pliciter do is just what you morally ought do. For a case in which this seems compelling, consider the examples we’ve seen from Stroud (2006) in which the moral demands of friendship seem to come into conflict with what you epistemically ought believe. Sup- pose someone tells you a damning story about a friend of yours, e.g., your friend cut them off in traffic. As a good friend, how should you respond to this information? Or- dinarily, if you were to receive testimony that some persona cut someone else, b, off in traffic, that would be sufficient to justify believing that a cut off b. Stroud (2006, pp. 504), however, argues that we owe our friends “something other than an impartial and disinterested review of the evidence where they are concerned.”
In this case of a conflict between the moral ought and the epistemic ought, Stroud suggests that the moral ought trumps the epistemic ought. As you consider what you ought simpliciter do, you should follow the demands of friendship which require being loyal to your friend and discounting testimony that suggests they behaved badly. As this is an account in which morality wins, let us call itmoral trumping. If we return to the flowchart, this account not only answers “yes” to Q2, but also “yes” to Q3 (i.e., is what the agent oughtsimpliciter do identical with either what they ought morally do or what they ought epistemically do? According to moral trumping there is something Spencer ought simpliciter do, it is just whatever morality recommends. The moral ought is the privileged ought.
On the other hand, another way of responding to these cases of conflicts is to argue that it is not what morality recommends rather it is what epistemic rationality recom- mends. As this is an account in which epistemic rationality wins, let us call thisepistemic trumping. The cases in which this alternative seems most compelling take a slightly dif- ferent form from what we’ve been considering. Whereas we’ve been considering cases in
1I am careful to hedge my language here because as the reader knows by now, I do not take these cases
to be setting up a real conflict between the epistemic ought and the moral ought. The interpretation that there is a conflict assumes that epistemic considerations are completely distinct and nonresponsive to moral considerations, and I have argued previously that this is incorrect.
which the conflict has the form you ought (epistemically) believe but you ought (morally) not believe; the cases that seem most compelling forepistemic trumping are cases with the following form: you ought (epistemically) not believe but you ought (morally) believe.
In the literature these appear as cases in which moral reasons to believe seem likethe wrong kind of reason to believe.2 For example, suppose an evil demon were to threaten
to destroy the world unless you believed that 2+2=5. Morally, you ought believe that 2+2=5, but epistemically you ought not believe that 2+2=5. With regard to these cases, fans ofepistemic trumping argue that moral reasons are not the right kind of reasons for belief. There is something Spencer oughtsimpliciter do, it is just whatever epistemic ra- tionality recommends. The epistemic ought is the privileged ought.
However, with regard to this direction of the conflict—you ought (epistemically) not believe but you ought (morally) believe—there are also cases that seem to make moral trumping more compelling than epistemic trumping. For example, Preston-Roedder (2013, 2017) argues that civic trust—the kind of trust that is is an essential part of living with others in the sort of harmony that characterizes morally permissible interaction—requires a kind of faith in humanity that is epistemically irrational. Maintaining such an attitude, nonetheless, is an important moral virtue. Further, Marusic (2012, 2015) argues that to make sincere promises we sometimes have to believe against the evidence.
In light of these various cases pulling us in different directions, one might be tempted to posit a separate ought—one that is not identical with either the moral or the epistemic ought, i.e.,ought as opposed to oughtmo ral or oughte pi s t e mi c. That is, a separate perspec- tive from which to adjudicate what Spencer oughtsimpliciter do. That is, you might be tempted to answer positively Q1, positively to Q2, but negatively to Q3 (i.e., is what the agent oughtsimpliciter do identical with either what they ought morally do or what they oughtepistemically do?) This brings us a defense of the all-things-considered ought, i.e., a free and unsubscripted sense of ought.3
I should note that this gloss on both moral trumping and epistemic trumping is very brief. To fully flesh out both accounts and the pros and the cons for either would require more space. My goal, however, in presenting the range of alternatives that are to the left of moral encroachment (as they appear on the flowchart) is simply to show that there is a range of thorny issues that must be settled and tackled for a full defense if any are to offer a promising alternative to moral encroachment. One key advantage of moral encroachment concerns how moral encroachment can sidestep many of the problems that
2See Rabinowicz and Ronnow-Rasmussen (2004); Hieronymi (2005); Schroeder (2012b) et al.
3The terminology here is borrowed from Foot (1972), but I should also note Foot as a critic of whether
plague accounts that answer “yes” to Q1. As will be shown, the debate to the left of moral encroachment has a troubling circular structure. Troubling objections to the ought simpliciter accounts motivate answering “no” to Q2. However, troubling objections also arise for those accounts, and those objections then lead one back to positing an ought simpliciter. But the previous problems remain which push you back to answering “no” to Q2. Moral encroachment offers a way to side-step these problems. But first, let me continue with the presentation of accounts that posit an oughtsimpliciter