Ricerc@Sapienza

The aim of this article is to explore the impact of Darwinism in metaethics and dispel some of the confusion surrounding it. While the prospects for a Darwinian metaethics appear to be improving, some underlying epistemological issues remain unclear. We will focus on the so-called Evolutionary Debunking Arguments (EDAs) which, when applied in metaethics, are defined as arguments that appeal to the evolutionary origins of moral beliefs so as to undermine their epistemic justification.

The chapter explores the importance of an attitude towards the natural environment understood as the wider and, to a certain degree, independent background of our practices. The independence and the distance established by animals and environments is a kind of fact which articulates our overall conceptual dimension: it is in fact the background which makes sense of the importance and of the depth of our inhabiting the world, of our encounters with others, and of many activities.