Reasonableness

Abstract

If there is, as it seems, deep and pervasive disagreement about what is right and good, as well as the nature of moral judgment, how can political debate have any moral justification? How are fellow citizens to morally justify themselves and their proposals to each other in an era of moral pluralism? We have already addressed the historicist approach. According to MacIntyre, when we reason we do so from within traditions, and also those traditions are incommensurable. The plurality of moral doctrines in the modern world suggests a plurality of incompatible approaches to moral reasoning as well. The post-modernist also assumes that points of view are and will remain diverse and distinct, but while the historicist finds certainty in his/her tradition the post-modernist wishes to disrupt any supposed source of truth and objectivity, whether it is ‘traditional’ or otherwise.