Reading, Gibbard, Chap 3

Chapter 3: Analysis Broached

"What is Appraised as Rational or Not"--in this section he argues that beliefs, actions and emotions can all be appraised as rational or not. Some say that only voluntary things can be rationally appraised, but Gibbard thinks that beliefs are a counter-example to this, and actions aren't entirely voluntary anyway (since they have to do with intentions, which aren't entirely voluntary, I think). So there's nothing against emotions being rationally appraised, which is what he really needs for his account. You might say that emotions are rationally appraised to the extent that they're based on beliefs that can be rationally appraised (as Hume argued), but Gibbard argues that these beliefs would have to be subconscious, and only make themselves present to the extent that the person gets angry, so you might as well just say that anger is rationally evaluated.

"Rationality and Morality"--Gibbard makes several distinctions in this section in order to focus in on morality, and to give an analysis of the relationship between morality and rationality. First, he distinguishes subjective from objective morality. Subjective morality is what an agent should do given his beliefs and knowledge, and objective morality is what an agent should do if she had perfect knowledge, or something. Gibbard says that he sees no interest in objective morality, so he's only interested in the subjective stuff. Then he distinguishes between blameworthiness and morality, so that he's only giving an account of morality (which is forward looking, as opposed to blameworthiness, which is retrospective). As an account of blameworthiness he gives "iff it is rational for the agent to feel guilty over the act and for others to resent him for it." Instead, he gives an account for moral wrongness: "an act is wrong if and only if it violates standards for ruling out actions, such that if an agent in a normal frame of mind violated those standards because he was not substantially motivated to conform to them, he would be to blame." So it's an account of morality built out of the retrospective attitude of blame. Blame depends on standards of subjective wrongness and standards for responsibility, so Gibbard defines what a moral wrong is by blocking out one of the factors for blame (the standards for responsibility).

"The Norm-Expressivistic Analysis"--The previous section gave an analysis of morality, and here we get a provisional analysis of rationality. "Put roughly and cryptically, my hypothesis is that to think something rational is to accept norms that permit it." Accepting norms is a state of mind, so naturally basic. "An observer believes an action, belief, or attitude A of mine to be rational if and only if he accepts norms that permit A for my circumstances." We here get the idea that "moral norms are norms for the rationality of guilt and resentment."

"Second Thoughts"--He clarifies what he means by rationality, and I skimmed this section. Same with morality. He's interested not in what the terms mean, but rather with the particular meanings that he's associating with them. He's happy to call these terms something else.

"Structural Problems"--On this account, the question "Is it ever rational not to be moral" makes perfect sense. Likewise, we can understand perfectly well what it means to ask whether the "moral ought implies can." Another question also makes sense: "It morality of value?" The norm-expressivistic analysis gives us an interpretation of this question too: "Is it a good thing for norms for guilt and resentment to play a big role in our lives? Or might other kinds of motivation...bring many of the same benefits without the same costs." (See Nietzsche). All he's doing is showing how powerful and flexible his framework is, and trying to show you that it is a good analysis of what's been going on this whole time. "Familiar problems can be put in new form, as questions about the structure of well-founded sentiments."