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An Agent-Based Account of the Normativity of Reflective Equilibrium

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Abstract

According to an influential characterisation of reflective equilibrium, it is a kind of algorithm for licensing explicitly normative claims in philosophical inquiries. Call this the machine-view of reflective equilibrium. The machine-view implies a causal relation between input and output data that is devoid of human agency in any significant sense. In this paper, I argue for a neo-Aristotelian alternative view. According to this view, the judgement that is called forth in the decision procedure of reflective equilibrium is a rational response of an epistemic agent, which integrates the whole of her character as a knower, both cognitive and affective, and which cannot be reduced to the explicit following of rules or an algorithm. Unlike the machine-view, this alternative account is able to support the dynamic structure and the normative status of the decision procedure.

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Notes

  1. NE for Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics. All references to Aristotle's Nichomachean Ethics are from Crisp's (2004) translation and edition.

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  1. KU Leuven, Leuven, Belgium

    Paul Oghenovo Irikefe

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  1. Paul Oghenovo Irikefe
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Correspondence to Paul Oghenovo Irikefe.

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I wish to thank the anonymous reviewers of Philosophia and Prof. dr. Sylvia Wenmackers for helpful comments in improving this paper.

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Irikefe, P.O. An Agent-Based Account of the Normativity of Reflective Equilibrium. Philosophia 48, 217–225 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11406-019-00080-w

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11406-019-00080-w

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