How not to avoid wishful thinking

Mark Schroeder

pp. 126-140

in: Michael Brady (ed), New waves in metaethics, Basingstoke, Palgrave Macmillan, 2011

Abstract

In 2002, Cian Dorr offered a new challenge to metaethical non-cognitivism: the wishful thinking problem. Based on considerations from epistemology, it is quite distinct from the usual problems associated with the title "Frege-Geach" which assail non-cognitivists in the philosophy of language, and, in contrast to the Frege-Geach Problem, it poses a challenge for non-cognitivist views in ethics which does not arise for similar views about, for example, probability judgments, epistemic modals, or conditionals. But, after an immediate round of attempted solutions from sympathists (James Lenman) and critics (David Enoch) of non-cognitivism alike, the ripples in the pond have somewhat quieted.

Cited authors

Frege Gottlob