123 School Work

Truth about Nagel and logic

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  I have titled my response The Truth about Nagel, because I think that Mr. Hood has missed the point of the chapter, by feeling as though the goal of the chapter was limited and unclear. The point of the book and the chapter is to clarify and defend the objective viewpoint by showing that subjective rationalization is inappropriate for justification, even on such a heated discussion of ethics. Nagel is merely setting the stage, or clearing the stage of theories that do not allow for true justification, for discussions that come to clear and discernable response based on objective rational thought. Nagel clearly concedes that he doesn't want to address the issues of what moral theory to employ, except to state that they are objective and any theory introduced is used "only as an example of a large substantive question of moral theory, one that firmly resists subjectivist or relativist interpretation. (124)" This is the heart of Nagel's argument, to resist the subjective or relativist notion that we might be wrong, or that we cannot get outside of ourselves. Another important point that Nagel makes is the idea that moral thought is not about the description of what happens, but is about the decision and the justification of those decisions as morally right. In short this chapter is concerned only with dispelling the subjective and relativist theories as a basis for moral justification.
       An important point that Nagel makes and Joe describes is the importance of clarifying the order of thought processes and what that is. It seems clear by Nagel's description is that the subjective viewpoint is stuck in second-order thought...