Moral scepticism

References and further reading

	Annas, J. and Barnes, J. (1985) The Modes of Scepticism, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, esp. 151–71. (Contains excerpts of the Pyrrhonist sceptical arguments and useful commentary.)
	Ayer, A.J. (1936) ‘Critique of Ethics and Theology’, in Language, Truth and Logic, London: Gollancz; 2nd edn, 1946; 2nd edn repr. in G. Sayre-McCord (ed.) Essays on Moral Realism, Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1988, ch. 1. (Probably the most accessible introduction to noncognitivism in ethics.)
	Brink, D.O. (1989) Moral Realism and the Foundations of Ethics, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, esp. chaps 2, 5, 6. (A difficult but comprehensive treatment of moral realism, containing a detailed response to error theory.)
	Butchvarov, P. (1989) Skepticism in Ethics, Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press. (A systematic defence of partial moral scepticism.)
	DePaul, M.R. (1993) Balance and Refinement: Beyond Coherentism in Moral Inquiry, London: Routledge. (A sophisticated discussion of the method of reflective equilibrium, and a defence of a nonsceptical, related method for moral inquiry.)
	Dworkin, R. (1996) ‘Objectivity and Truth: You’d Better Believe It’, Philosophy and Public Affairs 25 (2): 87–139. (A sustained and moderately accessible attack on various versions of moral scepticism.)
	Geach, P. (1972) ‘Assertion’, in Logic Matters, Oxford: Blackwell. (A difficult but influential criticism of noncognitivism.)
	Hare, R.M. (1952) The Language of Morals, Oxford: Oxford University Press. (The original, and most influential, presentation of universal prescriptivism.)
	Hare, R.M. (1993) ‘Objective Prescriptions’, in A.P. Griffiths (ed.) Ethics, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1–17. (A moderately accessible attempt to reconcile the prescriptivity and objectivity of moral judgments.)
	Harman, G. (1977) The Nature of Morality, New York: Oxford University Press. (An accessible introduction to ethics, containing an influential ‘explanatory’ criticism of moral knowledge.)
	Hume, D. (1739/40) A Treatise of Human Nature, ed. L.A. Selby-Bigge, revised by P.H. Nidditch, Oxford: Clarendon Press, 2nd edn, 1978, esp. 455–76. (A classic source of sceptical arguments, both in general and with regard to ethics.)
	Mackie, J.L. (1977) Ethics: Inventing Right and Wrong, Harmondsworth: Penguin, esp. 1–49. (The original, and most influential, source of error theory in ethics.)
	McDowell, J. (1985) ‘Values and Secondary Qualities’, in T. Honderich (ed.) Morality and Objectivity, London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 110–129; repr. in G. Sayre-McCord (ed.) Essays on Moral Realism, Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1988, ch. 8. (A difficult but important criticism of Mackie’s error theory.)
	Moore, G.E. (1903) Principia Ethica, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, esp. ch. 5. (An influential presentation of intuitionism about value, including partial moral scepticism about obligation.)
	Nagel, T. (1980) ‘The Limits of Objectivity’, in S.M. McMurrin (ed.) The Tanner Lectures on Human Values, Salt Lake City, UT: University of Utah Press, 77–139. (A difficult but influential piece, critical of Mackie.)
	Ross, W.D. (1930) The Right and the Good, Oxford: Oxford University Press, esp. ch. 2. (A classic exposition of pluralist intuitionism about obligation, combined with partial moral scepticism.)
	Sayre-McCord, G. (1988) ‘Moral Theory and Explanatory Impotence’, in Midwest Studies in Philosophy 12: 433–458; repr. in G. Sayre-McCord (ed.) Essays on Moral Realism, Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1988, ch. 11. (An accessible argument for the indispensability of evaluative facts.)
	Sinnott-Armstrong, W. and Timmons, M. (1996) Moral Knowledge? New Essays in Moral Epistemology, Oxford: Oxford University Press. (A collection of moderately difficult but important essays on moral knowledge and moral scepticism, with a useful annotated bibliography.)
	Stevenson, C.L. (1944) Ethics and Language, New Haven, CT: Yale University Press. (An early but sophisticated version of noncognitivism.)
	Sturgeon, N. (1984) ‘Moral Explanations’, in D. Copp and D. Zimmerman (eds) Morality, Reason and Truth: New Essays on the Foundations of Ethics, Totowa, NJ: Rowman and Allanheld, 49–78; repr. in G. Sayre-McCord (ed.) Essays on Moral Realism, Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1988, ch. 10. (A moderately accessible criticism of Harman’s explanatory critique of moral realism.)
	Timmons, M. (1990) ‘Spindel Conference 1990: Moral Epistemology’, Southern Journal of Philosophy, suplementary vol. 29. (A wide-ranging collections of essays on moral knowledge and moral scepticism, with an extensive bibliography, post-1971.)
	Toulmin, S.E. (1970) Reason in Ethics, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, esp. part III. (The original, and most accessible, presentation of the ‘good reasons’ approach in ethics.)
	Wright, C. (1996) ‘Truth in Ethics’, in B. Hooker (ed.) Truth in Ethics, Oxford: Blackwell, 1–18. (A moderately accessible introduction to a minimalist conception of truth in ethics.)