Bernard Arthur Owen Williams
1929-2003 · Analytic Ethics · Prominent
Bernard Williams was a British moral philosopher who turned the tools of analysis against systematic ethical theory. Kantian duty and utilitarian calculation both ignore the projects and loves that make you someone in particular, and a theory demanding you drop them costs you your integrity. With Nagel he pressed how much of praise and blame turns on luck, and he distrusted any morality built on obligation.
Signature
The position Williams is most identified with in the Profiler:
- Ethics
- leans Means
- Ethics Basis
- Intention / Virtue
Positions on the 14 axes the sources answer
- Natural Processes
- leans Mechanistic (25 on a 0–100 scale from Mechanistic to Purposeful)
- Society
- mildly between Collectivism and Individualism (53 on a 0–100 scale from Collectivism to Individualism)
- Mind
- leans Brain Only (25 on a 0–100 scale from Brain Only to Beyond Brain)
- Universals
- leans Nominalism (75 on a 0–100 scale from Realism to Nominalism)
- Identity
- mildly between Unchanging and Changing (50 on a 0–100 scale from Unchanging to Changing)
- Meaning
- leans Constructed (28 on a 0–100 scale from Constructed to Inherent)
- Nature of Reality
- leans Multiplicity (75 on a 0–100 scale from Unity to Multiplicity)
- Ground of Being
- leans Immanence (12 on a 0–100 scale from Immanence to Transcendence)
- Truth
- mildly leans Objective (69 on a 0–100 scale from Subjective to Objective)
- Polity
- mildly leans Liberalism (69 on a 0–100 scale from Illiberalism to Liberalism)
- Ethics
- leans Means (83 on a 0–100 scale from Ends to Means)
- Ignorance
- mildly leans Bondage (38 on a 0–100 scale from Bondage to Bliss)
- Conviction
- strongly leans Uncertain (3 on a 0–100 scale from Uncertain to Certain)
- Allegiance
- mildly leans Local (34 on a 0–100 scale from Local to Global)
6 of 20 axes are left blank: the sources do not answer them, or Williams refused the framing. Nothing is imputed; a blank is not a middling score.
Foundational questions
- Theology
- Atheism
What is your position on the existence and nature of God or gods? - Government
- Representative Democracy
What is your ideal form of government? - Highest Good
- Other
What is the highest good? - Good and Evil
- Moral Tragedy
What is the fundamental nature of good and evil? - Knowledge
- Phronesis
What is the ultimate foundation of knowledge? - Ethics Basis
- Intention / Virtue
What is the ultimate basis of ethics? - Agency
- Other
What is the nature of human agency and freedom? - Paradox
- Productive Tension
What is the status of paradox? - Death
- Annihilation
What happens at death? - Role of Emotion
- Evaluative Judgment / Cognitive Theory of Emotion
What is the proper role of emotion? - Human Nature
- Evolved Animal / Storytelling Animal
What is human nature? - Primary Bond
- Vocation / Beloved
What is your primary bond and loyalty?