Exemplarist Moral Theory

Zagzebski, Linda

doi:10.1093/acprof:oso/9780190655846.001.0001

Cited by 316 publications

(162 citation statements)

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“…She offers what seems to me a persuasive account, for example, of the way academic moral theory is properly dependent on everyday moral practice, and she has convinced me of the importance of giving an account of the moral life at least partly open to empirical observation and adjudication. Her most important contribution, in my view, is her analysis of the role that the emotion of admiration plays in selecting our exemplars and motivating us to emulate them (, 30–59).…”

Section: The Danger Of Appeals To Exemplarsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…While it is possible to admire natural talent , the kind of admiration more important to the moral life focuses instead on acquired excellences and typically moves us to emulate those excellences. Zagzebski goes so far as to say that “it is hard to imagine a functional moral life without trust” in the emotion of admiration, along with other key emotions like sympathy, compassion, and indignation” (, 46). I think she is right about that.…”

Section: The Danger Of Appeals To Exemplarsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Navigating Moral Struggle: Toward a Social Model of Exemplarity

Hamilton¹

2019

Journal of Religious Ethics

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Exemplars have the power to help people navigate various levels of moral struggle, from the relatively straightforward problem of lacking motivation to the much deeper problem of failing to see the moral realities that surround us. But there are also serious moral risks in the appeal to exemplars: we romanticize them, we make use of them in authoritarian ways, and we tend to forget how our choice of exemplars is conditioned by oppressive cultural formations. I argue that we need to develop a social model of exemplarity, attuned to social contexts of our exemplars themselves as well as the social processes of constructing and appealing to exemplars. More particularly, I argue that we need to develop space for thinking about exemplary groups, not just exemplary individuals, in order to develop the strengths and avoid the weaknesses in exemplarist moral theories.

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Section: The Danger Of Appeals To Exemplarsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: The Danger Of Appeals To Exemplarsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Navigating Moral Struggle: Toward a Social Model of Exemplarity

Hamilton¹

2019

Journal of Religious Ethics

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“…And now some ethicists are making a turn in ethical theory to examine what we can learn from examples of moral success. Linda Zagzebski’s Exemplarist Moral Theory is the most ambitious program statement yet for this form of ethical inquiry (Zagzebski ). She suggests that attention to specific examples of admirable persons may be the foundation for a successful moral theory.…”

Section: Problems In Ethical Theorymentioning

confidence: 99%

Exemplarist Environmental Ethics

Balthrop-Lewis¹

2019

Journal of Religious Ethics

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This article argues that environmental ethics can deemphasize environmental problem‐solving in preference for a more exemplarist mode. This mode will renarrate what we admire in those we have long admired, in order to make them resonate with contemporary ethical needs. First, I outline a method problem that arose for me in ethnographic fieldwork, a problem that I call, far too reductively, “solution thinking.” Second, I relate that method problem to movements against “quandary ethics” in ethical theory more broadly. Third, I discuss some interpretive work I am engaged in about Henry David Thoreau and how it bears on the methodological issues my fieldwork raised. I argue that some of the most important icons of right relation to environment, especially Francis of Assisi and Thoreau, should be envisioned as far more politically invested than they usually are. They demonstrate to scholars of religious ethics that an exemplarist ethic focused on character need not neglect politics.

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“…On this view, exempla have an important place in a theory of legal reasoning, even if they cannot be said to provide the foundation for 5 A foundational agent-based version of exemplarism is defended by Linda Zagzebski for both ethics and epistemology. See Zagzebski, 2004Zagzebski, , 2006Zagzebski, , 2010Zagzebski, , 2017 Ultimately, the problem is not that of giving exemplars a foundational role but that of assuming that a theory needs to have a foundational structure (whether the foundations be exempla or any other foundation) for it to be able to explain and justify the practice. Surely we want theories that have the resources to do that, but the structure of such theories need not be foundational.…”

Section: Two Versions Of Exemplarismmentioning

confidence: 99%

Analogy and Exemplary Reasoning in Legal Discourse

Velden¹,

Kaptein²

2018

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This book brings together contributions from leading figures in legal studies on analogy and related forms of reasoning in the law. Analogical reasoning-which relies on the concept of two different things being in some way like each other-is hugely important not just in the practice of law, but it is nonetheless strongly contested. This volume raises key questions like: What is the logical, argumentative, rhetorical, or just heuristic force of analogy in law? Is analogy really different from extensive interpretation, reasoning by precedent and appeal to paradigm?

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Exemplarist Moral Theory

Cited by 316 publications

References 0 publications

Navigating Moral Struggle: Toward a Social Model of Exemplarity

Navigating Moral Struggle: Toward a Social Model of Exemplarity

Exemplarist Environmental Ethics

Analogy and Exemplary Reasoning in Legal Discourse

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