<p>Why be moral? Philosophers have wanted to answer this question for well over two thousand years, ever since Plato wrote on the subject. The question turned out to be as frustrating as it is compelling. A proper philosophical answer begins by saying what morality is, and what it means to be moral. A wise philosophical answer also steps back to ask what sort of being wants an answer. Why are we asking? Who wants to know? What do we want, and in what way might being moral serve our purposes? What difference does it make whether we have any reason to be moral? Do we have reason to care whether other people have any reason to be moral? Why? In this book, David Schmidtz presents elements of a theory of humanly rational choice: why we have reason to be rational, why being rational about the big picture seldom involves maximizing our payoff on a day to day basis, how rational agents choose ends, and why rational agents choose to respect and care about other people. Schmidtz also presents elements of a theory of morality: how being moral connects to what is good for oneself and to what is good for others, how it connects to following rules and understanding what the people around us expect from us, and how it connects to the heights of human aspiration and flourishing.</p>

Rational Choice and Moral Agency

David Schmidtz

Sagent Publishing

Every species has its tools for survival. To say "no man is an island" is to say that without trade, we would live and die like any other large mammal. Humanity's unique survival mechanism is not a matter of being especially fast or strong or being able to fly. Our survival mechanism is our ability to make deals with strangers. Each of us arrives as a newborn baby to a world that does not yet need us. The greatest and most joyful challenge of adult life is to develop skills that make the people around us better off with us than without us. Integrity is a key part of that challenge. We are social animals, aiming not simply to trade but to make a place for ourselves in a community. You don't want to have to pretend that you feel proud of fooling your customers into believing you could be trusted. The ethical question is: how do people have to live in order to make the world a better place with them than without them? The economic question is: what kind of society makes people willing and able to use their talents in a way that is good for them and for the people around them? The entrepreneurial question is: what does it take to show up in the marketplace with something that can take your community to a different level? In this book, Cathleen Johnson, Robert Lusch, and David Schmidtz discuss the connections between the ethical, economic, and entrepreneurial dimensions of a life well-lived. This is the third printing (green cover).

Ethics, Economy, and Entrepreneurship

Robert F. Lusch

Cathleen Johnson

See the best price to sell, buy or rent books by the Sagent Publishing publisher. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by Sagent Publishing

See the best price to sell, buy or rent books by the Sagent Publishing publisher. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Rational Choice and Moral Agency

Ethics, Economy, and Entrepreneurship