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Daniel Kelly, Yuck! The Nature and Moral Significance of Disgust (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 2011), 208 pp. ISBN: 978-0262-01558-5. $30.00/£20.95 (cloth).

Daniel Kelly, Yuck! The Nature and Moral Significance of Disgust (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press,... Popularizing thought experiments about eating dogs and kissing siblings, a prominent strand of contemporary moral psychology has suggested that disgust plays a pervasive, previously ignored role in moral cognition. It is therefore unsurprising to find an up-and-coming philosopher of psychology detailing a fresh, thorough, empirically informed theory of the nature and origins of disgust and then applying it to moral debates. Daniel Kelly’s conclusion is that “disgust has no moral authority” and that we should be “deeply suspicious of the influence it can exert on ethical thought and deliberation” (p. 146). Kelly’s account of disgust is very impressive and helpful. However, his argument against disgust’s “moral authority”, while plausible in its conclusion, is overly compressed, leaving options unexplored. Chapter 1 describes some preliminary data about disgust, explanations of which are three desiderata for a theory of disgust’s nature and origin. Chapters 2-4 develop such a theory. Chapter 5 contains his argument against disgust’s “moral authority”. The class of properties which elicit disgust has some impressive features. It is unified : normal, mature humans from virtually all cultures seem to have similar behavioral, physiological, and facial disgust responses (pp. 15-16) in response to a certain “core” of elicitors pertaining http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png Journal of Moral Philosophy Brill

Daniel Kelly, Yuck! The Nature and Moral Significance of Disgust (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 2011), 208 pp. ISBN: 978-0262-01558-5. $30.00/£20.95 (cloth).

Journal of Moral Philosophy , Volume 10 (4): 561 – Jan 1, 2013

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Publisher
Brill
Copyright
© 2013 by Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, The Netherlands
Subject
Book Reviews
ISSN
1740-4681
eISSN
1745-5243
DOI
10.1163/17455243-01004005
Publisher site
See Article on Publisher Site

Abstract

Popularizing thought experiments about eating dogs and kissing siblings, a prominent strand of contemporary moral psychology has suggested that disgust plays a pervasive, previously ignored role in moral cognition. It is therefore unsurprising to find an up-and-coming philosopher of psychology detailing a fresh, thorough, empirically informed theory of the nature and origins of disgust and then applying it to moral debates. Daniel Kelly’s conclusion is that “disgust has no moral authority” and that we should be “deeply suspicious of the influence it can exert on ethical thought and deliberation” (p. 146). Kelly’s account of disgust is very impressive and helpful. However, his argument against disgust’s “moral authority”, while plausible in its conclusion, is overly compressed, leaving options unexplored. Chapter 1 describes some preliminary data about disgust, explanations of which are three desiderata for a theory of disgust’s nature and origin. Chapters 2-4 develop such a theory. Chapter 5 contains his argument against disgust’s “moral authority”. The class of properties which elicit disgust has some impressive features. It is unified : normal, mature humans from virtually all cultures seem to have similar behavioral, physiological, and facial disgust responses (pp. 15-16) in response to a certain “core” of elicitors pertaining

Journal

Journal of Moral PhilosophyBrill

Published: Jan 1, 2013

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