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02/13/2017

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Eric Schwitzgebel

Thanks for this interesting discussion, Eric. You're right that I didn't pay much attention to policy and community in that post -- and generally I've tended to focus less on policy and community in my work on moral psychology than on the individual and the individual's personal relationships.

Two thoughts I have in reaction:

1. I'm inclined to think this *adds* a dimension rather than compressing the dimensionality. Now we have, in addition to the four considerations of fairness, personal moral development, free exploration of demanding positions, and trying-out-by-living, a fifth one too: community-level considerations about the how policy-makers and the public will react to the behavior of Aggregators or philosophers with a prominent public profile.

2. Your post seems to depend on a difference between philosophers with a public profile and those without, and similarly between public behavior and private behavior. Of course it's a matter of degree, but I'm inclined to think that every university-employed ethicist is to some extent a public figure whose integrity will be scrutinized -- at least by their students if no one else (cf my cheeseburger ethicist in the dining hall). Likewise, even what I think of as private -- for example, how I behave with my spouse -- is to some extent discernible by others or might get out. If this is so, then all professional ethicists are in smaller or greater ways part of the public face of philosophy.

I think all of this is pretty close to just friendly amendment. Yes?

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Here's a link to my past blogging (and discussions involving me) at: New APPS.

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