Suggestions for Deontic Logicians

The purpose of this paper is to make a suggestion to deontic logic: Respect Hume\'s Law, the answer to the is-ought problem that says that all ought-talk is completely cut off from is-talk. Most deontic logicians have sought another solution: Namely, the solution that says that we can bridge the is-ought gap. Thus, a century\'s worth of research into these normative systems of logic has lead to many attempts at doing just that. At the same time, the field of deontic logic has come to be plagued with paradox. My argument essentially depends upon there being a substantive relation between this betrayal of Hume and the plethora of paradoxes that have appeared in two-adic (binary normative operator), one-adic (unary normative operator), and zero-adic (constant normative operator) deontic systems, expressed in the traditions of von Wright, Kripke, and Anderson, respectively. My suggestion has two motivations: First, to rid the philosophical literature of its puzzles and second, to give Hume\'s Law a proper formalization. Exploring the issues related to this project also points to the idea that maybe we should re-engineer (e.g., further generalize) our classical calculus, which might involve the adoption of many-valued logics somewhere down the line.

Name thesis:degree_name

Master of Arts

Level thesis:degree_level

masters

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Philosophy

Department dc:contributor.department

Philosophy

Grantor dc:publisher

Virginia Tech

Year dc:date.issued

2013

Author dc:creator

• Johnson, Cory

Chair dc:contributor.committeechair

• Pitt, Joseph C.

Committee members dc:contributor.committeemember

• Coffey, Kevin
• Faraci, David

• Deontic Logic
• Hume's Law
• Is-Ought Problem
• Many-Valued Logics

Statement dc:rights

• In Copyright

Licence dc:rights.uri

• http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/

Dc Identifier Other

vt_gsexam:139

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:vtechworks.lib.vt.edu:10919/19221