leadership are discussed. (shrink)

The goal is to present how shared decision-making in paediatric oncology occurs from the viewpoints of parents and physicians. Eight Swiss Pediatric Oncology Group centres participated in this prospective study. The sample comprised a parent and physician of the minor patient. Surveys were statistically analysed by comparing physicians’ and parents’ perspectives and by evaluating factors associated with children’s actual involvement. Perspectives of ninety-one parents and twenty physicians were obtained for 151 children. Results indicate that for six aspects of information provision (...) examined, parents’ and physicians’ perceptions differed. Moreover, parents felt that the children were more competent to understand diagnosis and prognosis, assessed the disease of the children as worse, and reported higher satisfaction with decision-making on the part of the children. A patient’s age and gender predicted involvement. Older children and girls were more likely to be involved. In the decision-making process, parents held a less active role than they actually wanted. Physicians should take measures to ensure that provided information is understood correctly. Furthermore, they should work towards creating awareness for systematic differences between parents and physicians with respect to the perception of the child, the disease, and shared decision-making. (shrink)

This paper demarcates a theoretically interesting class of "evaluational adjectives." This class includes predicates expressing various kinds of normative and epistemic evaluation, such as predicates of personal taste, aesthetic adjectives, moral adjectives, and epistemic adjectives, among others. Evaluational adjectives are distinguished, empirically, in exhibiting phenomena such as discourse-oriented use, felicitous embedding under the attitude verb `find', and sorites-susceptibility in the comparative form. A unified degree-based semantics is developed: What distinguishes evaluational adjectives, semantically, is that they denote context-dependent measure functions ("evaluational (...) perspectives")—context-dependent mappings to degrees of taste, beauty, probability, etc., depending on the adjective. This perspective-sensitivity characterizing the class of evaluational adjectives cannot be assimilated to vagueness, sensitivity to an experiencer argument, or multidimensionality; and it cannot be demarcated in terms of pretheoretic notions of subjectivity, common in the literature. I propose that certain diagnostics for "subjective" expressions be analyzed instead in terms of a precisely specified kind of discourse-oriented use of context-sensitive language. I close by applying the account to `find x PRED' ascriptions. (shrink)

Research on the cognitive abilities involved in decision making has shown that, under objective risk conditions (i.e., when explicit information about possible outcomes and risks is available), superior decisions are especially predicted by executive functions and exact number processing skills, also referred to as objective numeracy. So far, decision-making research has mainly focused on exact number processing skills, such as performing calculations or transformations of symbolic numbers. There is evidence that such exact numeric skills are based on approximate number processing (...) (ANP) skills, which enable quick and accurate processing of non-symbolic numbers (e.g. Chen and Li, 2014). Very few studies, however, have investigated ANP skills in the context of risky decision making and have analyzed direct associations among the aforementioned sub functions. Possible interactions between the closely related skills have not been considered. The current study (N = 128) examines interactions of ANP skills with executive functions and objective numeracy, in predicting risky choice behavior. ANP skills are represented by the accuracy in a dot-comparison task. Decision making is measured by two versions of the Game of Dice Task (GDT), which place different emphases on the reflection of potential risks. The results show two-way as well as three-way interactions between the measures of ANP skills, executive functions, and objective numeracy in predicting risky decisions in both GDT versions. The riskiest decisions were most frequently made in case of low scores in all of the three competencies, while good performance in any one of them resulted in significant reductions of disadvantageous decisions. The findings indicate that high ANP skills can positively affect choice behavior in individuals who have weaknesses in reflectively attributed skills, namely executive functions and objective numeracy. Potential compensatory effects and mechanisms of ANP in decision making are discussed. (shrink)

This paper develops an account of the meaning of `ought', and the distinction between weak necessity modals (`ought', `should') and strong necessity modals (`must', `have to'). I argue that there is nothing specially ``strong'' about strong necessity modals per se: uses of `Must p' predicate the (deontic/epistemic/etc.) necessity of the prejacent p of the actual world (evaluation world). The apparent ``weakness'' of weak necessity modals derives from their bracketing whether the necessity of the prejacent is verified in the actual world. (...) `Ought p' can be accepted without needing to settle that the relevant considerations (norms, expectations, etc.) that actually apply verify the necessity of p. I call the basic account a modal-past approach to the weak/strong necessity modal distinction (for reasons that become evident). Several ways of implementing the approach in the formal semantics/pragmatics are critically examined. The account systematizes a wide range of linguistic phenomena: it generalizes across flavors of modality; it elucidates a special role that weak necessity modals play in discourse and planning; it captures contrasting logical, expressive, and illocutionary properties of weak and strong necessity modals; and it sheds light on how a notion of `ought' is often expressed in other languages. These phenomena have resisted systematic explanation. In closing I briefly consider how linguistic inquiry into differences among necessity modals may improve theorizing on broader philosophical issues. (shrink)

“Ethics” is used as a label for a new kind of expertise in the field of science and technology. At the same time, it is not clear what ethical expertise consists in and what its political status in modern democracies can be. Starting from the “participatory turn” in recent social research and policy, we will argue that bioethical reasoning has to include public views of and attitudes towards biomedicine. We will sketch the outlines of a bioethical conception of “public understanding (...) of ethics,” addressing three different issues: (a) the methodological relevance of moral questions and problems raised by lay persons in everyday life regarding biomedicine and technology, (b) the normative relevance of such lay moralities for the justification of ethical decisions, and (c) the necessity of public deliberation in this context. Finally, we draw conclusions in view of the concepts and methods such a conception of “public understanding of ethics” should employ. (shrink)

The writers Thomas Mann and Erich Kästner took in the years between 1933 and 1945 extreme positions of inner and outer emigration, which can be shown concerning autobiographical aspects and concerning their works which they wrote during the time of national socialism. While Kästner, who represents the inner emigration, wrote humorous stories like "Drei Männer im Schnee" and "Der kleine Grenzverkehr", Mann completed his tetralogy of "Joseph und seine Brüder", which deals with the foundation and development of the monotheistic jewish (...) world religion, in France, Switzerland and America where in 1943 he began his dark artist novel "Doktor Faustus", while in Europe internicine warfare and the Shoa were in progress. While Erich Kästner, who was a very engaged political author in the so called Weimar Republic, was captivated during the period of national socialism by his inwardness, Thomas Mann released himself from this attitude in view of the Third Reich and became an emancipated author who was politically engaged and with moral integrity. (shrink)

This chapter develops an account of the meaning and use of various types of legal claims, and uses this account to inform debates about the nature and normativity of law. The account draws on a general framework for implementing a contextualist theory, called 'Discourse Contextualism' (Silk 2016). The aim of Discourse Contextualism is to derive the apparent normativity of claims of law from a particular contextualist interpretation of a standard semantics for modals, along with general principles of interpretation and conversation. (...) Though the semantics is descriptivist, it avoids Dworkin’s influential criticism of so-called “semantic theories of law,” and elucidates the nature of “theoretical disagreements” about the criteria of legal validity. The account sheds light on the social, interpersonal function of normative uses of language in legal discourse. It also gives precise expression to Hart’s and Raz’s intuitive distinctions among types of legal claims (internal/external, committed/detached), while giving them a uniform type of analysis. The proposed semantics and pragmatics of legal claims provides a fruitful framework for further theorizing about the nature and metaphysics of law, the relation between law and morality, and the apparent practical character of legal language and judgment. Discourse Contextualism provides a solid linguistic basis for a broader account of legal discourse and practice. (shrink)

Nonhuman primates don’t have formal kinship systems, but genetic relatedness shapes patterns of residence, behavior, mating preferences, and cognition in the primate order. The goal of this article is to provide insight about the ancestral foundations on which the first human kinship systems were built. In order for evolution to favor nepotistic biases in behavior, individuals need to have opportunities to interact with their relatives and to be able to identify them. Both these requirements impose constraints on the evolution of (...) kinship bonds in primate species. For nonhuman primates and many other mammals, maternal care generates close ties between mothers and offspring and among littermates. For species in which mother–offspring bonds extend beyond weaning, associations with the mother also generate familiarity among siblings of different ages. For species with female philopatry, mother–offspring ties provide the foundation for lifelong relationships between mothers and daughters, and dense matrilineal kin networks. However, several factors constrain the development of kinship bonds in nonhuman primates. First, dispersal strategies, which are designed to reduce inbreeding, bias kinship networks in favor of the philopatric sex. Second, hostile relationships between groups mean that kin ties are usually severed when individuals move from one group to another. Third, in species with polygynandrous mating systems, uncertainty about paternity and restricted periods of male reproductive monopoly limit the scope for development of ties among fathers and offspring, paternal siblings, or extended paternal kin networks. In this article, I explore the impact of these factors on the evolution of ancestral human kinship systems. (shrink)

This paper investigates how inquiry into normative language can improve substantive normative theorizing. First I examine two dimensions along which normative language differs: “strength” and “subjectivity.” Next I show how greater sensitivity to these features of the meaning and use of normative language can illuminate debates about three issues in ethics: the coherence of moral dilemmas, the possibility of supererogatory acts, and the connection between making a normative judgment and being motivated to act accordingly. The paper concludes with several brief (...) reflections on the theoretical utility of the distinction—at least so-called—between “normative” and “non-normative” language and judgment. Clarifying the language we use in normative conversation and theorizing can help us diagnose problems with bad arguments and formulate better motivated questions. This can lead to clearer answers and bring into relief new theoretical possibilities and avenues to explore. (shrink)

In den letzten Jahren berichteten mehr und mehr Frauen von Gewalt und Respektlosigkeit in der Geburtshilfe. Inzwischen hat sich auch die Forschung verstärkt dieses Themas angenommen. Prävalenzschätzungen sind jedoch aufgrund erheblicher methodischer Schwächen noch nicht hinreichend genau zu beziffern. Die Vielzahl und Vielfalt der bestehenden Forschungsergebnisse lassen dennoch den Schluss zu, dass es in der Geburtshilfe in fast allen Regionen der Erde regelmäßig zu Gewalt und Respektlosigkeit und damit zu Menschenrechtsverletzungen kommt. Die Folgen reichen bis hin zu Posttraumatischen Belastungsstörungen, was (...) nahelegt, dass dieser Missstand sowohl aus Menschenrechts-Gründen als auch aus Gründen der öffentlichen Gesundheit nicht übergangen werden darf. Daher ist es außerordentlich besorgniserregend, wenn geburtshilfliche Fachpersonen im Angesicht solcher Berichte und Forschung in einen Modus der Selbstverteidigung verfallen und die Erfahrungen der Frauen in Frage sowie Abrede stellen, anstatt zuvorderst mit Empathie zu reagieren. Der vorliegende Text wendet sich einigen dieser Reaktionsmuster seitens geburtshilflicher Fachpersonen zu: einem falsch verstandenen Objektivitätsanspruch und der mithin abwegigen Forderung, die subjektiven Erfahrungen der Frauen zu objektivieren, einer leugnenden und herablassenden Wortwahl sowie einer mangelnden Anerkennung des von den Frauen Geschilderten und einer aus berufsethischer Perspektive unzureichend fürsorglichen Haltung. Solcherlei Reaktionen sind nicht nur unzulässig, sondern lassen ebenjenen Respekt vermissen, den die betroffenen Frauen sich während der Geburt wünschten und dessen Abwesenheit sie verletzte oder gar traumatisierte. Schließlich sollten Gewalt und Respektlosigkeit in der Geburtshilfe sowie die beschriebenen Reaktionen darauf vor dem Hintergrund geschlechtsspezifischer Machtverhältnisse und Gewalt an Frauen generell diskutiert werden. (shrink)

“Ethics” is used as a label for a new kind of expertise in the field of science and technology. At the same time, it is not clear what ethical expertise consists in and what its political status in modern democracies can be. Starting from the “participatory turn” in recent social research and policy, we will argue that bioethical reasoning has to include public views of and attitudes towards biomedicine. We will sketch the outlines of a bioethical conception of “public understanding (...) of ethics,” addressing three different issues: the methodological relevance of moral questions and problems raised by lay persons in everyday life regarding biomedicine and technology, the normative relevance of such lay moralities for the justification of ethical decisions, and the necessity of public deliberation in this context. Finally, we draw conclusions in view of the concepts and methods such a conception of “public understanding of ethics” should employ. (shrink)

Purpose Although the term “responsibility” plays a central role in bioethics and public health, its meaning and implications are often unclear. This paper defends the importance of a more systematic conception of responsibility to improve moral philosophical as well as descriptive analysis. Methods We start with a formal analysis of the relational conception of responsibility and its meta-ethical presuppositions. In a brief historical overview, we compare global-collective, professional, personal, and social responsibility. The value of our analytical matrix is illustrated by (...) sorting out the plurality of responsibility models in three cases (organ transplantation, advance directives, and genetic testing). Results Responsibility is a relational term involving at least seven relata. The analysis of the relata allows distinguishing between individual versus collective agency, retrospective versus prospective direction, and liability versus power relations. Various bioethical ambiguities result from insufficient, implicit, or inappropriate ascriptions of responsibility. Conclusions A systematic conception of responsibility is an important tool for bioethical reflection. It allows an in-depth understanding and critique of moral claims on a meta-ethical level without presuming one particular normative approach. Considering the concept of responsibility can also help to complement the current bioethical focus on individual autonomy by including the perspectives of other actors, such as family members or social groups. (shrink)

A key factor that affects whether and at what age children can demonstrate an understanding of false belief and complement‐clause constructions is the type of task used (whether it is implicit/indirect or explicit/direct). In the current study, we investigate, in an implicit/indirect way, whether children understand that a story character's belief can be true or false, and whether this understanding affects children's choice of linguistic structure to describe the character's belief or to explain the character's belief‐based action. We also measured (...) children's understanding of false belief in explicit false‐belief tasks. English‐ and German‐speaking young 4‐ and 5‐year‐olds as well as English‐ and German‐speaking adult controls heard complement‐clause constructions in a story context where the belief mentioned in the complement clause (e.g., “He thinks thatshe's not feeling well”) turned out to be false, true, or was left open. After hearing the test question (“Why does he not play with her?”), all age groups were most likely to repeat the whole complement‐clause construction when the belief turned out to be false. That is, they tended to explicitly refer to the character's perspective and say “He thinks…” When the belief turned out to be true, participants often reverted to a simple clause (“She's not feeling well”). Furthermore, children with better short‐term memory were more likely to repeat the whole complement‐clause construction. However, children's performance in explicit false‐belief tasks showed no relation to their performance in our novel, more implicit/indirect, task. Whether or not the complement clause was introduced by athatcomplementizer only had a small effect on the German adults’ responses, where leaving out the complementizer also changes the word order of the complement clause. Overall, our results suggest that task characteristics and individual differences in short‐term memory affect children's ability to demonstrate false‐belief understanding and to express this understanding linguistically. (shrink)

The book deals with the significance of the philosophy of the Vienna Circle and Otto Neurath's concept of "visual education" for the emergence of a new image-text style, particularly in modern illustrated non-fiction. In this context, the contribution of German-speaking emigrants in Great Britain and the USA is acknowledged, many of whom are almost forgotten outside specialist circles today, such as Wolfgang Foges and Paul Steiner. In addition, the hitherto largely neglected relationship between the British philosopher L. Susan Stebbing and (...) Neurath during his years in exile is discussed. The publication thus opens up interdisciplinary perspectives for Vienna Circle research, both in the field of the history of science and books, exile research and the history of analytical philosophy. (shrink)

_ Source: _Volume 35, Issue 1, pp 32 - 52 In the 1630s, Grotius was engaged in extensive reading of patristic texts. From his involvement with these texts come the numerous and sometimes extensive quotations from patristic texts in the Annotata of De veritate religionis Christianae, which accompanied the work starting in 1640. Grotius was particularly interested in the apologetic literature of the ancient Church, which can also be seen in his correspondence. Strikingly, Grotius cites individual passages from texts that (...) had not yet appeared in print, which he could only have learned of from the circle of those who, in 1630s Paris, were working to produce editions of various Greek texts. The texts in question are Cyril of Alexandria, Contra Julianum, and the letter of Barnabas. Grotius had received a handwritten copy of the Barnabas letter, which he later bound into his notebook amid excerpts of patristic texts. This shows the high level of detail at which Grotius knew the patristic texts, and how he moved in the intellectual circles of Paris. (shrink)

In response to the significant increase of judgment and judgmentalism in contemporary film and television, 'A Critique of Judgment in Film and Television' investigates the evolving connections between the aesthetics and ethics of judgment. The volume ultimately contemplates whether we should, and can, do without judgment, questions that are just the beginning of a much-needed re-examination. The individual contributions of the collection all work towards a very specific focus on judgment that is unprecedented in its transdisciplinary composition and contemporary relevance. (...) By exploring examples of entertainment that aim to instigate judgment, 'A Critique of Judgment in Film and Television' advances the as yet underdeveloped area of research into television and philosophy. (shrink)

End-of-life decisions concerning euthanasia, stopping life-support machines, or handling advance directives are very complex and highly disputed in industrialized, democratic countries. A main controversy is how to balance the patient’s autonomy and right to self-determination with the doctor’s duty to save life and the value of life as such. These EoL dilemmas are closely linked to legal, medical, religious, and bioethical discourses. In this paper, we examine and deconstruct these linkages in Germany and Israel, moving beyond one-dimensional constructions of ethical (...) statements as “social facts” to their conflicting and multifaceted embedding within professional, religious, and cultural perspectives. (shrink)

This paper argues that a standard analysis of modals from formal semantics suggests a solution to the detaching problem — the problem of whether un-embedded 'ought'-claims can "detach" (be derived) from hypothetical imperatives and their antecedent conditions. On a broadly Kratzerian analysis, modals have a skeletal conventional meaning and receive a particular reading (e.g., deontic, epistemic, teleological) only relative to certain forms of contextual supplementation. I argue that 'ought'-claims can detach — subject to an important qualification — but only as (...) long as the 'ought's in the conditional premise and conclusion are interpreted relative to the same ordering sources. Although modus ponens can be shown to fail with hypothetical imperatives, the cases in question do not constitute a failure of detachment in the sense that ethicists have cared about. Rival wide-scoping accounts are proven to be linguistically problematic. They make incorrect predictions about the meanings of hypothetical imperatives, and founder in response to quantificational variants of the detaching problem. (shrink)