Hard Questions: Facing the Problems of Life - Hardcover

Kekes, John

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0190919981 ISBN 13: 9780190919986

Publisher: OXFORD UNIV PR, 2019

Synopsis

In this book, John Kekes discusses the hard questions we all must face in the course of our lives. Is there an absolute value that overrides all other considerations? Must we conform to prevailing conventions? Do we owe what our country asks of us? Must justice be done at all costs? How should we respond to evil? Should we forgive wrong actions? Does shame make life better or worse? Is it always good to be true to who we are? Do good intentions justify bad actions? Are moral values the highest of all values? There are reasonable answers to these questions, but we find that they often conflict. Their conflicts compel us to weigh the consequences of how the decisions we make affect ourselves, our relationships, and our attitude to the society in which we live.

In this clearly and accessibly written book, Kekes compares and evaluates the reasons that have been given for and against answers to these hard questions by those who actually faced them. By learning from the successes and failures of the decisions others have made, we can understand better how we should respond to the hard questions we ourselves face. We can then evaluate more reasonably the possibilities open to us and the limitations to which we are subject.

This approach is an alternative to both the absolutist and the relativist ways of trying to answer hard questions. Absolutists have, for millennia, fruitlessly searched for an authoritative answer that reason requires everyone to accept. Their failure have led relativists to assume that there comes a point at which we run out of reasons and have no option but to make an arbitrary decision. Kekes instead offers a message of hope by showing that there are reasonable answers to hard questions, which are neither absolute, nor arbitrary.

About this title

Review

This extraordinary book of practical philosophy is carefully organized, clearly written, and filled with illuminating discussions of compelling examples. Kekes presses gently, relentlessly, and provocatively for the irreducible plurality of conflicting values within our lives, and the absence of any absolute value, abstract moral principle, or controlling moral commitment that resolves those conflicts in hard cases. His remedy for this is equally clear, and equally provocative. (Lawrence C. Becker, Kenan Professor Emeritus of Philosophy, College of William and Mary, and author of Habilitation, Health, and Agency: A Framework for Basic Justice)

This book poses questions of ethics, broadly-construed, but they involve metaphysics (for example, duties to God, questions about the origins of evil, whether the cosmos is just) and epistemology. John Kekess focus is on reasons for different answers to each question. He writes with such sympathy and wisdom that readers can see both sides, with two opposing answers to each question often as good for the person or group that holds them. This is a well-written and smart book, and the reader will know herself in the hands of a learned and thoughtful guide. (Owen Flanagan, James B. Duke Professor of Philosophy, Duke University)

About the Author

John Kekes is the author of many books, including The Roots of Evil (Cornell University Press), Enjoyment (OUP), The Human Condition (OUP), and How Should We Live? (Chicago University Press). He has been visiting professor in Canada, England, Estonia, Hungary, Portugal, Singapore, and the United States Military Academy.

About this edition

• Publisher: OXFORD UNIV PR
• Publication date: 2019
• ISBN 10: 0190919981
• ISBN 13: 9780190919986
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 322