Kant and Parfit

Derek Parfitâs On What Matters is widely recognized as elegant profound and destined to change the landscape of moral philosophy. In Volume One Parfit argues that the distinctâindeed powerfully conflictingâtheories of deontology and contractualism can be woven together in a way so as to yield utilitarian conclusions. Husain Sarkar in this book calls this The Ultimate Derivation. Sarkar argues however that this derivation is untenable. To underwrite this conclusion this book traverses considerable Parfitian terrain. Sarkar shows why Parfit hasnât quite solved what Sidgwick had called the profoundest problem in ethics; he offers a reading of Kant Rawls and Scanlon that reveals Parfitâs keen utilitarian bias; and he demonstrates why Parfitâs Triple Theory does not succeed in its task of unifying conflicting moral theories (without making substantial utilitarian assumptions). The final chapter of the book is about meta-ethics. It shows that Parfitâs Convergence Principle is mistaken even though it unveils Parfitâs utterly humane concerns: Moral philosophers are not as Parfit thinks climbing the same mountain. But for all that Sarkar maintains Parfitâs book is arguably the greatest consequential tract in the history of moral philosophy. . Language: English