The moral behavior of ethicists and the role of the philosopher

Eric Schwitzgebel

pp. 59-64

in: Christoph Luetge, Hannes Rusch, Matthias Uhl (eds), Experimental ethics, Basingstoke, Palgrave Macmillan, 2014

Abstract

Professional ethicists appear to behave no differently than do non-ethicists of similar social background. However, ethicists also appear to embrace more stringent moral norms than do non-ethicists, at least on some issues. Part 1 will summarize the empirical evidence. Part 2 will discuss one possibly attractive response: that an ethicist's role is to espouse and defend moral norms, with no special obligation to live according to the norms she espouses and defends.