Preferences, Health, Interests and Value

Robin Attfield

University of Wales Cardiff

Abstract

[0] The view is defended that, unlike artefacts, living creatures have a good of their own and are morally considerable. In response to Frederik Kaufman's claim that the capacity for preferences is necessary for having interests and for moral considerability, it is argued that in these regards this capacity is sufficient but unnecessary, and that the capacity for health is also sufficient. This has the important implication that there is more to human good than mental states and their objects.


The Electronic Journal of Analytic Philosophy, 3 (Spring 1995)