Reconciling Our Aims The Berkeley Tanner Lectures The Tanner Lectures on Human Values, which honor the American scholar,industrialist,andphilanthropistObertClarkTanner,arepresented annually at each of nine universities in the United States and England. TheywereestablishedattheUniversityofCalifornia,Berkeley,beginning inthe2000/2001academicyear.Thisvolumeisthefifthinaseriesofbooks based on the Berkeley Tanner Lectures. In this volume we include the lecturesthatAllanGibbardpresentedinMarch2006,alongwiththere- sponses of the three invited commentators on that occasion—Michael Bratman,JohnBroome,andF.M.Kamm—andafinalrejoinderbyPro- fessorGibbard.ThevolumeiseditedbyBarryStroud,whoalsocontributes anintroduction.WehaveestablishedtheBerkeleyTannerLecturesSeries in the belief that these distinguished lectures, together with the lively debatesstimulatedbytheirpresentationinBerkeley,deservetobemade availabletoawideraudience.Additionalvolumesarenowinpreparation. RobertPost SamuelScheffler SeriesEditors VolumesPublishedintheSeries JosephRaz,ThePracticeofValue EditedbyR.JayWallace WithChristineM.Korsgaard,RobertPippin,andBernardWilliams FrankKermode,PleasureandChange:TheAestheticsofCanon EditedbyRobertAlter WithGeoffreyHartman,JohnGuillory,andCareyPerloff SeylaBenhabib,AnotherCosmopolitanism EditedbyRobertPost WithJeremyWaldron,BonnieHonig,andWillKymlicka AxelHonneth,Reification:ANewLookatanOldIdea EditedbyMartinJay WithJudithButler,RaymondGeuss,andJonathanLear Reconciling Our Aims In Search of Bases for Ethics ALLAN GIBBARD With Commentaries by Michael Bratman John Broome F. M. Kamm Edited and Introduced by Barry Stroud 1 2008 1 OxfordUniversityPress,Inc.,publishesworksthatfurther OxfordUniversity’sobjectiveofexcellence inresearch,scholarship,andeducation. Oxford NewYork Auckland CapeTown DaresSalaam HongKong Karachi KualaLumpur Madrid Melbourne MexicoCity Nairobi NewDelhi Shanghai Taipei Toronto Withofficesin Argentina Austria Brazil Chile CzechRepublic France Greece Guatemala Hungary Italy Japan Poland Portugal Singapore SouthKorea Switzerland Thailand Turkey Ukraine Vietnam Copyright#inthisvolumeTheRegentsoftheUniversityofCalifornia2008 PublishedbyOxfordUniversityPress,Inc. 198MadisonAvenue,NewYork,NY10016 www.oup.com OxfordisaregisteredtrademarkofOxfordUniversityPress Allrightsreserved.Nopartofthispublicationmaybereproduced, storedinaretrievalsystem,ortransmitted,inanyformorbyanymeans, electronic,mechanical,photocopying,recording,orotherwise, withoutthepriorpermissionofOxfordUniversityPress. LibraryofCongressCataloging-in-PublicationData Gibbard,Allan. Reconcilingouraims:insearchofbasesforethics/AllanGibbard; withcommentariesbyMichaelBratman,JohnBroome,F.M.Kamm; editedandintroducedbyBarryStroud. p.cm. Includesbibliographicalreferencesandindex. ISBN978-0-19-537042-3 1. Ethics. 2. Utilitarianism. 3. Ethicalintuitionism. I. Stroud,Barry. II. Title. BJ354.G532R432008 1700.42—dc22 2007050470 1 3 5 7 9 8 6 4 2 PrintedintheUnitedStatesofAmerica onacid-freepaper Contents List of Contributors vii Introduction 3 Barry Stroud RECONCILING OUR AIMS Allan Gibbard I. Insight, Consistency, and Plans for Living 11 II. Living Together: Economic and Moral Argument 33 III. Common Goals and the Ideal Social Contract 59 Appendix: The Harsanyi-like Result 83 COMMENTS Normative Thinking and Planning, Individual and Shared 91 Michael Bratman Comments on Allan Gibbard’s Tanner Lectures 102 John Broome Should You Save This Child? Gibbard on Intuitions, Contractualism, and Strains of Commitment 120 F. M. Kamm vi (cid:1) Contents REPLY TO COMMENTATORS Allan Gibbard Reply to Commentators 147 Bibliography 189 Index 195 List of Contributors AllanGibbardisRichardB.BrandtDistinguishedUniversityProfessor of Philosophy at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. He has been PresidentoftheCentralDivisionoftheAmericanPhilosophicalAssocia- tion and is Member of the American Philosophical Society, Membre Ti- tulaireoftheInstitutInternationaldePhilosophie,FellowoftheAmerican AcademyofArtsandSciences,andFellowoftheEconometricSociety.Heis the author of Wise Choices, Apt Feelings (1990), Thinking How to Live (2003),andnumerousarticlesbothinethicaltheoryandinsuchfieldsas theory of social choice, decision theory, evolutionary moral psychology, philosophyofmindandlanguage,andepistemology. Michael Bratman is U. G. and Abbie Birch Durfee Professor in the SchoolofHumanitiesandSciencesandProfessorofPhilosophyatStanford University. He is the author of Intention, Plans, and Practical Reason (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1987; Reissued by CSLI Publica- tions,1999),FacesofIntention:SelectedEssaysonIntentionandAgency (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1999), Structures of Agency: Essays(NewYork:OxfordUniversityPress,2007),andvariousotherar- ticlesinthephilosophyofactionandrelatedfields. JohnBroomeisWhite’sProfessorofMoralPhilosophyattheUniversity of Oxford. He was previously Professor of Philosophy at the University of St. Andrews and Professor of Economics at the University of Bristol. His books include Weighing Lives (1991), Counting the Cost of Global Warming (1992), Ethics Out of Economics (2001), and Weighing Lives (2004). F. M. Kamm isLittauerProfessorofPhilosophyandPublicPolicy,Ken- nedy School of Government, and Professor of Philosophy, Department of Philosophy, Harvard University. She is the author of Intricate Ethics (2007),Morality,Mortality,vols.1and2(1992,1996),CreationandAbor- tion(1992),and numerousessays onnormative ethicaltheory and prac- ticalethics. viii (cid:1) List of Contributors BarryStroudisWillisS.andMarionSlusserProfessorofPhilosophyat theUniversityofCalifornia,Berkeley.HeistheauthorofHume(1977), TheSignificanceofPhilosophicalScepticism(1984),TheQuestforReality (2000),andtwovolumesofcollectedessaysonavarietyofphilosophical subjects. Reconciling Our Aims