b. 1942
Holly M. Smith (publishing earlier as Holly Smith Goldman) is an American moral philosopher known for her influential work on the theory of moral obligation, particularly the debate between actualism and possibilism. Her paper 'Doing the Best One Can' (1978) is a landmark contribution to the analysis of obligation under conditions of predicted moral failure.
Developed influential critiques of actualist principles of obligation in 'Doing the Best One Can'
Advanced the possibilism vs. actualism debate in normative ethics
Contributed major work on the ethics of uncertainty and moral ignorance
Published 'Making Morality Work' (2018) on the problem of usable moral theory
Long-tenured professor of philosophy at Rutgers University
Doug is not obligated at 2 pm to eat a healthy meal at 6 pm
premisePrinciple (G) generates jointly unfulfillable obligations when an act sequence Ai satisfies (G)'s conditions but a counterfactual holds such that performing the first half of Ai would cause the agent not to perform the second half.
premiseThe sequence of acts following the first half of Ai would be worse than the sequence following an alternative to the first half of Ai.
Principle (G) generates jointly unfulfillable obligations when an act sequence Ai satisfies (G)'s conditions but a counterfactual holds such that performing the first half of Ai would cause the agent not to perform the second half.
premiseThe sequence of acts following the first half of Ai would be worse than the sequence following an alternative to the first half of Ai.
premiseA principle that generates jointly unfulfillable obligations at the same time cannot be a sound principle of obligation.
claimPrinciple (G) is defective as a general principle of actualist obligation.