Two Dogmas of Moral Theory? Comments on Lisa Tessman’s Moral Failure

Abstract

In Moral Failure, Lisa Tessman argues against two principles of moral theory, that ought implies can and that normative theory must be action-guiding. Although Tessman provides a trenchant account of how we are thrust into the misfortune of moral failure, often by our very efforts to act morally, and although she shows, through a discussion well-informed by the latest theorizing in ethics, neuroethics, and psychology, how much more moral theory can do than provide action-guiding principles, I argue that the two theses of moral theory that she disputes remain indispensable for ethical theory.