The Metaethical and Epistemological Framework

This chapter focuses on the metaethical and epistemological framework within which Ross develops his moral theory. It is argued that the most important distinctive feature of Ross’s nonnaturalist metaethics is his emphasis on the distinction between essence theories and grounds theories, which is the product of his introduction of the concept of prima facie duty; that Ross does a better job of arguing for nonnaturalism than Moore does in Principia Ethica; and that Ross also does well in recognizing and taking on two new alternative positions in metaethics: noncognitivism (against which he raises a version of the Frege-Geach problem decades before Geach) and error theory. It is then argued that his moral epistemology is less satisfactory. He inherits from Prichard a distinctive form of knowledge-first epistemology that (unlike Sidgwick’s fallibilist intuitionism) leads to dogmatism. And his claims about the special epistemic status of principles of prima facie duty are problematic.