Pragmatist Quietism: A Metaethical System

Some philosophers argue that nothing can be morally right or wrong because there are no moral values in the world, just as there are no ghosts or goblins. Others argue that nothing can be right or wrong because the moral "ought" can't be defined in non-moral terms, or otherwise lacks "content" or "sense".

Some philosophers reply to these charges via moral metaphysics -- trying to show that there are moral values in the world after all -- or via moral semantics -- trying to show how the moral "ought" can be defined in non-moral terms or otherwise have sense or content.

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I reject all of this. I contend that there are objective moral truths that are utterly immune to being undermined, or for that matter, vindicated, by arguments in metaphysics, semantics, epistemology, and so forth. Ethics is an entirely autonomous domain of inquiry, which neither requires nor admits of a "foundation". The purpose of this book is to explain why this jarring view of ethics is true