Topic:	Moral Dilemmas and Moral Ambiguity
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Guest:	Walter Sinnott-Armstrong, Chair of the Philosophy Department, Professor of Philosophy, and Hardy Professor of Legal Studies, Dartmouth College
What is it?	It would be nice if we always knew the morally right thing to do, if our choices and commitments were painted in stark black and white.  Unfortunately life is full of gray areas, including situations in which all the choices that confront us seem morally problematic, in which all the people who surround us seem composed of equal parts good and evil.   Join John and Ken as they explore the extent to which reality confronts us with moral dilemmas and moral ambiguity.

About the Guest

Walter Sinnott-Armstrong's research interests include ethics, philosophy of law, epistemology, and informal logic. In applied ethics, he has worked on abortion, nuclear deterrence, the insanity defense, computer ethics, and, recently, environmental ethics. In moral theory, he has written on moral dilemmas, consequentialism, and moral epistemology, where he defends limited moral skepticism. In informal logic, he creates teaching videos and defends the propositional calculus. In philosophy of law, he studies constitutional interpretation and defends a perspectival theory of law that grants some truth to the classic antagonists: legal positivism, legal realism, and natural law theory. He also published a debate book on the existence of God. Currently he is working on moral psychology and brain science.

His publications include:

• Moral Skepticisms (New York; Oxford University Press, forthcoming 2006)

• Understanding Arguments: An Introduction to Informal Logic, with Robert J. Fogelin (San Diego: Harcourt College Publishers, Seventh Edition 2005)

• Pyrrhonian Skepticism, editor (New York; Oxford University Press, 2004)

• The Existence of God (a debate with William Lane Craig) (Oxford University Press, 2003)

• Rationality, Rules, and Ideals: Critical Essays on Bernard Gert's Moral Theory with a Reply, co-edited with Robert Audi (Rowman and Littlefield, 2002)

• Philosophy of Law: Classic and Contemporary Readings with Commentary, co-edited with Frederick Schauer (Fort Worth: Harcourt Brace, 1996; Currently available from Oxford University Press)

Listening Notes

What is a dilemma? A situation in which you have to do two things but you can't do both. What is special about moral dilemmas? Do moral dilemmas stem from different sources of value? John introduces the guest, Walter Sinnott-Armstrong, professor at Dartmouth. Sinnott-Armstrong thinks that Judith Miller's case did not involve a moral dilemma. How far do Miller's obligations extend? Would she have to endure torture? Sinnott-Armstrong thinks the most compelling kinds of dilemmas involve symmetric obligations, conflicting, identical obligations to two parties.

Do moral dilemmas always involve a residue of guilt? Does guilt entail that there is a moral dilemma? Are there any real moral dilemmas? Sinnott-Armstrong thinks there are, such as a mother that has to choose which of two children will live. Is it possible to reason out which horn of a moral dilemma is the proper choice? Sinnott-Armstrong thinks that some apparent dilemmas can be solved but not all of them. Sophie's Choice represents a very difficult moral dilemma in which the agent did not do anything to get herself into the problem. Sinnott-Armstrong distinguishes between judgments of particular actions and judgments of particular agents. Can moral theories solve all the problems that could arise? Sinnott-Armstrong thinks they can't but that that does not undermine their worth.

Why do people want moral theories to cover all possible situations? Sinnott-Armstrong thinks that people want this to avoid having to make difficult decisions. He illustrates this with an example from Sartre of a French soldier in World War 2. Utilitarians may claim that all moral dilemmas are epistemological. Are all moral dilemmas the result of us not knowing enough about the future? Ken thinks that this view ignores different kinds of value in life. Sinnott-Armstrong says that the non-symmetric moral dilemmas force us to choose what kind of person to be.

• Amy Standen the Roving Philosophical Reporter (Seek to 03:50): Amy Standen interviews a reporter and a law professor about the moral dilemma of the Judith Miller case.

• Ian Shoales the Sixty Second Philosopher (Seek to 50:20): Ian Shoales gives an overview of moral dilemmas, from G.E. Moore to Simone de Beauvoir to Utilitarianism.

Additional Resources

• The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy entry on moral dilemmas

• A list of moral dilemmas

• Stories of the moral dilemmas faced by several Jewish doctors during the Holocaust

• News article about recent research into emotions and moral dilemmas

• An online version of Sartre's “Existentialism is a Humanism” which contains the dilemma of the student

• An essay on moral dilemmas in the entertainment industry

• Philippa Foot's collection of essays on moral dilemmas, Moral Dilemmas: And Other Topics in Moral Philosophy

• Walter Sinnott-Armstrong's book, Moral Dilemmas

• Thomas Nagel's book Mortal Questions

• A collection of essays entitled Moral Dilemmas

• The novel Sophie's Choice, the source of one of the dilemmas discussed on the show

• The collection Existentialism from Dostoevsky to Sartre which contains “Existentialism is a Humanism” by Sartre

• Patricia Greenspan's book Practical Guilt: Moral Dilemmas, Emotions, and Social Norms

• The collection Moral Dilemmas and Moral Theory which includes an essay by Walter Sinnott-Armstrong