McDowell, Williams, and Intuitionism

Abstract

This paper is concerned with a disagreement between Bernard Williams and John McDowell. It starts by asking what form a dispositional account of value should take. A no-priority view could hold that value is a disposition to elicit a certain response, and the response is to the object as disposed to elicit just that response. But a different no-priority view could talk of meriting a response and responding in the way merited. The response is explained as an instance of things being as they rationally ought to be. The paper debates the merits of such a view, and then turns to ask how much truth there is in the common claim that McDowell is an intuitionist.